THERE is an office high in a hillside barrio in Medellin, Colombia, home of
Escobar's powerful drug cartel, where a photograph, name, address and $50 cash buys you a hit job on the unwanted business rival or enemy of your choice.
The killers, known as sicarios, are poor teenagers living in the same area, willing to do anything to escape the frustration, poverty and boredom of their lives.
The sicario's first hit is free, just a test, on the target of his choice. If he survives and completes a few more successful "jobs," he will edge closer to the inner mafia circle, graduating perhaps to the post of bodyguard.
Ten years ago, on a student scholarship to Colombia, I was forced to leave the town of Chiquinquira after a late night encounter with a man wearing a poncho and carrying a gun. The reasons were blurred, but the message was clear.
I moved to Bogota to take up a teaching post. Each morning I left my apartment at 6 a.m., walked along a deserted street, wondering if the worst was going to happen today. One morning, a motorcycle with pillion passenger started up behind me, edged closer drew up beside me ... and went on.
The incident was trivial compared with the experiences of other journalists and investigators, for whom death was swift and merciless.
The Colombian people have often asked themselves the same question as people in Ireland have been asking this week how did we let our country slide this far?
The drug trade has infiltrated every aspect of their nation's life, from construction to tourism, the entertainment industry, football teams, and now to the president himself, who received $6 million for his 1994 election campaign.
The Colombian government ignored, tolerated and finally tackled the drug barons in the late 1980s, but the battle proved too much and the state finally settled for an end to drug related violence, rather than an end to the drug business itself.
First a journalist was killed, and there was outrage. Extra police powers were granted. Then a justice minister was killed.
Next it was a highly respected newspaper editor, Guillermo Cano. A day of mourning was declared. Then it was the turn of a presidential candidate, as anyone who spoke out was silenced.
There are no days of mourning any more, no more police powers left to grant and few voices brave enough to challenge the drug barons.
The death of Veronica Guerin, the first Irish journalist to die for her work in exposing criminal activities, could mark the beginning of the same process.
The call for internment, curfews, more police powers, arbitrary search and detention may satisfy public outrage for a while, but will not seriously affect the drug business.
In Ireland, low inflation, high growth rates, record car purchases and millionaire house prices are the accepted benchmarks of the nation's success.
Nowhere is there a serious discussion on quality of life, an intangible yet crucial marker which determines a society's ability to maintain a relatively happy and secure citizenry.
The Orejuela family, based in Cali, Colombia, control an estimated 80 per cent of cocaine entering the US and crave respectability. Their kids went to exclusive private schools, then on to European and US universities, majoring in business administration.
Again the pattern in Colombia has parallels with Ireland. Of the five main suspects in the Guerin killing, one has invested in transport and pubs, sending his kids to expensive schools, mixing with wealthy and public figures. Another owns a leisure business worth over £2 million.
The drug traffickers rely on a loyal network of professionals the solicitors, bankers and property owners who launder money
It is no coincidence that the top Irish criminals are Dubliners from deprived inner city backgrounds, craving wealth and respectability too difficult to achieve by other means.
The rot can be stopped. A fresh strategy would combine asset freezing with decriminalisation of drugs. The quality of life struggle means a reversal of the growing inequality of Irish society, which has left 60 per cent of the country's wealth in the hands of 5 per cent of the population.
The next stage, the most difficult, is to tackle the cult of consumerism and greed, a steady diet of consumer desire which excludes many, breeding resentment and a tolerance for activities regarded as beyond human moral boundaries.
If not, the Irish sicarios will multiply, secret offices will arrange dirty deals, and, obeying the iron law of market forces, the price will drop dramatically, approaching the cut price Colombian way.