7. The Final Call on the Rooftops
On December 2, 1993—just one day after his 44th birthday—Pablo made a fatal error. Knowing his family was detained in a hotel in Bogotá under government protection, he stayed on a radio phone call with his son, Juan Pablo, for too long.
Technicians from the Search Bloc traced the electronic signal to a middle-class residential neighborhood in Medellín called Los Olivos.As armed officers breached the house, Pablo and his lone remaining bodyguard, El Limón, scrambled onto the tiled roofs of the neighboring houses. A fierce firefight broke out. Pablo ran across the roof, but hitmen and police marksmen unleashed a hail of gunfire.
Pablo was struck by bullets in his leg and torso, and ultimately suffered a fatal gunshot wound that pierced his right ear.
To this day, debates rage over who fired the final shot: the Colombian police, a US sniper, a member of Los Pepes, or Pablo himself, who had always sworn to his family that if cornered, he would shoot himself through his right ear.
Pablo Escobar As You Have Never Known Him
