Coming Clean: The True Story of a Cocaine Drug Lord and His Unexpected Encounter with God

by Jorge L. Valdés and Ken Abraham

Book Overview

As a young man in his twenties with an insatiable thirst for money and power, Jorge Valdes was a founding member of a group that became known as Colombia's Medellin drug cartel at the age of... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1578562945
• ISBN13: 9781578562947
• Release Date: September 2000
• Publisher: Waterbrook Press
• Length: 320 Pages
• Weight: 1.03 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 6.1" x 9.2"

Customer Reviews

New Beginnings

From the very first page the reader is drawn into this first person account of the life of Jorge Valdez, former drug smuggler and money launderer.This is a compelling story of intrigue, corruption, power, and greed.Valdez describes the culture, family life and values of a Cuban family trying to find their dream in America. Valdez emigrated from Cuba with his family when he was 10 years old. He was an honor student and was planning a career in banking and accounting. A series of events changed his life. He became involved with a drug cartel. By age 20, Valdez was in charge of the entire U.S. operation that included smuggling, distributing drugs, and money laundering. Valdez eventually got caught and spent a total of 11 years in federal prison. The account of his family's support during his trial and imprisonment is especially touching.The story is written by author Ken Abraham. The reader is given insight into the world of drug dealers, the prison system, and Valdez's personal ethical values. The book is a well-written account of the dramatic change in the life of Jorge Valdez. This is the testimony of a man freed from the power of sin by the transforming power of Jesus Christ. Vignettes of fellow prisoners help the reader understand the consequences of bad judgment and wrong choices. The story takes you behind prison walls. The contrast of life in prison before and after Jorge's conversion give solid evidence of a man changed by the power of Christ.While in prison Jorge earned an undergraduate degree from Southeastern Bible College and most of his credits for a graduate degree from Wheaton College. After his release Valdez completed his graduate studies at Wheaton College and went on to Loyola University to earn a doctorate in New Testament theology.Valdez has made himself vulnerable in this honest portrayal of his strengths and weaknesses. It is a story of depravation, faith, forgiveness, and a new start. I am looking forward to another installment relating the miracles of Coming Clean Ministries in Tyrone, a nondenominational Christian ministry. This ministry seeks to intercept youth who are on destructive paths by redirecting their lives to become productive members of society.

A compulsive memoir. Be prepared to lose a night's sleep!

When I saw this book on the shelf at my local library, I assumed this would just be some preachy, manipulative work in which a drug dealer tries to make his past vanish by finding God. As a lapsed Catholic I found this concept rather weak, but I picked up the book with a (reasonably) open mind, and started reading.By the time he was in his twenties Jorge Valdes was a cocaine dealer on the rise, dealing to the rich and famous, the living embodiment of wealth and power and luxury; leading a life most of us can imagine only in our wildest dreams. The life of the rich with all the negative excess that goes with it: drugs, pornography, prostitution, infidelity, murder, double-crosses, torture, kidnapping. Enough drama and suspense for a Robert Ludlum novel. The only difference is, this is the real deal. But, as Valdes soon disovers there is a price to all this; and he finds the courage and committment to steer his life onto a new, positive path.Reading this stirred my intense interest in the good and evil that all human beings are capable of, what Karl Jung called "the shadow". Obviously some of the content of this book is tough to take (Especially Valdes' graphic account of him and an associate being tortured by police for refusing to leak info), but the honesty with which Valdes tells his story and the glimpse the reader gets into his former life makes for fascinating and sometimes horrific reading.Even though I gave up my religious faith long ago, I still found myself moved by Mr Valdes's committment to his beliefs and how dramatically his life has changed for the better because of his faith. COMING CLEAN is quite simply a remarkable story. I challenge anyone to read this book and finish it without feeling affected. A very moving and powerful work that could only have come from the pen of someone who has lived and breathed the life... and survived to help prevent others from making the same mistakes he did.

Coming Clean

I read it in three days. It was spellbinding. A wonderful witness to the power of God. Buy it, Read it, and pass it on.

Real Page Turner

I couldn't put it down once I started reading! I learned so much about the Cocaine business and Governments too. What a testimony this guy has! WOW!

Thriller, an inside view into the beginning of the drug cart

Coming Clean (title has now changed from Convicted)reads like a fast paced thriller giving the reader an inside look into the beginnings of the Medellin Drug Cartel and its inner workings,( Who were these people? What they looked like? How did they smuggled tons of cocaine into America? Why did they begin something that is killing many? Who did they corrupt? At what levels? All these answers are found in Coming Clean). It also allows the reader to engage himself or herself as he/she encounters a person who had all the power and money in the world, and everything that went with it, and yet was miserable and almost seems suicideable. It provides answers for parents who are wondering how to deal with their trouble youth, as the reader follows the phenomenal rise and fall of a young Cuban imigrant who become one of America's most powerful person (in his time), a person whose circle was made up of presidents,generals, judges, politicians, models, movie stars and hired killers, and his present rise. A most for all who are looking for hope, and answers in a desperate help. A must for the intrigued person who wants to read a real life thriller. A must for someone searching for hope. And a must for someone who thinks they have it all, but yet can not understand why? The title has now being changed to "COMING CLEAN."