Perjury, Passion, and Posada

Luis Posada Carriles obligingly rose when called as a witness to make his way to the makeshift witness stand in the uncomfortably small courtroom.  But Judge William Abbott waived Posada to sit back down, telling him that he could testify in place and need not trouble himself to move.  The atmosphere in court was surprisingly informal and relaxed, even as the terrorist and former CIA operative prepared to testify to matters concerning his nearly five decades as a bomber, figure of intrigue, and mule for U.S. policy in Latin America.

Posada’s voice is odd and barely intelligible from having part of his face and tongue blown away by gunmen in 1990, and the court interpreter strained to make sense of what he was saying. Just as people arch to hear the whisper across the room, the gallery leaned forward to try and make out Posada’s words.  When not talking, his jaw pumped up and down, as if chewing gum; a habit developed to work the space in his mouth where the rest of his tongue used to be.  Rendering his life in dense snippets that raised more questions than they answered, Posada gave only cursory information about his work history and his various offices in service of the Venezuelan government.

When the interpreter complained she could not understand Posada, he explained the failed assassination attempt, and his counsel asked him to give particulars of the attack.  "That is an old story that goes back to Venezuela," Posada said.  "Cuba," he continued, "sent people to take power over Venezuela, and I fought against this and we were successful – Cuba lost." "That is the reason why Cuba," his voice rising, "from that moment on tried to hurt me and persecute me."

After innocuous questions that really laid no foundation and led only to a confused account of disparate events, Matthew Archambeault turned the witness over for cross-examination.  Curiously, the first question asked by chief counsel Gina Garrett-Jackson for the Department of Homeland Security was, "Isn’t it true you last entered the United States through Mexico in March, 2005?," whereupon Archambeault objected, though Posada did admit to traveling to Miami, Florida, from Houston, Texas, by bus. This was only the first of a cascade of objections made to government questions, objections uniformly sustained and made on the basis of Posada’s right against self-incrimination.  

Garrett-Jackson then went through a list of aliases use by Posada, including the name of Ramon Medina. Probably the most infamous of his aliases, Posada at one point said he could not remember using that name.  As Ramon Medina, Posada was the second in charge of the illegal contra operation undertaken by President Ronald Reagan and Vice-President George H.W. Bush in the mid 1980s.  It is now clear that the contras ran drugs to the United States, a vindication of the reporting Gary Webb made on this subject in 1996. At every question concerning his aliases, Posada’s counsel invoked the right against self-incrimination, and Posada was clearly becoming annoyed at the process.  He just as clearly had little memory of his numerous aliases, and before the hearing began we overheard him tell his assistant counsel, Renee Soto, "tanto nombre" (so many names), "tengo confusion con los nombres" (I am confused about the names).

Asked if he had ever been convicted of a crime, Posada said only in Panama.  He outlined the charges against him and then claimed he was acquitted of all but one charge, the charge of "posing a danger to society." DHS counsel then promptly asked where the Panamanian conviction for "document fraud" came from, and Posada’s counsel again invoked the right not to answer. This time the right was invoked to prevent Posada from essentially confirming the lie he made just a few minutes before by saying he was only convicted of one count in Panama.  And so it went, question followed by objection. Finally, Posada in frustration said, "your honor I would like to make a statement about the names, if you will allow it."  But the judge quickly cut Posada off, referring him to his counsel and saying that this was a matter he needed to discuss with his attorneys.

The court recessed, and though they tried to disguise it, there was clearly a conflict between Ms. Soto and Mr. Archambeault.  Ms. Soto, the niece of Eduardo Soto, whose Miami law firm is handling Posada’s case pro bono, acts as the principle conversant with Mr. Posada.  Archambeault apparently does not speak Spanish and relies on Soto to understand Posada’s wishes, and it appeared that Ms. Soto was arguing Posada’s desires to Archambeault.

After the break, there was a different atmosphere in the court, and there were virtually no objections for the rest of the day.  Posada answered questions freely, but not truthfully.  In explaining why he had taken on the alias Ramon Medina to work for the United States after escaping from Venezuela, where he was being held for the bombing of Cubana Flight 455, he said, "In El Salvador there was a war and those of us fighting that war used helicopters against the Castroites or communists . . . We could not use our names because the communists would kill us."   And when asked about his arrest in Panama for an attempted assassination on Fidel Castro in 2000, Posada fabricated a fantastic story that even the most credulous person would find hard to believe.

DHS counsel started to pose a question to Posada, beginning, "Regarding the conviction in Panama, you and your co-defendants were in possession of 33 pounds of C-4 explosives. . .," but Posada cut in, saying, "No, that is not correct. . . The explosives were planted by the Cuban government."  He claimed he was in Panama to pick up a Cuban defector, and that when Fidel Castro discovered Posada was in Panama, made a false claim to the police that Posada was there for an assassination attempt.  "We were arrested because of a complaint or denouncement that Fidel Castro made. . . When he found out that I was in Panama, right away Fidel Castro made the claim."  When asked where he was arrested, Posada said, "In a hotel. . . If I were going to kill Fidel I would not be in a hotel."  Posada "categorically" denied having possession of explosives, but he is certainly no stranger to such substances having previously been found in possession of explosives, flame throwers, mortars, machine guns, bazookas, and rocket launchers.  

His tales of persecution did not stop with his arrest in Panama, and he claimed that he was misled in a 1998 interview with the New York Times wherein his statements were twisted, that he did not really say what he said in a television interview where he claimed responsibility for a series of bombings in Cuba in 1997, and that he is the hapless pawn of savvy reporters who used him for their own purposes.  Clearly embarrassed by contradiction, the only light moment was when he was asked where the interview with the New York Times reporter took place.  He said it occurred on an island in the Caribbean but he would "not say where," refusing to reveal Aruba as the location of the interview.  When asked why not, he replied "porque si."

When court reconvened this afternoon, Posada’s attorneys and DHS counsel immediately retired to a conference room to engage in negotiations.  Upon their return, Archambeault announced that Posada was dropping his asylum claim and that he would proceed solely under the provisions of the Convention Against Torture to fight his extradition to Venezuela.  The avowed reason for this concession was that in order to pursue the asylum claim, Posada "would have to reveal sensitive information about the U.S. Government and does not want to do that."

A clearly unhappy Garrett-Jackson responded that the government would "pretermit," or suspend, its opposition to Posada’s claim that his extradition to Venezuela would result in his torture.   Judge Abbott then asked if the government believed that Posada would indeed be tortured if returned to Venezuela, and Garret-Jackson said through her teeth that "we have no opinion" on that point.  The feeling was that perhaps headquarters had intervened and instructed Garret-Jackson as to how to proceed.

The judge then went on to say that since Posada had placed into evidence testimony yesterday by his friend Mr. Fernando Chaffardet and the government had put on no rebuttal evidence, he believed that "Mr. Posada has made a prima facie case under CAT as to Venezuela," and that he would be forced to rule in Mr. Posada’s favor and deny extradition.  Garrett-Jackson responded that while the U.S. was ready to concede that Posada could not be extradited to Cuba, she would reserve the right to put on rebuttal evidence as to the extradition request from Venezuela.  "We still need time to assess information and consult with other agencies," said Garrett-Jackson.  But she went on to say that "I want to emphasize that we do hope to resolve this after consultation with the Department of Justice and the State Department."

In scheduling a hearing in the event the two sides cannot resolve their remaining differences, Judge Abbott initially selected the week of November 7, but Posada loudly cried out "¡Noviembre 7!," apparently upset at how far away the date was.  Eventually, September 26 was agreed upon as the day to reconvene.  Posada obviously wishes to have the proceedings done with and probably knows as surely as anyone how unlikely it is that he will be extradited to Venezuela.  He seems to be enjoying his confinement, as we overheard him complaining only that his calls cost him, "16 centavos el minuto con la tarjeta" (16 cents a minute with the card) and that there was something wrong with his pants and the prison shirt rubbed his neck.  He noted with satisfaction that he gets "dos horas en el patio" and "solo me ponen un guardia."  As the gallery chatted before leaving the court, we heard him say, "Yo soy un heroe para. . ." but we could not hear just who it is he is a hero to.  Certainly not to the families of victims of Cubana Flight 455, and not to the myriads of people he plunged into misery with crimes against those disfavored by power.