STATEMENT OF LELAND L. RIGGS, JR. FOR THE USE OF THE SUBCOMMITTEE ON SEPARATION OF POWERS OF THE COMMITTEE ON THE JUDICIARY UNITED STATES SENATE Leland L. Riggs, Jr., being duly sworn, deposes and says as follows: I, Leland L. Riggs, Jr., am a retired Special Agent in Charge of the United States Drug Enforcement Administration. involving narcotics intelligence collection in Central America. I first became a criminal investigator for the U.S. Bureau of Customs in January, 1964, after having spent 8 years as a highway patrolman. I was first assigned by the Bureau of Customs to duties in California where I conducted narcotics smuggling investigations for a period of 6 years. Thereafter, I was promoted from Customs Special Agent to Senior Customs Representative and was transferred to Mexico City, Mexico. Inasmuch as I am bilingual and speak Spanish, my assignment to Mexico was deemed to be advantageous to the agency. My area of While assigned to Mexico City, I had sole responsibility for Customs narcotics intelligence gathering and for conducting follow-up investigations forwarded to me by our domestic offices of investigation. responsibility included not only the Republic of Mexico but additionally all of Latin America. However, 95% of my investigative time concerned either Mexico or the Republic of Panama. During the time I was in Mexico in 1970 and 1971, I conducted several investigations in Panama. Subsequently, in June of 1972, I was appointed Customs Attache and instructed to establish an office in the American Embassy in Panama City, Panama. This occurred during the period when the entire Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs agents force had been expelled persona non grata from Panama. I served as Customs Attache until July 1, 1973, at which time the Drug Enforcement Administration was formed and I then also assumed command of the Panamanian functions of the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs when the Bureau of Customs narcotics functions were merged with those of the BNDD. In short, I became the Special Agent in Charge of the combined office. I left Panama on June 17, 1974, to become the Special Agent in Charge of the DEA District Office in Brownsville, Texas. Thereafter while on temporary assignment as Project Manager for a special DEA operation in Colombia directed against clandestine cocaine processing laboratories in Colombia, on November 30, 1975, I was attacked, beaten, and pushed off a retaining wall to a street below and suffered several fractured vertebrae, a broken ankle, kidney damage, and assorted cuts and bruises. The DEA subsequently retired me on August 24, 1976, for medical disability reasons. When I first began conducting investigations in Panama, the BNDD Agent in Charge advised me that we had to be very careful about informing Panamanian government officials concerning our work since they were corrupt and also involved in narcotics trafficking. I soon learned from personal experience that this advice was sound. During September, 1970, I traveled to Panama to conduct a follow-up investigation regarding a Yolando Sarmiento case involving shipments of heroin from Panama to New York. Although I do not have presently in my possession intelligence reports prepared by me at that time, I do recall certain aspects of the case. Yolanda Sarmiento reportedly was smuggling approximately 100 pounds of heroin monthly into the United States.. This heroin was reported to be stored in the Colon Free Zone in the Republic of Panama. The Colon Free Zone is a large, fenced-in, heavily guarded section of Colon, Panama, on the Atlantic side where duty-free items are displayed in numerous stores for purchase by persons and businesses based primarily in South America. I was advised by U.S. Canal Zone officials and a confidential source that the Guardia Nacional controlled and guarded this enclosed area. I later did manage to gain entrance with a U.S. Canal Zone official; however, we were only permitted to go into the showcase areas of the various stores. The Colon Free Zone is entered at a gate guarded by uniformed members of the Guardia Nacional. Although the Government of Panama does have a Customs Office and there are Panamanian Customs Agents, Panamanian Customs does not have responsibility for control of the Free Zone. During 1970, United States Customs Agents in New York were able to effect the arrest of Yolanda Sarmiento, Emilio Diaz Gonzales, and others; however, Yolanda Sarmiento was released on bail, subsequently fled the country, and became a fugitive in Argentina. Gonzales escaped from prison in New York and is believed also to have fled the country. As best I recall, Emilio Diaz My efforts to continue a follow-up investigation of the Sarmiento case were essentially unsuccessful because of the problems inherent in free movement within the Colon Free Zone resulting from the control of the Free Zone by the Guardia Nacional of the Government of Panama. During my trips to Panama, I became aware of a BNDD investigation concerning the Panamanian chief air controller, Juaquin Him Gonzales. Juaquin Him was reportedly directing heroin from Panama into Texas and using his official capacity in the Government of Panama to facilitate the movement of this heroin. He was subsequently indicted by a U.S. Grand Jury in Texas and was arrested when he entered the U.S. Canal Zone to attend a softball Juaquin Him was tried and convicted for facilitating the transportation of narcotics into the United States. game. I understand that the arrest of Juaquin Him caused considerable dissension between the Ambassador and the U.S. narcotics agents in Panama. 'experienced similar problems in connection with the Raphael Richard-Moises Torrijos case. I learned of the Richard-Torrijos case after my assignment as the Customs Attache to the American Embassy in Panama. In fact, I became directly involved in the investigation concerning Moises Torrijos, now Panamanian Ambassador to Spain, and Raphael Richard Gonzales, the son of the then-Panamanian Ambassador to Taiwan. Richard was arrested on the evening of July 8, 1971, at John F. Kennedy Airport in New York in possession of 151 pounds of heroin. Immediately prior to his arrest, he claimed diplomatic immunity and asserted that his suitcase could not be opened and searched due to his diplomatic passport. A U.S. customs inspector advised him that he was accredited as a diplomat in Taiwan, not in the United States, and therefore had no diplomatic status in the United States. Also arrested that evening was Nicolas Polanco, a reported chauffeur-bodyguard of Moises Torrijos. Moises Torrijos was then the Panamanian Ambassador to Argentina, and he is the brother of Dictator Omar Torrijos. The day following the Richard arrest, Guillermo Alfonso Gonzales was also arrested upon his arrival in New York City from Panama for the purpose of accepting delivery of the heroin Richard had attempted to bring into the country. Others arrested the same day were Jose Francisco Oscar San Martino, an Angentine, and Cesar and Amarico Altanirano, both Panamanians. Subsequent investigations of the same case led to the indictment of Moises Torrijos by a Grand Jury of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York. Torrijos was indicted as a co-conspirator with the above-mentioned defendants. Thereafter, a warrant for the arrest of Moises Torrijos was issued by the U.S. Court for the Eastern District of New York. On the basis of the evidence of a warrant, I was instructed to be on the alert to effect an arrest in the event Moises Torrijos traveled from Spain through the U.S.-controlled Panama Canal Zone. During either late 1972 or early 1973, I was advised that Moises Torrijos, accompanied by his wife, was traveling from Spain to Panama on a passenger vessel. Subsequent information showed that the vessel would dock in Cristobal, Panama, within the U.S.-controlled Panama Canal Zone. Arrangements were therefore made to effect the arrest of Moises Torrijos in the U.S. territory upon his arrival. However, Moises Torrijos was obviously informed of his impending arrest and departed the vessel at Caracas, Venezuela, where he flew by commercial airliner to Tocumen Airport within the Republic of Panama. When the vessel arrived, only Mrs. Moises Torrijos disembarked. Inasmuch as the only parties aware of the planned arrest of Moises Torrijos other than BNDD were the U.S. Department of State and the Central Intelligence Agency, Moises Torrijos could only have been alerted to the planned arrest by United States authorities. |