Gilberto Rodríguez Orejuela

He died at a prison medical center in Butner, North Carolina on 31 May 2022 at the age of 83.

On 6 February 2020, Rodríguez Orejuela submitted an application to a Miami federal judge seeking compassionate early release pursuant to the First Step Act. The application was made despite having served only half of his 30 year term. On 28 April 2020, Federal District Judge Federico Moreno rejected the application stating that there were no "extraordinary and compelling" grounds to support the application. The judge stated that "the court is totally unwilling to undermine and undo such public respect for the law, as well as the gravity of the offenses committed" and that while Rodríguez Orejuela has endured a litany of chronic illnesses including cancer, his criminal record is so repugnant that there is no way he could effectively cut his sentence in half.

On 5 March 2018, a Colombian court sentenced eight relatives of the Rodríguez brothers to nine years in prison for laundering money that had been obtained during the Rodriguez brothers' time as heads of the Cali Cartel. Specifically, the court found that the family had used their legitimate businesses (including the pharmacy chain Drogas La Rebaja) to launder billions of pesos. These individuals had also shifted the money through various bank accounts in order to make it appear legitimate.

On 26 September 2006, both Gilberto and Miguel were sentenced to 30 years in prison, after pleading guilty to charges of conspiring to import cocaine to the U.S. They took this deal in exchange for the United States agreeing not to bring charges against their family members. Their lawyers, David Oscar Markus and Roy Kahn, were able to obtain immunity for 29 family members.

On 16 November 2006, the brothers pleaded guilty to one count of conspiring to engage in money laundering. Both were sentenced to an additional 87 months in prison. The two prison terms were set to run concurrently.

Gilberto Rodríguez Orejuela was extradited to the United States on 3 December 2004. His brother Miguel was also arrested.

He was sentenced to 15 years in prison but was temporarily freed in early November 2002, due to a controversial judicial order issued by deputy judge Pedro José Suárez. In March 2003, Rodríguez Orejuela was recaptured by Colombian authorities in Cali.

After the demise of Pablo Escobar, the Colombian authorities turned their attention to the Cali Cartel. The police campaign against the cartel began in the summer of 1995. President Ernesto Samper dispatched a "joint task force" code named "Search Bloc", formed by top police and elite commandos headed by Police General Rosso José Serrano, declaring an all-out war against the drug cartels.

On 9 June 1995, Rodríguez Orejuela was arrested by the Colombian National Police (PNC) during a house raid in Cali. When the police had searched the home several days earlier, he had escaped detection by hiding in a hollowed-out bathroom cabinet with an oxygen tank.

On 15 November 1984, Gilberto was captured in Spain. At the time of his arrest, he was accompanied by Jorge Luis Ochoa Vásquez. Gilberto would be in Spain to hold meetings with the aim of expanding the cartel business on the European continent. From that moment on, the cartel began to work with traffickers in Galicia, but mainly established strategic alliances with the powerful Camorra, which would be in charge of the distribution of Cali cocaine throughout Europe.

Gilberto Rodríguez Orejuela, along with his brother Miguel Rodríguez Orejuela and José Santacruz Londoño, formed the Cali Cartel in 1975. They were initially primarily involved in marijuana trafficking. In the 1980s, they branched out into cocaine trafficking. For a time, the Cali Cartel supplied 80% of the United States through Rodriguez's son, Jorge Alberto Rodriguez, and 90% of the European cocaine market.

Gilberto José Rodríguez Orejuela (30 January 1939 – 31 May 2022) was a Colombian drug lord, who was one of the leaders of the Cali Cartel, based in the city of Cali.