Turning over an old leaf

Robert Sabbag is the author of Smokescreen, a compulsively page-turning account of the exploits of Allen Long, the subject of the hotpress interview last issue. This is Sabbag’s second journey between hard covers on the subject of drug smuggling. Snowblind, his book about the life and times of cocaine smuggler Zachary Swan was hailed by Hunter S. Thompson upon publication and is now recognised as a classic of the genre. And it turns out it was that work which first brought the journalist and author into contact with the subject of his new book.

“I first met Allen sometime in the ’70s when he called me up and said that he wanted to buy the movie rights to Snowblind, Sabbag relates. “Although that wasn’t possible, we met up and he tried to convince me to write a book about his own marijuana smuggling activities. I really wasn’t eager to write another dope book right away and when I realised that Allen was still in business, I decided to let it pass. We still stayed in occasional contact.

“When he finally got out of federal custody in 1995, he called me again and then the time seemed right. I spent a lot of time interviewing him and travelling with him. He was much easier to work with than Zachary Swan (central character of Snowblind) ever was. Swan spent the first year or two years of my research just bullshitting me – lying, glamorising things or just plain covering things up. Allen didn’t do anything like that. Allen was very straightforward. Of course, Allen didn’t have anybody to protect. All the people had been arrested, he was not exposed and he didn’t have to protect himself – so he was very forthcoming.

Not that the collaboration was all plain sailing – or even, more to the point, plane flying.

“The difficulty in the co-operation that I got from Allen was that it took a long time for me to convince him that he couldn’t just wing it with the information, he couldn’t just estimate who was there, estimate the dates or, indeed, the weights,” says Sabbag. “It just falls apart when you start writing the narrative. So I had to keep going back every time stories or dates didn’t check out, or the information was bad. But the other thing he did was he got several of the characters to co-operate and once everyone came on board, they were able to share information and corroborate information and correct each other and come up with the right information.

“We couldn’t find this guy Frank Hatfield, the pilot, until we were well into the project and that made things difficult. There was so much technical data that was unavailable to me. You know, how fast was the DC3 plane going when it hit the ground? How much weight can it carry? What does the engine sound like when it’s about to crash? I think that kind of stuff enriches it.

“Of course another problem was that a lot of these people were completely stoned throughout most of the time the story was taking place. They just couldn’t remember! But I think we got the full facts in the end!”

What about his dealings with the authorities?

“I didn’t have any trouble with the DEA while I was writing the book and meeting all of these characters. But that’s not true of Snowblind. I think the DEA would very much like to have talked to me back then. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that my phone line had been tapped back then.

“But with Allen, there was none of that. These crimes were ancient history to the government, they didn’t want anything to do with these guys. They’d all gone to prison and all been released from prison. I’ve done articles where the DEA have co-operated with me – I’ve done articles on them. I’m not gonna get into trouble with them. The only thing I’ll say about the government is that if you’re legit press, they don’t mess with you. They do have a respect for the freedom of the press and they’re co-operative. In fact, they’re required by law to be co-operative.”