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Michigan couple face thousands
in fines for trip to Cuba
Detroit
Free Press, December
4, 2004.
WASHINGTON (AP) -- When Michael and Angela
McCarthy crossed the border from Ontario
into Michigan in April 2001, an officer
asked them where they'd been. The couple
answered truthfully -- Cuba -- and mentioned
they had brought back a couple of cigars.
Three years and thousands of dollars in
legal fees later, the Port Huron, Mich.,
couple is driving to Washington this week
to find out how much the U.S. government
will fine them for their illegal trip. Administrative
Law Judge Irwin Schroeder could make them
pay up to $110,000 after considering their
case during a hearing Monday.
The McCarthy case is one of about 20 now
before judges of the Treasury Department's
Office of Foreign Asset Control, according
to the Center for International Policy,
which advocates ending travel restrictions
to Cuba. Many more cases get settled before
they ever reach a judge.
OFAC has opened more than 10,000 enforcement
investigations in the last decade for possible
violations of the 40-year-old economic embargo
against Fidel Castro's regime. The agency
has collected more than $8 million in fines
since 1994.
The McCarthys, an earnest and soft-spoken
pair, are devout Catholics who considered
their trip a missionary effort as well as
a vacation. They brought medicine, as they
had done on similar trips to Mexico and
Haiti, and stayed with nuns in Havana. On
a road trip across the island, they picked
up more than 30 hitchhikers so they could
learn about the country.
"In the Gospel we're called to make
peace," Michael McCarthy said.
McCarthy, a physician's assistant, and
his wife, a nurse, have three college-age
children and a limited travel budget. The
pair say they spent $1,400, including money
for the cigars they bought to help a street
person.
The McCarthys could have gotten a license
from OFAC for humanitarian travel to Cuba,
treasury spokeswoman Molly Millerwise said.
Millerwise said tens of thousands of those
licenses are granted each year to families
visiting Cuban relatives, researchers, religious
groups, government officials and others.
But Kurt Berggren, the McCarthys' attorney,
said the couple didn't understand the rules.
"At the time they went, this was kind
of like sodomy statutes in states, where
there's a law on the books but it's not
enforced," Berggren said. "Lots
of people were going. They knew people who
were going."
Berggren said the case took years to work
its way through the system because OFAC
usually settles cases and has few judges
available to hear them. The McCarthys were
offered a settlement of $1,000 each but
refused because they want to challenge the
law in a hearing. Berggren expects the pair
will pay around $7,500 each if Schroeder
decides to fine them, since fines are partly
based on how much violators spent in Cuba.
Michael McCarthy stressed that he and his
wife respect the judicial process. But they
feel strongest about their ability to practice
the tenets of their faith.
"The United States is becoming more
of a gated community, and we're not going
to make it if we close ourselves in,"
he said.
On the Net:
Office of Foreign Assets Control: http://www.treas.gov/offices/enforcement/ofac/
Center for International Policy's Freedom
to Travel campaign: http://www.cubacentral.com/travelvictims.cfm
Copyright © 2004 Detroit
Free Press Inc. All rights reserved.
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