🔍
Incredible Story of British Stock Broker Who Became A Drug Kingpin In United States - YouTube
Channel: The Infographics Show
[0]
May 16, 2002 - Scottsdale, Arizona.
[3]
Thirty four year old Shaun Attwood was working
from home, making trades on the stock market
[7]
online when a 20 member swat team suddenly
burst into his apartment.
[11]
Wielding guns, the police yelled at Attwood
to get down on the floor.
[14]
He was handcuffed and arrested, charged with
money laundering and conspiracy.
[19]
Ironically, Attwood, persuaded by his girlfriend,
had already given up his wild life as Arizona’s
[24]
biggest ecstasy Kingpin and settled down to
domestic bliss.
[27]
In fact, Attwood thought he had gotten away
with it all...
[30]
Shaun Attwood was born to Derick and Barbara
Attwood on October 28, 1968.
[35]
He grew up in Widnes, a small chemical manufacturing
town near Liverpool in northwest England.
[41]
His loving parents encouraged him to excel
at school and he did.
[44]
As a teen, Attwood became interested in the
stock market.
[47]
With some books and the help of his economics
teacher, Attwood began to learn about stocks.
[51]
Soon he was reading The Financial Times.
[53]
By age 16 Attwood had made his first trade,
ending up doubling the pocket money given
[58]
to him by his grandmother.
[59]
A few times teenage Attwood visited his expat
aunts who lived in Arizona.
[63]
He found America dazzling, from the hot desert
sun to the wide open space and swimming pools.
[68]
He considered the US a promised land where
anyone could make it.
[72]
In 1987 after graduating high school and completing
A Levels in maths, physics, and economics,
[78]
Attwood enrolled at the University of Liverpool.
[80]
At the time, the rave scene was sweeping across
the UK.
[83]
Invited by a classmate for a night out at
the ThunderDome club in Manchester, shy, anxiety
[88]
ridden Attwood tried ecstasy and speed for
the first time.
[91]
He loved how the drugs made him feel; with
new found confidence fueled by his high, he
[96]
was able to talk to anyone.
[98]
Attwood was quickly sucked into the rave scene,
spending each weekend partying.
[102]
Despite his wild social life, he graduated
with First Class Honors in a Business Studies
[106]
degree.
[107]
He sought a job in London, but was unable
to find one.
[110]
In the summer of 1990, Attwood flew out to
Arizona.
[112]
He didn't have authorization to work in the
US.
[115]
However, an aunt worked in the fraud detection
business and knew exactly how to help him
[119]
to make a convincing fake H-1B work visa.
[122]
Attwood got a job as a commission-only stockbroker.
[125]
He lived cheaply and worked hard, cold calling
500 numbers a day.
[129]
Five years later, Attwood was a top earner,
with a salary of over half a million a year
[133]
with his own secretary and cold callers.
[136]
But the long hours and stressful job took
a toll on Attwood, he had ‘BOBS’ – Burnt
[141]
Out Broker Syndrome.
[142]
Attwood began blowing off steam by throwing
parties on the weekends.
[145]
Wanting to be known as a big spender, he started
buying 50 ecstasy pills at a time from a local
[150]
dealer and giving them away to friends.
[153]
In the mid-90s, ecstasy in the US was expensive
–it could run $30 a hit.
[158]
Attwood became committed to importing the
UK rave scene to Arizona.
[162]
Eventually, the hectic double life became
too much for Attwood.
[165]
In 1997, he quit his stockbroking day job
and invested his substantial savings into
[170]
technology shares.
[171]
As the dot-com bubble grew, Attwood's portfolio
became worth around $2 million.
[176]
By this time, Attwood was throwing raves in
the desert, in apartments and in a warehouse
[181]
in West Phoenix; wherever he could set up.
[183]
However, he had trouble with getting a steady,
quality supply of drugs.
[187]
Frustrated with his small time local dealer,
Attwood went to Los Angeles to purchase from
[191]
someone higher up on the chain.
[193]
He came back with 1,000 pills.
[196]
Attwood became a fulltime ecstasy dealer,
buying tablets for around $10 each and selling
[200]
them for between $25 and $30 a pop.
[203]
One night, Attwood gained protection from
the New Mexican Mafia by accident.
[208]
Attwood was hosting a house party.
[209]
The crowd was mostly college age partiers,
however one guy stood out.
[213]
A tough Mexican with huge tatted up arms.
[216]
He was there to deal cocaine, crystal meth
and weed.
[219]
Since Attwood only sold ecstasy, he didn’t
see the other dealer as competition.
[223]
The pair started chatting and the dealer introduced
himself as G-Dog.
[227]
Suddenly a policeman arrived.
[229]
After smelling weed, the policeman pulled
out a gun and aimed it at the partiers, shouting
[233]
for no one to leave.
[235]
G-Dog pulled out his gun, pointed it at the
cop and said "The only one who isn’t going
[239]
to leave is you, motherf-----."
[240]
The crowd scattered.
[242]
Attwood and his friends hid in another apartment.
[244]
The police began going door to door in the
complex as helicopters shone down spotlights.
[248]
There was a sudden pounding on the French
window at the back of the apartment, and they
[252]
assumed it was the cops.
[254]
But it was G-dog asking for shelter.
[256]
Attwood agreed and the group spent the rest
of the night silently hiding in the apartment
[260]
in the dark.
[261]
Sometime later police knocked on the door,
but they eventually left after there was no
[264]
response.
[265]
The next morning, Attwood drove G-Dog home.
[268]
In thanks for hiding him, G-Dog pledged that
he and his brothers would have Attwood’s
[271]
back.
[272]
At first, Attwood had no idea what this meant.
[274]
A few months later, G-Dog invited Attwood
to come meet his "brothers."
[278]
Attwood found himself at a New Mexican Mafia
hangout, full of guys in sagging pants, chains,
[282]
and tattoos.
[284]
A TV showed CCTV footage of the surrounding
area.
[287]
Next to it was the biggest TV Attwood had
ever seen.
[290]
On top of the huge TV, the gang displayed
their rocket-propelled grenade launcher.
[295]
Attwood was terrified, but relaxed when the
group joked with him and offered him protection.
[299]
The rave scene in Arizona was growing.
[302]
Attwood expanded his drug dealing business.
[304]
He sold mainly ecstasy, but also Special K
and LSD.
[308]
He began ordering several thousand ecstasy
tablets at a time from his LA connection.
[312]
He hired a team of people to work for him
and paid them in cash, cars and apartments.
[317]
Eventually, Attwood wanted to bypass his dealer
in LA and purchase straight from the source.
[321]
He found out that the ecstasy was being made
some 5,000 miles away in Amsterdam, Holland.
[327]
With his fraudulent visa, Attwood realized
he couldn’t leave the US.
[330]
So he sent some of his employees to Europe
on "fact finding missions."
[334]
Happy with the samples they brought back,
Attwood began testing different methods of
[337]
smuggling the drugs.
[338]
At first, Attwood's mules only carried around
5,000 pills at a time, but, as they became
[343]
more confident, they smuggled up to 40,000
pills per mission.
[347]
Mainly his employees would go to Germany or
France and then take a train to Amsterdam.
[351]
They would fly back to North America via Mexico
and then smuggle the drugs over the US border.
[356]
The drugs were hidden in luggage, computer
towers or vitamin bottles.
[360]
Attwood imported ecstasy at $3 a pill from
Holland and sold it for $10 a pill to his
[365]
team of sellers.
[366]
By 1999, Attwood had amassed a drug dealing
empire.
[370]
Hundreds of people worked for him; he was
the biggest Ecstasy dealer in Arizona.
[374]
Attwood became nicknamed ‘The Bank of England’
because he had so much money.
[378]
He was also dubbed the Wolf of Widnes, a play
on the ‘Wolf of Wall Street’.
[382]
Attwood’s main enforcers were his childhood
pal WildMan and his New Mexican Mafia buddy
[386]
G-Dog.
[387]
To support his operation, Attwood came up
with an elaborate money-laundering system,
[391]
flying old friends over from Widnes to the
US to set up bank accounts, which he then
[396]
used for illegal activities.
[397]
At the height of his operation, Attwood had
his own rave clothing line, a music store
[401]
and a personal LSD chemist.
[403]
He lived among the very rich in an opulent
mountainside mansion with his third wife,
[408]
a topless dancer and internet porn star.
[410]
He travelled by limo and acquired several
luxury apartments, one of which was just to
[415]
store his ill-gotten gains.
[417]
Attwood was taking drugs as well as selling
them.
[419]
He took upwards of 10 ecstasy pills every
weekend, as well as GHB, crystal meth, valium,
[425]
xanax and ketamine.
[426]
Attwood’s chaotic life was peppered with
extreme moments of paranoia; It wasn’t just
[431]
the drugs--Salvatore Gravano aka ‘Sammy
The Bull’, a former henchman for the Gambino
[436]
Crime Family who had once testified against
John Gotti set up a rival ecstasy distribution
[442]
ring.
[443]
Sammy took a hit out on Attwood and once plotted
to kidnap him from a nightclub, but Attwood
[447]
managed to foil his plans.
[449]
In late 2000, the dot-com bubble burst, and
Attwood’s stocks lost most of their value.
[454]
Meanwhile, Attwood struggled to maintain order
among his crew, quite often playing referee
[458]
to their squabbles.
[459]
Most of his squad was doing so much crystal
meth they were growing reckless, paranoid
[463]
and plotting against each other.
[465]
A few of his employees were caught smuggling
drugs at airports around the world.
[469]
Eventually Attwood fell in love.
[470]
His new girlfriend Claudia, who wasn’t into
the rave scene convinced him to stop his wild
[475]
ways.
[476]
Tired of the havoc, Attwood began to wind
down his partying and slow his drug use.
[481]
Furthermore, Attwood stopped dealing and tried
to rid himself of connections to his Ecstasy
[485]
Empire.
[486]
]He moved in with Claudia and began to improve
his life.
[489]
But it was too late, for the last five years
Attwood had been under federal investigation,
[494]
complete with undercover cops following him
and thousands of wire taps.
[498]
The DEA, US Customs and three Arizona police
forces created a joint task force to bring
[503]
Atwood down.
[504]
Furthermore, the police were able to get ten
witnesses to come forward to testify against
[509]
Attwood.
[510]
On a quiet spring day in 2002 the police finally
arrested Attwood.
[514]
Naively, Attwood thought he had to be caught
red-handed with drugs in order to get arrested.
[518]
Per Arizonian laws, the police had seven years
to convict for any drug offence committed
[523]
and they do not require physical evidence
of the drugs themselves.
[526]
All of Attwood’s assets were seized by the
State of Arizona.
[530]
Attwood was remanded to the notoriously tough
Maricopa County jail run by controversial
[534]
sheriff Joe Arpaio.
[536]
For the next 26 months he lived in a tiny
maximum-security cell with two steel bunks
[541]
and a seatless toilet.
[543]
Attwood struggled to survive the brutal conditions
at the jail, including extreme heat, cockroaches,
[548]
rotten food, violent inmates and murderous
guards.
[551]
Drug smuggling was common with many prisoners
addicted to crystal meth or heroin.
[555]
Stabbings, assault and rape were frequent--gangs
had more control over the jail than the gaurds
[561]
did.
[562]
To deal with stress Attwood began keeping
a journal.
[564]
On bits of paper he wrote entries using a
golf pencil sharpened on his cell door.
[568]
His aunt visited him frequently and she would
smuggle out his writings.
[572]
She would then type them up and email them
to Attwood’s parents.
[575]
Attwood’s father Derick created a blog called
‘Jon’s Jail Journal’ and would post
[580]
the entries there.
[581]
He kept the blog anonymous since Attwood feared
reprisal from guards.
[584]
Eventually the popular blog began to draw
media interest worldwide as the dangerous
[588]
conditions at Maricopa County jail were exposed.
[591]
After serving over two years prior to sentencing,
Attwood signed a plea bargain, admitting guilt
[596]
for drug-dealing and money laundering.
[598]
He was sentenced to nine and a half years,
thereby avoiding a maximum 200 year jail sentence
[603]
if his case had gone to trial.
[604]
In July of 2004, Attwood was moved to the
Arizona Department of Corrections to serve
[609]
out his time.
[610]
His living conditions improved, although the
prisoners were just as violent and dangerous
[615]
as the ones he left behind.
[616]
Attwood continued to write Jon’s Jail Journal
blog entries now, more about the unique, colorful
[621]
prisoners he met rather than his living conditions.
[624]
In prison Attwood attended therapy and read
voraciously, starting with classic literature.
[629]
He studied psychology and philosophy to help
him better understand himself and his life
[633]
choices.
[634]
Attwood claims he read around 1,000 books
in just over six years.
[638]
Attwood was released in December of 2007,
after having served about 6 years of his sentence.
[643]
He was deported to the UK, and banned from
the US for life.
[646]
Temporarily Atwood moved back in with his
parents, and initially struggled to adjust
[651]
to life post prison.
[652]
Cocaine was trendy in the UK and various connections
kept calling Attwood asking for his help in
[657]
establishing a cocaine import business to
the UK.
[660]
Attwood continued to write and in 2008 won
a short story competition with an entry about
[665]
prison life.
[666]
As a result of his win, Attwood was assigned
an author to mentor him.
[670]
Several months later, Attwood received a publishing
deal for his first book which was about his
[673]
experience in America’s toughest jail.
[676]
Since then, Shaun Attwood has published several
books about drugs and the prison system including
[680]
two more books regarding his wild life of
drug dealing and subsequent punishment.
[685]
He continues to update Jon’s Jail Blog,
publishing letters he’s received from prisoners.
[689]
He also campaigns for humane jail conditions.
[691]
In addition to being an author, Attwood is
a speaker who’s given TED talks and also
[695]
has spoken to school children across the UK
and Europe about drugs and the consequences
[700]
of his lifestyle.
[701]
He hopes to prevent youths from making the
same mistakes he did.
[705]
Attwood feels the speeches he makes and the
guidance he offers atones for his former life
[709]
more than the incarceration sentence he served.
[711]
What are some ways you think recidivism can
be lessened?
[714]
Let us know in the comments!
[715]
Also, be sure to check out our other video
called The White American Who Climbed the
[719]
Ranks of the Chinese Mafia - The White Devil!
[722]
Thanks for watching, and, as always, don’t
forget to like, share, and subscribe.
[725]
See you next time!
Most Recent Videos:
You can go back to the homepage right here: Homepage