RE: The CIA & The DEA:  Kingpins of the Global Narcotics Market
From: jad@cbnewsl.cb.att.com (John DiNardo)
Date: 1 May 92 16:20:32 GMT
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories
Message-ID: <1992May1.162032.26863@cbnewsl.cb.att.com>
Newsgroups:
alt.conspiracy,alt.activism,talk.politics.misc,misc.headlines,
soc.rights.human,soc.culture.usa,soc.culture.latin-america,
alt.society.civil-liberty,alt.censorship


   Thanks to Patricia McRae, T350134@UNIVSCVM.CSD.SCAROLINA.EDU
   for transcribing the following broadcast by Pacifica Radio station
       WBAI-FM (99.5)
       505 Eighth Ave., 19th Fl.
       New York, NY 10018        (212) 279-0707
   This is a transcription of an interview with Peter Dale Scott,
   co-author with Jonathan Marshall, of COCAINE POLITICS.  

*   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *
  [Dennis Bernstein is referring to Stephen Carr, who was murdered
   before he was due to testify in court against criminals in our Government.]

DENNIS BERNSTEIN:
I did some research on this myself and I know, in terms of the
autopsy, the coroner's office in Los Angeles was immediately notified 
that this was a potential Congressional witness, and nevertheless, 
the body sat over a week-end unprotected, and there were many concerns 
about how it was being kept and being transported. There are still
many questions about that. 

PETER DALE SCOTT:
My memory is that the family insisted on moving the body to Florida
and, when it was moved to Florida, insisted on another autopsy report. 
And for the first time, there was a report of needle marks behind the 
left elbow, which doesn't sound like your classical way of ingesting 
cocaine, so I think it was a very suspicious death. Not the only one,
by the way, of witnesses to this case. Other witnesses who did testify
had their lives threatened. A bomb went off outside the house of Joe
Coutine. Jack Terrell was told that if .... what happened to Jack
Terrell is a whole story in itself, but his life was threatened. 
And I must say that it was amazing to me as I went, as a university 
professor, to Washington at the height of the Iran-Contra affair.
During the hearings, I was in Washington talking on your WBAI show from
time to time. And the number of people in Washington who had bravely 
helped to break the Contra drug story, but who were terrified and who 
will not allow me to name who they are because that's how terrified
they are. And this was happening right in the nation's capitol.

DENNIS BERNSTEIN:
So here we are with Felipe Vidal and Rene Corvo in Costa Rica 
financed by Frank Castro and his operations. Incidentally, I believe 
it was the case that Jose Coutine was working on as an informant for 
the Miami PD, and he actually found information, or testified, or 
reported to his handlers at the Miami PD that Frank Castro was 
involved in drug trafficking, and, in fact, that informtion was 
passed along to the FBI, because it is stamped "FBI" and "George
Kuzinski" on the actual interviews with Coutine. So they did know
rather early.

PETER DALE SCOTT:
Yes, and they were actually the subject of an investigation which
went nowhere and enlarged eventually into an investigation of Corvo 
and Vidal down in Costa Rica.  What we haven't mentioned so far --
and this is the key to what made this so sensitive -- is that when 
Oliver North assumed responsibilities for coordinating various Contra
efforts and finding support for them, he had a leg man, Robert Owen,
whom people may remember from the hearings. He testified under
oath that there was absolutely nothing to the Christic charges, 
although many of them are corroborated by his notes to Oliver North,
which we now have. Owen was going down to Costa Rica and to Honduras
and to El Salvador. In Costa Rica he would regularly see John Hull,
and he regularly saw a man he called Max who was Felipe Vidal. He
regarded Rene Corvo as a bit of a maverick, but he relied very 
heavily on Felipe Vidal to coordinate activities with the assets --
the right-wing assets down there who included some more ex-Miami 
CIA Cubans in an outfit called Frigorificos de Puntarenas. It was 
a shrimp freezing outfit which was actually designated by the DEA
[U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency] as a front for laundering drug money.
These were drug traffickers that Felipe was working with with Robert 
Owens' and Oliver North's encouragement. And things had gotten so 
mixed up and inverted down there that in one of Owens' memos -- 
which was heavily censored by the Iran-Contra Committee, but we
have it from a Christic deposition -- Owen was talking about how 
the Cubans and the Frigorificos and Felipe Vidal were going to run
some shrimp boats for covert operations, and Owen was negotiating 
with North to get two DEA agents seconded down to Costa Rica to 
work under the direction of these drug traffickers. So you can see
just how high level this collaboration between the White House and
the National Security Council and the drug traffickers in Costa Rica
had become.

Now, Jack Terrell brought this to the attention of the FBI. And 
the FBI already had an investigation of Corvo going
because of the bombing of this bank in Miami. And you had a 
young Assistant U.S. Attorney in Miami, Jeffrey Feldman, who got  
the approval of his superiors to go down and start talking to 
people in Costa Rica about what it was that Corvo and Vidal were
doing.  And he expected to have the support of the U.S. Embassy.
And pretty soon he learned, to his amazement, that the Embassy
became very involved in this case, but involved on behalf of the 
people whom he was trying to interview, and [the Embassy] actually
advised John Hull not to interview and, also advised Washington --
which is to say, Oliver North -- of what was going on.  

The upshot of all this, which was partly talked about in the 
Iran-Contra report, was that the whole investigation was stymied.
Jeffrey Feldman had recommended going to a grand jury. First of all, 
they just turned that down. Then, at a higher level, without his
knowing, they turned his recommendation to go to a grand jury
into a recommendation NOT to go to a grand jury, because this
would be "a fishing expedition".  Then the Justice Department, 
or individuals in it, leaked this falsified recommendation, the
opposite of what he had recommended. They leaked it to the Press
at exactly the same time that the Christic Institute had filed its 
lawsuit against some of these individuals as defendants.

*   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *

    Right now, these CIA and DEA criminals against the American people
    are fiercely attempting to destroy the Christic Institute and 
    thus, to assassinate the last force of justice to be dogging 
    their trail. The criminals are brandishing the power of the people,
    vested in the Federal Government, as their assassination weapon.
    They have corrupted the Federal courts to rule against the
    Christic Institute's lawsuit on behalf of the American people.
    These corrupt courts have levied fines approching two million
    dollars, in an effort to bankrupt the Christic Institute.

    Please phone or write the Christic Institute
                              1324 North Capitol St., N.W.
                              Washington, D.C. 20002      (202) 797-8106

       John DiNardo