Netflix commissions 'Narcos' creators for a new series on notorious Griselda Blanco

Griselda Blanco is the subject of Netflix's latest production. With the creators of the iconic series "Narcos" behind the project, her story promises to prompt interest and discussion. Even though the Cocaine Godmother passed away 12 years ago, her legend persists. Some even claim that Blanco committed her first murder at just 11 years of age.

Originating from southern Colombia, Griselda was born into a direly impoverished family. Her mother, Ana Lucia Restrepo, was a prostitute, and her father was an alcoholic. Desperate to escape the squalor, Restrepo relocated with her three-year-old daughter from the slums to Medellin.

In her new home, Blanco sought ways to earn fast money. Initially, she resorted to robbing pedestrians, but the returns were inadequate. At the age of 11, she kidnapped a boy from a comparatively well-off family for ransom. When the money didn't materialize, Blanco allegedly executed the captive with a gunshot to the head.

A year later, Restrepo decided to draw her daughter into her line of work. For money, she sold her 12-year-old daughter. The girl swiftly understood that if she were to be a prostitute, she would instead have the profits come directly to her. At 14, she left her mother's home and moved in with a pimp, who soon became her first husband.

Although Carlos Trujillo was not an extraordinary criminal, he introduced Blanco to the criminal underworld. Until she was 20 years old, she worked as a prostitute in Medellin. After her wedding to Trujillo, she bore him three sons, who later inherited their mother's cocaine empire. Their careers ended tragically, costing them their lives.

After divorcing her husband, Blanco was implicated in Trujillo's murder years later. Some sources assert Blanco herself executed her former lover. Others maintain that she merely orchestrated the crime. Blanco's subsequent husband, Alberto Bravo, introduced her to the cocaine smuggling business in the USA. Bravo paved her way into the trade, and Blanco is credited with the pioneering idea of employing women for drug smuggling, as they attracted less suspicion at the border.

Blanco's business was booming, but drug trafficking charges forced her to flee the United States. After returning to Colombia, she moved back in with her husband. Around this time, she developed an addiction to "paco," an exceedingly harmful substance derived from cocaine production. The drug-induced severe paranoia caused her to suspect her husband of betrayal and theft, leading her to plot his murder. During the ensuing confrontation, Blanco was shot by her husband. Despite her injury, she survived the encounter; Alberto did not.

She later reentered the USA, settling in New York and Miami. Allegedly, the drastic alterations in her appearance, caused by drug use, rendered her unrecognizable and allowed her reentry undetected. Following her return to the USA, a wave of mass murders commenced. By the late 80s, a drug war had erupted in Miami, and despite Blanco's vast wealth accumulated from cocaine smuggling, she yearned for more.

Blanco ordered her henchmen to carry out public assassinations, shooting victims at point-blank range. Each assassin, or pistolero, would approach targets on motorcycles, a method reflecting the notorious modus operandi of the Medellin cartel. Blanco had a son with Dario Sepulveda, named Michael Corleone Blanco. Reportedly, Michael was witness to his father's murder, a crime allegedly directed by Blanco, as Sepulveda was shot while in a moving vehicle with one of her employees.

"My mother was no saint. She had to do what she had to do to survive. But in the end, she was my mother. I will always respect and honor her," admitted Michael Corelone in a 2020 interview with the "Daily Mirror".

Michael, now 45 years old and a father of three, chose to forge a benign lifestyle following his mother's passing, dedicating himself to ensuring a better destiny for his family. Currently, he is engaged in the entertainment industry and resides in a suburban area.

Blanco was eventually apprehended and convicted for drug trafficking. She was also connected to 250 murders, but she confessed to only three. She was sentenced to a 15-year prison term, but due to burgeoning health issues, she was released early on parole and deported to Colombia. In 2012, she was assassinated, ironically, in the same way as her many victims: by a masked gunman on a motorcycle who shot her in the head.