EXPLANATORY REPORTING 2014 COMPETITION | PULITZER PRIZES UNDER THE CURSE OF CARTELS | RISE AND FALL OF A TRAFFICKER (SECOND OF FIVE PARTS: MONDAY, JUNE 23, 2013) A KINGPIN’S TOXIC POWER Relatives, ruthlessness and boundless greed help Pocho — and many like him — command a brutal business By LES ZAITZ Lou Nalepa, an agent with the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, reached for his ringing cellphone as he guided his car through Portland freeway traffic. On that Friday aſternoon in February 2010, he expected to hear from a witness in an upcoming drug trial. Instead, he found on the line a fugitive he’d been chasing for six years. “is is Pocho,” said the voice on the other end — Porfirio Arevalo-Cuevas. e name means little to most Oregonians. But law enforcement officials know Arevalo-Cuevas as one of the most prolific drug traffickers in Oregon history, a violent thug with ties to Mexico’s most notorious cartels.
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E X P L A N A T O R Y R E P O R T I N G
2 0 1 4 C O M P E T I T I O N | P U L I T Z E R P R I Z E S
U N D E R T H E C U R S E O F C A R T E L S | R I S E A N D FA L L O F A T R A F F I C K E R( S E C O N D O F F I V E PA R T S : M O N D AY, J U N E 2 3 , 2 0 1 3 )
A KINGPIN’S TOXIC POWERRelatives, ruthlessness and boundless greed help Pocho — and many like him — command a brutal business
By LES ZAITZ
Lou Nalepa, an agent with the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, reached for his ringing cellphone as he guided his car through Portland freeway traffic.
On that Friday afternoon in February 2010, he expected to hear from a witness in an upcoming drug trial. Instead, he found on the line a fugitive he’d been chasing for six years.
“This is Pocho,” said the voice on the other end — Porfirio Arevalo-Cuevas.The name means little to most Oregonians. But law enforcement officials know Arevalo-Cuevas as one of
the most prolific drug traffickers in Oregon history, a violent thug with ties to Mexico’s most notorious cartels.
Pocho, calling from somewhere in Latin America, was angry that U.S. officials had disrupted his drug trade there. He resented that Nalepa’s work had helped jail relatives, including his mother, according to federal documents and law enforcement officials.
“Now,” Pocho told Nalepa, his fury escalating, “I am going to start (messing) with you and your family.”The DEA whisked Nalepa, his wife, son and stepson out of the state for two weeks. Officials also installed
high-tech security equipment at Nalepa’s home that weekend and stepped up street patrols.The threat illustrates the extraordinary brazenness of cartel-connected traffickers in the Northwest. Pocho
in particular turned Salem into a national hub for meth, cocaine and heroin distribution before leading U.S. officials on a maddening international chase. Authorities traced his drugs as far away as Texas, Georgia and Illinois.
“It’s hard to think of any drug organization in Oregon that was larger or had farther reach,” said Dwight Holton, Oregon’s interim U.S. attorney in 2010-11.
Pocho’s story, constructed with documents rarely available to reporters plus interviews with officials and former traffickers, offers a window on the tactics used by him and the many like him. His operation was unusual for its size and sweep, officials said, but his reliance on relatives, ruthlessness and a seemingly endless supply of meth cooks, dealers and couriers was dismally common.
“The only way they’ll take me is dead”Pocho was born in the Mexican state of Michoacan and peddled pot for his dad as a kid. He quit
school after eighth grade and later sneaked into the U.S. to join relatives. In spring 1997, at age 18, he and his girlfriend and two children moved into the Salem home of a cousin, according to federal court filings and law enforcement officials.
The cousin tutored Pocho in heroin trafficking. That November, Pocho stepped off a plane from Oakland, Calif., at Portland International Airport with 300 grams of heroin hidden under his insoles. He attracted a police officer’s attention by nervously pacing, then quickly confessed.
He served 13 months in the federal prison in Sheridan before being sent back to Mexico in 2000.Pocho boomeranged right back to Salem and expanded into meth production, according to documents
and officials. In September 2000, Salem police caught him with 7,400 pills of pseudoephedrine, a key meth ingredient, plus $1,240 and a .40-caliber Taurus handgun, according to Salem Police Department reports.
This time, Pocho had no plans to confess. He coolly gave police a false identity and chewed off portions of his fingertips on the way to jail to keep his true name secret. He was released on bail the next day.
“I’m like a fighting rooster,” he bragged in a call intercepted by DEA agents in 2008. “The only way they’ll take me is dead.”
Pocho moved to a home nine miles east of Scio, a small town northeast of Albany where residents gather each spring for a Lamb & Wool Fair and its pie-eating contest.
Using connections to the La Familia cartel in Michoacan, Pocho opened some of the biggest meth labs Oregon has ever seen, federal court documents show. Investigators calculated that one superlab outside Brownsville, still the biggest ever found in Oregon, churned out 70 pounds of meth a week, worth $700,000 wholesale.
Pocho’s younger brother, Arturo, dropped out of Salem’s McKay High School and joined the operation as a top aide. Other brothers made deliveries and sales. Sisters kept the books, paid the bills and shuttled to California for supplies.
In 2002, a meth cook’s mistake destroyed the group’s lab outside Scio in a fireball. Pocho’s crew scattered unscathed before firefighters and police arrived. Investigators linked the lab to Pocho only years later.
Pocho and his family then settled in a two-story house just off of Salem’s busy State Street. Pocho moved labs around the Willamette Valley, according to investigators.
In Salem, Pocho carried himself with a bravado common among traffickers in Mexico but unusual here, former associates said. Still in his 20s then and short and stocky at 225 pounds, Pocho favored Tommy Hilfiger jeans and shirts. He often wore a heavy gold necklace, a Mexican centenario framed by jewels. He told friends it was worth $20,000. He also had a girlfriend in addition to his wife, and children with both.
With his jet-black hair combed straight back and piercing eyes dominating a round face and thin mustache, Pocho regularly held court at El Flamingo, a nightclub on Salem’s east side.
“He would roll in with 10, 15, 20 people,” said a former associate, an Oregon man who asked that his identity be shielded to protect his safety. “He’d bring out a wad of cash and first thing buy 10 bottles of the most expensive wine.”
Pocho would pay a Mexican band $10,000 to play for after-hours parties at the club, the man said. He also hired bands to write songs praising his drug-trafficking savvy, according to a federal wiretap affidavit. Some of the “narcocorridos” can still be found on YouTube.
“His vice is to be a cook of good heroin and crystal. And if you want to meet him, you’ll find him in Oregon,” says one, titled “El Pocho.”
“He goes wherever he wants because he’s not afraid of anyone.”
Vicious to the corePocho lived up to the description.One associate described how in 2002 Pocho held a pistol to his head while two other men hit and
kicked him in the face, according to a federal wiretap affidavit. “Are you afraid to die?” one of the men asked. The associate passed the test and went on to work for Pocho for years.
Other insiders told DEA agents in 2008 that Pocho returned to Mexico in 2004 after ordering the Salem execution of a suspected thief. Agents searched but never found a body, according to Marion County Sheriff ’s Office records.
Pocho put his brother, Arturo, in charge of day-to-day operations but otherwise maintained brutal control. He sent collectors to rough up a Fresno, Calif., dealer behind on a $96,000 debt.
“Why did they come and get me, man?” the dealer asked Arturo in a phone call taped by investigators.“Because you don’t pay him, that’s why,” Pocho’s brother replied. “Dude, it is 96 pesos that are over
there.”In recordings from 2005, Pocho can be heard working the phones to track $162,000 left in a Lincoln
Navigator seized by investigators after a bungled run to San Jose, Calif.Pocho asked Arturo: Was the money hidden? No, his brother replied, it was in a duffel bag on a seat.“That’s why they have the cars with the hole,” Pocho chided, referring to secret compartments in drug
cars.“You guys get your story straight and act dumb,” he ordered.
State to state, nation to nationBy then, investigators knew they were on to something big.They were astonished to discover in early 2005 that 8 pounds of meth seized in Indiana had come
from Pocho via the Fresno dealer, according to a federal wiretap affidavit. That meant Pocho’s operation was so large that his drugs were reaching far from Oregon and, more important, feeding California’s vast drug market. A DEA task force in Salem began tailing Pocho’s associates, tapping phones and prodding for inside sources.
That spring, the DEA raided the meth lab outside Brownsville and arrested Arturo, Pocho’s girlfriend, three sisters and seven others. Pocho, keeping tabs from Mexico, sent an associate to recover 16 pounds of meth from a pickup police had overlooked, a wiretap affidavit shows.
About this time, federal investigators think, Pocho formed an alliance with the Los Zetas cartel. Pocho shifted meth production to Mexico, in part to circumvent a U.S. clampdown on meth chemicals. He also recruited a new crew to rebuild his Salem operation, according to a federal affidavit, and reinforced his reputation for violence.
Insiders told investigators that in 2006, Pocho retaliated against a pair of brothers he suspected of stealing $50,000. He ordered rounds fired into the Salem home of one brother, though no one was hit, according to a federal wiretap affidavit, and had the other brother’s home in Gervais burned to the ground.
Pocho paid his wife’s two brothers $10,000 to kill the Salem cousin who first taught him the trade, mistakenly suspecting that the cousin had informed on him and caused his arrest back in 1997, according to federal investigators. The cousin traveled to Mexico in May 2006 and stayed in a house owned by Pocho. The brothers knocked on the door and cut him down with bullets when he answered, investigators said.
In a bizarre twist, Pocho had the body shipped back to Salem for an elaborate graveside service at City View Cemetery, complete with a mariachi band.
THE OREGONIAN •MONDAY, JUNE 24, 2013A4
Pocho was born in the Mexican stateof Michoacan and peddled pot forhis dad as a kid. He quit school aftereighth grade and later sneaked intothe U.S. to join relatives. In spring1997, at age 18, he and his girlfriendand two children moved into the Sa-lem home of a cousin, according tofederal court filings and law enforce-ment officials.
The cousin tutored Pocho in her-oin trafficking. That November,Pocho stepped off a plane from Oak-land, Calif., at Portland InternationalAirport with 300 grams of heroin hid-den under his insoles. He attracteda police officer’s attention by ner-
vously pacing,then quicklyconfessed.
He served 13months in thefederal prisonin Sheridan be-fore being sentback to Mexicoin 2000.
Pocho boo-meranged rightback to Salemand expandedinto meth pro-duction, ac-
cording to documents and officials.In September 2000, Salem policecaught him with 7,400 pills of pseu-doephedrine, a key meth ingredient,plus $1,240 and a .40-caliber Taurushandgun, according to Salem PoliceDepartment reports.
This time, Pocho had no plans toconfess. He coolly gave police a falseidentity and chewed off portions ofhis fingertips on the way to jail tokeep his true name secret. He wasreleased on bail the next day.
“I’m like a fighting rooster,” hebragged in a call intercepted by DEAagents in 2008.“The only way they’lltake me is dead.”
Pocho moved to a home nine mileseast of Scio, a small town northeast ofAlbany where residents gather eachspring for a Lamb &Wool Fair and itspie-eating contest.
Using connections to the La Fa-milia cartel in Michoacan, Pochoopened some of the biggest methlabs Oregon has ever seen, federalcourt documents show. Investiga-tors calculated that one superlaboutside Brownsville, still the biggestever found in Oregon, churned out70 pounds of meth a week, worth$700,000 wholesale.
Pocho’s younger brother, Arturo,dropped out of Salem’s McKay HighSchool and joined the operation asa top aide. Other brothers made de-liveries and sales. Sisters kept thebooks, paid the bills and shuttled toCalifornia for supplies.
In 2002, a meth cook’s mistake de-stroyed the group’s lab outside Scioin a fireball. Pocho’s crew scatteredunscathed before firefighters andpolice arrived. Investigators linkedthe lab to Pocho only years later.
Pocho and his family then settledin a two-story house just off of Sa-lem’s busy State Street. Pocho movedlabs around the Willamette Valley,according to investigators.
In Salem, Pocho carried himselfwith a bravado common amongtraffickers in Mexico but unusualhere, former associates said. Still inhis 20s then and short and stocky at225 pounds, Pocho favored TommyHilfiger jeans and shirts. He oftenwore a heavy gold necklace, a Mexi-can centenario framed by jewels. Hetold friends it was worth $20,000. Healso had a girlfriend in addition to hiswife, and children with both.
With his jet-black hair combedstraight back and piercing eyes dom-inating a round face and thin mus-tache, Pocho regularly held court atEl Flamingo, a nightclub on Salem’seast side.
“He would roll in with 10, 15, 20people,” said a former associate,an Oregon man who asked that hisidentity be shielded to protect hissafety. “He’d bring out a wad of cashand first thing buy 10 bottles of themost expensive wine.”
Pocho would pay a Mexican band$10,000 to play for after-hours par-ties at the club, the man said. He also
hired bands to write songs praisinghis drug-trafficking savvy, accordingto a federal wiretap affidavit. Some ofthe“narcocorridos” can still be foundon YouTube.
“His vice is to be a cook of goodheroin and crystal. And if you want tomeet him, you’ll find him in Oregon,”says one, titled “El Pocho.”
“He goes wherever he wants be-cause he’s not afraid of anyone.”
Pocho lived up to the description.One associate described how in
2002 Pocho held a pistol to his headwhile two other men hit and kickedhim in the face, according to a federalwiretap affidavit. “Are you afraid todie?” one of the men asked. The as-sociate passed the test and went onto work for Pocho for years.
Other insiders told DEA agents in2008 that Pocho returned to Mexicoin 2004 after ordering the Salem ex-ecution of a suspected thief. Agentssearched but never found a body, ac-
cording to Marion County Sheriff’sOffice records.
Pocho put his brother, Arturo, incharge of day-to-day operations butotherwise maintained brutal con-trol. He sent collectors to rough upa Fresno, Calif., dealer behind on a$96,000 debt.
“Why did they come and get me,man?” the dealer asked Arturo in aphone call taped by investigators.
“Because you don’t pay him, that’swhy,” Pocho’s brother replied.“Dude,it is 96 pesos that are over there.”
In recordings from 2005, Pochocan be heard working the phones totrack $162,000 left in a Lincoln Navi-gator seized by investigators after abungled run to San Jose, Calif.
Pocho asked Arturo: Was themoney hidden? No, his brother re-plied, it was in a duffel bag on a seat.
“That’s why they have the cars withthe hole,” Pocho chided, referring tosecret compartments in drug cars.
“You guys get your story straightand act dumb,” he ordered.
By then, investigators knew theywere on to something big.
They were astonished to discoverin early 2005 that 8 pounds of methseized in Indiana had come from Po-cho via the Fresno dealer, accordingto a federal wiretap affidavit. Thatmeant Pocho’s operation was so largethat his drugs were reaching far fromOregon and, more important, feed-ing California’s vast drug market. ADEA task force in Salem began tailing
Pocho’s associates, tapping phonesand prodding for inside sources.
That spring, the DEA raided themeth lab outside Brownsville andarrested Arturo, Pocho’s girlfriend,three sisters and seven others. Po-cho, keeping tabs from Mexico, sentan associate to recover 16 pounds ofmeth from a pickup police had over-looked, a wiretap affidavit shows.
About this time, federal investi-gators think, Pocho formed an alli-
ance with the Los Zetas cartel. Pochoshifted meth production to Mexico,in part to circumvent a U.S. clamp-down on meth chemicals. He alsorecruited a new crew to rebuild hisSalem operation, according to a fed-eral affidavit, and reinforced his rep-utation for violence.
Insiders told investigators that in2006, Pocho retaliated against a pairof brothers he suspected of stealing$50,000. He ordered rounds firedinto the Salem home of one brother,though no one was hit, according toa federal wiretap affidavit, and hadthe other brother’s home in Gervaisburned to the ground.
Pocho paid his wife’s two broth-ers $10,000 to kill the Salem cousinwho first taught him the trade, mis-takenly suspecting that the cousinhad informed on him and causedhis arrest back in 1997, accordingto federal investigators. The cousintraveled to Mexico in May 2006 andstayed in a house owned by Pocho.The brothers knocked on the doorand cut him down with bullets whenhe answered, investigators said.
In a bizarre twist, Pocho had thebody shipped back to Salem for anelaborate graveside service at CityView Cemetery, complete with a ma-riachi band.
Even as Pocho’s relativesand asso-ciates trooped through federal courtin 2005 and ’06 — Arturo was packedoff to a federal prison in Eden,Texas,to serve 111⁄2 years — Pocho wasmaking plans.
DEA agents got wind in 2007 thatPocho, working with the Sinaloa car-tel, was plotting to smuggle 500- to1,000-kilogram loads of cocaine fromColombia to Oregon. Pocho called anOregon associate from Panama, ac-cording to a federal affidavit, sayinghe was about to leave for Guatemala“to start squaring up” — bribing offi-cials, investigators believed.
Panamanian officials, workingwith the U.S., got to him first. Theyjailed him the next day on money-laundering charges. They seized hisproperty, including the gold neck-lace.
“I remember waiting for his photoout of Panama,” said Nalepa, theDEA agent. “When I saw it, I felt likeI sunk the winning putt at the Mas-ters.”
In late 2007, after a second longinvestigation, federal prosecutors inOregon indicted Pocho and 23 oth-ers. They jailed his mother for 10days as a material witness, freeingher only after she agreed to providea voice sample to compare with re-corded phone calls.
Early the next year, Panama’s pres-ident approved Pocho’s extradition.
CartelsContinued from Page One
UNDER THE CURSE OF CARTE L S | R I S E AND FAL L OF A TRAFF I CKER
More than1,700 tons ofmarijuana,meth, cocaineand heroinwere seizedat or near thesouthwestU.S. border in2010.“National DrugThreat Assessment2011,” U.S. JusticeDepartment
Many narcotics traffickers worshipSanta Muerte (“Saint of Death”)and Jesus Malverde, a legendarybandit killed in the Mexican stateof Sinaloa in 1909. Drug smugglerspray to Malverde, seen as theMexican version of Robin Hood,to deliver them safely. They alsooften carry icons and images ofSanta Muerte.U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration
State and local lawenforcement agencies in 2010reported meth as the greatestdrug threat to the Northwest.“National Drug Threat Assessment 2011,”U.S. Justice Department
Pocho history1978: Born inMexican stateof Michoacan.
Spring 2005:The DEAraids a methlab outsideBrownsville,arrestingPocho’sbrother, sisters,girlfriend andothers.
May 2006:Two brothers-in-law — paid$10,000by Pocho —kill Pocho’scousin inMexico, federalinvestigatorssay.
November2007:Officialsin Panamaarrest Pocho.
December2007: Federalprosecutors inOregon indictPocho on drugtraffickingcharges.Police arrest23 associatesin Salem.Pocho’smother,MinervaCuevasSalgado,is held in jail10 days asa materialwitness.
Early 2008:Panama’spresidentapprovesPocho’sextradition.
February2008: U.S.agents travelto Panama tobring Pochoto Oregon. Heescapes beforethey can get tohim.
February2010: Pochocalls DEA agentLou Nalepa inPortland andthreatens hisfamily.
May 2010:Mexicanmilitarycommandosraid Pocho’sranch inMexico.
June 2010:Mexican policearrest Pocho.
June 2013:Pocho remainsin a Mexicanprison.
▲
Pocho (center), one of Oregon’s most infamous drug traffickers, celebrates his birthday with relatives in this 2004 photo. Law enforcement officialsconnected Pocho to three of Mexico’s biggest andmost notorious cartels: the Sinaloa, Los Zetas and La Familia Michoacana.
Pocho collected his GED in the late1990s while serving time in thefederal prison in Sheridan.
Continued next page
Falling to piecesEven as Pocho’s relatives and associates trooped through federal court in 2005 and ‘06 — Arturo was
packed off to a federal prison in Eden, Texas, to serve 111/2 years — Pocho was making plans.DEA agents got wind in 2007 that Pocho, working with the Sinaloa cartel, was plotting to smuggle
500- to 1,000-kilogram loads of cocaine from Colombia to Oregon. Pocho called an Oregon associate from Panama, according to a federal affidavit, saying he was about to leave for Guatemala “to start squaring up” — bribing officials, investigators believed.
Panamanian officials, working with the U.S., got to him first. They jailed him the next day on money-laundering charges. They seized his property, including the gold necklace.
“I remember waiting for his photo out of Panama,” said Nalepa, the DEA agent. “When I saw it, I felt like I sunk the winning putt at the Masters.”
In late 2007, after a second long investigation, federal prosecutors in Oregon indicted Pocho and 23 others. They jailed his mother for 10 days as a material witness, freeing her only after she agreed to provide a voice sample to compare with recorded phone calls.
Early the next year, Panama’s president approved Pocho’s extradition. Pocho and his allies hatched plans to buy his freedom with bribes, according to calls intercepted by U.S. agents.
The race was on. Nalepa, fellow DEA agent Shaun Alexander and Guy Gino, then a special agent with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, flew to Panama City, arriving Feb. 21, 2008.
Two days later, the three men and a DEA agent stationed in Panama headed back toward the airport expecting Pocho to be handed off there for the flight back, Gino said recently. They stopped for groceries on the way so they’d have something for Pocho to eat.
Then the local agent’s phone rang.“They can’t find him,” he said.“What do you mean they can’t find him?” Gino asked.They went to the airport and paced the tarmac for two hours before an embarrassed Panamanian
official showed up to explain that Pocho and two prison officials were missing. Panamanian investigators later determined that Pocho had walked though the prison gates the day before after paying five prison officials $500,000 to give him the identity of an inmate set for transfer to another prison.
Two years later, Pocho called Nalepa’s government cellphone.“I could not believe I was talking to someone who had been so elusive for so many years,” Nalepa said
recently. He has since left the DEA to become a special agent in the U.S. Postal Service’s Office of Inspector General.
In a conversation that quickly grew heated, Pocho told Nalepa he had “eyes and ears everywhere” and knew Nalepa had traveled to Mexico and Central America to interview relatives. Nalepa, he said, had no idea how powerful he was.
“By threatening an agent’s family, that was crossing a line that drug traffickers have not been willing to cross in the United States,” said Holton, the former U.S. attorney. “We talked about what to do. Are we going to tolerate that kind of violence coming into Oregon or are we going to put our foot down and say, ‘This stops now’?”
U.S. officials made catching Pocho a national priority, distributing “most wanted” fliers offering a $25,000 reward. They pressed Mexican authorities to do the same. Three months later, Mexican military commandos raided Pocho’s ranch outside the town of Xalapa and arrested his uncle and three sisters. They also seized guns, 43 cellphones, a gold Versace watch and “five fine horses” boarded there by the state governor.
Mexican police caught Pocho himself weeks after that in Puebla, about 75 miles southeast of Mexico City. He was charged with bribery and sent to a prison three hours east of Mexico City to await extradition.
Now 34, Pocho remains in that prison, awaiting extradition to Oregon and U.S. justice.Officials in both countries, wary of upsetting a sensitive process, won’t say what happens next.
This entire five-day Oregonian series, along with all its additional online elements can be reviewed at ORne.ws/cartels
Timbers sharefirst place afterwin over Rapids
MONDAY, JUNE 24, 2013$1.00 POWERING OregonLive.com
By LES ZAITZ | THE OREGONIAN
ou Nalepa, an agent with the U.S. Drug Enforce-ment Administration, reached for his ringingcellphone as he guided his car through Portlandfreeway traffic.
On that Friday afternoon in February 2010, heexpected to hear from a witness in an upcoming
drug trial. Instead, he found on the line a fugitive he’d beenchasing for six years.
“This is Pocho,” said the voice on the other end — PorfirioArevalo-Cuevas.
The name means little to most Oregonians. But law enforce-ment officials know Arevalo-Cuevas as one of the most prolificdrug traffickers in Oregon history, a violent thug with ties toMexico’s most notorious cartels.
Pocho, calling from somewhere in Latin America, was angrythat U.S. officials had disrupted his drug trade there. He re-sented that Nalepa’s work had helped jail relatives, includinghis mother, according to federal documents and law enforce-ment officials.
“Now,” Pocho told Nalepa, his fury escalating, “I am going tostart (messing) with you and your family.”
The DEA whisked Nalepa, his wife, son and stepson out ofthe state for two weeks. Officials also installed high-tech secu-rity equipment at Nalepa’s home that weekend and steppedup street patrols.
The threat illustrates the extraordinary brazenness of cartel-connected traffickers in the Northwest. Pocho in particularturned Salem into a national hub for meth, cocaine and her-
oin distribution before leading U.S. officials on a maddeninginternational chase. Authorities traced his drugs as far away asTexas, Georgia and Illinois.
“It’s hard to think of any drug organization in Oregon thatwas larger or had farther reach,” said Dwight Holton, Oregon’sinterim U.S. attorney in 2010-11.
Pocho’s story, constructed with documents rarely availableto reporters plus interviews with officials and former traffick-ers, offers a window on the tactics used by him and the manylike him. His operation was unusual for its size and sweep, of-ficials said, but his reliance on relatives, ruthlessness and aseemingly endless supply of meth cooks, dealers and courierswas dismally common.
TODAY:A trafficker namedPocho spreadsdrugs and fear froman Oregon-basedempire.
TUESDAY:A former insiderrisks harm totell about life inOregon’s strangedrug underworld.
WEDNESDAY:A clever kingpin inHermiston exposesthe huge challengesfor law enforcement.
THURSDAY:A Bend coupleanguish overlosing their sonto cartel-suppliedheroin.
Under the curse of cartels | Rise and fall of a trafficker
A KINGPIN’S TOXIC POWERRelatives, ruthlessness and boundless greed help Pocho— and many like him — command a brutal business
LGo to ORne.ws/cartels for:
• Photo galleries and videos
• An interactive map that shows Oregon drugtrafficking organizations — including Pocho’s — with mug shots,surveillance photos and wiretap excerpts
• An interactive map showing drug use in America
• Links to documents, including indictments, trial transcripts andcourt orders in cases related to Pocho’s organization
• A roundup of fugitives
• Chat with senior investigative reporter Les Zaitz about drugcartels in Oregon on Tuesday at noon atORne.ws/cartel-live-chat
By YUXING ZHENGTHE OREGONIAN
SALEM — Oregon children con-tinue to fare poorly in economicwell-being because of high rates ofchild poverty, underemployed par-ents and housing costs, according toan annual national report.
Oregon ranks 32nd in overall childwell-being and 41st in economicwell-being, according to the 2013Kids Count Data Book scheduledto be released today. About 37 per-cent of Oregon children have parentswho lack secure employment, and24 percent live in poverty, defined
in the study as a family of four thatmakes less than $22,811. Oregon’schild poverty rate was up from 18percent in 2005.
“We are encouraged to see signsof an economic recovery overall,but the increase in childhood pov-erty tells us that jobs are not ade-quately supporting families,” saidRobin Christian, executive directorof Children First for Oregon, a chil-dren’s advocacy nonprofit in Port-land. “As we emerge from the worstrecession in a generation, we needto ensure that those of us hit hard-est by the economic downturn haveaccess to supports that protect chil-dren, stabilize struggling families,and create a pathway to financial se-curity.”
About 22.5 percent of Oregon’s3.9 million residents are children,
Please see CHILDREN, Page A9
Many Oregon kids stillface childhood povertyA study ranks state 32ndin child well-being,with about a quarter ofyoungsters in poverty
By CHRISTIAN GASTONTHE OREGONIAN
SALEM — Oregon Sen. LarryGeorge would benefit financiallyfrom a local version of a federal taxprovision he proposed as part of astate budget deal.
But unlike a $150 million taxbreak for business owners thatalso would benefit George’s ha-zelnut business, the policy, knownas IC-DISC, isn’t facing much con-troversy.
IC-DISC, pronounced icy disc,stands for Interest Charge Domes-tic International Sales Corpora-tion. More simply, it’s a programthat lowers taxes for exporters.
G e o r g e , aSherwood Re-publican, ac-knowledgesreadily that hishazelnut pack-ing companywould benefitfrom his pro-posal to createa state versionof the existingfederal policy.But he said hewants to see itas part of thelegislative bud-get deal be-cause it’s goodpolicy, not be-cause of his per-sonal benefit.
“It’s not reallycontroversial. Ithink people aretrying to make it
a deal because I’ve declared thatI have one of these,” George said.
Under the federal policy, busi-nesses that export goods can setup a subsidiary company to get atax discount on 4 percent of theiroverseas sales.
The state proposal would applya 2.5 percent rate on those salesinstead of the standard Oregonpersonal income tax rates, whichtop out at 9.9 percent.
George said the federal pro-gram helps his company, GeorgePacking Company Inc., in com-petition with foreign hazelnutproducers, who have lower laborcosts.
“It’s a great way for us to com-pete,” George said. “Most of thehazelnuts are grown in Turkey, sowe’ve got to compete with themon the world market.”
Sen. Ginny Burdick, D-Port-land, chair of the Senate Financeand Revenue Committee and akey Democratic negotiator in the
Please see EXPORTERS, Page A9
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WASHINGTON — U.S. authori-ties scrambled Sunday to figure outhow to catch Edward Snowden, theformer national security contrac-tor accused of espionage, as he ledthem on an international chase,frustrating the Obama administra-tion and threatening to strain rela-tions on three continents.
Diplomats and law enforce-ment officials from the U.S. warnedcountries in Latin America not toharbor Snowden or allow him topass through to other destinations
after he fled Hong Kong for Mos-cow, possibly en route to Ecuadoror another nation where he couldseek asylum.
Snowden managed to eludecapture just as U.S. officials wereasking Hong Kong authorities todetain and send him to the U.S. oncharges that he illegally disclosedclassified documents about globalU.S. surveillance programs. He wasaided in his escape by WikiLeaks,the anti-secrecy organization,whose founder said he helped ar-range special refugee travel docu-ments from Ecuador.
The foreign minister of Ecuadorconfirmed receiving an asylum re-quest from Snowden. As of earlythis morning in Russia, Snowdenwas believed to be staying the nightinside the transit zone of a Moscow
Edward Snowden eludescapture as he flees HongKong, reportedly seeksasylum in Ecuador
NSA leaker’s flight toRussia frustrates U.S.
THE OREGONIAN •MONDAY, JUNE 24, 2013A4
Pocho was born in the Mexican stateof Michoacan and peddled pot forhis dad as a kid. He quit school aftereighth grade and later sneaked intothe U.S. to join relatives. In spring1997, at age 18, he and his girlfriendand two children moved into the Sa-lem home of a cousin, according tofederal court filings and law enforce-ment officials.
The cousin tutored Pocho in her-oin trafficking. That November,Pocho stepped off a plane from Oak-land, Calif., at Portland InternationalAirport with 300 grams of heroin hid-den under his insoles. He attracteda police officer’s attention by ner-
vously pacing,then quicklyconfessed.
He served 13months in thefederal prisonin Sheridan be-fore being sentback to Mexicoin 2000.
Pocho boo-meranged rightback to Salemand expandedinto meth pro-duction, ac-
cording to documents and officials.In September 2000, Salem policecaught him with 7,400 pills of pseu-doephedrine, a key meth ingredient,plus $1,240 and a .40-caliber Taurushandgun, according to Salem PoliceDepartment reports.
This time, Pocho had no plans toconfess. He coolly gave police a falseidentity and chewed off portions ofhis fingertips on the way to jail tokeep his true name secret. He wasreleased on bail the next day.
“I’m like a fighting rooster,” hebragged in a call intercepted by DEAagents in 2008.“The only way they’lltake me is dead.”
Pocho moved to a home nine mileseast of Scio, a small town northeast ofAlbany where residents gather eachspring for a Lamb &Wool Fair and itspie-eating contest.
Using connections to the La Fa-milia cartel in Michoacan, Pochoopened some of the biggest methlabs Oregon has ever seen, federalcourt documents show. Investiga-tors calculated that one superlaboutside Brownsville, still the biggestever found in Oregon, churned out70 pounds of meth a week, worth$700,000 wholesale.
Pocho’s younger brother, Arturo,dropped out of Salem’s McKay HighSchool and joined the operation asa top aide. Other brothers made de-liveries and sales. Sisters kept thebooks, paid the bills and shuttled toCalifornia for supplies.
In 2002, a meth cook’s mistake de-stroyed the group’s lab outside Scioin a fireball. Pocho’s crew scatteredunscathed before firefighters andpolice arrived. Investigators linkedthe lab to Pocho only years later.
Pocho and his family then settledin a two-story house just off of Sa-lem’s busy State Street. Pocho movedlabs around the Willamette Valley,according to investigators.
In Salem, Pocho carried himselfwith a bravado common amongtraffickers in Mexico but unusualhere, former associates said. Still inhis 20s then and short and stocky at225 pounds, Pocho favored TommyHilfiger jeans and shirts. He oftenwore a heavy gold necklace, a Mexi-can centenario framed by jewels. Hetold friends it was worth $20,000. Healso had a girlfriend in addition to hiswife, and children with both.
With his jet-black hair combedstraight back and piercing eyes dom-inating a round face and thin mus-tache, Pocho regularly held court atEl Flamingo, a nightclub on Salem’seast side.
“He would roll in with 10, 15, 20people,” said a former associate,an Oregon man who asked that hisidentity be shielded to protect hissafety. “He’d bring out a wad of cashand first thing buy 10 bottles of themost expensive wine.”
Pocho would pay a Mexican band$10,000 to play for after-hours par-ties at the club, the man said. He also
hired bands to write songs praisinghis drug-trafficking savvy, accordingto a federal wiretap affidavit. Some ofthe“narcocorridos” can still be foundon YouTube.
“His vice is to be a cook of goodheroin and crystal. And if you want tomeet him, you’ll find him in Oregon,”says one, titled “El Pocho.”
“He goes wherever he wants be-cause he’s not afraid of anyone.”
Pocho lived up to the description.One associate described how in
2002 Pocho held a pistol to his headwhile two other men hit and kickedhim in the face, according to a federalwiretap affidavit. “Are you afraid todie?” one of the men asked. The as-sociate passed the test and went onto work for Pocho for years.
Other insiders told DEA agents in2008 that Pocho returned to Mexicoin 2004 after ordering the Salem ex-ecution of a suspected thief. Agentssearched but never found a body, ac-
cording to Marion County Sheriff’sOffice records.
Pocho put his brother, Arturo, incharge of day-to-day operations butotherwise maintained brutal con-trol. He sent collectors to rough upa Fresno, Calif., dealer behind on a$96,000 debt.
“Why did they come and get me,man?” the dealer asked Arturo in aphone call taped by investigators.
“Because you don’t pay him, that’swhy,” Pocho’s brother replied.“Dude,it is 96 pesos that are over there.”
In recordings from 2005, Pochocan be heard working the phones totrack $162,000 left in a Lincoln Navi-gator seized by investigators after abungled run to San Jose, Calif.
Pocho asked Arturo: Was themoney hidden? No, his brother re-plied, it was in a duffel bag on a seat.
“That’s why they have the cars withthe hole,” Pocho chided, referring tosecret compartments in drug cars.
“You guys get your story straightand act dumb,” he ordered.
By then, investigators knew theywere on to something big.
They were astonished to discoverin early 2005 that 8 pounds of methseized in Indiana had come from Po-cho via the Fresno dealer, accordingto a federal wiretap affidavit. Thatmeant Pocho’s operation was so largethat his drugs were reaching far fromOregon and, more important, feed-ing California’s vast drug market. ADEA task force in Salem began tailing
Pocho’s associates, tapping phonesand prodding for inside sources.
That spring, the DEA raided themeth lab outside Brownsville andarrested Arturo, Pocho’s girlfriend,three sisters and seven others. Po-cho, keeping tabs from Mexico, sentan associate to recover 16 pounds ofmeth from a pickup police had over-looked, a wiretap affidavit shows.
About this time, federal investi-gators think, Pocho formed an alli-
ance with the Los Zetas cartel. Pochoshifted meth production to Mexico,in part to circumvent a U.S. clamp-down on meth chemicals. He alsorecruited a new crew to rebuild hisSalem operation, according to a fed-eral affidavit, and reinforced his rep-utation for violence.
Insiders told investigators that in2006, Pocho retaliated against a pairof brothers he suspected of stealing$50,000. He ordered rounds firedinto the Salem home of one brother,though no one was hit, according toa federal wiretap affidavit, and hadthe other brother’s home in Gervaisburned to the ground.
Pocho paid his wife’s two broth-ers $10,000 to kill the Salem cousinwho first taught him the trade, mis-takenly suspecting that the cousinhad informed on him and causedhis arrest back in 1997, accordingto federal investigators. The cousintraveled to Mexico in May 2006 andstayed in a house owned by Pocho.The brothers knocked on the doorand cut him down with bullets whenhe answered, investigators said.
In a bizarre twist, Pocho had thebody shipped back to Salem for anelaborate graveside service at CityView Cemetery, complete with a ma-riachi band.
Even as Pocho’s relativesand asso-ciates trooped through federal courtin 2005 and ’06 — Arturo was packedoff to a federal prison in Eden,Texas,to serve 111⁄2 years — Pocho wasmaking plans.
DEA agents got wind in 2007 thatPocho, working with the Sinaloa car-tel, was plotting to smuggle 500- to1,000-kilogram loads of cocaine fromColombia to Oregon. Pocho called anOregon associate from Panama, ac-cording to a federal affidavit, sayinghe was about to leave for Guatemala“to start squaring up” — bribing offi-cials, investigators believed.
Panamanian officials, workingwith the U.S., got to him first. Theyjailed him the next day on money-laundering charges. They seized hisproperty, including the gold neck-lace.
“I remember waiting for his photoout of Panama,” said Nalepa, theDEA agent. “When I saw it, I felt likeI sunk the winning putt at the Mas-ters.”
In late 2007, after a second longinvestigation, federal prosecutors inOregon indicted Pocho and 23 oth-ers. They jailed his mother for 10days as a material witness, freeingher only after she agreed to providea voice sample to compare with re-corded phone calls.
Early the next year, Panama’s pres-ident approved Pocho’s extradition.
CartelsContinued from Page One
UNDER THE CURSE OF CARTE L S | R I S E AND FAL L OF A TRAFF I CKER
More than1,700 tons ofmarijuana,meth, cocaineand heroinwere seizedat or near thesouthwestU.S. border in2010.“National DrugThreat Assessment2011,” U.S. JusticeDepartment
Many narcotics traffickers worshipSanta Muerte (“Saint of Death”)and Jesus Malverde, a legendarybandit killed in the Mexican stateof Sinaloa in 1909. Drug smugglerspray to Malverde, seen as theMexican version of Robin Hood,to deliver them safely. They alsooften carry icons and images ofSanta Muerte.U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration
State and local lawenforcement agencies in 2010reported meth as the greatestdrug threat to the Northwest.“National Drug Threat Assessment 2011,”U.S. Justice Department
Pocho history1978: Born inMexican stateof Michoacan.
Spring 2005:The DEAraids a methlab outsideBrownsville,arrestingPocho’sbrother, sisters,girlfriend andothers.
May 2006:Two brothers-in-law — paid$10,000by Pocho —kill Pocho’scousin inMexico, federalinvestigatorssay.
November2007:Officialsin Panamaarrest Pocho.
December2007: Federalprosecutors inOregon indictPocho on drugtraffickingcharges.Police arrest23 associatesin Salem.Pocho’smother,MinervaCuevasSalgado,is held in jail10 days asa materialwitness.
Early 2008:Panama’spresidentapprovesPocho’sextradition.
February2008: U.S.agents travelto Panama tobring Pochoto Oregon. Heescapes beforethey can get tohim.
February2010: Pochocalls DEA agentLou Nalepa inPortland andthreatens hisfamily.
May 2010:Mexicanmilitarycommandosraid Pocho’sranch inMexico.
June 2010:Mexican policearrest Pocho.
June 2013:Pocho remainsin a Mexicanprison.
▲
Pocho (center), one of Oregon’s most infamous drug traffickers, celebrates his birthday with relatives in this 2004 photo. Law enforcement officialsconnected Pocho to three of Mexico’s biggest andmost notorious cartels: the Sinaloa, Los Zetas and La Familia Michoacana.
Pocho collected his GED in the late1990s while serving time in thefederal prison in Sheridan.
Continued next page
THE OREGONIAN •MONDAY, JUNE 24, 2013 A5UNDER THE CURSE OF CARTE L S
Pocho and his allies hatchedplans to buy his freedom withbribes, according to calls in-tercepted by U.S. agents.
The race was on. Nalepa,fellow DEA agent Shaun Al-exander and Guy Gino, thena special agent with U.S. Im-migration and Customs En-forcement, flew to PanamaCity, arriving Feb. 21, 2008.
Two days later, the threemen and a DEA agent sta-tioned in Panama headedback toward the airport ex-pecting Pocho to be handedoff there for the flight back,Gino said recently. Theystopped for groceries on theway so they’d have somethingfor Pocho to eat.
Then the local agent’sphone rang.
“They can’t find him,” hesaid.
“What do you mean theycan’t find him?” Gino asked.
They went to the airportand paced the tarmac for twohours before an embarrassedPanamanian official showedup to explain that Pochoand two prison officials weremissing. Panamanian inves-tigators later determined thatPocho had walked though theprison gates the day before af-ter paying five prison officials$500,000 to give him the iden-tity of an inmate set for trans-fer to another prison.
Two years later, Pochocalled Nalepa’s governmentcellphone.
“I could not believe I wastalking to someone who hadbeen so elusive for so manyyears,” Nalepa said recently.He has since left the DEA tobecome a special agent in theU.S. Postal Service’s Office ofInspector General.
In a conversation thatquickly grew heated, Pochotold Nalepa he had “eyes andears everywhere” and knewNalepa had traveled to Mex-ico and Central America to in-terview relatives. Nalepa, hesaid, had no idea how power-ful he was.
“By threatening an agent’sfamily, that was crossing a linethat drug traffickers have notbeen willing to cross in theUnited States,” said Holton,the former U.S. attorney. “Wetalked about what to do. Arewe going to tolerate that kindof violence coming into Or-egon or are we going to putour foot down and say, ‘Thisstops now’?”
U.S. officials made catchingPocho a national priority, dis-tributing “most wanted” fli-ers offering a $25,000 reward.They pressed Mexican au-thorities to do the same.Threemonths later, Mexican mili-tary commandos raided Po-cho’s ranch outside the townof Xalapa and arrested his un-cle and three sisters.They alsoseized guns, 43 cellphones, agold Versace watch and “fivefine horses” boarded there bythe state governor.
Mexican police caught Po-cho himself weeks after thatin Puebla, about 75 milessoutheast of Mexico City. Hewas charged with bribery andsent to a prison three hourseast of Mexico City to awaitextradition.
Now 34, Pocho remains inthat prison, awaiting extradi-tion to Oregon and U.S. jus-tice.
Officials in both countries,wary of upsetting a sensitiveprocess, won’t say what hap-pens next.
Shipments: Big operators buy directly from cartels, othersthrough wholesalers in border states such as Arizona andCalifornia. Drugs are smuggled into the U.S. in cars, trucks,planes and on individuals. Drugs are then taken to “stashhouses” and divided into smaller loads. Sophisticatedtraffickers rarely keep drugs in their homes. Instead, theydistribute from other houses and businesses to insulatethemselves from prosecution. Drugs are driven north hiddenin cars, freight trucks and in luggage on Mexican bus lines.Mexicans in the country illegally and desperate for cash oftenwork as drivers.
Avoiding detection: Traffickers hide drugs in custom-madecompartments in vehicles, such as inside bumpers or airbagcavities. They try to foil drug-sniffing dogs by wrapping drugsin layers of plastic interspersed with diesel or other smellycompounds. They also try to overpower the distinctive smellwith air fresheners or by stuffing vents with scented dryersheets.
Paying cartels: Cash is sent back to Mexico using the samecompartments and routes as for drugs. Traffickers also usewire transfers, bank accounts and gift cards to movemoney.No one can estimate howmuch, but Oregon law enforcementofficials reported seizing $4million from drug traffickers in2011.
Making deals: Traffickers orchestrate orders and deliverieswith cellphones they frequently replace. They use crude codewords such as “windows” for methamphetamine, “two girls”for 2 ounces, “the girl with green eyes” for marijuana and“cows with horns” for patrol cars.
Cash and credit: In a practice known as “fronting,” a dealercan get drugs to sell, then pay a week or two later. Those whofail to pay face harsh retribution. Police suspect unpaid drugdebts are behind unsolved homicides across Oregon. Thosewho skip out on a debt can put families back in Mexico inmortal danger.
Gun running: Traffickerssmuggle guns to Mexicofor the cartels. In the pastseven years, Mexicanauthorities have seized 800guns traced back to Oregon.
WHO THEY ARE
Law enforcement officials are aware of 69 drug traffickingorganizations, or DTOs, operating in Oregon. Here’s a look atsome previous operations they’ve taken down.
Salem: Elias Espinoza Lopez flooded Oregon andWashingtonwith cartel cocaine — 200 kilos a month — for nearly a decadebefore he was caught in 2003 and sent to prison for morethan 12 years.
Portland: Before her arrest and convictionin 2009 for selling cocaine and heroin,Mariana Franco-Maldonado wired $2,000 aweek in 2008 to cover construction of whather mother called the “big, beautiful house”for extended family in Mexico, according toa federal prosecutor’s sentencing memo.
Beaverton: Isidro Garcia Juarez, known on the streets asChilo, sold cocaine ordered from the Sinaloa cartel throughLa Pinata grocery in Beaverton. He was arrested in 2009and later convicted. For a cut of the proceeds, he let othersconduct deals at the store. Groceries became dusty as thestore sold little food, instead becoming one of the mostactive drug marketplaces in Washington County, according toinvestigators.
Gresham:Maria Delrosario Guzman tookphone orders at her apartment and madedeliveries in parking lots as undercoverpolice watched in 2010. She was sentencedin 2011 to 71⁄2 years in prison. One of hercustomers, Victor Manuel Castillo, told ina recent prison interview how he startedselling to friends and their acquaintances
to support his own habit. He kept selling to one man even as itdawned on him that the man was an undercover cop. “I knew, Ijust knew, but the money was so good,” Castillo said.
Bend: Antonio Rico-Sanchez ran a meth ring out of Rico’sGroceries, directing midlevel distributors to leave money in afood cooler at the back of the store. They would return laterin the day to find the money replaced with their drug supply.Police took down the operation in 2011. Rico-Sanchez was sentto prison for 13 months.
Eugene: Jorge Orozco, working with traffickers in California,operated a meth network with dealers in Bend, Madras,Redmond andWarm Springs. Police dismantled the operationand arrested him in December 2011. He pleaded guilty in April2010 and awaits sentencing.
Klamath County: Forty-seven people were indicted lastmonth after 300 officers from local, state and federalagencies swept through homes and businesses to dismantlea drug and gun trafficking operation. The investigation beganwith the discovery of two suspected drug dealers found shotto death and buried outside tiny Bonanza.
Portland: Three associates of the Sinaloa cartel, Mexico’sbiggest, face sentencing in Portland after police busted theircocaine smuggling operation.
HOW THEY AVOID POLICE
Jamie Osegera-Gonzalez lived in Beaverton and sold meth andheroin supplied by the Los Zetas cartel, according to a federalaffidavit. He returned to Mexico in 2010 as authorities closedin, and remains a fugitive wanted on federal charges. Back in2007, he tried to recruit a Portland man — an FBI informant —and shared the tactics he developed after “many encounterswith local law enforcement both in the United States andMexico,” according to the affidavit.
• Deal only with those of Mexican descent. “Families inMexico can be used as leverage to ensure payment or preventcustomers from working as informants,” Osegera-Gonzalezsaid, according to the affidavit.
• Conduct deals after 5 p.m. and on weekends, when fewerpolice are on duty.
• Use evasive driving — abrupt U-turns, driving down dead-endstreets, stopping in the middle of the road.
• Loop through the neighborhood before going home to lookfor anything out of place.
• Don’t put your cellphone in your name, and change phonesfrequently.
— Les Zaitz
Interstate 5 is the maincorridor used for smugglingdrugs into Oregon,accounting for 54 percentof drug busts on statehighways in 2008-11.“2013 Threat Assessment andCounter-Drug Strategy,”Oregon High Intensity DrugTrafficking Area Program
Continued from previous page
airport where he was visitedby an Ecuadorean diplomat.It was not clear whether hewould be allowed to travelfurther or, if he were, whetherEcuador would indeed be hisfinal destination.
Russian news services re-ported that Snowden wouldtake an afternoon flight toCuba, prompting a late rushfor tickets from the horde ofjournalists gathered at the air-port. But others dismissed itas a ruse to put the news me-dia and others off Snowden’strail.
Theturnofeventsopenedastartlingnewchapterinacasethat had already captivatedmany in the U.S. and aroundthe world. Snowden’s trans-continental escape was seenas a fresh embarrassment forthe Obama administrationandraisedquestionsaboutitstactics in the case, such as itsfailure to immediately revokeSnowden’s passport.
It also further complicatedWashington’s ties with Rus-sia and China, where at leastsome officials take delightin tweaking what they callAmerican double standards.
Julian Assange, the founderofWikiLeaks, said in an inter-view from his own refuge inthe Ecuadorean Embassy inLondon that he had raisedSnowden’s case with Ecua-dor’s government and thathis group had helped ar-range the travel documents.Baltasar Garzon, the re-nowned Spanish jurist whoadvises WikiLeaks, said in astatement that“what is beingdone to Mr. Snowden and toMr.JulianAssange—formak-ing or facilitating disclosuresin the public interest — is anassault against the people.”
Hong Kong’s blind eyeObama administration of-
ficials privately expressedfrustration that Hong Kongallowed Snowden to boardan Aeroflot plane bound forMoscow on Sunday despitethe American request for hisdetention. But they did notrevoke Snowden’s passportuntil Saturday and did not askInterpol to issue a“red notice”seeking his arrest.
An administration official,speaking on condition of an-onymity, said no red noticewas requested because theyare “most valuable when thewhereabouts of a fugitive areunknown.” Snowden wasknown to be in Hong Kong,so his provisional arrest wassought under an existingAmerican agreement withHong Kong.
On Sunday, the HongKong authorities said thatthe American arrest request“did not fully comply withthe legal requirements underHong Kong law,” and there-fore they could not legallystop Snowden from leaving.The Justice Department re-jected this explanation andprovided a timeline of inter-actions suggesting that theHong Kong authorities firstrequested “additional infor-mation” Friday.
“At no point, in all of ourdiscussions through Friday,did the authorities in HongKong raise any issues regard-ing the sufficiency of the U.S.’provisional arrest request,” adepartment official said. “Inlight of this, we find their de-cision to be particularly trou-bling.”
By the end of the day U.S.officials, unsure whetherSnowden was actually head-ing to Ecuador, or possiblyCuba or Venezuela, as alsovariously reported, weresending messages to an ar-ray of possible destinations.
Passport revocationLegal experts said the ad-
ministration appeared tohave flubbed Snowden’s case.
“What mystifies me is thatthe State Department didn’trevoke his passport after thecharges were filed” on June14, said David Laufman, aformer federal prosecutor.“They missed an opportu-nity to freeze him in place.”He said he was also puzzledby the decision to unseal thecharges on Friday rather thanwaiting until the defendantwas in custody.
While off ic ia ls saidSnowden’s passport was re-voked Saturday, it was notclear whether the Hong Kongauthorities knew by the timehe boarded the plane, norwas it clear whether revokingit earlier would have made adifference given the Ecuador-ean travel document that As-sange said he helped arrange.When Snowden landed inMoscow, he was informed of
his passport revocation.Assange said he did not
know whether Snowdenmight be able to travel be-yondMoscowusingtheEcua-dorean document.“Differentairlines have different rules soit’s atechnical matter whetherthey will accept the docu-ment,” he said.
Assange sought refuge inthe Ecuadorean Embassy inLondon a year ago to avoidbeing sent to Sweden forquestioning in a sexual of-fense investigation, but Brit-ish authorities have notpermitted him to leave thecountry without risking ar-rest. Snowden could end upin a similar predicament.
U.S.-Russia relationsSnowden’s presence on
Russian territory dealt a freshblow to a relationship that hasdeteriorated sharply over thepast year over issues such asSyria and human rights. Yet
Russian leaders seemed tobe making efforts to keep hisvisit relatively quiet, not pa-rading Snowden before cam-eras or trumpeting his arrival.
“We have nothing to dowith this story,” said Dmi-try Peskov, a spokesman forPresident Vladimir Putin. “Iam not in charge of tickets. Idon’t approve or disapproveplane tickets. We’re not theproper people to address thisquestion to.”
But Dmitri Trenin, direc-tor of the Carnegie MoscowCenter, said Snowden couldremain in Moscow.
“Russia is turning into a ha-ven — virtually, intellectuallyand physically — for thosewho have an ax to grind withthe West, who are whistle-blowers or have problemswithWestern authorities,” hesaid. “It’s the only country inthe world that at this pointcan afford it, or thinks it canafford it.”
At a glanceEdward Snowden, the National Security Agency contractorbehind the disclosures of the U.S. government’s sweepingsurveillance programs, left Hong Kong on Sunday andwasseeking asylum in Ecuador. Five things to know about theadmitted leaker and his future:
THE LEAK: Snowden disclosed surveillance programs thatcollect vast amounts of online data and email, sometimessweeping up information on ordinary U.S. citizens. Officials havethe ability to collect phone and Internet information broadly butneed awarrant to examine specific cases where they believeterrorism is involved. The revelation sparked debate aboutgovernment surveillance and post-Sept. 11 civil liberties.
THE LEAKER: Since revealing himself as the principal sourcefor reports in The Guardian and TheWashington Post, Snowdenhad been in hiding in Hong Kong. The U.S. had sought hisextradition but officials in Hong Kong rejected that, saying theU.S. petition didn’t passmuster. The former CIA operative andNSA contractor has had his passport revoked, although thatalone was unlikely to thwart Snowden’s travel if he could find afriendly government to host him.
THE EVASION: Before the first stories were published,Snowden left Hawaii for Hong Kong. While there, he continuedspeaking to reporters and disclosing other details. This weekend,he left Hong Kongwith advisers fromWikiLeaks, the anti-secrecy group that helped disclose a trove of diplomatic cablesthat embarrassedWashington. He is said to have arrived inMoscow but did not leave the airport. His allies say he is en routeto Ecuador, which has an extradition treaty with the U.S. butpermits exemptions for political asylum. Ecuador’s embassy inLondon has housed and protectedWikiLeaks’ founder JulianAssange.
THE DIPLOMACY: The U.S. unsuccessfully sought cooperationfromHong Kong to extradite Snowden to the U.S. to face criminalcharges. Instead, Snowden shuttled to Russia, with which theU.S. does not have an extradition treaty. His potential next stopswere just as dicey for the United States: Cuba, Venezuela andEcuador. All three have extradition treaties with the U.S., butnone are strong allies. U.S. lawmakers said Sunday there wouldbe consequences for countries that harbor Snowden.
THE FUTURE: The disclosures to this point have beendamaging but the journalists who have published them have saidthey limited the scope to protect national security. Snowden’scooperation withWikiLeaks could signal a new chapter inthose disclosures. The chairwoman of the Senate IntelligenceCommittee said she has been told Snowden has asmanyas200 documents and another lawmaker suggested Snowdenhad received asylum in Ecuador in exchange for disclosingmoreinformation.
— The Associated Press
Lawmakers lash outLawmakers sharply criticized China andRussia on Sunday for
their apparent roles in Edward Snowden’s flight fromHongKongtoMoscow.
TheU.S. had askedHongKong authorities to extraditeSnowden so he could face criminal charges for his leaking ofdetails of secret U.S. surveillance programs. But lawmakers onTV news programs on Sunday said China andRussia conspired tohelp Snowden flee.
“What’s infuriating here is (President Vladimir) Putin of Russiaaiding and abetting Snowden’s escape,” Sen. Charles Schumer.D-N.Y., said on CNN’s “State of the Union.” “Allies are supposed totreat each other in decent ways, and Putin always seems almosteager to put a finger in the eye of the United States, whether it isSyria, Iran, and nowof course, with Snowden. … I think it will haveserious consequences for the United States-Russia relationship.”
China’s role was less clear becauseHongKong has its owngovernment, Schumer said, but Beijing still exerts influence. “Ihave a feeling that the hand of Beijingwas involved here,” he said.
Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., who heads the SenateIntelligence Committee, also pointed to Beijing. “I think it’s a verybig surprise,” she said on CBS “Face theNation.” “I had actuallythought that Chinawould see this as an opportunity to improverelations and extradite him to theUnited States. China clearly hada role in this, inmy view.”
— Tribune Washington Bureau
Pelosi booed by liberalsHouse Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi was heckled and
booed by liberal activists Saturday when she said that EdwardSnowden broke the law when he revealed classified informationabout secret surveillance programs.
Another round of disapproval came when the former Housespeaker said Americans’ rights to privacy must be balancedwith the nation’s security needs.
Snowden “did violate the law in terms of releasing thosedocuments,” she said during a luncheon Q-and-A on the closingday of Netroots Nation, an annual gathering of thousands ofliberal activists and bloggers.
The crowd erupted in boos.— Los Angeles Time
SnowdenContinued from Page One
ALEXANDER ZEMLIANICHENKO/THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Journalists waiting for Edward Snowden, a former CIAemployee who leaked secret documents about U.S.surveillance programs, crowd around the car of Ecuador’sambassador at theMoscow airport on Sunday.
