Posada closer to release on bond
TheVoiceInside
Posts: 361
Ayayai.....why am I not surprised. Letting this man go because he is old and frail. They should send him to Venezuela. Even though they don't have the death penalty there.
Posada closer to release on bond
BY JAY WEAVER
Cuban exile militant Luis Posada Carriles could be released as early as Wednesday from a jail in New Mexico near the Texas border if U.S. authorities don't take immediate action to appeal his bond or place him in immigration detention.
Posada took one step closer to moving to Miami on a $350,000 bond as he awaits trial on immigration fraud charges in a Texas federal court.
Posada's release from jail could be imminent, thanks to yet another ruling by U.S. District Judge Kathleen Cardone. She rejected the U.S. government's request to reconsider her recent decision on Posada's bond and to hold another hearing to reassess the sufficiency of his bail.
Justice Department lawyers argued in vain that the former CIA operative could flee the country to evade his May 11 trial if his bond is not set higher.
A Justice Department spokesman declined to say what prosecutors might do. ''We're weighing our options on whether to appeal,'' said Dean Boyd.
Posada's Miami lawyer, Arturo Hernandez, was poised to post his client's bond and seek his immediate release. ''We're going to proceed in accordance with the court's order,'' Hernandez said.
Meanwhile, an advocacy group that has condemned the 79-year-old anti-Castro militant as a ''terrorist'' said he should not be released. Instead, Free the Cuban Five -- named after a group of Cuban men convicted of being spies for Fidel Castro -- said Posada should be charged with terrorism in U.S. courts or extradited to Venezuela.
In 1985, Posada escaped from prison in Venezuela after his arrest in connection with the 1976 bombing of a Cuban airliner that killed 73 people. He is wanted by Venezuelan authorities.
''We demand that the U.S. government cease protecting the terrorist Luis Posada Carriles,'' Odalys Perez Rodriguez, daughter of the Cuban airliner's captain, said in a telephone press conference held by Free the Cuban Five.
''We demand that the U.S. government indict [him] as a terrorist,'' she added. ``We demand that if the U.S. government doesn't want to try [him] as a terrorist, then the U.S. government should extradite him to Venezuela.''
In addition, Posada has been accused of -- but not charged with -- masterminding tourist site bombings in Havana that killed an Italian in 1997. A federal grand jury is investigating that case.
''Luis Posada Carriles is a terrorist, and the U.S. government has refused to define him as so,'' said Livio di Celmo of Montreal, whose brother, Fabio di Celmo, was killed in one bombing attack in Havana a decade ago. ``This [release on bond] is an insult to my brother and the other victims of terrorism.''
Posada's mere presence -- and possible release -- in the United States has stirred controversy for the federal government.
The latest legal maneuvering by the Justice Department's counterterrorism lawyers reveals their tough stand to keep the controversial exile figure behind bars -- though Free the Cuban Five advocates say it's ``all show.''
In Texas, Posada faces trial on charges of lying at his naturalization hearing and on an official application about how he entered the country illegally.
If the Justice Department fails to block Posada's bond, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement could step in to detain him until trial because the Cuban-born Venezuelan citizen faces a deportation order. However, an immigration judge has already ruled that he cannot be sent back to Cuba or Venezuela because he could be tortured in those countries.
Posada has claimed he came to America across the Mexico-Texas border in March 2005. Federal authorities, relying on an FBI informant, have accused Posada of arriving on a shrimp boat manned by a group of Miami exiles. The informant, Gilberto Abascal, has said he was on the vessel that brought Posada here. Posada's attorney obtained information from the U.S. government showing that Abascal had been in contact with Cuban intelligence officials.
If the judge's bond ruling stands, Posada can post the $350,000 bail and live with his wife in Miami under 24-hour house confinement, leaving only for doctors' appointments or to meet with his attorney. Family members and supporters have pledged assets to secure his bond.
Posada, described as ''frail'' by Cardone, would be subject to electronic monitoring and not be allowed to contact codefendants or witnesses.
Cardone's ruling was the first major legal victory for Posada since immigration agents detained him in May 2005 in Miami-Dade County, accusing him of being in the country illegally.
Posada closer to release on bond
BY JAY WEAVER
Cuban exile militant Luis Posada Carriles could be released as early as Wednesday from a jail in New Mexico near the Texas border if U.S. authorities don't take immediate action to appeal his bond or place him in immigration detention.
Posada took one step closer to moving to Miami on a $350,000 bond as he awaits trial on immigration fraud charges in a Texas federal court.
Posada's release from jail could be imminent, thanks to yet another ruling by U.S. District Judge Kathleen Cardone. She rejected the U.S. government's request to reconsider her recent decision on Posada's bond and to hold another hearing to reassess the sufficiency of his bail.
Justice Department lawyers argued in vain that the former CIA operative could flee the country to evade his May 11 trial if his bond is not set higher.
A Justice Department spokesman declined to say what prosecutors might do. ''We're weighing our options on whether to appeal,'' said Dean Boyd.
Posada's Miami lawyer, Arturo Hernandez, was poised to post his client's bond and seek his immediate release. ''We're going to proceed in accordance with the court's order,'' Hernandez said.
Meanwhile, an advocacy group that has condemned the 79-year-old anti-Castro militant as a ''terrorist'' said he should not be released. Instead, Free the Cuban Five -- named after a group of Cuban men convicted of being spies for Fidel Castro -- said Posada should be charged with terrorism in U.S. courts or extradited to Venezuela.
In 1985, Posada escaped from prison in Venezuela after his arrest in connection with the 1976 bombing of a Cuban airliner that killed 73 people. He is wanted by Venezuelan authorities.
''We demand that the U.S. government cease protecting the terrorist Luis Posada Carriles,'' Odalys Perez Rodriguez, daughter of the Cuban airliner's captain, said in a telephone press conference held by Free the Cuban Five.
''We demand that the U.S. government indict [him] as a terrorist,'' she added. ``We demand that if the U.S. government doesn't want to try [him] as a terrorist, then the U.S. government should extradite him to Venezuela.''
In addition, Posada has been accused of -- but not charged with -- masterminding tourist site bombings in Havana that killed an Italian in 1997. A federal grand jury is investigating that case.
''Luis Posada Carriles is a terrorist, and the U.S. government has refused to define him as so,'' said Livio di Celmo of Montreal, whose brother, Fabio di Celmo, was killed in one bombing attack in Havana a decade ago. ``This [release on bond] is an insult to my brother and the other victims of terrorism.''
Posada's mere presence -- and possible release -- in the United States has stirred controversy for the federal government.
The latest legal maneuvering by the Justice Department's counterterrorism lawyers reveals their tough stand to keep the controversial exile figure behind bars -- though Free the Cuban Five advocates say it's ``all show.''
In Texas, Posada faces trial on charges of lying at his naturalization hearing and on an official application about how he entered the country illegally.
If the Justice Department fails to block Posada's bond, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement could step in to detain him until trial because the Cuban-born Venezuelan citizen faces a deportation order. However, an immigration judge has already ruled that he cannot be sent back to Cuba or Venezuela because he could be tortured in those countries.
Posada has claimed he came to America across the Mexico-Texas border in March 2005. Federal authorities, relying on an FBI informant, have accused Posada of arriving on a shrimp boat manned by a group of Miami exiles. The informant, Gilberto Abascal, has said he was on the vessel that brought Posada here. Posada's attorney obtained information from the U.S. government showing that Abascal had been in contact with Cuban intelligence officials.
If the judge's bond ruling stands, Posada can post the $350,000 bail and live with his wife in Miami under 24-hour house confinement, leaving only for doctors' appointments or to meet with his attorney. Family members and supporters have pledged assets to secure his bond.
Posada, described as ''frail'' by Cardone, would be subject to electronic monitoring and not be allowed to contact codefendants or witnesses.
Cardone's ruling was the first major legal victory for Posada since immigration agents detained him in May 2005 in Miami-Dade County, accusing him of being in the country illegally.
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Please the major media outlets don't even spend 15 seconds on this case. I have written my congressman and both of my senators, numerous times, and still haven't received an answer from them.
No problem, down here there are a few reporters who actually follow this case.
Well at least someone cares about seeing justice served.
Just like the 19 hikackers on 9/11 where freedom fighters.
Its still PR, nobody in the US even know we exist.
Isn't that that island close to Florida.
what is most interesting is this is probably the 3rd or 4th time this has been mentioned but you won't find one person trying to defend him or the american gov't but in almost every other thread where the good US of A is being trashed - someone will pipe in one way or another ...
this one is hands off ...
carlos delgado for presidente
What I find most interesting is that so many people will defend this administration for invading a country because there may or may not have been some connection with terrorism, but will sit on their hands and do absolutely nothing when we are the ones who are aiding a terrorist.
close enough
jeje I like Carlos very much, even if he plays for the Mets.
patriotism is a one way street
Patriotism is not a one way street. We have made it that way because we perfer to turn a blind eye to any wrong doings our country may take part in instead of standing up and fighting for a better country. Who is the true patriot, a person who will sit by as his government shit on anyone it pleases or the person that will stand up to said injustices because of his love of his country.
Nowadays the ones in power get to decide what patriotism is.
right now and has been for a while - the former
I agree that it has been this way for a long time but that is because we have allowed that to happen. You can only blame the government for so much but in the end the responsibility falls on us for continuing to allow our government to get away with such things.
Fidel Castro: Court Ruling in Favor of Terrorist Luis Posada Carriles is a Brutal Reply
A BRUTAL REPLY: George W. Bush is undoubtedly the most genuine representative of a system of terror forced on the world by the technological, economic and political superiority of the most powerful country known to this planet.
For this reason, we share the tragedy of the American people and their ethical values. The instructions for the verdict issued by Judge Kathleen Cardone, of the El Paso Federal Court last Friday, granting Luis Posada Carriles freedom on bail, could only have come from the
White House.
It was President Bush himself who ignored at all times the criminal and terrorist nature of the defendant who was protected with a simple accusation of immigration violation levelled at him. The reply is brutal.
The government of the United States and its most representative institutions had already decided to release the monster.
The backgrounds are well-known and reach far back. The people who trained him and ordered him to destroy a Cuban passenger plane in midair, with 73 athletes, students and other Cuban and foreign travellers on board, together with its dedicated crew; those who bought his freedom while the terrorist was held in prison in Venezuela, so that he could supply and practically conduct a dirty war against the people of Nicaragua, resulting in the loss of thousands of lives and the devastation of a country for decades to come; those who empowered him to smuggle with drugs and weapons making a mockery of the laws of
Congress; those who collaborated with him to create the terrible Operation Condor and to internationalize terror; the same who brought torture, death and often the physical disappearance of hundreds of thousands of Latin Americans, could not possibly act any different.
Even though Bushs decision was to be expected, it is certainly no Less humiliating for our people. Thanks to the revelations of Por Esto! A Mexican publication from the state of Quintana Roo later complemented By our own sources, Cuba knew with absolute precision how Posada Carriles entered from Central America, via Cancun, to the Isla Mujeres departing from there on board the Santrina, after the ship was inspected by the Mexican federal authorities, heading with other terrorists straight to Miami.
Denounced and publicly challenged with exact information on the matter, since April 15, 2005, it took the government of that country more than a month to arrest the terrorist, and a year and two months to admit that Luis Posada Carriles had entered through the Florida coast illegally on board the Santrina, a presumed school-ship licensed in the United States.
Not a single word is said of his countless victims, of the bombs he set off in tourist facilities in recent years, of his dozens of plans financed by the government of the United States to physically eliminate me.
It was not enough for Bush to offend the name of Cuba by installing a horrible torture center similar to Abu Ghraib on the territory illegally occupied in Guantánamo, horrifying the world with this procedure.
The cruel actions of his predecessors seemed not enough for him. It was not enough to force a poor and underdeveloped country like Cuba to spend 100 billion dollars. To accuse Posada Carriles was tantamount to accusing himself.
Throughout almost half a century, everything was fair game against our small island lying 90 miles away from its coast, wanting to be independent. Florida saw the installation of the largest station for intelligence and subversion that ever existed on this planet.
It was not enough to send a mercenary invasion on the Bay of Pigs, costing us 176 dead and more than 300 wounded at a time when the few medical specialists they left us had no experience treating war wounds. Earlier still, the French ship La Coubre carrying Belgian weapons and grenades for Cuba had exploded on the docks of Havana Harbor. The two
well synchronized explosions caused the deaths of more than 100 workers and wounded others as many of them tool part in the rescue attempts.
It was not enough to have the Missile Crisis of 1962, which brought the world to the brink of an all-consuming thermonuclear war, at a time when there were bombs 50 times more powerful than the ones dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
It was not enough to introduce in our country viruses, bacteria And fungi to attack plantations and flocks; and incredible as it may seem, to attack human beings. Some of these pathogens came out of American laboratories and were brought to Cuba by well-known terrorists in the service of the United States government.
Add to all this the enormous injustice of keeping five heroic patriots imprisoned for supplying information about terrorist activities; they were condemned in a fraudulent manner to sentences that include two life sentences and they stoically withstand cruel mistreatment, each of them in a different prison.
Time and again the Cuban people have fearlessly faced the threat of death. They have demonstrated that with intelligence, using appropriate tactics and strategies, and especially preserving unity around their political and social vanguard, there can be no force on this earth capable of defeating them.
I think that the coming May Day celebration would be the ideal day for our people, --using the minimum of fuel and transportation-- to show their feelings to the workers and the poor of the world.
Fidel Castro Ruz
April 10, 2007
yup ... asleep at the wheel is the technical term for it ...
I hate the man but a lot of what he said is true.
i'm trying to figure out if there was more silence here or when mark mcguire was asked if he took steroids ...
I know. Where are all those I support my government till the end and America can do no wrong people.
they are waiting for their local conservative writer to tell them what to say and seeing as no major media outlet is covering it - that means no one is writing to tell them what to say ...
LOL