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> Fidel, Alarcon, Cuban 5 Families Urge "Full Slate Vote for Unity"
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The facts on the Cuban 5:
HERNANDEZ, GERARDO, a captain in the Cuban military intelligence, was also
spymaster of an extensive ring of Cuban nationals and Cuban Americans
collecting intelligence, attempting to commit espionage and disrupt Cuban
exile groups in south Florida from 1992 until 1998. On 12 September 1998
the
FBI arrested 10 people associated with the "La Red Avispa," or the Red
Wasp
Network ring, including eight men and two women in their various south
Florida residences. They were accused of spying on US military
installations
and anti-Castro exile groups in south Florida and transmitting this
information to Cuba. Among the military installations the group attempted
to
infiltrate were the US Southern Command Headquarters in Miami, MacDill Air
Force Base near Tampa, and Boca Chica Naval Air Station in Key West. The
group's goals included documenting activities, exercises, and trends at
the
installations; monitoring anti-Castro groups and disrupting their plans;
and
developing positions of vantage from which to warn Cuban intelligence of
impending military strikes against Cuba. The group had been under
investigation by the FBI counterintelligence squad in Miami since 1995.
Three of the 10 arrested were identified as senior agents who communicated
directly with Cuban intelligence officials and received their instructions
from Cuba. The three senior agents were all Cuban nationals. They were
GERARDO HERNANDEZ, 31 (alias Manuel Viramontes), the spymaster; FERNANDO
GONZALEZ, 33 (alias Ruben Campa), and RAMON LABANINO, 30 (alias Luis
Medina), another Cuban intelligence officer. The remaining seven were
mid-level or junior agents who passed their reports to one of these three
senior agents. Included were ANTONIO GUERRERO, 39, who observed aircraft
landings at the Boca Chica Naval Air Station from his job as a sheet-metal
worker there; ALEJANDRO ALONSO, 39, a boat pilot; and RENE GONZALEZ, 42, a
skilled aircraft pilot and the only Cuban national among these seven. Both
joined the Democracy Movement to report on its activities devoted to
harassing the Castro government with demonstrations and threats. Two
married
couples, all American citizens, also worked in the spy network: NILO and
LINDA HERNANDEZ, ages 44 and 41 respectively, and JOSEPH and AMARYLIS
SANTOS, both 39. Five defendants, Alonzo, the Hernandez's, and the
Santos's,
accepted a plea bargain and cooperated with the prosecutors, providing
information about the others. The other five defendants eventually went to
trial, which lasted six months.
The US government's espionage case also became enmeshed with an incident
that happened in February 1996, in which Cuban air force jets shot down
two
of three Cessna aircraft flying toward Havana. Four pilots, members of the
anti-Castro exile group, Brothers to the Rescue, were killed. Several of
the
Wasp network agents had infiltrated Brothers to the Rescue, including Rene
Gonzalez, the pilot. In addition to charges related to
information-gathering
and the sending of "nonpublic" information to a foreign power, Gerardo
Hernandez was charged with contributing to the deaths of the four pilots
for
passing along to Cuban intelligence information about the group's planned
fly-over. Several other Cubans who were eventually indicted in the
incident
fled to Cuba before they could be arrested.
The trial of the five Wasp defendants who had not entered into plea
bargains
resulted in convictions on all counts on 8 June 2001. Three received life
sentences in December 2001 for conspiracy to commit espionage, although
they
did not collect or compromise any classified information. Cuban nationals,
Gerardo Hernandez and Ramon Labanino, and Antonio Guerrero, an American
citizen, received life in prison. Fernando Gonzalez and Rene Gonzalez,
also
Cuban nationals, received sentences of 19 years and 10 years,
respectively,
for conspiracy and for acting as unregistered agents of a foreign power.
The
five American citizens who pled guilty to one count of acting as
unregistered agents of a foreign power received lesser sentences:
Alejandro
Alonso, Nilo Hernandez, and Linda Hernandez got sentences of seven years'
imprisonment, Joseph Santos received four years, and Amarylis Santos three
and a half.
HERNANDEZ, LINDA and her husband NILO HERNANDEZ, 46, were members of the
Wasp Network, a Cuban spy ring in south Florida. Linda, 43, was born in
New
York but returned to Cuba where she grew up and married Nilo. In 1983 the
couple returned to the United States where he later became an American
citizen. In 1992 they were "activated" as spies and ordered to move from
New
York to Miami. They were arrested on 12 September 1998 along with eight
other members of the ring. [See also Gerardo Hernandez and Alejandro
Alonso.] Linda was charged with attempting to collect information for the
Cuban Intelligence Service by infiltrating a right-wing Cuban exile group
called Alpha 66. Nilo counted aircraft at nearby Homestead Air Force Base
and reported using a shortwave radio. Although the information they passed
to Cuba was in the public domain, in a plea bargain, the pair pled guilty
to
acting as unregistered agents of a foreign government. Each was sentenced
to
seven years in prison in US District court in Miami on 23 February 2000.
http://www.eyespymag.com/spylistmain1.htm
12 in the spy-ring, 10 convicted ( various freed by now) one deported and
one fled.
Even the Cuban embassy in Holland admits there were 10:
" 1998
September 12: The FBI arrests a group of "Cuban spies at 5.30 A.M. they
are
members of the Wasp Net; they are named: Ren? Gonz?lez, Antonio Guerrero,
Luis Medina, Rub?n Campa and Manuel Viramontes. Other names are given
until
reaching 10, among them two women, but according to the statements, the
main
ones, are the first mentioned. "
http://www.embacuba.nl/5heroes.htm
They did spy on military instalations.
The Miami Herald
September 14, 2001
Lawyer: Accused spy to plead guilty
BY GAIL EPSTEIN NIEVES
Accused Cuban spy Marisol Gari, half of a husband-and-wife team
arrested in
Orlando, will plead guilty to a single spying-related charge next week as
part of a plea agreement offered by federal prosecutors, her lawyer said
Thursday.
``I got the discovery in the case, I looked at it, [the plea offer]
is a
good deal, and it's what she wants to do,'' said Miami attorney Louis
Casuso.
Gari, 42, is scheduled to plead guilty to one count of conspiracy to
act as
an unregistered agent for Cuba, Casuso said. She faces a maximum sentence
of
five years in prison.
In turn, prosecutors will drop a second count of acting as an
unregistered
Cuban agent, Casuso said. That charge carries a maximum 10-year sentence.
Gari and her husband, George Gari, 41, were arrested last month and
accused
of being agents for the Cuban Directorate of Intelligence. The couple
allegedly belonged to Cuba's La Red Avispa, or Wasp Network, which the FBI
dismantled with 10 arrests in September 1998.
CONVICTIONS
Five high-ranking intelligence agents from the Wasp Network were
convicted
on federal spying-related charges in June, including three who were
convicted of espionage conspiracy. Those men are awaiting sentencing.
According to their indictment, the Garis reported to two of them: Ram?n
Laba?ino and Fernando Gonz?lez.
The Garis -- who used the code names Luis and Margot -- allegedly
assisted
in the ring's two primary goals: trying to infiltrate the U.S. Southern
Command headquarters in West Miami-Dade and to penetrate the inner circles
of the Cuban American National Foundation, a prominent Cuban exile group.
But Marisol Gari's lawyer said she was not as culpable as the
convicted
men.
He said the plea is scheduled for next Thursday before U.S. District
Judge
Ursula Ungaro-Benages. Assistant U.S. Attorney David Buckner could not be
reached for comment.
The Garis moved to Orlando 18 months ago after living in Miami for
about
eight years. She worked for the U.S. Postal Service for part of that time.
ACCUSATIONS
In Miami, the indictment states, Marisol Gari helped keep tabs on
security
at the CANF headquarters and helped manage another agent in his bid to get
a
job at
Southcom, which oversees American military operations in the
Caribbean and
Latin America.
Gari also is accused of preparing a report for her Cuban bosses
comparing
the costs of U.S. mail service, Federal Express and other mail handlers.
Elizabeth Delgado, a lawyer who represents George Gari, did not
return
phone calls seeking comment. Casuso said that George Gari has been offered
the same plea deal as his wife.
http://www.latinamericanstudies.org/espionage/marisol-gari.htm
Florida pair plead guilty to spying on US for Cuba
http://www.lib.sun.ac.za/army/army-talk/msg31338.html
Couple accused of reporting to two Cuban spies
http://www.cubanet.org/CNews/y01/sep01/03e5.htm
Lawyer: Accused spy to plead guilty
http://www.latinamericanstudies.org/espionage/marisol-gari.htm
Cuban Spies Sentenced to Prison
http://www.ciponline.org/cuba/cubainthenews/newsarticles/ap010502veig...
http://www.dss.mil/training/espionage/1997-99.htm
http://www.eyespymag.com/spylistmain1.htm
- The "Five Cuban Heroes" proclaimed by the Cuban regime were actually
part
of
a network of 12 spies that infiltrated the U.S. In addition to the five
spies who maintained their innocence but were convicted in a jury trial
(with no Cuban-American jurors), five pleaded guilty to charges of spying
in
exchange for reduced sentences, one was deported, and one fled to Cuba to
escape arrest. The trials cost U.S. taxpayers one million dollars to
provide the defendants with a free legal representation. An appeals court
is reviewing the five spies' conviction.
-- The Cuban regime initially denied the five men were Cuban agents; it
took
almost three years, after the spies' conviction, for the regime to
acknowledge that the five spies were in fact acting under its orders --
and
that they were "heroes."
-- The regime is silent on the fact that the ringleader of the spies,
intelligence agent Gerardo Hernandez, was found guilty of being closely
involved in the Cuban air force's shoot-down of two civilian planes, over
international waters, that resulted in the deaths of four persons.
-- The object of the five's spying was not solely the anti-Castro
community
in Miami, as the Cuban regime maintains. Among the U.S. military
installations of particular interest to the five spies was the Central
Command located in Tampa, which focuses on the Middle East and has no
operational responsibilities for Latin America.
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