The “Griselda” series is inspired by the true story of Griselda Blanco, a drug trafficker who sowed terror in Medellín and Miami in the 1980s.
She was the only person feared Pablo Escobar. And she now has the right to her own series. Griseldaa drama series in six episodes, is released on Netflix this Thursday, January 25, 2024. This new program to watch in less than six hours returns to a little-known crime figure, who is nevertheless the only woman to have established herself in the world of trafficking drugs in the 1970s and 1980s.
As its name suggests, the new series of Netflix tells the true story of Griselda Blanco. This wife of a drug trafficker and mother finally emancipated herself from her husband by fleeing Medellín to create her own drug empire in Miami. At first not taken seriously because of her gender, she managed to establish herself by becoming a trafficker as violent as she was formidable.
The one who was nicknamed “the queen of coca”, “the Black Widow” or “the Madrina” was at the head of a vast network, which transported up to 1,500 kilos of drugs per month and generated around 80 million dollars. This cartel queen was especially linked to nearly 200 murders, making her a criminal feared by her peers.
Kidnapping and prostitution before drug trafficking
Born in 1943 in Cartagena de Indias (Colombia), Griselda Blanco grew up in the slums of Medellin. She adapted to the violence of the environment where she grew up, stealing and prostituting herself until she was 20.. She is even accused of kidnapping a rich kid from her neighborhood when she was only 11 years old, and of killing him when she realized she would not get a ransom.
The one who inspires the series Griselda ends up marrying a pimp, who becomes the father of her three sons. However, she ends up having him killed, before marrying a drug trafficker who takes her to New York. She established, with her partner, her first drug trafficking business there. However, she was indicted in April 1975 in one of the biggest cocaine trafficking cases of the time. Griselda Blanco, however, managed to return to Colombia before being arrested.
Serial Killings
At the end of the 1970s, Griselda Blanco returned to the United States, this time to Miami. The woman who would become Pablo Escobar’s mentor saw her empire grow, as did the violence she used: she was associated with more than 200 murders, including that of her first husband. She was arrested in 1994 for ordering the murder of three people, including a two-year-old child.
In 1984, her competitors in Miami tried to kill her. Griselda Blanco escapes again, this time to California. She was arrested the following year by agents of the DEA (American federal agency responsible for combating drug trafficking) and sentenced to more than 10 years in prison for drug trafficking. However, she continues to manage her trafficking from prison.
Assassinated in 2012
She narrowly escaped the death penalty for procedural flaws in the handling of her case. But Griselda Blanco does not lack resources and decides to carry out a crazy operation from her cell in order to avoid serving her sentence: kidnapping the son of John Fitzgerald Kennedy and Jackie Kennedy. She fails, however, and will serve her 10-year prison sentence. Expelled in 2004, she returned to Colombia. She was murdered at the age of 69 in Medellin on September 3, 2012.
Griselda returns to the crazy story of this drug baroness, with actress Sofia Vergara (Modern Family) in the leading role. The six episodes are available on Netflix, and are released in a context of controversy: the son of the drug trafficker filed a complaint against Netflix because he would not have given his authorization for certain images to be broadcast, and they would have used anecdotes without his consent.