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Dirty Dealing: Drug Smuggling on the Mexican Border and the Assassination of a Federal Judge Audible Audiobook – Unabridged

4.6 4.6 out of 5 stars 177 ratings

Minutes into this rollicking good story, the central figure, Lee Chagra, comes alive: "[Lee] washed his morning cocaine down with strong coffee and remembered the time he had met Sinatra, how genuine he appeared." Everything you'll need to know and remember about Chagra - the son of Syrian immigrants to Mexico and an attorney who spun the world of dope-running, border-crossing, high-living outlaws along the El Paso-Juarez border around his finger like the gaudy rings he favored - can be neatly summarized in that one sentence. Chagra dies not long after, yet he haunts the rest of this cautionary tale like a high-rolling specter.

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Product details

Listening Length 15 hours and 46 minutes
Author Gary Cartwright
Narrator J. Rodney Turner
Audible.com Release Date March 24, 2020
Publisher HighBridge, a division of Recorded Books
Program Type Audiobook
Version Unabridged
Language English
ASIN B084NZ2RTF
Best Sellers Rank #231,923 in Audible Books & Originals (See Top 100 in Audible Books & Originals)
#426 in Organized Crime (Audible Books & Originals)
#1,092 in US State & Local History
#1,162 in Murder True Crime

Customer reviews

4.6 out of 5 stars
177 global ratings

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Top reviews from the United States

  • Reviewed in the United States on March 9, 2013
    I love this book. This author -- Gary Cartwright -- has done a fabulous job writing this true story about a convoluted family hell-bent on rising to the top of wealth and power, no matter the risk and cost. Their plot against a Federal Judge John Wood, whose reputation was exceptionally harsh, keeps the reader on the edge of his seat. The hit man, Charles Harrelsen (Woody's dad), now deceased, will put a few goose bumps on your arms. (Good thing Woody's Mom pointed him in the right way.)
    4 people found this helpful
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  • Reviewed in the United States on May 20, 2014
    Gary Cartwright has produced the best work on these two subjects. Exhaustively researched and extremely well written. The Chagras family is chronicled, warts and all. A very powerful work of El Paso/Juarez, Mexico history. It did seem that Judge Wood's murder was inevitable. If the cartels ever took hold in the USA, this book outlined that. The FBI prevented that from happening. That is the difference between the USA and Mexico.We are lucky. As bad as Judge Wood was, this book shows the cartels would be worse.
    One person found this helpful
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  • Reviewed in the United States on January 12, 2025
    Great book about the brothers attorneys in El Paso, TX. I’m from El Paso. I read this when I was 15. Now I read it again and it seemed better. Recommend.
  • Reviewed in the United States on May 18, 2014
    the book is about the chagra family and there drug dealings. it is one of the best written, well documented books i have ever read on the subject and Cartwright personally knew all players. jimmy chagra had federal judge john wood Jr killed el Paso Texas is 120 miles from my home town and the hit man and his dad had a house here. i knew several people mentioned but never knew there was any link between them until i read the book.
    One person found this helpful
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  • Reviewed in the United States on January 18, 2020
    Liked the book because it was a well known attorney that everyone knew here in El Paso, Texas...it's how it all came down from start to finish. It was in our local newspaper every day.
    5 people found this helpful
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  • Reviewed in the United States on December 19, 2019
    Factual - outstanding book. I have never doubted Jimmy Chagra’s and Charles Harrelsons’s guilt and I am always prosecution oriented...but I’m disappointed in the case put on by the government. Gary’s book is outstanding.
    One person found this helpful
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  • Reviewed in the United States on August 28, 2019
    I lived in El Paso when all this was going on and this book was great. I also learned a lot I didn't know. Great read.
    One person found this helpful
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  • Reviewed in the United States on October 2, 2014
    I had borrowed my brothers book but in a move I misplaced it, so I was trying to replace the book although it looks the same there were no pictures, it appears to read the same, but without the pictures.