Inside Mexico's Drug Labs | Narco State | Sky News

[Music] [Music] just hungry what is going [Music] welcome to the systemic means and evil who knows you know Mexico's curse stretches nearly 2,000 miles it's huge rich neighbor the United States of America is the world's largest consumer of illegal drugs beyond this border that insatiable appetite needles of money Mexico has been that supplier for more than a hundred years alcohol to Prohibition cheap workers for generations and now the most valuable products of them all illegal drugs of every Distortion for the first time ever we will go inside Mexico's illegal labs to see how does one billion dollar-a-year industry works and learn how cartels have come to dominate all life here restaurants and taco stalls in Mexico City affronts for the laundering of drug money at the back they cook crack we were brought inside to see the real business the crack producer and gang leader calls himself bull passing his weapon to a guard as he began work Bull has 10 shots and lockups like this one the gangs particular skill is the production of crack cocaine it's a small but successful business it was very very strong vapors coming off this cocaine mixture very surely they're going to start cooking it this process never ever been filmed before apparently well according to these guys tell me what's happening here this is a quite a skill to cooking you know Sally's civility master Flay Lisa said no see you it yellow yeah I can taste all your penis and this business here it's a successful business but it's quite a small one are there lots of others like the business that operates this particular series of labs I said there are thousands upon thousands of these sort of little groupings of selling this street stuff and so this yeah even this small industry when combined is worth billions of dollars even with 30% of his profits going on bribes to police and local officials and other overheads like guns to protect his territory from other gangs bullish still making good money but it is a dangerous business completely honest and Matala hindi detrás rutila casillas control all right release the trance of sis Erin Condren Mucha Sangre por esto person which was angry a mask is was malicious of Martin arrest miraculous he wants to see she's wearable yet process or Parcel Post or Aryan yes 2009 por esta usted mucho trabajo conseguir que no Valen esto porque key and lesson from we tolerance Maria que una Kinison your awareness Korean conservative estimate is Alan DeVos occasional appearance party Lamar [Music] every cartel has a power base usually a home city where they can depend on local muscle but essentially the cartel is made up of smaller gangs Danny is a left tenant in the Azteca cartel based around the city of Juarez on the border with the United States he's a made man important to the cartel and untouchable he showed us around his patch hey Martha oh I think a little oh yeah I can I can say he understands there's a boy that was a sauce for my even and raw it's everything that we see basically in some shape or form linked to cartel money oh no temple temple and that's either through payment of protection or actually directly being owned any alguna Alamos I love you Lucy if the sea levels will be narrow paparazzi we just had the police code pastors are they not really a problem to the business of now it allows almost getting Michael J Saladin Casey todo el mundo famous to fail [Music] the lure of drug money weaves its way through all society from the very bottom to the very top and in between the middle classes it's a science really an Lu scientists [Music] they call themselves Negro he Blanca black and white their chemistry graduates which is paying away through a PhD cooking methamphetamines crystal methods is known for the cartels he's a full-time cooker a probe making over 300 thousand pounds a year you see yourselves as chemists if they're a skill at doing it yeah the end of the decimal this is most dangerous part of the operation the fumes coming off they're extremely toxic they're also very explosive they're telling us that we pretty rubbish it gets taken in by our skin it can also make your hair fall out just spent six weeks in hospital body contaminated by the toxins do you worry about how many labs like this one are there in Mexico the purity of Mexican crystal meth is what makes it so different to meth made in the United States it means its value soars by the time it's reached Europe its price has gone up nine times if users love it the cartels love it even more Mexican meth can be on America's streets two days after it's produced here [Music] crystal meth has emerged as a lucrative business for the cartels they franchise out its production to small gangs then gathered in and export but the cartel leaders realized their trusted system of widespread but small-sized production simply wasn't meeting ever-growing market demand from the meth hungry United States so they changed gear and the concept of the super lab was born [Music] they call him the narcos Saint Robin Hood figure haters Malverde may never have actually existed in Mexican folklore he is a hero the subject of poems writings [Music] his shrine in the highlands city of Culiacan with its resident band is visited by thousands every year this is the home of the hugely powerful Sinaloa cartel they've co-opted Malverde and ruthlessly exploited his image as a saint stealing from the rich to give to the poor the Sinaloa cartel specializes in drugs now focusing on crystal meth production we've come to Culiacan after months of negotiation with the Sinaloa cartel because they've invited us to see a meth SuperLab in action and on arrival we learned that Mexico's anti-narcotics military units were making sweeps of known gang areas it meant there would be delays for three nights we followed the cartels instructions touring around the city parking up and waiting for their signal that the lab was on one of the reasons why the cartels are so successful and have lasted for so long is that they take security incredibly seriously our meetings with them have taken months to organize but now we're here they actually take many more hours to get to we get moved from different locations it's clear they're watching seeing if we're being followed checking out if we are being honest and that that we are indeed journalists we've now been told to come and stay behind this petrol station and to stay in their cars they're going to come back soon to take us to the next meeting finally word came that the gang had secured the area around the lab and we were ordered to follow this car to the next location we weren't told if it would be the lab or another holding area guarded by dozens of cartel members we were taken to a warehouse [Music] they cook in huge drums fixing the chemical ingredients they barely speak to avoid identification [Music] production on this scale will take days the risk of detection increasing with every hour a stay and work in one place the production of crystal meth on an industrial scale bought something of a narco revolution to Mexico what was once produced in the back of campervans is now producing huge quantities and makes huge profits for the cartels they were so convinced that their quality of their product would be good that they gave it away to America for free they were convinced the United States would become hooked where they were right it's extremely toxic and on this scale the chances of an explosion are incredibly high the cookers are wary moving back and forth as the ingredients react spewing stinking gas into the air well while this is a big operation it's interesting the security they do it in different locations so the cartel has a number of warehouses and houses and disused shops that they use for the production of their methamphetamines and other things like crack as well so we've come from one location we're now being sent to another to continue filming with the increase in demand and the ability to produce in vast quantities at home from scratch the cartels look to expand production they realized they'd struck gold white gold for the next 48 hours straight this gang will work to fill thousands of capsules with crystal meth before it's moved abroad this amount will clear the cartel a quarter of a million pounds in profit most importantly they can do this every week it's staggering this one lab is making 12 million pounds a year and it's a medium-sized operation how long will you stay doing it do you think I am this I don't have I don't have idea when I can leave this business in health terms anyone cooking or handling meth is putting themselves at risk they spray acetone on the powder to stop it turning to dust fell unwittingly inhale but we spoke to these boys when they had finished they were all high unable to sleep and all suffering dreadful headaches but this is a business that's too good to miss we are making money with this it's over here we know there is a risk we don't care [Music] perhaps it's human nature but with so much money to be made there is a seemingly inevitable consequence deadly violence [Music] [Applause] [Music] the cartels fight each other the military the Federal Police and vigilante groups to maintain the flow of cash tens of thousands have died in the narco Wars thousands have disappeared there is often an attrition rate far higher than in modern warfare this is a war and the cartels of winning the police make a show of intervention with regular roadblocks and searches across the country but the cartels boast that the police are by and large on the payroll everyone has a price in Mexico that price is pretty low [Music] the mausoleums to their own fallen are a morbid reflection of their own vast wealth two stories high complete with kitchens air-conditioned meeting rooms and protected by bulletproof glass these are temples not just to the dead but to the excess drug money combined [Music] [Laughter] Mexico is a huge country in this vast wilderness below the cartels of thrive they control the communities and they use Mexico's remote mountains and farmlands to grow ship and cook this is the land of the cartels do you believe they can be beaten mr. Pugh by the crusading head of security in the border town of huarez the most violent all places in recent years yo Caracas is supercommittee in western Poland to my the deli-style to our land Oh el estado de el esta me he can move a taller hollando Tolliver Pollock geography si se puede estamos a Chavez estamos mess preparados para llevar a caballo yo yo creo que eso lo que estamos trabajando a guitar la fuerza cabeza es us Femina so Vanessa los grupos criminales siento yo que es muy complicado Tellman our lows ready carlo pero estamos an illusion a su [Music] Mexico is a victim of its own success the cartels have turned Mexico into an unwitting multinational drug operation center that can produce ship and traffic to the markets in North America Europe and beyond the cartels are more skilled at delivery than any legal shipping company no border no border authority in the world has been able to stop the flow of drugs [Music] while the insatiable demand continues and grows mexico's cartels will continue to supply it's not about making drugs it's about making money whatever it costs [Music] you [Music]

Channel: Sky News

Views: 4,950,996

Rating: 4.7067595 out of 5

Keywords: Sky News, skynews, news, United States Of America (Country), Drugs, Narco State, Stuart Ramsay, Drug, Europe, Amsterdam, Narco, Narcos, Cartel, Mexico, Cocaine, Meth, Methamphetamine, Crack, Crack Cocaine, Heroin, US, USA, United States, Addict, Opioid, MS13, Texas, California, Florida

Id: et8Cn9q_A-g

Length: 22min 46sec (1366 seconds)

Published: Fri Jul 10 2015

Reddit Comments

[u/8979323]

Thanks for posting, I found this very powerful. One of my best friends has dropped off the radar after getting into meth. We can't even find him any more; he could have died by now for all we know. I'm not anti drugs, but meth scares the fuck out of me. This was traumatic to watch, but compelling.

[u/[deleted]]

Wouldn't it be simpler to confiscate the megabucks generated by the illegal narcotic business. Rather than the Mexicans engage in futile shootouts with the drug manufacturers.

[u/whaddyaknowmaginot]

How does a news company gain access to film a drug cartel?!

[u/mrskeetskeeter]

They cut this with rat poison? Are you fucking kidding me?

[u/kricker02]

It's crazy they send a British reporter with a translator instead of a bilingual, or even spanish speaking only report, and add subtitle after. His ability to ask meaningful questions, and get clear responses is really hindered, and makes watching a little stressful when you consider the simple solution.

[u/Fog_of_more]

This is actually the second Narco State documentary Stuart Ramsay has made, he did an AMA after the first one:- https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/2ovgah/my_name_is_stuart_ramsay_im_sky_news_chief/