EXCLUSIVE | ‘The Last Narc’ has been canceled? DEA agent Hector Berrellez says ‘CIA took it off’
Mexico’s second-largest metropolis, Guadalajara, is known for its sunny weather, tequila and mariachi music. Thirty-five years ago, it was not the same. In 1985, the colonial city was the base for most of the major narcotics traffickers.
On February 7, 1985, DEA Agent Kiki Camarena walked back to his truck to meet his wife, Mika, but he was abducted in broad daylight and scooted off to a quaint residence located at 881 Lope de Vega in the Colonia of Jardines del Bosque. The couple was planning to move to San Diego after spending four years in the drug hub of Mexico City. But fate had different plans for them.
Camarena was captured by drug kingpins Miguel Ángel Félix Gallardo, Ernesto ‘Don Neto’ Fonseca and Rafael Caro Quintero. Over a long period of 30 hours, he was tortured and brutally murdered. After the gruesome act, his body was found a month later, wrapped in plastic and dumped outside the small town of La Angostura, in the state of Michoacán.
His skull was punctured by a metal object, and his ribs were broken. Painting the gritty real-life tale on screen, ‘The Last Narc’ delves into the true story behind the barbaric slaughter of DEA Agent Kiki Camarena and talks about how one killing began a ruthless war.
The four-part docuseries was supposed to drop on May 15, 2020, but it was suddenly postponed without a clear release date for the future. Shockingly, the trailer has also been deleted from YouTube. Directed by Tiller Russell, the documentary had been in the making for 14 long years and features exclusive snippets of conversation with DEA Agents Hector Berrellez and Phil Jordan.
In an exclusive interview with MEA World Wide (MEAWW), Berrellez spilled the truth behind the delay. “CIA took it off,” he blatantly said. “They pressured Amazon to take it off because of national security. It's been canceled forever and it's a coverup and they don't want the truth to come out.” Why did the producers say yes? “I don't know what the truth is,” he said. When asked if there was news that it's being postponed, he said he had been told it's been canceled.
One of the major talking points of the entire fiasco is the Central Intelligence Agency's (CIA) alleged involvement in the kidnapping of Camarena. While there is no major proof, there have been quite a few accusations in the past.
Earlier, in an exclusive interview with MEA World Wide, DEA Agents Jordan and Berrellez had said, “It is well documented that during that time period, when Kiki was tortured and murdered, the CIA was complicit in bringing tons of cocaine, selling the cocaine to the godfathers of the drug trade and then using that money to buy arms to fight the Iran Contra war.”
Shedding light on how long he had worked on the idea, filmmaker Russell — who has helmed documentaries like ‘Operation Odessa’, ‘The Seven Five’ and has an upcoming feature film ‘Silk Road’ ready — told IndieWire, “It’s a story I’ve been wanting to tell for about 14 years.”
He added, “I’ve been carefully biding my time until I had a great canvas on which to tell it and access to the people involved.” Talking about Berrellez, Russell told TV Insider, “He braved threats from his own government and a spot on the cartel hit list to tell his story. He reveals what he uncovered about the players involved on both sides of the border.”
Peeling the myriad layers of myth and mystery hidden behind the story, the documentary also features Camarena’s widow Mika and other insiders, including Jorge Godoy, Ramón Lira, René Lopez, Manny Madrano, Conseulo 'Chatita' Berrellez, Jaime Kuykendall, Mike Holm and Jim White. Reminiscing the horrors from the past, Mika says in an emotional clip, “Kiki always wanted to do the right thing, at 18 he wanted to be an FBI agent. I remember the children coming home and I had to tell them he had been tortured.”
With the ambiguity around its release and cancellation, there seems to be a bigger motive at hand. Only time will tell if the story that needs to be told finally gets its due.