Drug kingpin Pablo Escobar’s top hitman has died after a battle with cancer.
Jhon Jairo Velasquez Vasquez, known as “Popeye,” died Thursday morning from cancer at the age of 57. He had been hospitalized in Colombia since New Year’s Eve for esophageal cancer that spread to his stomach.
Velasquez was known for his brutality when Escobar ran the Medellin cartel during the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s. He was imprisoned for the 1989 assassination of presidential candidate Luis Carlos Galan and sentenced to 30 years. He later admitted to 300 killings and coordinating 3,000 more while working for the “King of Cocaine.”
Velasquez was released from prison in 2014 and became a popular YouTube personality with over 1 million subscribers. In 2005, he published the book Surviving Pablo Escobar: ‘Popeye’ The Hitman 23 Years and 3 Months in Prison.
“I am repentant and determined to help build the truth for those who lived the reality of the Medellin of the ’80s and ’90s firsthand,” Velasquez said on his website. “I wake up daily and with the decision to show the scars that make me what I am but do not define what I will be today and tomorrow.”
The former hitman’s freedom did not last long, and he was arrested again in 2018 after being tied to criminal conspiracies and extortion.
Escobar, who at his peak was worth as much as $30 billion and supplied 80% of the world’s cocaine, died in a 1993 shootout with Colombian security forces. The Medellin cartel fragmented after the kingpin’s death.
