The Shawn Ryan Show

Podbit · The Shawn Ryan Show

#325 Sean Strickland - The Most Controversial Fighter in the UFC Opens Up Like Never Before

Explore episode Jul 27, 2026
True Crime
Shawn Ryan's Years in Medellín: Cocaine, Cartels, and a Death Wish

#325 Sean Strickland - The Most Controversial Fighter in th… · Jul 27, 2026 True Crime

After years of CIA contracting, Ryan moved to Medellín, Colombia for five years, embedding himself in cocaine networks, getting arrested multiple times, bribing cops at ATMs, and seeking violence in the most dangerous neighborhoods he could find. He OD'd several times. He wasn't there for work — he was chasing the same adrenaline high that combat gave him, hoping someone would finally kill him.

4m 40s

Where this was said

Shawn Ryan's CIA Years: Medellín, Cocaine, and a Death Wish

At 59:20 · chapter starts 54:40

The conversation about moral erosion prompts Ryan to open up about his own version of the same spiral. After leaving CIA, making good money as a contractor ($200–$250K/year), he couldn't return to normal life — so he didn't. He moved to Medellín, Colombia for roughly five years, buying cocaine from cartel-adjacent dealers while flashing iPhone calculators to simulate scales, bribing police officers at ATMs when arrested, partying in tin-roof shacks for days straight, and OD-ing on multiple occasions. He wasn't there for work. He was there because he was addicted to adrenaline and the only way to replicate combat was to keep stepping into danger. He would drive through neighborhoods hoping motorcycles following him were assassins. He got tipped off he was being surveilled and fled before the local feds moved on him.

Society & Culture
The Moral Erosion Theory: How Trauma Chips Away at Your Soul

#325 Sean Strickland - The Most Controversial Fighter in th… · Jul 27, 2026 Society & Culture

Strickland describes how trauma victims actively destroy their own goodness as a defense mechanism: every bad act erodes the 'little glowing ball' of soul you're born with, because being good only ever made him a victim. After enough acts — hate crimes, violence, cruelty — you become numb. The numbness feels nice. But it's a misery you like, and it leaves you hollow.

4m 40s

Similar podbits

True Crime
Cocaine Inside a Boa Constrictor: The Wildlife-Drug Trade Overlap

#2536 - Eric Goode & Jeremy McBride · Aug 6, 2026 True Crime

The illegal wildlife trade and the drug trade aren't just parallel industries — they actively overlap. Smugglers force-fed cocaine to boa constrictors to evade customs, packed drugs beneath layers of live animals in crates with spitting cobras on top, and exploited the chronic under-resourcing of US Fish and Wildlife inspection teams.

1m 56s
True Crime
Anson Wong: The Global Kingpin of Reptile Smuggling

#2536 - Eric Goode & Jeremy McBride · Aug 6, 2026 True Crime

Anson Wong from Malaysia was the Pablo Escobar of the global reptile trade, supplying rare animals — including Komodo dragons — to buyers across the world. He was caught in a sting, extradited to the US, and served the longest wildlife crime sentence at the time. The animals seized from him went on to stock some of America's biggest zoos.

2 min