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In the shadowy underbelly of British Columbia's drug trade, there's a hidden network that operates with the efficiency of a well oiled machine. It's called the Dialado Trade. For years, this system has fueled the province drug economy, providing a steady stream of revenue for organized crime groups while eluding law enforcement.
Today, we're pulling back the curtain of this Dark World, and there's no one better to guide us through it than Chris, a former high-ranking gangster who not only managed multiple dial Dope operations but also navigated the treacherous waters of international drug trafficking. Chris's journey into the criminal underworld began with the Dial Dope trade, a business that's often the first step for those looking to make their mark in organized crime.
From the streets of Vancouver to the violent territories controlled by the cartels in Mexico and Colombia, Chris has seen it all. His first hand experience offers a rare glimpse into the mechanics of a trade that is dangerous as it is lucrative. In this episode, we'll explore the history of the Dialydo trade, its ties to organized crime, and the brutal reality that comes with it.
But we also hear about Chris's path to redemption, his deep connection to the Vancouver's Downtown East Side, and how he's now dedicated to living a new life, free from the shadows of this past. Join us as we into the world that most people only read about in headlines with someone who's lived it every day. Born and raised in in Vancouver,
you know, a middle class family. It kind of all started for me with it was a desire to fit in. I mean, in high school I was bullied and you know, I had this moment where I stood up to the bully and then all of a sudden, you know, people would talk to me. Girls were looking at me and I just in my whole MO, to fit in and gain acceptance was just to do whatever these bad guys were doing to, you know, be cool.
So that was where it started. Out of high school I became heavily addicted to cocaine and my MO was cocaine and money. Right. My first introduction into making money were, you know, through working dial a dopes in their in their infancy in, in the lower Mainland where that's where you call a number and then the number dispatches a car to a customer. I worked those for a long time. I, I ran those. I had a couple of my own.
We had a couple. You know, there's, there's a lot of fraud going on, a lot of phone calls to Europe doing, you know, lottery scams and that kind of thing, which I do know still exists today. Then following that, you know, I, I was living in Mexico for, for three years, yeah. That was when I really got exposed to, to how this stuff works. After that, I was in Columbia
for about a year. Then after that I, I got clean, had a relapse and then I ended up in the Downtown Eastside and through there, I've been out there on and off in the Downtown East Side for about, I don't know, 6-7 years. And I mean, I've been clean for about a year, almost a year and a half now. So and I don't live in the Downtown East Side anymore. So really, even the time I've known you, you've really come a long way. And yeah, you've been, you've been even just watching your
journey. It's been inspiring because I know it's tough. It's not easy. We live in a very fucking stressful society and it's easy to go back to what's comfortable. And sometimes what's comfortable is for someone else would be like scary as fuck. But you know, you get used to
stuff, right? So I'm sure, you know, you're, if you're struggling and you're going through shit, the, the temptation is always there because the, when you make that kind of money, and I've been around a lot of like drug dealers that were pretty successful and people who made a lot of money. That's the hardest thing that they found when they left the life because we're just used to like, you know, I'd go out and I'm going to go out with one
dude. He'd bring like $20,000 with them, just that that was his spending money. Go to the bar, go to the strip bar, buy rounds When you can't do that. We're from for most people, like a hard working dude, making $20,000, especially in Canada is almost impossible. You might be able to make it then the government comes and takes half your back down to 10. You know what I mean? So really you got to make like 40,000 legitimately to bring home 20.
So but for a dealer, Oh, what, what's 20 grand, right? You know what I mean? So you don't get money differently and and and that could fuck with your head it right. I told I totally right. So that that there's that temptation must be always there, if that makes sense. Yeah, I mean, the, that blast of cash is, is an addiction in itself.
And I mean, when you're, you know, you're on payday, when you get that paycheck in the underworld, you know, you get $10,000 stock of $100 bills or, you know, a $2000 stock of 20s. And and they, they just, they just become really disposable. Like that money leaves as fast as it comes, you know, whereas if I make 500 bucks working minimum wage 10 years ago, I might stretch that out a bit because, you know, I've put a lot more heart and soul into that.
So you have that blast of cash is very addictive. Absolutely. When you have a lot of money, it's easy to get women, you know. So, so you almost really got to change like, and just from my personal experience, the shit I went through, my friends and stuff like that, you got to change your life completely. Even the people, everything, even like my friend Kevin who did five years in in Kent when he got out of jail, like he, he
was on a work program. So he at least when he came out of prison, he had about $30,000 saved up and and then he moved right out of Vancouver because he said everywhere I look, I see a mistake I made, you know what I mean? So there's that constant reminder and, and that that's why he had to leave. Well, then leave, but then he ended up he ended up relapsing himself and dying anyway. So that's a different story for him. The temptation was was drugs, right?
He wasn't so much chasing the money. He he, he would, he would chase the drugs like big time. Like he would go clean for a year and then he would have like a month where he would just go scorched earth and then clean up again. And it was like, so it was just horrific to watch, right. Yeah. And dress life and all that kind of stuff. So anyways, I really appreciate you. I do. I mean that from the bottom of
my heart. And, and and I know like, sometimes as shit, it's like the only way to get through it is white knuckling it, right? You know there's no other way. Right. Yeah, it. Takes takes a lot, right. So let let's talk about something here. Then you brought up a few things. So let's talk for the audience because I, I'm always was fascinated by the dial A dope businesses like I you know, I've been only been around for a long time when I even back when I was younger, they used to have one.
It wasn't drugs, it was booze. So you know, about 3:00 in the morning, you need a bottle of something and it and they would actually hand out cards that said roadside repair. So so you can put it on your fridge and say it looks like, you know, if you need a flat tire stuff, but they'd come to your house, deliver whiskey, bought, you know, case of beer, of course, you know, had a huge markup, right.
So maybe just breakdown the dial A dope business for a while because I'm sure that had some adventures. Dial A dope five dial A dope operations are always looking for drivers. And I mean, that's that's a good starting point into into the life, you know, and but most of these drivers also use the drugs that they're selling.
So it's that's a little bit of a liability, but, you know, you get one out of every 10 guys that's actually just there to make the money and doesn't mind driving around meeting addicts and dealing with that, that sort of dynamic. So I mean, yeah, you, you will check in at a place where the drugs are being weighed out and, you know, organized and you will take like a package that's maybe worth anywhere from 500 to
$1000. You'll have your phone and then you're in your car and the person that either owns a dial it up or is working dispatch will receive phone calls from addicts. And he will in turn call you, dispatch you to a certain location. So you're never actually taking calls from customers. You're just taking calls from the dispatcher and you're going to each location that he we need you to go to. And you know, you don't want to, they don't like you carrying a
lot of money. So that's why they only give you $1000 worth of shit. And then you know, you get to 500,000 bucks, you go back to the dispatch location and you drop off the cash. You got more drugs and you're on your way again, so. Have you have you been in any like crazy situations where someone tried to rip you off or maybe even like rivals trying to disrupt your crew or. Yeah, I mean myself not not so much, but I, I was in the car
once. Like most of the time there you'll be a, there'll be a driver and then someone else that has the product. So the driver just drives and then the guy with the product give the drugs.
But I was in the car once and the guy got in the back seat and he took out a pipe wrench and started clubbing, clubbing and the guy and my guy that had the drugs and yeah, like I just, I got out of the car and tried to rip him out, but you know, he'd grabbed his bag and, you know, he was with a buddy and they got out and ran away. So yeah, it's in this guy was left. I took him to the hospital so. Welfare Wednesdays, right? So baby breakdown for the audience. How busy?
A welfare Wednesday or a check day for less business? Operations will usually stock up triple, quadruple the amount of drugs on welfare Wednesday. I mean, welfare Wednesday in the Downtown East Side is a massive day every month. Like, it's so busy. Overdose after overdose after overdose. But yeah, welfare Wednesday is a big day for for the drug industry for sure. And then it's OK. So you did the Dialado business
and then I guess you did well. So you got kind of like in in your organization with it. How does that promotion work is because you just put in the work you're you're you're reliable. Yeah, it's. It's all, it's all about
reliability. If you're reliable and you're bringing back, you know, you're bringing back envelopes of cash and you know, you're not using all the drugs all the time, you know, you're not getting pulled over and screwing up that, that just, you'll move up pretty quickly, you know, and then they'll, they'll push you usually in a dispatch position.
And I mean, it can end there. But if the organization is involved in higher level stuff or other activities, they'll usually offer you some sort of other position. As long as you're reliable, like you said, reliability is everything. That's the key. Yeah. What? Have you ever seen the consequences of someone not being reliable like you? What? What are the consequence for someone fucking up? Maybe go into like a minor fuck up and then a major fuck up?
The consequence? Yeah, I mean, a minor fuck up is usually just coming short on one of the packages you owe for, and that'll just be added to a debt in the start. But once that debt accumulates, you know, you you're short 200 bucks 5 or 10 times, all of a sudden it's 1000. Or. A and you know there's there will be consequences for that like you, you might take a
beating or something like that. So nothing too crazy, but I mean, when you start sort of like leaving with packages and then you use the whole package, which happens quite often, you you'll probably take a beating and they just won't deal with you anymore like it's. Just be out. Yeah, and there's always someone to replace you. So I mean the the consequences aren't super heavy on that because it's pretty expected that a lot of these drivers are
going to be addicts themselves. So it's actually quite common for for people not coming back with $0.00 or short or whatever, so. Dealing with addicts itself must for the faint of heart too. Like I remember I had a friend back in the day who was a pretty big coke dealer and, and the, and the, The thing is that he was the most unlikely guy that you would ever think that he was. He came from like a upper middle class Jewish family, very
buttoned down, very clean cut. But this guy, you know, not, not to go into the stereotype, but he was obsessed with money and he tried a bunch of businesses. They failed. And then he said, fuck it, I'm going to, I'm going to, I'm going to start selling coke. And he built a business up pretty fast. And he for him, he was telling me, he said the turning point was for him, he had this regular customer and he would, he would deliver to the guy every single
day. And, and as soon as he gave the guy the flap, the guy already had a needle spoon. Boom like just like this, like like that, that fucking shot. And the guy couldn't even wait like fucking 30 seconds for him just to leave it. He was, it was like, it was that immediate. And then he realized like, wow, what the like the what you're dealing with, right? So the nature of addiction is kind of what I'm getting at,
right. So it's kind of like, is it hard to be in that life to and not get addicted because you're always having to block that shit out. You're seeing violence, you're seeing like and, and then quite frankly, dealing with addicts and the depth of their addiction is, is it's not fun. No, it's, it's, it's it's
traumatizing on its own scale. I mean, it, it's really for like when we're talking about dialogue, you know, you're, you're driving around, you're just dealing with people that are experiencing high levels of unmanageability in their lives. So they're completely scattered. They're disorganized. They're, you know, and they'll come with the money ready. But yeah, often they'll want to use in your car or, you know, there's a problem. They'll be short themselves.
And, you know, you've already driven across town and, you know, and you see people getting worse, worse. You see people starting on as a cocaine customer and then, you know, moving to a side customer or a fentanyl customer, you know, and yeah, you see the progression happen for sure. But there's, there's a lot of chaos and a lot of unreliability with customers. Like you never know what's going to happen. So that's always in the back of
your mind. And you know, when you're just doing that long enough, you know, the, the question about, you know, people becoming addicted, like it's, it's almost like I like 9 out of 10 people are addicts who because you have to be using to, to just, just to just deal with that. And even the monotony of it all too, like driving around in traffic and, you know, just the same thing over and over again. It's pretty hard to do without some sort of substance in the.
Where's the day going, right? You know what I mean? You make the day go by a little quicker, David. Same thing too David, he did traffic in at a high level, but he also he was doing hit so he he had to use to get over the head. So I'd I'd ask him point blank. OK, you did a hit. How do you decompress it? Oh, escorts 8 ball hotel. He'd have to get blasted to put it out of his mind what he did right. A funny story of a dealer I once knew.
He was pretty successful downtown Vancouver and he had a regular guy was, you know, and they get you said first he was all, you know, pretty, he had a shit together, had a good job. You know what I mean was we'd show up, give him the money, go away. Not no problems whatsoever. And then slowly over time getting worse, lost his job. And then he said he got a call from him like at 4:00 in the
morning, frantic, right? The guy comes by, has no money, but has like some leather jacket that looked like it was from the 70s. It's a leather jackets vintage. It's worth a lot because I don't want this fucking brown leather jacket. You know, we had four lording, arguing with the guy for over a Coke deal for a leather jacket that you don't want. Right. So, you know, there, I guess there's some, you know, in
gallows humor. There's some funny moments, but it's pretty pathetic at the same time, too. Like you're, you know, you're so wired and like, Oh my God, what can I trade? Oh, my God, that leather jacket. Yeah. I mean. You get addicted enough and you you run out of money. And then just slowly things in your house start going missing. And I mean you, you, you try to start trading goods or services
for drugs. Yeah. So let's maybe segue then into what I wanted to ask you about because you spent some time in the Downtown Eastside. And then we don't, we talk a lot with me and you. We went back and forth quite a few. We've had quite a few conversations, you know, over the year and stuff and I think quite a few of them we're about the Downtown Eastside. And you know, I'm fascinated.
Like I've, I've been around the Downtown Eastside for about 30 years, work in close proximity, live downtown, had friends that ended up there. And I've seen it like it's always was rough. I personally think it's the roughest it's ever been. Now, you know, David talked about, he ran around Blood Alley, one of those SRO's, incredible money, incredible. 20,000 a day was a slow day for the building. Yeah, 100K on a welfare Wednesday was was, you know, welfare Wednesday.
You make 100K, Yeah, in a day, right. So it's a massive drug economy, first of all. But there also must be like so many sharks and say, you know, maybe breakdown this the kind of the environment for the listeners. Well, I mean, it's, it's an extremely vibrant place, but it's also very, very volatile. And I mean, if you're going in there with any sort of trying to run any sort of CODA ethics, you're going to be sadly
mistaken. Because I mean, with the sharks and the sharks that are on drugs and you know, the Sentinel and crystal meth epidemic and the potency that is just driving more and more shitty behavior and, and, and just, and just weasel type shit. It's just not a safe place at all. You know, I, I'm a guy like, you know, I was raised with pretty like pretty good family and like, I'm just, I'm not a sociopath. But I mean, I'm convinced that 95% of those guys.
Down there are all sociopaths because nobody seems to give a fuck about anything but themselves. Your life is worth pretty much nothing. Like if, if there's an opportunity for them to, you know, somehow be involved in taking your life for some sort of personal gain, like that'll happen. Like, no question. Just like that, you know you can become the center of something pretty quickly.
If you don't just have money for drugs, you will start doing other things for drugs and that's when the problems start. Right. Yeah, that totally makes sense because the nature of addiction, like we just broke down. It's like you gotta feed the hunger. Yeah. And, and no money, you're hungry, then you got to do other stuff, right? With with the women, that tends to be prostitution with dudes, it's stealing, shoplifting girls to shoplifting stuff, right.
Conversations that we've had too was about human trafficking, which I truly believe it's on the rise. And, and there's such a transient population there because it's like people rolling into town coming across Canada. And what's important for the audience when they, when they see Hastings Street, they think, oh, people from Vancouver, majority of those people are not from the city.
Like I when in my research, and this is off the top of my head, it's estimated that only about 15% of the population there are like, you know, Vancouver, Metro Vancouver based most of them come across Canada, but one way bus tickets up north from BC running away from stuff, right. It's a it's a good place to hide out, you know, if you want to be an Incognito for sure. Vulnerable people on the run unaccounted for, especially women. They can go missing.
No one will even know. You know one of the series I've been writing for the last year, the Picton stuff, the missing women of the Downtown Eastside. There's, there's more cases than you can count, you know, and, and the other, the other aspect too is I talked to a lot of parents who've had kids that have, you know, their sons or daughters having overdoses or dying under very mysterious circumstances and then just gets written off fentanyl overdose, nothing to see here, right.
So if I wanted to kill someone, the easiest way I can think of in this environment, inject someone with fentanyl, throw a baggie in their pocket. Oh, good luck. They're doing fentanyl. They must have died. Must have did too much. Yeah. In case. Closed Scary shit, eh? Yeah, well, it's, I mean it is terrifying. The like an addicts worst nightmare. A fentanyl addicts worst nightmare is is getting what's called hot capped where they get injected with battery acid.
There's a misconception where hot cap just means somebody overdoses you with fentanyl. I mean that that would be an easy way to kill someone, but for for whatever reason like it, it doesn't happen that way that often like this. Hot capping happens a lot in these shelters. Actual fucking battery acid. Actual battery acid.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I even heard a story about, you know, this, this crew that was making videos of, of, of injecting people with battery acid, filming it while it was online when the person, you know, started convulsing and and, and slowly dying there. So yeah. Yeah, that would not be a good way to go. You told me a crazy story and you, you that just, you know, for your own personal safety, maybe just kind of censor it down so it doesn't mean identify.
But you told me a story that I was shocked I didn't make the news about a decapitation and Oppenheimer Park. Yeah, so there there was a dispute over over drug supply and somebody was was doing it in a dishonest way and their crew found out that they were kind of looking to another crew at the same time and and his his head got displayed on a hockey stick, you know, Oppenheimer Park. Yeah, he does not just sound like gallows humor, but how Canadian.
What a hockey stand. You know, if it was Mexico, it'd be like hanging from a bridge with some, you know, morbid sign and scary writing. But Canada, you know, a hockey, you know, again, a poor bastard, you know, extremely traumatic for everyone that saw that. But wow. So OK, here's a question right from seeing that, and this is just, you know, your speculation. Why do you think that the media itself really tries to keep a lid of how fucking horrible it is down there?
Because again, anyone I talk to, any of the shit I've seen and people I've talked to, I've talked to people that talked about people being thrown out windows, chicks being thrown out windows or head shape or because they owe a crack dealer like $10. Beatings, fingers cut off with like cigar choppers, you know, the chop the end of your cigar, right? So horrific.
And I feel that the media, the mainstream media does a terrible job of actually breaking down because I think if the average person really understood how it really works on that, they'd be horrified that that this is a neighborhood in their city. It's strange. It's absolutely strange. I mean, I, I've kind of wondered that myself because I mean, you hear horrific story after horrific story that doesn't actually make it into the paper or the news.
And you know, what's motive for keeping it out? Is it to keep the, the, the glow of our city in a more positive way or, or what is it? Because I mean, we're not hearing about, you know, the women being thrown out of the third story or fucking, you know, just the the sexual assaults taking place in these Sr. OS and the filming of those. And there's just there's none of that in the paper ever. It's yeah. So it's surprising they keep kind of a lid on it.
And maybe it's to maybe it's to show that harm reduction that that whole that whole policy is working or right, doing the right things to make the Downtown Eastside a better place and reduce the overdose rate, which we all know is not reducing. But I think it's just to keep it shining in a more positive light. They don't. It's. Like, you know, again, everyone's a human being, absolutely. And everyone deserves respect.
They deserve a chance and they also deserve, you know, I've had you know, I've, I, I'm, and there's a lot of phases of my life where I'm not that person anymore. I had the opportunity to change right. So I I believe that for other people as well. However, silence pretending that the problem is not there going into the hardcore stuff of the human trafficking.
When I was researching the Picton stuff about the missing women, there was these crews of of organized crime crews like that would make extremely violent pornography. And then it was it was a rumor that then after these women were used in these movies, they'd be sold to truck drivers. And then who knows where they're ended up with, right? So there's an economy and this is what I'm getting here. There's an economy of exploitation, right?
There's a exploitation of addicts exploit to human exploitation of like you're saying, like making movies. Injecting someone in battery acid I'm sure ends up on dark web for psychopaths, you know, eat their grilled cheese sandwich in their bathrobe and have a giggle, right? You know what I mean? It's like by the media not exposing this, they're catering to the worst in our society, in my opinion. You know what I mean?
I talked to a journalist, he was a pretty good journalist and he's living in he's a Canadian duty, but he's, he's living in Mexico right now. His whole philosophy and he's written some pretty good pieces on the down to see especially the regarding the missing women. So what his his view of it is, it's so they can sell real estate in Vancouver because that was the big thing and who buys the expense of real estate is
people overseas. So they're not going to want to hear about decapitations and women being thrown out of windows and stuffed movies being made right. That's, that doesn't sound good in your real estate portfolio, right. No, he believes it's tied to keeping that offshore money coming in to buy up real estate. That's. So that's what his opinion, my opinion. I do agree with that. But I think there's like some overlap.
I think there are people here that like fast money may not be involved in drugs, may not be the person, you know, making the transactions, but they're in the position where they get an envelope, if you get what I'm saying. Yeah. So hey, it works for them, right? Yeah, absolutely.
Yeah. I mean, there, there's a lot of irony there because I mean, the, the, the real estate boom is really a large part of it is fueled by the drug economy in Vancouver. Because, I mean, they, they import these chemicals from China, they make these drugs, then they sell all these drugs. Then they have guys to take these stacks of cash to casinos and trade equations. Then they launder the money by trading the chips back and they take the money to these clandestine banks that are
linked. And then they wire all the money back. And then in turn they use that money to buy real estate in Vancouver. Like that's not all of it, but. It's but it's a single, right? Yeah. It's so crazy. Well, look at the history of Vancouver. Like start off the Groves, you know, the grow OPS, like I knew guys that were just oh, fucking killing it. What do they do? They buy real estate, right? They launder the money. So it started really like in the
90s with the grow up, the grows. Then the BC bud was so valuable and so high quality and and seen as a almost a status symbol like in in the United States. Oh, you got BC bud. Everyone love BC bud and BC bud was being traded on par with cocaine. Now think about this. You grow a fucking plant, right? You grow, you grow a plant and then that plant gets, you know, harvested and then you come back with cocaine. Now that's worth like five times as much, right? That gets converted into cash
when you break it all down. And you know what I mean? You get the idea, right? So it, it was literally, and I think I did a in my early days, I did a podcast called the Green Gold Rush. And that's really what it was. And then I think as the grow up, things fizzled out, then it got into other drugs. And then I think where we're at now we're we're in a scary place where we're awash with drugs. Absolutely. And now you have the government itself and call it what it is straight up dealing.
Like to me, the the government is trying to be it's almost like a competition to the drugs because people will take the so-called safe supply drugs and buy and sell them, putting more drugs into the marketplace. Like like for a good. I'll ask you a straight up question then. Like most drug addicts, right? You know, they need a fix. They need a fix. They do they really care? Oh, this is a government pill and this is a cartel pill. You know what? I mean when they're jonesing.
Not in the least. Not in the least exactly. Sickness itself is is is one of the most powerful things I've ever experienced. Like when I'm sick in that way, there is nothing that will stop me from moving through whatever is in my way. Family, friends, the law, morals, nothing. Just to get away from the
sickness. Yeah. What's your view if you were still like in in your, in that life and this safe supply mandate where you're allowed to have 2.5 grams, how would that affect your way of your doing business? The way of doing business I mean it wouldn't have a huge effect because when you're standing there with a package you're just you're strategically placing
yourself away from police. It's it's quite rare that you actually get stopped by a beat cop and searched and they find a big package on you because every third guy standing your man in Hastings has way more than the legal limit on them. Right. OK, I I actually, I mean, that's a good question because I've never actually, it's not even like a disgusting, like when that legal limit came into into play, like in the downturn, you say like nobody fucking cares.
Like they're just kidding. At any point. Like it's yeah, so. Yeah, that, that's interesting prescription and you're given like say 16 pills a day. Yeah, majority with, in your experience in majority the persons they use them themselves or they sell them or like high, high what, what's, what's been your kind of common knowledge of what happens to what majority of those pills? So I mean, there's a, there's a market to, to sell those pills that's quite prevalent down there.
And, and I mean, no, these pills are beginning this hydromorphone pills are beginning being given to fentanyl addicts as a PRN style prescription. So they, they go to the the the pharmacy in the morning and they, they take their witness dose of methadone and then they get a bottle of Dilaudid, which is what the brand name of that is.
And they take those 16 pills. Then they go to the down, they're in the Downtown East Side and they will trade all those, all of those pills for, you know, a point of fentanyl or $20. Like that's kind of the Golden Gate. Yeah. And then in turn, those pills, I mean, from what I understand, I've, I've never been involved in the trafficking of those. But from what I understand, those pills are either cooked back into the drug supply to make it more potent, or they're
sent across country. Whereas like in PC, it's those are are less than a dollar a pill. Whereas if you go to Ontario, someone is probably going to pay you 10 to $20 a pill. So this is sort of markup. And then at the same time, they're sending these to places where they're sedating people to work in the sex trade, including children. And I Oh my God.
Yeah, I've heard this from from a doctor and a police officer and that's going on. They're going to, you know, indigenous areas of Canada and they're used being used to sedate kids, which is just, and then also being used to sedate, you know, adults too. But that's that's a big problem. And that's why these doctors are are not really, you know, I mean, they're they're making their cut off that prescription.
But a lot of these doctors have morals and will mention that this is what's going on to the addict that is asking for a prescription now. But I mean, it's not stopping an addict who's addicted to drugs and just wants to no. No, you're giving them more fuel for the fire. That's how I look at. Or are you like, you know, another metaphor? Bullets and their gun, right?
Simple, right? When you go to Maine and Hastings, like, you know, just just sell the Hastings on Maine is, you know, there's a mixture of of drugs you can buy and sell, you know, but just right around the corner from Carnegie is where all these guys stand. And then people go and sell their hydromorphone to these guys. It's like a certain part of the corner there and there's. All they. There'll be someone, yeah.
So that's where they're going. He just said something that that actually made me woah like I never even thought of that. He said something very interesting there. They take the hydromorphone pills and then they re cut it because they had that makes perfect fucking sense. I get AI have a pure hydromorphone pill. I cut it for a bunch of stuff. I take that one pill now. I now I have like 1/4 gram or like five points right to, you know what I mean? That that totally makes sense.
So a business boom for, you know, for addicts, really, you know, gives them it gives them the ability to, to have something to barter with something to trade with. Those pills, in my opinion, are, are, are just as equal to to money. I'm sure you can buy and sell and trade them just like currency down there. Absolutely. Yeah, they. Have a government stamp and dah dah dah dah. They're almost like a Bitcoin so to. Speak right? Absolutely.
Yeah. Wow. Unbelievable. Well, again, every time I talk to you, I could talk to you for like 10 hours, right? You have to go so many, there's so many nuances and variations and perspectives and cuz again, I've lived in Vancouver majority of my life, I've lived around in different parts of the world. So have you and I understand especially now in a lot of inner cities are now having this addiction issue that we've seen in the Downtown Eastside for the last 30 years, right?
The phenomena of addiction is becoming more widespread. That's a whole different conversation because that's more, I personally believe that I think that society has become so hard and so complex and so difficult for the average person. It's easy just to, oh, get wasted, get drunk, get you know what I mean, escapism. And the next thing you know, someone passes you a pill or you
get injured or something. And holy fuck, this makes this makes everything kind of takes the edge off right, takes rounds of corners off right. And then, you know the nature of addiction, right? Vancouver to me is a very unique place for for a variety of reasons, It was always promoted as a a beautiful, safe, healthy lifestyle type of city outdoors. You know what I mean? Lululemon, that kind of shit.
And then you have a neighborhood that's the polar opposite of everything that the city promotes, right? And, and it has never been adequately fixed, right. I personally believe that they should bring back a Riverview type of environment, you know, some kind of place where people can regain their ability to integrate with life lifestyle skills. Because it's sure you can take the attics out of that neighborhood, but you have to fix what put them there in the first place in my opinion,
right? So anyways, so let's talk about the human trafficking, because again, like you said, these people down there, they're cutthroat, they're psychopaths. And human trafficking is a massive, massive, massive industry, bigger than drugs. You, you sell one of those, you get one of those hydromorphone pills, you can sell it once or right? Yeah, a girl passed out in a hotel room. You could send dudes in there
all day long, right? Yeah, I mean, I absolutely it's, I mean as long as the the person exists, they can keep on being the commodity, right. So. And, and how, how widespread do you believe that from your experience that you, you, you think this is happening down there as far as like as a, as an epidemic of, of human?
The thing is, is okay, like the, the Downtown East side itself is absolutely like a major source point to facilitate exploitation of these interprovincial corridors that exist across Canada because it's where addicts go to use drugs and sell their bodies to gain drugs. So I mean, if you're an addicted male or female, I mean, it's, it's, it's horrible, but it's more prevalent than females, obviously.
But the majority of females are going to be involved in the sex trade just to facilitate their drug use. And if they spend long enough down there, they will often get themselves in a situation where they are being trafficked
because there's, there. Would you want, I don't want to call them scouts, but you know, they're, they're, they're, they've always got their eyes open and they're looking for people that look a certain way or people that maybe don't have people that, you know, love them and are looking for them. There's no, they don't have anyone. They're accountable to their. Bridges back home. Or burnt their bridges. Yeah. So they they get down and out enough down there.
And then sooner or later, sometimes you know, you'll be offered a different type of different type of deal where or you'll be forced into it where you're being trafficked across the province or across the country. But often it does start in the Downtown East Side because it's the biggest source of vulnerable addicts already involved in the sex trade just to facilitate their own drug use. So. We've talked like off air and stuff like that, you know, to keep people safe and stuff.
I don't like naming organizations and stuff because one, they're still around and the police really have proven they have no ability to protect one from these people if they want to get you. But I've been hearing about more like crews that are like from like back east, especially that that's is what they specialize in. There was some crews from Eastern Canada and and that is like that is their main source of income. It's human trafficking first, then drug 2nd.
And which is scary because what that tells me is, is that cruise from from afar are saying, Oh, this is this is the place to go, right? We got cover the the law enforcement is so overwhelmed by daily St. crime and this and that. This is the place, right? Which is scary, Yeah. I mean, it's terrifying. There's just such a high concentration of vulnerable people and potential, you know, ways to make money through these
people. So yeah, I mean, people are going to flock because of the relaxed drug laws. And you're right, the the police are overwhelmed, you know, resources to stop it are completely overwhelmed. And so a lot of it just just happens with with no, with no accountability, so. That's scary, man. Well, let's leave it here. I really truly appreciate your time. I will obviously continue the conversation and stuff and and, you know, hope everything else
your day is going goes well. Enjoy the summer and. Yeah, yeah. No, have a great day and we'll keep in touch and we'll get back on. Welcome and thank you for tuning into this podcast wherever it's morning, afternoon or evening, wherever you are, I appreciate you taking the time to listen. In 2024, I took a break from podcasting after consistently producing content since 2019. What began as a personal challenge to overcome procrastination quickly evolved into something more substantial.
Early on, I was recording on my iPhone 7. While the quality wasn't the best, my focus was on learning and improving. Over the years, I refined my skills and broaden my scope. The purpose of this podcast? This broadcast serves 3 primary purposes showcasing research.
I'll be sharing in depth investigations that I've been working on for years, including the mysterious disappearances of young men across Western Canada, British Columbia, and the United States. I'll also dive into the chilling case of Robert Picton, which I've been researching extensively for the past few years. Additionally, I'll be highlighting cold cases from British Columbia that remain puzzling and mysterious #2
personal insights. I'll take you behind the scenes, offering insights into my creative process and challenges I faced over the past five years. The landscape of social media, and media in general, has changed dramatically since I began. I'll share my experiences navigating these changes and #3 discussing broader issues beyond true crime. I believe it's crucial to address the unprecedented social and political changes we're witnessing today.
We live in strange times, and it's important to have honest, open conversations about these issues without resorting to name calling or rhetoric. I aim to provide a platform where we can discuss these topics thoughtfully and respectfully. My reflections on social media. When I started, the platforms like Instagram were more focused on connecting people with similar interests. However, as my follower count grew, so did the toxicity.
At one point, my platform reached nearly 50,000 followers and then across multiple platforms, about 100,000. But the increase in numbers brought me more negativity. I found myself spending more time moderating comments than focusing on my work. This experience has led me to prioritize quality over quantity when it comes to my followers. I've become more selective about where I invest my energy.
The current challenges I have spoken with many people from different walks of life and there's a common thread of stress that concerns about the state of our society. From job losses to the high cost of living, people are struggling. I believe these are important issues to discuss as they impact all of us and looking ahead through this series, I combine storytelling with in depth research to explore complex issues in an accessible and
engaging way. My goal is to make you think, to challenge you, and to encourage deeper conversations about the problems we face. I believe that by getting more people on the same page, we can begin to address the challenges and work together towards creating a better, safer society for everyone. Thank you for joining me on this journey. Thank you so much, Mark.