Wtf are you gibbering about? For essentially the entirety of the 20th century, and especially so after Nixon launched the war on drugs, serious drug trafficking has been considered to be right up there with murder in most countries. You can face the death penalty for it even in relatively civilised places like Singapore.
If you want to argue that drug trafficking isn't a serious crime morally/ethically speaking then I will be the first to agree with you. However, the majority of people now and the vast majority then were/are fully on board with this, they hate drug traffickers, and while I disagree with their ultimate conclusion* it's not hard to see why. But to claim that Pablo Escobar wasn't considered a serious criminal is flipping nuts.
Just ask the Columbian police:
*cause I am smarter than them and have put a lot of intellectual effort into rationalising what I like to do as good, just like every other person who thinks they are good...