– We had free access to everything we wanted. We could arrange to collect the money wherever we wanted. When we arrived, it was all about alcohol and women, says José Irizarry Associated press.
Meet the news agency in San Juan, Puerto Rico a few hours before saying goodbye to freedom.
“Team America”
In the interview, he talks about his life as a Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) agent and how pulverized his life became when he was undercover in the hunt for Colombian drug cartels.
PARTYLIV: José Irizarry at en fest in Cartagena and Colombia in 2017. Photo: AP / NTB
When Irizarry and his cronies had to collect money to launder it, they often agreed to meet where Real Madrid or Rafael Nadal were playing.
Along the way, they popped into the VIP lounges of Caribbean strip clubs, Amsterdam’s red light district, or aboard a Colombian yacht filled with booze and prostitutes.
Irizarry says other cartel agents, police lawyers, informants, and occasionally even bootleggers were part of “Team America,” which was partying and wreaking havoc across three continents.
The reason it spiraled completely out of control is that the agents realized they had no chance of winning the war on drugs, he believes.
– You can’t win an unwinnable war. The DEA knows this. The agents know this. There are so many drugs coming out of Colombia. And lots of money. We know we don’t make a difference. The war on drugs is a game. It was a very fun game we played, says Irizarry.
Working with Colombian drug cartels made him “a different person,” admits Irizarry.
He stole money from the kidnappings and spent it on fancy cars, expensive jewelry and wild parties.
Then came the crash landing.
WANT TO SEE MORE IN PRISON: José Irizarry considers it unfair that he is the only one to be punished. Photo: Carlo Giusti/AP
It was not believed
In 2019, he pleaded guilty to 19 counts of corruption, including money laundering and bank fraud. The former DEA agent was sentenced to just over twelve years in prison.
“It’s a black eye for the DEA that one of their own has been involved in corruption at such a high level,” the agency’s then-head of international operations, Mike Vigil, said in a statement. 2020.
But Irizarry isn’t interested in taking all the blame herself.
Irizarry’s former colleagues say, according to the Associated Press, that he fabricated stories to get a lighter sentence.
However, Irizarry’s claims are bolstered by the fact that a 2015 report criticized DEA agents for attending sex parties with prostitutes under the auspices of Colombian cartels.
SEIZURES: More than a hundred million dollars and more than a ton of cocaine were seized in a major operation in 2016. Photo: DEA via AP/NTB
The DEA initially tried to paint a picture of Irizarry as an isolated case, but the Justice Department has followed up on his testimony in recent months.
– It was too unreal for them to believe that it actually happened. The prosecution paints a picture of me as the corrupt agent who did all of this, but says nothing about the rest of the DEA. I wasn’t the mastermind, says Irizarry.
Supported by the judges
The Tampa judge who sentenced him to prison seems to agree. Charlene Honeywell concluded that more officers should be investigated.
“Irizarry has been caught, but it’s obvious to this court that there are others here,” Honeywell told prosecutors.
IN PRISON: José Irizarry was supposed to catch criminals, but ended up becoming one himself. Photo: Carlo Giusti/AP
The investigation is now looking into Irizarry’s former partner and several other DEA agents, among other things. At least three current or former prosecutors have been questioned.
One of the suspects is said to be a former prosecutor from Ohio who was expected to become attorney general there before abruptly and unexpectedly resigning.
Irizarry alleges, among other things, that former colleagues in the DEA’s Miami office have been stealing money and forging documents for nearly a decade. He also claims that a customs broker accepted a $20,000 bribe.
In a response to the Associated Press, a DEA spokesperson said the agency is working hard to strengthen “discipline and hiring policies to ensure the integrity and effectiveness of our work.”
– José Irizarry is a criminal who broke his oath as a federal agent and abused the trust of the American people, says the spokesman.
