#CinemaJourney
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00:01The brazen and sophisticated escape of the head of the Sinaloa cartel, El Chapo Guzman, from a maximum security prison, makes the mastermind behind the escape, public enemy number one.
00:14Prison guards discovered a hole in the floor of the shower area. Below that, a 32-foot ladder led to a secret tunnel almost a mile long.
00:22A criminal genius leads authorities on a decade-long cat-and-mouse game, following several ATM heists in Canada.
00:31Blanchard rehearsed the entire procedure with dummy ATMs that he built out of large cardboard boxes, until he had it down to 90 seconds per machine.
00:39A major bust in Long Island, New York, uncovers an international counterfeit pharmaceutical scheme.
00:45They set up an internet pharmacy based in Costa Rica, and smuggled their cash of 4 million fake pills into the U.S. in small packages that were purposely mislabeled.
01:01The world's most inventive criminal minds.
01:06Lawless ingenuity, born out of greed.
01:09From back alleys to the high seas.
01:15Secret structures.
01:16Custom-built vehicles.
01:19High-tech innovation.
01:21What happens when engineering genies ends up on the wrong side of the law, and starts building bad?
01:39On July 11th, 2015, in Toluca, Mexico, Joaquin Guzman, better known as El Chapo, vanished from the maximum security prison of Altiplano.
01:51At 8.52 p.m., the cartel boss was seen in surveillance footage, sitting on his bed.
01:58A few minutes later, he was gone.
02:01The security camera showed Guzman taking off his shoes, and then walking to a corner of the cell by the shower area.
02:09He knelt behind a waist-high concrete partition, which obscured a clear view from the camera.
02:15And then he just disappeared.
02:19This was not good news for the Mexican authorities.
02:22Not only was Guzman head of one of the most deadly cartels, the Sinaloa, but he had already escaped from custody on a previous occasion.
02:29Prison guards discovered a hole in the floor of the shower area, roughly 18 by 18 inches, just wide enough for Guzman to escape.
02:38Below that, a 32-foot ladder led to a secret tunnel almost a mile long.
02:43The tunnel had electric lighting and pipes for ventilation, running the entire length.
02:48Most compelling, there was a light rail track, on top of which a modified Honda motorcycle was used to pull a trolley all the way to the end of the tunnel.
02:59The Sinaloa genius for tunnel design not only secured El Chapo's escape, but for the previous 25 years, had played a pivotal role in securing the organization's place as the most powerful drug cartel in Mexico.
03:16But just who created the tunnels, and how, was a complete mystery.
03:21Tunnels have been used by smugglers to traffic their goods throughout history.
03:28During the 1980s, the U.S. drug trade was dominated by cocaine from the Caribbean or directly from Colombia.
03:34But a series of crackdowns by U.S.-led authorities forced traffickers to establish new routes through Mexico, with drugs that could also be grown in Mexico.
03:44The remote region of Sinaloa, on the west coast of Mexico, was ideal terrain for growing marijuana.
03:51Add to that the incredible profit margin for pot, which at the time was worth 10 times as much in the U.S. than it was in Tijuana.
03:57And it got a perfect opportunity for Mexican traffickers to get rich.
04:02Unlike cocaine, which was compact and practically odorless, marijuana was bulky and smelly.
04:08No problem for drug-sniffing dogs at the border.
04:10El Chapo needed an effective way to move massive quantities of marijuana without attracting attention.
04:18In short, he needed a super tunnel.
04:24In 1989, the first planned tunnel was scheduled to originate at a Sinaloa-owned house in Agua Prieta, a Mexican border town,
04:33and travel 300 feet to a newly constructed 2,000-square-foot warehouse in Douglas, Arizona.
04:41300 feet is a relatively short distance, but the history of tunnel building is fraught with tragic accidents and deadly mistakes.
04:49Any strike of a pickaxe or drill could release a sudden rush of groundwater, spark a methane fireball,
04:55or disrupt the soil to cause the entire tunnel to collapse and crush those inside.
05:00The Sinaloa Tunnel Builders applied modern construction methods to combat these threats.
05:06They reinforced the tunnel walls with concrete and created arched ceilings,
05:11a technique engineers used to distribute the soil pressure and reduce the chance of collapse.
05:15They built a ventilation system to prevent asphyxiation from lack of oxygen and added a rudimentary lighting system.
05:23And crucially, they built the tunnels tall, at least five feet high,
05:27so that a grown man could almost stand up straight or push a wheeled cart filled with contraband marijuana.
05:32The Agua Prieta to Douglas Passage took a few months to complete and cost over a million U.S. dollars.
05:42But once it was fully operational, it didn't take long for the tunnel to pay for itself many times over,
05:50given its proximity to large distribution centers like Phoenix and Los Angeles.
05:54The Agua Prieta Tunnel became the prototype for any future tunnels to be built.
06:04And as the Sinaloa smugglers quickly discovered, it was almost impossible for law enforcement to locate.
06:12The Agua Prieta and tunnels like it were practically undetectable by ground radar,
06:19satellite, motion sensors, or thermal imaging.
06:22Faced with few alternatives and limited resources,
06:26the authorities started to hunt for drug tunnels on the foot,
06:29literally knocking on doors, asking questions, and handing out business cards.
06:33To throw the foot patrols off further,
06:36the Sinaloa smugglers devised cunning methods for camouflaging the entry and exit points for their tunnels.
06:41The entry into the Agua Prieta passage was hidden under a billiard table in the house's game room.
06:48And this was only activated by turning on a water spigot outside the house,
06:55which elevated the pool table to reveal a ladder leading down.
07:00It was very James Bond.
07:01Despite the ingenious methods the Sinaloa employed to hide their operations,
07:10by the early 2000s, American and Mexican authorities were catching up and catching on.
07:17Hundreds of federal agents from border control, homeland security, the DEA, and Immigration Customs Enforcement
07:24all worked together to share intelligence.
07:27From this group, the San Diego Tunnel Task Force was created in 2003.
07:31El Chapo and the Sinaloa cartel had been growing their business and expanding their turf further west
07:38to include the California border and a large swath of the Mexican coast.
07:42But the main concentration of their marijuana operations was a corridor
07:45that stretched from Tijuana, two miles across the border,
07:49to a section of southern San Diego called Ote Mesa.
07:51Ote Mesa was an industrial area with hundreds of warehouses and construction sites.
08:00In other words, a perfect location for drug shipments to arrive from Tijuana
08:03and be driven to the American distribution centers.
08:06It was busy, loud, and filled with trucks coming and going.
08:12Agents from the San Diego Tunnel Task Force managed to find an average of two tunnels a year,
08:18resulting in the arrests of low-tier Sinaloa operatives, such as truck drivers and warehouse workers.
08:23But it wasn't enough to stop the growing number of tunnels being built.
08:30Communication and information flow in the Sinaloa cartel was extremely compartmentalized,
08:35so it was impossible for police to identify the bosses, much less arrest them.
08:42Even the arrested truckers and warehouse workers didn't know the true identity of their bosses,
08:46all of whom had nicknames like Primo, Granito, and Quirino.
08:52Police did surmise that whoever was behind the Sinaloa supertunnels was a master tunnel builder
08:58and also orchestrated most of the routes between Tijuana and San Diego.
09:04He added elevators at the entry points in Mexico, which could hold larger masses of marijuana.
09:10But the most significant addition to his design was the creation of a light rail system.
09:14He also fastened metal tracks and trolleys to the tunnel floor,
09:20making it much easier to remove soil and rubble during the tunnel's creation.
09:24He also simplified the task of moving massive amounts of marijuana quickly through the passageways.
09:30The authorities were determined to unmask the identity of the master tunnel builder.
09:35After months of comparing Sinaloa wiretaps from the construction sites of different tunnels,
09:42police made a discovery.
09:44Over the phone, workers from various tunnels kept referring to their boss as Quirino and Primo.
09:51But since there was only one construction crew,
09:54police realized these were all code names for the same man,
09:59Juan Sanchez Villalobos.
10:02Technically, Villalobos was the Sinaloa's financial officer in charge of California border operations.
10:11But that was likely code for what he was actually doing,
10:14as the chief architect of the new and improved super tunnels.
10:18In early 2012, Mexican authorities arrested the 49-year-old Villalobos near Guadalajara.
10:24He was sentenced and put behind bars in El Altiplano Maximum Security Prison.
10:31His capture did nothing to slow down the bustling Sinaloa marijuana trade,
10:35as most of his tunnels were still operational.
10:38But the future of the Sinaloa cartel was thrown into question when, in 2014,
10:42El Chapo was finally caught by police after being on the run for 13 years.
10:46And just like Villalobos, the kingpin was placed in El Altiplano prison.
10:54Behind bars, almost immediately, El Chapo and his associates started to plan his escape.
11:01The plan centered on the creation of a new super tunnel,
11:05leading directly below El Chapo's jail cell,
11:09using the same techniques and innovations as the drug routes.
11:14At nearly 5,000 feet, the El Chapo escaper was going to be the longest tunnel yet.
11:19It would require the removal of 2,500 tons of soil.
11:24That's 375 truckloads.
11:27It was also the most expensive,
11:29costing over $50 million in construction expenses and bribes to prison officials.
11:34The tunnel entrance was an abandoned farmhouse at least half a mile from any other building.
11:40Inside the house, the tunnel workers used a hydraulic winch to move machinery and displace soil.
11:45Jackhammers were used to drill down,
11:47and horizontal-facing boring machines punched the tunnel hole forward.
11:51It was a massive operation.
11:52The escape tunnel required a crew of at least 15 men,
11:57and it took the workers over a year to reach El Altiplano prison.
12:02The tunnel builders likely had access to the prison's blueprints,
12:05and they used laser pointers and compasses to navigate their way directly to El Chapo's cell.
12:10To break through the cell's shower floor, they had to penetrate two to three inches of concrete,
12:15all without detracting suspicion.
12:18With the tunnel complete, at the designated time,
12:21El Chapo simply cut through the tracking device on his ankle,
12:25slipped through the 18 by 18 inch cut hole,
12:27and climbed down the ladder.
12:29Waiting for him at the bottom of the tunnel was a Honda motorcycle,
12:34modified and retrofitted to pull a trolley car the mile-long distance to the safe house.
12:39El Chapo either rode the motorcycle himself,
12:42or, more likely, an accomplice drove it,
12:45and he became the trolley's cargo to his own freedom.
12:47From the safe house, El Chapo was driven to a second secret location on an ATV,
12:54and from there to a nearby airstrip,
12:56where he was flown by his most trusted pilot to his hometown of La Tuna,
12:59in the mountains of Sinaloa.
13:05While El Chapo found himself on the run yet again,
13:08his chief architect, the Lord of the Tunnels, Juan Sanchez Villalobos,
13:13ultimately signed a plea deal with the U.S. Department of Justice,
13:16and served a 10-year prison sentence.
13:22According to court documents,
13:23he was the highest-ranking member of a drug cartel
13:26to ever be charged with smuggling marijuana into the U.S.
13:36El Chapo was recaptured in 2016
13:38and extradited to the United States the following year.
13:43He is currently serving a life sentence
13:45at the ADX Maximum Security Prison in Florence, Colorado.
13:49January 23, 2007, British Columbia, Canada.
14:06A dozen heavily armed SWAT team members
14:08descend on a Vancouver condo and bust the door open.
14:12Inside, the team discovers a treasure trove of evidence
14:16connected to a series of lucrative robberies.
14:19There were stacks and stacks of cash and a whole bunch of uniforms
14:24from, like, security guards or construction workers,
14:27clearly disguises.
14:29And there were fake IDs,
14:31things like driver's licenses and passports,
14:33all with fake names and aliases.
14:35In addition, police found thousands of keys of all sizes,
14:41cell phones, video recorders, and memory sticks,
14:45plus receipts and handwritten notes
14:47documenting years of criminal activity.
14:50It looked like the secret headquarters
14:53of a large-scale crime ring,
14:55but it was all the result of one man.
14:59Gerald Daniel Blanchard
15:01was an unassuming, soft-spoken Canadian
15:03who didn't exactly fit the stereotype
15:05of a wanted fugitive.
15:08But Blanchard was a criminal genius,
15:11responsible for multiple high-profile heists
15:14and spent a lifetime outsmarting the authorities.
15:17After his parents' divorce,
15:21Gerald moved with his mother to Omaha, Nebraska,
15:24to a rough section of town
15:26with a higher-than-average share of gang activity.
15:30Gerald started to go by his middle name, Daniel,
15:33and he quickly found ways to adapt to the new environment.
15:37According to his mother,
15:38as a child, Blanchard was a whiz
15:40with electronics and mechanics.
15:42He would spend hours taking machines and appliances apart
15:44and then putting them back together perfectly.
15:47His natural facility with electronics
15:49was the key to becoming an accomplished thief.
15:54Blanchard's initial targets
15:56were small department stores and electronics stores,
15:58but his methods were detailed and sophisticated.
16:03Blanchard would take weeks
16:04to study a store's security protocols,
16:07looking for ways to exploit any weaknesses.
16:09He was obsessed with video cameras and surveillance.
16:12So, with his own camcorder,
16:14he secretly filmed the routines of the security guards
16:17and he made note of the placement of the CCTV cameras.
16:22On the chosen day, Blanchard would enter the store,
16:25either alone or with an accomplice,
16:27then create a diversion
16:29and boldly steal the merchandise
16:31right under the nose of the staff and security.
16:34On some occasions,
16:36he would have his accomplice film him
16:38while he was stealing the goods.
16:42The more expensive items
16:44were kept behind plexiglass display cases,
16:47so Blanchard was ready
16:49with a variety of screwdrivers,
16:51keys and homemade lockpicks
16:53to release the casing.
16:55Once he had the stolen goods safely in his possession,
16:58he created fake receipts
16:59that were indistinguishable
17:01from the actual store receipt.
17:03After a few weeks,
17:04he returned the item to the store
17:06and received the full value back in cash.
17:08Blanchard's thrill-seeking need for danger
17:30eventually got him in hot water.
17:33After helping an associate
17:35torch a stolen car in Iowa
17:36in the spring of 1993,
17:39Gerald Blanchard was arrested
17:40and sentenced to four years in prison.
17:44When he was released in 1997,
17:46he was deported back to Canada
17:48and barred from returning to the U.S.
17:50for five years.
17:54Rather than becoming a changed man,
17:57Blanchard spent his four years in prison
17:59plotting and devising new ways
18:01to execute ambitious robberies.
18:05Blanchard decided to target
18:06Canadian banks over the next few years,
18:08specifically those banks' ATM machines.
18:11Those machines had tons of money in them,
18:13and unlike robbing a bank teller at gunpoint,
18:16there was very little threat of violence
18:18or collateral damage.
18:19Just to see it done as a teenage thief,
18:25Blanchard started each mission
18:27by carefully observing and studying
18:29every detail of the targeted location.
18:33He assembled an arsenal of gear
18:35for his own surveillance of the surveillance systems.
18:38This included night vision goggles,
18:40cameras with long-range lenses,
18:41high-gain antennae,
18:43and scanners that could decrypt the codes
18:44of police radio frequencies.
18:45Typically, Blanchard chose banks
18:49that were not yet open to the public
18:51before the ATMs contained any cash,
18:54so security was not as high.
18:56As the opening date got closer,
18:59he could observe the installation
19:00and opening of the ATM panels from a distance.
19:03He would also know when the empty ATMs
19:06were likely to be filled with cash,
19:07usually just a few days before opening.
19:09His next move was to gain access to the foyer
19:13where the empty ATM machines were installed.
19:16And since the new branch was usually under construction,
19:19Blanchard would just waltz right in
19:21disguised as a delivery person
19:23or as a construction worker.
19:26Once inside, he hid pinhole video cameras,
19:31microphones, and the occasional baby monitor
19:33behind the panels of electrical outlets.
19:36That way, he could listen in on conversations
19:39between security staff and, more importantly,
19:43watch them open and close the ATMs
19:46with either keys or numeric codes.
19:51When Blanchard was confronted with a locked foyer,
19:54he found other ways to plant the hidden devices.
19:58He identified air conditioning ducts,
20:00squeezed himself into tight spaces,
20:02and snaked along until he reached the vent
20:04connected to the ATM room.
20:06Other times, he just picked the locks.
20:07From his earlier reconnaissance,
20:10Blanchard knew what kind of locks the ATMs used.
20:13So he ordered the same locks and reverse-engineered them at home,
20:16much like he'd done as a kid with electronics.
20:20In the days leading up to the planned robbery,
20:22Blanchard rehearsed the entire procedure
20:24with dummy ATMs that he built out of large cardboard boxes.
20:27He knew he had a limited amount of time to escape
20:30once the bank's alarms went off.
20:31So he set a timer and he rehearsed his technique
20:35for safe-cracking the ATMs
20:36until he had it down to 90 seconds per machine.
20:40Each ATM contained four inner casings, or drawers,
20:44roughly the size of a shoebox.
20:47Blanchard had to open the main panel of each ATM
20:51and then spraying open each of the drawers
20:54in a minute and a half.
20:56But given that each ATM contained up to $100,000 cash,
21:01he had a pretty good incentive to perfect his technique.
21:07For one robber, there were seven ATM machines in a row.
21:10He released the cash drawers of six of the seven,
21:13placed them on a dolly,
21:14and wheeled them out to his van,
21:16waiting in the parking lot.
21:18It only took eight minutes for police to arrive
21:21from the time Blanchard opened the first ATM.
21:23But by that time, he was long gone.
21:25And he'd taken the hard drive
21:27that stored the bank's camera footage
21:29with him for good measure.
21:32When the police first arrived,
21:34they assumed it was a false alarm
21:35because there was no physical damage to the ATMs.
21:38Blanchard had just closed and relocked the panels.
21:41So it wasn't until the bank opened for business
21:43the next morning that they realized they had a problem.
21:47Best of all, Blanchard was watching their reaction
21:50in real time,
21:52thanks to the hidden cameras he'd placed.
21:54It's like he was laughing at them.
21:57As the police sprang into action,
22:00Blanchard jumped on their radio channel
22:02and pretended to be an informant.
22:04He gave them misleading information
22:06about where he'd escaped to,
22:08which completely threw them off the trail.
22:13For the next few years,
22:16Gerald Blanchard used this methodology
22:18on multiple ATM heists,
22:21and he became very rich in the process.
22:25Blanchard was getting a name for himself
22:27as a criminal genius.
22:29On one occasion,
22:31he got a call from the head of a powerful
22:33but mysterious organized crime ring
22:35known only as The Boss,
22:37who asked Blanchard to do a job for him in Egypt.
22:41Ever the adventurer, Blanchard agreed.
22:45The job was essentially a credit card scheme
22:47that required Blanchard to hit up hundreds of ATMs in Cairo
22:50in a short period of time.
22:52But it didn't go quite as planned.
22:55Blanchard contracted the help of an associate,
22:58but after only a few jobs,
22:59he took off with the cash,
23:01leaving Blanchard on the hook.
23:02By the end of the first week,
23:06Blanchard found himself owing The Boss
23:08a large sum of money.
23:09And The Boss had ties to arms trafficking
23:12and terrorism.
23:14So Blanchard panicked and returned to Canada,
23:17planning to get The Boss' money
23:18the only way he knew how,
23:20by robbing ATMs.
23:21But by that point,
23:23the police were waiting for him.
23:27Investigators received a tip
23:28from a Walmart security guard
23:30who wrote down the license plate
23:31of Blanchard's rented getaway van
23:33from a 2004 heist.
23:36And Gerald Blanchard,
23:38master of disguise,
23:40with over 20 aliases,
23:42signed the rental agreement
23:43with his own name.
23:45The police had enough evidence
23:47to apply for a search warrant.
23:49And on January 23rd, 2007,
23:52they arrested him
23:53at his Vancouver condo.
23:56As they were searching the apartment,
23:58police discovered a secret safe room
24:00hidden behind a mirror
24:01that contained years' worth
24:03of physical and digital evidence,
24:04mostly because Blanchard
24:06was obsessed with his own legacy.
24:10Unfortunately for him,
24:11Blanchard's legacy now included
24:1316 counts of theft and fraud.
24:15He was sent to jail
24:16and wasn't released until April of 2012.
24:19And five years later,
24:21he was arrested again
24:22for stealing a PlayStation from Best Buy.
24:24Gerald Daniel Blanchard
24:30achieved the impossible
24:31by robbing high-security ATMs
24:34over and over again,
24:35all with technical brilliance
24:37and a knack for pulling a fast one
24:39over the police.
24:41While no one condoned his actions,
24:43the judge presiding over his case
24:45suggested the banks
24:47should instead hire him
24:48for security detail.
24:50On September 12, 2014,
25:05in Long Island, New York,
25:07Americans Marla L. Grimm
25:08and Balbir Bogau
25:10were indicted for masterminding
25:12a three-year counterfeit
25:13pharmaceutical scheme.
25:15These two weren't members
25:17of a drug cartel.
25:18They didn't sell meth or opioids,
25:20and they certainly didn't
25:21traffic drugs on the street.
25:23Maria L. Grimm was a pharmacist,
25:25and her partner,
25:26Balbir Bogau,
25:27was a pharmacologist.
25:29On the surface,
25:29they were just everyday people,
25:31but their crimes were significant
25:33and exceptionally dangerous.
25:38L. Grimm and Bogau
25:39were charged with conspiring
25:41to supply 4 million
25:43misbranded and counterfeit
25:44pharmaceuticals
25:45to people in the United States
25:47through a Costa Rican pharmacy.
25:49The drugs included
25:51the psychotropic
25:52anti-anxiety pill,
25:54alprazolam,
25:55fentermine,
25:56a weight-loss drug,
25:58and Viagra.
26:02Fake drugs cost Big Pharma
26:04almost $200 billion
26:05every year,
26:07and in today's developing countries,
26:09make up between 10%
26:10and 30%
26:11of all medicines.
26:12Since drug manufacturing
26:15in these countries
26:16is very difficult to regulate,
26:17the quality varies widely,
26:19from too little active ingredient
26:21to too much,
26:22or even none whatsoever.
26:24But the problem isn't just
26:25that counterfeit pills
26:26are cheating customers
26:27and companies.
26:28The worst cost is human lives.
26:30As many as 169,000 children
26:34die every year
26:36after taking
26:37fake pharmaceuticals
26:38for pneumonia.
26:39And counterfeit
26:40or substandard
26:41anti-malarial drugs
26:42are the probable cause
26:43of death
26:44for over 120,000 children
26:46every year.
26:51For counterfeiters
26:52around the world,
26:53the fake drug trade
26:55offers nearly unlimited
26:57financial gain
26:58for an incredibly low investment.
27:02The world's leader
27:04in production
27:04of counterfeit pills
27:05is India.
27:06But although industrial manufacturers
27:08rule their market,
27:10there are many small producers
27:11with more rudimentary operations.
27:15In most cases,
27:16the manufacture
27:17of counterfeit pharmaceuticals
27:19requires only a pill press,
27:21dye molds,
27:22and readily available,
27:23easily obtained
27:24binders, fillers,
27:25and food dyes.
27:26You can potentially
27:28get started
27:28for under $500.
27:30And with a few thousand more
27:31for active ingredients
27:33and binding agents,
27:34soon have a thriving business
27:35making millions.
27:38The problem is
27:39it's super easy
27:40and it's super lucrative.
27:41A little desktop pill press
27:43can make 1,800 pills an hour.
27:45And it'll fit in the trunk
27:46of a car.
27:46And if you have
27:47a big industrial one,
27:48that can make
27:49one and a half million pills
27:50in an hour.
27:52And the chemical recipe
27:53for things like Viagra
27:54is publicly available.
27:55So for criminals,
27:57this is a little too easy.
28:00Believe it or not,
28:01when perfectly counterfeited
28:03and its entire production costs
28:04are calculated,
28:05a kilo of Viagra
28:06has a higher profit margin
28:08than a kilo of heroin.
28:12The pill press,
28:14also known as
28:14a tableting machine,
28:16was a tool
28:16originally designed
28:17for legitimate
28:18pharmaceutical development
28:20and production.
28:21Then counterfeiters
28:23discovered pill presses
28:24and realized
28:25how simple
28:26they were to use.
28:28They first create
28:29a powder mix
28:30by combining
28:31the pill's active ingredient.
28:33For Viagra,
28:34sildenafil citrate
28:35with binding agents
28:37and food dyes.
28:39The powdered ingredients
28:40are then run
28:40through a pill press,
28:41which is fitted
28:42with a counterfeit
28:43dye mold
28:44that duplicates
28:45the size
28:46and the shape
28:46and the individual markings
28:48of the legitimate
28:49pharmaceutical.
28:50That dye mold
28:51compresses the powdered mix
28:53into the counterfeit tablets,
28:54which are ready
28:55to be sold.
28:59Bogao was a dual citizen
29:01in both the U.S. and India,
29:02so he and Al Grimm
29:03were able to arrange
29:05for the manufacture
29:05in India
29:06of millions
29:07of fake pharmaceuticals.
29:09After that,
29:10they just needed
29:11to get them
29:11into the United States
29:12to sell them.
29:14But for Americans
29:16like Bogao and Al Grimm,
29:18it can be a huge challenge
29:19to import illegal contraband
29:21from India
29:22without getting caught.
29:24Fake drugs
29:25are usually shipped
29:26by using multiple layers
29:27of smuggling
29:27and fake documentation.
29:30The drugs are often
29:31mislabeled
29:32as another product
29:33and are either mailed
29:34or sent by express courier
29:36in small packages.
29:40The most popular
29:41transit points
29:42for those fake pharmaceuticals
29:43are Hong Kong
29:44and Singapore,
29:45followed by Iran,
29:46the United Arab Emirates,
29:48and Yemen.
29:49The small packages
29:50change hands
29:50really quickly
29:51in every country
29:52and they're often repackaged,
29:54which makes tracing them
29:55back to their original
29:55counterfeiters
29:56pretty much impossible.
29:58This separation
30:00shipping strategy
30:01is often used
30:02when Americans
30:02buy pill presses
30:03from foreign countries
30:04like China.
30:05They disassemble them
30:06and they send them
30:07to the U.S.
30:07in multiple packages
30:08to avoid detection.
30:10And it's not illegal
30:11to own one of them,
30:12but it is illegal
30:13to buy a pill press
30:14without telling
30:15the drug enforcement agency.
30:17So by getting it
30:18in little pieces,
30:19criminals have a way
30:20to get around that.
30:23Greater vigilance
30:24by government regulators
30:25has mandated
30:26that a drug's paper trail
30:27be checked
30:28more diligently
30:29as it moves
30:30through its supply chain.
30:32While making the purchase,
30:33import,
30:34and sale of fake drugs
30:35more complicated,
30:36there are still
30:37many loopholes
30:38for counterfeiters
30:39to exploit.
30:41Algrem and Bogal
30:43smuggled their cash
30:44of 4 million fake pills
30:46into the U.S.
30:47in small packages
30:48that were purposely mislabeled.
30:52Then they figured out
30:53a clever plan
30:54for selling them
30:55where their identities
30:56and location
30:56would be hidden.
30:58They set up
30:58an internet pharmacy
30:59based in Costa Rica.
31:04They marketed
31:05their fake pills
31:06on websites
31:07and took orders
31:08either online
31:09or from Costa Rican
31:10call centers.
31:11But these orders
31:12were actually filled
31:13inside the United States
31:14where they had
31:15smuggled the fake pills
31:16and where they lived
31:17and ran the entire operation.
31:21Algrem and Bogal
31:22had staff in the states
31:23filling pharmaceutical orders
31:25that were completely
31:26unlicensed
31:27and unqualified to do so.
31:29And they funded
31:29the ingenious operation
31:31by funneling money
31:32between Costa Rica,
31:33the states,
31:34and India.
31:35The internet is now littered
31:39with online pharmacies
31:40selling fake drugs.
31:42While it's a billion dollar
31:44windfall for counterfeiters,
31:45it's a critical problem
31:47for governments
31:47all over the world.
31:50The estimates are
31:51that prescription meds
31:52purchased online
31:53are fake
31:5450% of the time.
31:57And for Viagra,
31:58it's 77%.
32:00A study of over 10,000
32:02online pharmacies
32:03found that more than
32:0399% of them
32:05either broke a state law
32:06or a federal law
32:07or they violated
32:09safety practices
32:09and pharmacy standards.
32:12Online pharmacies
32:13are cashing in
32:15because the people
32:16who buy weight loss meds,
32:18painkillers,
32:19tranquilizers,
32:20and sex enhancers
32:21are saving tons of money
32:24without leaving the house.
32:25They don't need a prescription
32:26and there's greater discretion
32:29for their sensitive conditions.
32:31But there's a critical cost
32:32for the acute lack
32:33of quality control,
32:35their safety.
32:37These counterfeit pills
32:39can kill you.
32:40It's as simple as that.
32:41In 2018,
32:43counterfeit male enhancement pills
32:44from Puerto Rico
32:45were sold on eBay
32:46after being purchased in China
32:48and smuggled in via Miami
32:50where they were then repackaged.
32:53The pills were extremely dangerous
32:56because they were contaminated
32:57with drugs
32:58that could cause heart attacks
32:59and strokes
33:00in unknowing customers.
33:04Criminal sentences
33:06for distributing
33:06counterfeit pharmaceuticals
33:08are much lower
33:09than that of other forms
33:10of drug smuggling.
33:12Plus,
33:12the risk of prosecution
33:13is very low
33:14due to the difficulty
33:16of tracing the origin
33:17of fake drugs.
33:18The low risk-to-reward ratio
33:22is a huge factor
33:23in the out-of-control
33:24opioid crisis
33:25that is crippling the U.S.
33:27and other developed countries.
33:28One kilogram of fentanyl
33:29purchased from China
33:30for a few thousand dollars
33:31in the dark web
33:32can produce enough
33:33fake oxycodone
33:34to make as much
33:35as $20 million.
33:39Fentanyl
33:40is the drug of choice
33:41for many counterfeiters
33:43because it's cheap,
33:44readily available,
33:46and incredibly potent
33:47and addictive.
33:49In America,
33:50counterfeit pills
33:51containing fentanyl
33:52were first reported
33:54in 2015
33:55in a few jurisdictions.
33:57Four years later,
33:59every U.S. state
34:00has found the deadly drug
34:02in its fake pills.
34:03The result is a public health emergency.
34:06In 2022,
34:09synthetic opioids,
34:10primarily fentanyl,
34:12caused over 76,000 deaths
34:14countrywide.
34:17Regulatory authorities
34:19and law enforcement agencies
34:20around the world
34:21believe that greater vigilance,
34:23international cooperation,
34:25and improved detection methods
34:27will save innocent lives
34:28from the perils
34:30of counterfeit drugs.
34:32But the sentences
34:33of Marla Algrim
34:34and Bashir Bogal
34:35indicted a decade ago
34:37for importing,
34:38possessing,
34:39and selling millions
34:40of fake pharmaceuticals
34:41are a resounding message
34:43that the punishment
34:44in the counterfeit drug arena
34:46is still shockingly weak.
34:49All Grim and Bogal
34:53were convicted
34:54of mail and wire fraud,
34:56but all other charges
34:57were dropped.
34:58They received nothing more
34:59than a slap on the wrist,
35:01probation, fines,
35:03and a couple of hundred hours
35:04of community service,
35:06a small price to pay
35:07for turning huge profits
35:09while putting lives at risk.
35:19On January 12, 2021,
35:26a Mr. Wang arrived home
35:27in Changsha
35:28in China's Hunan province
35:30where he was promptly arrested
35:32by Chinese authorities.
35:34Police suspected
35:35he was a covert financial director
35:37of the world's largest
35:39video game cheating ring.
35:42Wang held a modest position
35:43at a small company
35:44and received a nominal salary
35:46with the equivalent
35:47of $462 a month.
35:50And yet,
35:50he owned a Rolls Royce,
35:52a Ferrari,
35:52and at least one Lamborghini.
35:54He also had about
35:55$4 million worth of Bitcoin.
35:57So it was no surprise
35:58that he caught the attention
35:59of the Chinese authorities.
36:03China is the world's largest,
36:05most lucrative gaming market.
36:07Close to 700 million people
36:09play online games
36:10with total revenues
36:11reaching over $40 billion a year.
36:14About 75% of that market share
36:18is in mobile gaming.
36:19And the king of the mobile industry
36:20at the time of Wang's arrest
36:21was something called
36:22Peacekeeper Elite,
36:24also known as PUBG.
36:26PUBG,
36:27short for Player Unknowns Battleground,
36:30was inspired by a Japanese movie
36:31called Battle Royale.
36:34In the game,
36:35up to 100 players
36:35are airdropped onto a map
36:37and have to fight each other
36:38until only one player
36:39or team survives.
36:40When PUBG was released in 2017,
36:44it was an instant smash hit.
36:47And currently,
36:48over 650 million people
36:50in China play the game.
36:55PUBG was released by Tencent,
36:57China's largest video game publisher.
37:00And the game is one reason
37:01why Tencent's value
37:02on the stock exchange
37:03had at one point
37:05edged towards a trillion dollars.
37:07In 2017,
37:09a software engineer,
37:10alias Catfish,
37:12was off work
37:13and playing PUBG online
37:14when they realized
37:15a lot of players
37:16they were up against
37:17were doing unnaturally well.
37:19Catfish figured
37:20they had to be using cheats.
37:23Cheats are illegal software plugins
37:25a gamer can install
37:27on their device
37:27that override
37:29a game's limitations
37:30or enhance its functionality,
37:32such as allowing them
37:33to shoot more rapidly
37:34or to not take any damage
37:36when they get shot.
37:39That's a cheater!
37:41Video game cheats
37:42go as far back
37:42as video games themselves.
37:44In fact,
37:45the first cheats
37:46were special secret lines of code
37:48written into the game's software
37:49by the developers themselves
37:51for the testing of the game
37:52as they were designing it.
37:55The next evolution
37:57of game cheats
37:57involved the player
37:58actually changing values
38:00within the game's code itself,
38:02giving them things like
38:03extra ammunition
38:04for more lives.
38:07In the 1990s,
38:09third-party companies
38:10started selling game cartridges
38:11that had this kind of code
38:13pre-programmed into them.
38:15So now,
38:15cheats were a money-making proposition.
38:18With the advent
38:20of multiplayer online games,
38:22the reach of software cheats
38:23changed.
38:25If a player
38:25installed a cheat
38:26on their device,
38:27they now had an edge
38:28against dozens
38:29or hundreds of opponents
38:31at a time.
38:33Cheats are popular
38:34and a lot of people
38:34are willing to pay for them,
38:36but a lot of players
38:36don't like them
38:37then will quit a game
38:38if they know cheats
38:39are being used.
38:40He's definitely cheating.
38:42Oh my God!
38:44The catfish seemed
38:45to be of the mindset,
38:46don't get mad,
38:47get even.
38:48Instead of quitting,
38:49he figured,
38:49what if I write
38:50my own PUBG cheat?
38:54Catfish then set
38:55about creating
38:55his own cheat,
38:57and when he was done,
38:58it provided
38:59a formidable advantage.
39:01One feature
39:02aimed catfish's weapons
39:03was automatically
39:04with superhuman accuracy.
39:07Look at that aimbot.
39:08Oh my God,
39:09he just hits every bullet.
39:11It also allowed catfish
39:12to see enemies
39:13through walls,
39:14floors,
39:14and behind obstacles.
39:16Another feature
39:17let them see
39:17the opponent's screen,
39:18their perspective,
39:20and all their private information
39:21like health
39:22and ammunition supply.
39:23It was a huge
39:24strategic advantage.
39:26Catfish found
39:27an internet chat group
39:28for cheat developers
39:29and connected
39:30with a person
39:31who agreed to see
39:32if they could sell
39:33his software cheat online.
39:36In China,
39:37developing and selling
39:37game cheats
39:38is considered
39:39a hacking crime.
39:40You can get years in jail
39:41and life-destroying fines.
39:43So Catfish
39:43and their new partner
39:44agreed right away.
39:45The less they knew
39:46about each other,
39:47the better.
39:48They never divulged
39:48their real names
39:49and only communicated
39:50via secure,
39:51end-to-end encrypted apps
39:52from the start.
39:53And they were only
39:54going to deal in Bitcoin,
39:56the new favored currency
39:56of criminals
39:57and organized crime groups.
40:01Catfish has plugged
40:02now named Cheat Ninja
40:04went on sale
40:05in China only
40:06on a third-party website.
40:10It sold thousands
40:11of copies within days
40:12earning Catfish
40:13several thousand dollars.
40:16Game publishers
40:17don't tolerate cheats
40:18because players
40:19are less likely
40:20to purchase
40:21in-game content
40:22if they believe
40:23cheating is going on.
40:24And this can hurt
40:25a company's bottom line.
40:27Tencent would have been aware
40:28of Cheat Ninja
40:29very early on.
40:30To protect their game's
40:33reputation
40:34and their revenues,
40:35publishers like Tencent
40:37have to constantly
40:38update their game code
40:39to detect and defend
40:40against every new cheat.
40:44Whenever Tencent
40:44patched up a vulnerability
40:46in PUBG,
40:47Catfish had to find
40:48a new way in
40:49and tweak Cheat Ninja's code.
40:52Soon, Catfish had to
40:53hire more coders,
40:55all remotely,
40:56all anonymously,
40:56just to keep ahead
40:58of Tencent's developers
40:59and make sure
41:00Cheat Ninja
41:00kept working its magic.
41:03Catfish also recruited
41:04an additional sales partner,
41:06again,
41:07in complete anonymity.
41:09The alias
41:10was just
41:11nine vertical bars.
41:13But it was worth it.
41:14Catfish was charging
41:15the equivalent
41:16of about a buck fifty a day
41:17or a deal
41:18at twenty-eight dollars a month.
41:20And customers
41:20were happy to pay.
41:22Cheat Ninja
41:22was gaining
41:23a thousand new subscribers
41:25daily.
41:25They had various levels
41:28of resellers,
41:29like a pyramid.
41:31Cheat Ninja
41:31sold large batches
41:32of licenses to resellers,
41:34accepting payment
41:35only in Bitcoin.
41:37Cheat Ninja
41:38was now pulling
41:39in between
41:39roughly $350,000
41:41and $400,000
41:42every month.
41:44And Catfish
41:44decided to expand
41:46the business
41:46again.
41:48Catfish
41:49built their own website,
41:51CheatNinja.com,
41:52and went after sales
41:53beyond China's borders
41:54for the first time.
41:55Into India,
41:57Kuwait,
41:57the United Arab Emirates,
41:58Saudi Arabia,
41:59and Egypt.
42:01But the good times
42:02couldn't last
42:03and things were
42:04about to get ugly.
42:06See,
42:07Tencent really is
42:07a Goliath
42:08in the Chinese gaming world.
42:10They own more than
42:10half the market share there.
42:13In March of 2020,
42:15Tencent notified
42:16the Kunshan police
42:17of a sales website
42:18selling an illegal
42:19game cheat
42:20that targeted PUBG.
42:21authorities made
42:23at least 10 arrests
42:24that year,
42:25all low-level
42:25sellers at first.
42:26But none of those
42:27sellers could point
42:28the police
42:28to their higher-ups.
42:29They didn't know
42:30anyone's name.
42:32Somehow,
42:33possibly by going
42:34through those
42:34Bitcoin transactions,
42:35the authorities
42:36figured out that
42:37Wang was one of
42:38the Cheat Ninja's
42:38two key sales agents.
42:40And that's
42:41when they arrested him.
42:42The police then
42:44used one of Wang's
42:45personal devices
42:46to message Nine Bars,
42:47pretending to be Wang,
42:49and managed to fool
42:50Nine Bars
42:50into clicking a website
42:51that instantly captured
42:52his IP address.
42:54And from that,
42:55the police were able
42:56to determine his location
42:57in Jiangsu province
42:59near Shanghai.
43:01The police rushed
43:02to Nine Bars' home
43:03and arrested him.
43:06Later that same day,
43:07Catfish received
43:08an odd message
43:09from Nine Bars' phone
43:10saying,
43:11he suddenly had to
43:12leave for Shanghai.
43:16Catfish knew Nine Bars
43:17would never go offline
43:19on such short notice.
43:20Something was wrong,
43:22so they immediately
43:22cut off all their
43:24communication channels.
43:25And with their number
43:26of monthly subscribers,
43:28now up to 600,000,
43:30shut Cheat Ninja's
43:31website down
43:32without a moment's notice.
43:35Catfish wiped
43:36Cheat Ninja's servers
43:37and then destroyed
43:38all the organization's
43:39data that was on
43:40their hard disks
43:41using a hammer.
43:46Nine Bars and Wang
43:48each got four years
43:49for copyright infringement
43:51and were fined
43:52about $3 million.
43:54Catfish hasn't been caught
43:56and is doing what Catfish do,
43:59laying low somewhere
44:00in the Internet's
44:02murky depths.
44:03Catfish
44:03waterway,
44:07bat,
44:08$3 million to hoop
44:09or half
44:09or half
44:11quickly.
44:12The next thing,
44:12has been
44:14a Monday on the
44:15minute's
44:21sun for the
44:24night.