Speaker 1: The law is not there to protect criminals. Is there
Speaker 1: to protect the innocent. I was a criminal, so the
Speaker 1: law wasn't there to benefit me. Is there the core?
Speaker 1: So I have to respect that. You know, if I
Speaker 1: was on the opposite side of the law, you know,
Speaker 1: if I was on the right sad of law, maybe
Speaker 1: that law would protect me. There's no one else who
Speaker 1: were in our shoes. TA could sit next year and
Speaker 1: tell you this. I'm alive, I'm here and where my family.
Speaker 1: Things ain't the way I wish they were, But it's
Speaker 1: like that for in every situation. Right, I'm sharing the
Speaker 1: story with you. Right, Oh, I got me a chap couple.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I can. I'm busy straight next Wednesday Night.
Speaker 1: Now to the inside story of two Chicago brothers who
Speaker 1: turned on El Chapo, Chicago's infamous drug trafficking twins Pedro
Speaker 1: Flores and his brother Margarito. Growing up in Little Village,
Speaker 1: the twins learned the drug trade at the age of seven.
Speaker 1: Chicago is a wonderful place to become a drug distributor.
Speaker 1: The two important more than thirty tons of cocaine from
Speaker 1: El Chapo and sent close to a billion dollars in
Speaker 1: cash from Chicago to the Sinaloa cartel. The two hid
Speaker 1: the drugs in some of New York's best neighborhoods, and
Speaker 1: the pantheon of drug prosecutions in the history of the
Speaker 1: Northern District of Illinois, this case stands at the highest level.
Speaker 1: Federal agents arrested twin brothers from Chicago's Little Village neighborhood,
Speaker 1: Pedro and Mark Arrito Flores. We're El Chapo's biggest distributorsy
Speaker 1: my name is Pedro Flores. I'm given this statement freely
Speaker 1: and voluntarily. My name is Margarito Flores Jr. I was
Speaker 1: born in Chicago, Illinois, and Julee tak One. I have
Speaker 1: a twin brother named Pedro Flores. Since approximately m brother,
Speaker 1: Argarrio Flores and I have been responsible for the distribution
Speaker 1: of thousands of kilogans of cokine in Chicago, Illinois and elsewhere.
Speaker 1: Thousands and thousands and thousands. We were distributing in Chicago, Illinois, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Minneapolis, Minnesota, Detroit, Michigan, Cincinnati, Ohio, Columbus, Ohio, Louisa, Kentucky, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania,
Speaker 1: New York City, Washington, Dunsey, Atlanta, Georgia, Los Angeles, California,
Speaker 1: and Vancouver, British Columbia. Bargaryo and I have acted as
Speaker 1: partners in the drug business, worked collectively with a cartel
Speaker 1: known as a Federation. The federation was headed by Hawk Engles,
Speaker 1: mat Laura White, Noise Chapel where Chapel was mine, and
Speaker 1: members of his organization. Let me tell your story about
Speaker 1: two brothers. If you think this is just another Knockos story,
Speaker 1: you're wrong. Sure it's got all the action and drama
Speaker 1: you'd normally expect, but at the end of the day,
Speaker 1: it's about two boys born into a life they didn't choose.
Speaker 1: It made me think about how my life could have
Speaker 1: gone if not for music. I started dealing on the
Speaker 1: streets of Queens at the age of twelve. At the
Speaker 1: same time over in Chicago, seven year old identical twins,
Speaker 1: Margolito Junior Flores and Pedro Flores, we're learning the family
Speaker 1: trade these days. They go by Ja and Pete randomly.
Speaker 1: I met these two after I had a necklace old
Speaker 1: and in Chicago completely green projects June spinning piece the
Speaker 1: young Bucks. Stupid ass was dumb enough to wear to
Speaker 1: their neighborhood to us to completely Green projects when the
Speaker 1: police don't go for no reason, he decided to go.
Speaker 1: So after they recovered the piece and got it back
Speaker 1: to me, we developed a relationship. I'm excited to share
Speaker 1: this story. Which how would you describe Pete? I think
Speaker 1: he's one wasn't touching person's like, why all offer me?
Speaker 1: How would you describe Jay? The most intelligent personally? I know,
Speaker 1: I mean that doesn't know. We're not all that people.
Speaker 1: I couldn't tell the story I'm all so I called
Speaker 1: the friend, Charlie Webster. She's one of the best journalists
Speaker 1: I know in the person I could rely on to
Speaker 1: do the story of some justice. Vifty called me up
Speaker 1: and introduced me to the brothers over zoom. Because we
Speaker 1: weren't allowed to meet in person. There's a condition of
Speaker 1: that proble. The brothers aren't allowed to be together, and
Speaker 1: to be honest with you, even if they were, it
Speaker 1: would mean more danger for them anyway. Getting them in
Speaker 1: the same room to be able to do this it
Speaker 1: was not just a logistical nightmare, but also carried a
Speaker 1: real risk of their lives. It took me around six months,
Speaker 1: but eventually I managed to arrange a secret location for
Speaker 1: us all to talk in. Imagine a safe house hidden
Speaker 1: in plain sight. Inside the brothers Pete and Ja, their
Speaker 1: entire families, me and outside a couple of bodyguards mine
Speaker 1: the door. It's twenty one people crammed into this safe
Speaker 1: house and if you walk past, you would never have known.
Speaker 1: Tons of drugs going through to these two twins. They
Speaker 1: create them distribution operation to send it to other parts
Speaker 1: of the country. Certainly the Flower of his brothers cooperating
Speaker 1: and providing all the information, uh literally in tons of
Speaker 1: cocaine and billions of dollars, and then quite frankly getting
Speaker 1: Chapel for the first time on a wire tap where
Speaker 1: he's negotiating for Keelos of heroin secretly recorded the drug
Speaker 1: lord before turning himself into the d e A. We're
Speaker 1: not talking about kelos. We are talking about tons of
Speaker 1: cocaine that went through their distribution system. There is never
Speaker 1: a day in their lives where they won't have to
Speaker 1: look over their shoulder. There's never a time that they'll
Speaker 1: turn the ignition switch on a car and not wonder
Speaker 1: to themselves is it going to start or is it
Speaker 1: going to blow up? That's its own form of life sentence,
Speaker 1: and that's a part of the extraordinary nature of this case.
Speaker 1: There's a family drama regalis the how you look at
Speaker 1: it because ups bringing your brother, your dad, and then
Speaker 1: you got the significance is you really reationships. What obstacles
Speaker 1: are in front of you obviously pulled you guys closer
Speaker 1: to each other every time. And I always say people
Speaker 1: were like plants, we gotta growth, and you guys managed
Speaker 1: to do that. And it's tough to do that if
Speaker 1: it's such a good business. Why they turned I'm Curtis
Speaker 1: to st Jackson and I'm char Webster and then this
Speaker 1: is surviving old chap that's once you brought down the
Speaker 1: drug board. What happens when you decide to turn over
Speaker 1: the most wanted man in the world. How do you
Speaker 1: get close enough to even be able to do that
Speaker 1: in the first place. Identical twins Peter and j Flores
Speaker 1: have just spent the last fourteen years in secret prison locations.
Speaker 1: Much of the time was spent on the twenty three
Speaker 1: hour lockdown. The story made international news because they are
Speaker 1: the reason El Chapel is now in prison, and they've
Speaker 1: never spoken publicly until now. But their story doesn't start
Speaker 1: or end without Chapo. So to understand how we get there,
Speaker 1: we need to rewind to the beginning, to the streets
Speaker 1: of Chicago, in the neighborhoods called Little Village. Our production
Speaker 1: to to the drug business started at that seven years
Speaker 1: old woman that came for prison. How long was he
Speaker 1: in prisoned? Seven years? Pete and Ja were born on
Speaker 1: June twelve. They're the youngest of seven children and the
Speaker 1: only twins in the family. They often speak as one.
Speaker 1: They were only really ever known as twin in the singular.
Speaker 1: So we won't keep bothering you by identifying which twinnies
Speaker 1: which unless we really need to. While they might look
Speaker 1: the same, they are very different people. You'll soon start
Speaker 1: to figure it out. My father ends up being arrested
Speaker 1: and leader seven kids. Their father, Margarito Flores Sr. Was
Speaker 1: a well known drug trafficker who married their mother at
Speaker 1: the age of twenty two when she was just twelve
Speaker 1: years old. Margharito Sr. Was arrested in March one, three
Speaker 1: months before the twin boys were born. He was caught
Speaker 1: selling a million dollars worth of heroin to an undercover agent.
Speaker 1: He asked not to be handcuffed in front of his
Speaker 1: pregnant wife, concerned she might miscarry the twins. At that time,
Speaker 1: like Mexicans don't get divorced. They just deal with it.
Speaker 1: They don't know what divorce is. What was like him,
Speaker 1: It was your typical like Mexican relationship. I think, where
Speaker 1: the man is the the head of the household and
Speaker 1: the woman just holds the house together, cooking, taking care
Speaker 1: of the kids. That's what she was supposed to do.
Speaker 1: But when my dad was away, she became everything without
Speaker 1: even knowing it. I still remember me my brother, like
Speaker 1: when my dad came home, we're like, we knew we
Speaker 1: had a dad right with COVID, but we didn't know
Speaker 1: what it was like. So we thought we were getting
Speaker 1: like a reward. Now we're gonna be like everybody else
Speaker 1: in our life of change, but not for good comes home.
Speaker 1: My older brothers are gang members. My mother doesn't know
Speaker 1: what a gang is. We're talking about, you know, any right.
Speaker 1: She she doesn't know that my brother's be King ganger,
Speaker 1: but she thinks that's there's just something they do. At
Speaker 1: the time, the Black and Gold of the Latin King's
Speaker 1: Gang dominated the streets of Chicago, but it was little
Speaker 1: village known as Mexico of the Midwest. That was the
Speaker 1: main battleground for the bad blood between the Latin Kings
Speaker 1: and their main rival, the Two Sixes. The rules of
Speaker 1: the Latin Kings demand members engage in violence. They are
Speaker 1: still the biggest and one of the most violent Hispanic
Speaker 1: and Latino street and prison gangs in the world. And
Speaker 1: Peter and Jay's older brother, Armando was their dope peddler.
Speaker 1: He's a high ranking member Bland King's at the time
Speaker 1: in the neighborhood, and he had like all this gang
Speaker 1: graffiti all over the basement where they're going to take
Speaker 1: pictures and and my mom would be like, oh, your
Speaker 1: friends are here, like it was okay because she didn't understand.
Speaker 1: But my dad came on from prison like what he's
Speaker 1: like these these guys, I mean he's with them. He
Speaker 1: was like up, said with my mom like what were
Speaker 1: you doing? My mom like what are you talking about?
Speaker 1: And kicked my older brothers at the house that week. Wow,
Speaker 1: And now we had a new set of rules, which
Speaker 1: was harsh because my dad, who's had that strong voice,
Speaker 1: he would say that we're being raised to be almost
Speaker 1: like women because we're being raised by women. And since
Speaker 1: day one he said, I'm gonna change them. So that
Speaker 1: came with chores and just be birmless stuff that me
Speaker 1: and my brother weren't as a kid. I hate that
Speaker 1: he came all right, this is James us being kids.
Speaker 1: They're like got shifted, that got turned upside, you know down.
Speaker 1: Then we gotta do chores, you know, throughout the garbage.
Speaker 1: And he would make us do like clean up the
Speaker 1: you know, pick up the garbage from the street. And
Speaker 1: we were done too fast, but pick up the one
Speaker 1: for the full block. Right, yeah, I'll tell you my
Speaker 1: best friend growing up, Right, he looks very close and
Speaker 1: street for away. Growing up, he had to be his
Speaker 1: pops are very strict, right, he had to be on
Speaker 1: his stoop as the street light came on. So at
Speaker 1: certain days when you go to school early far in
Speaker 1: the year, the street light would come on before it's
Speaker 1: done outside. So we've been playing touch football. He run
Speaker 1: like on the catch the ball and he would just
Speaker 1: run past all the way back to the stool. We're like,
Speaker 1: what the fun? But we he just his dad growing up.
Speaker 1: I'd be like, man, I hate that mother kill him.
Speaker 1: He was like looking at me like you're gonna do
Speaker 1: it later. You do appreciate it because those things. Look,
Speaker 1: he was three years older than me and he couldn't
Speaker 1: leave the block. So when I came back and I
Speaker 1: had all these experiences, I was talking to him about
Speaker 1: it was a known drug location for twenty years that
Speaker 1: I was up to block. To him back, this is
Speaker 1: when I'm twelve seeing all of the ship you ain't
Speaker 1: supposed to be seeing. And he didn't get a chance
Speaker 1: to see it because he had to be on the block.
Speaker 1: They went to become a lawyer. The way he was
Speaker 1: studying for law, and very becose. It prevented the things didn't.
Speaker 1: But your see the difference, you see, Like you said,
Speaker 1: I was going there at our years old to see
Speaker 1: some ship that he was in seat with me and
Speaker 1: my brother. The ship we were seen was at home.
Speaker 1: Where do you go from there? At that time eighties, nineties,
Speaker 1: dang violence all the time high. My dad would tell
Speaker 1: us like, don't be here on with these sucking bumps
Speaker 1: all the time. You're not gonna be one of these bumps.
Speaker 1: You're not gonna be one of these bumbs on the corner.
Speaker 1: And uh, I guess we were not going to be
Speaker 1: one of those bumps in the corner. I guess we're
Speaker 1: gonna be something else, and which is weird. He would
Speaker 1: say that at the same time and be like, now,
Speaker 1: go get me those pounds, or go get me that
Speaker 1: bag of money, and go go give me those guns.
Speaker 1: You know. But I don't even think we thought marijuana
Speaker 1: was like a bad thing, right, well, else it was
Speaker 1: a plant that stunk. There's no Internet, there's no people
Speaker 1: explaining to you about what drug dealing is. You know,
Speaker 1: here we are in with this stinking in the middle
Speaker 1: of Americans, in the big city metropolis like Chicago with
Speaker 1: the drug business, right and I mean, you know, my
Speaker 1: dad went from heroin f marijuana. I guess because it
Speaker 1: was the easiest. Was like I could invest you know,
Speaker 1: tan grand or five grand and come back and make
Speaker 1: you know, a hundred grand. It was like, as soon
Speaker 1: as he got home, he was like back at it
Speaker 1: to that look we looked back when you didn't even
Speaker 1: wait a year. Their father began the twins education at
Speaker 1: the age of seven by taking them on his regular
Speaker 1: runs from Little Village, Chicago across the Mexican border them
Speaker 1: back again. All look, it was a three thousand mile
Speaker 1: round trip when we first it. Mentally, I remember and
Speaker 1: really he was like next, you know, we're in the
Speaker 1: middle of a desert, a desert, and there there's other
Speaker 1: cars and they're like all on the open and they're loading,
Speaker 1: they're loading, they're they're compressing marijuana bills, they're they're drying
Speaker 1: up the actually the drying up like it's a whole
Speaker 1: little factory. Like we did everything that you could think
Speaker 1: about when it came to drug did it from the
Speaker 1: loading up or even the cultivating of the marijuana in
Speaker 1: Mexico all the way to the last drop of who
Speaker 1: was actually gonna receive marijuana back in the state. And
Speaker 1: it was translating, if it was you know, transporting, if
Speaker 1: it was counting the money, it was bagging up the
Speaker 1: marijuana into pounds, every single thing that had to do
Speaker 1: with Druggingly, he took us. He showed us he we
Speaker 1: were there with him. Remember them compressing the bills. If
Speaker 1: we have seen they had coke bottles when they were
Speaker 1: fitting up these spray bottles. I mean, what's the quotable
Speaker 1: quota for it? We spray that too, compressed the way
Speaker 1: to make a stick together like Colca coola. Okay, it's
Speaker 1: nice long drive through like thats a you know, coming
Speaker 1: back from where we're from, and it would be like
Speaker 1: a maybe ten hour drive to the border. You a
Speaker 1: crossing border at Laredo. Oh, it was a learning experience
Speaker 1: though every state. My dad was like he knew exactly
Speaker 1: what every state did, what they cultivated, what they were
Speaker 1: known for in the states and in Mexico. So it
Speaker 1: was a learning experience. Yeah, who tell us about the cattle,
Speaker 1: and we'll ask so many questions right the whole trip,
Speaker 1: I was always learning, Ernie. So getting to the board,
Speaker 1: I remember like I was getting sick on the way
Speaker 1: back home because that marijuana wet Mary want to smell,
Speaker 1: smells different than like smokes. It just had this ugly
Speaker 1: like smell to it. Then we get you know, car sick.
Speaker 1: You know that smell didn't help would draw up, you know,
Speaker 1: it was just it was kind of hard. I remember
Speaker 1: getting to the border. I remember feeling that anxiety and
Speaker 1: dance and not understanding but knowing that just hearing the conversation,
Speaker 1: that having that feeling where okay, we're next in line,
Speaker 1: and the customer agent coming to the car, you know,
Speaker 1: American citizens, where you guys head it. Remember pulling us
Speaker 1: out the car and separating my brother and I from
Speaker 1: my parents. But me and my brother knew exactly had
Speaker 1: it played off. What could you guys go to who
Speaker 1: are your parents? You know, just the question to make
Speaker 1: sure that we were A market says, to make sure
Speaker 1: that they were our parents. I guess we passed the test. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I remember that later and we're like, let's just pretend
Speaker 1: we're sleeping. And I think that because of most of
Speaker 1: the time, we're pretty kind to be like I told
Speaker 1: them that the kids are sleeping in the back. You
Speaker 1: now go ahead, go through. We didn't notice that. My
Speaker 1: dad he handled it pretty well, but I can't. It
Speaker 1: would get nervous as well. I remember this time when
Speaker 1: we have a car full of drugs and we pull
Speaker 1: up h m h and everyone American Saysians. My dad said, yes, sir,
Speaker 1: my dad Namerpans says, and my dad, you just told
Speaker 1: him the Americans says that I did, and we're like, okay,
Speaker 1: he's nervous. He was nervous. I see him here. Sometimes
Speaker 1: he'll buy the hot pepper peppers for some reason, and
Speaker 1: if he was nervous, he'll buy it. I started, He'll
Speaker 1: started eating it just like that. He started. You don't
Speaker 1: have to. I guess to get his mind up of
Speaker 1: I don't know. I guess it helped him to kind
Speaker 1: of calm the nerves. And I remember also thinking like,
Speaker 1: once we're across those high stakes places, when we're at
Speaker 1: our worst with anxiety, then he'll stop to rest, and
Speaker 1: I'll be like this, he has to stop to rest.
Speaker 1: Can we just get home. When we did make it across,
Speaker 1: you would say we need steak, we need great state dinner.
Speaker 1: I remember he orders these people's steaks like we could eat,
Speaker 1: and he just wanted to make sure, like this is
Speaker 1: what the reward is, like I guess, like a sign
Speaker 1: to go, you're gonna eat good. Why do you think
Speaker 1: he took you? I honestly, I think it helped him.
Speaker 1: I don't think he was thinking like, oh, my teaching
Speaker 1: kids a drug business. It was teaching us everything enough
Speaker 1: the highway system. Oh he give us here, you know,
Speaker 1: and usful to him to have us with him. Of course,
Speaker 1: no doubt. At those times, people were like, yeah, he
Speaker 1: wouldn't do that to his kids, and don't forget in
Speaker 1: those eighties, you know, Twinson realized comment that's today. So
Speaker 1: we were a big deal for a long time. It's
Speaker 1: so easy to remember saying things for us. We did
Speaker 1: just fifty times when I don't want one to three,
Speaker 1: we did. Actually my dad take three cars at a time,
Speaker 1: so we would go across the border because across the border,
Speaker 1: get off, across the border, walking, go pick up the
Speaker 1: next car, across the border again, because he didn't trust
Speaker 1: the driver, like I don't want to cross the board
Speaker 1: said some cars had double gas tanks. I got back up,
Speaker 1: you know, because they took up a lot of gas,
Speaker 1: and I keep those carder the easier wants to use
Speaker 1: for a drug dealer. But there was an easier once
Speaker 1: for police officers to be you have this car because
Speaker 1: it has two gas things, what's in use? And I
Speaker 1: think that my dad knew that he was to take
Speaker 1: that chance. But his more successful trip roup with smaller cars,
Speaker 1: compact cars that that's who were like trusts that he
Speaker 1: could fit. The first he used it was like a
Speaker 1: four temple, a four temple, a four or four temple,
Speaker 1: like a two tone like blah, It was like eighty
Speaker 1: and look for our first trip, eight hundred pounds and
Speaker 1: you might think, well, eight hundred pounds and you're bringing
Speaker 1: it from Mexico at that time, he probably spent a
Speaker 1: thousand dollars. Yeah, made sixties seventy tholland dollars. I love money.
Speaker 1: It's a lot of money from not all of them,
Speaker 1: but now that money. He loves that marijuana business. He
Speaker 1: was like, this business would mean you money. It grows on,
Speaker 1: trade might go down trades and he's like, you don't
Speaker 1: invest a lot, you don't lose a lot. You know.
Speaker 1: All that start on what was that year that too
Speaker 1: when our an was Radiobu chicaw put his department. The
Speaker 1: Chicago police found two hundred pounds of marijuana at the
Speaker 1: family home with the street value of over a million dollars.
Speaker 1: My older brother took could blame the first time. The
Speaker 1: second time they came, they're the ones that will take
Speaker 1: the blame fame. That's where my dad was on human
Speaker 1: un Eleven years old, j and Pete were pulled out
Speaker 1: of school by their now fugitive dad and along with
Speaker 1: them more and were forced to do one more trip
Speaker 1: to Mexico. This time it was so Margarito Flores Sr.
Speaker 1: Could live as a freeman. They wouldn't be returning to
Speaker 1: America for only enough Mexico is also where he started
Speaker 1: his cash that he built from thirty years and the
Speaker 1: drug trade. We got to see my dad, you know,
Speaker 1: and he was like having to gambling, you know. He
Speaker 1: liked horse races and um. He liked to back up
Speaker 1: his big mouth. You know, He'll say something and he'll
Speaker 1: go through with it, like I'll bet you my car.
Speaker 1: He introduced us to everyone and we knew exactly how
Speaker 1: to speak to you. Nice to meet you. He's are
Speaker 1: my sons, and we were here so many stories about
Speaker 1: how rich my dad was back in the sixties. He's
Speaker 1: the only one that had a car. He's not even
Speaker 1: the governor to use his car or driving the governor.
Speaker 1: And he owned more land in the state than anyone else.
Speaker 1: I remember it was funny that I was a kid
Speaker 1: and there's a big daddy on some marcles. It's called
Speaker 1: the fat of some marcles and oscans. It's like the
Speaker 1: biggest festivals, you know in Mexico, and gambing is huge there.
Speaker 1: You have cock fights and gambles, tune dollars fight. Think
Speaker 1: about that. Oh yeah, there's even at our age you
Speaker 1: can go to a horse race and gamble a hundred
Speaker 1: thousand with dollars you know, it's just weird, like would
Speaker 1: tell me like that was like the big thing to do,
Speaker 1: like gamble money, hundred dollars, game of poker, like one hand,
Speaker 1: nothing to walk away from it. There was a kind
Speaker 1: of introduction of Mexico right he's introductions. People were meeting people.
Speaker 1: We understand the culture, we understand the respect and how
Speaker 1: to treat people, how to talk to people and all
Speaker 1: that stuff. And even though we looked in their views
Speaker 1: like America in kids, those people started looking at a
Speaker 1: little bit different when they went in school in Mexico.
Speaker 1: The dad sent the twins to spend their evenings and
Speaker 1: weekends doing hard labor on a chicken farm. They were
Speaker 1: the youngest workers there, though not by much. The rest
Speaker 1: of the workforce were also at varying stages of puberty.
Speaker 1: Heavy machinery and trucks were being operated by twelve year olds.
Speaker 1: It was almost the hardest thing I had ever done
Speaker 1: as a kid. And I would see other kids like
Speaker 1: my age, like working in man. There's there's strong they
Speaker 1: need to do this, like notham, I'm dying. We will
Speaker 1: be like this is so stupid. Do you want to
Speaker 1: find a better answer? That was started to kind of
Speaker 1: like to Mexico, we weren't happier. It's a big, drastic change.
Speaker 1: They spent every chance they could on the phone to
Speaker 1: the older brother, Armando. He was just twenty three himself,
Speaker 1: begging to come home to Chicago. I'll never forget that
Speaker 1: conversation he actually called. And at that we're like the
Speaker 1: only house, one of all the house some towns. I
Speaker 1: had a phone, Hey, what are you doing? I'mlike nothing.
Speaker 1: I probably give him the side voice like board. He's like,
Speaker 1: you want to come back home? He said, I'll bring
Speaker 1: you back comb only if you agree that I'm not
Speaker 1: gonna be a babysitting. You can come, you can go
Speaker 1: to school, you can be out the way. I want
Speaker 1: to hear. No, bs, I don't have time for that.
Speaker 1: If you and p could promised me to get in
Speaker 1: a comment and not give me a hard time and
Speaker 1: do everything saying respect the rules, I'll buy your planet
Speaker 1: because you come back home tomorrow. How would the twelve?
Speaker 1: I was like, yeah, for sure, for sure? And what
Speaker 1: about your parents? What did you? Oh? He said, let
Speaker 1: me speak to my mom was and she understood. She
Speaker 1: wanted to see us happy, and my dad was just like, well,
Speaker 1: I can't go back, so like whatever, thank whatever, you know,
Speaker 1: their mama's says, it's okay. After a year of complaining,
Speaker 1: j and Pete were able to head back home to
Speaker 1: Chicago and live with Armando, who was still active in
Speaker 1: the Latin Kings. My dad actually, even though he was
Speaker 1: on the run, he'd come back. He came back with
Speaker 1: an alias and unexpectedly show up and and say, look,
Speaker 1: I got a hundred pounds of my I wanna okay,
Speaker 1: what was that right? When he showed up for us?
Speaker 1: I mean, yeah, we will be like, oh my god,
Speaker 1: can you just did this again? That would hurt us though,
Speaker 1: that was like hurt us. Allowed my older brother he
Speaker 1: brought us back and he build out the basement for us,
Speaker 1: and because an apartment and your older brother's house. My
Speaker 1: older brother actually bought my parents house in the neighborhood.
Speaker 1: He said two rules for us. Don't get caught for curfew,
Speaker 1: you know the city curfew, which was ten thirty in
Speaker 1: the weekdays, eleven thirty the weekends. The city case you
Speaker 1: because of the because again gangs, So stay out of
Speaker 1: trouble and help out however you could. That was simple.
Speaker 1: We're not telling me Kase, What was it like living
Speaker 1: in his in the basement that he built you there
Speaker 1: for you don't write we front God, right. You guys
Speaker 1: into Catholic school and they've created they considers to be
Speaker 1: like gang members. And I always like to have a haircut.
Speaker 1: And they said, well, if you come to school with
Speaker 1: your haircut, you can. We're gonna make you wear a
Speaker 1: shower cat came to school. There's a shower camp was
Speaker 1: a pink one with flowers, and give it to me.
Speaker 1: I'm aware, no way. And everybody would laugh weekend week out.
Speaker 1: I wonder because eventually they're like, he's not gonna give it,
Speaker 1: like they should give you the shower cut. Bro. It
Speaker 1: was for a long time. I did wor shower cup
Speaker 1: every week. When my hair will start going out, I'll
Speaker 1: take it off and now I'll go get another haircut,
Speaker 1: wear it again. I could look back and see him
Speaker 1: sitting there, you know, as shower and how he said
Speaker 1: in eighth grade third um, I didn't mean to this
Speaker 1: perspect to school. It was about me saying that's what
Speaker 1: I like and that's what I'm gonna stand for. And
Speaker 1: and it was a learning experience. Once I did it,
Speaker 1: it gave me a little confidence to it, Okay, being
Speaker 1: able to kind of stick up for herself and give
Speaker 1: your plan name help help kind of start developing who
Speaker 1: we were later and who who we're going to be,
Speaker 1: and why we looked at in a certain way. And
Speaker 1: it's gonna be like the foundation of I think that's
Speaker 1: today right, why we actually say here kind of bag
Speaker 1: for them to give us a chance because they thought
Speaker 1: we were not the fait. I mean the principal knew
Speaker 1: of like she could see who my brother was. He
Speaker 1: knew who we were, and I don't think it that
Speaker 1: was a good fair for the school. I remember being
Speaker 1: so upset, like because I was thinking to my brother like,
Speaker 1: oh man, they're gonna transfer your school. Man, I think
Speaker 1: you said that they would you have to do. And
Speaker 1: then because the final they transferred of us, I was like,
Speaker 1: it's like my eighth crazy, Like it was upsetting. I
Speaker 1: think it was the beginning of what I call always
Speaker 1: being caught in this middle right, and this middle ground
Speaker 1: is gray zone that here we're on Catholic school when
Speaker 1: most of those kids were good kids, right, and here
Speaker 1: we come to them. We were two street and in
Speaker 1: the school we went, so there was young hood kids
Speaker 1: there now here we are in this place where we're two.
Speaker 1: I guess bad for the good kids. But yeah, we're
Speaker 1: too good for the bad kids. We're gonna be stuck
Speaker 1: in this zone. I think many times, even to this day,
Speaker 1: my older brother he had people coming to the house
Speaker 1: all day. B D. We started meeting all kinds of people,
Speaker 1: you know, in his business. He would sell cocaine out
Speaker 1: the house. It's a bag of cocaine. And he was
Speaker 1: also selling ketoes at the same time. Around that time,
Speaker 1: just we met Marron Thompson, who was ahead of a
Speaker 1: streaking these big you know names in the Chicago in
Speaker 1: the streets, like we've been knowing him since we were
Speaker 1: ten years old. You know, he is up becoming like
Speaker 1: the owning creator of the charter slide. He's fighting like
Speaker 1: a case. You know. I think it was like some
Speaker 1: kind of attempted murder and a police officer or something
Speaker 1: like that. You know, we're marling like what everyone, that's
Speaker 1: just him. That's when we start me a lot of
Speaker 1: people from seeing a lot of for sure, miles from
Speaker 1: the closest Mexican border. Even members of l Chapos in
Speaker 1: a lower cartel would stop by the house. As teenagers,
Speaker 1: they were already connected to the biggest drug lord in
Speaker 1: the world without even knowing. KA nine, my older brother
Speaker 1: to all like a lot two kilos on informat and
Speaker 1: he was arrested by the d e A that left
Speaker 1: us in her situation and we depended on him, you know,
Speaker 1: he was our provider view them when he got arrested.
Speaker 1: It was with him. He had this car lot it
Speaker 1: was I was signing partner and that he used to
Speaker 1: work at on the West side of Chicago. He used
Speaker 1: that as a spot where it was convenient for him
Speaker 1: to some drugs and at that time he was probably
Speaker 1: he was probably moving, you know easy a the month.
Speaker 1: I still remember that that day in the afternoon, he's
Speaker 1: sitting down at the desk. He saw so many cars
Speaker 1: at that time. Everybody loved my brother. He's just so
Speaker 1: people presenting the car that held a big office for
Speaker 1: surrounding windows. Man. I remember looking at the window and
Speaker 1: I saw the Lincoln town car come inside, but you
Speaker 1: can't see I couldn't see inside. They just like came
Speaker 1: into a dry room like part like where the cars
Speaker 1: come in and out, and I'm like looking out and
Speaker 1: when I turned to my left. I saw a white band.
Speaker 1: I saw a bunch of agents coming. Yeare at the
Speaker 1: office door. Get down, get downe the the other one
Speaker 1: down on the ground. They'd short of supremacism. They had
Speaker 1: me handcuffed in for a little bit. Oh do you
Speaker 1: that I had just turned seventeen. I remember being nervous,
Speaker 1: like what's at the house or whatever the case is,
Speaker 1: like what's going on? So they took him and I
Speaker 1: remember they took him to that Tom Cark and they
Speaker 1: put me to the garage. He said, what do you
Speaker 1: know about your brother? Do you know where he had
Speaker 1: his trugs? Of Like, no, no, no, no, I don't
Speaker 1: know what you're talking about. And he said, we know
Speaker 1: that you're always with your brother. He said, we hope
Speaker 1: we don't find that that you're involved with his business,
Speaker 1: me involved with him? This is like, what are you
Speaker 1: talking about? Did you not see yourselves? I was like
Speaker 1: seeing business? Yeah, And he just he just were his
Speaker 1: brothers right when it's only been in the house and
Speaker 1: you know, hey, and what are you talking about? And
Speaker 1: and he was taken away. It was hard. I think
Speaker 1: it was hard for all of us. You know. I
Speaker 1: was worried about my brother just like wow, like it
Speaker 1: was a shocker, Like damn, my brother got to go.
Speaker 1: Was seemed like everyone wanted to take a spot right away,
Speaker 1: some way, somehow, and everyone wanted to be him. I
Speaker 1: guess not too long after that, a couple of months
Speaker 1: was when we first got approached by his connect ye
Speaker 1: drug supplier with opportunity to to get in the business.
Speaker 1: I knew my brother were like, you know, we're in
Speaker 1: theia really, I mean we we felt where we knew
Speaker 1: some of like like to cook details, like a whole
Speaker 1: different bargame. You know. It wasn't just that cocaine came
Speaker 1: knocking on their door. Their older brother, Armando, might have
Speaker 1: been an alright drug peddler, but he was not very
Speaker 1: good at managing the family's finances. Their kitchen table was
Speaker 1: covered not only were weeks of empty take our boxes,
Speaker 1: but mounds of red inked papers. When Armando went to prison,
Speaker 1: the twins were let to fend for themselves, and they
Speaker 1: suddenly became responsible for years of unpaid household bills, mortgage, electricity, gas,
Speaker 1: and an almost three thousand dollar phone bill. Yeah, I'm
Speaker 1: sixteen years old, I'm ten years old, and you know
Speaker 1: there's ten thousand dollars where four bills on the table.
Speaker 1: I mean, working at Walmart wasn't going to cover that.
Speaker 1: And it just felt like everything was settled. Like if
Speaker 1: someone comes in, you know, and invites you to make money,
Speaker 1: and you have the opportunity to make thirty tho dollars
Speaker 1: enough day, it's hard when you're you know, seventeen years
Speaker 1: old to pass that up. You know, your naturalistic kicks
Speaker 1: and like what I learned to do kicks and you
Speaker 1: go to doing what you and I guess we're bred
Speaker 1: to do. You're going talk. But like I think what
Speaker 1: you see the labras and retrievers, they go out and
Speaker 1: they bring back. You fetch them a ball and they
Speaker 1: will fetch you. They bring you back to you, you
Speaker 1: throw the ball. They do it over and over again,
Speaker 1: because that's what they're training to do, that's what it's
Speaker 1: in there blood. They do it naturally. You don't have
Speaker 1: to teach them. I felt like that, like we're just
Speaker 1: on autopilot, just doing it and again, you know, feeling
Speaker 1: that void and my brother left and taking care of
Speaker 1: the family, you know, remb you said to me, and
Speaker 1: it always sticks in my head. If we were from
Speaker 1: a family of lawyers. We would have been lawyers. So
Speaker 1: we went. My dad was sending drugs, my brothers are
Speaker 1: selling drugs. Um in a way, it was a family business.
Speaker 1: My mom and we all knew, you know, what was
Speaker 1: going on in the family. And sadly I always say that,
Speaker 1: you know, no one ever told me to stop. So
Speaker 1: I felt like you've done the right thing. Three months
Speaker 1: into our drug traffic careers, three four months, we're making
Speaker 1: a million dollars. To be clear, we never count the
Speaker 1: money we had spent. We kind the only we had saved.
Speaker 1: When we say we made a million dollars, because we
Speaker 1: had a million dollars saved, that we're spending a lot
Speaker 1: that how much do we make by then? Who knows?
Speaker 1: We're probably in a couple of million dollars. There was
Speaker 1: times like in the Big Emmy where I used to think, well,
Speaker 1: I go back to a regular dropt and you go
Speaker 1: out at eighteen years old with you know, I didn't
Speaker 1: know where to care. I have to be here here
Speaker 1: care of this money for me because it didn't from
Speaker 1: my pockets. This is before man bags and your influences
Speaker 1: are the people that have done the best around you
Speaker 1: have done it in this path. The path looked about it.
Speaker 1: It looks like a route like and you said in
Speaker 1: the early stages, you making decisions, when for me it
Speaker 1: was girl hustle I was twelve. Is because everybody that
Speaker 1: I saw it from my mom was it were from
Speaker 1: my mom's life, and she had already chose to go
Speaker 1: down that path to take care of me. And there
Speaker 1: was always they had nicer things like you see things.
Speaker 1: They were representing financial freedom. You don't see it represented
Speaker 1: in the neighborhood growing up unless they're done. Mha. The
Speaker 1: brothers are fascinating, at least to me. Their cooperation helped
Speaker 1: to take down one of the world's most notorious criminals.
Speaker 1: He and his brother visited l Chopo, where they saw
Speaker 1: a naked dead man chain to a tree, a reminder
Speaker 1: that those who crossed the cartel rarely live to talk
Speaker 1: about it. I just imagine that that wasn't in that world.
Speaker 1: That would have probably been a regular person, right, regular person.
Speaker 1: And I am a regular person, just full of ideas,
Speaker 1: full of you know, aspiration myself and once and just
Speaker 1: I happened to add me born into this world. It's
Speaker 1: part of my story. This is who we are. Just
Speaker 1: in my life. Keep it here. The story is Just
Speaker 1: Gets Started Surviving l Chapo, The Twins who brought down
Speaker 1: a drug lad is hosted by Curtis fifty cent Jackson
Speaker 1: and me Charlie Webster. Our producers are myself alongside Jackson mcclennan.
Speaker 1: Research and editorial support is from Casey Hurtz. Edit and
Speaker 1: sound design by Nico Palella. Original score by Ryan Sorenson.
Speaker 1: Audio provided by Very Tone and Next Star Media, Inc.
Speaker 1: Executive produced by Curtis fifty cent Jackson and myself Charlie Webster.
Speaker 1: If you'd like to know more about this story, head
Speaker 1: over to lions Gate Sound dot com. Curtis fifty cent
Speaker 1: Jackson presents a lions Gate Sound and G Unit audio
Speaker 1: production exclusively for I Heart Podcast