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Barry gunned down baton rouge Drug Runner's Testimony Key to Noriega Case The Los Angeles Times (Pre-1997 Fulltext); Los Angeles, Calif.; Mar 15, 1990; DOUGLAS FRANTZ; (Copyright, The Times Mirror Company; Los Angeles Times 1990all Rights reserved) Prosecutors in the Miami drug-trafficking case against Manuel A. Noriega are counting on important testimony from a secret witness who has spent more than a decade alternating between drug smuggling and undercover work for U.S. law enforcement and intelligence agencies. Alfredo Sanchez, who risked his life developing a major case against Colombian cocaine dealers, appears able to bolster the government's central contention-that Noriega had extensive dealings with the drug lords of the Medellin cartel. So far, Sanchez is a mystery figure in the Noriega case. His name does not appear in court documents in the case, and defense attorneys said they had never heard his name in connection with the case. Prosecutors in Miami refused to acknowledge his involvement in the case, presumably out of concern for his safety. Weighing the value of Sanchez's testimony is difficult because of the secrecy, and most records naming him have been placed under court seal. But records contained in a related case file in Denver portray Sanchez as a highly paid government informant who met with drug barons in Colombia on a dangerous undercover mission. A source who has had extensive conversations with Sanchez said the informant also met personally with Noriega while working for the Drug Enforcement Administration. Court records provide no hint of a direct meeting with Noriega and efforts to confirm that assertion were unsuccessful. Records available in Denver and interviews, however, do provide the outline of Sanchez's key role in the Noriega case, as well as a vivid portrait of his life as an informant for the DEA, the military's Defense Intelligence Agency and even the super-secret National Security Agency. Noriega is charged in federal indictments in Miami and Tampa with protecting drug traffickers and facilitating money-laundering. The Miami case is scheduled to go to trial first, in November. Much more is at stake than Noriega's own fate. A conviction would help the Bush Administration justify its December invasion of Panama, which succeeded in its goal of forcing Noriega out of Panama to face trial in the United States. A source familiar with the case against Noriega in Miami described Sanchez as "a very valuable witness" with access to sensitive information about Noriega's relationship with Colombian drug lords. That assessment was supported at Sanchez's sentencing on drug charges in June, 1988, by Richard D. Gregorie, the former assistant U.S. attorney who put together the Noriega indictment in Miami. Sanchez had pleaded guilty to importing 80 kilograms of cocaine from Colombia to Miami, and Gregorie appeared at the sentencing to describe Sanchez's cooperation in a bid for leniency. "This particular defendant, your honor, is providing information and other evidence which will allow us to explain a great deal of the conspiracy, which was sort of a blank spot in the Noriega case," Gregorie said. "There are a number of facts which . . . were essentially not clear because there was no testimony. This particular defendant can now provide the information which will fill in those blanks." Gregorie offered no details of Sanchez's evidence, but he indicated that it involved Noriega and Colombian drug barons Pablo Escobar and Jorge Ochoa, two of Noriega's co-defendants in the Miami case. The indictment charges that Noriega provided a haven for Escobar and Ochoa after they arranged the murder of Colombia's justice minister in 1984 and that he protected their drug shipments through Panama. He said Sanchez would be called as a witness in the event of a Noriega trial, which seemed a remote possibility in 1988. He expressed concern over Sanchez's safety as a result of his cooperation with the government. The danger stemmed not only from Sanchez's role in the Noriega investigation. Sanchez had also worked for the DEA in putting together a case in which Escobar and five others were indicted for smuggling $80 million to $90 million worth of cocaine into Colorado for distribution in Los Angeles, according to testimony at the sentencing. "He put his neck out a mile long," said Matthew Maher, a DEA agent in Denver, describing Sanchez's daring role in the Colorado investigation. "These people don't quibble when it comes to retribution." To protect Sanchez's identity at the sentencing, U.S. District Judge Stanley Marcus took the unusual step of ensuring that no one was in the courtroom who was not involved officially in the case. The transcript of the proceeding was sealed in Miami, but a copy was obtained from the public file in the Denver smuggling case. The Denver file contains extensive information about Sanchez's work as an informant. Sanchez has been under full-time federal protection since he began cooperating in the Noriega and Denver cases in 1988. The names of his family members have been deleted from court records. Nonetheless, his attorney, Christopher Mancini, said in court that Sanchez faced an unprecedented degree of danger. He compared him to Barry Seal, the drug pilot who was gunned down on the streets of Baton Rouge, La., after he began providing information to the government on Escobar and Ochoa. Testimony at the sentencing and other court records depict Sanchez as someone who has moved in dangerous circles for years, shuttling between illegal drug deals and undercover work for U.S. intelligence and law enforcement agencies. Sanchez was born in Cuba on Christmas Day in 1945. His family left in the 1960s for Panama, and he attended college there. Soon afterward, Sanchez was recruited to work for the Defense Intelligence Agency, the Pentagon's intelligence-gathering arm, Mancini said. The lawyer said at the sentencing that Sanchez was involved in "national security matters" with the DIA and had risked his life several times. He did not elaborate. The DIA maintains a strong presence in Panama because of the U.S. bases there. The agency had extensive ties with Noriega, government sources said. The Drug Enforcement Administration likewise has extensive operations in Panama and long ties to Noriega. Sanchez told the Denver grand jury that he became a DEA informant in Panama in 1980 and worked extensively with drug agents at the U.S. Embassy in Panama City. He boasted that he was virtually running the DEA operation in Panama in the early 1980s. In addition to the Noriega and Denver cases, a DEA agent testified at one hearing that Sanchez provided information for Operation Bolivar, a series of successful DEA attacks on Colombian cocaine laboratories. Sanchez also claimed that he had helped track guerrilla movements in Latin America for the National Security Agency, which conducts worldwide electronic eavesdropping for the United States. A convicted drug dealer said Sanchez told him that he had firsthand dealings with Noriega and that he had gotten to know the former leader through a brother who operated a machinery business in Panama. Sanchez is described as blond and chubby. A former federal agent who knows him said: "He is not flashy or flamboyant, and comes off more like a businessman." Like many informants, Sanchez played two roles in the criminal world, apparently operating with and without sanctions from U.S. authorities. He acknowledged to the Denver grand jury that he had been involved in drug trafficking for 15 years, and he was arrested in a gunrunning case in Miami in which the charges were ultimately dropped. Mancini maintained at the Miami drug sentencing that most of his client's drug smuggling was related to his undercover work for the DEA. And, when he was arrested in Miami in 1987 for importing cocaine, Sanchez claimed that it was a "national security" operation, a colleague said. When that failed to extricate him, Sanchez turned to the other job he knew well-cooperating with authorities. Sources said Sanchez offered to provide information to Miami prosecutors about Escobar and Ochoa, and that moved him into a central role in the Noriega case. Sanchez, who was living in Boulder, Colo., at the time, also said he could help crack a cocaine smuggling operation there. Working with DEA agents out of Denver, Sanchez flew to Colombia on April 21, 1988, and set up a shipment of cocaine after meeting with Escobar and one of his lieutenants, Victor Cardona, according to the Denver indictment. While in Colombia, Sanchez was outside the protection of the DEA. On May 21, Sanchez returned to Colombia on a private airplane operated by two mercenaries on the DEA payroll. At a small airport, they loaded up 300 packages containing 335 kilos of cocaine. Conversations recorded by Sanchez through a microphone on his body and over the telephone show that he had a previous relationship with the Colombians. Apparently they trusted him enough to let him have the cocaine without putting up any money. But the trust only went so far. Peter Schild, a defense lawyer in the Denver case, said Cardona sent a man on the return flight to keep an eye on the drugs and dispatched another to Boulder a few days later to oversee the distribution. According to DEA records, the plane made a prearranged refueling stop on Grand Cayman Island in the Caribbean. When it departed, two DEA pilots and an agent were following at a safe distance in another aircraft. The planes ran into a severe storm over the Gulf of Mexico. DEA agent Maher testified at Sanchez's sentencing that the surveillance plane twice thought Sanchez had gone down. Finally, the storm forced the DEA plane to turn back. But Sanchez's plane went on. The DEA picked up the trail again at another refueling stop in South Texas and tracked the aircraft to Jefferson County Airport, midway between Denver and Boulder. The harrowing flight had taken 23 hours. On May 24, Antonio Lubo-Arregoces arrived from Barranquilla to supervise the distribution of the drug, according to the indictment. "This shipment was part of a plan by the Colombians to establish a foothold in Colorado to distribute cocaine in the U.S., principally into California," Michael J. Norton, the U.S. attorney in Denver, said in an interview. The next day, as the drugs were being prepared for distribution, DEA agents arrested Lubo and three other Colombians in what was described then as the largest seizure of cocaine in Colorado history. All four eventually pleaded guilty and received long prison terms. Escobar and Cardona were also indicted and remain fugitives. Escobar is one of the so-called "dirty dozen" Colombian drug lords at the top of the Justice Department's most-wanted list. Before the pleas were entered, defense attorneys attacked the government's case, charging that Sanchez had initiated the smuggling operation to win leniency for himself. They also pointed out that Sanchez had been paid more than $75,000 in cash by the DEA in a four-month period. Court records show that Sanchez got $25,000 the day before he testified to the Denver grand jury and another $25,000 a few days later. Defense attorneys argued that the money was a bribe, a charge that the DEA disputed. Sanchez's big payoff came in Miami, however. His sentencing hearing occurred the week after his grand jury testimony in Denver. After Sanchez was praised by Gregorie and DEA agent Maher, Marcus sentenced him to three years in prison. Without his cooperation, the judge said, Sanchez would have gotten at least 15 years. A year later, a federal prosecutor went before Marcus again and characterized Sanchez's continued cooperation as "truly extraordinary." The nature of the cooperation was not disclosed, but this time the judge reduced the sentence to time served. Alfredo Sanchez was freed. [Illustration] MAP: THE DANGEROUS ROUTE OF A DRUG SMUGGLER-Alfredo Sanchez, a drug trafficker-turned-federal informant, smuggled 335 kilos of cocaine from Colombia to Colorado on a private plane to gather evidence that helped crack a major Colombian smuggling operation. The plane flew through a severe storm that caused federal agents, who were trailing in another plane, to turn back. VICTOR KOTOWITZ / Los Angeles Times -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Sub Title: [Home Edition] Start Page: 1 ISSN: 04583035 Dateline: WASHINGTON

Barry boys [jpg] Barry gunned down baton rouge Barry seal sentenced 10 years Barry seal Barry worked cia dea Bush barry seal Casey seal clinton cocaine { January 28 1981 } Casey_1 [gif] Casey_2 [gif] Casey_3 [gif] Cia airline tied to cocaine iran contras Colombian seal slayers convicted { May 14 1987 } Intrigue arkansas wp3 1 89 [jpg] Intrigue in the arkansas ozarks { March 1 1989 } Legacy of a slain drug informer { February 28 1989 } Mena quiet little place Mena secret cia base Seal federal informant posing as smuggler { March 1 1989 } Seal killed testified in noriega trial Slain informer wp2 28 89 [jpg] Slain informer wp2 28 89b [jpg] Files Listed: 21

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