More on the La Ceiba drug raids

Photos: La Prensa, El Heraldo, Honduras

Newspaper reports on Friday stated that a total of 15 raids were effected in different parts of the city beginning in the early hours of the morning Thursday. Approximately 300 anti-drug agents, fiscales, judges, and military personnel participated in the operatives.

In addition to La Gringa's neighborhood, blogger Katrina's apartment building, restaurants, the harbor, and other "tourist places" were also the subject of raids. Apparently only six people were taken into custody which sounds like a disappointing result to me.

The name of the 30-year-old man who was killed was released: Franklin Cunningham James (sounds like a gringo name to me), who said he was captain of a fishing boat. He was from Nicaragua where he is had a criminal record for narcotrafficking and was operating out of the La Mosquitia area. He died after being taken to the public hospital with two bullets in his body. Another man was injured (or depending upon the newspaper reports, six people were injured).

Explosives were used to gain entry in more than one home and at least five nearby homes were damaged as a result.

A press conference was promised for the afternoon Thursday but never materialized. The media was left in the dark as far as whether there was confiscation of drugs or money or whether the suspects were charged with narcotrafficking or money laundering. Names of the homeowners or renters were not released.

I believe that if they had found quantities of drugs or money, we would have seen the evidence on the news. Apparently, (as suggested by the taxi driver!) the local police and fiscalia were left out of the loop in this investigation due to corruption in prior cases.


Updated news on Saturday:

Photos: El Heraldo and La Prensa, Honduras

La Prensa reported that L.6 million in cash (US $317,460) was found hidden in cowboy boots, cloth sacks, and cabinets. The Fiscalía Contra el Crimen Organizada (state attorney in charge of organized crime) reported that no drugs were found although there was indications of money laundering.

Also decommissioned were a quantity of high caliber firearms, prohibited munitions, and half a kilo of TNT explosive.

Investigators also took custody of numerous computers, 18 vehicles, some motorcycles. The homes and businesses remain under the control of the authorities while waiting a resolution from the Office of Bienes Incautadas (seized property).


This article is a follow up to the November 8 article: The war on drugs comes to La Gringa's colonia

Chimirri resigns, Hondutel raided, President's cabinet asked to resign

Photos: Proceso Digital, La Tribuna, Honduras

Much is going on today in Honduras.

The Honduran state-owned telephone company Hondutel was raided this morning by DGIC agents, the investigative arm of the Ministerio Público (similar to the FBI according to Aaron). Employees were evicted from the premises while the agents confiscate computers and other evidence.

I don't know what possessed me to turn on the local TV channels this morning. I must have a sixth sense! I never turn on the TV in the morning, but when I did today − what excitement! Although they have been talking about this issue all day, officials haven't given much concrete information to the press.

Hondutel has been the subject of tens of thousands of denuncias (official complaints) over the years, including most recently credible charges that Hondutel management is involved with tráfico gris (illegal phone traffic) to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars in loss of revenue to the country. My article, Part 3: Swamp of Corruption in Hondutel includes a list of articles (both mine and newspaper) with background information.

While Marcello Chimirri, head of Hondutel, was in La Ceiba today, his luxurious home in Valle de Angeles near Tegucigalpa and his Hondutel office were raided. His computers, guns, cell phones, and (reportedly) telephone espionage equipment were confiscated. During the day, he resigned from his government position. Homes of other Hondutel officials have been raided as well.

Interestingly, President Mel Zelaya, related by marriage to Chimirri, is out of the country today while all this is happening. He has been accused of being a protector of Chimirri in the past while some members of the government and other organizations have clamored for Chimirri's resignation.

Chimirri is being investigated as a suspect behind the controversial taped telephone conversations among himself, President Mel Zelaya, and other high level government officials. The 11 taped conversations (in Spanish, of course) are available from user juanapueblo at YouTube. 'Juana Pueblo' is a female version of 'John Q. Public'.

Mel Zelaya has indicated that he would like to see Juana Pueblo put in jail for exposing the illegally taped conversations. I say Hooray! for Juana and whoever provided the tapes to her. When the laws protect the criminals and the system doesn't work, as it obviously doesn't, it is time for drastic measures.

News reports are thin on facts, but some have stated that these raids are not to investigate the charges of corruption and criminal activities of Chimirri and Hondutel which have been circulating for months and years without any appearance of a serious investigation but rather to investigate the illegal recordings of government officials! If only the government of Honduras would put such efforts into combating corruption as they do in investigating those who attempt to expose it.

One of the most disappointing things to me is that in interviews of various Hondutel employees and other government officials, they say, "The raid is an abuse of authority," etc. I would have hoped that the employees, who are bound to know at least some of the corruption in this organization, would be saying "Thank God that something is finally being done about corruption!" (Reader Mane, I know what you will be saying! ;-o)

I find it so ironic that if Chimirri was involved with these tape recordings, he may fall, not from his own alleged corrupt activities, but instead from exposing the conversations of other government officials.

So many potential pitfalls could result in nothing of substance from any of these investigations. The DGIC might not find the evidence needed, they might not be capable of interpreting the evidence or of developing a solid case. Evidence frequently disappears. Police and fiscalías are often accused of compromising cases for their own personal benefit. The courts often throw out cases against 'important people' for lack of evidence or technicalities − which is often attributed to the judges being bought. The fact is that high level government officials are rarely prosecuted and never go to jail. Will we see a change this time? I'm guardedly hopeful, but realistically, based on history, probably nothing will come of it.

However, President Zelaya, in a shocking act from Chile today, requested letters of resignation from his entire cabinet, all of the directors, and managers of all the decentralized government agencies! I don't know if this is a 'show,' or if Mel is losing control.

Proceso Digital reported that one of the first to submit his resignation was Yani Rosenthal, a proposed presidential candidate, whose family was implicated in the tráfico gris scandal.

What does this mean? Is he trying to get rid of the corruptos or trying to get rid of those fighting the corruptos? Honestly, at this moment, I'm still confused about what is actually happening here.

The war on drugs comes to La Gringa's colonia

Photo: El Heraldo and not from today

You know what I always say: There is never a shortage of blogging material in Honduras.

I was sitting here today thinking about what to blog about and, as usual, got sidetracked into other more interesting things. Finally I looked at a bunch of drafted articles for which I need more information or photos. Sometimes those drafts just get so old that I end up deleting them. Then I started looking at my recent photos for inspiration ('recent' is a misnomer because some of them go back to February!). I have a ton of chicken photos and videos but that is going to take more time to put together than I have today.

Still stumped, the phone rang. It was El Jefe warning me that there had been a allanamiento in our neighborhood just a couple of blocks from here. Allanamiento means a burglary or unlawful entry, but is also the term used for when the police raid and tear apart your house, presumably with a warrant. He wanted to let me know because they have been known to go to the wrong house on occasion...and just exactly what could I do if that happened???

El Jefe was calling from town. He heard all about it from a neighbor he passed on his way to catch a taxi and then from the taxi driver. The driver has a regular pickup of two school children every morning at the house in question. The taxista arrived to see a dozen or more heavily armed, bulletproof-vested, ski-masked police lurking about, possibly waiting for pick-up or drop-off to occur. (My comment was that if the taxi driver saw them, then they weren't exactly hiding to catch someone by surprise.)

I really, really wanted to go take photos. I mean, a drug bust in action! What more exciting thing can you think of. However, I doubted that I would be allowed to take photos and didn't particularly want the neighbors, if they were still there, to see me reveling in their 'misfortune,' not to mention that the police might decide I was a suspicious character and take me in for questioning!

The taxi driver told El Jefe that he knew the homeowner and was suspicious about him. He said the guy lived in a very small house in a poor colonia not too many months ago and now seemed to be living the good life. He said he didn't want to make judgments but he just didn't see any other way for this family to become so prosperous so quickly.

The driver was a wealth of information about other recent allanamientos. In one case in a nearby colonia, the home owners wouldn't open the gate for the police so the police threw a bomb into the gate! The driver said that there were a total of four allanamientos that he knows of. This could just be gossip, but I've found that taxi drivers usually have a pretty good grasp of what is going on.

I was happy to hear about this renewed effort against drug trafficking, though not so happy to hear that we have narcotraffickers in our colonia. I wasn't surprised though, because we have one vacant house that is said to belong to a Colombian drug dealer who left the country.

I don't put a lot of faith in rumors like this, just because it seems that anyone who is reasonably well-off is often a target of such rumors. But there is another vacant house in our neighborhood owned by a couple who also were rumored to be drug dealers. They moved away after the husband was shot in the street in town so maybe there is some truth to the rumor. OMG! Maybe all my neighbors are drug dealers!

Watching the local news tonight, I found out that the taxi driver's information was correct. Special organized crime agents had been brought in from Tegucigalpa to perform the raids. One suspect was killed.

In the recent past other La Ceiba raids have been unsuccessful in that the alleged criminals were tipped off and had already left the area or maybe even the country. That's disturbing since you know that only the judge, police, and fiscalía (district attorney's office) would have access to the information.