A botched U.S.-bound drug run triggered the June 30 massacre in a nightclub in Colombia’s central Antioquia department, according to a report by newspaper El Tiempo.
The Colombian daily cites a report containing intelligence obtained by “foreign anti-mafia agents,” which refers to the failed delivery of a cocaine shipment belonging to “a group of old drug dealers, who do not even appear in the organisational charts of the Colombian authorities.”
The intelligence reportedly identifies those responsible for the shipment as “the Peña brothers” and a man nicknamed “Pacho Correa.”
El Tiempo reports that a man, who participated in the unsuccessful run and who is now held by Colombian police, killed Pacho Correa’s son in reprisal for the failure. This prompted Correa, who has been part of the narcotics scene for decades and used to do business with Pablo Escobar, to deploy a death squad to seek retribution.
In an apparent attempt to complete their mission, the hitmen gunned down eight people at a nightclub in Envigado, a town on the outskirts of Medellin.
In the wake of the shooting, local mafia boss Gustavo Alvarez Tellez, alias “El Gordo,” claimed to be the target of the attack. Initially, El Gordo was thought to have escaped the assault because he had left the club to have a snack. However, El Tiempo claimed Friday that he escaped the disco, crawling on his knees, taking cover under the tables.
El Tiempo revealed earlier this month that El Gordo was in line to replace the head of the criminal group “The Office of Envigado,” Maximiliano Bonilla, alias “Valenciano.”
Investigators previously stated that they believed the indiscriminate massacre was the result of a bloody turf war between “Valenciano” and another local narco-kingpin “Sebastian.”
