Ike Atkinson - Relationship To Frank Lucas

Relationship To Frank Lucas

According to the DEA Atkinson was in fact the main supplier of heroin to Harlem drug lord Frank Lucas after the two met in Bangkok around 1974. Atkinson takes issue with the most famous aspect of Lucas' operation, the so-called "Cadaver Connection" in which heroin was smuggled in the coffins of dead American soldiers coming back from Vietnam, instead claiming he smuggled the drugs inside furniture.

In the 2007 film American Gangster, Atkinson is represented by the character Nate, played by Roger Guenveur Smith. The film depicts Nate as being Lucas' cousin, but Atkinson's family deny there are any blood ties between the two. However, Frank Lucas claims that Ike is married to one of his cousins, which made him akin to family.

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