Colombian investigation points to DEA narco-corruption

Dan provides the following translation of the article from the TV station’s Web site:

Bogotá: Revealing details continue to come forward about the scandalous infiltration of narco-traffickers and guerrillas in the Colombian Armed Forces. Defense Minister Juan Manuel Sanos admitted that the infiltration occurred at a very high level.

A former soldier captured in the investigation into mafia infiltration in the Army told the Fiscalía (Justice Department) that the drug trafficking informants' network had even reached into the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) officials that operate in Colombia. [emphasis added]

The tentacles of the trafficker who goes by the alias "Don Diego," [Diego Montoya of the North Valley Cartel] who infiltrated the highest levels of the Army, had reached the DEA's Colombia office, according to the confession that Captain Manuel Pinzón, the first soldier captured in the case, gave to the Fiscalía.

"Someone came directly from Bogotá, according to what I heard Zeus saying, and it seems they met in Cartago. That person gave him a list of telephone numbers that were being monitored and asked him how much he was willing to pay if he wanted to know more. Those people were from the DEA, according to Zeus," says the document.

The government recognized that the mafia's infiltration in the Armed Forces was at a very high level.

"It is serious, because it indicates that they have had access to relatively high levels of authority, but the important thing is that the information and what we are doing, is still in our hands, in order to continue the investigation and bring those responsible to Justice," stated Defense Minister Juan Manuel Santos.

RCN news has discovered that at least three officials and five lower-ranking officers have been removed from their positions in the Army due to the infiltrations, there have been several arrests, and that the Fiscalía is pursuing several others.

The Spanish-language version of the TV report can be found at this link.

Assuming this mysterious “Captain Manuel Pinzón” figure is the real deal, what he is telling Colombian authorities dovetails in frightening detail with Narco News’ revelations of alleged DEA corruption in Colombia.

That corruption scandal, dubbed the “Bogotá Connection,” was revealed in a series of government documents uncovered by Narco News, including an internal U.S. Justice Department document known as the Kent memo — which advances detailed allegations of a criminal conspiracy involving corrupt U.S. law enforcers who are operating in league with key Colombian narco-traffickers.

The first of the major allegations in the December 2004 Kent memo centers on an undercover operation launched in 1997 called Cali-Man, which targeted narco-traffickers in Colombia and was overseen by David Tinsley, a DEA group supervisor in Miami. As part of that operation, Tinsley and the agents working under him had uncovered evidence that DEA agents in Bogotá appeared to be assisting narco-traffickers in Colombia.

But in late January 2000, Bogotá DEA top gun Leo Arreguin shot off a memo to DEA headquarters. The charges in that memo (later proven to be unfounded) led to Tinsley’s operations being shut down that same year, including Cali-Man and another investigation called Rainmaker.

Rainmaker, sources tell Narco News, was set up to specifically target Colombia National Police Col. Gonzalez — long before he found himself in the sights of a U.S. indictment for narco-trafficking in the spring of 2004. Gonzalez was later assassinated in Colombia before he could be brought to the United States to spill the beans about what he knew.

Also included in the reams of documents obtained by Narco News exposing the Bogotá Connection is a February 2003 DEA report on a polygraph test administered to a Colombian narco-trafficker who also worked as an informant for DEA.  

That DEA report paints the following picture of how information was being leaked out of DEA’s office in Bogotá:

“During the interview with the [DEA] Inspectors, the CS [a confidential informant who also was a narco-trafficker] stated that over the last few years, he/she had been able to obtain between 50 to 60 documents from the BCO [the DEA Bogotá Country Office] at will. This is not a new revelation to us … as we met with [DEA Miami Group Supervisor] David Tinsley on January 2000; whereas GS Tinsley related to us that he had a CS that was obtaining documents from inside the BCO [as part of an investigation into the corruption] and showed us an original document, not a photocopy.”

So the wheel turns, and where it stops is likely beyond the control of minor mortals like me who cling to a belief that truth and justice still matter in this corner of hell.