Apr 9, 2009 7:53 am US/Eastern
Posada Carriles Indicted On New Charges
EL PASO, Tx (AP) ―
-
-
Archive: Luis Posada Carriles
CBS
An anti-Castro Cuban militant was accused Wednesday in a federal indictment of lying about his involvement in a series of 1997 bombings that targeted tourist spots in Cuba.
Luis Posada Carriles, a former CIA operative and U.S. Army soldier, was indicted on 11 counts, including perjury and obstruction of a federal proceeding. The 81-year-old militant had previously been indicted on six counts, including immigration fraud and lying to federal authorities in a bid to become a naturalized U.S. citizen.
The indictment is the first time he has been accused in the U.S. of being involved in the bombings. Cuban authorities have long accused Posada of orchestrating the bombings as well as a deadly 1976 bombing of a Cuban jetliner.
A trial date has not been set.
Felipe Millan, Posada's El Paso lawyer, said Posada maintains his innocence.
"Mr. Posada is innocent of these charges," Millan told The Associated Press. "He's innocent ... and looks forward to having his day in court."
Efforts to reach the Cuban Interest Section, which Havana keeps in Washington, D.C., in place of an embassy, were unsuccessful Wednesday evening.
The Cuban government did not immediately comment on the indictment, which came after offices closed for the day. The evening news broadcast on state television did not mention it.
Posada was originally indicted in January 2007. At the time, prosecutors alleged that he lied to investigators about having used an alias and how he entered the U.S. in the spring of 2005. Posada claims he sneaked across the border from Mexico near Brownsville, Texas. But prosecutors have alleged that he actually arrived in Miami on a boat from Mexico.
The new indictment, issued Wednesday afternoon, charges that Posada, who is wanted in Venezuela and Cuba in the airline bombing, lied about being involving in "soliciting other individuals to carry out ... bombings in Cuba."
Prosecutors charged that he also lied about asking a man named Raul Cruz Leon to take explosives into Cuba that were used in a 1997 bombings. Cruz was sentenced to death for terrorism in the bombings, which killed an Italian tourist.
Though Posada has denied any involvement in the 1976 jetliner bombing or the Havana bombings in recent years, he has previously acknowledged involvement in the Havana hotel bombings -- he told The New York Times that "we didn't want to hurt anybody."
In another published interview, Posada said the bombs were small and intended to only "break windows and cause minor damage." He called the death of Italian tourist Fabio di Celmo "bad luck."
Cuban officials have alleged that Posada hired Cruz and another man to carry out the bombings as part of a plot to hurt tourism on the communist island.
Posada, a Cuban native and naturalized Venezuelan citizen, denied knowing Cruz or having anything to do with the 1997 bombings in Cuba during a hearing in El Paso in 2005. Posada has also recanted previous published statements that he was involved.
Posada was arrested on immigration charges in Miami in 2005. He was held at an immigration jail in El Paso until being indicted in the fraud case.
He initially sought asylum in the U.S., before withdrawing that application and asking to become a naturalized citizen.
An immigration judge in El Paso ordered that Posada should be deported in 2005, but said the ailing militant could not be sent to his native Cuba or Venezuela because of fears he could be tortured.
Posada has been free on bond, living with his family in Florida, since 2007.
The fraud case against Posada was initially thrown out by U.S. District Judge Kathleen Cardone in El Paso, who said the government manipulated Posada's naturalization interview. In a lengthy ruling, Cardone said the government's Spanish-to-English translation of the April 2006 interview was "so inaccurate as to render it unreliable as evidence of defendant's actual statement."
The judge also agreed with Posada's lawyers that the naturalization interview had been a pretext for a criminal investigation of Posada.
The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans reversed Cardone's ruling last year and earlier this year the U.S. Supreme Court turned down Posada's request to have the case dismissed based on government trickery.
(© 2009 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)
Presidential Inauguration 2009
Click to enlarge
Stumble It!
