ONE OF FOUR MEN CHARGED WITH SMUGGLING $200 MILLION WORTH OF COCAINE

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00552R000302430026-3
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: July 21, 2010
• Sequence Number: 26
• Publication Date: January 11, 1983
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

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Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/21 : CIA-RDP90-00552R000302430026-3
UNITLJ PRESS INTERNATiONA
11 January 1983
3-? JACK MALTEY
TENN.
CCK TRIAL
vn_ of four men charged with smuggling $200 million worth of cocaine from
of South America to East Tennessee was a gun runner who was not
:revolved with drugs, a defense lawyer claimed in opening arguments Tuesday.
Attorney Frank Rubino told an eight-man, four-woman jury that Gerald Hemp was
'.c. involved with the ill-fated scheme to smuggle 614 pounds of nearly pure
cocaine into East Tennessee in March 1981.
Hemp is the last suspect on trial in the failed attempt to smuggle the nearly
pure cocaine into East Tennessee in the dead of night on March 23, 1981. His
trial began Monday, and testimony began after an eight-man, four-woman jury was
picked and opening arguments completed.
''They were running guns, going to Cuba to buy the guns and then take them
don to Managua to give to the guerrillas,'' Rubino said. ''Mr. Hemp., the proof
will show, throughout his his lifetime, had been in contact with the- CIA, and
has teen a gun runner to South America.''
Rubino used the same tactics that defense lawyers in November 1981 tried to
use for Charles Leslie kageler Jr., 25, formerly of Lubbock, Texas, who was
convicted of helping fly the twin-engine airplane that landed at Sevierville
Airport in March 1981 with 614 pounds of cocaine aboard.
Rubino did not address how Hemp came to be in Sevier County if he was running
tuns from Cuba to South America.
The bearded Hemp, 44, formerly of Gatlinburg, eluded authorities for 18
months before he was finally arrested in Florida last Sept. 30. He has been held
under $50 million.bond at the Sevier County Jail.
Of the other three men at the airport that night, Charles Leslie Kageler Sr.,
54, is dead, his body found floating in the Atlantic Ocean off the Florida coast
last summer. His son, the younger Kageler, is serving his prison term.
A third suspect, C.D. Newell, 52, of Kemah, Texas, who allegedly flew the
cocaine-laden plane, is expected to testify against Hemp in exchange for a
reduced sentence.
STAT
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/21 : CIA-RDP90-00552R000302430026-3