Drugs, Violence and God. Those are three things that are well present in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. With unprecedented access to Rio de Janeiro’s dangerous backstreets, Oscar-winning filmmaker Jon Blair provides an unflinching look at one of the bloodiest urban conflicts in the world, which leaves more than 1,000 people dead each year. What has previously only been portrayed in fictional films like the famous City of God is now on screen and for real, [...]

Set in 1991 on the inner-city streets of Oakland, California, cocaine dealer Charles Cosby has his life is changed forever when he writes a fan letter to the “Cocaine Godmother” Griselda Blanco, who is serving time at a nearby federal prison. Six months later, Cosby is a multi-millionaire, Blanco’s lover, and the head of her $40 million a year cocaine business. Also known as “The Black Widow” for her propensity to permanently dispose of her [...]

The first collection of pictures is not for the faint of heart. The Mexican drug war is still going strong. Bodies of drug traffickers, dealers and gang members are found on a daily basis, sometimes even in huge numbers. The second is a collection of color photographs taken in Russia between 1909 and 1912. Photographer Sergei Mikhailovich Prokudin-Gorskii (1863-1944)  used a specialized camera to capture three black and white images in fairly quick succession, using [...]

A chance encounter with a Russian drug lord becomes a ticket to hell when two young Englishmen fall for promises of money and beaches. Relive their terrifying story from the contact to their 10 years in a Venezuelan prison to their desperate escape. The Bizarre and The Cool:

Recent research has analysed the link between the harmful effects of drugs relative to their current classification by law with some startling conclusions. Perhaps most startling of all is that alcohol, solvents and tobacco (all unclassified drugs) are rated more dangerous than ecstasy, 4-MTA and LSD (all class A drugs). If the current ABC system is retained, alcohol would be rated a class A drug and tobacco class B. The drug policies have remained unchanged [...]

In San Salvador, El Salvador 3220 km of Los Angeles ‘ Eighteen street ‘ , there is a gang known as “18 “and reign over their territory as an armed militia. In the mid 90′s, thousands of Salvadoran who lived illegally in the U.S. were deported to their homeland. Some brought LA gang culture with their back to a country ravaged by poverty and awash with weapons was. Organizing support for gang members in need, [...]

Locked Up Abroad tells the true stories of unsuspecting travelers embarked on what they thought would be fun-filled vacations, only to be spent years in a foreign prison. This episode tells the story of a Texas teen who attempted to smuggle 33 pounds of marijuana into the U.S. and was imprisoned in Mexico. The Bizarre and The Cool: