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Books

The war on drugs is stupid and counter-productive

According to Zero Zero Zero by Roberto Saviano and Dreamland by Sam Quinones, the flow of Class A drugs around the world is now unstoppable, and traffickers have grown increasingly violent. If only the trade were regulated, all this could change

18 July 2015

9:00 AM

18 July 2015

9:00 AM

Zero Zero Zero Roberto Saviano

Allen Lane, pp.448, £20, ISBN: 9781846147692

Dreamland: The True Tale of America’s Opiate Epidemic Sam Quinones

Bloomsbury, pp.380, £18.99, ISBN: 9781620402504

Rosalio Reta was 13 years old when recruited by a Mexican drug cartel. He was given a loyalty test — shoot dead a man tied to a chair — then moved into a nice house in Texas. Soon he was earning $500 a week for stakeouts and odd jobs, but the big money came from slitting the throats of the gang’s enemies, which paid a $50,000 bonus.

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