COCAINE SUSPECT CLAIMS CIA ALLOWED HIM TO DEAL

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00552R000605610010-4
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: August 30, 2010
• Sequence Number: 10
• Publication Date: August 5, 1984
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/08/30: CIA-RDP90-00552R000605610010-4
ATLANTA JOURNAL-CONSTITUTION (GA)
5 August 1984
cocaine suspect
CIA allowed him
$y Tracy Thompson
,Staff Writer
i His name is Harold Rosenthal -
or Humberto, or Mishugana, or Col.
Momez, or sometimes plain old Har-
cold Ross.
.
~ He is accused of being the master-
i-mind behind the largest cocaine
*trafficking ring in the nation's
t'bistory, cracked last January after a
lengthy federal probe dubbed Opera-
tion Southern Comfort.
And on Monday, almost seven
months to t4e day after he was in-
icted along with 29 others, Rosen-
thal goes on trial in federal court
there, surrounded by what may be
the tightest security precautions in
the courthouse's history.
It promises to be a titillating
show for amateur spy buffs, featur-
ing a defense claim that, depending
on one's point of view, is either
ingenuous or incredible: Rosenthal
was indeed a cocaine dealer, but
with special dispensation from
Uncle Sam because he was a CIA
spy.
Among other things, say attorneys
for Rosenthal and another key de-
fendant, evidence at the trial will
reveal that the CIA engineered a
daring escape Rosenthal made in
1981 from a federal prison in Mem-
phis.
Defense attorneys also say that
the CIA gave Rosenthal clearance to
deal cocaine in exchange for infor-
mation Rosenthal gave the agency
on ties between Colombian Marxist
terrorist groups and the Soviet
Union, and the supply of arms to
those groups - allegedly funded by
profits from the cocaine trade.
Those allegations were contained
in documents filed under the Classi-
fied Information Procedures Act,
which requires attorneys to notify
the government if evidence likely to
be given at a trial might compro-
mise national security.
"Horse manure" was the inelegant
characterization given the allega-
tions by one federal prosecutor in-
volved in the Rosenthal case. "Just
a fishing expedition (and) smoke-
screen - the whole maneuver," said
the prosecutor, who asked not to be
identified.
True or not, the allegations mark
the latest chapter in the unlikely
saga of the flamboyant former
Atlanta bail bondsman who, until his
arrest last year, often cruised the
streets of Bogota, Colombia, in mili-
tary garb, surrounded by enough
bodyguards to protect a Latin
American dictator.
The Jan. 23 indictment that
named the defendants alleges that
Rosenthal headed a drug ring that
smuggled at least five tons of co-
caine into this country between Sep-
tember 1981 and January 1984.
With 19 potential defendants
(some defendants may be tried sepa-
rately, and the other 11 persons
named in the Rosenthal indictment
are still fugitives), this week's trial
is expected to be one of the largest
ever held in federal court here.
The trial - expected to last any-
where from six weeks to three
months - will be the culmination of
Operation Southern Comfort, a 18-
month-long investigation conducted
by the Organized Crime Drug En-
forcement Task Force here.
Rosenthal himself was arrested
last September by Colombian police
and U.S. agents. Armed with Israeli-
made Uzi machine guns, they nab-
bed him as he sat in his car stuck in
a traffic jam in Bogota.
Rosenthal has awaited his' trial in
the Atlanta Federal Penitentiary
and even in jail, he has managed to
make news. Last February, FBI
agents intercepted letters he sent
from his cell detailing an escape
plan - this time, with the help of $1
million and a team of hired com-
mandos.
That plan was no less flamboyant
claims
to deal
than the allegations contained in
court documents here, filed on be-
half of Rosenthal and Philip
Anthony Bonadonna, another key de-
fendant in the case.
"U.S. intelligence agencies ar-
ranged for Rosenthal to continue his
drug trafficking activities in Colom-
bia (as) part of a U.S. intelligence
mission to gather vital information
on terrorist activities in Colombia,"
the documents say.
According to defense attorneys,
Rosenthal was recruited by the CIA
to spy on the M-19s and the FARC
(Revolutionary Armed Command of
Colombia), two Colombian Marxist
terrorist groups.
The data Rosenthal funneled to
the CIA, the documents say, included
information on the two groups, "the
movement of arms to the terrorists
from (Soviet bloc) countries, (and)
the purchase of arms from those
countries by the terrorists with
monies gained from cocaine traf-
ficking."
Among the most intriguing allega-
tions is that the CIA engineered
Rosenthal's September 1981 escape
from a Memphis federal prison,
where he was serving a drug convic-
tion sentence. According to federal
marshals, Rosenthal made his get-
away by simply dressing in a stolen
prison employee's suit and strolling
past guards out the door.
The documents allege that the
CIA arranged the escape through
two reputed mobsters with ties to
Rosenthal, and that the Drug En-
forcement Administration has docu-
ments corrobating the CIA's involve-
ment.
"It would be totally improper for
us to respond to that," said Ted
Swift, a spokesman for the DEA in
Washington. DEA officials here also
declined to comment, as did CIA
spokesmen in McLean, Va.
The documents also allege that
while Rosenthal was being held in a
federal prison in Miami on a previ-
ous drug charge in late 1979 and
early 1980, he was instrumental in
arranging the release of Peace
Corps volunteer Richard Starr, kid-
napped by the M-19s.
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In fact, Starr was kidnapped in
1977 by the FARC, not the M-19s,
and held in the Colombian jungle for
three years until he was finally
released in February 1980 for a
$250,000 ransom paid by Washington
columnist Jack Anderson.
The gist of Rosenthal's story is
not corroborated by Jack Mitchell, a
former associate of Anderson's re-
sponsible for negotiating Starr's re-
lease.
Mitchell, now a reporter with
Cable News Network in Washington,
said he "vaguely" recognized Rosen-
thal's name, and did call him or his
attorneys at several points during
the negotiations with the FARC.
However, Mitchell said, "that partic-
ular contact played no role whatso-
ever" in Starr's eventual release.
"We were sort of grasping at
straws at that point," Mitchell said
in an interview last week. "Rosen-
thal is one of these characters who
makes a lot of claims, but only a
small percentage of them turn out
to be true."
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