[3] Seal's career with TWA ended in July 1972, when he was arrested for involvement in a conspiracy to smuggle a shipment of plastic explosives to Mexico using a DC-4. Barry Seal: The real-life story behind Tom Cruise's character in Author Del Hahn, a former FBI agent who wrote the book about Seal titled Smuggler's End: The Life and Death of Barry Seal, told Vice, "Seal thought he was smarter and cleverer than the Ochoas," who are one of the founding families of the Medelln Cartel. According to author Del Hahn, who wrote the book Smuggler's End, next to Barry's yearbook photo was the description, "Full of fun, full of folly" (TIME). When Seal was convicted of smuggling charges, he became an informant for the Drug Enforcement Administration and testified in several major drug trials. Adler Berriman Barry Seal (July 16, 1939 February 19, 1986) was an American airline pilot who became a major drug smuggler for the Medelln Cartel. He didn't meet Pablo Escobar and the Ochoa brothers in person until 1984, after his arrest when he was working as an informant for the DEA on an undercover operation. The Nicaragua drug story first appeared in the Washington Times (7/17/84) and was immediately given big play by all the major papers, wire services and TV networks. Even criminals have a love life and Barry Seal was no different. He soon began using his flight skills for another purpose: smuggling. The real Barry Seal claimed he had been working for agencies . Jeb Bush and the 1986 Murder of CIA Drug Smuggler Barry Seal I'm a multi-engine, instrument-rated commercial pilot," Cruise said in a Wired interview. American Made is one of many "so crazy, it must be real" stories that have hit Hollywood in the form of a major action movie in recent years. [52], Six Colombians were quickly arrested in connection with the murder. In 2017, Seals life became the subject of a Hollywood adaptation titled American Made, starring Tom Cruise. The Charmed, Doomed Life of Barry Seal - Consortium News Cruise's Seal gathers intelligence by flying low over Guatemala and Nicaragua and snapping photos from his plane. But the media showed much less interest when subcommittee chairman Hughes recently disclosed he had new evidence that the entire Sandinista connection was a US intelligence fabrication. The extent of Barry Seal's involvement with the CIA in the 1980s has provided fuel for speculation and conspiracy theories. Both rejected any deals, even though Seal told them a little about his involvement with the Ochoa family. 4 - July/August, Iran-Contra Affair. Alder Berriman, or Barry Seal, was one of America's most notorious drug smugglers. It proved impossible to impanel sufficient jurors in Baton Rouge, so the venue was moved to Lake Charles. Domhnall Gleeson, right, stars in director Doug Liman's crime drama 'American Made,' based loosely on the story of Baton Rouge native Barry Seal, a pilot-turned-smugger-turned-federal-informant. In her suit, Lisa, who is not depicted in the movie, also claimed that there were factual inaccuracies in the script, including the fact that Barry had five children, not three, and that the movie falsely suggests he was an alcoholic and a reckless pilot. Funny how these people missed theFACT, now public knowledge, that Pablo Escobar was granted wide and free passage and full protection, by the Sandinistas. Filed under: Covert Operations, Drugs, Extra! In April 1981, a DEA informant introduced Seal to an undercover DEA agent. The documentary series, titled "Uncle Sam Wants You", ran on five consecutive evenings. [43] After listening to summaries of Seal's successful work for the DEA, Judge Norman Roettger sentenced Seal to time served (a little over three months in witness protection) and three years probation. In October 1985 he returned to court over the first indictment in Big Screamer, for which he had originally been sentenced to ten years. MENA: BARRY SEAL - What Really Happened '80s drug, gun saga portrayed in new Tom Cruise movie remains sore spot In imposing sentence, Polozola further stipulated that Seal could not carry a gun or hire armed bodyguards as this would be possession or constructive possession of a firearm by a convicted felon. An interesting fact we learned while researching the true story was that while training for the Civil Air Patrol in Baton Rouge, Barry Seal met President John F. Kennedy's assassin, Lee Harvey Oswald. However, her real name is Debbie, not Lucy. He was brought to the U.S. where he agreed to plead guilty to conspiracy to import and distribute cocaine. In addition to implicating Escobar as a drug kingpin, Seals photos provided evidence that the Sandinistas, Nicaraguan revolutionaries who overthrew the countrys dictator in 1979, were being funded by drug money. The marriage ended with his death in 1986. The arrests never happened since Seal's cover was blown. "Tom did all his own flying in the movie," says director Doug Liman, who is a pilot himself (Vulture.com). [10][11] By 1982, Seal was using over a dozen aircraft in his smuggling operation. "We're talking about one of the largest drug smugglers in America, and these agents loved him." Yes. His character is inspired by the stories we learned about Barry." Through his cartel contacts in Miami, Seal arranged a meeting using the name Ellis McKenzie (the real name of another Seal associate). . The DEA felt this would be impossible to explain away, and Seal returned to the U.S. without cargo. In his book, he uses case documents and first-person accounts to dispel this idea and other half-truths about Seal. He made four trips to Nicaragua that year, allegedly to document the complicity in cocaine trafficking. Barry Seal was an ace pilot and a drug smuggler of such proportions that he has been called "the biggest drug smuggler in American History". He was hired by Trans World Airlines (TWA) in 1964 and at age 26 became one of the youngest Captains operating a Boeing 707. But when he was busted in 1984, he decided to double-cross Escobar, and he soon became one of the Drug Enforcement Administrations most important informants. On his return to the U.S., Seal landed at Homestead Air Force Base and the drugs were transferred into a Winnebago camper, which Seal turned over to his Colombian contact. Tom Cruise got his pilot's license in 1994. Indeed, at age 26, Seal became one of the youngest pilots to ever fly for Trans World Airlines. Seal pilote un avin C-123 que llevaba tambin unas cmaras fotogrficas escondidas. -Daily Mail Online. The DEA eventually took him up on his offer because of his knowledge and connections to the cartel. Why Bill Clinton And George W. Bush Are Portrayed In A Tom Cruise Movie Barry Seal, The Most Important Witness In The History Of The Drug Enforcement Administration. -Vulture. Seal took pictures during a Nicaragua sting operation clearly showing members of the Colombian Cartel loading kilos of cocaine onto the plane. George W. Bush was literally being flown around in what had been the favorite plane of the murdered CIA asset and drug runner Barry Sealon the exact same day (2/19/86) Barry Seal was murdered in Baton Rouge, his mistress "Barbara" was also murdered in Miami; two other men also affiliated with the Medellin drug cartel, Pablo Carrera . It was probably shortly before the operation or thereabouts when he was enlisted to give us proof that the Sandinista regime in Nicaragua was actually . 'American Made' sheds light on shady Arkansas airfield deals However, the U.S. needed a way to covertly get the funds and weapons to the rebels. Everything To Know About Barry Seal's Wife - AnswersAfrica.com He also provided testimony that led to drug charges against high-level government officials in Nicaragua and Turks and Caicos. "He put the airplane into a parabolic arc and pinned me against the ceiling, and right in that moment, I had this inspiration. The 70s. Times Staff Writers. [31], The DEA plan was to keep Seal working with the cartel on other parts of the supply chain, such as moving cocaine base into Nicaragua from Colombia and inspecting smuggling airfields in Mexico and the U.S. The DEA initially tried to protect Seal, but he refused to go into the Witness Protection Program. However, some still allege the opposite, that the government turned a blind eye to Seal's drug running in order to use him to deliver weapons to the Nicaraguan rebels. "One day Barry came in and said there was a contract on him - half a million dead, a million alive," says widow Debbie Seal. Widespread publicity and the general public outcry caused a delay of several months before Seal's murder trial began. In the film, his abductors take him to a secret airstrip in the Colombian jungle where three businessmen, including Pablo Escobar, make him an offer he can't pass up. When it did, the overloaded plane crashed at the Colombia airfield on takeoff. Hahn was part of the task force that pursued Seal in the 1980s. Barry and his wife talked about going into witness protection, but like in the movie, he decided against it. He stated that IranContra figure Oliver North had attended two meetings about the sting operation and had the motivation to release the information. The second indictment charged Seal and three others with multiple counts of possession and distribution of methaqualone, phenobarbital, and meperidine.[16]. [36], The evidence acquired from the arrest, plus the evidence gathered by Seal, provided the basis for the first drug trafficking indictment in the U.S. against Escobar and the Ochoas. The DEA refused to let Seal leave the country due to the danger he was in, so Seal arranged for his ex-brother-in-law William Bottoms to make the flight. The last movie was produced by Imagine Entertainment under Universal Pictures and was made after the company purchased Barry's life rights from Deborah at the cost of $350,000. On Feb. 19, 1986, three Colombian hitmen that had been hired by the Medelln cartel tracked Seal down at the Salvation Army. [7] At his peak, he earned as much as $500,000 per flight transporting shipments of cocaine from Colombia to the United States. FAIR is the national progressive media watchdog group, challenging corporate media bias, spin and misinformation. His flight instructor described him as a naturally gifted pilot. Arthur, the chief council, investigated the CIA and questioned Col. Oliver North, who is depicted in American Made. However, the film takes certain liberties in regard to Seals life as well. Tom Cruise is moving on from his Mummy -fied adventures in 2017, with his next big release, American Made, hitting theaters soon. Debbie, who was 21 at the time, met Barry, 33, while working as a cashier at a restaurant. Fact-checking American Made revealed that Monty Schafer is a fictional character created to represent Barry Seal's contacts at the CIA. This operation involved a long, complicated cocaine shipment from Bolivia, refueling in Colombia, refueling again in Texas, and delivering the cocaine in Las Vegas. Barry Seal: The Real Renegade Pilot Behind Tom Cruise's 'American Made' He took it out for a test flight and never came back." Yes. [25] The drugs were unloaded by the military and Seal and his co-pilot were taken to detention in downtown Managua, where they were released to the cartel's Nicaraguan contact, Federico Vaughan. [12] The number of planes and the frequency of flights soon attracted the attention of Louisiana State Police and Federal investigators. She says that she thought he was an airplane broker and also that he rented out old anti-aircraft lighting for various promotional events. YouTubeThe photograph taken by Barry Seal that outed Pablo Escobar as the Medelln cartels drug kingpin. Also, before the agreement was reached, the Louisiana task force investigation had been looking into Seal's involvement in smuggling thousands of kilograms of cocaine. Seal used his knowledge of aviation to aid in his life of crime. With his real name unknown to the cartel, Seal was in the perfect position to avoid prosecution by becoming a government informant or so he thought. Yes. The story of Barry Seal, an American pilot who became a drug-runner for the CIA in the 1980s in a clandestine operation that would be exposed as the Iran-Contra Affair. Barry Seal - Interesting stories about famous people, biographies -Daily Mail Online, "Mena" refers to the small town in Arkansas where Barry Seal moved his operation, smuggling in drugs to a clandestine airfield under the nose of then-Governor Bill Clinton. As part of his reduced sentence, the judge had ordered Barry to spend his nights, from 6 p.m. to 6 a.m., at a Salvation Army halfway house for six months. Facing major prison time, Seal attempted to cut various deals with the DEA. "He would tell me all these wild stories about the missions he had flown. NARCO-POLITIK: 'Bushwacked', The Murder Of The Legendary & Problematic We rely on your support to keep running. But before he died, the photographs he captured made Pablo Escobar a wanted criminal and ultimately played an important part in the drug kingpins downfall in 1993. Also, Mr. Seal, who also went by the name Bill Elders as well as variations of his real name, "testifies he made 6 or 7 hundred thousand dollars in trafficking drugs after he went to work for . [24] The cartel provided a new plane, but it lacked the capacity for a direct flight to the U.S., so the cartel arranged a stopover in Nicaragua earlier than one planned at an airfield in Los Brasiles near Managua. [53], In addition to the state charges against the killers, federal charges were filed against Fabio Ochoa, Pablo Escobar, and a third cartel member, Rafael Cardona, for conspiring to violate Seal's civil rights by murdering him.[54]. He received a phone call from Fabio Ochoa and Escobar, who both thanked him for his help, and was given $100,000 for any costs he incurred. Seal said that he started by doing things like flying guns for the CIA to revolution fighters in Cuba in the late 1950s and flying operations for U.S. Army Special Forces in Laos just prior to the Vietnam War. Three of them, Luis Carlos Quintero-Cruz, Miguel Vlez, and Bernardo Antonio Vsquez, were indicted on state charges for capital murder. -Daily Mail Online, No. Seal's Drug Enforcement Administration file also supports this, noting that he was smuggling marijuana as early as 1976, then adding cocaine to his resume in 1978. The Ochoa Family, along with Pablo Escobar and others, were the founders of the Medelln Cartel. Seal had six children; two from his first wife, one from a relationship he had in between marriages, and three more with Deborah.[62][63]. [44], When Seal received only time served and probation, Louisiana state and federal drug investigators were faced with a dilemma. On June 25, 1984, the CIA placed hidden cameras in Seal's 123K plane that was directed to Los Brasiles, in Nicaragua: the photos that were taken show 'some Nicaraguan soldiers', Barry Seal, Pablo Escobar, Federico Vaughn, Emile Camp ('Seal's co-pilot') placing over one thousand kilos of cocaine onto the plane (Peet 2002). When asked how, he replied, "Oh, Barry stole an airplane from me. The film stars Tom Cruise as Barry . . The Nevada aviator killed when a cargo plane was shot down in Nicaragua last weekend served as one of the CIA's chief pilots in . A Baton Rouge, Louisiana native, Barry Seal was eventually forced to move his drug smuggling operation after he drew the attention of Louisiana authorities. After this look at the brazen smuggler Barry Seal, check out how the Medelln cartel became one of the most ruthless crime syndicates in history. Barry Seal was one of the biggest drug smugglers in America in the 1970s and 80s. In the American Made movie, Barry Seal's boredom with piloting commercial flights leads him to perform stunts that cause the oxygen masks to fall and frighten passengers. Wouldn't it be fun if they were fooling around in a plane and the plane went into the same kind of parabolic arc and they got pinned against the ceiling?" The Fat Lady, over Nicaragua. CBS Evening News (7/28/88), the only major network to cover the proceedings, reported on the testimony of DEA agent Ernest Jacobsen, who said that White House officials undermined a DEA probe of the Colombian cocaine kingpins by blowing an undercover informants cover when they leaked information in an attempt to link Nicaragua to the drug trade. If they were, the mission was aborted. Adler Berriman "Barry" Seal was an American commercial airline pilot who became a major drug smuggler for the Medelln Cartel. [51], On the evening of February 19, 1986, Seal was shot to death in front of the Salvation Army Center, three weeks into his probation. In American Made, facts matter less than fiction. . Nicaragua's Drug Connection Exposed as Hoax - FAIR As stated in the previous question, there is no strong evidence to confirm that Barry Seal was working with the CIA prior to becoming an informant after his arrest in 1983. When he learned that he would probably be killed afterward, he refused. 5 Jackson Stevens. The photograph taken by Barry Seal that outed Pablo Escobar as the Medelln cartels drug kingpin. [6] Also, after his release from prison Seal met William Roger Reaves on the flight back to the U.S. Daniel Rennie is a freelance writer residing in Melbourne, Australia. [59] Another eyewitness saw Quintero-Cruz outside the car, handing the MAC-10 to the car driver through the window after the murder. Using pilots like Barry Seal was a means to an end. Adler Berriman "Barry" Seal (July 16, 1939 February 19, 1986) was an American commercial airline pilot who became a major drug smuggler for the Medelln Cartel. -The Hollywood Reporter, Debbie Seal insists that she was unaware of what her husband was up to. And it was there, according to The Gentlemans Journal, that he was arrested by the DEA in 1984 with 462 pounds of Escobars cocaine on his plane. The photo was in a cardboard frame of the kind used by nightclubs and tourist attractions, with the date it was taken, January 22,1963, stamped on the back. . He testified that in January 1986, he was ordered by Jorge Ochoa to kill Seal. The photo shows Federico Vaughan, who Seal claimed was a top aide to Tomas Borge, the Nicaraguan government's . No. Things became worse when a report in the Washington Times on July 17 . [35], Following the exposure of the Nicaraguan investigation, the DEA had to move quickly to arrest the cartel distributors in Miami. President Reagan displayed Seals photo in a nationally televised speech in March 1986. Seal became a federal informant in March 1984. Like in the movie, the American Made true story reveals that Barry made a living as a commercial airline pilot for several years. He had previously been married to Barbara Bottoms (m. 1963-1971) and Lynn Ross (m. 1971-1972). From the get-go, he was a talented aviator, and before he graduated from high school in 1957, Seal had earned his private pilot wings. Photo 1: This is a photo taken July 23, 1955. Instead the Times ran a brief item in its Sunday national edition (7/31/88) quoting President Reagans weekly radio broadcast about how Sandinista officials are still involved in drug trafficking. Seal made important connections while in prison in Honduras, including Emile Camp, a fellow Louisiana pilot and smuggler who became one of Seal's closest associates, and Ellis McKenzie, a local Honduran smuggler. Seal's story is the focus of the . The flight, in January 1985, was successful and led to arrests and convictions. Barry Seal (Photo: Facebook) . What's Fact and What's Fiction in American Made - Slate Magazine Barry Seal "'Fat Man' key to mystery" By Michael Haddigan THE ARKANSAS GAZETTE June 26, 1988 Allegations of cocaine smuggling and international intrigue swirled about the Mena Airport and Seal for years. Twin Beech | Beaumont Hotel Purwin was a passenger in a plane that went down, killing both Purwin and Venezuelan pilot Carlos Berl. The assassination happened on February 19, 1986 in the parking lot in front of the Salvation Army building on Airline Highway (U.S. 61) in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Despite the heat surrounding Seal, he made a drug run to Nicaragua in 1984, where he picked up 1,465 pounds of . Hahn told Vice that Barry was likable but "not as smart and clever as he thought he was. The story of Barry Seal has since been made into films such as Doublecrossed (1991), Infiltrator (2016) and American Made (2017). American Made - Rotten Tomatoes "He stopped in there and, just like that, he asked me out," says Debbie. On Feb. 19, 1986, Barry Seal, a very prominent CIA drug smuggler and ace pilot, was murdered outside his halfway house in Baton Rouge, LA. [29], Seal made one more trip to Nicaragua on July 7, bringing money to Escobar to pay the Nicaraguans for landing rights.