Read The Mastermind Drugs Empire Murder Betrayal Audible Audio Edition Evan Ratliff Random House Audio Books
Download As PDF : The Mastermind Drugs Empire Murder Betrayal Audible Audio Edition Evan Ratliff Random House Audio Books
The incredible true story of the decade-long quest to bring down Paul Le Roux - the creator of a frighteningly powerful internet-enabled cartel who merged the ruthlessness of a drug lord with the technological savvy of a Silicon Valley entrepreneur
"A tour de force of shoe-leather reporting - undertaken, amid threats and menacing, at considerable personal risk." (Los Angeles Times)
It all started as an online prescription drug network, supplying hundreds of millions of dollars' worth of painkillers to American customers. It would not stop there. Before long, the business had turned into a sprawling multinational conglomerate engaged in almost every conceivable aspect of criminal mayhem. Yachts carrying $100 million in cocaine. Safe houses in Hong Kong filled with gold bars. Shipments of methamphetamine from North Korea. Weapons deals with Iran. Mercenary armies in Somalia. Teams of hit men in the Philippines. Encryption programs so advanced that the government could not break them.
The man behind it all, pulling the strings from a laptop in Manila, was Paul Calder Le Roux - a reclusive programmer turned criminal genius who could only exist in the networked world of the 21st century, and the kind of self-made crime boss that American law enforcement had never imagined.
For half a decade, DEA agents played a global game of cat-and-mouse with Le Roux as he left terror and chaos in his wake. Each time they came close, he would slip away. It would take relentless investigative work, and a shocking betrayal from within his organization, to catch him. And when he was finally caught, the story turned again, as Le Roux struck a deal to bring down his own organization and the people he had once employed.
Award-winning investigative journalist Evan Ratliff spent four years piecing together this intricate puzzle, chasing Le Roux's empire and his shadowy henchmen around the world, conducting hundreds of interviews, and uncovering thousands of documents. The result is a riveting, unprecedented account of a crime boss built by and for the digital age.
"A wholly engrossing story that joins the worlds of El Chapo and Edward Snowden; both disturbing and memorable." (Kirkus Reviews, starred review)Â
"With his relentless and fearless reporting, Evan Ratliff has pried open a hidden world filled with high-tech gangsters and drug kingpins and double-crossers and stone-cold hitmen. The story is as fascinating as it is terrifying, and it is one that will hold you in its grip." (David Grann, author of Killers of the Flower Moon)
Read The Mastermind Drugs Empire Murder Betrayal Audible Audio Edition Evan Ratliff Random House Audio Books
"This book has it all -- a brilliant criminal mastermind, a cast of sometimes-bumbling mercenaries, a dogged DEA agent, and a trail of blood that Ratliff follows from the Philippines to Israel to Brazil to a nondescript bureaucratic office in Minneapolis. Reads like a thriller, but it's all, unfortunately, totally true. A terrific book."
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The Mastermind Drugs Empire Murder Betrayal Audible Audio Edition Evan Ratliff Random House Audio Books Reviews :
The Mastermind Drugs Empire Murder Betrayal Audible Audio Edition Evan Ratliff Random House Audio Books Reviews
- As an investigative reporter, Evan Ratliff deftly uncovered the dark organization of Paul Le Roux, a megalomaniac driven by crackbrained grandiosity and fueled by paranoia. Le Roux had created encryption code that the NSA could not break. He leveraged his technical brilliance to exploit ambiguities in the U.S. drug laws, and he enlisted thousands of legitimate pharmacies & doctors into a complex, opaque network. They prescribed millions of doses of painkillers as a result of Le Roux’s sophisticated and relentless email spam solicitation.
Obsessed with power and greed, Le Roux used a twisted combination of financial incentives, psychological control and death threats to expand his empire into gold, illegal drugs and arms deals to rogue states. He ultimately ruled a vast empire ranging from North Korea to Somalia from his safe haven in the Philippines—where he controlled the police and judiciary.
Ratliff weaves this journey into an incredible story. Just when you think it can’t get more bizarre, it does. - I was intrigued by this non-fiction story after reading the prologue, and indeed the first few chapters are riveting. Paul Leroux is a devious mastermind who helped fuel the opioid epidemic in the US. The way in which he skirted the laws and laundered his money were genius because it was almost legal. The author makes a very good case that had Leroux continued in that vein, instead of breaking all the way bad, he would have been a celebrated billionaire.
This is a fast read, though, I read it over a weekend, and look forward to the TV documentary...some day. - This book has it all -- a brilliant criminal mastermind, a cast of sometimes-bumbling mercenaries, a dogged DEA agent, and a trail of blood that Ratliff follows from the Philippines to Israel to Brazil to a nondescript bureaucratic office in Minneapolis. Reads like a thriller, but it's all, unfortunately, totally true. A terrific book.
- This is one of THE best books I have ever read. Wonderfully written, and you just will not believe some of what you read, but it's true! I could not put this book down. Paul Le Roux is a true monster, as evil as they come. But this book. You won't regret it!
- Perhaps scholarly and determined erudition best describe this manuscript of events so connected to one man's brilliance, corruption and savagery as they evolve into years of ruthless dominion over relentless crimes from the allure of power, wealth and sex.
No, you won't find any quotes from the likes of Ben Franklin or Billy Graham in these pages. Author Evan Ratliff recounts his four years of inquiry and source materials from individuals on six continents in nearly 400 pages of events that "really happened". Events such as drug and gun running, murders for vengeance and for hire, extortion for pecuniary needs, and much more where page turning becomes another adventure into human greed and other familiar receptacles.
A sociopath is defined as one lacking conscience with attendant defective mental or emotional disturbances. Was the protagonist and central character in The Mastermind, Paul Leroux, sociopathic in his daily routines? Readers will likely consider this a rhetorical question as they absorb the sequences in these chapters.
Umbriago - I have enjoyed Evan Ratliff on the Longform podcast, so before this book came out I suggested my local library purchase it, and they did. I borrowed it immediately and read it over a weekend; engrossed enough to ignore all of my typical weekend activities. It is a bonkers story, well researched and well presented. It's good enough that I decided to buy the book to support the author, and read it again. I look forward to the film version, and whatever else Mr. Ratliff produces in the future. You should buy this book.
- Ratliiff’s fabulous reporting and accessible writing has resulted in a truth is stranger than fiction crime tale that will keep you engrossed to the very end.
- Le Roux a/k/a "The Mastermind" is basically a Bond villain, and this book unfolds like a great espionage/crime thriller. It's hard to believe this is real life, but the author obviously spent many hours researching the story to accurately capture every detail. Definitely worth a read, for fiction and nonfiction fans alike.
