Simon Bond (Author) During the mid-1980s Howard Marks had forty-three aliases, eighty-nine phone lines and owned twenty-five companies trading throughout the world. At the height of his career he was smuggling consignments of up to thirty tons of marijuana, and had contact with organisations as diverse as MI6, the CIA, the IRA and the Mafia. Following a worldwide operation by the Drugs Enforcement Agency, he was busted and sentenced to twenty-five years in prison at Terre Haute Penitentiary, Indiana. He was released in April 1995 after serving seven years of his sentence.Howard Marks (Author) Howard Marks (1945–2016) wrote the international bestseller Mr Nice, which describes his years as one of the world's most wanted drug barons. It has sold over one million copies worldwide and was adapted into a major film. He also garnered critical and popular acclaim for The Howard Marks Book of Dope Stories, Senor Nice and a series of crime novels.