Miguel (Grand Theft Auto)

Miguel is a character in the Grand Theft Auto series who appears as a main character, as well as a major antagonist in Grand Theft Auto III (set in 2001) and as a minor character in Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories (set in 1998).

Miguel is co-leader of the Colombian Cartel along with Catalina, and is involved in the gang's narcotics trade.

He was voiced by Al Espinosa.

Biography
Miguel is born in Colombia and at some point prior to 1998 moves to Liberty City, joining the Colombian Cartel, becoming a prominent member of the gang.

Miguel frequently sells drugs from Portland Harbour to the Leone Family and meets Toni Cipriani in a deal in 1998 that is later ambushed by the Liberty City Police Department. Toni Cipriani seemingly kills Miguel, who manages to survive. He continues to climb the ranks of the Cartel and, following the death of Cisco, becomes one of the gang's co-leaders.

In 2001 he 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 begin to increase the gang's influence in the city by stepping up the production of the drug SPANK from a freighter in Portland Harbour and 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, on orders from Don Salvatore Leone, kills Curly Bob and then destroys the freighter containing the SPANK factory.

Claude, after moving to Staunton Island, 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 hands the package to Claude but is shot by Catalina, who jumps down into a skip to escape.

Asuka Kasen, enraged following the death of her brother Kenji at the hands of a "Cartel assassin" (really Claude disguised as a Cartel member), begins to torture Miguel for information on the Cartel's operations.

After extracting information from Miguel, Asuka then sends Claude to stop the Cartel operations, which includes killing three Cartel hit squads, destroying the Kappa Coffee House stands (which were a front 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, with Miguel impaled on a construction pole, with a note addressed to Claude attached to his body. After Claude reads the note, he leaves the corpses of Miguel and Asuka behind and goes to the Cochrane Dam to save Maria from Catalina's clutches. It's presumed that the corpses of Miguel and Asuka are later found either by the authorities or by the Yakuza and disposed of.

Trivia

 * In the beta of Grand Theft Auto III, at the introduction cut scene Miguel would have said "Catalina! Move your ass!". This may suggest that in the video game's earlier version, Miguel was a high-ranking member of the Colombian Cartel above Catalina. Given that Catalina is the cartel's leader and the game's main antagonist in the finished version, it's likely that this line was removed to show that Miguel is behind her within the ranks.
 * Interestingly, it's possible to kill Miguel during his appearance in Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories. Nevertheless, if Miguel dies at Toni Cipriani's hands, his death in that game can't be considered canonical as he really dies near the end of GTA III, set three years later.