The Underworld Podcast - Cattle Rustlers to Cocaine Kings: Los Cachiros

Episode Date: November 18, 2025

When feds convicted Honduran cocaine kingpin Juan Matta Ballesteros in 1990, authorities hoped it would spell an end to the Central American nation’s growing reputation as a narco state — a status that had caused havoc across the region. Those hopes were dashed almost immediately — and not just by Matta’s family, who carried on his legacy of cartel wheeler-dealing. In the jungles of eastern Honduras, another power was on the rise, forging ties with crooked cops and banking magnates. The Cachiros were a family of cattle rustlers, whose rural smarts and ruthlessness would make them some of the most unlikely leaders in cartel history. But they would fall almost as quickly as they had risen, as US agents went on a rampage. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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An odd site, perhaps, but not that odd. This place is really rural, a few scattered villages in the shadow of a mountain, surrounded by jungle, and almost six hours from the capital city to Gusei Galpa. But the plane taxis, turns and parks outside a farm, a farm belonging to Ramon, Matta, Bay Osteros. Recognize the name? He's the son of Juan Mata Bayesteros, Honduras' most famous narco, cartel matchmaker, political puppet master, and, since 1990, a resident of the U.S. penitentiary Canaan in Pennsylvania.

Back then, Mata the Elder was one of the biggest scalps in America's war on drugs. Lawmakers had taken triumphantly to the media, heralding the end of the Honduran narco state. They were wrong. In Latin America, drugs are a family business. And in Honduras, where the ties between narcos, corrupt politicians and military leaders are tied to the leather harness in the Kansas kink club, there was just too much money flowing through the matter cartel for anything to actually end upon his arrest. Ten years previous, in 1993,

Mattas' brother-in-law had been arrested for shipping huge quantity of coke into the US via Costa Rica. And now, in 2003, as the planes' engines die and Campesinos emerged from the farm to load it with bales of valuable cargo, investigators are beginning to realise that tiny Honduras never got over its addiction to drug money. Everybody, even the president of the nation himself, is in on the take. And despite the attempts of a valiant view, the country is already hurtling towards murder, mayhem, and a military coup that will change the face of the region's trafficking. for decades to come. This is the Underworld podcast.

Hello, everyone, and welcome to the weekly crime podcast that trades in facts and not speculation, which combined with poor personal and financial choices is why neither of its hosts will ever achieve true wealth. I am Sean Williams, and as you can see, I am in New York City with Danny Gold. This is exciting, pretty new, weird, isn't it? Yeah, yeah, yeah. We're going to tell you very little about the past few days in the United. New York, except the stake at five leaves is pretty solid, and they should probably add at least another

bathroom. Yeah, look at this. Sean in New York in the Spotify Studios for the first time. First off, Kansas King Club, I don't even know what that entails. Sounds good, though, doesn't it? If you've been to one or if they exist. Second off, yes, Sean's first time ever here in Spotify Studios recording with us. It is bright, though, right? Like, I'm warranted in wearing the sunglasses sometimes. Yeah, yeah, sometimes. Yeah, yeah. So I put them on right now? Yeah, go on, don't do it. It's like, there are lights here, guys.

You can't, it's bright in this studio. I'll take them off, don't worry. This is a monumental occasion having Sean here. I thought there would be some sort of celebration or moments in Spotify when we walked in. But it turns out only like two or three people who work here actually know or care who we are. So, uh, we did get a bunch of free snacks, though, so that's always great. Yeah, as for our weekend here, I still feel deep amounts of shame. It's been like four or five days.

of what transpired between me and Sean and audio producer Dale on our night out in Brooklyn. Sean may have gotten thrown out of somewhere that you really should not get thrown out of. We might have made some new friends in the parking lot that we probably shouldn't have that told us a lot about the crimes they've committed in Canada. Yeah.

So don't do that to strangers if you're allegedly on the run. I don't even know. If I could go back in time, though, I would probably not have gone through with that night or would have liked to have woken up somewhere where there was like a puppy or something else to make me feel better. But none of that came true.

Anyway, glad to have you here, but I'm going to take this off. It could have, that night could have ended way earlier. But anyway, it didn't, and we are cool grown-ups with great lives. Moving on, in addition to these shows, if you want to get bonus interviews, episodes, ad-reys shows, Show notes, reading lists, head over to patreon.com slash the Underworld Podcast, where you can get all that for just a few bucks a month. And judging by the price of everything in the States, isn't it expensive in New York?

What an original thought. Yeah, it's pretty good value to get on our Patreon. And no, I won't leave a Google review for your $7 flat white, Mr. Brooklyn Cafe Man. And you guys can still buy teas, hoodies, mugs at our website, UnderworldPod.com, and set us emails. We've had tons of good ones lately. the Underworld podcast at gmail.com there's way worse stuff to spend you money on

right, Danny, like actually, yeah, just a few miles from the studio, there's quite a lot more. No more, dude, I can't, I can't do this at my age anymore. I got to stop. No, we should, yeah, we should probably stop talking about that for the rest of our lives. Yeah, yeah. Anyway, Honduras, a few weeks ago,

we did a show about the rise and fall of Juan Mata Bay Asteroztheros, a pickpocket who became an emerald smuggler, then got involved in cocaine, connected Colombian coca producers with distributors in Mexico and the US, and he did a fair bit of international drug trafficking himself. We also got into the history of Honduras, how its elites leveraged their connections to colonial administrators and later foreign fruit magnates to reap all of the country's wealth and dominate its politics, which, in turn, made them incredibly easy to corrupt and either turn a blind eye to or get involved in the cocaine trade.

So if you haven't know where you listen to that show, it might give you a good bit of background knowledge for this one, but you can also enjoy this one alone. But that episode ended, as I mentioned in the cold open and with the 1990 conviction of matter for trafficking and other charges and the hopes by many that it would bring an end to Honduras's position as one of Latin America's premier narco stays. Turns out not a good hope to have.

Wish I could have gone back in time and bet on that if like Kalshi or Polly Market exist. Which Kalshi or Polly Market, you should be sponsored. talking out. It's like, we are your geopolitical gambling guys right here. Make it, make it happen. Even given the show we're going to record after this. Yeah. Yeah. Anyway, for pour a lot of cold water on the hope and the aspirations of law enforcement and some people in Honduras. Yeah, that hope that things would end with the narco state stuff. It ends. It does end. The hope ends. The hope ends. Yeah, not the cocaine trafficking. Not the cocaine trafficking. Not the cocaine. It's the hope that kills you, and it's the knowing that the hope will kill you that kills you,

in the words of Jackson Lamb. Anyway, here's the book, bribes, bullets, and intimidation, which I used a lot for the Mata episode. It goes, quote, all who harbored hopes that the removal of Juan Ramon, Mataballis Stiros, would substantially curb Honduran drug trafficking, was soon disappointed. In fact, as the cocaine trade took hold, Mata had often been traveling abroad. Many traffickers, foreign and domestic, recognize the significant bridge-favoring factors associated with Honduran transshipment. Some, like the Rodriguez-Orejuela brothers leading the Cali cartel,

had already successfully trans-ship large quantities of cocaine through the country and were poised to capitalize further. Thus, the cocaine flow continued a pace after matters removal. I've always got to be careful when reading these dense academic books and quoting them that it's quite hard to actually say them out loud. And people turn out. And people should realize that when they write books. Anyway, yeah, that's a bit of a uh-oh for everyone involved in trying to smash the drug trade in Honduras.

Now, when Juan Matabeasthiras is arrested, Honduras doesn't even have a law on the books to go after the proceeds of crime, which is nuts. So despite him sitting in a US prison, his empire, which stretches in some places as far as Spain, it just keeps rolling on. His brother-in-law is arrested in 1993 for shipping product from Costa Rica into the US, and the following year, Honduras finally does christen the proceeds of crime law, and officials start hunting down matters mountain of cash, and they seize his properties into Goosey Galper.

What's interesting is that I think back then, like I assume, like it really was mountains of like cold hard cash. It wasn't now where like everything's just numbers on a screen. You could have gone out to like his properties. I mean, I don't know how protected they were. just started like digging around the backyard like like tony you know when they're digging out and probably found mountains and mountains of cash i mean that's always such a fascinating element of like being a a drug like a massive drug dealer back in those days what actually to do with all of the bills that you had you know there's those stories of like rats getting to something just eating

like millions and millions of dollars of bills and stuff like that so maybe it's still out there buried somewhere in plastic yeah yeah let's just go find it let's have another fun night out but in Honduras. It's going to take incredibly, right, until 1998 for officials there to pass a law criminalizing the laundering of narcotics-related proceeds. However, writes the U.S. Embassy cable, quote, weaknesses in the law, including the narrow definition of money laundering, have made it virtually impossible to successfully prosecute the crime.

So, yeah, plus Soshenge. Honduran leaders have to be dragged, kicking and screaming into passing these laws. much less enforcing them because obviously they're all on a take. Just like the country's cops chronically underpaid and unwilling to investigate increasingly deadly drug cartels. You see, all through this period, murder rates are rising through Honduras. And part of that reason is this crumbling state capacity, soaring corruption. Another reason is guns. So a big reason that Juan Matam-Balisteros has managed to become so successful

was by getting protection from the US by using his own airline to ship guns, ammo and personnel to Nicaragua anti-communists, the so-called Contras, during their civil war. That conflict had ended in 1990, as Americans were coming to terms with the Iran-Contra affair, but it leaves a shit-ton, I mean, I think that's the technical term, a shit-ton of weapons and ammunition in Honduras, ready to be, one, used by organized crime, and two, to be sold for huge profits to rebels in neighboring countries. Most notably, Colombia's leftist FARC. So this creates a Tinderbox, of course.

Not only do this huge weapon cachets, by some counts there are over half a million guns in a country of 6.5 million people, not only do they make them richer and more dangerous, but they also tool up the FARC and other rebels in cocaine producing areas of the Andes, meaning that everybody who's making or selling drugs has more capacity to make and sell drugs, more money to recruit, and more weapons to kill anybody in their way. So another thing that it starts happening around this time, I don't know if we're going to get into it, because it's sort of related, but not really, is that this is really when mid-90s to late 90s

is really when MS-13 and 18th Street starts showing up in Central America. And of course, El Salvador really gets all the attention, but it also happened in Guatemala and Honduras, right? Because you have these gangs that were formed in LA, both MS-13 and 18th Street, that they started getting deported. A lot of them had fled. the Civil War and El Salvador, I think fled Honduras as well.

They end up in LA. They start getting deported in the 90s because of change in the law. A lot of them were felons, they get deported, and they just start showing up in these countries. In El Salvador and Honduras, where there's just complete vacuum of power. There's really no one to take control, and there's no big gangs like that.

Also, tons of guns, like we're just discussing right now. And they kind of start forming, and they just get sent there, and it's kind of like a free-for-all. they don't really get powerful, I would say, until like the mid-2000s. And that happens because of the situation you're describing. But then they get scary pretty quickly. Like I said, El Salvador gets all the attention.

But Honduras and to a lesser degree, Guatemala, they had a big MS-13-18th street thing too. Yeah, I mean, it's not like the consolidation of gangs in, say, Mexico now is making anything particularly safer. But at this time in Central America, there's like, there's just thousands of people out for themselves and they're all armed to the teeth. It's pretty wild. But now we're into the early 2000s, right?

And this is when everything kind of changes in Honduras's narco scene. And that's because it's when a small group of friends and family members from the east of the country, which is just a stone's throw from Ramon's Matters farm in the cold open, they make a pack with one of the most powerful business families in the country. And that will cement a partnership that will soon be worth almost a big. billion dollars. In Honduras, a billion dollars, that's pretty nuts. Los Cacchiros, which is Spanish for the Cacieros, had emerged as cattle ranches and then rustlers, which is Nicking cattle, in the 1970s in the eastern coastal state of Cologne. These are poor people. They're selling maybe a dozen

cattle at a time. They're sleeping in their cars after doing deals across the country instead of staying in hotels, but they soon realize they're better off not going it alone. They soon begin selling cattle to a meatpacking firm owned by the Rosenthal family, which is a prominent clan based in San Pedro Sula, Honduras's second city. And then they start banking with the Rosentals. The Rosenthal are a big, big piece in this week's puzzle. So let's get into it a bit. Their life in Honduras begins in the 1920s, which is when Yankul, Rosenthal, a Romanian Jew, travels from Eastern Europe to Central America. And then he meets the daughter of a big coffee-producing family in Honduras, and he stays. Yankal intends to head on then to the United States, but the 1929 financial crash persuades him to stay put.

He settles in the northern city of San Pedro Sula, which is a key logistics hub into the Caribbean, where he partners with Arab and Turkish migrants to build wealth in shipping related to the all-powerful banana industry. We did get back to that in the one about Matabeasiros. Yankal then uses this wealth to send his kids to elite schools, particularly his son Jaime, who gets undergrad and master's degree from MIT in Massachusetts, and in the 60s, this education appears to pay off. When Jaime diversifies the Rotenthal's empire, grows wildly rich, and in 1974, he founds Banco Continental,

which expands by focusing on commercial enterprises, particularly in coffee and agriculture. Jaime is frugal, and he stays late in the office telling friends and employees that, quote, a fortune is made by saving. Well, as Jaime's father could readily tell him, it's also about making the right friends. In 1986, Jaime becomes Honduras's vice president. He also has a stab at the presidency unsuccessfully as well at this time, which makes him, of course, one of the most powerful men in the country. He resigns three years later, but he returns to politics in 2002 as a

congressman, by which time Honduras's narco trade is booming and its key state functions are dominated by elites and oligarchs. Bangkok Continental and Jaime Rosenthal are the perfect fit for the Cacchiros. By glomming on to one of Honduras' most powerful men, the Cachirosk go from redneck cattle rustlers to rural elites. And they collaborate with Rosenthal to win state contracts to build roads, homes, and other big-ticket jobs, not to mention closer ties to political elites in San Pedro Sula and Teguze Galpa.

So wait, who are the Cachiros? Like, they're a family, a group, a clan, just a bunch of buds who have a business together? There's a family at the center of it, the Rivera Madi-Dai-Dakas. I can't. I'm going to struggle to say there in a normal episode. And then there's a few smattering of their family members, and then there's a few buddies. They're just like a family, a few friends that started out with cattle in this really rural part of the east of the country.

And they soon realize when they're going over to like San Pedro Sula, oh, we can kind of like glom on to these elites, see what we can get out of them. and then they kind of start working together in finance and stuff like that. So they're like a small sort of like business group based on a family bit that like does this like cattle ranching and whatever. Yeah. And they link up with this banking family to like get more funding for their businesses or whatever it is to form of partnership.

Yeah, exactly. And like there's a good bit in a in a piece that I read that describes like I said before how when some of these guys were going out to the big city to sell their cows, they're like literally sleeping in their flatbeds. They're not even like in hotels because they don't have the money. They're just like dirt poor, roughneck guys from the jungle. But they don't stay that way for long and it's kind of like a, it's a symbiotic relationship. So around this time, the early 2000s, the Kachiros also begin to befriend folks in the country's underworld because why not?

Especially when you own massive tracks of land that no one is keeping an eye on. Most notably, the brothers in charge of the Kachiros, here we go, Javier and Devis, Rivera, Maraida, Maraida. It's a good effort. Yeah, we'll get by with that. Get close to a guy named El Cocque. And El Cocque is Spanish for, can you guess, Danny? The Cucke?

No, it means the Coke. Jesus Christ. Anyway, El Cocque is similar to the Caciros. He's from the East like them. And he straddles the legitimate and illegitimate worlds. He's got money in banking. And he also has a congressman on his side, too. Only in his case, it's by dating the guy's daughter.

Yeah, I mean, for our younger listeners, this is a very important lesson to learn about the right way to do things. The way that Jaime did things, right, or his father did things, which is, like, getting a really good education, working hard, staying late in the office, like being frugal, saving your money. That's actually not the right way to succeed and do things in life. their right way to do it is to start dating powerful guy's daughters. True. Because that really just, you skip a lot of the other stuff

and just get right elevated to the top. True, but you've always then got to blow up all those relationships with bad behavior and then fall back on journalism, which is like a booming industry. Is there a story? Did you date a powerful guy's daughter?

I just lost my mind. No, the Sean lore, even I am still learning things about the life of Sean Williams. I might remember someone come back in the day, but I don't remember exactly. Which, which, which Prince. Oh, hell no.

No, no, no, it doesn't. I think I'm still getting over the weekend. Anyway, yes, dating powerful men's daughters. What's up, guys? I want to tell you about something I've been using that is just like changing the game, blowing my mind. It's called wave.com. And it's an app.

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I think, Sean, did you use it for one of your recent long-form articles? Oh, yeah. I'm writing a story today in the next couple days' deadline, and it has 25 interviews, something like that. And transcribing them all myself would be not only horrific, but take around a month. So, yeah, using AI to transcribe it is saving my life. Yeah, I mean, it rules.

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El Coke. Yes, El Cucca, Honduras. We're doing a podcast, that we? He's also in the cocaine trade because at this point, everybody is. And he and the Kachiros build a pretty significant partnership quarterbacking flights from South America into Honduras before sending them off to the United States. That is the main thing going on now, the flights, right? There's also stuffed by boat we'll get into in a minute. So you have this connection between two big narcos, El Kocke and the Kachiros. The Kachiros are in bed with Jaime Rosen.

entire. And unlike when Juan Matta Baratiris was in control of Honduras's drug scene, now things are fragmented. Their tensions building between rival groups over land, access to politicians. They've kind of like all got their own pet politician. That's how it seems to work at the time. The politicians themselves are scheming and backstabbing more over their own access to the cocaine trade. Mexicans are seizing bigger chunks of the industry from rivals in Cali, which anyone who's watched Narcos will know well. They're richer. and more powerful than ever. And everybody in this picture is armed to the back teeth,

thanks to the weapons left over from the Nicaraguan Civil War, and so you can see how this whole thing is heading down a pretty dangerous path. The Kachiros seem to be the master manipulators throughout all of this. They cement power in their home state of Cologne by keeping the chief of police on their payroll. And they expand into San Pedro Sula thanks not only to their connection to Rosenthal, but a top cop in the region named Kowl. Carlos Alberto Bayadares, a.k.a. El Tigre. That's the tiger. Yeah, you got that one. Yeah. That's pretty dumb. Yeah. Bayadares has risen through the ranks to become chief of police in a number of municipalities surrounding San Pedro Sula. Let's just say, not because he's a gifted investigator per se. He's a naughty boy with a bad habit, dad. A bad habit for drugs.

Yes. I wondered if you get that one. Come on, man. Yeah, good. Well played. I mean, I hope so. our listeners do because that is just some of the best some of the way is kiwi or is that like he's he's he's Aussie he's Ozzy yeah but still people say uh people say it hasn't aged well and uh it's a no it's a little dodgy but it's great it's great come on it's so good it's so good uh more to the point um this guy has a bad habit for drug related violence danny he's a he's a naughty boy with a bad habit for drug related violence so let's just push that one home one more time anyway he's a nasty piece of work and the Cacchiros used Bayares, El Tigre, to terrorize their rivals using police raids as cover to kill several people at a time. In the most explosive example, Badares takes

part in a nightclub shootout in San Pedro Sula, which results in the deaths of a drug trafficking rival to the Cacieros plus several members of the Guy's security team. In 2004, the Cacieros fall out with Cicolkoi. It's unknown exactly why. I've read that El Cocque had killed a member of Javier and DeVis's family, which, I mean, I guess that would cause a slight spat. But who knows among narcos? But whatever the truth, the Cacillos go firmly on the offensive. Sicario's first hunt El Coker down in San Pedro Sula. They fire 25 bullets into one of his cars, and they injure his girlfriend.

Remember the girlfriend of the very powerful congressman. El Cocque then flees to Cuba and then Costa Rica. where another team of hitmen track him down and fail to kill him for a second time. El Cocque then heads to Panama, but he's arrested by Panamanian authorities and sent back to Honduras. And on his fourth day in jail, Cicario's burst into his cell and shoot El Cocque four times, killing him. All right, so let me backtrack, like backtrack with me for like a second here. The Cachirosos work with Jaime Rosenthal in banking, but they also work with El Cokane and They have enforcer named Altigray Valadez, who partners with them as well.

So they're just, they're partner with everyone. These guys are just like Matt, even though they're like these, what I assume, like, hillbilly types from like the jungle who are like cowboys. They're amazing networkers. And then they have this falling out with El Coker, and that's where we are right now. Yeah, they're like the guys from Ozark. Like they're just, they're kind of like rednecks who are just master manipulators. So they've got their guy at the top, Rosenthal, who's like dishing out loans and working on

sort of like black finance. The legitimate sort of, legitimate. Yeah, he's the crossover. And then they're also in bed with old coque, but they decide, yeah, screw you for whatever reason. And they eventually get him. So they're getting way, way more powerful, right? And they are cooking.

Here's Insight Crime, which has written a huge, like massive 20,000 word feature on their rise. Quote, the Kachiros took control of some of the most important cocaine routes along the Ifsmas. I hate that word. Colon is strategically located along. the northeastern coastline. To the east is Grasias Adios, thanks to God state, that's a cool name for a state, and to the South Olancho. These three states have become some of the

best landing areas for small aircraft carrying drugs from South America, in part because of the infrastructure left by the agro-export economy that once thrived in the area. So you can see they're kind of using the background, using their own now to get to sort of get in. There is little state presence and vast stretches of land that are used to create makeshift clandestine airstrips. There are also large tracks of African palm plantations and other agro-industrial businesses that can help camouflage the storage and movement of illicit products. In addition, the coastline receives drugged by sea,

ferried via go-fast boats and fishing vessels. This vast expanse of land rate, it offers another key benefit for the Cachillos, which is tons of people struggling for work. Fishermen, and boat operators can store product, refuel boats and work as lookouts. The region is also home to a marginalised indigenous population whose homeland stretched between the Honduran and Nicaragua borders, meaning they know the terrain of both countries well and they can slip across isolated bits of the border with no problem at all, meaning that you now have an international cartel with backers in politics and big business, massive land holdings, connections to narcos in south, and North America and cocaine routes that have been perfected for decades.

Continues Insight Crime again, quote, the Cachillas' business model worked. They accumulated considerable wealth from their illicit project. Authorities gave wide range in estimates for how much cocaine moves through the Cachillas area of influence, but they agree that it is significant, or at least was significant at the group's height. At the low end, authorities said the group was moving between one and two tons per month. At the high end, they put it at between four and five tons a month. The range of monthly earnings was therefore between $2 and $12.5 million. Which is high, but not like insane.

No, no. I mean, they're not making like the Mexican money. No, no. But to be clear, like they are just the transshipment point, right? So I assume is it like Colombians or Venezuela is flying it in? And then from there, someone else to take, like, they're just basically holding it or are they responsible for transporting it on into Mexico? Yeah, both.

They would do both. So over time, they're like, they're actually the logistics. Oh, so they were like an actual, they were actually more than, I mean, they were coordinating the shipments from, from South America into Mexico. Yeah, it's like, it's similar to not just holding it. It's similar to what Bayes Stiros was doing, right? At first he was kind of gopher and then he kind of like consolidated his position. And it's such a wild part of the world, right? And it needs to go through somewhere.

So it's the same, I think the same happens today, right? No one really trusts a lot of the gangs. Yeah. in like Central Americas actually do the big work. Well, that was the whole thing with MS-13 and all that. People were always like, oh, they're involved in the drug, but they really weren't because they were not trusted by the cartels both in South America, Colombia or Venezuela and Mexico to like be responsible off the hold of cocaine and not mess it up somehow.

And they weren't like buddies with the politicians as much, right? Whereas these guys, they eventually became tied in, but they were never huge transshipment point people. Yeah, yeah. So these guys, yeah, they are. They're kind of like doubling down on this sort of niche that they have and they're doing really well. So in 2009, Honduras enters another period of political turmoil when its leftist president, Manuel Zelaya, tries to rewrite the constitution to allow presidents the ability to serve more terms in office. Classic move, something folks in this country might get better acquainted with pretty soon.

And relax, Rachel Maddow. We'll be fine. On the morning of July 28 that year, soldiers stormed the presidential residence in Toguisi Galpa, disarmed security, wake up July. I think it's kind of hilarious because I think it's like 9 a. And put him on a plane to San Jose, which is the capital of Costa Rica. I have been kidnapped, he tells a scrum of reporters. I'd like to think of him looking like wee, Willy Winky and like little hat and pajamas at this point. I'm not who that is.

Oh, what? Is this a British thing? It's like a nursery rhyme in Britain, yeah. Oh, yeah, there you go. Runs through the town in his dressing gown. Yeah, anyway, that was way too British. He says he adds afterwards violently, brutally kidnapped. Yeah, I just want him to be wearing his, like, dozy pajamas there.

Later that day, Honduras's Supreme Court issues a statement that it has sent the military in to get rid of Zelaya, which is the country's first coup since 1978, which we covered in the Juan Mata-Basteroz Perist. It then installs Roberto Mikoletti as interim president, which is a move condemned by the international community. Wait, so hold on. As someone who does not know a lot about Honduras' politics in general. Do you know? No, is this considered a coup?

Like, the guy, like in the negative set, I guess in the negative set, like, this guy was overstaying his term, right? Yeah. So isn't just like, isn't just this basically asserting, it's a bloodless coup in general, right? They take him out and no one gets hurt in the whole situation. He gets kidnapped in his little pajamas with the hat. But, like, is that really like a... a coup or is it just like asserting the peaceful transfer power?

A somewhat peaceful transfer power. So there's... Like, why is it looked at so negatively? I read an annoying amount about why they did it. And like what the exact thing that he was trying to do is. And I've kind of condensed it here. But it was a bit more legally. It's kind of a Rorschach test, right?

If you're like a leftist, you think he's been like completely removed, like violently. If you are on the other side of political spectrum, you think he's trying to snatch power. What if you're a normal human being? If you're normal. I mean, it's a coup, but a coup for a reason. Yeah. Yeah. And the reason was he was trying to stay in power longer than his term dictated.

Yeah. Yeah. It's difficult. It's like there's a whole bunch of political wrangling. And I'm sure there is a 10-part podcast on Honda and political history that people can listen to about that. But it's complex. But keeping things brief, right? And this is kind of like a bit of a tell that afterwards, Mikoletti installed.

a quasi-martial law. There's loads of protests in the capital city. He shuts down opposition media, which I don't understand why he would do that if it's just like a removal of power for the right ideas. And he sends the army onto the streets. Zelaya then, this is great.

He sneaks back into the country via a mounting pass. I mean, this is a guy that wears like a massive cowboy hat. He's, you know, that kind of leftist, like, leader in Latin America. he sneaks back into the country via a mountain pass and he holds himself up in the Brazilian embassy into Goose-Galpa and he then tries from there to negotiate return to power and then Mikoletti actually does declare martial law I think it's like a state of exception or emergency

similar to what Bukhle has announced and that November there's an election after which a conservative named Porfidio Lobo wins who just so happens to be that dad of El Cocque's girlfriend that we mentioned earlier. Good plotting. Yeah. For some, this is all seen as a rejection of Zelaya,

who's left-leaning enough to be good pals with Venezuela's Hugo Chavez. But the vote in November also has like a 50% extension rate, which ain't great. And other people see the whole thing as a return to 1978, which was when elites had pretty nakedly removed a leftist leader with the help of the military. Okay, but was his term actually up? Yeah. Okay. So then he leaves.

And then he comes back and he tries to overthrow the government when his terms up. And then like, I mean, like, yeah, I know, I know, I know. It's like, it's, yeah, I don't know. It's Chinatown. I know. Whoever you believe, whatever side of the political divide you're on, because we don't discriminate here, the 2009 coup has its biggest effect on. is narco industry. So for start, as the affair prompts the White House to freeze $33 million in economic and military aid, which is a lot despite the money that's going through and drug money.

And plus, Americans stop working alongside Honduran counter-narcotics agents on intercepting boats or training Honduras' piss poor air force. And thirdly, the coup and its aftermath, they force Honduras's cops and military to station the majority of their officers in Teguze Galpa. So they all congregate in the centre because there's so much protest. And the result of all of this is that there's basically just an open goal for the country's drug traffickers. And their empires saw. And I mean, saw literally. In 2008, US authorities working alongside Honduran counterparts had noticed 31 suspect flights landing in Honduras from South America.

I guess that's the ones they're catching anyway. By 2009, there are 54. and by 2010, post-coup, 75 planes are touching down on Honduran airstrips, refueling and either getting sent back out to neighbouring countries still laden with coke or having the product ripped and thrown onto trucks or boats. A single-engine plane can carry 500 kilos of cocaine at a time, which is something in the region of 20 million street value back then, and a twin-engine plane can carry between 800 kilos and a ton,

which is worth, yeah, it's double that, isn't it? journalists can do maths sometimes. No, that's a lie. We can't. At this time, there is no shortage of narco rocking up in Honduras. Someone are from Mexico, others are from Colombia or Venezuela. There's actually a really interesting story about this club together, Colombian-Venezuelan crew that kind of pop in and then quickly sort of evaporate somehow in a couple of years. We could do that in another show, I'm sure. But at the time of the 2009 coup, the Kachiros were among the biggest, if not the biggest, already. They're not only running flights, but building entire new airstrips, complete with lighting and other facilities like proper actual airports.

And as their profits ramp up, they get into more legit businesses, especially alongside Jaime Rosenthal and his Banco Continental. The Cacheros are still selling their cattle to the Rosenthal meat packing firm. They're using Rosenthal logistics firms to sell their African palm. They secure a bunch of loans from Rosenthal's Bank of Continental on there, and they're even, even joint partners on a zoo, right, which is pretty crazy. They bought a zoo. They bought a zoo. They bought a zoo.

They bought a zoo. They even go in on the Cologne soccer team, which is Reozociad de Tokoa in a proud tradition of Latin American drug traffickers using the sport to launder cash going back decades. I think I mentioned that. There was one about Andreas Escobar being killed in Colombia. Escobar bought his own team, right? Yeah. Yeah.

And there's a couple of teams in Mexico. there's like a thousand teams in Mexico, that cartel-in. Did that guy, the guy who went undercover as a footballer, the Uruguayan guy? Did he buy a football team or did he just play for football teams? I think you bought a team too. Yeah. And then put himself on the team. Cool.

Which is what you should do if you're a jogger out. Like that I respect. Yeah. Yeah. That is cool. Maybe that's how I play football in South America. Buy professional team and put yourself on the team. Yeah.

Good advice. I think there's a story with like, um, like a prince or sheikh or something like that doing that in the Middle East and put like his son on or something. Oh yeah. It was terrible. Gaddafi did it. Gaddafi... I think a more recent one did it.

And the sun was like terrible whenever away. I think the Uruguayan guy was actually like pretty solid. Yeah, he played like second division football. Yeah, like not good enough to like actually play but like could like somewhat hold his own a little bit. I think Sardial Gaddafi played for Perugia and that was the same time they had this crazy owner and they signed, oh they sacked a Korean player off. after he scored against Italy in the World Cup. And also they signed a woman up front and played her.

Which is great. It was an interesting time. Good save, boy. And Russian people, yeah, I think their sons play for the same. Anyway, guys, our sponsor, Asit, which is the wellness company dedicated to the other underworld, which is your butthole or bumhole, just launched a new product line target in the biggest menace to backdoors everywhere. Hemorrhoids. You were just telling me that you've been having some issues.

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and it's wrapped up with this bank owned by Rosenthal. They dig mines. They've still got the African palms. They've got firms in transport, gas. They're even making clothes. And neither do they let go of their OG cash cow, of course, like I just mentioned, which is literally cash from cows. And by this time, their cattle company is one of the biggest meat suppliers in all of Honduras. I mean, like I said, my impression of these guys was that they're like these, um, hillbillies, for lack of better, like, you know, from the jungle. So it's super impressive that they're, like, able to pull all of this off and, like, figure it out. Yeah, they are.

Like, they're completely uneducated, like, they come from nowhere. And also, why not pull, like, the, you know, the thing in every, every TV show about organized crime? Like, you got all these legitimate businesses making a lot of money. Like, why not at this point just, like, go clean? Yeah, ditch, ditch, get out. Yeah, I don't get it. They just like that. Cash.

Anyway, yeah, remember their top cop, the El Tigre, Bayadares. Well, he is on a rampage for them. So in October 2011, he orchestrates a shootout between the Kachiros and a rival drug faction, which leaves six dead. Soon afterwards, he helps Devis, Kachiro, kill two rivals by accusing them of murder, and then kidnapping them, which is, I guess, yeah, the usefulness of having a cop on the payroll. Bayaades also helps move drugs for the group, either via car or by securing airstrips himself, and police are also involved in an increasing number of targeted killings of farmers or activists

by drug traffickers who want their land. And all of this, the political turmoil, the USAID withdrawal, the rise of the drug flights, and the co-opting of cops into the narco trade means that by 2011, holds a title that no country envies. It has the highest homocyte rate on earth with 93.2 people killed per 100,000, which that number is like almost actually genuinely unbelievable. It's double what the highest rate is today. Can you guess which country currently holds a title? Jamaica or Brazil or South Africa? Yeah, Jamaica. Yeah, but that's, people don't have good numbers on like, I think Venezuela would be up there. Yeah, probably.

Even though it's got a huge population, but then no one has good numbers. Yeah, yeah. It's, I mean, this 93.2 number is nuts, right? It's around 40% more than El Salvador in 2017, which is when MS-13 and Barrio D.S.E.R. 18th Street were at their kind of peaks of lines. Line Sean Williams over here, just getting the facts wrong. No, the peak was in 2015, and I know because I was there,

making a documentary called Gangseville, El Salvador, which you should have watched on Vice News. And it was over 100 in 2015. I think it was like 103 to 106 was the murder rate in El Salvador at that time. Yeah, it was crazy. Oh my God. Because I think it was a country of like $5 million, $6 million. So you're talking like, I don't know, 20 murders a day in a country like that.

Holy shit. My math might be off. But yeah, it was over 100 in 2015, wild times. That's always nice to get fact checked in real time. So you don't have to send those emails, guys. You could just leave it. Wait, what did you get wrong last episode? something about the entertainer, right, didn't they say?

Oh my God, the song, The Entertainer. Yeah, we got to, we got to do your, your admission of, of, Oh yeah, it's not, it's like the most famous American showtime tune of all, ever, right? And I gave French people credit for it. Yeah, which makes me a little bit sick. So it's kind of, kind of my fault too.

Yeah, yeah, it's your fault, yeah. That's what we do here, we correct ourselves, that's what we do. At this, at this time, so feel free to jump in if this is bullshit, but four-fifths of Honduras, four-fifths of Honduran people, rather, do not believe that the police is capable of fighting the bloodshed, according to this regional survey.

And four-fifths of Hondurians are correct, obviously. One-fifth of Hondurans are insane. Says the country's secretary of security a couple of years later, quote, we were in a crisis because the institution of the police had a crisis of credibility. The problem was so serious that we even analyzed scenarios to close the police. Yeah, I mean, that triangle right there of Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador, I don't think people really understand, like, how brutal and bloody it was in, like, the 2010's, just completely an insane, unprecedented level of, like, criminal violence

that, um, I think even, you know, uh, even today, it's hard to even look at, at other places and compare it. It was just, it was nuts over there. I can't think how that would ever be recreated as well, given, I mean, they reformed. They could always be terrible things happening, but, um, I think in 2012, they do actually reform the police in Honduras, which is basically chucking out a load of the most sort of venal guys in the force. And they do kind of work with other countries to revamp. But yeah, like, writes the UNODC report in 2012, quote, Honduras's national murder rate in 2011 is one of the highest recorded in modern times. In 2009, President Zelaya of Honduras was deposed by the military. Local law enforcement fell into disarray.

resources were diverted to maintaining order, and United States counter-narcotics assistance was suspended. The result was a kind of cocaine gold rush. Flights from the Venezuelan-Columbian border to airstrips in Honduras skyrocketed, and a violent struggle began for control of this revivified drug artery. Given new life, apparently. Genuinely new to me, it's shocking academic writing. All of these horrors and the increasing drug, drug flights bring a new round of attention from the US. In 2012, the countries passed an extradition treaty for drug trafficking and terror offences, which just so happens to coincide

with the arrest of a major Cachiros member. By 2013, almost 90% of all cocaine smuggling flights from South America are landing in Honduras. And American authorities think that 90% of them are controlled by the Cachiros. And that year, Honduran officials working once again with American counterparts, they begin digging into the Kachiros Empire, conviscating property and estimating that the group is worth $800 million in assets. That's around half the entire value of Honduras's booming coffee industry, for example. Authorities also begin to take land, much of it stolen from farmers by force. In May, the Obama administration formally identifies the Kachiros as a drug trafficking organization under the Kingpin Act. And this is when you know,

know you're truly about to get screwed. Six months later, the US Treasury said it's going after them, too, prohibiting US citizens from any business with them and freezing assets in US jurisdictions. Suddenly, Kachiro owns palm, mining, cattle, road building, and the zoo are sanctioned. And apparently all this comes as a shock to Jaime Rosenthal, who says that, quote,

we had no reason to believe that they were as devious as they turned out to be, which is actually quite a nice little sorry-not-sory thing. It's not saying he didn't know. These revelations seem to spark Honduran officials into an effort to purge Rosenthal from their elite circles, perhaps because he's genuinely be working with some of the country's most dangerous criminals for 30 years, or maybe because they're now in full survival mode themselves. They're desperate to cover their asses. In 2014, Honduras's banking and insurance commission finds Bank of Continental half a million dollars,

I mean, whatever, for failing to check their client's backgrounds, and US officials appear to hint they're about to go after the Rosentiles too. The institutions and the individuals who help or incite criminal organisations share the responsibility for the violence and the destruction that these groups have reaped on the people of Honduras, says the US ambassador to Honduras. Those who know they are helping launder money for corrupt people or terrorists should face long and costly legal procedures, sanctions and sentences.

What I'm saying is that if you were helping criminals, you are also criminals. President Porfirio Lobo holds his tongue this entire time, which is pretty incriminating. Whether or not is in bed with the cartels, his administration has overseen the most catastrophic failure to rein them in, and one of the highest murder rates since like the Babylonian Empire. And then, in January 2015, Javier Rivera Madreiga, aka Javier Cicero, One of the Cachiro's two leaders alongside his brother Devis hands himself into officials at the U.S. Embassy in Tegucy Galpa. And Devis follows suit soon after. By January 26, Javier pleads guilty to drug trafficking and both of the sing like birds about their friends in government, big business and a police.

You assume desperate for a reduced sentence. Yeah, it's pretty crazy how common that is, right? The actual leaders of the cartel is the guys behind most of the violence, just turning themselves in so they can sneak. niche on their government, government or business partners and just get less severe punishments. Yeah. I'm not sure if it works or not in this case. We'll find out. And the arrests keep coming. In May 2015, in a sting operation alongside Haitian authorities, the US grabbed Fabio Lobo, the son of Porphyrio Lobo, the president, who by now has lost his presidency in an election. And they'll sentence the son to 25 years for conspiring to import cocaine into the U.S.

says one of the prosecutors leading his case in New York, quote, by his own admission, Fabio Lobo, great name, conspired to import huge quantities of cocaine into the US. To assist traffickers and enrich himself, Lobel used his father's position and his own connections to bring drug traffickers together with corrupt police and government officials. Now, I have a theory on this, like, I think they were trying to get Lobo, the elder,

and I think they, like, deliberately did not get him, because they didn't want to destabilize the country too much. But as we'll learn in whatever third episode we do about Honduras, they finally got cheesed off a few years after this as well, quite famously. In October 2015, the US Justice Department officially points its finger at Jaime Rosenthal, his son Yanni and his nephew Yankul, as drug traffickers, adding that its foreign assets control office accuses the Bangkok Continental of being one of Central America's most significant money laundering operations.

They arrest Yankle, the nephew, at Miami Airport, and they send him to NYC to face trial. Yanni Rosenthal, the son, he turns himself in at the end of the month. In 2017, Yankal, who had been Honduras's Minister of Investment, which is hilarious, plays guilty to money laundering for the Kachiros. Yanni goes down with him. In 2019, Honduran officials seized most of the Rosenthal family's assets, including seven businesses, and that same year, Jaime Rosenthal, the family patriarch, he dies, age 82, in San Pedro Sula.

Writes Revista Ennio, quote, The news of the Rosenthal's connection to drug trafficking, especially to the family cartel known as Los Cachiros, was no surprise in Honduras. It was a well-known secret that their bank had been moving dirty money for years. Trustworthy testimonies by ordinary people abound about the discovery of boldly. amounts of income with no record of the issuing entity when they would update their Bank of Continental account. That is nuts, right? That's really crazy. We learned, this is them speaking, of one woman who discovered a deposit of 200,000 Lempiras in her bank booklet and immediately

went to the manager of that branch to return the money. Don't worry, lady, the manager assured her. You didn't have that money before, and now you do. Don't worry about where it came from. Just worry about using it for your own good. Things like this tended to happen in places where the drugs barons reign. It was one of the ways they maintained the people's support. That's a Patreon.com slash the underworld podcast. We also have Zell, cash app, whatever you need. Just, you know, email us. Yeah, do that. Do that. There's a great idea. And this article goes on, quote, after amassing a fortune through myriad businesses, hate the word myriad, during the second half of last century, the Rosenthal family caught up in the dynamism surrounding the state,

deteriorated institutional framework and the excessive greed for money permeating all areas of the economy into which they diversified their fortune got in bed with the drug traffickers in this century. It was that decision that led to the collapse of their fortune. So Porphydeo Lobo, the ex-president, somehow manages to stay out of prison. Like I said, I think it was a deliberate move. In October 2019, however, his wife, Rose Elena, is arrested alongside her private secretary for a $4 million fraud. Everyone in this guy's life is corrupt. Except for him, apparently. He's completely clean. Juan Carlos Valderas, aka El Tigger, the Cacchero's man inside the

police, he'll evade justice for several years longer. But in 2022, he is also extradited to the US, and in August 24, he's sentenced to 19 years in prison, which actually seems like a pretty light term, given that he's actually being found guilty at this point for taking part in actual murders. Says a retired Honduran police commissioner, quote, we had a government that was in criminal hands, which steered the destiny of the people,

and El Tigre was his armed branch. Good quote, take notes, UNODC. Yeah, we really do have so many, like, Latin American officials and higher-ups and authority figures and cartel guys, and Caribbean too, like in the US police system right now. I mean, in the US police, in the prison set, like I really wonder if there's like a master list out there.

Yeah. It would be interesting to see. Is that, do you reckon the mess hall at Rikers is really good as a result? There's like loads of these Latin American narcos like flexing. Not at Rikers. Yeah, where did they go? They go to like random ones in the Midwest and stuff. Rikers is a jail.

So if you're doing 30 years, you're not spending it at Rikers. Yeah, they're all like, you know, what is it, the one in Indiana. Oh yeah. There's one in Illinois that I think comes up about. Yeah, and there's the one in the Supermax. This is like proper podcast chat. Yeah. There's that one somewhere.

Yeah, yeah. Now we've got to say, well, we love it or hate it. Two thumbs up. Yeah. So, we're getting to the end of this show, right? The Honduras's murder rate continues to be the world's highest in 2012 and 2013. And then it drops by almost half in 2014. And in 2015, it falls off the top spot, beat into the title by, like you said, El Salvador.

He's taking photos of me in the studio. It's really weird. This is great news. And yes, this is coming to the conclusion of today's show. But despite all of these arrests, the work alongside US agents, the exposing of the link between narcos and the Cacchiros and business titans like the Rosenthales and politicians like the Lobos, Honduras remains one of the key transshipment points in the Latin American drug trade.

And that's at least partly because the guy who follows Lobo as president, Juan Orlando Hernandez, despite being a key ally of Washington, isn't quite the good guy he's made out to be. And yeah, I'm going to do a full show on him further down the line. But for now, what do you reckon? Maybe another year or so of doing these from our houses and a normal studio. Or should I come here next week? I like coming here, dude.

The snacks alone are worth it. Oh, the nachos, yeah. Yeah, good episode, dude. Look at us. That's cool. Look at the real life, like, you know, charisma. What are we looking for? Is that?

No one's literally ever said that about it. Yeah, not charisma. Ever in my life. The real life chemistry. Yeah. In person. Yeah. Patreon.com

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