₦airaland Forum

Tirso ‘TJ’ Dominguez says Escobar paid him $20m monthly to fly planeloads of coke

A man who eventually became Pablo Escobar’s go-to cocaine pilot has revealed that he first turned down an employment offer from the notorious Colombian drug lord because he was content with the $4m a month he was earning while flying for a competitor.

But, in a new podcast containing what is believed to be his first interview since authorities arrested him at his Florida mansion in 1988, Tirso “TJ” Dominguez recounted how he changed his mind about working for Escobar when the so-called Patrón – or boss – offered him a salary that was five times higher: $20m monthly.

I had 30 Lamborghinis, and I dressed well, Dominguez says of his ensuing lifestyle during the eight-part documentary podcast titled Cocaine Air, a copy of which was provided to the Guardian. They brought me the car that matched the shirt that I decided to wear that day.

The interview that Dominguez granted the Cocaine Air host Johnathan Walton after spending more than a dozen years in prison for drug trafficking and money laundering provides a stark, first-hand account of what would motivate someone to work for one of the world’s most infamous criminals. Escobar had a hand in murders, kidnappings and bombings before Colombia’s special forces shot him to death in 1993.

As he told it to Walton, Dominguez only became involved in drug smuggling in the late 1970s after his father, a south Florida real estate developer, unexpectedly died from cancer in the middle of building a sugar mill in Haiti.

Dominguez says he was 20 at the time, and he was subsequently scammed out of $100,000 by two ruthless Miami bankers who refused to give him the $14m loan his father had secured before dying. Desperate to raise capital for the sugar mill, Dominguez – whose mother was a homemaker – learned to fly airplanes so he could earn some money from drug dealers by illicitly smuggling marijuana into the US from the Bahamas and Colombia.

He says he graduated to illegally flying cocaine over American skies after he dropped $800,000 worth of marijuana into the wrong smuggling boat, prompting his suppliers to kidnap him and threaten to kill him along with his family if he did not quickly make them whole. The quickest path to regaining the lost investment was to fly a planeload of coke to be dealt on behalf of another supplier, so Dominguez did it, according to his account.

I never wanted to get into cocaine because cocaine [smugglers] were the bad guys … doing all the killing, Dominguez says on Walton’s podcast, which is unrelated to an upcoming Netflix documentary of the same name but on a different subject. I don’t condone drugs. I’ve never done any drugs. I was the victim of a con which actually pushed me in the direction that I ended up in.

Nonetheless, that first flight brought Dominguez a cool $1m to pay back his irate weed suppliers, he says. He says that was lucrative enough for him to decide to begin flying smuggled cocaine full-time, proving himself to be someone who was punctual as well as professional – and he never lost a shipment.

Dominguez said his reliability ultimately captured the attention of Escobar, who tried to recruit him to his cartel. Yet Dominguez, also nicknamed Tito, initially was unmoved, saying he was fine with four flights a month at $1m a pop.

I’ll be honest with you – Pablo Escobar didn’t mean anything to me, Dominguez says on Cocaine Air. I [was] full of myself. I walk on water, you know? I’m making $4m a month. What the hell’s wrong with that?

Escobar then offered to pay Dominguez for four flights a month at $5m a trip. Dominguez thought $20m monthly – the equivalent of $60m today when factoring in inflation – was too much to pass up. And he says that was when he opted to begin flying for Escobar exclusively.

That fee evidently became too much even for Escobar, who later started paying Dominguez in cocaine. Dominguez at that point went from a cocaine smuggler to a dealer, meaning he could fly the product, sell it, collect the proceeds, launder the money and invest the funds – all on his own, without needing to count on middlemen.

I did what no other smuggler had ever done in the history of smuggling, Dominguez bragged to Walton, whose prior projects include the hit Queen of the Con: The Irish Heiress podcast series.

In a particularly noteworthy moment on Cocaine Air’s series opener, Dominguez reads from a memoir co-authored by Escobar’s brother – his accountant Roberto Escobar – that asserts TJ had a fleet of 30 airplanes and was one of the “main transporters” for Pablo’s drug empire.

Dominguez recalled accumulating a mansion, a company that sold cellphones at a time when the devices cost $5,000 a piece, a housing development, a charter airplane and boat business, and an exotic car dealership at the peak of his powers. He even raised a pet mountain lion whom he dubbed Top Cat.

But it all came crashing down one early morning in April 1988 when federal investigators – equipped with rifles and helicopters – descended on his house and arrested him. Prosecutors had charged him and 12 associates with illegally bringing more than five tons each of marijuana and cocaine into south Florida from at least July 1984 to December 1985, as the Miami Herald and Sun Sentinel newspapers reported.

Officials contended that Dominguez’s exotic-car dealership in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, and his other businesses in the area were fronts for a multimillion-dollar drug-smuggling ring. They seized two dozen luxury cars – Lamborghinis, Ferraris, Excaliburs and Panteras – and five airplanes collectively worth nearly $3m to auction them off, among other consequences for Dominguez.

In 1991, about two years before Escobar’s slaying, Dominguez pleaded guilty to distributing cocaine and marijuana as well as illicitly laundering money. He spent 13 years imprisoned, including two in solitary confinement after one of his fellow inmates reported Dominguez after he managed to buy a helicopter from within his cell and plotted to be flown out to freedom.

Dominguez explains on Cocaine Air that, before being caught, he had instructed the helicopter pilot to land on the grounds of the prison and then “just jump me over the fence”.

“There was a canal, not too far away – I had a car waiting for me, Dominguez says on Cocaine Air, which premiered on Wednesday with plans to release new episodes weekly through 23 July on podcast platforms such as Apple and Spotify.

Now aged 73, Dominguez told the podcast that he considers his debt to society repaid and aspires to become a legitimate entrepreneur.

Failing is when you quit, Dominguez says of his desire to write a new chapter in his life. You’re going to fall? You fall forward. That means you gained two steps already.

"The glass is always half full for me.”

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shortgun:
Can this be considered cheating?or is her husband just being insecure and acting immature?



Ewatomi Oritoke Omowumi

FreeIgboho:
I have noticed this Sentisense or whatever they call it is USELESS!!!

yinkus6750:
It's now obvious this statistics has no sense. Price of foreign rice has drastically dropped within the past few weeks. Currently sold at 58-60,000 in Ogun State. The rate was even a slight increase which is attributed to Sallah celebration.

ify2016:
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.vanguardngr.com/2025/06/breaking-highlife-maestro-mike-ejeagha-dies-at-95/amp/

Agbegbaorogboye:
Lol
So Wike turned Rivers Treasury to a bailout fund for every and anyone interested
Rivers have suffered sha
See how they are sharing people's money to settle different things
Imagine using loot to settle loot. And the settled loot will still be looted
Nigerian politicians will not die well

A man has shared the heartbreaking story of how his wife treated him badly despite all the good things he did.

According to the man, his wife has a daughter with another man, and he has been the one taking care of the girl. The man said he cared for the girl since she was a child.

In a story he shared in Proud Black Fathers, a Facebook page, the man said he even paid the girl's school fees. However, he lamented that when it was time for the girl to graduate, he was not invited to the ceremony

He wrote: I need to get something off my chest. Yesterday, my stepdaughter graduated and I wasn’t invited. I’ve been in her life since she was 4 months old. Married her mother when she turned 2. I’ve been there, consistent, showing up, providing loving her like my own. But come graduation day, I wasn’t given a seat. They told me there were only eight tickets.

According to the heartbroken man, his wife told him that there were not enough tickets for the graduation event, and so, he was left out. What was more painful for him was that his wife shared the eight tickets to her family members.

He said: Let me tell you who made the list: My wife, her two sisters, her biological dad, her uncle, her grandma, her aunt, and her boyfriend, eight tickets… and I wasn’t one of them.

As revenge, the man who said he is a truck driver said he is not going to continue taking care of the girl.

He said since she is now a graduate, she should start paying her own bills. His words: I’ve been sitting with that pain all day. I took time off work three days gone. I drive trucks. That’s money and time I can’t get back. And still, I got left out. So today, I made some decisions. I removed her from my car and health insurance. Took her off everything I’d been covering. Told her mother: since she’s grown and graduated, she can go stay with her father the one she made room for over me.

Now there’s tension in my house. Emotions are high. But I’m standing on what I feel. Because the truth is so I’m hurt. Not mad. Just deeply, genuinely hurt. I don’t need applause. I just needed to speak my truth. Thanks for listening.

sunky97:
Either you cal her Madam P or madam PHD.
Mrs Jonathan has now bagged PhD


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QuT4ZL94Vr8?si=o2NitjtrdC4qkdfG


https://punchng.com/patience-jonathan-bags-phd-urges-nigerians-to-embrace-lifelong-learning/?amp

atleast we know the school she obtained her PhD degree unlike one baba who attended a nameless school

adenigga:
…Says Tinubu laying foundation for Nigeria’s industrial base


Source: https://vanguardngr.com/Debt-burden-No-sin-in-borrowing-Presidency

Mjshexy:
You increase by #900 and reduce by #10, what's all these

seunoyeleyep:
Na meaningless reduction

Peakdesign23:
Una dey give this boy too much relevance.

SQLmastar:
She is not yet married.

I'll use my last savings to wife her before this year runs out.

OgaRico:

Story of a young man that abandoned his scholarship in Norway, just to sell drugs abroad.

Currently he is into packing waste for people in Bayelsa State, Nigeria pic.twitter.com/oTzUxARQUJ

— Port Harcourt Socials (@PH_Socials) May 27, 2025

Video Source https://www.instagram.com/reel/DKJiNRjt8XG/?igsh=MW03OWZnaTEyeXBmNA==

DiasGodinHeaven:
Where is the video

Lutherblaq:
What is This OBE?

Zonefree:
About 19 years?

Can she swear "oath of loyalty" in a strong deity? If NO, there's nothing emotional about the reunion.

RichIgboBoy:
7 of 12 from the Land of the rising sun.

Igbo amaka!!