Motorbike Murderers and Femmes Fatales: The Rise of the Female Assassin in Colombia

This article charts the rise in historical reality and cultural production of the female assassin in Colombia. Though Pablo Escobar has largely been assumed to be the most infamous and powerful narco in Colombia's drugs wars during the 1980s and early 90s, female narcos and bosses have always been evident, from Griselda Blanco, the 'Madrina de la cocaína' onwards. Furthermore, women in the Colombian drug trade have become a popular topic in the novels and  telenovelas about narco life that have proliferated in the country in the last twenty years. These women do not simply star as wives and girlfriends of the drugs lords but as leaders of cartels and criminal enterprises in their own right, reflecting both a desire within Colombia to understand the torrid years of the drugs wars and an actual rise in the Colombian news reports of cases of female assassins and gang members.