There are things in this world that don't end when they should.
We like to believe that when a man dies—especially a man like Pablo Escobar—his story dies with him. That the damage he caused is buried with his body, sealed in history, analyzed, debated, and eventually left behind.
But it doesn’t work that way.
Not in Colombia. Not anywhere where violence has taken root deep enough to alter the land it touches.
In the lowlands near the Magdalena River, there are hippos.
They don’t belong there.
They move through the water with a sort of silent authority, as if they have always been part of the rhythm of the river. But that’s not the case. They are an intrusion—an echo of something that began far from the current they are now altering.
They were brought decades ago to a place called Hacienda Nápoles, where excess took on a life of its own. Four animals. A whim. A gesture that, at the time, must have seemed insignificant in light of the magnitude of everything else.
When the empire collapsed, when the man at the center of it all disappeared, the hippos remained.
No one claimed them.
No one controlled them.
No one really knew what to do with them.
So they stayed.
And over time, they multiplied.
There is something unsettling about that kind of permanence.
Not for what they are, but for what they suggest.
There is an old story about a man who brought something into the world without fully understanding what it would become. Something that, once set in motion, could not simply be undone. It did not disappear when its creator ceased to exist. It remained. It moved on its own. And over time, it became a burden that others had to bear.
In Colombia, that idea does not belong to fiction.
The hippos are not violent in the way men are. They do not conspire, do not corrupt, do not traffic in fear. They simply exist—massive, indifferent, guided by their instincts in a place that was never destined for them.
And yet, their presence alters everything.
The water changes.
The balance shifts.
The natural order bends in ways that are almost imperceptible.
They are, in their way, a consequence.
One that is still alive.
But there is another truth that coexists with that reality.
The hippos did not choose this land.
They did not choose this river.
And neither did the people who now live alongside them.
The communities along the Magdalena River did not ask for this intrusion, just as the animals did not choose to be a part of it. Both were placed within the same consequence—some by instinct, others by circumstance.
Both, in their way, are innocent.
One adapts because it must.
The other endures because it has no alternative.
And somewhere between the two lies the silent weight of a choice made long ago by a man who is no longer here to answer for it.
I have spent enough time observing the aftermath of things to recognize the pattern.
There was a night, years ago, that never quite left.
It didn’t make the headlines. There were no cameras or urgency beyond the people in that room. Just a family—or what was left of it—sitting in silence long after everything that could be said had been said.
The man we were looking for was no longer there.
The damage he left behind was.
I remember how the air felt. It wasn’t noise. It wasn’t chaos. It was something deeper. As if something had been ripped from that space… and nothing could take its place.
No one asked for explanations.
No one needed them.
What remained was not the operation, nor the outcome.
It was the certainty that what had begun long before that night was not going to end there.
I have seen how an act of violence rarely remains limited to one person.
It expands.
It reaches families, friends, relationships. It settles into the most intimate spaces and transforms them in ways that are not always visible, but are always present.
What is lost is not just a life, or a moment, or a sense of security.
It’s the continuity.
And what remains is an absence that is never filled. A kind of void that does not respond to time.
Over the years, I have come to understand that is where the weight of violence truly resides. Not in the act itself, but in what it leaves behind.
And I don’t think those who set these things in motion ever stop to think about that.
The hippos, in their silent way, reflect that truth.
They are not responsible for what brought them there. They did not choose the land or the river. They are innocent participants in a story that began long before they did.
And yet, they remain.
They increase in number.
They extend their reach.
They become part of a landscape that now must learn to coexist with them.
A reminder—not of the man himself—but of the alteration he left behind.
We often focus on the rise and fall. On power. On violence. On the mythology built around men like Escobar.
But those things eventually fade.
What does not fade is what they set in motion.
The residue.
The imbalance.
The silent and persistent consequences that no one can entirely undo.
Long after the headlines fade, long after the stories have been told over and over, the river continues on its course.
And within it, something remains.
It is not loud.
It is not dramatic.
But it is undeniable.
A presence that does not belong…
and yet refuses to disappear.
I too carry something like that. Not from the same river, not from the same land.
But I recognize the weight. I have carried it with me since that night, since all the nights like it.
And I have learned that certain things do not resolve—they simply find a way to keep moving with you.
Leo Silva is a former special agent in charge of the DEA (Monterrey Office) and author of Reign of Terror and El Reinado de Terror. With decades of experience on the front lines of the fight against transnational cartels, Silva offers readers an intimate look at some of the most dangerous operations directed against high-level leaders and organizations.
Since the publication of his memoirs, Silva has become a recognized voice in the media and on the speaking circuit. His story and analyses have been featured in interviews with Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Jorge Ramos on Univision (Así veo las cosas), three-time Emmy-winning journalist Paco Cobos (La Entrevista), and Ana Paulina (Voces con Ana Paulina), where his participation generated millions of views. He has also been invited to prominent platforms such as the podcast Cops and Writers with Patrick J. O’Donnell, Game of Crimes with Steve Murphy, and Llamados a Servir with Roberto Hernández.
Through his books, lectures, and media appearances, Silva continues to shed light on the realities of organized crime, the work of law enforcement, and the human cost of the war on drugs, while sharing lessons of resilience, leadership, and truth.
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