Understanding the drivers of global legal and illegal deforestation is of significant policy concern, particularly for tropical rainforests like the Amazon. This paper explores the local environmental consequences of illegal drug production, specifically focusing on the impact of coca prices and cultivation on tree cover density in Peru. Utilizing remote sensing satellite imagery and cell-level variation in the economic value of potential coca cultivation, I demonstrate that variations in return to cultivate coca drive local deforestation in the Peruvian Amazon forest, surpassing the effects of agricultural and mineral commodity prices. Moreover, a technological revolution involving the adoption of agrochemicals has expanded the coca cultivation frontier to remote Amazon areas, making it a into a diffuse source of environmental degradation, i.e. a non-point source activity. It allowed the cultivation of coca in the unsuitable yet strategic northern districts of Loreto – forested region bordering Colombia. The technological advancements, increasing productivity of forest-derived land uses, presented Narcos with fresh economic opportunities for environmental, and more specifically, forestry crimes.