During his career he was considered an extremely cunning criminal and in the words of his former associates the Rodriguez Orejuela brothers "More bloodthirsty than Pablo Escobar".
He did this with the active collaboration of retired Armed Forces officers, well equipped with high calibre weapons, means of communication and all-terrain vehicles.
Despite evidence of illicit enrichment, Prosecutor General Gustavo de Greiff refused to open an investigation against Henao.
After the capture of his former associates in the Cali Cartel, Henao gained power by bribing authorities, especially police Colonel Danilo González, and by allying himself with the paramilitaries led by Carlos Castaño Gil.
[15][16] Henao's murder marked the fragmentation of the Norte del Valle Cartel into two irreconcilable and rival factions; the Machos led by his cousin Diego Montoya "Don Diego", and the Rastrojos led by Wilber Varela, in addition to the violent Varela's reaction ordering the murder of the clan of the Herrera brothers, among them "El inválido" in Guayaquil, Ecuador, and the exile of others of them.