Lisardo Capote: "For drug traffickers, life no longer has value: if they can run you over, they will"

Every year, more than 3 million containers pass through the port of Algeciras. Hundreds of thousands of trucks also pass through. The person in charge of controlling all this material is Lisardo Capote, head of the Customs Surveillance Service (SVA) in the Campo de Gibraltar. He leads the fight against drug trafficking and money laundering in southern Spain: the African coast is only 14 kilometers from the Iberian Peninsula. How is the drug trafficking issue right now?

— There were years of many seizures on a European scale, but last year there was a stagnation in all ports. Drug traffickers have changed, they have improved because for them money is not a problem, they have brutal resources. One of the evolutions, for example, has been the use of the Guadalquivir to introduce drugs. They had the infrastructure to bring hashish, a lot of semi-rigid narco-boats operating in the water, and they asked themselves ""Why don't we do the same with cocaine?" Now much of this drug has been diverted to the river before reaching the Strait of Gibraltar. A semi-rigid boat approaches the ship, they throw the drug to it or put a beacon and some floats on it, and then they collect it, and with the semi-rigid boat they head for the river. Port activity has anticipated the sea. The price of cocaine has gone down because there is more supply. It is even being exchanged for hashish to take it to South America.

For the drug trade to work, there must be complicity from dockworkers and police.

— Once you have the container at the port, the first thing you need to know is where it is and then get the drugs out. And for that you need infrastructure. You have to corrupt someone at the origin and at the destination, look for someone who will cooperate to secure an entry point for the product. A door is a port, and when they find a safe port, until we close the door with an operation, they will exploit it as much as they can. Drug traffickers don't like to lose, they don't think about the merchandise they lose, but about the millions they have stopped earning.

Does everyone have a price?

— They can catch you at a moment of weakness, you might have an illness or a child who needs an operation. But once they have you, they don't let you go. The vast majority of the staff remain upright, otherwise this would be hell, but, of course, with just one who gets corrupted...

Young people often see drug trafficking as easy money. Luxury. Good life.

— It is very difficult to recover a child who, at 14 years old, has money in their pocket and can do whatever they want while their peers are waiting for their parents' allowance, if they can even give it to them. These kids are very difficult to recover. If, at 16, I have 300 euros in my pocket, I'm a machine. If I'm 20 and still have 300 euros in my pocket, I'm a piece of shit. Therefore, what you want is to climb. Before, it was enough for me to have a phone and call, what is known as a point. But there comes a time when you want to get ahead. Then you go to the beach and start doing cocaine. If you are a car driver, don't even want to know. But if you are already among the crew of the rigid-hulled inflatable boat or storing drugs in a nursery, imagine. And that is the problem, that to reach these levels you have to show bravery. A misunderstood bravery, important. And this leads to a level of aggressiveness that is what has distorted the playing field lately. Now life has no value. If they can run you over, they will. Before, there was respect. There could be a corrupt official, but everyone was in their place. One day you won; the other, them. But today they can run you over with a car, with a van, with a motorcycle, with a drug-running boat, with whatever it takes.

Why is there so much violence?

— To defend the place where you are. You are talking about very brainless people, people who money comes in and out very quickly. They go to a restaurant and close it, they are invited to a brothel and spend it all in one night. To stay in their place, which has taken them a lot of effort and time to reach, they have to show this misunderstood bravery. Do I have to pick up a weapon? I pick up a weapon. Because if you don't reach this level of aggressiveness, you're out and, then, you're a piece of shit. Where are you going? To work in a supermarket? Who will hire you? You end up sunk in misery. You think "I was the king, I had a name". You have to protect the drug to the last extreme, otherwise, they don't count on you and you find yourself at 35 with nothing else you can do. This leads you to collisions, to run-overs, to carrying a weapon. Now, from the outset, they shoot and defend their position to not be left out. In fact, money is no longer the most important thing. What's at stake is your way of life, your reputation, your world, your people. When you have managed to mold a person from their youth to this point, you have destroyed them as a person.

How much can they earn?

— One point, we're talking hundreds of euros. If you go to the beach to unload, we're talking thousands of euros, and if you're on a boat, we're talking tens of thousands of euros. Then, on the subject of the port, opening a door costs money. We've encountered cases of people we've arrested and told them: "You must have made a fortune, right?"" And they reply: "You don't earn that much from tobacco". And we explain to them: "¿Do you know how much cocaine the container was carrying?" "Cocaine? I'm being paid for tobacco", they assure us. Perhaps they were asking for 30,000 euros per container because they thought it was 500,000 euros in tobacco, and in reality, 3,000 kg of cocaine have entered. This is the problem, that many times you don't see what's inside, but you're simply paid to look the other way. Everything is paid for. Now, if they have you cornered, they might say: "Now you'll do this, otherwise someone will find out you're involved".

Is any organization in charge of the port of Algeciras?

— Those who work in the port environment are native. Now, those who come to carry out the drug extraction do not have to be from here. But they always need someone from here, that's why it is fundamental to get hold of someone who can open the port door.

What are the differences between Barcelona and Algeciras?

— There are two basic differences. If we talk about containers, the route: we are much more exposed because we are where we are. And second, the immense quantity of merchandise that reaches us through trucks, especially from Africa. We have ferry connections that no other Spanish port has. Last year we exceeded 500,000 commercial trucks and the projection is that we are approaching 2,700 trucks daily. We have intercepted trucks with four melons and 25 tons of hashish.

What capacity do they have to scan goods?

— A residual percentage, because you have to be very surgical not to harm companies, because everything is resources, everything is time, and time is money. I can stop a ship because I have a lot of information and it is usually judicially processed. Sometimes I have looked at a container for three days and found nothing, and it turns out there were five kilograms of cocaine hidden among 22,000 kilos of merchandise. It was undetectable. But sources are also what they are: someone has been paid for the information, they send you a photograph of the drug bags inside the container and, when you open it, they are no longer there. And they have already been paid. Why do they give us a container with drugs? Normally it is because someone does not want to die and their life insurance is that the police seize the drugs. When you have an agreement with someone and you haven't been able to get the drugs out of the port, the best thing is for the administration to intercept it, because otherwise they might think you've kept it. Then you are dead.