By Karen DeYoung and Sue Anne Pressley. Washington Post Staff Writers. Monday, April 17, 2000; Page A03
As they waited for a court decision that could come today, the two sides of the Elian Gonzalez controversy turned to two traditional Sunday venues--church and television--to press their cases.
Elian's father, Juan Miguel Gonzalez, and his family received a standing ovation from 1,000 parishioners when they entered Shiloh Baptist Church in the District's Shaw neighborhood. Gonzalez told the congregation from the podium: "My family, the people of Cuba--my son Elian, especially--we
really appreciate the support you have offered us."
In Miami, rosaries were draped across police barricades holding back a growing crowd of hundreds of people in the streets around the house of Elian's great-uncle, Lazaro Gonzalez. Under skies that were alternately sunny and purple with storm clouds, ice cream vendors played carnival-style music,
well-dressed families held a Palm Sunday Mass, and tourists in jeans and T-shirts wandered through asking for directions to "Elian's house."
In one of a series of last-ditch efforts to retain custody of Elian after he defied a government order to surrender the 6-year-old last Thursday, Lazaro Gonzalez wrote an "open letter to the government" Friday asking for all action in the case to be suspended during Holy Week.
That appeared unlikely, however. "I don't think, frankly, that the [Miami] family has much standing to make those kinds of requests," White House Chief of Staff John D. Podesta said yesterday on NBC's "Meet the Press." "Once the 11th Circuit's ruled, I think the
government is prepared to effectuate a return of Elian to the custody of his father, where he belongs."
The federal appeals court, located in Atlanta, is believed to have spent the weekend considering a petition from Lazaro Gonzalez for an injunction preventing Elian from leaving the country. Although the issue of his possible departure has no direct bearing on the question of custody, the Justice
Department said it would not move to enforce its Thursday order transferring custody of Elian to his father until the court ruled.
The government asked the court not only to reject the injunction, but also to affirm its order and instruct Lazaro Gonzalez to turn over Elian to his father. The government said that, if he cooperates, it would use its administrative power to ensure that the boy does not leave the United States
until Lazaro Gonzalez's appeal of a previous federal court ruling upholding the custody order is heard next month. The father's attorney has said the father has agreed.
On television yesterday, several attorneys for the Miami relatives broadly hinted, and in some cases said directly, that Juan Miguel Gonzalez is an unfit father who beat his son and first wife. One suggested, then said he hadn't meant to, that there was sexual abuse involved.
For most of the nearly five months that Elian has been in their custody, Lazaro Gonzalez and other relatives in Miami described Juan Miguel Gonzalez as a good and loving father they wanted to move to the United States and stay with his son. As their possession of the boy has become more tenuous,
however--particularly since the federal court case was lost--and the father has repeated his intention to return to Cuba with Elian, they have referred to evidence of abuse. They have said such evidence could only be revealed in the preferred venue of a Florida family court, which they believe would
be more sympathetic to them.
The Justice Department believes that it has already reviewed virtually all information gathered by the relatives to bolster their claims and has dismissed it as hearsay from former neighbors of the Gonzalezes in Cardenas, Cuba, who now live in Miami.
In an interview last night on CBS's "60 Minutes," Juan Miguel Gonzalez angrily denied that he had ever hit Elian or his mother or abused them in any way. In fact, he turned the accusation on the boy's Miami relatives.
"This is child abuse and mistreatment what they're doing to this boy," Gonzalez said. "The way they're abusing him, turning him against his father . . . he's suffering more here amongst them than he suffered in the sea."
Elian saw his mother drown after their small boat, in which the two of them and 11 others were trying to reach the United States, capsized and sank. He floated in an inner tube for two days before being found off the Fort Lauderdale coast by two fishermen on Nov. 25.
Attorneys for the relatives said yesterday that Lazaro Gonzalez was not violating the law because he cannot be made to deliver Elian to a location away from the demonstrators in his neighborhood. He has said repeatedly that he would not resist if federal agents came to take the boy--something
the government is reluctant to do out of fear of crowd violence and the possibility of physical danger and emotional damage to Elian.
Lawyers Jose Garcia-Pedrosa and Linda Osberg-Braun repeated that the Miami relatives want an independent psychological evaluation of Elian--who they say does not want to go back to Cuba--and a private meeting with the father before they agree to surrender the boy. But while the father has agreed
to meet with the relatives, he has insisted--with federal government backing--that he will not meet with them until Elian is back in his custody.
Sen. Robert G. Torricelli (D-N.J.), who wants Elian to stay in this country and last week brokered a deal for such a meeting with Lazaro Gonzalez's attorney, said that "when it came time to implement it, he was not in accord."
"I don't personally believe that Lazaro Gonzalez is capable at this point of reaching an accommodation," Torricelli said. "I think that the pressure under which he is operating, and the direction that sometimes is coming from the people surrounding his home, has made it impossible
for him to really reach any accord."
Juan Miguel Gonzalez, his wife and their infant son received a standing ovation yesterday morning when they entered Shiloh Baptist Church, one of the most prominent African American congregations in the city, as the church's senior choir sang "Guide My Feet, Lord."
The Rev. Wallace Charles Smith said he had received a call last week from the Rev. Joan Brown Campbell, the former president of the National Council of Churches supporter of Gonzalez's efforts, who asked if it would be all right for the family to worship at his church on Palm Sunday.
Although Gonzalez has described himself as a non-believer, he has said that he and Elian were baptized in the tradition of many Cubans who have kept up Catholic customs.
"I welcomed him to our church; I told him I had been to Cuba, I had preached in Havana," Smith said in a later interview. "I told him how the Cuban people, against great odds, have shown tremendous courage, particularly in the face of the [U.S.] economic blockade."
Pressley reported from Miami. Staff writers Hamil R. Harris and Helen Dewar in Washington contributed to this report.
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