The Three Miamis
When I was a kid in high school, living in Miami and going to one of the more affluent public schools, there were three types of kids — the rich ones from Coconut Grove and Key Biscayne, the poor ones also from Coconut Grove, and the somewhat middle-class ones in between.
It was the late ’70s, early ’80s — sun, swagger, and a city already running on something stronger than orange juice.
I was in that in-between middle class. My parents worked for a living, and I worked at Burger King in the Grove. I had friends from all sides — the Black kid who tried to sell me weed, and the rich buddies from the Keys who used to borrow cocaine from their parents. Quaaludes were starting to show up. When I was in middle school, a couple of kids used to sniff hairspray to get high. Both had divorced parents and generous fathers. The pattern was obvious even then — the richer and more disconnected the parents, the more lost their kids became.
The Night That Could’ve Ruined My Life
Drug use was everywhere, but alcohol was ten times worse. If we care about our society and our children, we’ve got to admit it starts early — and usually with the parents.
Nancy Reagan said, “Just Say No.” Everyone laughed. But the truth is, she was right. It just didn’t work, because the money behind drugs always wins.
When I was fifteen, I almost became one of those lost souls. My friends and I met some girls on US-1. The older guys decided to buy weed in the Grove, and of course, I went along — clueless and thrilled. Then the police lights came on. The driver floored it, somehow outran them, and we escaped.
That night could have wrecked my life. One arrest and I’d have started adulthood with a record. No business, no future — just another name in the system.
The Respectable Criminals
Before Miami Vice made it glamorous, drug running was considered just another hustle. Some made a few runs and retired rich; others did a few more and got caught.
Money laundering was the real business. Car dealers, bankers, restaurateurs, hotel owners — all laundering drug money. Many of those same people later became “pillars of the community.”
When I started my first business, a vice president of Ocean Bank offered me half a million dollars as a “loan.” No paperwork, no questions. My mother’s words echoed — Don’t do anything shady; you’ll regret it the rest of your life. I walked away. Years later, that entire branch was under investigation, and people went to prison.
The 1980s: Cash, Chaos, and Car Alarms
The 1980s were wild. If you weren’t selling drugs, you were washing the money or selling guns. Real estate, banking, even laundromats — all fueled by cocaine cash.
People built ten-thousand-square-foot mansions in the middle of nowhere, paid all-cash. Everyone had a stack of hundreds.
I ran a car-alarm business. Installed systems in BMWs, Porsches, and Mercedes for $300-$500. After the third stereo theft, people were ready to pay.
Once, wiring a house alarm, one of my guys peeked under a bed — full of automatic weapons. I told him, Don’t look. Just finish and get out.
Another client wanted an alarm on his new Ferrari Testarossa — but with a “special feature.” He wanted the car to blow up if the alarm went off. He offered me $5,000. I said no. He said someone else would do it. I told him, That’s okay. Other people need the money.
That was Miami in the 1980s. Beautiful, dangerous, and completely insane.
Three Miamis, One War
There were really three Miamis:
- The flamboyant, drug-fueled paradise of the rich.
- The working-class majority living off the overflow.
- The dark side everyone ignored.
Bodies floated in Biscayne Bay. Dadeland Mall turned into a war zone. The police, armed with six-shot revolvers, faced dealers with Uzis, rocket launchers, and armored cars.
I met traffickers with their own fleets of boats and planes — one guy even had his own 727.
When law enforcement finally fought back, they brought helicopters, automatic weapons, and a new mindset: if the drug cartels had declared war, the police were going to fight one.
The Ones Who Got Out
Some of the early dealers — mostly Cubans and Americans — cleaned up their act. They donated to charities, backed politicians, and rebranded themselves as civic leaders.
Others weren’t so lucky. Many died or rotted in prison. I knew all three types. They weren’t monsters — just people who made bad choices and couldn’t find the exit.
The Crack Boom
Push one way, and life pushes back harder. Enter crack.
It was cocaine’s cheaper, deadlier cousin — faster, easier to make, and more addictive. A marketing genius’s dream. It destroyed people faster than any drug before it.
By then, Colombians controlled the East Coast, Mexicans the West. America was divided — not politically, but chemically.
Truth About Drugs
Let’s be honest:
Marijuana numbs you. It’s addictive and turns ambition into apathy.
Cocaine makes you feel like Superman — until you crash.
Mix them with new chemicals, and you get zombies — people who’d kill for the next hit.
Dealers joke: Make it strong, make it cheap, don’t kill the customer. But no one talks about what it does to their mind.
When It Reaches the Children
By the time my son was in elementary school, they arrested someone for selling pills to kids. The logic was simple: If my parents do it, why shouldn’t I?
Same excuse kids used for smoking in the 1950s — only this time, it kills faster.
Fentanyl: The Final Stage
Now it’s 2025. China and India mass-produce the precursor chemicals. Colombia and Mexico mix them with cocaine. Venezuela helps finance the trade. Submarines carry it to the U.S. and Europe.
These drugs kill about 100,000 Americans every year — and just as many in spirit. Don’t be fooled — this isn’t just business. It’s a quiet act of war.
The Real Cost
For every person who dies, five more become walking dead. They don’t go to rehab. They just fade until the next dose finishes the job.
So when Trump sends helicopters and blows up drug boats, I don’t shed a tear. Those aren’t fishermen. That’s the cost of doing business in hell.
The real world isn’t a utopia where everyone hugs it out. Some choices are fatal, and some wars are forced on you.
The Man on the Plane
A few years ago, I was flying from Bogotá to Medellín and met a man who said he was a fiscal — a kind of district attorney and sheriff combined. His job was to investigate government officials tied to narco-traffickers.
He pointed out the window at a C-130 military plane. “That one was used last week to move drugs,” he said. He explained that soldiers and politicians worked for the government by day and for traffickers by night.
I started to feel uneasy sitting next to him. A few months later, I saw in the news that he’d been killed.
Now go tell me about the rights of drug dealers.
Epilogue
Sex, Drugs and Rock and Roll isn’t just about Miami. It’s about how greed, neglect, and bad parenting can rot a nation from the inside out.
We went from a joint behind the bleachers to submarines full of poison.
And all along, people said, “It’s just business.”
But business built on death never stays clean for long
EXTRA CREDIT:
So what happened to the Sex and Rock & Roll part?
That is coming in another post.
Oh, that boat in the picture above was mine. I bought it at a Palm Beach sheriff’s auction — a former drug boat. She could hit 70 miles per hour… right up until she ran out of gas, which happened more than once. Gas was cheap back then, but the real problem was the Coast Guard. They kept pulling me over for inspections, convinced I was running drugs instead of just running out of fuel.
Meanwhile these are some related posts:
Spice, Speed, and Overreach:The Al Copeland Story
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