Synopses & Reviews
Synopsis
There Are No Dead Here is the untold story of three brave Colombians who stood up to the paramilitary groups that, starting in the mid-1990s, decimated the country in the name of counterinsurgency and drug profits. With the complicity of much of Colombia's military and political establishment and in a climate of widespread fear and denial, the paramilitaries massacred, raped, and tortured thousands, and seized the land of millions of peasants forced to flee their homes. The United States, more interested in the appearance of success in its own War on Drugs, largely ignored them. Few dared to confront them.
Drawing on hundreds of hours of interviews and five years on the ground in Colombia, Maria McFarland Sanchez-Moreno takes readers from the sweltering Medellin streets where criminal investigators constantly looked over their shoulders for assassins on motorcycles, through the countryside where paramilitaries wiped out entire towns in gruesome massacres, and into the corridors of the presidential palace in Colombia's capital, Bogota. Throughout, she tells the interconnected stories of three very different Colombians bound by their commitment to the truth. The first is the gregarious Jesus Maria Valle, whose prophetic warnings about the military's complicity with the paramilitaries got him killed in 1998. A decade later, Valle's friend, the shy prosecutor Ivan Velasquez, became an unlikely hero when his groundbreaking investigations landed a third of the country's congress in prison for conspiring with paramilitaries, and put him in the crosshairs of Colombia's then wildly popular president, US protege Alvaro Uribe. When Uribe's smear campaign against Velasquez threatened to bury the truth, the scrawny investigative journalist Ricardo Calderon exposed the lies, revealing that the paramilitaries' reach extended all the way into the presidency.
Thanks to the efforts of Valle, Velasquez, and Calderon, Colombians now know the truth about the brutality and corruption that swept like a lethal virus through the country's society and political system. And slowly, the country is breaking free from the paramilitaries' grip.
Synopsis
In the 1990s and 2000s, in the midst of the decades-long civil war, and with the complicity of much of the country's military and political establishment, Colombian paramilitary groups with close ties to drug cartels massacred, raped, and tortured thousands.
In There Are No Dead Here, three ordinary Colombians-a prosecutor, an activist, and a journalist-risk everything to uncover the truth about the paramilitaries' hold on the government. Maria McFarland Sanchez-Moreno's gripping narrative takes readers from the sweltering Medellin streets where criminal investigators were hunted by assassins, through the countryside where paramilitaries wiped out entire towns, and into the corridors of the presidential palace in Bogota.
The result is an unforgettable portrait of the valiant men and women whose tireless work offers hope amid the cascade of corruption and brutality.
Synopsis
Colombia's drug-fueled cycle of terror, corruption, and tragedy did not end with Pablo Escobar's death in 1993. Just when Colombians were ready to move past the murderous legacy of the country's cartels, a new, bloody chapter unfolded. In the late 1990s, right-wing paramilitary groups with close ties to the cocaine business carried out a violent expansion campaign, massacring, raping, and torturing thousands.
There Are No Dead Here is the harrowing story of three ordinary Colombians who risked everything to reveal the collusion between the new mafia and much of the country's military and political establishment: Jesus Maria Valle, a human rights activist who was murdered for exposing a dark secret; Ivan Velasquez, a quiet prosecutor who took up Valle's cause and became an unlikely hero; and Ricardo Calderon, a dogged journalist who is still being targeted for his revelations. Their groundbreaking investigations landed a third of the country's Congress in prison and fed new demands for justice and peace that Colombia's leaders could not ignore.
Taking readers from the sweltering Medellin streets where criminal investigators were hunted by assassins, through the countryside where paramilitaries wiped out entire towns, and into the corridors of the presidential palace in Bogota, There Are No Dead Here is an unforgettable portrait of the valiant men and women who dared to stand up to the tide of greed, rage, and bloodlust that threatened to engulf their country.
Synopsis
The bloody story of the rise of paramilitaries in Colombia, told through three characters--a fearless activist, a dogged journalist, and a relentless investigator--whose lives intersected in the midst of unspeakable terror. Colombia's drug-fueled cycle of terror, corruption, and tragedy did not end with Pablo Escobar's death in 1993. Just when Colombians were ready to move past the murderous legacy of the country's cartels, a new, bloody chapter unfolded. In the late 1990s, right-wing paramilitary groups with close ties to the cocaine business carried out a violent expansion campaign, massacring, raping, and torturing thousands.
There Are No Dead Here is the harrowing story of three ordinary Colombians who risked everything to reveal the collusion between the new mafia and much of the country's military and political establishment: Jesus Maria Valle, a human rights activist who was murdered for exposing a dark secret; Ivan Velasquez, a quiet prosecutor who took up Valle's cause and became an unlikely hero; and Ricardo Calderon, a dogged journalist who is still being targeted for his revelations. Their groundbreaking investigations landed a third of the country's Congress in prison and fed new demands for justice and peace that Colombia's leaders could not ignore.
Taking readers from the sweltering Medellin streets where criminal investigators were hunted by assassins, through the countryside where paramilitaries wiped out entire towns, and into the corridors of the presidential palace in Bogota, There Are No Dead Here is an unforgettable portrait of the valiant men and women who dared to stand up to the tide of greed, rage, and bloodlust that threatened to engulf their country.