Juan Cortez

Background

Colonel Juan Garcia Cortez is an exiled military officer who lives aboard a luxury yacht moored at the Ocean Bay Marina in Vice City. Officially a cultural attache with diplomatic immunity, he deals in narcotics, arms and stolen military technology. He claims to have survived dozens of coups and several death sentences in his homeland. A widower, he lives with his daughter Mercedes Cortez and has a long-standing grudge against the French secret service.

Events of GTA Vice City

• Cortez helped broker the deal between the Forellis and the Vance brothers that is ambushed at the start of the game. In The Party, Tommy Vercetti meets him at a party on his yacht, where he promises to look into the matter and hints that Ricardo Diaz may know more.
• In Treacherous Swine, Cortez gives Tommy a chainsaw and asks him to kill Gonzalez, a trusted aide who has been leaking information to Diaz. Tommy chases Gonzalez out of a Vice Point penthouse and kills him.
• In Mall Shootout, Tommy meets a courier, Pierre La Ponce, at the Washington Mall to collect a military guidance chip. French agents attack, Pierre flees, and Tommy recovers the chip.
• In Guardian Angels, Cortez arranges a Ruger for Tommy and sends him with Lance Vance to guard Diaz during a deal in Little Havana. This brings Tommy into Diaz's employ.
• In Sir, Yes Sir!, Cortez asks Tommy to hijack an army Rhino tank from a convoy on the mainland and deliver it to a lock-up.
• In All Hands On Deck!, the French discover who has their technology. As Cortez sails out of Vice City, Tommy mans the yacht's defenses against boats, helicopters and a Hunter gunship. Cortez escapes and leaves Tommy a Speeder boat as thanks.

Personality

Cortez is polite, old-fashioned and refined. He enjoys rich food, including exotic and endangered species, and speaks in a courtly manner even when discussing murder. Beneath the manners he is a pragmatic arms dealer who sells to anyone, though he treats Tommy with genuine respect and pays him well.

His formal politeness and love of fine dining make him one of the more likeable employers in the game, even though his business is arms dealing.

Relationships

• Mercedes Cortez: his daughter, whose wild lifestyle he seems unable to control.
• Tommy Vercetti: a reliable contractor he considers a friend.
• Ricardo Diaz: a business partner in the drug trade.
• Gonzalez: an aide who betrays him and pays with his life.

Trivia

• Cortez is voiced by Robert Davi.
• He is the first major contact in the game to leave Vice City for good, departing after All Hands On Deck!.
• Cortez's yacht hosts the opening social event of the story and is where Tommy first meets Diaz and Mercedes.