The name of Pablo Escobar is one of the most notorious among international drug traffickers. Numerous series, movies or documentaries have been shot about the founder and top leader of the Medellín Cartel, perhaps the largest drug trafficking group in history. Until his death in 1993, the drug lord controlled most of the world’s production and his story led him to be sentenced not only for drug trafficking, but also for money laundering, murder or terrorism, among others.
There are endless words to talk about most powerful man of the Colombian mafia and his criminal empire, even to myths and legends about them. But one of the curiosities throughout his life was when he tried to kidnap Michael Jackson, the “King of Pop”. A thorough operation that was close to being carried out.
The singer was in his prime in the 1990s. His social circle was made up of celebrities and world famous people. He was loved by everyone, and even, he even entered the White House to meet with the then President of the United States, George HW Bush. His son Juan Pablo, in an interview for TN Argentina, confessed that one day, he asked his father to bring the musical eminence, who was his idol.
“This arose from the fact that I, tired of seeing the same artists at Hacienda Napoles, told him why we didn’t bring someone of international stature and he accepted me. I suggest Michael Jackson as a possible character.”, declared the descendant of the drug trafficker. And it is that not only was he a fan of his music and admired the artist, but also his entire family, which made it seem easier for the kidnapping to take place. “I was a fan and my father liked it too. The idea seemed good to him.”he said, after his book “Pablo Escobar in Fraganti”, in 2016.
Given the cost of bringing Michael Jackson to the farm from the United States, with a land area of more than 3,000 hectares and which Escobar normally used for private shows, money was not a problem. Juan Pablo had already asked Frank Sinatra to stop bringing local artists to the building and start bringing international ones.
A dramatic turn of events that nullified the plan
“The cost of a private concert was not known, but later with his Machiavellian mind inclined towards evil, he told me ‘Yes, I’m going to invite him. She wanted to bring him in, pay him to sing, and then have him pay her to let him out of where he had come to sing.”he added to the Argentine media.
But the idea was not only to listen to his songs, but after the show, to kidnap Michael Jackson. The kidnapping of the “King of Pop” would mean asking for a reward of 60 million dollars, making a media show and his name will sound beyond the continent, to points where he was not known. A great idea, ideal and dangerous, but with an incredibly tasty prize.
“Everything seemed very normal because we had the private landing strip there, the soccer field very close for him to set up his concert, and I saw the logistics as easy for him to arrive and do his concert and return to his country”, revealed the drug trafficker’s son.
He just had a little problem that derailed the whole plan. The abduction did not materialize because, a few days before, Hacienda Napoles was expropriated by the Colombian state after a legal battle. A few months later, Pablo Escobar was captured by the Colombian Police in Medellín while trying to escape.