Kingpins & Coyotes
Available Soon
Kingpins and Coyotes is an unflinching journey into the underworld that thrives along the U.S./Mexico border; a multi-billion-dollar shadow economy of drug cartels, human smugglers, and corrupt facilitators that has flourished in the gray zone between two nations for years.
Drawing on over two and a half decades of firsthand investigative experience, the author exposes the inner workings of transnational criminal organizations, the failures and successes of U.S. border enforcement, and the human cost borne by communities on both sides of the line.
Eric on the front lines along the U.S./Mexico border
Click each photo to enlarge.
Meet Eric BAlliet
Eric S. Balliet is a retired Special Agent with Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) with more than twenty-five years of experience dismantling transnational criminal organizations. A rare “triple-threat” in the field of national security, his career spans high-level policy advisory, internal integrity oversight, and direct involvement in the world’s most significant cartel investigations.
Kingpins & Coyotes draws from Balliet’s firsthand experience confronting cartel leadership, penetrating human smuggling pipelines, and dismantling the adaptive systems that operate in the shadows of the border. His work offers readers an inside look at how illicit networks function—and what it truly takes to dismantle them.
The Insider Perspective
From the front lines of the U.S. Border Patrol in Nogales to the operations centers of the Department of Homeland Security, Balliet has witnessed the evolution of the modern drug war from every angle. He served as the Law Enforcement Advisor to the Secretary of Homeland Security under both the Obama and Trump administrations, providing strategic counsel on border policy, national security matters, and transnational organized crime at the Cabinet level.
Speaking
Eric is available for speaking…
What the public misunderstands about El Chapo
How cartels adapt faster than policy
What 25 years inside HSI reveals about the border
Why enforcement disrupts but rarely destroys the system
Contact Eric Balliet
for media inquiries:
Jessica Sager
Smith Publicity
jessica.sager [at] smithpublicity.com
to contact eric directly:
Eric welcomes your thoughts and questions about the book, and about the drug smuggling and human trafficking underworld. He will try to respond promptly.
He is also available for appearances, interviews, podcasts, and book signings.