Miguel is the tertiary antagonist of Grand Theft Auto III and a minor character in Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories.
He is voiced by Al Espinosa in GTA III and Jamie Hector in GTA Liberty City Stories.
History
Background
Miguel is co-leader of the Colombian Cartel along with Catalina, and is involved in the gang's narcotics trade.
He was born in Colombia and at some point prior to 1998 moved to Liberty City, where he joined Colombian Cartel and soon became a prominent member of the gang.
Events of Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories
Miguel frequently sells drugs from Portland Harbor to the Leone Family and meets Toni Cipriani in a deal in 1998, which is ambushed by the LCPD and FBI. Toni escapes with the drugs after seemingly killing Miguel, but he manages to survive.
Over the next three years, Miguel continues to climb the ranks of the Cartel and, following the death of Cisco in 2000, becomes one of the gang's co-leaders.
Events of Grand Theft Auto III
In 2001 Miguel meets Catalina and Claude as they arrive in the city and helps them rob a bank as their getaway driver. After Catalina shoots Claude and leaves him for dead, Miguel escapes the police with Catalina. Catalina and Miguel then continue leading the Cartel together and increase the gang's influence in the city by stepping up the production of the drug SPANK from a freighter in Portland Harbor. They also begin to work against the Leone Family, exchanging Leone secrets for SPANK with barman Curly Bob. Their operations, however, are stopped by Claude who, under orders from Don Salvatore Leone, kills Curly Bob and then destroys the freighter containing the SPANK factory.
Claude later moves to Staunton Island, where he begins to work for Donald Love, first rescuing the Old Oriental Gentleman from the Cartel. Love later sends Claude to collect a package from an incoming plane at Francis International Airport and later has him return to collect the real package, having previously sent Claude to collect decoy packages. The package, however, has already been collected by Miguel and Catalina. Claude goes to a construction site in Fort Staunton and confronts Miguel and Catalina. Miguel attempts to reason with Claude and gives him the package, but is then betrayed and shot by angry Catalina, who jumps down into a skip to escape.
Death
Asuka Kasen, enraged following the death of her brother Kenji at the hands of a "Cartel assassin" (actually it was Claude disguised as a Cartel member), begins to torture the injured Miguel for information on the Cartel's operations. After extracting information from Miguel, Asuka sends Claude to stop these Cartel operations, which includes killing three Cartel hit squads, destroying the Kappa Coffee House stands (which were fronts to sell SPANK) and destroying a plane and collecting the SPANK packages inside. After collecting the SPANK packages, Claude returns to the construction site and finds Asuka and Miguel dead, who were both killed by Catalina (or by other Cartel members) in an attempt to stop Claude's attacks on the Cartel. Claude then investigates Miguel's body, in which a piece of rebar is impaled through the back of his upper spine, and finds a note from Catalina attached to it, before leaving.
Prominent Appearances in Gameplay
Grand Theft Auto III
- Introduction (Betrayal)
- Cutting the Grass
- Grand Theft Aero
- Bait
- Espresso-2-Go!
- S.A.M. (Killed off-screen)
- Ransom (Corpse)
Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories
- Contra-Banned (Can be killed) (non-canon death)
Gallery
Grand Theft Auto III
Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories
Trivia
- In the beta version of GTA III, during the introduction cutscene, Miguel would say, "Catalina! Move your ass!"[1]
- In the beta version of GTA Liberty City Stories, Miguel looked more like his GTA III appearance.
- Miguel was scheduled to appear in Grand Theft Auto Advance, but was cut during development. He is listed in a wishlist of character artworks for cutscenes as of the 26 February 2003 revision of the game's Design Document.[2]