John Jairo Velásquez, Pablo Escobar’s top hit man, has called on British Prime Minister Theresa May to legalize cocaine—and we’re all positive she’ll listen to him.
Velásquez suggested that the Conservative Party leader should allow for the dishing out of coke in pharmacies, where it can be regulated and clean.
The once-feared assassin, who obviously knows a thing or two about cocaine, said that in its purest form—and in small doses—cocaine is no more of a danger to health than fatty food or fizzy drinks.
The 54-year-old Velásquez, AKA “Popeye,” speaking from Medellín, Colombia, where he lives clandestinely, said: “Look, everything kills. Soft drinks, whiskey, beer, cigarettes, marijuana, bread.”
Marijuana and bread?
Well, he forgot to name himself: While working as Pablo Escobar’s head assassin for the now-defunct Medellín Cartel, Popeye popped off anywhere from 300 to 1,000 people for his boss.
After serving over two decades for drug trafficking, terrorism and the 1989 murder of Colombian presidential candidate Luis Carlos Galán, Velásquez was released from a Colombian prison in 2014.
Although in hiding now for fear of reprisals, Velásquez has become a social media star, with his own YouTube channel called “Popeye Arrepentido” (Remorseful Popeye). He has nearly 300,000 subscribers.
So now, having reformed, regretted and repented, it apparently only seems logical to him to reach out to the British PM with an offer of saving lives.
After all, nearly 4,000 people in Britain died in 2015 after being poisoned by drugs sold on the streets, according to the Independent.
The figure includes hundreds who fatally snorted coke mixed with toxic ingredients, such as laundry detergent and horse tranquilizers.
Could this be what caught the attention of Popeye, who still takes pride in clean cocaine?
“If cocaine is legalized it will be sold only in pharmacies, and people who choose to take it will know it is clean,” he said.
Velásquez also argued that legalizing coke would help wipe out gangland war feuds in Britain and would suck vast profits from traffickers and dealers. He called the U.S. War on Drugs a failure.
“The drug war is an illusion. Every day the illicit trade grows and grows,” Velásquez told the Independent’s Irish reporter Jeff Farrell, who interviewed him in Colombia. Farrell also wrote The Cocaine Diaries.
“And everywhere Colombian cocaine goes: Great Britain, United States, South Africa, Ireland, it brings misery and bloodshed ,” Velásquez continued. “More people are in danger when it is in the hands of the mafia.”
The hit man has a point.
