Word: escobars
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...eight members of the Search Block broke into a remote farmhouse two hours outside Medellin. "We were sure we had him surrounded," a police official told the press. But the kingpin melted away at the last minute. His trackers were so close that Escobar was forced to leave behind two briefcases filled with soap, T shirts, blue jeans and dark glasses. There were also letters from his nine-year-old daughter Manuela -- "Dear Papa, I miss you a lot and wish I could see you" -- and his son Juan Pablo, 16. And there was a letter in Escobar's handwriting...
...neither his slipperiness nor his offers to pay $27,000 for each Search ; Block officer killed could prevent the systematic liquidation of 26 of Escobar's closest collaborators. By last Wednesday, Escobar's 44th birthday, he had been a fugitive for 499 days and was growing weary; ulcer medicine found in the house where he was killed indicates he was also unwell...
...distress, Escobar was growing panicky about the safety of his family. In recent weeks, his brother-in-law had been killed by police and his children's teacher had been murdered by PEPES, a vigilante group thought to comprise former colleagues whom the drug lord had betrayed, but also to include hit men from the rival Cali drug cartel. Fearing they would be next, his wife and children fled early last week to Germany, seeking asylum; they were promptly deported back to Bogota...
...That led Escobar to two fatal mistakes. First, he called a Medellin radio station to complain about the "lack of solidarity by the German government." On Thursday, he dared to phone his family at Room 2908 in the Residencias Tequendama to say, "I'm fine," and advise them to "stay in Bogota for the time being." His wife, Maria Victoria Henao de Escobar, wished him a happy birthday and urged him to be careful. Within 90 minutes the calls had been traced through a scanning operation set up outside Medellin with U.S.-donated equipment. The high-tech equipment pinpointed...
...than risk a mass operation, the Search Block sent a small 17-man contingent to surround the house. They cut off telephones in the area so no lookout could call in a warning. Two armed officers loitered outside the suspect house until a teenager, described as a nephew of Escobar's, appeared at the door with lunch. The two swiftly slipped inside the front door with the youth, while four more police smashed through the carved-wood garage door. They entered shooting...