I previously read I Am A Hitman, which I thoroughly enjoyed, so was very much looking forward to reading about the drug world now. The Inner Workings of Modern Drug Dealing” — THE BUSINESS SECRETS OF DRUG DEALING author Matt Taibbi interviewed for Merry Jane (2/12/2021)

Secrets of Drug Dealing Unveiled” — THE BUSINESS SECRETS OF DRUG DEALING author Matt Taibbi interviewed on Rising (4/1/2021) I've read a decent amount on the world of narco-crime, with one of the most formative books being ZeroZeroZero, a read that truly exposed the underworkings of something quite complex through an investigative lens. It asks questions about how things work, why things exist, and how power is crucial to both things. The search and seizure rules dictate these rules. Cops can’t say they saw a suitcase full of weed in plain view. They need a reason to open that trunk, and if you play it right, you never give that to them. In business, racism is your friend. If you master the nuances of it, you will prevail. Race is everything in America, especially in law enforcement.Liam Hughes enjoyed up to six holidays a year, jetting off to see top DJs at events in Ibiza and Croatia, thanks to his ill-gotten gains. He was out of St. Louis, the son of my aunt Sonja, my father’s sister. Aunt Sonja treated me like a son of her own. Whenever I was in town, she’d drop everything to make me catfish. We were tight, which is why I made a mistake and brought in her son. But he didn’t want to play the bait role. He thought he was too big time for that, even though he was still only twenty-four. He insisted on being in charge, in the rear car.

A party boy drug dealer who snorted his profits away was caught red-handed with carrier bags full of cocaine and cash.

You don’t really need that second car. It costs more and doesn’t do anything specific other than add a set of eyes. But it’s an extra buffer, one more layer of confusion for authorities. Three cars is too few, five cars is too expensive. But four is perfect. Buddy didn’t have a clue what he was doing. He didn’t know how many grams there were in an ounce, how many ounces in a pound. He didn’t know the difference between profit and loss. Stephen McNally, prosecuting, said Hughes' home in Fazakerley, was used to store large quantities of cash and drugs, where he was "hands on" in weighing and "bashing" - cutting with adulterants - for onward supply. The first third was a little slow as we got more information about his childhood, with lots of history on the area and civil wars which his mother was involved with. Whilst it was fairly interesting, it did drag on and I wanted to hear more about the actual murky world of being a drug dealer.