Nelson Pablo Yester-Garrido, also known as "Tony Yester," is a notorious Cuban-born drug kingpin, former intelligence officer, and associate of the Medellín Cartel who infamously operated a global narcotics network from South Africa for nearly two decades.
Yester-Garrido immigrated to the United States during the 1980 Mariel boatlift. By the 1990s, he had become deeply entrenched in international drug trafficking. His most infamous plot involved negotiating with Russian contacts to purchase a Soviet-era diesel submarine for Colombian cartels to smuggle massive quantities of cocaine into North America.
When US federal authorities uncovered the plot in 1997, Yester-Garrido fled to South Africa using a fraudulent Mexican passport under the name Antonio Lamas. Posing as a wealthy businessman, he settled into Johannesburg’s affluent suburb of Sandton. For years, he lived a high-society lifestyle, associated with local underworld figures like Glenn Agliotti and survived multiple local arrest attempts and collapsing prosecution efforts.
In April 2002, heavily armed police and Interpol agents intercepted Yester-Garrido as he drove out of his luxury home in Hyde Park, Johannesburg. Police raided his home, seizing over R1 million worth of luxury cars, $30,000 in cash, and roughly 20 fraudulent passports (including Mexican, Venezuelan, and Cuban identities). He had been living under the alias “Antonio Lamas”.
He was held at Pretoria Central Prison while the United States fought to have him extradited for his 1990s cocaine trafficking and submarine plot. A magistrate ruled in 2003 that he could be extradited. However, Yester-Garrido launched aggressive legal counter-challenges in the Johannesburg High Court. Due to political delays, legal technicalities, and the eventual dismissal of his initial US Florida charges, the government never handed him over, and he was released.
In March 2011, the Hawks arrested Yester-Garrido at his Sandton home in connection with a massive narcotics seizure.
In August 2010, authorities discovered 166kg of high-grade cocaine (worth an estimated R400 million) hidden inside the metal pillars of a shipping container at Gqeberha. During his arrest, police also charged him with possessing an illegal Desert Eagle handgun. The gun was traced back to Chris Couremetis, a notorious underworld associate known as "Mr. Cocaine," who had been assassinated in a hit just months prior. In 2013, the state abruptly withdrew all charges against Yester-Garrido. Officially, the case stalled because of an unfulfilled Portuguese translation of crucial state documents.
A self-styled underworld informant later filed an affidavit claiming that Czech fugitive crime boss Radovan Krejcir had intervened on Yester-Garrido's behalf. The informant alleged that he had personally delivered R700,000 in cash to Port Elizabeth, which was reportedly destined for the team prosecuting Yester-Garrido to ensure the charges were dropped. While these corruption allegations were never proven in court, Yester-Garrido walked free once again.
He left South Africa in 2017. He did not leave permanently by choice; rather, he took a trip to Europe, which resulted in his capture because the US government had secretly built a new criminal case against him.
In December 2017 he was arrested by Interpol at Fiumicino Airport in Rome, Italy. Following a lengthy legal battle, Italy extradited him to the United States in July 2019.
In August 2020, faced with overwhelming evidence, he pleaded guilty in a Florida federal court to conspiracy to distribute high-grade marijuana, linked to a $250,000 drug debt collection he managed while living in South Africa.
In December 2020, he was sentenced to five years in US federal prison.
After receiving credit for time served in Italian and American detention facilities, Yester-Garrido was released from a Miami detention centre in January 2022.
It was strange to see an agenda to protect Sibiya from the media getting footage of him sitting in the dock as an accused rapist and groomer.
Strange because there was clearly an agenda to embarrass the National Commissioner General Fannie Masemola.
Fadiel Adams and James Sharnick shared a car to gloat and mock and cast aspersions outside of court. Media was given full access to take pictures and videos. To document the fall of Masemola.
The big five cartel affiliated don’t want the treatment that they eagerly dished out on an innocent man through Project Diversion. They want to shame others but do not want the shame.
What’s truly scary is that the actions of Adv Andrea Johnson, General Feroz Khan and Paul O’Sullivan with their media allies had an agenda deeper than embarrassment.
They sought to use shame, charges and media shame to restructure the SAPS. General Masemola should be given his job back with the same energy and urgency that it was taken away.
It was always a baseless suspension.
My latest video explores how Burberry casting Central Cee to walk whilst not ever having Skepta walk, despite decades of ambassadorship, directly correlates to the exclusion of Black people from Black art and rising anti-woke politics in the UK
I have seen a trend on TikTok where parents share when they realized they were bad parents to their children. The stories there are heartbreaking 😭😭😭😭.
One man said he went to pay school fees and found children leaving for a school trip. He was surprised because his son never mentioned anything about that trip; he found him in the classroom, alone, reading a book. The son said he knew his father would have said no and didn't bother to tell him 🥹🥹.
In 2021 Kagiso Lerutla was speeding in a Mercedes G Wagon, and knocked into another car head on. Instantly killing the other female driver.
Tow truck drivers arrived before Metro Police or SAPS. Lerutla convinced the tow truck guys to take the females body away. He offered them R10,000.
They agreed. Then the female's body was taken and dumped in a field.
To this day the family does not know where their mother's body is 💔
While a family suffered, Lerutla lived the high life with Instagram baddie like Mahwoo, Cyan Boujee and Sithelo Shozi 💔
How can a former Mayor of Cape Town who was also a Premier of the Western Cape make a promise to bring affordable housing to JHB while Cape Town and Western Cape as a whole has the most expensive housing crisis in South Africa! Make it make sense!
As a white, middle-aged Afrikaner who spent the first24 years of his life under apartheid I have more freedom now than I ever had under apartheid.
The same is true for this man who made himself wealthy by exploiting tragedy. But he thinks he is persecuted.
The conspiracy theory that Jews are intentionally turning all western production into “goyslop” to dumb down the population falls apart when you realize this is what Israelis make for other Israelis. It is Infact chosen people slop. this is what they genuinely enjoy.
Bought this 2 Hectares in Midrand to build our Head Office, Coffee Shop and DRIP Warehouse Store.
I come here time to time to remind myself why i started and what this dream means.