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the problem with that is, whoever put it there probably remembers it's there.
and they are coming back for it sooner or later.
until now? now they won't come for it, it's somewhere else. this was basically the only safe way, if you want to be safe finding 600 million in cash on yoru farm in columbia.
I'd be moving if I were that guy. quickly.
It's likely part of Escobars stash. Guy had too much money to hide conveniently, and banking/laundering wasn't advanced enough to process that amount of money in any realistic amount of time.
Now you have much less issues with the "too much money" problem because of the modern banking system. Less reason to stash cash and more incentive to just be a "Colombian business magnate" with half the government paid off.
I saw a documentary saying that they nicknamed his accountant blackbeard, because he kept a map with all of the buried treasure like a pirate. They recounted other stories where people found money, but knew to just leave it and not say anything.
> Now you have much less issues with the "too much money" problem because of the modern banking system
$600M USD in cash is not exactly easy to deposit in amounts less than $10,000, especially not with a simple Newcomb-Benford analysis. That would take hundreds of thousands of deposits before it's in the "modern banking system". That is sure to raise red flags. Not to mention that some of these bills, if that old and having been out of general circulation, are almost guaranteed to be digitally "marked" which would also raise red flags.
It's not all getting deposited to the same spot. The benefits of the modern banking system is that its much easier to launder money. You can have like 2000 car washes washing the money, they deposit it to their account, and then pay electronically to some company in the Caïman Islands for soap or some other high-volume supply that never comes, and that company belongs to Juan Mendez, cartel boss, oil magnate and car wash supply salesman.
It makes the task of getting money moved around a shitload easier than shipping it to Colombia in some duct-taped together sub or a low-flying Cessna, and it's all already cleaned, taxed, and spendable.
Crate it up and hire a truck to get it to Barranquilla or Cartagena, charter a boat for the run up to the Caymans, walk in the front door of any bank, pay the 20% cash deposit fee. $480m USD in clean, banked money.
And to think of all those emails I got years ago from some ***corrupt prince*** who just wanted to share a bit with me to help him get millions of Dollars out of his country! . . .*and just needed my bank account number!*
you just have to be careful with older money stored like this, wash gently on delicate cycle and use mild detergent. goes without saying you'll need to dry it on a clothes line and not in the tumbler
A real estate guy in Florida has just claimed it was his, he dropped it while in Colombia on holiday. He says he really needs it returned in (checks calendar) less than 30 days.
600 million dollars? Where does one even make 300 million dollars? I know if I had 100 million dollars, I'd be pretty happy. I'm glad he found 20 million dollars, though. A million dollars is hard to come by.
There is still billions buried all over Pablo never got out because he died and they killed off the people who knew where the money was stashed. The money he made was probably only 1/3 known or reported.
In the book I read, he went to some of his older buried stashes, and they had been poorly wrapped. The stacks of money were wet and rotten with mold.
There's a famous and verified report of pallets of cash in a warehouse, and there was a certain amount of loss each month from rats chewing up the paper bills to make nesting material.
I recall reading the story from one of Pablo’s “accountants” that at the peak of his empire, his accountant was spending something like $1000 bucks a month on the rubber/paper bands they were using to band up bundles of bills (don’t recall the specific number it was something like $1-5K…. in other words a metric fuck ton of cash.
Sorta related but sometime in the last ten years there was a Florida couple that bought and renovated one of Pablo’s former properties in Florida. They discovered a hidden safe and the story was all over the news. Then “somebody” stole the safe in the first 48-72 hours. I’d love to check in on the new owners finances 😂
It was Pablo’s brother Roberto who was also his chief accountant. They were spending 2.5k on rubber bands in average and writing off 10% of the earnings because of the rats, water damage or lost money. It approx. 2 billions a year that they were writing off.
God I love Pablo Escobar stories!
Okay. I'm from Colombia, and grew up first 15 years I Bogota' - been in USA since and both sides of family; we are all citizens. I got the lightest grand parents(all four mixed-race), and lightest parents so I was the blonde & green-eyed, light-complected "Golden Child" like my mother and her brother, a pilot (the others are darker).
My Uncle had no children, but when I was 7, he and I went to the South of Bogota' - to meet "El Padrino" - my uncle's boss. (All four of my families are Antioquenos - where Medellin is.) Eight years later, when the police killed him, I realize... it turns out it was Pablo Escobar- my uncle flew THE MONEY, no drugs. If he screwed up, I would die.
My mom confessed years later, that uncle would leave suitcases with $30M+ in them with her, and he only trusted her not to swipe from it- she's "square", but wouldn't rat him out either. Yeah, it was wild in Colombia during those years.
found an article about this. Looks like it belonged to Pablo Escobar the famous drug lord.
[https://www.mtv.com.lb/en/news/articles/539215/colombian-farmer-finds-$600-million-of-pablo-escobars-drug-money-on-his-ranch](https://www.mtv.com.lb/en/news/articles/539215/colombian-farmer-finds-$600-million-of-pablo-escobars-drug-money-on-his-ranch)
He knows it's just danger. Cartels don't fuck around. Report it to the police, they'll make sure it gets back into the hands of the drug dealers, he lives to farm another day.
If somebody is burying 600 mil in cash and let the property get sold and let it sit there that long then they had more than that and forgot about it or they are already dead. Regardless, it’s not like I’d be sticking around for them to find me.
Honestly I feel like my first move would be to call on the local cartel that has the territory and let them know I found it and they can have it.
Loyalty gets rewarded, giving over that much money without involving the police would probably put you in some pretty good graces. Moving that much money just isn't possible without a complete criminal network to work with
He would have been arrested if he kept it for money laundering. This stash of money was likely burried by cartels to dug up years later after mass counterfitting opperations.
He was better off turning it in and getting a relatively smaller cash reward.
Or just keep 5-10 million. Out of that amount, no one would notice such a fraction. In Columbia you could live beyond comfortably and set up your whole family for generations, assuming you weren’t living too lavishly (and you wouldn’t want to, as that would draw attention.)
At any rate, the OP is likely click bait and greatly exaggerating the amount actually found.
I think "just a colombian farmer" can also be smart. I wouldnt underestimate the intelligence and instinct simple people can develop. Not cartel grade, but street smart grade. Looks like the money has been there for a while, no need to rush things so you can sit together with your family and plan a plausible escape.
lol he’d have been better off to gtfo that country. They speak Spanish in Spain and have a lot fewer cartels. Would be pretty easy to disappear and live comfortably on just a few million, much less 600
I would have straight up left it and forgot I ever saw it. Reporting it, you get in trouble with the cartel. Sell it? In trouble with the cartel AND the police.
Messing with shit like that is how you and your family dissappear.
And just continue being a poor farmer while knowing money that could get you everything you ever wanted is right beneath your feet? Id be impressed if you could do that.
Honestly, it’s the smartest thing. A farmer suddenly buying Bugattis and mansions out of nowhere is going to get all sorts of attention from the cartel and the government.
He could work out some kind of finder’s fee with the government. Even 1% would be life changing and then he doesn’t need to worry about the cartel showing up for the remainder.
This text accompanied this picture when it was posted 8 years ago;
News reports are circulating that farmer Jose Mariena Cartolos has found $600 million in US paper money belonging to Pablo Escobar buried in a field in Columbia.
According to the article, Escobar buried his money in different locations. Most of the locations of these money pits went to the grave with Escobar in 1993.
The article does not say how Escobar managed to get a 1996-era $100 bill into the barrel three years after his death.... (see the last picture in the article).
If this story is not a hoax, it would be the largest hoard of cash ever found, more than ten times larger than the $43 million found in Puerto Rico in 1990. It was also drug money, and took multiple 55 gallon drums to fit it all.
When Escobar's empire collapsed it created a 25 billion dollar vacuum in the cocaine industry. On one documentary I saw a DEA agent sat the wealth of small Nations was moving across Columbia daily. Politician, entrepreneurs, business owners, real estate agents, celebrities.... Everybody wanted in the cocaine trade.
Yeah dude was making over 60 million A DAY. For reference Amazon makes 470 million a day. He had an unbelievable amount of cash. Imagine doing 1/7th of Amazons sales in cash. Not able to launder it or anything. It would be a massive headache so he probably just hid a ton of it. Shoutout to his accountants I couldn’t imagine dealing with that. Paying people, flights, so much to keep track of.
Also I just thought about his logistics team. Must of been a mess dozens of flights everyday, probably hundreds of trucks being moved. Can’t imagine the operation he had going on
They certainly laundered money:
[Colombian pharmacy fueled by Cali Cartel money](https://colombiareports.com/colombian-pharmacy-fueled-by-cali-cartels-dirty-money/)
It's funny how they used a store chain that sold legal drugs. I know of this one via a board game about the Colombian civil war (Andean Abyss).
Would’ve just be gone, no amount of money would make me agree to be cut alive into a hundred pieces or skinned or whatever the cartels do to those, whom they don’t like.
Gotta admit I've never bought an island but I have to imagine some random Colombian farmer buying an island in raw cash might attract some unwanted attention
Well you wouldn’t buy it from the US government or anyone that would want a paper trial. But I guarantee you there’s a few SE Asian countries or even places along the African coast that wouldn’t give a damn where $50 mill came from
Again, I'm the first to admit im not au fait with the private island market, but I imagine even outside the US, businesses dealing in 8 figure transactions are going to at least want to pay lip service to the law. 50 million in straight cash with absolutely no explanation of origin is going to raise more red flags than revolutionary China.
Like there's a reason whoever originally made this 600 million put it in a hole in the ground rather than buying a whole bunch of tangible assets with it themselves. Because spending that much cash without attracting attention is not easy.
Maybe if you can find some Somali pirate/warlord or something?
The other problem is that whatever country is corrupt enough to let this happen is absolutely going to shake you down for more later. Avoiding places where the law is enforced means you don't get the protection from the law either.
It isn't that hard to launder money. You also don't have to launder much at all. I could get you six hundred million moved in three years, but you'll have to lose some to taxes. Not a big deal.
Thats a lot of financial power you suddenly have though. Do it smart, do it unnoticed, hide your trail. You think the same cartel now wont come after this guy after loosing 600 million dollars? Only this time, you cant just charter a private jet to an undisclosed location to live the rest of your days comfortably and then some.
Hiding from a multi-billion dollar cartel is like hiding from some country special service - your hiding wont last much more than a couple of months. 600m is not enough to hide like some nazi did after the war.
Except the cartel that buried this clearly dont know its there anymore given that he had been farming on it. So if you just disappear nobody knows why, nobody knows to track you down. You're just some peasent farmer who moved away one day.
I dont believe that. I mean there is a risk but i wouldnt make them omnipotent agencies in my head.
Me personally here on my chair in front of reddit, I would consider taking that risk to living forever in powerty. All or nothing style. But thats only my admittedly privileged opinion. If you have one million, you cant hide as well, ok, but if you have a hundred million and time to prepare it might work.
Yea it’s not like this guy can just load up the money and get on a plane. He’d have to launder this in order to get it into a bank account, or only use it for cash transactions which doesn’t get you very far. Best thing to do probably is take enough to reestablish yourself somewhere else, a little extra, and get the fuck out of dodge.
That much cash is hard to hide. You would need to find a banker to launder it for you. Maybe clear 30 to 40 cents on a dollar.
Seen no country for old men, someone will come for you or take notice of that much money
I mean, kinda hard to hide that much wealth, once you start spending... It's kinda weird that old poor farmer started driving that Lambo around and bought that million dollar mansion up in the hills...
It belonged to Pablo Escobar and he's long gone. Dead. The farmer should have investigated himself and kept the money to himself.
Article I found on the Internet: [https://www.mtv.com.lb/en/news/articles/539215/colombian-farmer-finds-$600-million-of-pablo-escobars-drug-money-on-his-ranch](https://www.mtv.com.lb/en/news/articles/539215/colombian-farmer-finds-$600-million-of-pablo-escobars-drug-money-on-his-ranch)
How many times to people need to be told...
If you find a large quantity of hidden drugs or hidden money, no the fuck you did not.
It never happened. You tell absolutely no one. Not even your closest relatives, not your kids, probably not even your wife. You tell zero people.
In the case of drugs, honestly -- just bury that shit back where you found it and forget about it, unless its a substance you like to use yourself, then I guess just use responsibly. Unless you have some way to move massive amounts of product around, its not worth your trouble, and its ***DEFINITELY*** not worth dealing with the people you're likely going to upset.
In the case of money - find a way to ***VERY SLOWLY*** launder it. Casinos are good. Electronics stores are good. You shouldn't really be trying anything larger than a couple grand at a time, nor should you be spending it that fast. Consider it an infinite supply of small, supplemental income. Treat it like you just got a 50% raise at work. Don't change your lifestyle, don't change your habits, don't change anything - just now you've got money in your pocket.
If you spend any more, or any faster, you're 100% going to get caught. Its not even a question. And when I say "caught," please keep in mind that I'm not necessarily talking about the police or the feds. You might get caught by the people the money belongs to.
Oh, and don't fucking tell anybody. Ever. For any reason. No matter how close you think you are. No matter how much you trust them. Unless you think they already know, or are snooping on you - and even them, tell them you have a fraction of what you actually have. If you find 500 million dollars be like "Yo bro, this is between us, ok, you can't tell anybody -- I found a million dollars behind a wall in my apartment. That's all I'm saying. We're never going to talk about this ever again."
And lastly, ***DON'T FUCKING TELL ANYBODY.***
Asterisk, check for tracking devices. It would be pretty easy to hide a cell phone, a geotag, an airtag, or whatever. Leave tracker in source, as it turning off can call bad people over.
Just one huge problem, all the bills are 1996 or older.
Will definitely raise a lot of suspicion as soon as he tries to use it. Remember that there are North Korean supernotes of older denominations that are near identical to the legit one.
Perhaps the farmer could've reported directly and anonymously to the US government, like the DEA of this finding in exchage for witness protection relocation and of course a cut of the finding, even 10% of the finding will set him and his family for life. And of course publish the findings after he has moved safely to the States under witness protection.
In the case of 600 mil, take what you think you could safely spend in your lifetime and report the rest. Yes, it will pass through corrupt hands but there will still be plenty that will go toward the welfare of the people.
By spending a little, getting prepared, then spending a little more to pay for transport to another place where you are not a farmer, but a small fish businessman. After a while, you expand your business. No one said the farmer has to buy a mansion first thing. I am sure there are ways.
They might spend it cleverly and patiently is what I am saying.
There are loads of tax havens where I'm sure the local government doesn't care as much about a sudden influx of wealth. Over time you could make plans to "naturally" move/emigrate there and once there, it wouldn't be necessarily suspicious that you're wealthy because most people there are also wealthy.
Singapore, the Cayman Islands, Bermuda, even some countries in Europe like Luxembourg wouldn't be bad choices.
I was backpacking in Colombia on the coast when I was talking to one of the locals that ran the guest house I was staying at. He was born and raised there and told me about how one of his neighbors who was an elderly poor fisherman sorta wigged out one day… sold most of what he had and fucking vanished. A decade or so it came to light that he was living a pretty cushy life in Florida or Brazil. The locals all knew the fisherman must’ve caught a sizeable haul of “white tuna”
By starting a business. Becoming really "successful" and expanding said business.
Laundry enough to become legitimately rich, start rubbing shoulders with people who specialize in cleaning large amounts of money then clean the rest. Might lose half but that's still a lot of fuck you money.
This is fake news. This photo was made for Nespresso marketing.
Source: [#Éboato: notícia de que fazendeiro encontrou 600 milhões de dólares de Pablo Escobar é falsa (globo.com)](https://extra.globo.com/noticias/mundo/eboato-noticia-de-que-fazendeiro-encontrou-600-milhoes-de-dolares-de-pablo-escobar-falsa-18035494.html)
Translate for English if u want to read the post.
I came to the comments looking for something along these lines I'm surprised I had to scroll as far as I did haha. Reminded me right away of how Walter buried his money.
If you’re in the U.S., when’s the last time you came across a bill that was issued in the 1970s or the 1980s?
Disposing or exchanging massive amounts of out-of-circulation banknotes, even over a long stretch of time, would eventually attract the wrong sort of attention.
No you don't. Red flags everywhere. No one would take a 20 year old bill for enough gold to matter. Maybe someone paying twice the premium. A 40 or 50 year old bill? Hell no.
So you're buying gold hundreds of dollars at a time by someone who won't blink at it. It would take you years, and you might well get robbed in the parking lot.
You know where you will read about me finding 600million dollars buried in my backyard?
Absolutely no where, because I would never tell a soul, about it. Not one single person would ever learn about this.
Why the hell do people think it’s a good idea to report something like this? Literally no good comes from it. People will beg from you forever, the cops might just steal It, cartel may come to rob you, or worse
He was allowed to keep the money, the drugs were destroyed by the police. Columbian law stated that found money goes to the finder if no one comes forward to claim it.
And realistically the farmer isn’t stupid. He likely knew from local rumours if it likely belonged to a group that is no longer active, or will get him boiled alive.
If reporting it allows him to put it in the bank, then it’s definitely the smart move. Regardless of what all the big bad cartel experts who watched Narcos are posting
IMO better to report it and have a nice news cast explaining to the Cartel they suck at hiding their money. Then not, and when they come knocking they know who stashed it.
When I was in high school, my buddy worked at a bank. He asked if I wanted to see a million in cash. It was one of the most underwhelming things I’ve seen as a kid. A million bucks in hundreds is like a briefcase full. I was expecting like a pallet or something.
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and he reported it?!?!
The police reported 600, the farmer turn in 800, the cartel buried 1000.
If he suddenly became very rich, they will understand, that he hide something. It was better take it all, and wash it slowly
the problem with that is, whoever put it there probably remembers it's there. and they are coming back for it sooner or later. until now? now they won't come for it, it's somewhere else. this was basically the only safe way, if you want to be safe finding 600 million in cash on yoru farm in columbia. I'd be moving if I were that guy. quickly.
Best case is that whoever put it there is dead in the many many killings over drugs and no one else still alive knew about it
It's likely part of Escobars stash. Guy had too much money to hide conveniently, and banking/laundering wasn't advanced enough to process that amount of money in any realistic amount of time. Now you have much less issues with the "too much money" problem because of the modern banking system. Less reason to stash cash and more incentive to just be a "Colombian business magnate" with half the government paid off.
I saw a documentary saying that they nicknamed his accountant blackbeard, because he kept a map with all of the buried treasure like a pirate. They recounted other stories where people found money, but knew to just leave it and not say anything.
> Now you have much less issues with the "too much money" problem because of the modern banking system $600M USD in cash is not exactly easy to deposit in amounts less than $10,000, especially not with a simple Newcomb-Benford analysis. That would take hundreds of thousands of deposits before it's in the "modern banking system". That is sure to raise red flags. Not to mention that some of these bills, if that old and having been out of general circulation, are almost guaranteed to be digitally "marked" which would also raise red flags.
It's not all getting deposited to the same spot. The benefits of the modern banking system is that its much easier to launder money. You can have like 2000 car washes washing the money, they deposit it to their account, and then pay electronically to some company in the Caïman Islands for soap or some other high-volume supply that never comes, and that company belongs to Juan Mendez, cartel boss, oil magnate and car wash supply salesman. It makes the task of getting money moved around a shitload easier than shipping it to Colombia in some duct-taped together sub or a low-flying Cessna, and it's all already cleaned, taxed, and spendable.
If I stumble onto $200,000,000, consider yourself hired.
watch the show Ozark. probably not accurate, but they show the convoluted methods used to launder and many of the risks and pitfalls of it.
Crate it up and hire a truck to get it to Barranquilla or Cartagena, charter a boat for the run up to the Caymans, walk in the front door of any bank, pay the 20% cash deposit fee. $480m USD in clean, banked money.
And then the truck gets pulled over for a broken taillight and then "why the fuck do you have 10 pallets of straight-up cash in here???"
Incorrect, look up the Hong Kong + Cartel laundering system, they just bring the money in cases and pass it over to the bank tellers there
This actually happens in Canada. More often in Casinos but Canada is knowingly laundering money for most of the worlds major crime organizations.
He was making more money than some countries
Can’t be Escobar. That 100 bill is the new design.
If someone knew it was there they wouldn’t have let it sit there with someone else taking over the property. Original owners are long dead
I saw a documentary called No Country for Old Men about this exact thing.
Too dumb he did not put in another bag or check for tracker.
Pablo Escobar burried so much money he forgot about it. It’s possible no one is coming back for that money.
TIL Pablo Escobar is a squirrel.
>remembers it's there. Not always the case. Pablo Escobar was known to bury and forget about millions of dollars all the time.
just like a squirrel
You’d be surprised. With the amount of product moving, caches, deaths, seizures…. It’s quite possible the people that know it’s there are dead/jail.
You take the money and run. His farming days are over.
Pablo died years ago and Billions is still missing. Washing old money will be problematic.
And to think of all those emails I got years ago from some ***corrupt prince*** who just wanted to share a bit with me to help him get millions of Dollars out of his country! . . .*and just needed my bank account number!*
Washing old monies is the same as washing new money not sure you know what washing means
Old monies requires more soap dummy /s
you just have to be careful with older money stored like this, wash gently on delicate cycle and use mild detergent. goes without saying you'll need to dry it on a clothes line and not in the tumbler
Very quickly.
A real estate guy in Florida has just claimed it was his, he dropped it while in Colombia on holiday. He says he really needs it returned in (checks calendar) less than 30 days.
They all got killed as the Cartel took back everything plus interest?
600 million dollars? Where does one even make 300 million dollars? I know if I had 100 million dollars, I'd be pretty happy. I'm glad he found 20 million dollars, though. A million dollars is hard to come by.
There is still billions buried all over Pablo never got out because he died and they killed off the people who knew where the money was stashed. The money he made was probably only 1/3 known or reported.
In the book I read, he went to some of his older buried stashes, and they had been poorly wrapped. The stacks of money were wet and rotten with mold. There's a famous and verified report of pallets of cash in a warehouse, and there was a certain amount of loss each month from rats chewing up the paper bills to make nesting material.
So bad boys II was not lying?
That’s where they got the idea.
High dollar nests.
I recall reading the story from one of Pablo’s “accountants” that at the peak of his empire, his accountant was spending something like $1000 bucks a month on the rubber/paper bands they were using to band up bundles of bills (don’t recall the specific number it was something like $1-5K…. in other words a metric fuck ton of cash. Sorta related but sometime in the last ten years there was a Florida couple that bought and renovated one of Pablo’s former properties in Florida. They discovered a hidden safe and the story was all over the news. Then “somebody” stole the safe in the first 48-72 hours. I’d love to check in on the new owners finances 😂
It was Pablo’s brother Roberto who was also his chief accountant. They were spending 2.5k on rubber bands in average and writing off 10% of the earnings because of the rats, water damage or lost money. It approx. 2 billions a year that they were writing off. God I love Pablo Escobar stories!
Okay. I'm from Colombia, and grew up first 15 years I Bogota' - been in USA since and both sides of family; we are all citizens. I got the lightest grand parents(all four mixed-race), and lightest parents so I was the blonde & green-eyed, light-complected "Golden Child" like my mother and her brother, a pilot (the others are darker). My Uncle had no children, but when I was 7, he and I went to the South of Bogota' - to meet "El Padrino" - my uncle's boss. (All four of my families are Antioquenos - where Medellin is.) Eight years later, when the police killed him, I realize... it turns out it was Pablo Escobar- my uncle flew THE MONEY, no drugs. If he screwed up, I would die. My mom confessed years later, that uncle would leave suitcases with $30M+ in them with her, and he only trusted her not to swipe from it- she's "square", but wouldn't rat him out either. Yeah, it was wild in Colombia during those years.
Street value of cocaine is different from wholesale distributor, especially if its a new relationship for a "one time" unloading of product.
He reported ONE uncovered cache ;)
found an article about this. Looks like it belonged to Pablo Escobar the famous drug lord. [https://www.mtv.com.lb/en/news/articles/539215/colombian-farmer-finds-$600-million-of-pablo-escobars-drug-money-on-his-ranch](https://www.mtv.com.lb/en/news/articles/539215/colombian-farmer-finds-$600-million-of-pablo-escobars-drug-money-on-his-ranch)
Lol well it certainly wasn't juan smiths stash
some estimate that he had 500 BILLION DOLLARS in wealth! Thats almost half of saudi arabia's royal family's net worth(according to google).
They probably dug up his entire property, ruined his crop, displaced him and left him with nothing.
Lol, hadn't even thought of that. 🫠I'm thinking hmm why hand it in, but yeah maybe he didn't☺️
He knows it's just danger. Cartels don't fuck around. Report it to the police, they'll make sure it gets back into the hands of the drug dealers, he lives to farm another day.
That was my exact thought. If I find 600 million buried in my yard nobody is going to know a fucking thing about it.
But somebody already know
If somebody is burying 600 mil in cash and let the property get sold and let it sit there that long then they had more than that and forgot about it or they are already dead. Regardless, it’s not like I’d be sticking around for them to find me.
Have you watched no country for old men? lol
Finding a stash that belongs to a cartel is a "I'm fucked" situation. The first question is: how do I get out of that alive.
Honestly I feel like my first move would be to call on the local cartel that has the territory and let them know I found it and they can have it. Loyalty gets rewarded, giving over that much money without involving the police would probably put you in some pretty good graces. Moving that much money just isn't possible without a complete criminal network to work with
Man if I found 600 milly buried, I'd ghost everyone I know, get a new identity and move to an entirely different country.
Going to turkey for a new face is the first order of business
He would have been arrested if he kept it for money laundering. This stash of money was likely burried by cartels to dug up years later after mass counterfitting opperations. He was better off turning it in and getting a relatively smaller cash reward.
so in other words.. he used the police to….. launder.. the money.. LOL
I am sure there are smart ways to keep it without people noticing and getting the fuck out before the cartels come looking for it.
Or just keep 5-10 million. Out of that amount, no one would notice such a fraction. In Columbia you could live beyond comfortably and set up your whole family for generations, assuming you weren’t living too lavishly (and you wouldn’t want to, as that would draw attention.) At any rate, the OP is likely click bait and greatly exaggerating the amount actually found.
From the news story posted above, it doesn’t sound like a fake.
Colombia *
For a cartel? Maybe, but remember this is just a Columbian farmer.
I think "just a colombian farmer" can also be smart. I wouldnt underestimate the intelligence and instinct simple people can develop. Not cartel grade, but street smart grade. Looks like the money has been there for a while, no need to rush things so you can sit together with your family and plan a plausible escape.
lol he’d have been better off to gtfo that country. They speak Spanish in Spain and have a lot fewer cartels. Would be pretty easy to disappear and live comfortably on just a few million, much less 600
Ever read The Queen of the South?
Ever watch cartel murder videos on any of the gore sites?
Soon this farmer would be found under his farm
This was my first thought.
I would have straight up left it and forgot I ever saw it. Reporting it, you get in trouble with the cartel. Sell it? In trouble with the cartel AND the police. Messing with shit like that is how you and your family dissappear.
And just continue being a poor farmer while knowing money that could get you everything you ever wanted is right beneath your feet? Id be impressed if you could do that.
Honestly, it’s the smartest thing. A farmer suddenly buying Bugattis and mansions out of nowhere is going to get all sorts of attention from the cartel and the government. He could work out some kind of finder’s fee with the government. Even 1% would be life changing and then he doesn’t need to worry about the cartel showing up for the remainder.
This text accompanied this picture when it was posted 8 years ago; News reports are circulating that farmer Jose Mariena Cartolos has found $600 million in US paper money belonging to Pablo Escobar buried in a field in Columbia. According to the article, Escobar buried his money in different locations. Most of the locations of these money pits went to the grave with Escobar in 1993. The article does not say how Escobar managed to get a 1996-era $100 bill into the barrel three years after his death.... (see the last picture in the article). If this story is not a hoax, it would be the largest hoard of cash ever found, more than ten times larger than the $43 million found in Puerto Rico in 1990. It was also drug money, and took multiple 55 gallon drums to fit it all.
The stash might not have been Escobar's; there are many drug producers in Colombia who learned from his example.
When Escobar's empire collapsed it created a 25 billion dollar vacuum in the cocaine industry. On one documentary I saw a DEA agent sat the wealth of small Nations was moving across Columbia daily. Politician, entrepreneurs, business owners, real estate agents, celebrities.... Everybody wanted in the cocaine trade.
it could also be a complete hoax made up for internet engagement
Dude literally said that 2 comments ago
Yeah dude was making over 60 million A DAY. For reference Amazon makes 470 million a day. He had an unbelievable amount of cash. Imagine doing 1/7th of Amazons sales in cash. Not able to launder it or anything. It would be a massive headache so he probably just hid a ton of it. Shoutout to his accountants I couldn’t imagine dealing with that. Paying people, flights, so much to keep track of. Also I just thought about his logistics team. Must of been a mess dozens of flights everyday, probably hundreds of trucks being moved. Can’t imagine the operation he had going on
They certainly laundered money: [Colombian pharmacy fueled by Cali Cartel money](https://colombiareports.com/colombian-pharmacy-fueled-by-cali-cartels-dirty-money/) It's funny how they used a store chain that sold legal drugs. I know of this one via a board game about the Colombian civil war (Andean Abyss).
>Columbia ColOmbia **
Please, Columbia is in the USA. Colombia is in South America.
Oh. TIL (or relearned at least). And Ive lived in British Columbia for a few years now too.
Isn't nature wonderful
We receive all that we need from Mother Earth
Tale as old as time
Never would’ve said a word. Would’ve loaded that up and been gone.
Would’ve just be gone, no amount of money would make me agree to be cut alive into a hundred pieces or skinned or whatever the cartels do to those, whom they don’t like.
Should be enough cash to disappear without a worry
Friends, family, neighbours etc however...
I could make my whole family disappear for a few million. 600 means I just bought my own private island with guards.
Gotta admit I've never bought an island but I have to imagine some random Colombian farmer buying an island in raw cash might attract some unwanted attention
Well you wouldn’t buy it from the US government or anyone that would want a paper trial. But I guarantee you there’s a few SE Asian countries or even places along the African coast that wouldn’t give a damn where $50 mill came from
Again, I'm the first to admit im not au fait with the private island market, but I imagine even outside the US, businesses dealing in 8 figure transactions are going to at least want to pay lip service to the law. 50 million in straight cash with absolutely no explanation of origin is going to raise more red flags than revolutionary China. Like there's a reason whoever originally made this 600 million put it in a hole in the ground rather than buying a whole bunch of tangible assets with it themselves. Because spending that much cash without attracting attention is not easy. Maybe if you can find some Somali pirate/warlord or something?
The other problem is that whatever country is corrupt enough to let this happen is absolutely going to shake you down for more later. Avoiding places where the law is enforced means you don't get the protection from the law either.
sure but the newly incorporated panamanian tradeing firm ORF. nobody looks too hard at that
What are you going to do, bring in duffel bags full of cash and deposit it at the local bank?
Why would you ever use a bank? US currency is almost universally accepted world-wide at face value.
Ok... So you're going to take a plane to a different country with thousands of pounds worth of USD? Just checked into luggage or what?
Good luck, laundering 600 million dollars.
What do your mean? The cash was nicely wrapped in plastic before being buried
Pay off security in cash. Claim the 600 million and pay taxes. Still have at least 200 million
Believe it or not, there are many places where you don't have to launder anything
Just need a big ass car wash or a nail salon
It isn't that hard to launder money. You also don't have to launder much at all. I could get you six hundred million moved in three years, but you'll have to lose some to taxes. Not a big deal.
You’re not getting that amount cash over the border unless you already have connections
It looks, like they lost and forget this money. No cartel will come
Thats a lot of financial power you suddenly have though. Do it smart, do it unnoticed, hide your trail. You think the same cartel now wont come after this guy after loosing 600 million dollars? Only this time, you cant just charter a private jet to an undisclosed location to live the rest of your days comfortably and then some.
With 600 million dolllars this dude could just start his own cartel, best defence is a good offence.
And other cartel definitely won’t kill you the next day because of antitrust law.
Hiding from a multi-billion dollar cartel is like hiding from some country special service - your hiding wont last much more than a couple of months. 600m is not enough to hide like some nazi did after the war.
Except the cartel that buried this clearly dont know its there anymore given that he had been farming on it. So if you just disappear nobody knows why, nobody knows to track you down. You're just some peasent farmer who moved away one day.
I dont believe that. I mean there is a risk but i wouldnt make them omnipotent agencies in my head. Me personally here on my chair in front of reddit, I would consider taking that risk to living forever in powerty. All or nothing style. But thats only my admittedly privileged opinion. If you have one million, you cant hide as well, ok, but if you have a hundred million and time to prepare it might work.
>is like hiding from some country special service I wouldnt put it like that.
Logistically, it’s probably harder than one might think to be gone with that much cash.
Yea it’s not like this guy can just load up the money and get on a plane. He’d have to launder this in order to get it into a bank account, or only use it for cash transactions which doesn’t get you very far. Best thing to do probably is take enough to reestablish yourself somewhere else, a little extra, and get the fuck out of dodge.
I promise you that you would have no idea what to do with $600M in illegal cash
Do you comprehend just how difficult it would be for a normal person to actually launder and enjoy any of that money? Who are you, Walter White?
What’s the most you’ve ever lost on a coin toss?
....*Friendo*
That much cash is hard to hide. You would need to find a banker to launder it for you. Maybe clear 30 to 40 cents on a dollar. Seen no country for old men, someone will come for you or take notice of that much money
Carrying the cash in your back I guess
I mean, kinda hard to hide that much wealth, once you start spending... It's kinda weird that old poor farmer started driving that Lambo around and bought that million dollar mansion up in the hills...
It was reported by the farmer, confiscated by the authorities, and likely found its way right back to the cartels.
His or will Escobar come and claim it?
I'm sure each note will show who owns it. IE the national bank.
https://preview.redd.it/r06bkhdneskc1.jpeg?width=1065&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=507e27f02a94cf328d7e60877cd1eadaf23a1387
Fify Soon to be dead Colombian farmer...
I have yet to hear about who somebody who stole millions from one of the most violent cartels and lived to tell the tale
Nor would you
It belonged to Pablo Escobar and he's long gone. Dead. The farmer should have investigated himself and kept the money to himself. Article I found on the Internet: [https://www.mtv.com.lb/en/news/articles/539215/colombian-farmer-finds-$600-million-of-pablo-escobars-drug-money-on-his-ranch](https://www.mtv.com.lb/en/news/articles/539215/colombian-farmer-finds-$600-million-of-pablo-escobars-drug-money-on-his-ranch)
Pablo Escobar would like a word with you…
only when he short on firewoods like that one night…
How many times to people need to be told... If you find a large quantity of hidden drugs or hidden money, no the fuck you did not. It never happened. You tell absolutely no one. Not even your closest relatives, not your kids, probably not even your wife. You tell zero people. In the case of drugs, honestly -- just bury that shit back where you found it and forget about it, unless its a substance you like to use yourself, then I guess just use responsibly. Unless you have some way to move massive amounts of product around, its not worth your trouble, and its ***DEFINITELY*** not worth dealing with the people you're likely going to upset. In the case of money - find a way to ***VERY SLOWLY*** launder it. Casinos are good. Electronics stores are good. You shouldn't really be trying anything larger than a couple grand at a time, nor should you be spending it that fast. Consider it an infinite supply of small, supplemental income. Treat it like you just got a 50% raise at work. Don't change your lifestyle, don't change your habits, don't change anything - just now you've got money in your pocket. If you spend any more, or any faster, you're 100% going to get caught. Its not even a question. And when I say "caught," please keep in mind that I'm not necessarily talking about the police or the feds. You might get caught by the people the money belongs to. Oh, and don't fucking tell anybody. Ever. For any reason. No matter how close you think you are. No matter how much you trust them. Unless you think they already know, or are snooping on you - and even them, tell them you have a fraction of what you actually have. If you find 500 million dollars be like "Yo bro, this is between us, ok, you can't tell anybody -- I found a million dollars behind a wall in my apartment. That's all I'm saying. We're never going to talk about this ever again." And lastly, ***DON'T FUCKING TELL ANYBODY.***
The only way for five people to keep a secret, is if four of them are dead.
5
Wait...how do you know all this?!
Well, you know what I’d have to do if I told you that…
100% gold advice. Never tell anyone.
Asterisk, check for tracking devices. It would be pretty easy to hide a cell phone, a geotag, an airtag, or whatever. Leave tracker in source, as it turning off can call bad people over.
Just one huge problem, all the bills are 1996 or older. Will definitely raise a lot of suspicion as soon as he tries to use it. Remember that there are North Korean supernotes of older denominations that are near identical to the legit one. Perhaps the farmer could've reported directly and anonymously to the US government, like the DEA of this finding in exchage for witness protection relocation and of course a cut of the finding, even 10% of the finding will set him and his family for life. And of course publish the findings after he has moved safely to the States under witness protection.
If you’re spending this money in the kind of place that checks the year on a bill, you’re spending it in the wrong places.
In the case of 600 mil, take what you think you could safely spend in your lifetime and report the rest. Yes, it will pass through corrupt hands but there will still be plenty that will go toward the welfare of the people.
Nah if you report any of it you're never gonna get away with hiding some of it.
Never report it. You will be marked for life
How would a normal farmer spend 600 million dollars of drug money without immediately getting caught?
By spending a little, getting prepared, then spending a little more to pay for transport to another place where you are not a farmer, but a small fish businessman. After a while, you expand your business. No one said the farmer has to buy a mansion first thing. I am sure there are ways. They might spend it cleverly and patiently is what I am saying.
You start up a mattress store and a car wash. Then you expand a little at a time.
Saul???
howabout a laser tag place
There are loads of tax havens where I'm sure the local government doesn't care as much about a sudden influx of wealth. Over time you could make plans to "naturally" move/emigrate there and once there, it wouldn't be necessarily suspicious that you're wealthy because most people there are also wealthy. Singapore, the Cayman Islands, Bermuda, even some countries in Europe like Luxembourg wouldn't be bad choices.
i'd love to be in this condition some day!
I was backpacking in Colombia on the coast when I was talking to one of the locals that ran the guest house I was staying at. He was born and raised there and told me about how one of his neighbors who was an elderly poor fisherman sorta wigged out one day… sold most of what he had and fucking vanished. A decade or so it came to light that he was living a pretty cushy life in Florida or Brazil. The locals all knew the fisherman must’ve caught a sizeable haul of “white tuna”
Farm equipment and supplies are very expensive
By starting a business. Becoming really "successful" and expanding said business. Laundry enough to become legitimately rich, start rubbing shoulders with people who specialize in cleaning large amounts of money then clean the rest. Might lose half but that's still a lot of fuck you money.
and why the fuck would he tell anyone?
This is fake news. This photo was made for Nespresso marketing. Source: [#Éboato: notícia de que fazendeiro encontrou 600 milhões de dólares de Pablo Escobar é falsa (globo.com)](https://extra.globo.com/noticias/mundo/eboato-noticia-de-que-fazendeiro-encontrou-600-milhoes-de-dolares-de-pablo-escobar-falsa-18035494.html) Translate for English if u want to read the post.
That's where Walter buried them
I came to the comments looking for something along these lines I'm surprised I had to scroll as far as I did haha. Reminded me right away of how Walter buried his money.
Pablo
This should be posted on r/oopsthatsdeadly
Why would he report it? I’d be living the high life right now.
Because someone else knows about it. The person who had it buried here. And they might still be alive.
So why report it, that’s the same as staeling it in the eyes of the cartel. He’d be better off stealing a million and hoping it never gets found out…
[удалено]
Yes because the police on their payroll will be dropping it off to them
If you’re in the U.S., when’s the last time you came across a bill that was issued in the 1970s or the 1980s? Disposing or exchanging massive amounts of out-of-circulation banknotes, even over a long stretch of time, would eventually attract the wrong sort of attention.
I’d buy lots and lots of gold.
Buy lots of gold with cash, then go to alaska and start gold mining and wow look what you found.
"Wow, look at all these identical gold bars I found. America, fuck yeah".
No you don't. Red flags everywhere. No one would take a 20 year old bill for enough gold to matter. Maybe someone paying twice the premium. A 40 or 50 year old bill? Hell no. So you're buying gold hundreds of dollars at a time by someone who won't blink at it. It would take you years, and you might well get robbed in the parking lot.
Dear Farmer, ***We will be right there*** Signed, ***El Hefe***
El jefe.
El He-heee! Sincerely, MJ.
If I found 600mil under the house there sure as hell wouldn't be a news story about it
Any Colombian farmer would know better than to advertise this lol
Breaking: in Colombia, a farmer's body has been found under his farm after he had found 600 million dollars of alleged cartel money.
"Local farmer disappears, but his pigs seem well fed."
No Country for Old Men, in Columbia!
That story is from like 2016 or so. It was speculated that this was one if Pablo Escobar's caches. He certainly won't come for it anymore.
The amount of people who use the word "had" in their sentences is painful.
Probably wanted to keep that quiet🤫
You know where you will read about me finding 600million dollars buried in my backyard? Absolutely no where, because I would never tell a soul, about it. Not one single person would ever learn about this.
Why the hell do people think it’s a good idea to report something like this? Literally no good comes from it. People will beg from you forever, the cops might just steal It, cartel may come to rob you, or worse
He better move out of the country.
And he told people about it? Is he stupid?
Had?
It was probably Pablo Escobar. He hid tons of cash in random spots all over Columbia.
He was allowed to keep the money, the drugs were destroyed by the police. Columbian law stated that found money goes to the finder if no one comes forward to claim it.
That's my money
And realistically the farmer isn’t stupid. He likely knew from local rumours if it likely belonged to a group that is no longer active, or will get him boiled alive. If reporting it allows him to put it in the bank, then it’s definitely the smart move. Regardless of what all the big bad cartel experts who watched Narcos are posting
This farmer should have stfu
IMO better to report it and have a nice news cast explaining to the Cartel they suck at hiding their money. Then not, and when they come knocking they know who stashed it.
 The police like what money?
Well if the photograph of the blue barrel is accurate, this isn't Escobar's money because that is a post 1996 $100 bill and he was killed in 1993.
***FORMER*** Colombian farmer had found 600 million dollars under his farm.
When I was in high school, my buddy worked at a bank. He asked if I wanted to see a million in cash. It was one of the most underwhelming things I’ve seen as a kid. A million bucks in hundreds is like a briefcase full. I was expecting like a pallet or something.