Havana hookers rob US chef in art show
Posted on Friday, 05.25.12
Havana hookers rob US chef in art show Not funny, says critic of trips to Cuba By Juan O. Tamayo jtamayo@ElNuevoHerald.com
Celebrity chef Tom Colicchio jokingly tweeted, "I was no where near Cuba."
So who was the New York chef, or assistant chef, who went to Cuba for a bit of food diplomacy and wound up being robbed by the two hookers he took back to his hotel room?
It seems like nobody is willing to tell, although reports on the misadventure have been making the rounds of foodie blogs and websites and drawing jokes, insider jabs between chefs and at least one serious reproach of the trip to Havana.
Ten prominent New York chefs flew to Cuba earlier this month for the 11th annual Habana Bienal modern art show, to put on a piece of performance art with 10 Cuban counterparts — cooking in a kitchen built into a cargo container.
But New York chef Sara Jenkins on Wednesday cast a different light on the visit when she tweeted, "So one of the American chefs in Cuba took two whores home with him and then got robbed of all his money #butofcourse #icantsaywho!"
The restaurant, bar and nightlife blog Easter National swiftly published the tweet and began speculating on exactly which chef had been robbed, because some on the list of 10 never made it to Cuba and were replaced by others. Some also took assistants to Havana.
Among the names mentioned were the chefs of famed New York restaurants like Hearth, Terroir, Sueños and Sunday Night Dinner and Alma de Cuba in Philadelphia, Eater National reported.
Colicchio, a long-time judge on the reality TV show Top Chef, was not on any of the lists and his tweet was clearly a "not me" joke.
After the brouhaha erupted, Jenkins, the chef at Porchetta in New York, sent a tweet apologizing "to all the chefs and colleagues who helped put together this amazing cultural exchange for indiscreetly calling out the behavior of one member."
"What was meant to be some collegial ribbing in fact has instead reflected poorly on all the chefs who donated their time and energy to this project," she added. "And while I don't condone the individual's behavior, I do regret airing it publicly on Twitter. Social media lesson learned."
One reader's comment posted on the Easter National site said, "If it's good enough for the Secret Service and the DEA…" referring to the recent scandal involving the agencies and prostitutes in Cartagena, Colombia.
The kitchen performance, named "Project Paladar" after Cuba's family-owned restaurants, was part of a program designed to use food, cooking and eating to improve relations between the people of Cuba and the United States.
Elizabeth M. Grady, an adjunct professor of art history at the State University of New York, managed the project for smARTpower, described on its web site as a U.S. State Department-funded initiative to use visual arts to bring people together.
But the program drew fire from Mauricio Claver-Carone, director of the U.S.-Cuba Democracy Political Action Committee, which favors strong U.S. sanctions on the island's communist government.
The chefs flew to Cuba under a new category of U.S. Treasury Department license approved by the Obama administration to promote so-called "people-to-people" contacts between Cubans and Americans.
Too many U.S. visitors on those licenses are in fact engaging in pure tourism, which is illegal, and sometimes hiring Cuba's famously cheap hookers, Claver-Carone has complained.
"As if serving gourmet meals while regular Cubans struggle to serve themselves any meal wasn't insulting enough, at least one of the chefs took the 'people-to-people' definition too literally," he complained Thursday in his blog, Capitol Hill Cubans.
"Boy, these "people-to-people" programs are really winning the hearts and minds of the Cuban people," he joked. More seriously, he added, "Could this new policy be any more insulting and counter-productive?
http://www.miamiherald.com/2012/05/25/2816014/havana-hookers-rob-us-chef-in.html
Conviction / Laritza Diversent
Conviction / Laritza DiversentLaritza Diversent, Translator: Sian Creely
Once Cuban trials have declared a person's guilt, they then order the destruction of incriminatory evidence.
Jesús Daniel Forcade Portillo, 29 years of age, and Ramón Echevarría Fernández, 40, were punished with 35 years in prison for the assassination of the jeweller Humberto González Otaño in the early morning of 14th September 2010, whilst they robbed his house of money and garments to a value of 206,193 pesos local currency.
According to the sentence enacted by the Court of Havana, after the robbery the accused gave a blood-stained blue denim jacket, exactly like that of Esther Fernández, the jeweller's wife, the only surviving victim and sole eyewitness, to his accomplice.
Traces of his scent were also found at the scene of the crime. There was no identification by fingerprints or DNA samples. In spite of the technological advances, in Cuba, there are few cases where these tests are used, currently the most reliable, to confirm or destroy a person's innocence.
The Law of Penal Proceedings allows crime investigators to order scientific tests when they consider them necessary. The courts for their part, don't demand the tests be completed in order to he entirely certain of their ruling.
The court was fully convinced of Jesús Daniel and Ramón's guilt. Their relatives, on the other hand, are fully convinced of their innocence. Betty Anne Waters, a young North American, divorced with two children, who registered at law school to take on her brother, Kenneth Water's defence, had the same belief.
Her story was played by Hilary Swank, an actress awarded two Oscars for best female actress, in the film 'Conviction', from director Tony Goldwyn in 2010.
In 1983 Kenneth Waters was found guilty of the murder of Katharina Brow on 21st February 1980. The attacker's blood was found at the crime scene and his blood was found to be of the same type. He was sentenced to life imprisonment without hope of bail.
His sister, Betty Anne, became a lawyer and succeeded in reopening his case in 1999 after finding evidence which, according to the laws of the State of Massachusetts, should have been destroyed in 1993. The DNA test gave negative results. In 2001 he was acquitted after spending 18 years in prison.
Regrettably, Forcade Portillo and Echevarría Fernández won't have the same luck as Kenneth Waters in spite of their relatives' conviction. The jacket, a piece of evidence of the crime, was not found amongst the garments of which the court ordered a seizure.
They didn't order its retention either. The accused assured that the garments weren't theirs and their families stated that no garment had been returned to them. In these conditions it will be very difficult to review their case in the future and try to prove their innocence.
Their case isn't the only one in which the evidence has been destroyed or has disappeared. In 2007 the Court of Camagey sentenced Delvis David Peña Mainer to 40 years imprisonment for brutally stabbing to death a young married couple in January of the same year.
The court stated that both victims' wounds were caused by a left-hander, like Peña Mainer, with a short, blunt instrument. David was in possession of a mocha, a type of machete used to cut cane.
According to the sentence, blood was found in the 'inside part of the handle', 'although it could not be determined to which species it belonged' the court was told during the sentencing.
The Camagueyan Court was well convinced of his guilt and it seemed unnecessary to compare the blood found on the murder weapon with the victims' DNA.
Furthermore they sent the mocha to be handed in to a job centre and 'the destruction' of several of the couple's garments with 'spots of blood' and bloody footprints from the crime scene.
A different situation came with Rafael Ramos Utra, sentenced by the Court of Las Tunas to 20 years imprisonment for the sexual attack of a minor inside his own house in March 2005.
'There is no relationship between the semen present on the panties' recognised the Cuban Central Forensic Laboratory in its first DNA tests, referring to the garment that the 6 year old child was wearing and Ramos Utra's blood sample.
In a second test it was found 'that the yellowish stain on the panties' of the minor matched that of 'her own blood sample'. 'It was not possible to establish the genetic profile of the semen present on the panties because the seminal material was used up', the laboratory recognised.
The likelihood of finding two people with the same genetic information is one in fifteen million. In spite of the certainty of the first exam that proved Utra's innocence, the Court of Las Tunas declared him guilty and also ordered the incineration of the panties, a piece of evidence.
According to data from the film 'Conviction', in the USA 254 post-sentence acquittals have been given between 1989 and 2010 thanks to DNA testing. In Cuba, this possibility looks well off whilst courts, based on their guilty convictions, order the destruction of incriminating evidence.
Translated by: Sian Creely
April 18 2012
Cuba Reluctant To Detain Suspects In Attack On Pastor, Christians say
Cuba Reluctant To Detain Suspects In Attack On Pastor, Christians sayThursday, April 12, 2012 (3:42 am)
HAVANA, CUBA (Worthy News)– Over two months after a Cuban pastor was beaten and left unconscious in eastern Cuba, officials have still no suspects in the case, Christian rights activists told Worthy News Wednesday, April 10.
Pastor Reutilio Columbie ccontinues to suffer from dizziness, intense nausea and vomiting after he was left for dead in early February, said Christian Solidarity Worldwide (CSW), a major advocacy group.
The 41 year-old pastor of the Shalom Christian Center, a Pentecostal church in Moa was reportedly attacked by unknown assailants in the early hours of the morning on February 6 and left unconscious on the street.
The pastor was on his way to file a complaint with regional authorities about what the "arbitrary confiscation of the church vehicle" by authorities in late 2011, Christians said. The only thing taken from him was the document proving Columbie's legal ownership of the vehicle, according to rights activists.
In a statement distributed by CSW, Pastor Columbie said last week that the attack has left him "incapacitated, with memory and speech difficulties, near constant dizziness and nausea."
NO PREACHING
As a result, he is unable to preach at his church and finds it impossible to travel outside of Moa, CSW explained. "He has been advised to seek a consultation with a neurologist in [the capital] Havana but is physically unable to make the 923 kilometer (574 miles) journey."
Pastor Columbie said that while he received support support from the community, local authorities "remained intransigent on both the investigation into the attack and the confiscation of the church vehicle."
He claims that his purchase and ownership of the vehicle was legal, but is worried that with the disappearance of the key document this would now be virtually impossible to prove.
Local Christians have expressed doubts about the impartiality of the investigation into the attack as authorities may have to identify fellow officials.
"THOROUGH INVESTIGATION"
CSW's Advocacy Director Andrew Johnston told Worthy News that his group "continues to call for a thorough investigation into the attack on Pastor Columbie and the return of the church's vehicle."
He said that if local authorities "are unwilling or unable to fulfill their obligations, the regional or central government must ensure that those who attacked Pastor Columbie are brought to justice."
Christian rights activists have also urged authorities to address the "larger legal situation which helped lead" to "this crime" against Pastor Columbie.
CSW said it wants to see the removal of authority "over all religious activities and property from the Office of Religious Affairs of the Communist Party. Religious activities and property should be regulated through the regular channels with proper recourse for appeal."
http://www.worthynews.com/11396-cuba-reluctant-to-detain-suspects-in-attack-on-pastor-christians-say
Counterfeit Pesos Circulating in Cuba
Counterfeit Pesos Circulating in CubaMarch 22, 2012Isbel Diaz Torres
HAVANA TIMES, March 22 — "Sorry but this bill is counterfeit, my love, so I can't take it." That was what a clerk said to a woman a few days ago when she tried to buy a soft drink for her child at the private stand where I catch the bus to work every day.
Faced with the unpleasant situation, the poor woman didn't know how to react. In her face was a mixture of embarrassment, in case anyone might have thought that she was the forger, and anger toward the taxi driver, who had just given her the bill as change.
I asked the clerk to explain to us how she had determined the bill was fake, which she agreed to do willingly. Two security elements were sufficient:
1. The image of Celia Sanchez (the heroine of the Cuban Revolution), printed as a watermark, should have showed in the blank area of the bill when it was held up to the light.
2. A "cord" or dark security thread running across the bill, should have also been seen when the note was held up to the light.
I searched a little more and I found that the same security thread should have had the words "Homeland Or Death" printed on it, and there should have also been micro-text reading "Central Bank of Cuba__Pesos" and fluorescent colored fibers visible to the naked eye.
According to this salesperson a surge of counterfeit bills had showed up throughout the city. They're in 5 and 10 peso notes (worth from 25 to 50 cents USD). Years earlier a similar phenomenon had been experienced, but with 20 and 50 peso bills, according to the woman.
I don't know if the National Bank of Cuba has designed some mechanism to effectively stimulate the reporting of this type of crime or if the victims can be compensated in some way at bank branches when they present the counterfeit notes.
With the usual poor attention provided by government institutions here, along with the well-known craftiness of my countrymen, one can expect that none of these things do or will exist.
Luckily, the woman was able to buy a soda for her child with another bill, and gradually her anger began to subside. She promised in front of everyone that the following day she was going to flag down that same taxi and would pay the driver with the same bill.
The Odyssey of Reporting a Crime in Cuba / Laritza Diversent
The Odyssey of Reporting a Crime in Cuba / Laritza DiversentLaritza Diversent, Translator: Adam Cooper
Gabriel got up in the morning. He was shocked to find that when going to shower water was not coming through the rusty pipes of his modest home. It seemed to him that something wasn't right. He went out onto the patio and followed the course of the piping until he saw the cut in the adjoining house.
His neighbor, with whom he had legal problems about the patio boundaries, had cut the pipe. He stated that he was within his rights to do so. Gabriel went early on to the nearest police station with the aim of reporting his neighbor. There the torturous process began.
Upon arriving, a mother was making a fuss because she didn't know to which police station her detained son had been moved to. After a while the police, neither willing nor able to give her an answer, took her to an office. Once they were away from the civilians present, they began to give support to the exasperated woman.
By then it was eleven in the morning. The plan to get to work for the evening shift had disintegrated. "I got out of the chair, thinking that the official in charge of the case had forgotten about me. The official hardly raised his eyes from his papers and told me to wait," Gabriel remarked.
There he stayed seated for three hours, though it almost seemed like centuries. Then came his turn. The young official started to prepare the criminal complaint form when he suspended the act and left the office. Impatient with the delay, Gabriel went over to the file once more. Behind his desk the agent looked up the crime in the Penal Code that the claim could be based on.
The reporting party suggested a crime category: arbitrary exercise of rights. The policeman, offended, claimed he would not file a report because there had been no crime. Unsatisfied, the reporting party asked to speak with his superior. After much insistence he succeeded in filing the complaint. Gabriel returned home exhausted, disappointed, and in a bad mood.
Stories like this are told more often than one would like. As a result, when people are victims of a crime, instead of filing a report they say to themselves with certainty, "Why bother? I'd just lose the whole day doing it and nothing would get resolved." So says Caridad, victim of a robbery at her house a year ago. Her items have not been recovered.
This rude behavior violates the penal legislation in force regarding criminal complaint filing procedure and the behavior of the police when they have knowledge of a crime. The lack of human sensitivity of the uniformed officers and their poor judicial training stand in the way on the road to justice. Thus, more and more each day, the public loses confidence in the authorities.
Translated by: Adam Cooper
January 6 2012
Cubana Hijacking: A Tragedy Remembered, An Alleged Hijacker Living Free
Cubana Hijacking: A Tragedy Remembered, An Alleged Hijacker Living FreeBy Hank TesterNBCMIAMI.comupdated 10/4/2011 11:45:28 PM ET
The first-ever international hijacking operation originating on U.S. soil departed from Miami International Airport on November 1, 1958.
Cubana Airlines flight 495 was forced to attempt to land on a small airstrip in eastern Cuba, but plunged into nearby Nipe Bay.
Locals near the crash site remember the wreckage and the runway being too short for the four-engine prop jet.
Fourteen people died in the crash, and six survived, including most of the hijackers who fled the crash and joined Fidel Castro's 26 of July revolutionary movement, according to U.S. State Department documents. .
Mike Medrano, whose father was the pilot of the plane, said he remembers his mother sobbing and looking at a photo of her dead husband.
"I will never forget that sight in their bedroom holding a small photograph which I still have, just sobbing standing there sobbing. Everytime I think about that it always hits me," said Medrano, who was five at the time of the crash.
He and his sister Patricia Pita remember their father as a loving man who played the piano and was an accomplished aviator. He loved astonomy and devoted to his children.
"Life changed completely for us. We were just a happy family. He was such a great and wonderful father," said Pita.
For years, unknown to family members of the passengers on the plane, one of the alleged hijackers has lived in Hialeah within miles of the victims.
A property dispute over a house in El Portal exposed 70-year-old Edmundo Ponce de Leon because his sister wanted survivors of the crash to testify to his character.
The legal action against Ponce de Leon made headlines.
"I never knew it till the day it was in the paper," said survivor Osiris Martinez, who lost his wife and children in the crash.
Two crash survivors and a member of Ponce de Leon's family identified him as one of the hijackers.
Ponce de Leon is a U.S. citizen and Air Force veteran. He had said he was on the plane because he was going on vacation, but that doesn't explain why he remained outside the U.S. until the early 90s.
In Cuba at the time of the hijacking, Fidel Castro had all but wrapped up his revolution. The hijackers told the terrified passengers they were supporting the Castro 26 of July movement.
Ponce de Leon's cousin said he told her he participated.
"He told them he could…get guns and ammunition to help the cause and they told him the revolution was almost over and told him we don't need you," said Solange McCargar.
McCargar said Ponce de Leon told her the Cuban revolutionary leadership didn't have a problem with the hijacking.
"I asked him 'You were not authorized to do it? He said they are OK with it,'" she said.
Wayne Smith, then attaché at the U.S. Embassy in Havana, was sent to the crash site to oversee American interests.
"It was accepted as a 26 of July operation, whether in fact it had been that way or not," Smith said.
Ponce de Leon immediately joined the revolution after the hijacking, said McCargar.
Documents reveal that right after the crash, the American Civil Aernoautics Authority, the FAA's predecessor, declined to get involved.
It was, after all, a Cuban airliner that crashed in Cuba.
The case hasn't been prosecuted so far because of the lack of evidence, and also because it was such an old event.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/44781348/ns/local_news-miami_fl/#.ToxWIHIuAUM
Demand extradition of cop-killer from Cuba
Demand extradition of cop-killer from Cuba6:18 PM, Oct. 4, 2011
In September 2010, a murder victim was found inside a burning automobile in Atlantic County. Shortly after, his alleged killers fled to Cuba. Little more than a year later, U.S. marshals traveled to Havana and returned the suspects to New Jersey to face trial.
Thirty-eight years ago, a young New Jersey state trooper in only his third year of service was brutally executed on the shoulder of the New Jersey Turnpike. JoAnne Chesimard was convicted of the cold-blooded murder of Trooper Werner Foerster, but she escaped from prison and was grant asylum in Cuba.
I ask: Why is a convicted cop-killer still being protected by the Cuban government? Why hasn't the United States applied more pressure to Cuba to force her return to incarceration?
Chesimard was one of three terrorists in the car pulled over that day by Trooper Foerster for what he thought was a routine traffic stop. Moments later he lay bleeding on the side of the road, the victim of a hail of bullets fired by Chesimard and her followers. Chesimard then finished the deed, executing Trooper Foerster with a gunshot to the head.
I again join with law enforcement officials and call on President Barack Obama to demand the immediate extradition of Chesimard.
Today, two suspects sit behind bars in an Atlantic County jail awaiting their trial. Chesimard has already had her day before a jury. Now it's time she finally pays for her heinous crime.
Joseph H. Vicari
Ocean County Freeholder Director
http://www.app.com/article/20111005/NJOPINION02/310050022/1028/OPINION&source=rss
Condenado a 15 años de cárcel empresario francés acusado de lavado de dinero
Juicio
Condenado a 15 años de cárcel empresario francés acusado de lavado de dinero
Jean-Louis Autret dispone de 10 días para apelar ante el Tribunal Supremo, después de que sea notificado su defensor
Agencias, Madrid | 10/08/2011
Un tribunal de La Habana condenó a 15 años de cárcel al empresario francés Jean-Louis Autret, detenido en Cuba desde 2009, por el delito de lavado de dinero, ligado con el narcotráfico y el fraude fiscal, informó este miércoles una fuente cercana al condenado, reportó la AFP.
Según el reporte, Autret, cuya condena se corresponde con la petición fiscal, dispone de 10 días para apelar ante el Tribunal Supremo, después de que sea notificado su defensor, el cubano Menelao Mora, lo que no había sucedido la tarde de este miércoles.
De acuerdo con la AFP, la esposa cubana de Autret fue condenada a cinco años de prisión y a otros cuatro de trabajo correccional sin internamiento, precisó la fuente.
Añade la nota que no han sido comunicadas aún las sanciones dictadas contra otros siete ciudadanos cubanos involucrados en el caso, para los cuales el Gobierno cubano solicitó entre tres y siete años de cárcel.
Autret está detenido desde el 7 de abril de 2009, tras vender su yate en octubre de 2004 a dos franceses, a quienes las autoridades francesas y españolas decomisaron en septiembre de 2005, cerca de Cabo Verde, 2,8 toneladas de cocaína a bordo de la embarcación.
El empresario se dedicaba a una serie de actividades relacionadas con la identificación de proyectos para que empresarios interesados los financiaran, en sectores importantes de la economía cubana.
Exonerado de toda culpa en ese caso por las autoridades francesas, el empresario era reclamado por las autoridades cubanas por sus presuntas actividades relacionadas fundamentalmente con lavado de dinero, fraude fiscal y falsificación de documentos.
Durante el juicio, celebrado a comienzos de julio, el fiscal sostuvo que la actividad de lavado de dinero de Autret se enmarcaba en "movimientos cíclicos de dinero entre cuentas bancarias en Cuba y el extranjero, destinados a ocultar, desviar y legalizar el origen de los fondos resultantes del comercio ilícito de estupefacientes".
Mora había defendido en julio "la inocencia total" de su cliente y había reclamado su liberación.
Autret permanece recluido en la cárcel La Condesa, 70 km al sur de La Habana, destinada a extranjeros.
Wanted man living it up at resort
Wanted man living it up at resort 12JUSTIN SADLER, QMI AgencyUpdated: Saturday, July 23, 2011 5:28:56 EDT AM
OTTAWA – Photos of a man police say is on the run and wanted in the shooting death of a 16-year-old Ottawa man surfaced online Friday showing him vacationing in Cuba, QMI Agency has discovered.
But shortly after QMI Agency found the photos of Mohamed Wehbe they mysteriously disappeared.
On Friday, a man calling himself Khalid Wehbe posted photos of Mohamed Wehbe shortly after 5:14 a.m. on his Facebook page — though it is not clear whether the pictures were taken recently.
It is also unclear whether Mohamed Wehbe, who has a Canada-wide warrant out for his arrest, remains in Cuba.
After QMI Agency contacted Khalid Wehbe, through Facebook, the photos were promptly removed and later in the day his profile was deleted altogether.
The images show the two Wehbes together along with other young men and women posing at what Khalid Wehbe describes as the "Havana Resort." Several show them posing with imaginary guns.
Yazdan Ghiasvand Ghiasi was shot through the heart in a Dec. 6, 2010 drug deal gone wrong.
Mohamed Wehbe, 18, of Ottawa is facing a charge of second-degree murder in the killing but cops have no idea where he is. Investigators say they believe he might have fled the country.
Police say Mohamed Wehbe is the suspected shooter.
When contacted in December, Wehbe's mother said police had been in contact about Ghiasi's death but seemed unaware her son was alleged to be involved in his murder.
"I just know he went (on) vacation," she said.
"I don't know nothing," she said when pressed for more information.
Three other men were charged in relation to the murder.
Abdulhamid Wehbe faces a charge of second-degree murder while Zakaria Dourhnou, 18, pleaded guilty to attempting to obstruct justice and breach of probation. He was sentenced to a year in jail and three years of probation in April.
The third man, Khaled Wehbe, remains out on bail after he was charged with being an accessory after the fact.
Police say Ghiasi was a small-time pot dealer and a quarrel over it left the Notre Dame High School athlete dead on a sidewalk outside 340 Booth St.
Cops on Friday said there were no updates on their pursuit of Mohamed Wehbe other than "it's still under investigation."
Mohamed Wehbe is described as 6-feet tall, 126 lbs. with dark hair and of Middle-Eastern descent.
Anyone who knows Wehbe's whereabouts, or has any information, should contact police at 613-236-1222, ext. 5493, or Crime Stoppers at 613-233-8477.
Twitter: @ottawasunsadler
http://www.torontosun.com/2011/07/23/wanted-man-living-it-up-at-resort
Medicare crooks find safe haven in Cuba
Posted on Saturday, 07.16.11Medicare fraud Medicare fraud fugitives
Medicare crooks find safe haven in Cuba
South Florida is known as the capital of Medicare fraud, but increasingly Cuba is where the scammers go to avoid prosecution.BY JAY WEAVERjweaver@MiamiHerald.com
As Medicare crime spreads across South Florida, accused scammers are escaping in droves to Cuba and other Latin American countries to avoid prosecution — with more than 150 fugitives now wanted for stealing hundreds of millions of dollars from the U.S. healthcare program, according to the FBI and court records.
The tally of fugitives charged with healthcare fraud here has tripled since 2008, when The Miami Herald first reported on the phenomenon of Cuban immigrants joining the Medicare rackets and fleeing to evade trial in Miami.
But during the past three years, the FBI has captured only 16 fugitives, reflecting the difficulty in catching Spanish-speaking suspects who head south to hide out. Most of the fugitives were born in Cuba, immigrated to South Florida after 1990 and can easily live under the radar in Latin America with hundreds of thousands or millions in taxpayer dollars fleeced from Medicare.
Even if fugitives can be located in Cuba, there's no way to get them back because of the political realities at play.
"They go to Cuba so they can't be caught,'' said Rolando Betancourt, a longtime Miami bail bondsman who has tracked one Medicare fugitive to Havana. "You can find anybody in Cuba; you just can't arrest them.''
Because so many of the Medicare defendants are Cuban, rumors have swirled for years that the Castro government has purposely trained and deployed immigrants to take over Medicare-licensed clinics in South Florida, and then harbored them after they returned home. But federal agents and prosecutors, while privately speculating about an official Cuba connection, say they've never uncovered evidence linking Fidel and Raul Castro's regime to the rampant healthcare fraud on this side of the Florida Straits.
Moreover, the feds have made no official attempts to seek extradition of fugitives in Cuba, mainly because the United States has no formal relations with the government. Agents have captured some Cuban fugitives returning from the island as they travel through Miami International Airport.
Repeated calls and emails seeking comment from the Cuban Interests Section in Washington, D.C., were not returned.
Earlier this year, a University of Miami report quoted a former Cuban intelligence official who suggested there were "strong indications" his government was either facilitating the Medicare fraud or providing safe harbor for fugitives in exchange for hard U.S. currency. But the report provided no examples.
Soon afterward, U.S. Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, a Medicare watchdog for years, questioned Health and Human Services officials at a congressional hearing about the possible Cuban government link after the department's inspector general posted a "Most Wanted" list of Medicare fugitives, and seven of the top 10 were Cuban.
CURRENCY FOR CUBA
Cuba watchers, legal experts and others who have witnessed South Florida's ascendance as the nation's Medicare fraud capital say the Cuban government's involvement would not be that far fetched — though they have no proof to back it up.
"It wouldn't surprise me if one day that is proven to be a fact," said Miami attorney Sam Rabin. One of his clients, Eduardo Moreno, fled to Cuba after posting a $450,000 bond in 2007 on healthcare fraud charges. He had collected $2 million from Medicare on bogus claims for medical equipment and HIV services.
"I think it would be very hard for someone with millions in currency to stay under the radar in Cuba" without that government's protection, Rabin added.
Andy Gomez, a senior fellow at the University of Miami's Institute for Cuban and Cuban-American Studies, said he has heard from sources in Miami and Cuba allegations that the Castro government extorts Medicare bounty from criminals who are allowed to go back and forth between here and the island nation. But he said he knows of no evidence directly implicating the Castro regime in the fraud.
"The Cuban government knows what's going on," Gomez said. "The government knows who the fugitives are, and the bigger they are, the more the government expects to be paid by them. … It's a way to obtain hard currency and a way to discredit the Cuban-American exile community."
James Cason, who served as chief of the U.S. Interests Section in Havana from 2002-2005, said he was not aware of the fugitive phenomenon during his tenure, but noted that relaxed travel restrictions in recent years have enabled Cubans to fly more easily between Havana and Miami. He said it's highly probable that the Cuban government shakes down Medicare fraud fugitives, but doubts its direct involvement in the healthcare scams.
"There is no way the Cuban government wouldn't know about this," said Cason, who was recently elected mayor of Coral Gables. "Whether the Cuban government is involved or not [in Medicare fraud], the Cuban government wants the hard currency from the fugitives."
Cason called the Medicare offenders "scammers, not revolutionaries," saying the FBI should try to work with the Justice and State departments to engage Cuba in extraditing some of the fugitives.
"The Cuban government will investigate if they think it's in their interest," he said. "But I bet the FBI hasn't asked them."
Officials for the FBI and Justice declined to comment. A spokesman for the State Department also declined to comment on Medicare fraud fugitives, but said that the federal government has sought the extradition of fugitives in Cuba wanted for other serious crimes.
THE PHANTOM
Four years ago, Eduardo Moreno, the Miami-Dade man who had collected $2 million from the government program and fled back to Cuba, became the poster boy for Medicare fraud fugitives. The feds featured him in a news conference with a "Most Wanted" mug shot along with a photo of his $200,000 Rolls-Royce Phantom.
Moreno, who bail bondsman Betancourt believes is running a Havana disc jockey business for clubs, weddings and other events, is among 54 fugitives identified by the FBI who collectively submitted at least $545 million in fraudulent bills to the Medicare program in the last six years, according to federal court and other records.
From those claims, Medicare paid the fugitives a total of $218 million, records show.
An additional 102 defendants have been charged with Medicare fraud under sealed indictments, but the FBI has been unable to arrest them because they have fled South Florida or the country.
The U.S. attorney's office keeps the suspects' names under wraps so they won't know that they've been charged — sometimes leading to fortuitous situations when the defendant reenters the United States and gets arrested.
The FBI says the 156 Medicare fraud fugitives from Miami-Dade and other parts of South Florida comprise the majority of fugitives charged with ripping off the program nationwide.
Still, since 2008, the FBI has struggled to capture Medicare fraud fugitives, especially those who flee abroad. Of the 54 named fugitives, 26 are believed to be in Cuba and the rest in Mexico, the Dominican Republic and other Latin American countries.
The bureau, working from 2008 to 2011 with foreign governments except Cuba, captured and arrested 16 fugitives charged with pocketing $83 million from Medicare. Of those, four were known to have fled to Cuba and were apprehended when they returned via Miami International Airport.
FBI agents and federal prosecutors say several factors have fueled the fugitive trend. One is sheer volume: Since 2006, the U.S. attorney's office in Miami has prosecuted about 1,200 defendants on Medicare fraud charges, accounting for one-third of all such cases in the country.
Also, federal judges have issued much tougher sentences, with the average prison term ranging from five to 15 years. Last month, a physician convicted of writing phony prescriptions for unnecessary HIV therapy was sentenced to 20 years.
STRAW OWNERS
Another influential factor: In 2008, Chief U.S. District Judge Federico Moreno of Miami, troubled by the rising tide of fugitives — including some with bonds who fled the country after being convicted — advised his fellow judges to set higher bail for Medicare-fraud offenders.
"They realized that although it's a white-collar crime, there's still a risk of flight," said FBI special agent Bryan Piper.
Also at play: The lure of a quick and easy buck for new Cuban arrivals. Some established clinic operators recruit the Cuban migrants to pose as "straw owners" of their Medicare businesses to protect the real owners' identities. Then, the migrants are sent back to the island with a pocket full of cash as part of the deal.
The leader of one $100 million HIV-clinic scam in Miami-Dade and other parts of the Southeast admitted that he recruited three Cubans "with the understanding that the 'straw' owners would flee to Cuba to avoid law enforcement detection or capture," according to court records.
Michel De Jesus Huarte pleaded guilty in 2009 to fraud charges and was sentenced to 22 years in prison. His accused recruits — Orlin Tamayo Quinonez, Juan Carralero and Madelin Barbara Machado — are suspected of having fled to Cuba, the FBI says.
Huarte's accused business partner, Ramon Fonseca, is believed to be in Venezuela.
The Miami FBI's toughest case involves the Benitez brothers — Jose, Luis and Carlos — who owned and operated a dozen HIV-therapy clinics in Miami-Dade. They allegedly filed $119 million in false claims with Medicare, raking in a whopping $84 million.
The Cuban-born brothers, who fled to the Dominican Republic before being indicted in May 2008, are accused of funneling millions through sham companies to finance their purchase of luxury toys and properties in that country.
Their acquisitions included homes, motels, apartments, land, cars, boats, horses, a helicopter, a distribution plant leased to Coca-Cola, and a hotel flanked by water- and dinosaur-theme parks, all in the areas of Punta Cana, Bavaro, Higüey and the capital, Santo Domingo.
"They became little entrepreneurs with their Medicare money," said FBI special agent Ellen Lapp, adding that Dominican authorities have helped the United States seize the Benitezes' properties so they can be sold by the Marshals Service to pay back the Medicare program.
JAILED IN CUBA
In an unusual twist, the brothers, naturalized U.S. citizens, were jailed after arriving in Cuba in April 2008, according to the FBI. The Cuban government is still detaining them, though it is not clear why.
To help catch fugitives, the FBI sometimes issues "red notices" through Interpol to alert foreign authorities to stop suspects traveling while on the lam. The red notices are distributed at airports and other travel sites.
Fugitive Fermin Rey, who fled Miami after posting a $100,000 bond in 2007, was accused of pocketing $2.8 million from bogus Medicare bills for aerosol medications and other equipment. In November 2009, Rey, posing as a businessman, traveled from Ecuador to Mexico.
Mexican authorities, who had received a red notice for him , sent him back to Ecuador, where he fought his extradition but lost.
Lapp and Piper, the FBI agents, flew there to pick him up in a 12-hour whirlwind trip.
Rey was convicted and sentenced to eight years for Medicare fraud — plus about a year for fleeing.
http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/07/16/v-fullstory/2317603/fbi-struggling-to-catch-150-plus.html
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