Country boy makes bad

Keith Bulfin. Supplied photo.
Keith Bulfin. Supplied photo.
Lots of drugs, lots of money, lots of executions and lots of fear - Undercover: A novel of a life could be described as a ''rollicking good yarn''.

Author Keith Bulfin claims however it is more than a yarn. It is mostly true, and it happened to him.

He expects many will find that hard to accept and will consider the book ''a figment of his imagination''.

He told the Otago Daily Times he has evidence to back up his story and his publisher, Random House, had seen the evidence.

An unnamed spokesman for Random House described Undercover as ''a novel, based on [Mr Bulfin's] life''.

''We called Undercover fiction as we believe there's a great deal of literary licence.''

The spokesman said Random House had witnessed ''various documentation that verifies parts of Keith's story'' and said it ''should not have to verify what's in the novel - as the same way Shantaram doesn't justify itself.''

Shantaram was a 2003 novel by Australian bank robber Gregory Roberts.

Roberts escaped from prison and wrote Shantaram which, according to Wikipedia, he later ''clarified'' as being ''largely fictional''.

The most gruesome part of Mr Bulfin's book is where he writes of nine people being shot and then beheaded with a chainsaw.

It is not the sort of context you expect for a boy who grew up in Lawrence and went to school at Waitahuna.

Mr Bulfin (64) told the ODT from Melbourne his father, Edward, once operated a bus service between Lawrence and Dunedin and is buried in Lawrence alongside Mr Bulfin's grandparents.

His mother and sister live in Christchurch, he has cousins around Waitahuna West, Tuapeka West and in Tapanui and Gore, a brother in the Bay of Islands and an uncle in Mosgiel.

He is planning to visit early in the new year.

Over the course of 300 pages, Mr Bulfin explains how he went from the bucolic paradise of Otago to the sleazy underworld of South American drug crime.

He took the first step while working in the Australian investment banking industry as a share and mortgage broker in the 1980s, when he committed the crime of conspiracy to defraud and was sentenced to three years' jail.

Rather than serving his time in a cushy cell in a low security prison as he expected, he ended up in what the Australians call a ''supermax'' unit for criminals considered ''the worst of the worst''.

There he was beaten and, on one occasion, stabbed.

He lived in fear of the guards and of the other inmates he describes as ''lunatics'' only interested in their next drug ''fix'' and who they were going to kill.

''It was just dreadful. It was like a pack of animals roaming in one circle and each day some of them would fight. They were like caged animals.''

In prison, he befriended two Mexican drug dealers and this, Mr Bulfin suggests, was the beginning of a conspiracy by the United States Drug Enforcement Agency to recruit him so his banking skills could be used in sting operations against South American drug cartels.

On leaving prison, he accepted the DEA's job offer so he would not be deported to New Zealand and also in the hope of resuming his previous occupation.

''The United States Government said they would provide me with credibility, they would provide me with money, they would provide me with the opportunity to work back in the finance industry in New York and they would provide green cards for my family to come over and start a new life.

''But once I'd finished my assignments, none of that was made available to me.''

The only advice he got was not to talk about where he had been and he was told ''if you do, you are going to endanger your own life''.

The main assignment he carried out in South America was to shift millions of dollars of illegal drug profits into an investment bank controlled by the DEA.

All the while, he was telling drug cartel leaders in Mexico - to their face - that he was helping them launder their illegal profits.

Given the shootings and executions he saw, Mr Bulfin had good reason to find these meetings particularly tense and it seems as though he spends most of the book trembling in fear.

Mr Bulfin makes no particular effort to paint himself as either brave or heroic.

''I'm just a country boy from outback New Zealand so I'm not [heroic].

''I never really pushed myself.

I think the only time I've really pushed myself is going back to Mexico and drawing a line in the sand and seeing if I can cut a deal with the Colombians. Which I did.''

Colombians with murderous intent are around every corner of Mr Bulfin's book, and he spends much of his time trying to keep safe his wife and children in Melbourne and his girlfriend and her children in the United States.

Mr Bulfin said he had not spoken to anyone, including his family, about what he had been through until about a month ago - after he had completed the book.

''I witnessed the execution of nine people, so they haunt me quite often.

''It has a devastating effect on you.

''My mother and my sister and my brother and my own family realised something was wrong but because I didn't talk about it, they couldn't work out what it was.''

Mr Bulfin says his main reason for writing the book was as therapy.

''It's been an incredible journey.Every day I talk about it I feel much better in myself.

''Before, I was a bit of a mess after my three assignments ... but I'm like an old Central Otago rugby player. I can bounce back.''

Mr Bulfin admits going public with the story has meant changing names and changing facts to protect himself and innocent people who helped him.

Even so, he does not feel entirely safe from the drug cartels.

''Certainly I'm at risk.

''But then again I've been quite calculated in the sense of finding out who's dead and who's gone to prison.

''And those that are still alive I've never betrayed, so I haven't been a Judas to them.

''It's time now to speak up and I'm not looking over my shoulder.''

He believes in the eyes of South American drug dealers he will be considered a lot more valuable alive than dead.

''If something happened to me, the United States authorities would have a lot of information.

''I've made that quite clear to a lot of people. I carry a lot of information.

''So as long as I keep walking round the streets and staying alive then everybody's safe.''

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