num_pages: 560
description: In 2008 veteran journalist Evan Wright acclaimed for his New York Times bestselling book Generation Kill and co-writer of the Emmy-winning HBO series it spawned  began a series of conversations with super-criminal Jon Roberts star of the fabulously successful documentary Cocaine Cowboys. Those conversations would last three years during which time Wright came to realize that Roberts was much more than the de-facto transportation chief of the Medellin Cartel during the 1980s much more than a facilitator of a national drug epidemic. As Wrights tape recorder whirred and Roberts unburdened himself of hundreds of jaw-dropping tales it became clear that perhaps no one in history had broken so many laws with such willful abandon. Roberts in fact seemed to be a prodigy of criminality  but one with a remarkable self-awareness and a fierce desire to protect his son from following the same path. American Desperado is Roberts no-holds-barred account of being born into Mafia royalty witnessing his first murder at the age of seven becoming a hunter-assassin in Vietnam returning to New York to become -- at age 22 -- one of the citys leading nightclub impresarios then journeying to Miami where in a few short years he would rise to become the Medellin Cartels most effective smuggler. But thats just half the tale. The roster of Roberts friends and acquaintances reads like a Whos Who of the latter half of the 20th century and includes everyone from Jimi Hendrix Richard Pryor and O.J. Simpson to Carlo Gambino Meyer Lansky and Manuel Noriega. Nothing if not colorful Roberts surrounded himself with beautiful women drove his souped-up street car at a top speed of 180 miles per hour shared his bed with a 200-pound cougar and employed a 66 professional wrestler called The Thing as his bodyguard. Ultimately Roberts became so powerful that he attracted the attention of the Republican Partys leadership was wooed by them and even was co-opted by the CIA for which he carried out its secret agenda. Scrupulously documented and relentlessly propulsive this collaboration between a bloodhound journalist and one of the most audacious criminals ever is like no other crime book youve ever read. Jon Roberts may be the only criminal who changed the course of American history. 
language: English
title: American Desperado: My Life--From Mafia Soldier to Cocaine Cowboy to Secret Government Asset
publisher: Crown