Original subtitles

I was broke and needed money.

I went to Nicaragua.

I saw more cocaine than I've ever seen in my life.

Now I think we're going to get better.

But it all went wrong.

I'm really scared.

They think I'm a DA agent.

They're going to rip me to pieces.

I've got two kilos of coke strapped to my body, but they think it's a bomb.

In 1990, I was 26 years old.

I was living with my girlfriend in Long Beach.

We were both into the music thing.

Very close friends of ours were in a band that were pretty popular and they

played a lot of gigs around town.

I started taking drugs in seventh grade.

We used to smoke weed.

Then I got a hold of some cocaine.

And then we started doing crystal meth.

Crystal meth is much more potent.

I did it on a somewhat regular basis, you know, and so, yeah, I guess I was

hooked.

I thought it was a lot of fun.

And then we had a baby.

was there during the birth, and I cut the umbilical cord.

I fell in love with her immediately.

The birth of our daughter changed things.

My girlfriend wanted a different life at that point.

She was going to nursing school and wanted me to be more responsible and to

a proper father.

I had a tendency to be a little more susceptible to drugs.

Okay, cool. I'll meet you down there.

And just having a good time and going out with the band.

I had

a good job with the Japanese car manufacturer.

One day, I was sent for a drug test.

The results came back positive.

That was the end of my job. I was terminated.

My girlfriend was upset.

She said, you know, you need to find another job.

I wouldn't get up when I was supposed to to go look for a job.

Do something.

See you later.

Eventually, it ended our relationship.

I was real upset by that.

I felt terrible.

Bye, baby.

And it was a letdown, mainly to my daughter.

She was three years old.

I behaved badly, and I regretted it.

Now, I was a single part -time father.

But I still had responsibilities.

She needed clothes, food, things like that.

I needed to make some money.

I went to a

party at a guy named Rick's.

He was doing well, you know, he had a nice house.

We had a conversation about where things were in my life. I almost lost my job.

And then he talked to me about a possible job that he had that I might be

interested in.

Rick said he had a connection in Nicaragua, and he needed somebody to fly

there, pick up a kilo of cocaine and bring it back to the States.

He would give me $3 ,500 to make the trip.

How do we bring it back?

He said, it taped your body.

He asked me, I was like, oh my God.

This could change my life around.

I could provide for my daughter and possibly get back with my girlfriend.

I could make one trip and be done with it.

And I said, yeah.

I'm sure I can do that.

I was going to pull it off regardless of how it happened.

When I landed in Managua, I started feeling nervous.

But I couldn't let that get in my way.

Everybody was speaking Spanish.

I had no clue what was being said to me.

Hotel?

When Agua is pretty run down, it just looked poverty stricken.

First hotel he took me to looked, you know, somewhat decent.

Rick gave me a number to call. I immediately called and left a message.

Shortly thereafter, Rick's friend Manu showed up.

He said, hey, how you doing?

He asked me about the money.

I was tense.

Are you okay?

Rick gave me $5 ,000 to bring back a kilo of cocaine.

One kilo cost $1 ,500.

I gave Manu the money that left, $3 ,500 for me.

With that, I could buy two more kilos for myself and sell them for $40 ,000 in

the States.

That's a big profit.

It could change my life around.

And so I gave him $4 ,500 for three kilos.

Three kilos?

He says, okay, I'll be in contact with you.

Nice room.

Waiting for Manu, I was getting nervous.

I didn't talk to him for a few days.

I should have heard from him by now.

I had already given up my money, and this was not turning out the way it was

supposed to be.

I was worried I'd been ripped off.

But the sixth day that I was there, Manu showed his face again.

He just said, we're going to go take care of some business today.

We left Managua.

We drove mostly in silence.

There was no homes, there was no neighborhoods, there was no businesses.

It was the jungle.

I had no idea where we were going.

feel a little uneasy about things.

After about an hour and a half or so, we pull off this side of the road.

Come on.

I was worried.

What am I doing here?

a guy who I hadn't seen when we pulled up.

Are they talking Spanish?

Suddenly, all the worst -case scenarios were going through my head.

Maybe I was going to be robbed, or maybe they're going to kill me.

Hey, come on.

Now I'm getting really apprehensive.

I thought, how do I get out of this?

And I said, isn't there some wild animals out here?

I'd feel more comfortable if I had a gun.

They looked at me like I was crazy.

Manu said, no, don't worry about it. And I said, well, I'd really like to have a

gun.

He pulled one out of the glove box.

I was like, oh, my God.

He's going to kill me.

I was standing there with a gun pointed on me.

I just couldn't believe it.

But then he skips me.

I checked to see if it had bullets in it, and sure enough, it did.

Maybe I had this all wrong.

If he was trying to kill me, he wouldn't let me have a gun.

Then they started walking out into the jungle.

Well, I just kind of followed.

But I still felt apprehensive.

I have no idea where I'm going.

I think we walked probably a mile.

And then there was some sort of a clearing with a hut.

Suddenly, I just hear some sort of motor in the distance.

And then I realized that it's up in the air and it's a plane.

And then I saw some packages come outside.

Shortly thereafter, two guys come out holding them.

These gentlemen brought the packages into the hut.

Mannix started opening them up.

I saw more cocaine than I've ever seen in my life.

These guys are a lot bigger time dealers than I had imagined.

I was concerned as to why I was being involved with it.

I was a little nervous.

If somebody had seen the planes dropped at, the cops could come in and, you

know, we would be in big trouble.

I wanted to get out of there as quickly as possible.

They put half a kilo of cocaine into a rectangular -shaped mold, which was on

the car jack that was jacked up under the table, and compressed it as much as

possible.

When he'd done that, then it's wrapped.

They called it tacos.

Two of those would be one kilo.

It took about...

hour and a half or so to do the six tacos.

Hey, come on, let's go.

That's my three kilos.

I'd seen enough and I was glad to get out of there.

Manu took me back to my hotel.

I asked him, what about the cocaine? And he said, Do you want to take it back to

your hotel room? Do you?

He says, well, we'll deal with that on the day that you leave.

See you.

I was worried I'd been ripped off.

Give him $4 ,500 and I have no cocaine.

The next morning, Manu didn't show up.

How am I going to explain this to Rick?

Finally, he showed up about 3 o 'clock in the afternoon.

So, let's do it.

He's carrying a bag with duct tape and six tacos.

They looked pretty large to have taped around my body for...

you know, nine, ten hours on a flight.

Once I got the tacos duct taped to my waist, I started feeling really

restricted.

It looks ridiculous. I can't even breathe.

Loosen that here.

He told me, walk around and pick something up.

Try to be normal, okay? Yeah.

I thought, this is crazy, but I said to myself, there's, you know, there's no

backing out. There's no way.

Once I found a place for him to where my body could suck it

up and it looked normal, then I felt more comfortable with it.

I took his hand and said, okay, good luck.

When I walk into the airport, I'm really nervous.

I checked in my suitcase.

I went to the customs area, and there was a security officer with a metal

detector wand.

And then I saw people were getting patted down.

I thought, if they frisk me, I'm done.

I get to

the front of the line.

I'm getting really apprehensive.

I want to turn back, but I can't.

He runs the wand over me.

My heart's racing pretty good.

I've got three kilos of cocaine strapped to my body.

I just thought about... My freedom and how good it is.

I am so nervous.

I don't even know how much prison time I would get if I got caught.

And then he let me go.

I just couldn't believe it.

I get back to L .A.

It was a relief taking all the packages off.

I felt good. You know, I was done.

I pulled it off.

I contacted Rick.

We set up to meet the next day.

Now things are going to get better.

Rick had a little party.

I gave him his kilo.

He was elated.

We celebrated the fact that we finally pulled it off.

I had two kilos of cocaine.

You know, now I was going to make some money.

People sampled it.

Everybody loved it.

It was a good quality.

were spread around.

People wanted more.

I probably made $15 ,000, $20 ,000.

I see my daughter as much as possible.

When a child's growing up, there's always expenses.

I paid my part of those.

See you next week.

Bye. It was painful.

I miss being a family.

I compensated by doing more drugs.

I went back to, you know, life of partying, but that's a fool's paradise.

Having all that money made me more careless.

As frivolous as I was with the cocaine itself, I was the same way with my

I was broke within a month.

I thought that I could make one trip and change my life around.

But now I needed to go back and do it again.

Hey, Rick.

I contacted Rick and told him I was ready to go.

and he said, okay, that's fine, we'll set it up.

I get into Managua Airport by taxi and went to a hotel.

Mano came by to see me, and I gave him $3 ,000 for two kilos.

I told him, bring him at the end of the week.

The day before my flight, Some of the feelings from my first trip started

back.

I started getting nervous.

I thought it would be a good idea trying to stay ahead of, you know, any

problems.

I went to Updoor.

I grabbed a book, and it's about the same size as one of the packages.

I thought of placing it in my pocket in the case that I was to

get.

Touched by the agent.

If anything of that sort was felt on my body, I could pull that out and say,

hey, this is what you felt.

Okay.

It all sounds really silly and crazy, but at the time, I thought it was a good

idea.

On the second trip, it was pretty much the same procedure.

Manu packed me down.

this time with only four packets.

I put my clothing on, had a couple drinks, take the edge off.

I put the book in my pocket, then went to the airport.

I was nervous and uncomfortable, but I felt a little more confident that, you

know, I've been through this before.

I felt that the book would... giving me a shield of protection.

When I walked into the airport, there's not only police, but there's military.

I was feeling tense, but I've done it before.

I was telling myself, you've got to play the role. You've got to be normal.

I'd get to the front of the customs area.

There was this one customs officer.

Each person that came up, he was taking the metal detector wand and just going

around them.

No one was getting touched or patted down.

And I kind of felt a little more confident.

But as I got closer and closer, I started feeling uneasy about things.

I get up to him.

He steps back and he runs the wand over me.

The packages that were taped to my body weren't feeling very comfortable, so I

had to suck it up.

I'm really nervous.

And then he hit.

The tip of the wand on my book.

He goes, what's that?

My heart probably skipped a beat or two.

I pulled out my book.

He looks at it and he's fingering through it.

I thought to myself, I can't do this again.

Just let me get through this and I'm going to change my ways.

I kind of wanted to call it off, but there wasn't anything I could do.

And then out of the blue, he just grabs me.

He just started yelling.

All the military ran over with their guns pointed on me.

I'm really scared.

The customs officer points to my waist.

He says, what is that?

My heart's racing pretty good.

I was looking down the barrel of at least three rifles, but I wasn't going

admit to anything.

I told him, I don't know.

Policemen were talking with the customs agent.

They were looking at me like I was some animal in a zoo.

I had no idea what would happen next.

One of the police officers approached me slowly, like he was scared of

something.

I thought it was odd.

Then he started...

pulling up my shirt, trying to keep as much distance as possible.

There was definitely fear in their eyes.

It made me more nervous because they're holding weapons, and somebody holding a

weapon who's nervous is likely to accidentally fire their gun.

All of a sudden, everybody sees it at the same time, duct tape.

Everybody in the airport dropped to the ground.

There was a moment of silence.

I didn't know why they were just so scared.

And then somebody went over and got an interpreter.

She said, what is that? And I said, it's duct tape. She said...

But what's under the duct tape?

And I said, I don't know.

She goes, well, they think it's a bomb.

I just couldn't believe it.

I've got two kilos of coke strapped to my body, but they think it's a bomb.

I was like, oh, my God.

I would never think of hurting somebody like that.

Is it a bomb?

I was getting tired, and I was scared.

My arms were starting to hurt.

But I got this feeling that if I moved, they may shoot me.

I said, no, it's not a bomb.

It's cocaine.

At this point, I knew it was over.

I knew I'd go to prison.

I thought I'd never see my daughter again.

I have felt a lot of shame, embarrassment.

A lot of... Mixed emotions.

I'm thinking, how am I going to explain that to my family, to my daughter, and

mainly to my daughter?

My life is never going to be the way it was before.

This was the end, you know, for me.

The police, they did their initial report.

And then I was moved to the La Modelo prison.

It's the main prison in Nicaragua.

There was something like 1 ,500 prisoners in the whole La Modelo

It's considered the worst prison in Nicaragua, as far as the people that are

housed there.

To my knowledge, I was the first American ever in prison there, and these

hate Americans.

They had fought in a war against gringos.

At that moment, I was scared for my life.

They put me in a cell by myself.

The cell is just concrete floor, white plastered walls.

I'm looking around, and I look under my bed, and there's a scorpion.

I've seen a scorpion about 20 feet away from me before. I'd never been close up

with one, and these were bigger and uglier.

All I know is you get bit by a scorpion, you die.

I had to eliminate him right then.

Suddenly, the power went out.

I'm really scared.

I can't see anything.

There's no way I was going to be able to even close an eye with those things

right under my bed.

That first night, it was terrible.

I just thought, how long am I going to be here?

In the morning, there was just one big scorpion in the cell.

I beat it to death a million times, man. I made sure that thing was dead. That

was the last scorpion I was ever going to run.

I was ever going to see in my life.

After I was inside for a

month, I got my first court date.

My lawyer told me the packages of cocaine were tested, and they came out

.9 % pure.

He said that... The judge is going to give me one year for each percentage of

purity.

I was just in disbelief.

It's 99 years.

Yes, I know.

I just couldn't believe it.

I just thought, I'm going to be here the rest of my life.

I was allowed to make one phone call a week to my family in the United States.

Hello?

First time I had a chance to speak to my daughter. It was great to hear her

voice, but it was also sad.

She did ask me when I'm coming home, and I said that I was

away working.

Daddy's far away from home right now.

I really didn't like the fact that I was lying

to her.

I love you very much, baby. I just told her I loved her and that Daddy would be

home soon.

She said, I love you, Daddy.

And that was the end of the conversation.

I was upset.

But I couldn't, you know, break down like that.

I just needed to be strong the whole time.

At this point, I was housed with people that were part of the largest cocaine

bust in Nicaragua.

We're all watching this morning talk show.

And a government officer is being interviewed about the drug problems of

country here. And he says, oh, it's not us, it's the Americans.

He says, we've got one DEA agent, and he's in prison here in Nicaragua.

He doesn't name anyone, but to my knowledge, I'm the only American in the

system.

Basically, he's fingered me as being a DA agent.

Suddenly, they all kind of look at me in disbelief.

They started calling me Sapo.

It means you're a snitch.

In that environment, if you're called a snitch, it's comparable to a death

sentence.

I'm terrified.

They're going to rip me to pieces, and no amount of explaining will stop them.

Suddenly, this guy jumps up.

He says, that's not who this guy is.

His name was Nick.

He happens to be one of the bigger time dealers in Nicaragua.

He went on down the line and said, this guy is not a DEA agent.

There's been a crazy mix -up.

There were guys that were much bigger than him that could have done him some

harm if they wanted to go after him.

Nick, he had a lot of connections, and no one would mess with him.

He respected me as being a righteous person and not a snitch or a thop or a

DEA.

He was influential enough to save my ass in that moment.

And I get out alive, and my heart's still racing.

But I was extremely worried to be called a snitch.

Maybe somebody else would be convinced and come at me in the middle of the

night.

The cell doors don't lock.

So I'd rip a strip off my sheet and tie my door shut.

They'd have to cut it to come in.

And I'd set up a bar.

If the door was open, it would fall off.

That way, I'd be alarmed.

There was one prisoner called Loma.

He doesn't like gringos.

He started calling me for a snitch.

He thinks I'm a DA agent.

It was something that wasn't going away.

It sensed my fear.

I was scared for my life again.

Later,

I was washing my clothes.

He came in with a pair of scissors.

At this point, I'm, you know, I'm just, I'm scared.

No, man, I don't want any problems.

I thought it was going to end in a stinking prison a million miles from

Lomas came at me with a scissor.

I was scared.

But I've been known to take care of myself.

All I know is... I wasn't going to die there.

There's no way.

I was extremely pumped up with adrenaline.

I was fighting for my life.

I hurt him pretty bad.

But after I had my run -in with Lomas, I didn't really have any

more trouble with anybody.

And then all of a sudden, I was fighting for my life again.

I had malaria, and I was taken down to the hospital.

They put me on a cot with a hole in the center of it that was actually made that

way, and I had IV flowing in one arm and everything else flowing out the other

hand.

I also had a bad ear infection.

The doctor took a big...

and he filled it up with saline solution and squirted it in my ear.

My head exploded.

He had blown up my eardrum.

They did that about ten times.

It was probably one of the most painful things I've had to go through.

Next, I remember I woke up and my head wasn't hurting as bad as it was.

I'd been inside for almost two years, but I still don't have a sentence.

I just thought, how am I going to survive here?

I can't see me leaving this place anytime soon.

The verb to be.

After about six months, I started teaching English.

I felt I was doing something, not only to benefit myself, but to benefit

some of the prisoners.

I even started teaching some of the guards.

You know, they see I wasn't just some drug smuggler.

I wasn't a halfway decent person, I guess you could say.

Any questions?

I was known as, you know, the gringo teacher, and it was a good feeling.

One day, there was a... Guy who

was being visited by his mom.

I'm very sorry.

That's fine.

Her name was Margarita. She was actually a police captain and she was a

criminologist. And her and I had a conversation.

So how long is your sentence?

I still didn't have a sentence. Just the possibility of 99 years.

99 years? You're kidding me?

Many people thought the judge was crazy in my case.

Margarita felt sorry for me.

And so she said she would go talk to the judge.

I'd been inside for almost three years.

One day I was sweeping some walkway.

I just hear a faint noise of someone yelling.

I can't really make out, and as he gets closer, I start making out. It is

someone yelling my name.

She's got this paper in her hand, and she's screaming.

She was ecstatic. She was screaming, tu order de libertad, which means your

freedom order.

I've got it.

The judge has released you. You're free to go.

Turns out the judge in my case retired.

And the new judge that took her place let me go.

Couldn't believe it.

I was just elated. I was ecstatic.

Thanks to Marguerite, I got my life back.

Now I can see my daughter again.

What I regret most about this whole experience is what I did to my daughter

my mother.

There's no amount of money worth what it does to your family.

You're never able to bring everything back to the way it was or the way you

think it should be.

It's a loss all the way around.