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Defending fabia ochoa vasquez { May 18 2003 } Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/palmbeach/sfl-pcochoa18may18,0,4273961.story?coll=sfla-news-palmhttp://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/palmbeach/sfl-pcochoa18may18,0,4273961.story?coll=sfla-news-palm
Defense picks apart drug trial testimony
By Ann W. O'Neill
Staff Writer
May 18, 2003
It was defense attorney Roy Black's kind of day. The key government witness was on the stand, and Black was using him to slowly pick apart the case against his latest high-profile client, accused Colombian drug lord Fabio Ochoa Vasquez.
The evidence against the 46-year-old leader of the defunct Medellín cocaine cartel at first seemed devastating. Colombian police bugged a cocaine smuggler's Bogota office in 1999, capturing about 1,500 hours of alleged drug trafficking talk.
The target turned witness, and last week Alejandro Bernal Madrigal, 43, testified at Ochoa's trial in federal court in Miami, implicating him as having a financial stake in two multiton cocaine shipments in 1999, years after he professed to have left the drug business.
The stakes are high: For Ochoa, a conviction means a life sentence in a U.S. prison. For prosecutors and federal agents waging the war on drugs, Ochoa is the biggest catch in a decade.
As the trial began, prosecutors told jurors Bernal would provide context to the tapes and transcripts. Instead, Black used him to cast doubts about them. By the time Black finished his cross-examination, the government's strongest evidence -- a 141-page transcript of a June 16, 1999, meeting in Bernal's office -- appeared to be in tatters.
Black earned a national reputation for scrupulous preparation and precise cross-examination as he racked up victories in trials of high-profile clients, most notably in the 1991 rape case of Kennedy cousin William Kennedy Smith in West Palm Beach and the sex and assault case of sportscaster Marv Albert.
Methodically questioning Bernal in his low-key style, Black won these concessions:
At least a half-dozen times, the person shown speaking in the transcript really wasn't there. At least once, the speaker didn't exist.
Conversations appear in the transcript that can't be heard on the tape. In other instances, lengthy conversations aren't transcribed.
Words spoken by other people, including Bernal, were attributed to Ochoa.
Many of the government's translations from Spanish to English make no sense, and conversations that initially seemed to be about drug trafficking actually were about more innocent subjects, such as soccer.
The trial is far from over, with about another month of testimony expected.
If the trial judge, K. Michael Moore, finds Bernal provided substantial cooperation to Ochoa's prosecutors, he could reduce Bernal's prison sentence by at least a decade.
Ann W. O'Neill can be reached at awoneill@sun-sentinel.com or 954-356-4531.
Copyright © 2003, South Florida Sun-Sentinel
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