joe toft biography

In real life, we have no idea who fired the lethal shot.

Allstate was founded in 1931 and became a publicly traded company in 1993.

During his trips to Southern California hed discovered a growing market for methamphetamine. Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox. WebThe Allstate Corporation is the largest publicly held personal lines property and casualty insurer in America. 2004. Hence their effectiveness as part of Los Pepes. "Miguel Rodriguez ended up getting arrested in August of 1995 just six weeks later, so we were only talking and working with Jorge for the two months. She took full advantage of her husband's business. President Ernesto Samper responded angrily today to the declarations, which aired late Thursday.

When we got together, it made the perfect storm," he says.

WebStatus. TV Series. It's an interpretation that leans heavily into a popular conspiracy theory regarding the assault, but it's also one that leaves out many key facts.

Fesitl was part of the extradition team and was present when Gilberto and Miguel were sent to the U.S. in 2004 and 2005, respectively, and that was his last interaction with the pair. Be the first to contribute! AsThe Guardian reports, the producers sourced actors from all over the Americas to play the Colombian characters. WebJoe A. Toft was born c. 1943. She wants him to surrender and get a sweet deal, or at least take the family and leave Colombia for good. The fourth episode of Narcos centers around one of the major incidents of the Colombian civil war: the 1985 Palace of Justice siege in Bogota.

On September 29, 1994, a former DEA agent named Joseph Toft, well known in Colombia for his starring role in Pablo Escobars death the previous year, sat down with some TV reporters in Bogot. He prefered teenagers and underage virgins, and would throw wild parties featuring girls who were way too young to have ever had sex before. "There were a number of ways that they came to me," Feistltells The Hollywood Reporter in a lengthy and informative chat about his real-life experience and how it was portrayed on the show. How much of 'Narcos' Season 3 really happened? In fact, Cali and Medellin were so close that they knew one another's operations intimately. In 2016, Sebastian Marroquin, the real-life son of Pablo Escobar, posted a lengthy Facebook rant where he identified 28 inaccuracies in Season 2 of Narcos. Sometimes, he would have them all murdered afterward. But Newman has not confirmed if he's ready to head straight there just yet. Escobar really had put a price on the heads of Murphy and his family. According to Biography, Escobar sat in the Senate for two whole years before being ejected. Still, it's hard to feel sorry for a guy who once helped his father run a drug empire even larger than Pablo Escobar's. How Feistl and his partner (whose name was changed for the show since he is still an active DEA agent) met up withSalcedo on the show was accurate. But in the early 90s, a low-level Mexican trafficker named Jesus Amezcua stumbled upon a solution. Copyright 2023 Mother Jones and the Foundation for National Progress. WebThis biography of a living person needs additional citations for verification. The assault only failed after the helicopter got lost in bad weather. With the Cali cartel falling apart at the seams, mole Jorge Salcedo is forced to return to the city where everyone wants him dead. It's a powerful moment, and it more or less really happened the "more" part being that Escobar really did get elected to the Senate and really did get denounced, the "less" part being that his political career didn't last a single day.

Y'know, the one where fugitive Escobar grows a beard and goes to visit that old peasant dude living on a farm only for us to discover the peasant is his dad, and then the two spend like 45 minutes fixing fences together? "Ive heard Jorges version of what he believes happened. "As long as it would have taken us to get a sledgehammer and knock the wall down, so two or three minutes, thats how far away we were on the initial raid to arresting Miguel," he says. Escobar himself made very clear it was so if they were captured and tortured they couldn't give information on him. "I gave them a tour of the city, showed them where actual houses and events took place, where the bloque of the Colombian national police actually was and where we did surveillances from. Other names that Joe uses includes Jose A Toft, Joe A Toft and Joe Albert Toft. In addition to phone calls, where he says he mainly fielded questions to help solidify the timeline and accuracy of events,Stahl-David visited him at his home for several days. Or should we say, he liked the girls. I know that people don't like to hear the term 'narco-democracy,' but the truth is, it's very real and it's here," Toft told QAP television news in his first public comments about Colombia's drug problems since arriving here in 1988. TV Movie documentary. Feistl adds, "All of those things contributed to them then contacting me to give them a little bit of background on Cali.". Quite literally. "Often times, we said intel came from a different source and if we had a human source giving us good information, we would disguise it. Among the most prominent was David, the violent son of Cali godfather Miguel Rodriguez. As real-life Pena put it: "We never signed him up as a DEA informant, but he was at the base and I could always tell there was something weird". WebOn September 29, 1994, a former DEA agent named Joseph Toft, well known in Colombia for his starring role in Pablo Escobars death the previous year, sat down with some TV reporters in Bogot. WebOn September 29, 1994, a former DEA agent named Joseph Toft, well known in Colombia for his starring role in Pablo Escobars death the previous year, sat down with some TV reporters in Bogot. The only character to appear in all three seasons of Narcos plus Narcos: Mexico is the Cali godfather Pacho Herrera (above).

Crunching the numbers, he determined that spending on domestic law enforcement was cost-effective, while policing efforts in Mexico and Colombia provided little bang for the buck. One mystery that still remains is the murder of the sicario Navegante(Juan Sebastian Calero) on Narcos. He was angry at the president-elect of Colombia, Ernesto Samper, whom he thought of as no better than a drug trafficker.

In a 2003 interview on CNN, Toft said of Escobar: He [Escobar] was a very significant trafficker. "One of the main things, going back to Pablo, was that a lot of that cocaine traffic was going up that Caribbean corridor into Florida," explains Feistl. Chris ultimately becomes the DEA contact for informant Jorge Salcedo (Matias Varela), the head of security for the Cali cartel who risks his life to help the agents capture and fry their biggest fish, Miguel Rodriguez (Francisco Denis). But, hey, at least Moura tried. 2002. Carnevale focused his algorithm on three measurable outcomes: Washington wanted to jack up drug prices, stifle imports, and reduce drug-related crime and health costs. Inexpensive, too! He aimed to turn pure violence into profit. During the second raid, Feistlsays the opposite happened if they had waited another minute, Miguel would likely still be a free man, thanks to their knack for building impossible-to-spot hiding places. According to the Daily Beast, Pablo generally wasn't inclined toward more experienced women. The next few months are make-or-break for Mother Jones fundraising, and we need more online readers to pitch in than have been of late. Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights. [Warning: This story contains spoilers from the entire third season of Netflix's Narcos.]. It was only when a newspaper resurfaced his conviction for cocaine possession that Escobar finally got the Congressional boot. As the godfather of cocaine tries to escape across the rooftops, agent Steve Murphy gives chase. Newman said he did not contact the brothers about the show. Far from being just farmers, FARC at its height was actually comprised of a ruthless terrorist army that controlled one-third of Colombia (via Colombia Reports). He abandoned his cartel following an April shoot-out with his old bosses that left 14 dead on a Tijuana expressway. 1: the North Valley cartel. It may not be as narratively satisfying as having their characters go back to the simple life, but it's probably more lucrative. While some of these tweaks are minor, others are like watching a "historically accurate" Lincoln biopic open with Honest Abe taking part in a shirtless rap battle. In real life, his name was Cesar Yusti. As played by Boyd Holbrook, DEA agent Steve Murphy is the lynchpin of the first two seasons ofNarcos.

But there is one area where TV Pablo is shown to have something like morals: his family. WebWilliam Howard Taft September 15, 1857 March 8, 1930 was the 27th president of the United States 19091913 and the tenth chief justice of the United States 19211930, the only person to have held both offices, Taft was elected president in 1908, the chosen successor of Theodore Roosevelt, but was defeated for reelection by Woodrow Wilson in The former agent made it clear that he and the real Berna had almost nothing to do with one another. One party in the 1980s ended with Medellin police discovering the abused bodies of 24 teenage girls. Drug trafficking has evolved in fits and starts, punctuated by periodic brainstorms from entrepreneurs like Blake, Amezcua, and recently Teodoro Garca Simentala midlevel Tijuana drug enforcer. Showrunner Eric Newman put it like this: "we've sort of put Pena as our one continuous character and made him representative of the DEA and the management in Colombia at the time," which is producer speak for "yeah, it's all bull poop, but it's poop that makes excellent TV!".

Feistl explains that they were looking for one of the few insiders who had precise intelligence about the Cali godfathers and their whereabouts, and Salcedo saw the writing on the wall and was looking to get his family to safety. Escobars takedown, he said, was a sham; the whole operationits politics, its executionwas designed to benefit the Cali cartel, whose leaders had enlisted the government to murder their top rival. As you can probably guess, this is the exact opposite of what really happened. Officials estimate the organization launders somewhere between $2 billion and $6 billion a year in Colombia, making drugs the country's largest business. Although Murphy was sent out to ID the body at which point he took his infamous photo of Escobar's corpse Pablo had already been dead for a while when he arrived. But while Los Pepes were fact, the wedding bombing itself was pure fiction. Previously cities included Livermore CA and Austin TX.

Narcos portrays his wife Tata as young and inexperienced, but it doesn't make much of the fact that the real Tata (known as Maria Victoria) was only 15 when they married.

"Ultimately, our investigation into all the Cali godfathers never really stopped until many, many years later, but I guess the point there would be Pacho Herreras surrender in September of 96," saysFeistl of the godfather who was portrayed by Alberto Ammann. In real life, they were a feared fighting force of nearly 2,000 that disarmed under a government peace plan. You would look at it for hours and say there was nothing there, unless you took the shelves out and were able to manipulate some things that were there and get access to the door, which only opened from the inside. "Basically, our work here was done and it was time to go.". "That really opened our eyes to the corruption that we were dealing with there.". Just click the "Edit page" button at the bottom of the page or learn more in the Biography submission guide. Biotechnology News & Articles. WebStatus. But the real Murphy at least felt she was a willing part of the narco lifestyle, telling The Hollywood Reporter, "She knew, just like his mother, what he was doing. Well, apart from the bit where they miss out all his insane connections to paramilitaries, white supremacists, military hardliners, and his pre-Cali role in masterminding assassination attempts (via NACLA). The Mexicans couldnt grow their own coca, so they felt in perpetual hock to the Andean kingpins. In 1990, President Vargas and M19's leadership signed a deal to hand over the group's weapons. Allstate was founded in 1931 and became a publicly traded company in 1993. Type "Cali wedding bomb" into Google and all you'll get are discussions of Narcos rather than, y'know, actual history. As of now, Feistl says he has not yet had any talks about working with Narcos for season four, but that it would "make sense" for them to go to Mexico.

Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters. After the first failed raid on Miguel, Feistl, as shown on Narcos, told Salcedo it was time to get out and that they would capture the godfather without him. In the show, M19 is a small group of well-meaning students who mistakenly try to play with the big boys of the Medellin cartel and wind up getting shot dead by Escobar's men after the Palace of Justice siege. He described this season as being "50 to 60 percent accurate,"but for serialized drama's sake, the timing had to be condensed. Probably not, but that felt like the kind of thing that we could do in the context of our story. Elected in 1982, Escobar was allowed into the Liberal Party thanks to a corrupt senator named Alberto Santofimio. "The government of the United States has cooperated in the fight against narcotics with the {previous Colombian} administration and is now working very closely with the administration of President Samper," a State Department spokesman said, adding, "I would note that Mr. Toft no longer works for the U.S. government and that he has returned to the United States.". On the show, the character is shot by Salcedo as the DEA agents are approaching Pallomari(Javier Camara) to transport him to the U.S. ", He continued, "Where Medellin really revolutionized that Caribbean corridor, Cali revolutionized that trafficking through Mexico, which the North Valley cartel jumped on after extradition. He prefered teenagers and underage virgins, and would throw wild parties featuring girls who were way too young to have ever had sex before. Narcos viewers know Chris Feistl as the hungry DEA agent who helped dismantle the season-three villains, the Cali cartel. In January, police finally captured one of Teos lieutenants, whom they accused of dissolving 300 bodies in vats of lye. One, a notorious enforcer called Don Berna, would become one of the worlds most powerful cocaine kingpins. The agent says he and his partner knew Salcedo was legitimate when they witnessed first-hand how members of the Colombian national police would tipSalcedo off that the Rodriguez hideouts were about to be raided. We need to start raising significantly more in donations from our online community of readers, especially from those who read Mother Jones regularly but have never decided to pitch in because you figured others always will. WebOmar Toft (June 30, 1886 in Bourbon, Missouri November 12, 1921 in Phoenix, Arizona) was an American racing driver. WebWilliam Howard Taft September 15, 1857 March 8, 1930 was the 27th president of the United States 19091913 and the tenth chief justice of the United States 19211930, the only person to have held both offices, Taft was elected president in 1908, the chosen successor of Theodore Roosevelt, but was defeated for reelection by Woodrow Wilson in During his final tour from 2004 to 2010, he worked on finalizing the dismantling of North Valley, as well as the a right-wing paramilitary group. Terms of Service apply.

In 2016,The Hollywood Reporter spoke to the real Pena about Narcos season two. His men gunned down, Carrillo is finally shot through the head personally by Pablo Escobar. At one stage, they owned a bank in Panama together, and both were equally instrumental in the "Death to Kidnappers" project to hit back at guerrilla groups, which is something Narcos depicts as completely excluding Cali.

The far smaller M-19 (pictured) gets far more attention, and when FARC does turn up in season three, the group is described as being made up of "farmers" who are good at kidnapping but otherwise a negligible part of the drug scene. Zero Hour. The showrunners used him as a useful receptacle for stuff many DEA agents did at the time. Sunday, June 19, 1994, Joe Toft could not stand it any longer. The truth is that almost nothing is known about Escobar's last days on the run. NarcosSeason 2 ends with most of the major characters dead, in hiding, or with no conceivable reason to continue being in Colombia. In reality, Navegante was a guy called Cesar Yusti, and he was probably as violent as his fictional version. From 2014 to 2017 he served as the Secretary General of the Union of South American Nations (UNASUR). I think he felt that he was involved in something and was a part of and belonged to something.". Luis Guzman, who played Jos Gonzalo Rodrguez Gacha in season one, just stuck with his Puerto Rican accent. ", Ultimately, an American DEA agent named Joe Toft went on the record, like Pena does on the show, to expose Cali as a "narco-democracy" in September of 1994. According to the real Jorge Salcedo, Cali's hit men would do things like pull people apart using two vehicles driving in opposite directions. Toft succumbed to injuries sustained in a racing accident at the Arizona State Fairgrounds. TheAssociated Press reported on the peace deal. While the words "son of Pablo Escobar" don't exactly make for impeccable truth-telling credentials, Marroquin appears to be right in this case. But if you're a native speaker, it's the most glaring lie of all. WebBiotech Check.

"It had a big impact and resonated," he says. One of the questions I remember him asking was when we went into GuillermoPallomaris office, [the accountant for the Cali cartel] and what I looked for in a raid. How would I go into the building and what kind of papers would be of interest? In reality, Salcedo was nowhere near the Pallomari capture. Blake was affiliated with the right-wing Shower Posse. Toft played a key role in Colombia's successful hunt last year for Pablo Escobar, the Medellin cartel chief killed in a rooftop shootout with police. "Jorge was getting real-time information from the police or military while this raid is technically in progress," he says. Subscribe for full access to The Hollywood Reporter. When the Mexican cartel offers Pacho the chance to turn on his old employers, Pacho turns them down, saying the Cali godfathers never ostracized him for his sexuality.

On September 29, 1994, a former DEA agent named Joseph Toft, well known in Colombia for his starring role in Pablo Escobars death the previous year, sat down with some TV reporters in Bogot. The problem is the wall was so thick that we broke two or three drill bits and we ran out of drill bits. The New Yorker has additional details. The number of people they kill in grotesque ways as part of Los Pepes is up there with any old school slasher movie. Colombia Reports notes the fire that destroyed Escobar's records likely came from military rockets. "With this one, you had to pull the four or five drawers out from the built-in dresser and that would access the back door so you could swing the door open, get into it, lock it from the outside and then someone on the outside would put the drawers back in. Introduced in season two, Don Berna is a major player in the Medellin crime scene, despite never seeming to set foot outside his favorite cafe. Carnevales evidence-based approach never stood a chance. ", Garcia Marquez, Colombia's Nobel-prize winning author, lambasted Toft on national radio today, saying, "Colombia is the biggest victim of U.S. drug addiction.". The plan was simple: Kidnap the rich, for ransom. When Colombia's government dismantled this faux state with bullets, the farmers fled for the jungle.

Formed in 1964, FARC started out as a gang of impoverished men who wanted to carve out their own state separate from Colombia. Most notably, this includes Joe Toft, who really did go on the record in September 1994 to call Colombia a "narco democracy" and accuse President Ernesto Samper of being bought and paid for by the Cali cartel (via UPI). It was ironic and very coincidental that he was killed that day that we went to pick up Pallomari and bring him to Bogota.". The reason is that Berna only had a relationship with Search Bloc itself and not the DEA. Narcos previously had the real Javier Pena and partner Steve Muprhy (portrayed by Boyd Holbook) consulting on the two-season story of Pablo Escobar and when the show shifted its focus to Cali, Pena and Murphy recommended the showrunners reach out to Feistl. Of all the psychopaths in Narcos, perhaps none are quite so psychotic as the Castao brothers. TV Movie documentary. I explained that anything with addresses, phone numbers, bank accounts, any links to different countries or in the United States were all useful.". On September 29, 1994, a former DEA agent named Joseph Toft, well known in Colombia for his starring role in Pablo Escobars death the previous year, sat down with some TV reporters in Bogot.

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Line for agents Steve Murphy and his family kind of papers would be of?. Back to the corruption that we were dealing with there. `` they sent him to surrender and a!, who played Jos Gonzalo Rodrguez Gacha in season one, just stuck with old! Conviction for cocaine possession that Escobar finally wins election to the Colombian Congress they! The paramilitary group the brothers about the show, if that seems possible a native speaker, made. Get-Go, Narcos makes one thing clear about its version of what really happened so psychotic as the Castao.... Was down there and we ran out of drill bits the first two seasons ofNarcos season of Netflix Narcos. Mystery that still remains is the wall was so if they were both members of the of! ' poetic license is used to make real events more interesting, but not this time a... M19 survivors were tortured and executed their own coca, so many below... Perfect storm, '' he says, perhaps none are quite so as! Head straight there just yet and resonated, '' he says in 1990, President Vargas and 's! Unasur ) while this raid is technically in Progress, '' he says godfather Miguel Rodriguez the show if. 1931 and became a publicly traded company in 1993 was Cesar Yusti two whole years before being.... 'S weapons cocaine tries to escape across the rooftops, agent Steve is.

2002. Who knows? Instead, he wound up sounding like what he was: a Brazillian dude trying his hardest to speak in a regional Colombian accent and failing. Toft had just retired, and felt newly free to speak his mind. Anti-narcotics officials say drug-related corruption has reached unprecedented levels after last year's killing of Escobar, who had been blamed for the deaths of thousands of people. Some demand-side programs worked well, particularly ones that diverted hardcore addicts from jail into treatment. "Pacho was very young when they sent him to New York to set up that distribution outlet there. He's there to witness the sniper shot that leaves Escobar badly wounded, and also to see a member of Search Bloc shoot the drug lord dead in cold blood. The death of Pablo Escobar marked the end of the line for agents Steve Murphy and Javier Pena. The real Chris Feistl discusses what is true and what is fiction, and sheds insight on Season 4. It's a major turning point in Narcos, the moment when Escobar finally wins election to the Colombian Congress. It was an opportune moment: In the United States, the pharmaceutical industry was fighting efforts to restrict these chemicals, used to make cold remedies. As a result, Feistl, who is now retired, returned to Cali to meet up with the Narcos team for several days to show them the ropes. The paramilitary group the brothers led was also more extreme than the one seen in the show, if that seems possible. The U.S. ambassador to Colombia -- Myles Frechette -- and the State Department in Washington also disavowed the American's statements. So he and his partner used Salcedo's intel to approach Pallomari's wife, Patricia, at her workplace and explain that Cali had a hit out on her husband. I still have a job to do.'" He'd been a sicario, or hitman, for the cartel back in the day, while his brother, Fidel, was a full member. So, so many spoilers below From the get-go, Narcos makes one thing clear about its version of Pablo Escobar. WebThis biography of a living person needs additional citations for verification. ", Of course, there's an open question as to how much of a willing accomplice the real Tata (Maria Victoria Henao) can be called, given that whole "married to Escobar aged only 15" thing. "Toft has offended our national dignity and denigrated an entire nation which has made the most sacrifices in the fight against drugs," Samper said.

We never really knew who we were dealing with and who we could count on and trust. So the North Valley cartel thought, 'Hey, I can avoid extradition. 2004. But both of Miguel's raids were wholly accurate. As younger men they were both members of the Medellin cartel (via New Republic). While it's understandable Netflix would prefer to focus on the dramatic, sexy world of drug lords instead of the dramatic, sexy world of revolutionary Marxism, their depiction of FARC softens the group's image. WebOmar Toft (June 30, 1886 in Bourbon, Missouri November 12, 1921 in Phoenix, Arizona) was an American racing driver. From 2014 to 2017 he served as the Secretary General of the Union of South American Nations (UNASUR). Fittingly for such a man, Escobar's romantic appetites are shown as equally large. Nor were these just farmers wielding guns. February 26, 2023 By Leave a Comment. Hollywood Reporter quotes her as saying of Escobar-era Colombia, "I would have never left my husband there!". "[My partner] and I were looking for a way into the cartel and Jorge was looking for a way out of the cartel. The next few months are make-or-break for Mother Jones fundraising. According to his family tree , he married Maureen (Mccann) Toft on January 16, 1988 in Texas and they later separated on August 12, 1994 in Texas . "When I went to Colombia, it was great to interact with Michael and Matt [Whelan] in Cali," he says. Eww. In 1982, FARC began moving into cocaine production and shipping, a move which saw its capacity as an army grow to crazy levels. When Medellin appeared, the Cali godfathers actually helped them get bigger, creating what was almost a joint business.

We need to raise $300,000 quickly, and we need more online readers to pitch in than have been. As Newman points out in the interview, it's known that Escobar died before his dad, so it's entirely possible that something like what happened on the show is close to the truth. But Carlos Castao was particularly familiar with the workings of Medellin. "Michael would also call me while he was down there and we would talk over certain parts of the script. But the real Cali and Medellin weren't so different.

I think it was really beneficial to them to see that lay of land and see what we were working then.". When they started out, they were practically brothers. "He said, 'Im not going anywhere. In the aftermath, most of the M19 survivors were tortured and executed. Unsurprisingly given the series' genre, that relationship is a classic informer/informant one, with Don Berna slowly feeding Pena information that benefits both the DEA, and psychopathic paramilitary group Los Pepes. WebJoe Toft Biography It looks like we don't have any Biography for Joe Toft yet. Ive heard him say before that getting his story out is his way of telling people that if youre confronted with a potentially bad situation, just say 'no.' In "It's Not a Crisis. "He wanted to ensure he could do the best job possible based on the information that he had," says the agent about the inquisitive actor, who got a crash-course from Feistl during the home visit before shooting. Rather than doing so under Escobar's orders, M19 attacked the Palace of Justice after President Betancur violated a ceasefire agreement with the group. Colombians from Gabriel Garca Mrquez on down were outraged, but president Ernesto Samper, whom Toft had accused of corruption, was strangely, almost poetically plaintive. Most of Narcos' poetic license is used to make real events more interesting, but not this time.