Noriega On Ice

By Richard Lacayo

The last time Manuel Noriega set foot in the U.S. was in 1985. He was not only Panama's strongman then but also an American intelligence asset. His hosts from the CIA took him to lunch at a Washington restaurant.

Noriega made a different kind of arrival last week at Homestead Air Force Base near Miami. Now he was an accused felon and his hosts -- from the Justice Department this time -- took him to jail. After landing at 2:45 a.m., the deposed dictator was sped to a Miami federal courthouse. There he was posed in a T shirt for a humiliating mug shot, then stashed in a windowless basement cell. Panama's numero uno had become federal prisoner 41586.

After the eleven-day standoff outside the Vatican embassy in Panama City, Noriega's surrender to American authorities, which George Bush had defined as a chief goal of the invasion of Panama, triumphantly clinched the gamble the President took by ordering U.S. troops into combat. With Noriega in handcuffs, Panamanians celebrating in the streets and U.S. casualties relatively low, Republican Party chairman Lee Atwater probably had it right when he called the outcome a political jackpot for Bush.

Yet even as the war in Panama winds down, the battle in the U.S. is just shaping up. Noriega now has at his disposal an arsenal he could not call upon at home: the ample resources of a defendant in an American courtroom. The general's lawyers raised the standard defense objections about pretrial publicity and inadmissible evidence. Both objections have been given a fresh twist by Noriega's singular status as a de facto head of state tracked down by an invading army. The biggest question, however, is more a matter of politics than of legal procedure. With Noriega in court, will Bush also be on trial?

Noriega's ties to U.S. intelligence agencies date back to the 1950s, when he began to pass along information about his fellow students at a military academy. Later he went on the payroll of the Central Intelligence Agency, reportedly earning as much as $200,000 a year. The general can plausibly argue that U.S. Presidents stretching back to Richard Nixon were aware of his drug involvement -- no one more so than former CIA director George Bush -- but looked the other way to avoid losing a valuable source of intelligence. At a press conference on Friday, Bush sought to squelch speculation that Noriega could embarrass him. "The Attorney General assures me our case is strong, our resolve is firm, and our legal representations are sound," the President said.

Nevertheless, Iran-contra defendants Oliver North, John Poindexter and former CIA agent Joseph Fernandez forced prosecutors to reduce or dismiss many of the charges against them by insisting that reams of classified information were necessary for their cases. Noriega's lawyers are almost certain to make the same argument. "The only way to get to the truth is to get those documents," said Noriega defense attorney Steven Kollin last week. Even if that tactic fails, a question that has haunted more than one previous President -- what did he know and when did he know it? -- may yet rise up to bedevil this one.

"Noriega probably knows more about what is in our CIA files than anyone in the Justice Department," says Richard Gregorie, a former Assistant U.S. Attorney, who drew up the Miami indictment against the general. "He knows what to ask for." The asking is likely to begin early in a pretrial process that could go on for a year or more. Only documents that relate directly to the drug charges can be introduced into court, so much of the most provocative material concerning Noriega's services to the CIA may be beyond the reach of his attorneys. But if the government refuses to turn over files that Federal % District Judge William M. Hoeveler deems essential, that could result in a mistrial or the dismissal of some charges. Some Washington insiders doubt that the trial will result in embarrassing disclosures. "There isn't anything there," says Elliott Abrams, former Assistant Secretary of State for Inter- American Affairs. "It's a bugaboo." Other intelligence experts disagree. According to a former CIA official quoted by the New York Times, Noriega "can make us look terribly meddlesome. He can expose a lot of activities, people and places. At a minimum, it will be embarrassing and difficult. This sort of case is bad enough when there's nothing there. It's doubly bad if, as in this case, there is."

Last week former prosecutor Gregorie said that when his office asked to review classified information that might pertain to the case, standard procedure in investigations that might require the airing of Government secrets, the request was denied. "None of the prosecutors working on the case were allowed to see the CIA files," he claimed.

For now at least, the troubles are all in Noriega's corner. The twelve-count racketeering indictment alleges that between 1981 and 1986 Noriega received payments of more than $4.6 million from Colombia's Medellin cartel. Prosecutors claim that in return he permitted the drug lords to use Panama as a refining and transshipment point for cocaine and as a sanctuary for themselves while the profits were laundered in Panamanian banks and false- front companies, usually with a suitable cut for the general.

Fifteen other Panamanians, Colombians and Americans are named in the indictment. Four are in custody (another is out on bail), including two Panamanians -- Lieut. Colonel Luis del Cid and Daniel Miranda, a Noriega pilot -- who were captured by American troops during the invasion and brought to the U.S. Prosecutors will probably offer to reduce or dismiss charges against Del Cid and Miranda if they agree to testify against their former chief.

Noriega faces a second indictment in a Tampa court charging that he took a bribe from a trafficker who was importing more than 1.4 million lbs. of marijuana into the U.S. If he manages to beat the rap in both American jurisdictions, he may face more serious trouble in Panama. The country's new leaders say they hope to bring him to account on charges that could include the torture and killing of political opponents. "He will be tried for these things," vowed Panamanian Vice President Guillermo Ford, adding briskly, "Not lynching -- due process."

Noriega began his legal counterattack the day he arrived in Florida by refusing to enter a plea at his arraignment in U.S. district court. Dressed in a fresh uniform that was sent to him at the Vatican embassy by his mistress Vicky Amado, the general used headphones to follow the proceedings in Spanish. Defense attorney Frank A. Rubino argued that his client was immune from prosecution because he was a political prisoner who had been brought to the U.S illegally.

Though that argument may provide a basis for later appeals, it was just a minor stumbling block last week. After U.S. Attorney Dexter Lehtinen raised objections to Rubino's statements, Judge Hoeveler entered a not-guilty plea on Noriega's behalf. Defense attorneys are also insisting that Noriega cannot get a fair trial in a nation where the President has publicly called him a thug. Yet the fact that twelve jurors could be found who were unfamiliar with the congressional testimony of Iran-contra star Oliver North makes it less likely that those objections will stand in the way of a trial.

Noriega may hope to escape a guilty verdict because of weaknesses in the Government cases. The indictments in Tampa and Miami are based largely on testimony by convicted felons, whose word juries sometimes find less persuasive than evidence provided through wiretaps or documents. Said a prominent federal prosecutor: "Sounds to me that they got nothing but snitches." A probable witness is Steven Michael Kalish, 37, a convicted drug dealer serving time in Louisiana who claims he passed on $6 million to Noriega over a ten-month period in 1983 and '84. Two other likely convict-witnesses who have given testimony from their jail cells are drug-running pilots Floyd Carlton-Cacerez and Antonio Aizprua, the latter another of Noriega's personal pilots.

An important witness who has not been charged with any crimes is Jose Blandon, former consul general of Panama in New York and a onetime member of Noriega's inner circle. After breaking with the dictator two years ago, Blandon told a Miami grand jury that in Havana in 1984 he watched Fidel Castro mediate a dispute between Noriega and members of the Medellin cartel after Panamanian troops closed down a drug laboratory that Noriega had been paid to protect.

That allegation later formed the basis for one of the charges in the Miami indictment. Blandon maintains that Castro was not so much interested in furthering the drug trade as he was in preventing the drug lords from destabilizing Noriega, who was helping Cuba get around U.S. trade restrictions through false-front companies in Panama that purchased Western goods.

To strengthen their case, prosecutors are sifting through documents seized by U.S. troops who invaded Noriega's Panama headquarters. Noriega's attorneys are likely to claim that the military's warrantless search makes the evidence inadmissible in court. Few legal observers expect that objection to hamper the prosecution; American constitutional safeguards usually apply only within the nation's borders.

Weaknesses in the prosecution's case would increase the chances that the Government would seek a deal with Noriega, offering to drop or reduce the charges in return for his cooperation in nailing other foreign drug traffickers. But at this early stage in their test of strength, neither the Government nor the defense was willing to entertain the notion in public. The President was especially touchy about speculation that his prosecutors might bargain with a drug dealer whose capture had cost several hundred Panamanian and American lives. "Our Government is not seeking a deal with Noriega," he said, although he did not rule out the possibility entirely. So far, Bush has lived up to his vow to bring Noriega to U.S. justice, no matter how long it took or what it cost. Based on that evidence, Noriega's prospects in this coming battle are not promising.

With reporting by Jerome Cramer/Washington and Bernard Diederich/Miami