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PODCAST

The Underworld Podcast

The Underworld Podcast

Underworld exposes the secret world of transnational criminal networks that have flourished since there were banks to bust, drugs to smuggle, and scams to run. Journalists Danny Gold and Sean Williams bring their experience reporting on dangerous people and organizations to take listeners on a global tour of mobsters, warlords and crooks - from Brooklyn to Beijing, from the streets to the boardrooms - and everywhere in between. Underworld is a show about heroes, villains, and the barely visible

society & culture documentary

All Episodes

53:39

The Bloody Turkish Mafia War Raging Across the World

The Underworld Podcast ·

2024/11/12

With their leader sentenced to life in a Dutch prison, the most powerful heroin trafficking organzation in Europe, the Turkish-Kurdish Baybasin clan, wasn't about to call it quits. Younger brother Abdullah Baybasin set out to control the streets of North London with his feared crew of Hackney Bombers. But another powerful gang, the Tottenham Turks, and the met police investigators, had other ideas. Two decades later, control of Europe's heroin market is once again facing instability, as the Taliban

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63:55

Europe's Pablo Escobar: The Heroin Emperor Huseyin...

The Underworld Podcast ·

2024/11/05

From a village in rural Turkey, Huseyin Baybasin emerged as one of the most powerful drug lords in Europe, setting up a global heroin trafficking ring. Stepping into the vacuum left by the downfall of the French Connection, Baybasin and his clan, dubbed "The Family," brought in billions of dollars of opium from Afghanistan through Iran and smuggled into Turkey before it headed to western Europe on the so-called Balkan route, all with the help of the Kurdish separatist militia known as the PKK. But

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57:11

The Billion Dollar Scam Cult King who tried to Take...

The Underworld Podcast ·

2024/10/29

When Bougainville fought an incredible civil war over a colossal mine, and won, its military leader emerged a hero. But he would soon fall under the spell of a conman and cult leader who wanted the Pacific island—and believed himself to be its king.The unlikely pair soon carved an empire out of a coconut palm jungle—and a wild, picaresque myth about Eden, ancient monarchs, and gold. The wildest thing was that almost everybody in the region believed it. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit

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58:33

North Korea's Meth Trafficking: The Hermit Narco-Kingdom

The Underworld Podcast ·

2024/10/22

When a bizarre group of international gangsters shook on a massive meth deal with a DEA agent in Bangkok, Thailand eight years ago, it kicked off a manhunt ensnaring Hong Kong Triads, Outlaws bikers and an ex-US Army sniper’s band of contract killers. But the bust also shone a light on the shady drug network of North Korea, part of a crime machine fuelling the world’s maddest dictatorship. This is the story of how a war-torn Hermit Kingdom became a narco-trafficking, cash-counterfeiting, pimping

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64:52

Indian Posse: The Native Teen Gang Ruling Canada's...

The Underworld Podcast ·

2024/10/15

Danny and Richard Wolfe were barely even teenagers when they formed the Indian Posse in their mother's basement with a handful of friends, but they had already been living the street life since they were in grade school, robbing, stealing and fighting. Never did they expect that within a few short years, the gang would balloon to hundreds and then thousands of members, taking shape in Winnipeg's poor and violent North End where there was no shortage of poor indigenous teens from broken families

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73:23

The Warring Prison Cartels Carving up Ecuador

The Underworld Podcast ·

2024/10/08

Jon Lee Anderson is an author and staff writer at The New Yorker. Anderson recently profiled Ecuador’s young president Daniel Noboa for a piece entitled “Ecuador’s Risky War on Narcos”. Jon Lee spoke about his weeks long visit to the embattled nation, its place in the wider drug world, and how political movements across Latin America have metastasized into the biggest and most violent underworld on the planet. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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57:45

The Cartel That Went to War w/Pablo Escobar: The...

The Underworld Podcast ·

2024/10/01

As Colombia's cocaine industry exploded in the 1980's, Pablo Escobar's Medellin cartel became the dominant player, capturing headlines across the world. But there was a second cartel rising up, one that operated more in the shadows and would soon grow more powerful - and more profitable - than even Medellin.The Gentlemen of Cali were slick, sophisticated and always looking for a solution that wouldn't attract headlines. They fancied themselves businessmen and aristocrats, and as Pablo went to war

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49:43

How Chinese Money Launderers Took Over the Narco...

The Underworld Podcast ·

2024/09/24

When gunmen ambushed a Mexican-Chinese businessman outside his Guatemala City casino in 2016, few outside the DEA paid much attention. But the shootout presaged the downfall of a man who, feds would later say, hadn’t just made a tidy living out of money laundering, but pioneered it. But Xizhi Li, who grew up in the border town of Mexicali, was just one of a new army of Chinese money launderers who, tooled with millennia of underground banking skills, and China’s own economic policies, have become

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45:13

The Legend of Bum Farto and the Florida Keys Cocaine

The Underworld Podcast ·

2024/09/17

Something about Bum Farto, Key West’s fire chief, stunk. And it wasn’t just his red suits, bling and lime green company car. By the early 70s Florida’s farthest-flung outpost was a lawless drug enclave. And Bum was smack bang in its center. ((NOTE: This isn't just our best episode, it might be the podcast episode ever, in the history of podcasts.)) When the state’s governor dispatched a multi-agency task force to Key West, however, they stumbled on something far darker than an errant Farto. Out

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77:13

Colombia's FARC Guerillas: From Revolution to the...

The Underworld Podcast ·

2024/09/10

The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia fought a guerrilla war against Colombia’s government - as well as against right wing militias and drug cartels - for over four decades before signing a peace treaty in 2016 and then dissolving in 2017, though splinter faction known as The Dissidents still prowls the jungles. As the FARC were coming up, another violent group in Colombia hellbent on taking over territory was also growing: the country’s infamous drug cartels. In this episode, we’re joined by

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52:30

Venezuela’s Cop Killing Street Gang Tren de Aragua...

The Underworld Podcast ·

2024/09/03

The Tren de Aragua grew out of disastrous regime policies to give gang leaders more power in prisons. Its mysterious leader, Niño Guerrero, soon controlled an entire facility, and installed a prison bar, a nightclub—and even a zoo.More state bungling allowed the Tren to take over entire city neighbourhoods unchallenged. So when Venezuela’s economy plummeted and hundreds of thousands fled the nation, it became a key player in the booming migrant smuggling trade, spreading into neighboring Latin

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57:30

The Westies, Psycho Killers of Hell's Kitchen and the...

The Underworld Podcast ·

2024/08/27

In the chaos of 1970’s New York, it took a lot to shock the city. But the Westies managed to leave quite the impression. Dubbed the last of the Irish mob despite being more like an anarchic gang, they terrorized the Hell’s Kitchen neighborhood of Manhattan, garnering headlines due to their penchant for daytime hits and chopping up their victims bodies. They even managed to attract the attention of New York’s five mafia families, who took notice of their numerous hits and started contracting out to

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46:55

Sammy the Bull, Nazis and Mormon Killers: How the...

The Underworld Podcast ·

2024/08/20

This year, the Phoenix suburb of Gilbert has been rocked by the death of 16-year-old Preston Lord, at the hands of a group calling themselves the ‘Gilbert Goons,’ jocks and hicks combining forces to unleash violence on the city’s streets.The craziest thing? This happened before. And back then, the group’s godfather was none other than Sammy the Bull, Gambino consigliere turned super-snitch. The 90s are well and truly back in fashion. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit

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53:51

The 30 Year Old Billionaire Cartel Boss Playing...

The Underworld Podcast ·

2024/08/13

In recent years, Sebastian Marset has emerged as the first narco kingpin out of Uruguay. He rose from a mid-level weed dealer to an international cartel boss in less than 10 years, even with half that time being spent in prison, pioneering Latin America's southern route; trafficking blow from Bolivia to Paraguay and Uruguay, and then Europe, where he's allegedly behind record-breaking multi-ton busts from Germany to Belgium. He’s a master at money laundering, setting up front companies, and winning

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40:46

The Rise and Fall of the Dark Web Fentanyl King

The Underworld Podcast ·

2024/08/06

When Mohammed Alaa Allawi, a former US military interpreter, moved to Texas in 2012, selling weed was a side hustle. But when a company asked him to design a website, the young Iraqi soon realised his American dream was better forged online.Soon Allawi was making millions on the dark web, selling counterfeit pills with precursors from China—including the deadly opioid fentanyl. When a Marine OD’d on the gear, the heat on Allawi intensified. Before long he was trapped in a spectacular multiagency

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50:35

EL MAYO ARRESTED! Was he betrayed by Chapo's son?!?!

The Underworld Podcast ·

2024/07/30

Bombshell out of Mexico, El Mayo (!!!!!) is in US federal custody after arriving on a small private plan alongside El Chapo's son, Joaquin Guzman Lopez. What. The Hell. Is going on. How does the most elusive, powerful narco kingpin in Mexico's history, whose avoided arrest for decades and operated like a ghost in the shadows, end up being gift-wrapped for feds? Alongside 1/4 of Los Chapitos? In this hastily thrown together episode, we try to get to the bottom of exactly what's known, what isn't

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45:18

South Africa's Rampaging Murder Rate: Gangs,...

The Underworld Podcast ·

2024/07/23

When Nelson Mandela and the ANC delivered South Africa from Apartheid in the 90s, hopes were high that the country could become a beacon of freedom and fairness. A generation later, those dreams lie in tatters. Elites have plundered state coffers to the tune of billions, mines have been taken over by illegal “chancers,” and the ghettoes of South Africa’s largest city, Cape Town, are suffering levels of violence unseen since segregation.Left with few opportunities, corrupt cops and hundreds of

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46:40

The Fugitive British Gangster Instagramming His...

The Underworld Podcast ·

2024/07/16

Sam Walker already had a huge rap sheet in his native Liverpool before 2018, when he took off across Europe and through the Sahara Desert into Sierra Leone - posting on social media the whole time. There he crafted a new life as a saviour of Freetown’s slums. But is there another, darker motive for Walker’s second act?Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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49:56

El Chapo's Sons Built a Fentanyl Empire: Los Chapitos

The Underworld Podcast ·

2024/07/09

With El Chapo locked up in a supermax prison and never going home, there's been a battle to maintain the power of his feared Sinaloa cartel. Many thought his sons, groomed to take his place, would falter. Seen mostly as spoiled rich kid "narco juniors" who possessed neither the intelligence nor the strength to outmaneuver older, more experienced druglords, the men known as Los Chapitos have surprised many by turning their faction of the cartel into a ruthless powerhouse pumping out fentanyl into the

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52:27

The Deadliest Biker War in History: Hells Angels vs...

The Underworld Podcast ·

2024/07/02

In the mid 90's, the Quebec Hells Angels made an offer to every drug trafficking organization in Montreal: buy from us or die. The Rock Machine motorcycle club refused to bend the knee, allying with a secretive group of business owner drug dealer money launderers known as the Dark Circle.What followed was 8 years of unparalleled violence, resulting in over 160 killed and turning the streets of Montreal into a war zone. Meanwhile, the Hells Angels and their leader Mom Boucher kept up their war on

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98 results

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