When he heard the news that Pablo Escobar had been gunned down on a Medellin rooftop in 1993, the drug lord’s teenaged son, Juan Pablo, vowed to avenge his father’s death. “If it’s true,” he said, “I’ll kill all the sons of bitches.”
But rather than following in his father’s murderous footsteps in Colombia, Juan Pablo Escobar settled in Argentina. He married his longtime Colombian girlfriend and works as an architect. To avoid notoriety and harassment, he has changed his name to Sebastian Marroquin.
For years, Marroquin avoided the media. But now he’s emerged as the central character in a documentary about his father’s violent legacy: "Pecados de mi Padre," or "The Sins of my Father." In the film, Marroquin urges Colombian youths — some of whom still view Escobar as a romantic, Robin Hood-like figure — not to be tempted by the power and wealth of the current generation of cocaine kingpins.
The highlight of the documentary is when Marroquin apologizes to the sons of two of Pablo Escobar’s best-known victims: Justice Minister Rodrigo Lara, who was gunned down in 1984, and presidential candidate Luis Carlos Galan, assassinated by the drug lord’s hitmen five years later. The two politicians were targeted due to their fierce criticism of Colombia’s drug cartels.
"The Sins of My Father" premieres this month in the Argentine city of Mar del Plata. Marroquin recently spoke with GlobalPost about the film and about life with the world’s most notorious drug lord.
Read more here.
Semana International delivers news about Colombia in English. Find more in our home.