1 00:00:08,049 --> 00:00:09,134 [girl in Spanish] Beaches. 2 00:00:12,262 --> 00:00:13,388 Vacation. 3 00:00:15,890 --> 00:00:16,933 Escape. 4 00:00:18,268 --> 00:00:20,562 They always say, "Come to Miami." 5 00:00:21,855 --> 00:00:23,064 "Explore Miami." 6 00:00:27,235 --> 00:00:30,864 But what if I told you about the other side? 7 00:00:33,450 --> 00:00:36,578 You may have heard about the drugs... 8 00:00:38,204 --> 00:00:39,706 but what about the gold? 9 00:00:47,088 --> 00:00:48,339 Money laundering. 10 00:00:49,674 --> 00:00:51,050 Sex trafficking. 11 00:00:52,635 --> 00:00:53,928 Murder. 12 00:00:56,848 --> 00:00:58,975 All because of that pretty metal... 13 00:01:05,273 --> 00:01:06,107 Gold. 14 00:01:09,944 --> 00:01:11,946 ["Lie, Cheat, Steal" by Run the Jewels plays] 15 00:01:21,289 --> 00:01:25,710 ♪ Lie, cheat, steal, kill, win, win ♪ 16 00:01:25,794 --> 00:01:27,212 ♪ Everybody doin' it ♪ 17 00:01:27,295 --> 00:01:31,466 ♪ Lie, cheat, steal, kill, win, win ♪ 18 00:01:31,549 --> 00:01:32,926 ♪ Everybody doin' it ♪ 19 00:01:33,009 --> 00:01:36,679 ♪ Lie, cheat, steal, kill, win ♪ 20 00:01:57,033 --> 00:01:57,951 [girl in Spanish] Gold. 21 00:02:01,955 --> 00:02:03,623 It's everywhere. 22 00:02:11,256 --> 00:02:12,090 In everything. 23 00:02:20,056 --> 00:02:24,519 Man's fascination and quest for gold is timeless. 24 00:02:31,067 --> 00:02:33,695 But what is gold, really? 25 00:02:37,532 --> 00:02:39,576 And where does it really come from? 26 00:02:43,037 --> 00:02:44,956 Do you even want to know? 27 00:03:09,272 --> 00:03:11,941 [man] Here you have Miami International Airport. 28 00:03:12,901 --> 00:03:16,029 Two, three planes come from Latin America daily... 29 00:03:18,406 --> 00:03:20,074 filled with tons of gold. 30 00:03:21,242 --> 00:03:24,287 Thirty-five billion dollars in the last ten years. 31 00:03:24,996 --> 00:03:26,289 And from those doors, 32 00:03:26,998 --> 00:03:30,168 probably around 10:00 in the morning most of the days, you have all the... 33 00:03:31,252 --> 00:03:35,173 trucks carrying all the gold off to the refineries. 34 00:03:36,341 --> 00:03:39,344 And most of the gold is all blood gold 35 00:03:39,427 --> 00:03:42,847 that is being illegally mined from the jungle in Peru or Venezuela, 36 00:03:43,222 --> 00:03:45,683 which has a huge impact in the environment, 37 00:03:45,850 --> 00:03:47,727 and communities that are very vulnerable. 38 00:03:48,353 --> 00:03:49,938 But nobody cares. 39 00:03:50,730 --> 00:03:52,398 As long as the money is flowing, 40 00:03:53,066 --> 00:03:54,442 the business continues. 41 00:04:00,406 --> 00:04:04,452 I was the Secretary of Finance for the city of Bogota, 42 00:04:04,535 --> 00:04:07,538 and we were trying to prove that gold has become 43 00:04:07,622 --> 00:04:09,749 one of the main instruments in the laundering 44 00:04:09,832 --> 00:04:12,877 of the drug dealers' proceeds from the US. 45 00:04:14,212 --> 00:04:17,799 We began to look at the complete gold supply chain, 46 00:04:19,175 --> 00:04:24,806 and the flow of money that is-- that was coming back from the US was enormous. 47 00:04:26,224 --> 00:04:30,311 When we realized we had in our hands a big money laundering scheme, 48 00:04:30,395 --> 00:04:33,606 we began trying to ask for help from the US agencies. 49 00:04:33,690 --> 00:04:37,235 But getting the US moving forward is very difficult. 50 00:04:38,778 --> 00:04:42,115 And that's when the Attorney General of Colombia 51 00:04:42,615 --> 00:04:46,327 mentions to me that some powerful criminals were... 52 00:04:47,245 --> 00:04:48,788 asking for contributions 53 00:04:48,871 --> 00:04:52,375 to come up with $3 million to organize 54 00:04:53,209 --> 00:04:54,711 an attempt on my life. 55 00:04:54,794 --> 00:04:57,672 And they had already killed some people that work for me. 56 00:04:57,755 --> 00:04:59,590 So, I've been here since. 57 00:05:05,847 --> 00:05:09,225 [man] Some people like to fill the cooler and catch as many fish as they can. 58 00:05:12,729 --> 00:05:13,771 I like to figure out 59 00:05:13,855 --> 00:05:15,857 what is the smartest way to catch the biggest fish... 60 00:05:17,692 --> 00:05:19,027 even if you only catch one. 61 00:05:20,403 --> 00:05:22,196 In 2015, I'm... 62 00:05:23,489 --> 00:05:24,574 34, 63 00:05:25,241 --> 00:05:26,409 35 years old. 64 00:05:26,492 --> 00:05:29,620 I was just a rookie who had never done a big case, 65 00:05:30,204 --> 00:05:32,915 I'm what's considered a baby Assistant US Attorney. 66 00:05:35,168 --> 00:05:39,005 A lot of agencies, the FBI, HSI, DEA in Peru, 67 00:05:39,088 --> 00:05:44,052 have been seeing this suspicious activity involving large, large amounts of gold 68 00:05:44,218 --> 00:05:45,970 being exported to Miami. 69 00:05:46,929 --> 00:05:51,267 The agents and I decided that we were going to build a case 70 00:05:51,351 --> 00:05:53,019 just looking at data. 71 00:05:53,353 --> 00:05:57,315 Excel spreadsheets that were tens of thousands of lines long. 72 00:05:58,232 --> 00:05:59,776 There were times I wondered... 73 00:06:01,652 --> 00:06:03,988 "Were we crazy? Were we ever going to make the case? 74 00:06:04,655 --> 00:06:07,241 Will I have wasted two critical years of my life 75 00:06:07,325 --> 00:06:08,910 and the time and trust of... 76 00:06:09,410 --> 00:06:10,828 a lot of agents and agencies?" 77 00:06:12,455 --> 00:06:14,082 It was scary sometimes. 78 00:06:15,917 --> 00:06:20,004 We began to realize that there's billions of dollars 79 00:06:20,088 --> 00:06:21,672 of something criminal going on, 80 00:06:21,756 --> 00:06:24,634 touching everyone and everything involved in gold. 81 00:06:25,760 --> 00:06:28,429 And the scheme spans a hemisphere. 82 00:06:29,263 --> 00:06:32,225 So, we knew it was happening, the gold smuggling 83 00:06:32,308 --> 00:06:35,520 and the gold money laundering, and we knew the scale 84 00:06:36,270 --> 00:06:37,355 it was happening on. 85 00:06:37,980 --> 00:06:39,148 What we didn't know... 86 00:06:40,650 --> 00:06:42,235 was how we were gonna prove it. 87 00:06:45,947 --> 00:06:47,573 [man] Yo. I'm about to pull up. 88 00:06:50,868 --> 00:06:52,453 [girl in Spanish] The story starts 89 00:06:52,787 --> 00:06:56,999 with a simple drug sale in the US. 90 00:06:58,751 --> 00:06:59,752 -What's up? -It's good. 91 00:07:01,254 --> 00:07:04,382 There is a big appetite for drugs. 92 00:07:06,551 --> 00:07:09,762 [Maderal] If you're a drug dealer and you had a million dollars cash, 93 00:07:10,972 --> 00:07:12,390 you have a problem, 94 00:07:12,473 --> 00:07:14,684 because the US has become pretty good 95 00:07:14,767 --> 00:07:17,728 at preventing people from using dirty money. 96 00:07:20,690 --> 00:07:23,443 The drug business has changed from the times of Pablo Escobar 97 00:07:23,526 --> 00:07:27,363 where the drug dealers were the notorious members of the business. 98 00:07:27,738 --> 00:07:28,781 That has evolved. 99 00:07:28,948 --> 00:07:32,660 Now the money launderers are probably the ones that make most of the money. 100 00:07:33,161 --> 00:07:36,706 Imagine you have tons of fives, tens and twenties in the US, 101 00:07:36,789 --> 00:07:40,126 of all the cocaine that has been sold in the streets of Miami and New York. 102 00:07:40,209 --> 00:07:42,670 You have this big problem. 103 00:07:42,753 --> 00:07:45,882 You have cash in the US of all the drugs that have been sold. 104 00:07:46,215 --> 00:07:49,177 And you need to bring all the cash back to Latin America 105 00:07:49,260 --> 00:07:52,346 to continue the production of the murderer's drug business. 106 00:08:02,273 --> 00:08:03,858 [Maderal] So, this is Latin America. 107 00:08:05,193 --> 00:08:06,903 Cocaine begins its life 108 00:08:07,737 --> 00:08:10,114 shipped by smugglers to Mexico... 109 00:08:11,532 --> 00:08:14,118 where it's then distributed by more smugglers 110 00:08:14,202 --> 00:08:16,954 into various points in the United States. 111 00:08:17,622 --> 00:08:19,916 Street-level dealers sell the cocaine, 112 00:08:20,416 --> 00:08:22,501 bag men collect that cash. 113 00:08:23,711 --> 00:08:26,214 This cash is then consolidated, 114 00:08:26,297 --> 00:08:29,300 let's say, a hundred million dollars, in Miami in cash. 115 00:08:29,550 --> 00:08:31,844 This is the fruits of the narcotics trafficking, 116 00:08:32,303 --> 00:08:33,596 but they can't spend it. 117 00:08:34,096 --> 00:08:36,807 You can't buy a yacht cash, you can't buy a jet cash, 118 00:08:36,891 --> 00:08:38,643 you need to turn this into a bank account. 119 00:08:38,726 --> 00:08:41,646 The problem is, if you try and go directly 120 00:08:41,729 --> 00:08:44,398 to a bank, not only will the bank not take your money, 121 00:08:44,482 --> 00:08:47,985 but they'll likely report you to the FBI, the DEA, whoever. 122 00:08:48,569 --> 00:08:51,322 So what you need is a way to turn this hundred million dollars 123 00:08:51,572 --> 00:08:53,407 into something legitimate that you can use. 124 00:08:53,491 --> 00:08:57,745 So the first step is they get smugglers to bring the bulk cash down to Peru... 125 00:08:59,705 --> 00:09:03,334 and they buy a hundred million dollars' worth of illegal gold. 126 00:09:03,876 --> 00:09:06,587 And now they have a box of illegally mined gold. 127 00:09:06,671 --> 00:09:09,382 Now, once they have this gold, they open up... 128 00:09:10,466 --> 00:09:12,468 a front company in Peru. 129 00:09:12,552 --> 00:09:15,263 They just make up names, so let's call this front company 130 00:09:15,805 --> 00:09:18,724 World Gold Trader. 131 00:09:18,975 --> 00:09:21,060 So now, World Gold Trader 132 00:09:21,435 --> 00:09:25,564 owns a hundred million dollars of gold purchased with drug money. 133 00:09:25,648 --> 00:09:29,694 It gets on the phone and calls a US refinery... 134 00:09:30,945 --> 00:09:31,904 in Miami. 135 00:09:33,614 --> 00:09:37,118 This refinery is in the business of buying gold from Peru. 136 00:09:37,660 --> 00:09:39,453 All they want to do is buy gold. 137 00:09:39,537 --> 00:09:41,789 They need volumes of gold. That's how they make money. 138 00:09:42,915 --> 00:09:46,335 They ask World Gold Trader, "Where did you get this gold?" 139 00:09:46,419 --> 00:09:48,504 And the people running the front company say, 140 00:09:48,629 --> 00:09:49,797 "We dug it out of the ground," 141 00:09:50,256 --> 00:09:52,466 and the US refinery asks no more questions. 142 00:09:52,800 --> 00:09:57,221 Now, the hundred million dollars of gold is delivered to the US refinery 143 00:09:57,763 --> 00:10:01,726 and the US refinery pays for that hundred million dollars in gold 144 00:10:01,809 --> 00:10:06,188 with a hundred million dollar wire transfer to a bank. 145 00:10:07,106 --> 00:10:10,276 Now, the drug dealer took his hundred million dollars of cash 146 00:10:10,359 --> 00:10:13,654 and has ended up with one hundred million dollars in the bank. 147 00:10:13,863 --> 00:10:16,574 The bank doesn't ask any questions because they see it came 148 00:10:16,657 --> 00:10:19,201 from the sale of gold that was mined in Peru. 149 00:10:19,910 --> 00:10:21,537 Cocaine. Cash. 150 00:10:21,912 --> 00:10:22,747 Gold. 151 00:10:23,039 --> 00:10:23,914 Bank. 152 00:10:23,998 --> 00:10:25,291 Laundered money. 153 00:10:26,542 --> 00:10:28,461 That is illegal gold money laundering. 154 00:10:34,050 --> 00:10:36,552 [girl in Spanish] Welcome to my home, Peru. 155 00:10:40,348 --> 00:10:43,851 I've heard that two-thirds of my country... 156 00:10:44,185 --> 00:10:47,813 is covered in Amazon rain forest. 157 00:10:51,609 --> 00:10:56,572 Over thousands of years, the gold flows downstream from the Andes. 158 00:11:00,785 --> 00:11:04,497 And then they find it in the river beds. 159 00:11:07,124 --> 00:11:12,588 They say Peru has the most gold in all of South America. 160 00:11:15,591 --> 00:11:19,929 I think that's why many people come here now... 161 00:11:22,181 --> 00:11:23,057 for the gold. 162 00:11:53,879 --> 00:11:55,172 [man in Spanish] It's not simple. 163 00:11:56,298 --> 00:12:00,553 Almost a quarter of Peru's population lives in real poverty. 164 00:12:01,887 --> 00:12:07,143 There is enough gold in Peru to end this and develop our entire country, 165 00:12:10,020 --> 00:12:12,148 but Peruvians never see this money. 166 00:12:21,824 --> 00:12:25,286 The La Pampa region is like no-man's land. 167 00:12:26,287 --> 00:12:29,498 It's the heart of Peru's illegal mining. 168 00:12:40,468 --> 00:12:43,721 I'm returning to film the miners and mine owners. 169 00:12:44,346 --> 00:12:46,974 I expect some won't be happy with me coming. 170 00:12:49,477 --> 00:12:50,936 [woman] Get out! 171 00:12:51,020 --> 00:12:54,064 Why do you keep coming? Get the hell out of here! 172 00:12:54,148 --> 00:12:57,318 Why do you keep coming? 173 00:12:57,443 --> 00:13:00,237 Go! 174 00:13:03,532 --> 00:13:04,533 [dog barking] 175 00:13:08,287 --> 00:13:10,498 [man] They think my reporting will take away their jobs. 176 00:13:12,791 --> 00:13:14,710 But they don't understand that my intention 177 00:13:15,211 --> 00:13:17,129 is to help them live a better life. 178 00:13:25,596 --> 00:13:27,598 [Spanish song playing faintly on radio] 179 00:13:37,817 --> 00:13:41,987 [man] The drug cartels and mafia control many parts of this region. 180 00:13:43,739 --> 00:13:46,158 Simply put, who comes in and out of the area. 181 00:13:50,621 --> 00:13:52,832 If you don't pay them, they will hurt you. 182 00:14:01,215 --> 00:14:04,218 La Pampa is the edge of the National Reserve, 183 00:14:04,927 --> 00:14:07,137 where gold mining is prohibited. 184 00:14:09,056 --> 00:14:12,101 The gold that people extract here is illegal. 185 00:14:13,394 --> 00:14:16,146 It can't be commercialized. There are laws in our country 186 00:14:16,230 --> 00:14:19,149 that prohibit this gold from being sold. 187 00:14:19,525 --> 00:14:21,861 Regardless, it's where thousands and thousands of people 188 00:14:21,944 --> 00:14:24,572 came from the Andes in search of better opportunities. 189 00:14:25,906 --> 00:14:30,828 And with that came the bars, the prostitution 190 00:14:31,287 --> 00:14:32,454 and organized crime. 191 00:14:33,163 --> 00:14:37,459 In some places, drug cartels and criminal groups operate these mines. 192 00:14:37,626 --> 00:14:40,129 And in other places, they extort independent miners. 193 00:14:53,017 --> 00:14:55,686 Starting in the year 2017, 194 00:14:57,021 --> 00:14:59,773 information was coming out that people 195 00:14:59,857 --> 00:15:01,275 were disappearing from La Pampa. 196 00:15:03,986 --> 00:15:06,906 Coming up, we're going to show the footage that we were able to get 197 00:15:06,989 --> 00:15:08,157 when we entered La Pampa, 198 00:15:08,240 --> 00:15:11,994 where you can't record. No one can. 199 00:15:12,077 --> 00:15:14,830 This is definitely a very complicated place 200 00:15:14,914 --> 00:15:16,582 of intense mining activity. 201 00:15:17,750 --> 00:15:18,667 Each month, 202 00:15:18,751 --> 00:15:22,838 this dangerous work generates hundreds of millions in gold sales 203 00:15:22,921 --> 00:15:26,383 for criminal organizations who use the gold 204 00:15:26,467 --> 00:15:28,302 to launder dirty drug money. 205 00:15:28,510 --> 00:15:30,721 Okay, we've reached the end of the program. 206 00:15:31,305 --> 00:15:34,850 I am Manuel Calloquispe. This is The Face of the Village. 207 00:15:35,684 --> 00:15:37,311 We'll see you on Monday. Bye! 208 00:15:41,815 --> 00:15:45,402 [girl in Spanish] Miles and miles of rain forest are cut down 209 00:15:45,486 --> 00:15:47,488 as the miners look for gold. 210 00:15:50,324 --> 00:15:57,081 Each week, they reach deeper into the Amazon for richer soil. 211 00:16:24,733 --> 00:16:27,069 [faint rhythmic hacking] 212 00:16:39,331 --> 00:16:43,711 [girl in Spanish] The miners work very hard to sift the mud 213 00:16:44,712 --> 00:16:46,130 and find the gold. 214 00:16:54,722 --> 00:16:56,265 Wait. 215 00:17:29,673 --> 00:17:31,216 [engine turns over] 216 00:17:57,701 --> 00:18:01,288 They scoop up the mud and feed it to the machine. 217 00:18:36,824 --> 00:18:40,077 The tiny gold hides in the carpet. 218 00:19:15,445 --> 00:19:17,781 [miner in Spanish] What the mercury does is act like a magnet 219 00:19:17,865 --> 00:19:19,283 that absorbs only the gold... 220 00:19:21,827 --> 00:19:23,745 until all the gold particles stick together. 221 00:19:33,714 --> 00:19:37,676 So when you do this process, it's easier to get the gold out. 222 00:19:54,193 --> 00:19:58,989 [girl in Spanish] Mercury will damage your sight, memory and organs. 223 00:20:04,203 --> 00:20:08,081 [interviewer] Are you at all concerned about exposure to mercury in this process? 224 00:20:08,540 --> 00:20:11,084 [miner in Spanish] I know the mercury can kill you in the long run. 225 00:20:11,168 --> 00:20:13,879 So, we are exposed a bit. 226 00:20:14,963 --> 00:20:17,758 Even more so without taking real precautions... 227 00:20:18,717 --> 00:20:19,635 to keep you safe. 228 00:20:24,431 --> 00:20:28,602 A lot of people say, "You'll make good money working in gold," 229 00:20:28,769 --> 00:20:29,645 and it's not true. 230 00:20:33,023 --> 00:20:36,193 Daily, it's $15 to $18. 231 00:20:36,610 --> 00:20:40,113 Truth is, that doesn't come out to a lot. 232 00:20:43,617 --> 00:20:44,910 [rhythmic hacking] 233 00:20:47,287 --> 00:20:50,332 [in Spanish] Formalizing a mine is complicated. 234 00:20:50,916 --> 00:20:52,125 We can't do it. 235 00:20:52,876 --> 00:20:57,839 As small-time miners, we can't meet the requirements. 236 00:20:58,340 --> 00:21:00,509 The state asks for a huge number of requirements. 237 00:21:00,592 --> 00:21:04,096 You have to reassemble the ground with machines. 238 00:21:04,179 --> 00:21:05,973 You have to reforest the area. 239 00:21:06,932 --> 00:21:08,267 It is impossible. 240 00:21:10,018 --> 00:21:11,561 The workers are from here, 241 00:21:11,645 --> 00:21:15,816 so they work to support their families, to survive. 242 00:21:16,525 --> 00:21:18,193 That's why you have to work. 243 00:21:28,245 --> 00:21:30,122 It's difficult and risky. 244 00:21:33,834 --> 00:21:35,877 There's a lot of corruption. 245 00:21:37,379 --> 00:21:41,883 Organized criminals will ask for tax. 246 00:21:42,259 --> 00:21:44,761 You have to pay the tax in order to keep working, 247 00:21:46,096 --> 00:21:50,684 so you can keep going in peace, you know? If not... 248 00:21:51,768 --> 00:21:54,021 they don't just threaten you, they kill you. 249 00:22:03,322 --> 00:22:07,951 [man 1 in Spanish] I've worked about five years in the transfer of gold 250 00:22:08,577 --> 00:22:12,497 at almost every illegal mine in Peru. 251 00:22:15,500 --> 00:22:17,544 Almost all of Peru is full of gold. 252 00:22:20,088 --> 00:22:22,883 A gram costs $39. 253 00:22:24,801 --> 00:22:27,971 And if we're talking about a kilo, we're talking about a very large amount. 254 00:22:28,555 --> 00:22:29,931 [man 2 chattering in Spanish] 255 00:22:34,936 --> 00:22:38,482 [man 1 in Spanish] Gold can generate money and a lot of problems. 256 00:22:52,287 --> 00:22:55,123 When you're transporting the gold, 257 00:22:57,376 --> 00:23:00,045 people will kill each other. 258 00:23:01,671 --> 00:23:02,506 [engine starts] 259 00:23:05,300 --> 00:23:07,636 And I know that at some point, I'm gonna have to quit. 260 00:23:11,181 --> 00:23:12,099 But... 261 00:23:12,182 --> 00:23:14,643 that's what my family depends on. 262 00:23:14,851 --> 00:23:17,270 It's up to me to feed my family, my children. 263 00:23:26,738 --> 00:23:28,740 [man in Spanish] How much are you paying for a gram? 264 00:23:28,824 --> 00:23:30,325 [woman in Spanish] One hundred-ninety. 265 00:23:30,408 --> 00:23:32,160 [rock music playing] 266 00:23:49,970 --> 00:23:52,639 [man in Spanish] We carry the gold in the chassis. 267 00:23:54,933 --> 00:23:57,102 Or else, in the horn. 268 00:24:01,898 --> 00:24:03,525 It's very dangerous. 269 00:24:06,736 --> 00:24:10,073 The people coming to intercept us are coming to kill us. 270 00:24:21,376 --> 00:24:23,545 [woman in Spanish] There's a lot of prostitution. 271 00:24:24,588 --> 00:24:27,591 Sometimes they'll attack you. Stab you with a knife... 272 00:24:29,176 --> 00:24:31,261 I came because I said, "I'm going to try my luck," 273 00:24:31,344 --> 00:24:32,471 like anyone else. 274 00:24:35,056 --> 00:24:36,391 For my son. 275 00:24:36,600 --> 00:24:38,560 In order to give him a better future. 276 00:24:39,186 --> 00:24:41,938 But you can't escape. 277 00:24:42,439 --> 00:24:44,774 Why? Because they will kill you and dispose of you. 278 00:24:48,111 --> 00:24:52,449 To get to the United States, or wherever else is buying Peruvian gold, 279 00:24:53,033 --> 00:24:54,993 it goes through a lot of things. 280 00:24:55,076 --> 00:24:58,038 It goes through a lot of deaths. 281 00:24:58,455 --> 00:25:02,918 By many sacrifices from many people who lie in this gold... 282 00:25:04,252 --> 00:25:07,130 so that gold can be taken to another country 283 00:25:07,631 --> 00:25:10,634 without knowing the risk of how that gold arrives. 284 00:25:13,011 --> 00:25:14,471 Everybody's scared. 285 00:25:38,745 --> 00:25:40,747 [indistinct chatter in Spanish] 286 00:25:43,833 --> 00:25:46,795 [indistinct chatter in Spanish] 287 00:25:54,803 --> 00:25:56,179 [Calloquispe in Spanish] I'm ready. 288 00:25:57,681 --> 00:25:59,975 Three, two, one, go! 289 00:26:00,767 --> 00:26:03,311 Hello, good evening. I am Manuel Calloquispe 290 00:26:03,395 --> 00:26:05,105 and this is The Face of the Village. 291 00:26:05,689 --> 00:26:09,776 The miners from La Pampa face many types of threats 292 00:26:09,901 --> 00:26:12,946 and security people can control the miners with violence. 293 00:26:13,822 --> 00:26:18,868 Recently, John Anderson Garcia Mamani disappeared in La Pampa. 294 00:26:18,952 --> 00:26:22,622 He was mistaken for an informant in La Pampa, and they killed him. 295 00:26:23,248 --> 00:26:26,418 Five mass graves have been found in the La Pampa area. 296 00:26:27,627 --> 00:26:30,505 [Spanish song playing, overlapping TV broadcast] 297 00:26:40,849 --> 00:26:42,851 [song continues, drowning out TV] 298 00:26:58,450 --> 00:27:00,452 [chatting indistinctly] 299 00:27:01,578 --> 00:27:03,413 Which one? That one? Okay. 300 00:27:05,373 --> 00:27:07,042 Going back to 2007, 301 00:27:07,125 --> 00:27:10,128 the movements of gold just didn't make sense. 302 00:27:10,211 --> 00:27:11,880 People coming out of the woodworks. 303 00:27:11,963 --> 00:27:14,299 Passengers just showing up at the airport with gold. 304 00:27:14,633 --> 00:27:17,886 No... no discernible reason why they'd have a bag full of gold. 305 00:27:18,386 --> 00:27:20,555 The theory right away was that it was narcotics-related, 306 00:27:20,639 --> 00:27:22,807 because what generates that much proceeds? 307 00:27:23,350 --> 00:27:27,103 We just noticed a lot of unusual  importation activity in Miami, Florida. 308 00:27:27,604 --> 00:27:28,813 A lot of red flags. 309 00:27:29,481 --> 00:27:31,733 We could see the narco element down south. 310 00:27:31,900 --> 00:27:34,861 You had the middlemen,  you know, the brokers, 311 00:27:34,944 --> 00:27:37,447 all the way up to the customer reps and the refineries. 312 00:27:37,530 --> 00:27:39,699 That's when we said, "The refinery's involved in this." 313 00:27:43,244 --> 00:27:46,039 [Maderal] We were starting to get a lot of investigatory leads 314 00:27:46,122 --> 00:27:48,416 from law enforcement agencies into the gold industry. 315 00:27:53,797 --> 00:27:56,383 At some point, a confidential source tells us 316 00:27:56,466 --> 00:27:59,094 that gold had become  317 00:27:59,511 --> 00:28:01,054 a favored method 318 00:28:01,596 --> 00:28:06,101 for large-scale narco traffickers to launder their cash, 319 00:28:06,184 --> 00:28:09,521 and then we started to really look at the Customs records... 320 00:28:10,980 --> 00:28:14,859 and the way that billions of dollars in exports seem to be shifting 321 00:28:15,318 --> 00:28:17,987 from one country in Latin America to another one, 322 00:28:18,071 --> 00:28:20,573 year by year in response... 323 00:28:21,533 --> 00:28:24,994 to efforts by those countries to stop illegal gold mining. 324 00:28:25,578 --> 00:28:29,958 And seeing that the amount of gold being exported attributable 325 00:28:30,291 --> 00:28:33,294 to this suspicious activity-- It wasn't some small part, 326 00:28:33,378 --> 00:28:37,340 it was, in some countries, almost all of the country's exports. 327 00:28:37,882 --> 00:28:39,175 Billions of dollars. 328 00:28:40,427 --> 00:28:43,263 [Ortega] We were looking at what were the main exports. 329 00:28:43,346 --> 00:28:47,016 All of a sudden, gold became the major source of foreign currency 330 00:28:47,308 --> 00:28:48,184 for Colombia. 331 00:28:48,268 --> 00:28:51,020 Not coffee, as it has always been, nor oil. 332 00:28:51,271 --> 00:28:53,356 It was gold, and when I look at the data, 333 00:28:53,648 --> 00:28:57,444 it grew from 12 tons to 70 tons a year. 334 00:28:57,944 --> 00:29:00,029 When we were pushing forward this investigation, 335 00:29:00,113 --> 00:29:04,576 we were hoping the US would begin investigating on their end 336 00:29:04,659 --> 00:29:07,620 because anybody that tries to allow the world to know 337 00:29:07,704 --> 00:29:10,165 what is really happening gets murdered. 338 00:29:10,957 --> 00:29:15,003 It became pretty clear that there is a huge... 339 00:29:15,795 --> 00:29:18,173 part of this industry that is criminal, 340 00:29:18,256 --> 00:29:21,718 including many refineries that were in the industry. 341 00:29:24,012 --> 00:29:27,640 We decided to focus on NTR because of evidence 342 00:29:27,724 --> 00:29:29,642 that was readily available to us. 343 00:29:39,110 --> 00:29:42,322 [girl in Spanish] These big gold companies in Miami 344 00:29:43,031 --> 00:29:46,201 melt all the different pieces of gold together. 345 00:29:48,786 --> 00:29:52,874 The heat makes the gold look perfect and clean. 346 00:29:58,129 --> 00:30:01,466 [man] NTR was one of the many gold companies 347 00:30:01,549 --> 00:30:05,261 and refineries based in Miami, but... 348 00:30:06,137 --> 00:30:10,683 we became the largest domestically owned... 349 00:30:11,309 --> 00:30:14,395 supplier of gold, silver, platinum, palladium... 350 00:30:14,771 --> 00:30:15,813 across America... 351 00:30:17,482 --> 00:30:18,483 totally. 352 00:30:21,236 --> 00:30:23,112 And that was fueled by South America. 353 00:30:23,905 --> 00:30:25,323 When we looked at NTR, 354 00:30:26,783 --> 00:30:28,868 we saw something pretty incredible. 355 00:30:29,327 --> 00:30:31,871 In 2012, they exported about... 356 00:30:32,539 --> 00:30:35,333 $80 million worth of gold from Peru, 357 00:30:35,625 --> 00:30:37,293 but by 2013, 358 00:30:38,127 --> 00:30:39,712 that number had jumped up... 359 00:30:40,797 --> 00:30:42,048 to almost one billion. 360 00:30:42,757 --> 00:30:44,133 And we asked ourselves... 361 00:30:44,968 --> 00:30:45,802 "Why?" 362 00:30:46,219 --> 00:30:48,596 The head of NTR said, 363 00:30:48,680 --> 00:30:51,474 "Go down there and source every ounce of gold 364 00:30:51,558 --> 00:30:53,560 out of Latin America you could get." 365 00:30:53,643 --> 00:30:55,353 That was the task. 366 00:30:55,687 --> 00:30:59,274 And that is what was accomplished. 367 00:30:59,774 --> 00:31:02,360 It was the wildest ride... 368 00:31:03,528 --> 00:31:04,362 that... 369 00:31:05,154 --> 00:31:06,322 I've ever seen. 370 00:31:10,827 --> 00:31:13,955 We were on the jet twice a month. 371 00:31:14,622 --> 00:31:18,459 Peru, Colombia, Bolivia, Ecuador, Chile, 372 00:31:18,543 --> 00:31:20,587 wherever there was gold. 373 00:31:22,505 --> 00:31:27,594 My job was getting the customers paid as promptly as possible. 374 00:31:27,677 --> 00:31:30,930 And in the beginning, it was all about Peru. 375 00:31:31,556 --> 00:31:33,725 Humongous amount of gold out of Peru. 376 00:31:34,309 --> 00:31:35,852 What drove that 377 00:31:35,935 --> 00:31:39,564 was the pressure to produce. 378 00:31:40,857 --> 00:31:43,484 The story of gold money laundering, 379 00:31:44,110 --> 00:31:46,195 through NTR, begins with Peter Ferrari. 380 00:31:47,447 --> 00:31:49,616 Peter Ferrari was widely known 381 00:31:49,699 --> 00:31:53,119 as a narcotics trafficking money launderer in Peru. 382 00:31:53,578 --> 00:31:56,789 [man in Spanish] This man that dances to the rhythm of Stevie Wonder 383 00:31:56,873 --> 00:31:59,000 is Pedro David Perez Miranda, 384 00:31:59,083 --> 00:32:00,793 or Peter Ferrari. 385 00:32:00,877 --> 00:32:05,882 Peter Ferrari, the man who wants to be a playboy, 386 00:32:05,965 --> 00:32:07,675 the talk of the town. 387 00:32:07,759 --> 00:32:09,761 [Maderal] Peter Ferrari was kind of the most obvious 388 00:32:09,844 --> 00:32:11,846 and incredibly suspicious character. 389 00:32:11,929 --> 00:32:13,973 Dealing in smuggled gold, 390 00:32:14,057 --> 00:32:16,100 large, large amounts of gold. 391 00:32:16,184 --> 00:32:18,770 His gold was illegally mined. 392 00:32:18,937 --> 00:32:20,271 He had no paperwork, 393 00:32:20,355 --> 00:32:23,066 he had to bribe Customs to export his gold, 394 00:32:23,483 --> 00:32:28,029 and he found in the NTR salespeople three individuals, 395 00:32:28,196 --> 00:32:32,575 Juan Granda, Samer Barrage, and Renato Rodriguez, 396 00:32:32,659 --> 00:32:37,538 who were ready and willing to accept gold from pretty much any source. 397 00:32:37,830 --> 00:32:38,915 and it was a... 398 00:32:39,624 --> 00:32:40,833 perfect match. 399 00:32:40,917 --> 00:32:43,127 [interviewer] Were the other three guys on the team aware 400 00:32:43,211 --> 00:32:45,046 they were dealing with narco-traffickers? 401 00:32:46,923 --> 00:32:48,257 In the beginning, no. 402 00:32:49,717 --> 00:32:50,968 I know that for a fact. 403 00:32:51,511 --> 00:32:53,262 [interviewer] You're saying they weren't aware 404 00:32:53,346 --> 00:32:55,974 of these high-profile criminals like Peter Ferrari. 405 00:32:56,391 --> 00:32:57,392 The money, the drugs, 406 00:32:57,475 --> 00:33:00,061 all the shell companies  didn't raise some concern? 407 00:33:00,144 --> 00:33:01,980 I-- Initially, 408 00:33:02,730 --> 00:33:04,232 I think the-- 409 00:33:05,733 --> 00:33:06,567 the-- 410 00:33:06,943 --> 00:33:08,903 the naivete was... 411 00:33:09,737 --> 00:33:10,571 high. 412 00:33:11,614 --> 00:33:13,032 I-- I truly do. 413 00:33:13,950 --> 00:33:17,620 But as it went on and as the volumes grew, yes. 414 00:33:19,038 --> 00:33:19,914 Of course. 415 00:33:22,709 --> 00:33:25,003 [Maderal] There's a federal law called the Bank Secrecy Act. 416 00:33:25,086 --> 00:33:25,962 It's a good law, 417 00:33:26,045 --> 00:33:29,006 and it's designed to stop money laundering. 418 00:33:29,590 --> 00:33:32,510 Precious metals dealers, under the Bank Secrecy Act, 419 00:33:32,593 --> 00:33:35,138 are supposed to not take gold... 420 00:33:37,181 --> 00:33:40,685 without subjecting them to some anti-money laundering screening. 421 00:33:40,768 --> 00:33:41,978 We can see that... 422 00:33:43,187 --> 00:33:46,149 they're front companies, clearly apparent front companies, 423 00:33:46,315 --> 00:33:49,485 pumping $200 million of gold for several months, disappearing. 424 00:33:49,569 --> 00:33:51,154 Same owners open up a new company, 425 00:33:51,237 --> 00:33:53,281 do another hundred and something  million dollars. 426 00:33:53,698 --> 00:33:56,325 The same owners disappear, that company... 427 00:33:56,409 --> 00:33:58,745 open up another one, do another hundred million dollars. 428 00:33:59,328 --> 00:34:01,873 There's no legitimate business reason to do that. 429 00:34:03,082 --> 00:34:05,418 [interviewer] The majority of Peter Ferrari's shell companies 430 00:34:05,501 --> 00:34:08,129 would only be open months at a time  and then they would shut down. 431 00:34:08,212 --> 00:34:09,047 Exactly. 432 00:34:09,338 --> 00:34:10,757 Was that ever suspicious to you 433 00:34:10,840 --> 00:34:13,009 that you were buying  tens of millions of dollars of gold 434 00:34:13,092 --> 00:34:16,512 from a company that only had a three or four-month history? 435 00:34:16,888 --> 00:34:19,056 -No, they would-- -What would their answer be? 436 00:34:19,140 --> 00:34:20,516 They would supply 437 00:34:21,058 --> 00:34:22,685 their documentation 438 00:34:22,852 --> 00:34:28,149 and say, "We lost our banking relationship with HSBC. 439 00:34:28,274 --> 00:34:29,859 We had to change our names." 440 00:34:30,151 --> 00:34:31,652 So what we did... 441 00:34:34,614 --> 00:34:37,617 submit it to our compliance, 442 00:34:37,867 --> 00:34:39,494 they went through the whole thing, 443 00:34:39,619 --> 00:34:43,539 interviewed them, and then it was approved. 444 00:34:44,040 --> 00:34:45,958 They turn down a ton. They turn down a ton. 445 00:34:46,417 --> 00:34:48,836 -But they approved even more? -Yes. Yeah. 446 00:34:50,129 --> 00:34:52,215 [Maderal] What they were doing was simply asking 447 00:34:52,298 --> 00:34:54,092 the gold suppliers down in Latin America: 448 00:34:54,300 --> 00:34:57,053 "Are you a money launderer?" And they would say no. 449 00:34:58,012 --> 00:35:00,264 And then they would annotate that in their file 450 00:35:00,723 --> 00:35:02,433 and say that they had done their diligence. 451 00:35:02,517 --> 00:35:05,103 This type of ridiculous... 452 00:35:05,645 --> 00:35:06,896 junk document 453 00:35:07,355 --> 00:35:10,191 is what helped us not only build the case 454 00:35:10,274 --> 00:35:12,985 against the NTR sales people for money laundering, 455 00:35:13,069 --> 00:35:17,448 but also against NTR and its parent company Elemetal 456 00:35:17,532 --> 00:35:18,699 for failure to comply 457 00:35:18,783 --> 00:35:21,035 with the anti-money laundering requirements. 458 00:35:22,120 --> 00:35:26,249 For years, they had used our own paperwork against us to legitimize the process, 459 00:35:26,499 --> 00:35:29,919 and so where we decided to look was dive deeper in the actual scheme... 460 00:35:30,586 --> 00:35:32,672 of bringing goods into the country. 461 00:35:32,964 --> 00:35:35,091 The way they declare, they use the paperwork, 462 00:35:35,174 --> 00:35:37,343 they look like they're doing what they're supposed to be, 463 00:35:37,426 --> 00:35:39,804 because when you're a trade-based money launderer, 464 00:35:39,887 --> 00:35:41,305 you're hiding in plain sight. 465 00:35:42,306 --> 00:35:45,059 [Maderal] And this graph is from the Customs data, 466 00:35:45,143 --> 00:35:49,230 and what it's showing you is the amount of gold 467 00:35:49,313 --> 00:35:52,233 that NTR was importing from Peru 468 00:35:52,441 --> 00:35:54,277 versus Ecuador and Bolivia. 469 00:35:54,402 --> 00:35:55,236 First of all, 470 00:35:55,695 --> 00:35:59,407 NTR started operating in Peru in 2012, 471 00:35:59,615 --> 00:36:01,409 and it only imported 472 00:36:01,492 --> 00:36:05,830 about $80 million worth of gold in 2012, which is a lot of money. 473 00:36:05,913 --> 00:36:09,250 And what's shocking is that the very next year, 474 00:36:09,333 --> 00:36:13,087 2013, it jumps from one year to the next 475 00:36:13,462 --> 00:36:15,882 by basically a billion dollars, 476 00:36:15,965 --> 00:36:17,758 when they had done  80 million the year before. 477 00:36:17,842 --> 00:36:18,926 It was shocking. 478 00:36:19,760 --> 00:36:25,516 And after 2013, Peru cracked down on illegal gold mining, 479 00:36:25,600 --> 00:36:28,144 and NTR's business in Peru dropped... 480 00:36:29,061 --> 00:36:33,024 from the billion-dollar figure back almost all the way down 481 00:36:33,316 --> 00:36:35,318 to around a hundred million dollars. 482 00:36:35,401 --> 00:36:37,194 And so, we thought to ourselves, 483 00:36:37,278 --> 00:36:39,822 "What happened in the countries that bordered Peru?" 484 00:36:40,448 --> 00:36:42,283 When Peru closed its borders, 485 00:36:42,867 --> 00:36:46,746 and the exports out of Peru sank back down to almost nothing, 486 00:36:47,163 --> 00:36:50,041 NTR's imports from the neighboring countries jumped. 487 00:36:50,291 --> 00:36:52,460 Well, it was pretty clear to us when we saw it. 488 00:36:52,543 --> 00:36:55,671 They were buying Peruvian gold that was being smuggled out of Peru 489 00:36:55,755 --> 00:36:58,299 into Ecuador and Bolivia. 490 00:36:58,758 --> 00:37:02,511 Based on what we can see, this is incredibly suspicious. 491 00:37:02,637 --> 00:37:06,974 Almost certainly money laundering. NTR can see the same thing we can see. 492 00:37:07,058 --> 00:37:08,392 They were filing the reports. 493 00:37:08,476 --> 00:37:10,353 It was their information that we were looking at. 494 00:37:11,020 --> 00:37:12,813 And if we're both looking at the same thing 495 00:37:12,897 --> 00:37:15,149 and I'm seeing a money laundering transaction, 496 00:37:15,399 --> 00:37:18,361 the question is, well, how come your anti-money-laundering department 497 00:37:18,861 --> 00:37:21,072 isn't seeing a money laundering transaction? 498 00:37:21,989 --> 00:37:24,200 Because they made so much damn money. 499 00:37:28,663 --> 00:37:32,458 Everyone was going balls to the wall 500 00:37:32,541 --> 00:37:34,877 to get all the gold out of there. 501 00:37:40,007 --> 00:37:43,886 Everyone was incentivized, compensated. 502 00:37:44,971 --> 00:37:48,766 It was a race to be the best and get every ounce of gold 503 00:37:48,849 --> 00:37:51,185 out of Latin America as possible. 504 00:37:52,019 --> 00:37:53,396 And that's... 505 00:37:53,980 --> 00:37:55,439 where they got caught up. 506 00:37:59,277 --> 00:38:00,987 [Salisbury] What is important to point out 507 00:38:01,070 --> 00:38:02,238 is just how easy it was to do. 508 00:38:02,321 --> 00:38:06,075 So you had three individuals working for one refinery 509 00:38:06,242 --> 00:38:08,869 that were able to launder over 3 billion dollars' worth of gold. 510 00:38:08,953 --> 00:38:10,121 That's just three individuals. 511 00:38:10,204 --> 00:38:12,999 So that's... three individuals, by themselves, 512 00:38:13,082 --> 00:38:16,627 were able to move and trade-based  money launder over three billion. 513 00:38:16,711 --> 00:38:20,881 That is astounding to me, that so few could move so much. 514 00:38:22,508 --> 00:38:24,844 [Maderal] One of the next big breaks in the case is 515 00:38:24,927 --> 00:38:29,015 we actually obtained WhatsApp messages for some of the NTR sales people. 516 00:38:30,808 --> 00:38:33,978 Juan Granda says to Renato Rodriguez, 517 00:38:34,061 --> 00:38:36,939 "Just landed in Puerto. 93 degrees." 518 00:38:37,023 --> 00:38:38,524 That means Puerto Maldonado, 519 00:38:38,607 --> 00:38:41,569 which is one of the epicenters of illegal gold in Peru. 520 00:38:41,652 --> 00:38:43,321 Rodriguez says, "Stay safe," 521 00:38:43,404 --> 00:38:46,157 and Granda says, "I'm like Pablo..." 522 00:38:46,449 --> 00:38:48,409 [Salisbury] "...coming to Ecuador to get the coke." 523 00:38:49,076 --> 00:38:51,370 Right there, I mean, that tells you 524 00:38:51,746 --> 00:38:54,999 there is an implication of something illicit going on around this. 525 00:38:55,082 --> 00:38:58,169 You know, they are joking about being like Pablo Escobar getting coke. 526 00:38:58,753 --> 00:39:02,131 This-- the coke being gold, it's illegal, we're moving it, stuff like that. 527 00:39:02,214 --> 00:39:03,841 That's not what puts it over the edge, 528 00:39:03,924 --> 00:39:06,802 but obviously, when you're starting  to look at stuff like this, 529 00:39:06,886 --> 00:39:11,807 it seems very casual, and again, the red flags start going off. 530 00:39:11,891 --> 00:39:16,270 Juan would say that if he was going to Exxon to buy Snickers. 531 00:39:16,354 --> 00:39:18,356 That doesn't mean anything. 532 00:39:19,231 --> 00:39:22,193 [Maderal] Then Granda goes on to say, "I have person's one material 533 00:39:22,276 --> 00:39:23,361 routed to the priests." 534 00:39:23,444 --> 00:39:25,613 And, when he says material, that means gold. 535 00:39:25,696 --> 00:39:27,031 And Rodriguez asks, 536 00:39:27,114 --> 00:39:29,325 "So person one is buying as company one 537 00:39:29,408 --> 00:39:33,120 and exporting through trade as what exporter? San Fidel?" 538 00:39:34,038 --> 00:39:38,876 They're talking there about a person who has material, gold, 539 00:39:38,959 --> 00:39:40,127 and how it's routed... 540 00:39:40,711 --> 00:39:41,962 and they're acknowledging there 541 00:39:42,046 --> 00:39:46,008 that... the companies that they're buying from are just shells. 542 00:39:46,967 --> 00:39:49,804 And then, a couple of months later, Barrage says, 543 00:39:49,887 --> 00:39:54,016 "Peru is number one in drug exports and illegal mining exports. 544 00:39:54,433 --> 00:39:57,937 We need more Peruvian gold from Bolivia and Ecuador." 545 00:39:58,729 --> 00:40:00,022 That's illegal gold. 546 00:40:00,898 --> 00:40:03,109 They're talking about buying illegal gold. 547 00:40:03,192 --> 00:40:05,069 It's what prosecutors always want. 548 00:40:05,152 --> 00:40:08,030 It's evidence of consciousness of guilt. 549 00:40:08,906 --> 00:40:12,118 The whole thing is liquidity and the speed of payment. 550 00:40:12,201 --> 00:40:15,621 You can send us $800,000 worth of gold. 551 00:40:16,122 --> 00:40:18,916 We'd pay you 750 in 10 seconds. 552 00:40:18,999 --> 00:40:20,960 -[interviewer] Was this-- -That'd be in your bank. 553 00:40:21,043 --> 00:40:22,670 [interviewer] Was this clean or dirty gold? 554 00:40:24,588 --> 00:40:26,382 It was clean until it was dirty. 555 00:40:26,590 --> 00:40:27,925 [interviewer] What does that mean? 556 00:40:29,552 --> 00:40:32,680 It was never questioned until... 557 00:40:33,681 --> 00:40:36,058 they started questioning where the gold came from. 558 00:40:37,143 --> 00:40:40,646 About a month later, he goes on another... 559 00:40:41,272 --> 00:40:43,816 rant, bragging with his friends, 560 00:40:44,525 --> 00:40:46,777 "Remember when I was in Bolivia and I said 561 00:40:46,861 --> 00:40:50,030 I know someone that can get a $700 kilo of coke? 562 00:40:50,531 --> 00:40:54,452 Well, I helped him move to Cuzco and get a million dollars over the border. 563 00:40:54,660 --> 00:40:56,453 Only thing is that on Friday, 564 00:40:56,537 --> 00:41:00,583 my customer from Cuzco put a hit on him for some bad business." 565 00:41:01,542 --> 00:41:03,544 A lot of, like, the... 566 00:41:03,627 --> 00:41:05,963 "Oh, I got some guy who's going to murder somebody." 567 00:41:06,046 --> 00:41:08,549 Like, they don't know anybody who's going to murder somebody. 568 00:41:08,674 --> 00:41:10,176 Maybe they do, but... 569 00:41:10,468 --> 00:41:13,471 they are not involved in that, trust me. 570 00:41:14,180 --> 00:41:15,931 I can promise you that. 571 00:41:16,807 --> 00:41:20,436 A hundred percent. They are not that sophisticated... 572 00:41:21,270 --> 00:41:23,981 and they are terrified of guns. 573 00:41:45,711 --> 00:41:47,338 [girl in Spanish] It seems like every week 574 00:41:47,421 --> 00:41:49,298 there is more scary news. 575 00:41:51,550 --> 00:41:53,802 [in Spanish] 576 00:41:58,265 --> 00:42:02,186 [girl in Spanish] People are upset but don't know what to do. 577 00:42:35,261 --> 00:42:36,262 [equipment beeps] 578 00:42:37,596 --> 00:42:38,931 [in Spanish] He died on... 579 00:42:39,598 --> 00:42:40,641 July 7th, 580 00:42:42,142 --> 00:42:43,435 2018. 581 00:42:44,562 --> 00:42:49,858 This is one of the citizens who was killed by 582 00:42:51,068 --> 00:42:53,320 the miners in charge of their territory. 583 00:42:54,071 --> 00:42:57,116 He's just one of the many who've disappeared in La Pampa, 584 00:42:57,491 --> 00:43:00,619 but his body is buried here now in the ground. 585 00:43:01,328 --> 00:43:04,081 The cross is here to show 586 00:43:04,331 --> 00:43:09,670 that he died or was murdered in this area. 587 00:43:11,755 --> 00:43:13,882 This is how I register the numbers, 588 00:43:15,426 --> 00:43:21,473 to know how many people have been killed, cremated or disappeared 589 00:43:21,974 --> 00:43:23,642 here in La Pampa region. 590 00:43:33,402 --> 00:43:35,237 [interviewer] Why would you agree to speak to us 591 00:43:35,321 --> 00:43:36,822 about something so dangerous? 592 00:43:38,949 --> 00:43:41,869 [in Spanish] I've decided to go public and talk about this because... 593 00:43:42,411 --> 00:43:46,040 I've lost a lot of friends in the movement of gold, 594 00:43:46,123 --> 00:43:49,168 and because of all the pollution it creates. 595 00:43:50,502 --> 00:43:54,298 Behind the gold smuggling in Peru are the politicians. 596 00:43:55,424 --> 00:44:00,137 There are a lot of illegal mines out there that are actually owned by politicians. 597 00:44:01,013 --> 00:44:05,059 Many times, there's been attacks...   598 00:44:06,143 --> 00:44:12,107 where the authorities are the ones stealing from you. 599 00:44:23,744 --> 00:44:27,289 [Maderal] I knew what NTR was doing was wrong. 600 00:44:27,790 --> 00:44:30,584 I knew what they were doing needed to be prosecuted... 601 00:44:31,752 --> 00:44:35,673 but what's the crime I can charge here based on the evidence I have? 602 00:44:38,717 --> 00:44:41,512 This is the Title 18, the federal criminal codes book. 603 00:44:41,679 --> 00:44:45,516 I literally just opened it up one day, turned to section one... 604 00:44:46,767 --> 00:44:49,103 and I just started flipping through the pages... 605 00:44:49,728 --> 00:44:52,856 trying to figure out what I could charge directly... 606 00:44:53,816 --> 00:44:55,776 what conspiracies I could charge. 607 00:44:56,235 --> 00:44:58,779 What could be the proceeds for money laundering? 608 00:45:05,035 --> 00:45:08,831 [Renaudin] This is how the gold would arrive in Miami from Latin America. 609 00:45:09,081 --> 00:45:10,499 We would melt it. 610 00:45:10,666 --> 00:45:14,086 And by that time, the provenance of the gold 611 00:45:14,169 --> 00:45:15,879 was... was undetectable. 612 00:45:19,133 --> 00:45:21,552 [Maderal] I developed theories for weeks. 613 00:45:23,095 --> 00:45:25,472 And then I'd come up with the reasons of why that didn't work, 614 00:45:25,556 --> 00:45:29,101 or some element of the crime that was gonna be too difficult to prove. 615 00:45:31,478 --> 00:45:35,149 Every shipment that we had come through Miami 616 00:45:35,232 --> 00:45:37,359 was cleared by the US Customs, 617 00:45:37,443 --> 00:45:39,987 and within 24 hours, 618 00:45:40,279 --> 00:45:43,031 it was out the door, ready to go 619 00:45:43,115 --> 00:45:46,452 to any of the top purchasers of precious metals. 620 00:45:46,535 --> 00:45:51,874 Everything from automobile companies to Apple cell phones, Tiffany, Cartier, 621 00:45:52,124 --> 00:45:54,293 Rolex, the US Mint. 622 00:45:54,376 --> 00:45:56,920 It was, you know, it was non-traceable... 623 00:45:57,546 --> 00:45:58,464 Um... 624 00:45:59,548 --> 00:46:02,759 once everything was mixed together or melted together. 625 00:46:05,220 --> 00:46:07,681 [Maderal] I flipped through Title 18 continuously... 626 00:46:08,849 --> 00:46:11,810 and then I found 18 USC 1956, 627 00:46:12,686 --> 00:46:14,897 which is a not-too-frequently used subsection 628 00:46:14,980 --> 00:46:16,315 of the money laundering statute. 629 00:46:18,442 --> 00:46:20,486 [Renaudin] The shocking thing for me is that 630 00:46:20,569 --> 00:46:22,529 we were doing everything by the book, 631 00:46:22,613 --> 00:46:26,325 right there in front of the government, hands open, 632 00:46:26,408 --> 00:46:28,494 and nothing, you know, nothing was ever questioned. 633 00:46:29,536 --> 00:46:35,375 But over time the greed got a hold of many of us. 634 00:46:36,418 --> 00:46:39,296 [Maderal] I almost fell over because I thought to myself, 635 00:46:39,379 --> 00:46:41,548 "Wait a minute, we don't need to prove 636 00:46:41,632 --> 00:46:44,760 where the gold came from, which is basically impossible. 637 00:46:45,177 --> 00:46:48,388 All I have to prove is that when I send you the $100-million wire 638 00:46:48,472 --> 00:46:49,598 to pay for that gold, 639 00:46:49,681 --> 00:46:52,935 knowing that you're a drug trafficker, I'm promoting it." 640 00:46:53,560 --> 00:46:56,438 And that's also a crime. It's not the same crime... 641 00:46:57,648 --> 00:46:59,691 it's a different crime, but it's a crime. 642 00:47:04,738 --> 00:47:06,240 [in Spanish] Some big news. 643 00:47:06,323 --> 00:47:10,118 Three executives from Miami-based gold refinery NTR 644 00:47:11,036 --> 00:47:15,791 were arrested for smuggling $3.6 billion 645 00:47:15,874 --> 00:47:21,421 in dirty gold from South America, predominantly from our mines here in Peru. 646 00:47:22,047 --> 00:47:24,132 Prosecutors say the men 647 00:47:24,216 --> 00:47:25,759 falsified paperwork 648 00:47:25,843 --> 00:47:30,097 and circumvented their own anti-money-laundering compliance programs 649 00:47:30,180 --> 00:47:34,309 by buying gold from drug trafficker Peter Ferrari. 650 00:47:45,904 --> 00:47:49,366 [Renaudin] Got a call from a special agent in the FBI 651 00:47:49,700 --> 00:47:55,455 in downtown Miami wanting me to, uh, to come, have an interview. 652 00:47:56,123 --> 00:47:59,877 I didn't really have a lot of fear for myself, 653 00:48:00,502 --> 00:48:02,462 because I was never involved 654 00:48:02,546 --> 00:48:04,923 in the decisions of whether to approve 655 00:48:05,257 --> 00:48:08,677 or deny any of the gold dealers in South America. 656 00:48:20,188 --> 00:48:22,566 And I was not working there at the time, 657 00:48:23,108 --> 00:48:24,818 because I, um... 658 00:48:26,653 --> 00:48:27,613 I was in rehab. 659 00:48:28,822 --> 00:48:30,991 [echoing] Every day, going into the office... 660 00:48:31,074 --> 00:48:32,701 Get as much gold as possible. 661 00:48:32,826 --> 00:48:33,660 What's your volume? 662 00:48:33,744 --> 00:48:37,080 Having the head of NTR be like, "What's this?" 663 00:48:37,164 --> 00:48:40,042 The pressure to perform, perform, perform. 664 00:48:40,125 --> 00:48:42,502 We would have ten, 12 cocktails. 665 00:48:42,586 --> 00:48:45,589 The addiction was always there. The drinking just went through the roof. 666 00:48:45,672 --> 00:48:47,090 I'm not going to lie to you. 667 00:48:47,174 --> 00:48:48,800 What I had been a part of... it's horrific. 668 00:48:48,884 --> 00:48:52,387 After that came, you know, suicide attempts and that kind of stuff. 669 00:48:52,471 --> 00:48:53,805 That's when I went away to rehab. 670 00:48:58,435 --> 00:49:00,646 [girl in Spanish] A necessary end to things 671 00:49:00,729 --> 00:49:03,440 comes when it is most needed. 672 00:49:21,750 --> 00:49:23,543 [Calloquispe in Spanish] I no longer have fear. 673 00:49:24,544 --> 00:49:25,462 I'm past it. 674 00:49:29,549 --> 00:49:33,595 I can't let anything get in the way of finding the truth... 675 00:49:35,514 --> 00:49:36,807 and telling it to the people. 676 00:49:37,683 --> 00:49:41,144 The gold companies and consumers of the world need to know. 677 00:49:41,728 --> 00:49:44,481 Our people must not bleed for your gold. 678 00:49:56,910 --> 00:49:58,787 [Ortega] Illegal mining is destroying... 679 00:49:59,705 --> 00:50:00,664 people's lives... 680 00:50:01,707 --> 00:50:04,876 and for some reason there is not the will 681 00:50:05,002 --> 00:50:07,713 to put a stop to this carousel of pain and suffering. 682 00:50:10,090 --> 00:50:14,720 The destruction of the jungle and nature has been tremendous. 683 00:50:14,803 --> 00:50:17,597 Ah, mercury is... 684 00:50:18,765 --> 00:50:21,309 in the rivers at incredibly high levels, 685 00:50:21,560 --> 00:50:23,311 and is gonna be causing... 686 00:50:23,979 --> 00:50:25,397 suffering for many, many years. 687 00:50:25,480 --> 00:50:27,149 All the children that are eating those fish 688 00:50:27,232 --> 00:50:28,608 are going to be suffering... 689 00:50:29,443 --> 00:50:32,571 mental challenges and underdevelopment 690 00:50:33,029 --> 00:50:34,281 for the rest of their lives. 691 00:50:38,535 --> 00:50:40,662 To this day, the refineries in Miami 692 00:50:40,746 --> 00:50:44,040 continue in the business with illegal mining, 693 00:50:44,916 --> 00:50:47,502 and probably the perception is that nothing will happen. 694 00:50:57,429 --> 00:50:58,889 This is Republic Metals. 695 00:51:00,348 --> 00:51:02,225 Republic Metals went bankrupt 696 00:51:02,309 --> 00:51:05,687 before it was ever investigated fully and brought to justice. 697 00:51:07,898 --> 00:51:11,276 We need more public information on all these companies, 698 00:51:11,359 --> 00:51:12,360 because to this day, 699 00:51:12,444 --> 00:51:14,905 there are many refineries buying dirty gold. 700 00:51:15,447 --> 00:51:17,324 They knew they were buying dirty gold 701 00:51:17,699 --> 00:51:18,742 for over... 702 00:51:19,159 --> 00:51:20,160 ten years... 703 00:51:20,869 --> 00:51:22,412 and they are still 704 00:51:23,038 --> 00:51:25,415 incredibly wealthy and still scot-free. 705 00:51:27,626 --> 00:51:30,378 And it's just a way for people to make 706 00:51:31,254 --> 00:51:33,256 dirty blood money. 707 00:51:36,635 --> 00:51:41,264 [interviewer] Go through this. This is the list of acceptable gold hallmarks 708 00:51:41,348 --> 00:51:43,642 or gold sources by the US Mint. 709 00:51:43,725 --> 00:51:44,601 Yeah. 710 00:51:44,684 --> 00:51:48,396 [interviewer] This is the list of approved sellers of gold to the US Mint. 711 00:51:48,772 --> 00:51:51,775 These are all the companies the Mint has accepted gold from. 712 00:51:53,193 --> 00:51:55,195 What does this list say about the gold supply 713 00:51:55,278 --> 00:51:57,489 that's been going into our federal vaults? 714 00:52:00,325 --> 00:52:01,159 Asahi-- 715 00:52:01,701 --> 00:52:03,245 Salt Lake, I don't know. 716 00:52:04,496 --> 00:52:07,124 Metalor, I can tell you it's not good. 717 00:52:07,207 --> 00:52:08,708 Republic is terrible. 718 00:52:10,168 --> 00:52:13,463 Royal Canadian Mint, I would like to think it's good. 719 00:52:15,257 --> 00:52:16,675 Englehard, not good. 720 00:52:16,925 --> 00:52:18,760 Handy andamp; Harman, they got in trouble. 721 00:52:19,469 --> 00:52:22,931 And Johnson Matthey, I know they're in trouble. So, yeah. 722 00:52:23,390 --> 00:52:25,183 I'd say 80% of it is... 723 00:52:26,101 --> 00:52:26,935 bad. 724 00:52:27,394 --> 00:52:31,523 The US Mint, like every citizen, is assuming these major companies 725 00:52:31,606 --> 00:52:32,732 are doing their due diligence 726 00:52:32,816 --> 00:52:35,026 and following  their anti-money-laundering practices. 727 00:52:35,110 --> 00:52:37,904 And when you don't,  that's when investigations happen, 728 00:52:37,988 --> 00:52:41,449 people get arrested, seizures and that sort of thing. 729 00:52:42,075 --> 00:52:44,202 Eighty percent of these companies... 730 00:52:45,162 --> 00:52:49,749 if they're sourcing gold from Latin America or from Europe... 731 00:52:50,834 --> 00:52:53,003 then their gold is tainted. 732 00:52:54,462 --> 00:52:56,298 And they're selling to the US Mint. 733 00:52:56,798 --> 00:52:58,842 [interviewer] What do you think when you see this list 734 00:52:58,925 --> 00:53:00,093 of approved gold sources? 735 00:53:02,554 --> 00:53:04,222 I'm familiar with several of them. 736 00:53:04,848 --> 00:53:06,766 Because some might be under investigation? 737 00:53:08,101 --> 00:53:09,311 I really can't comment. 738 00:53:11,771 --> 00:53:14,774 [interviewer] Was NTR selling dirty gold to the US Mint? 739 00:53:15,901 --> 00:53:18,194 They delivered blanks. 740 00:53:18,278 --> 00:53:20,989 A blank is a coin with nothing on it. 741 00:53:21,531 --> 00:53:25,160 It's just like a-- just like a coin that's flat. 742 00:53:25,243 --> 00:53:27,078 So yes, the blanks... 743 00:53:28,121 --> 00:53:33,084 uh, that they sent up there? Yeah, probably dirty gold. 744 00:53:34,252 --> 00:53:36,046 [interviewer] The majority of NTR's gold supply 745 00:53:36,129 --> 00:53:37,756 has to be coming from South America. 746 00:53:38,715 --> 00:53:43,053 And how much of that South American supply is illicit? 747 00:53:44,888 --> 00:53:47,182 -Off the record? -[interviewer] On the record. 748 00:53:47,474 --> 00:53:48,308 Hundred percent. 749 00:53:50,560 --> 00:53:52,854 [interviewer] Hundred percent of your South American gold 750 00:53:52,938 --> 00:53:54,147 you would consider... 751 00:53:54,940 --> 00:53:56,149 -dirty? -[interviewer] Illegal. 752 00:53:56,399 --> 00:53:57,609 Not illegal. Dirty. 753 00:53:59,402 --> 00:54:02,364 I mean, I don't know what the--  I don't know the legalities, but yeah. 754 00:54:03,198 --> 00:54:05,784 Well, it's dirty because it's illegally mined and trafficked. 755 00:54:05,867 --> 00:54:06,701 Yeah. 756 00:54:21,883 --> 00:54:24,552 [Maderal] This case was groundbreaking. 757 00:54:24,636 --> 00:54:25,637 I think it put... 758 00:54:26,596 --> 00:54:27,931 an industry on notice. 759 00:54:28,014 --> 00:54:29,933 It put the population on notice to a problem 760 00:54:30,016 --> 00:54:31,893 that maybe they hadn't paid attention to. 761 00:54:33,270 --> 00:54:35,438 [interviewer] Do you question if the case created 762 00:54:35,522 --> 00:54:37,357 enough change in the gold industry? 763 00:54:41,486 --> 00:54:42,320 No. 764 00:54:44,030 --> 00:54:45,824 I'm proud of what the team did. 765 00:54:46,408 --> 00:54:48,410 Do I wish I could have done more? Absolutely. 766 00:54:48,827 --> 00:54:52,080 Will the next prosecutor, team of agents, do a better job? 767 00:54:52,163 --> 00:54:53,039 I hope so. 768 00:54:55,208 --> 00:54:57,127 There's a lot more prosecutions 769 00:54:57,585 --> 00:54:58,628 that could be brought. 770 00:55:00,046 --> 00:55:04,050 Not necessarily even related to this case, but in the gold industry in general. 771 00:55:06,303 --> 00:55:07,429 I think this is the problem. 772 00:55:07,512 --> 00:55:09,723 "Everyone else is doing it" doesn't make it legit. 773 00:55:10,348 --> 00:55:12,434 It makes it commonplace. 774 00:55:12,684 --> 00:55:14,644 And people are getting  a false sense of security. 775 00:55:14,728 --> 00:55:17,397 Well, if this was a crime, all these guys would have been prosecuted. 776 00:55:18,356 --> 00:55:22,319 This plays into the common white-collar mindset, 777 00:55:22,402 --> 00:55:24,696 which is one of self-delusion. 778 00:55:24,863 --> 00:55:25,905 It's just these... 779 00:55:26,990 --> 00:55:29,492 incremental decisions to do more, 780 00:55:29,909 --> 00:55:32,370 to risk more, that add up over time. 781 00:55:32,871 --> 00:55:35,915 When you put all those things together,  it creates the perfect storm. 782 00:55:36,082 --> 00:55:38,752 And so, did they believe those things? 783 00:55:39,419 --> 00:55:40,295 Maybe they did. 784 00:55:41,421 --> 00:55:43,048 That doesn't make it not a crime. 785 00:55:45,800 --> 00:55:48,928 [Renaudin] Yeah, the stress of everything that I went through... 786 00:55:49,387 --> 00:55:50,513 it certainly led to... 787 00:55:53,183 --> 00:55:55,560 you know, a decline in my mental health, 788 00:55:56,436 --> 00:55:58,855 severe alcoholism and... 789 00:55:59,939 --> 00:56:02,233 you know, the destruction of my marriage and... 790 00:56:02,650 --> 00:56:04,527 what I'm most, uh... 791 00:56:05,153 --> 00:56:06,404 most sorry for. 792 00:56:07,030 --> 00:56:09,991 Just to think about the symbol 793 00:56:10,950 --> 00:56:12,494 of my marriage 794 00:56:12,786 --> 00:56:17,832 was a beautiful, beautiful, beautiful  gold ring that I selected. 795 00:56:18,333 --> 00:56:21,961 Cartier was... was a customer of ours, and that was a Cartier ring. 796 00:56:22,045 --> 00:56:25,882 So, if we supplied gold for that ring, it would be dirty gold. 797 00:56:27,342 --> 00:56:29,386 Yet, it's worth-- 798 00:56:29,844 --> 00:56:31,346 It came full circle. 799 00:56:36,976 --> 00:56:38,770 [Ortega] Even though I left Colombia, 800 00:56:38,853 --> 00:56:40,897 I've been trying to continue to shine light 801 00:56:40,980 --> 00:56:43,858 on these people that are moving dirty money across the continent. 802 00:56:44,359 --> 00:56:46,820 But gaining the trust of the US agencies 803 00:56:46,903 --> 00:56:49,823 has been a very slow process. Many years. 804 00:56:52,992 --> 00:56:54,035 I care... 805 00:56:55,245 --> 00:56:56,579 because, as a Colombian, 806 00:56:56,955 --> 00:57:00,834 I have to deal with our reputation  and with the Narcos movies 807 00:57:00,917 --> 00:57:05,088 and everybody knowing and even celebrating criminals like Pablo Escobar. 808 00:57:06,548 --> 00:57:07,382 [man on TV] Pablo! 809 00:57:08,591 --> 00:57:11,886 And they don't even know about all the Colombians that have... 810 00:57:12,762 --> 00:57:15,723 lost their lives and their livelihood, 811 00:57:16,141 --> 00:57:18,101 because they have tried to put a stop 812 00:57:18,184 --> 00:57:21,563 to all the networks of criminals 813 00:57:21,646 --> 00:57:24,190 that allowed for the cycle to continue. 814 00:57:37,829 --> 00:57:40,790 [girl in Spanish] You don't know me. And why should you? 815 00:57:44,210 --> 00:57:48,006 I'm just the idea of a young girl you've never met... 816 00:57:51,342 --> 00:57:57,182 whose father will work in the mines for years, taking out the gold. 817 00:58:01,769 --> 00:58:03,354 Ounce by ounce. 818 00:58:05,523 --> 00:58:06,900 Month by month. 819 00:58:12,697 --> 00:58:15,658 My family might get hurt one day... 820 00:58:20,079 --> 00:58:22,290 but you won't have to see that. 821 00:58:27,212 --> 00:58:31,216 Some of them may disappear in the mines one day... 822 00:58:37,138 --> 00:58:39,599 but there will always be gold.