Former Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega arrived in France early Tuesday morning, where he is expected to face trial on money laundering charges.
April 26, 2010
By JAY WEAVER
JWEAVER@MIAMIHERALD.COM
One-time Panamanian strongman Manuel Noriega, who turned his country into a narco-trafficking hub at the height of the U.S. war on drugs, may never go home again.
On Monday afternoon, the former nemesis of President George H.W. Bush spent his last moments in a Southwest Miami-Dade federal prison before being flown to France to face new money-laundering charges -- capping one of the hemisphere's most politically explosive drug cases.
"It was the mother of all battles in the war on drugs," said former Miami federal prosecutor Myles Malman, who tried the early 1990s case. "There was so much riding on it -- the reputations of the prosecutors, the U.S. government and the president of the United States."
Noriega, whose transfer came after he had spent 20 years in federal prison, was placed on an Air France flight following U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's signature on his extradition order.
Noriega, now in his 70s, was ousted as Panama's leader and brought to Miami to stand trial following the 1989 U.S. invasion that drove him from power. He was convicted of cocaine-trafficking and racketeering charges in 1992 and declared a prisoner of war by U.S. District Judge William Hoeveler.
That drug sentence ended on Sept. 9, 2007, but Noriega remained behind bars. Noriega and his lawyers argued he should be returned to Panama, where he was wanted on murder charges, because he was a prisoner of war. His legal team said the U.S. was violating the Geneva Conventions by not sending him back to Panama. But several federal courts rejected the claim, with the U.S. Supreme Court refusing to hear his final appeal this year.
The court's majority turned away Noriega's appeal without comment. Justices Clarence Thomas and Antonin Scalia said they would have heard the appeal, however, to help decide what the law is for prisoners of war being held by the United States. Noriega was the only person being detained under that status.
In a last ditch effort, Noriega's lawyers, Frank Rubino and Jon May, formally asked the secretary of state to send Noriega back home to Panama, arguing that the Panamanian extradition request should take precedence because it was filed first and carried more serious charges than France's.
Both lawyers expressed disappointment after learning from the media that the U.S. government sent Noriega to France instead.
May said the fix was always in to send Noriega to France because when Noriega came up for parole, federal authorities said at a hearing that the Bush family had expressed serious concerns about his potential threat to President George H.W. Bush if he were released.
"The only reason the French asked for Noriega's extradition is because the Bush family did not want Noriega to return to Panama," May said. They wanted him to die in prison in France.
"I'm convinced that Noriega's extradition to France was a political accommodation by the French," he added.
A few weeks before Noriega's sentence ended in September 2007, the U.S. filed papers backing France's request that he be extradited to stand trial on drug money-laundering charges there. Noriega was convicted in absentia of laundering some $3 million in drug proceeds, but France has agreed to give him a new trial.
Noriega faces a 10-year sentence for funneling $3.15 million to a bank account. He was accused of using some of that money to buy three luxury apartments in Paris.
Decades ago, Noriega was a reliable ally of the United States whose background included a stint as a CIA operative.
But his merger of power and drug trafficking led to his downfall. The first President Bush ordered the U.S. military to invade Panama in Operation Just Cause in late 1989.
Noriega took sanctuary in the Vatican Embassy in Panama City but surrendered to U.S. troops in Jan. 3, 1990. While he was there, the U.S. military blasted rock music, including songs by the band Guns N' Roses, at top volume. The music stopped after the Vatican complained of harassment.
The dictator was whisked to Miami, where he would later stand trial. It took until 1992 for the U.S. attorney's office -- prosecutor Malman along with colleagues Michael "Pat" Sullivan and Guy Lewis -- to convict him because of the legal and political complexity of the case.
After his conviction and sentencing, Hoeveler declared him a prisoner of war who should be accorded special privileges, including an apartment-like cell -- complete with phone, color TV and exercise bike -- at the low-security Southwest Miami-Dade federal prison.
Hoeveler played a major role in Noriega's fate. He even wrote a 2004 letter to the U.S. Parole Commission recommending his release.
Hoeveler cited Noriega's "advancing age" and his "tempered" view toward the ex-strongman. That contrasted sharply with the Bush administration's stand to keep him behind bars, which delayed his parole for three more years.
On Monday, Hoeveler said Noriega's extradition to France came as no surprise.
"As far as I'm concerned, he paid his price to society," Hoeveler told The Miami Herald. "Now he's on his way to France, and that's all I can say. There's nothing that I or anyone else can do."
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