Published Monday, May 1, 2000, in the Miami Herald
Group suffers blow with Elian loss
By Alfonso Chardy . achardy@herald.com
The Cuban American National Foundation spent thousands of dollars and considerable political capital underwriting the fight by Miami relatives to keep Elian Gonzalez in the United States.
Foundation Chairman Jorge Mas Santos estimates the foundation has spent about $10,000 on lobbying trips to Washington, D.C., by some of Elian's Miami relatives.
Other costs absorbed by the foundation include the deployment of its security chief to the Little Havana house where federal agents seized Elian on April 22. A senior foundation official also has given money to Elian's great-uncle Lazaro Gonzalez and jobs to Lazaro and the two adult survivors of
the sea tragedy that killed the child's mother and 10 others.
Money aside, perhaps most costly to the foundation was the failed negotiation that would have taken Elian and his Miami relatives to Washington on April 12 for a meeting with the boy's father.
Mas Santos announced the meeting at a nationally televised press conference at 11 p.m. April 11, but by midnight Lazaro Gonzalez abruptly canceled the trip.
At the outset, the foundation produced posters showing a dazed Elian just minutes after he had been picked up at sea.
At the end, just hours after federal agents took Elian from Lazaro Gonzalez's home, the foundation flew Gonzalez, his daughter Marisleysis and his brother Delfin to Washington in a failed bid to see the boy.
Top foundation officials were at the side of Elian's Miami family almost from the start. And they were there at the end -- in the person of foundation security chief Mario Miranda, who could only watch as agents seized the boy he had been guarding.
To some, the image of Miranda lying face down on the lawn of Lazaro Gonzalez's house under a federal agent's gun was symbolic of the foundation's decline since founder and longtime Chairman Jorge Mas Canosa died of lung cancer in 1997.
ELECTION POLITICS
But in a recent interview with The Herald and two reporters from Spain, Mas Canosa's son -- Mas Santos -- said the foundation remains strong.
He acknowledged, however, that the Clinton administration has not been as supportive on Elian as the group would have wished.
Part of the problem, Mas Santos suggested, is that President Clinton is no longer running for office and therefore no longer cares about the exile vote.
But Vice President Al Gore, who is running for Clinton's job, does. That's why, Mas Santos said, the foundation reached out to Gore and he embraced the group's Elian position.
In late March, the vice president endorsed foundation-backed legislation that would have granted Elian U.S. residency.
''To put it in context, a lot of people were calling,'' Gore campaign spokesman Doug Hattaway said Saturday. Gore campaign chairman Tony Coelho had ''several conversations'' with Mas Santos, Hattaway said. However, on the residency bill, Gore also got advice from three influential Democrats --
Florida Sen. Bob Graham and New Jersey's Sen. Robert Torricelli and Rep. Robert Menendez.
LOBBYING EXPENSES
Gore ''has taken his stance on the legislation because he thought it was the right thing to do, not because of politics,'' Hattaway said.
The biggest cash expense, Mas Santos said, has been the lobbying trips to Washington by family members and supporters, including Donato Dalrymple, the man who helped rescue Elian and who was holding him when federal agents raided Lazaro Gonzalez's home. When asked how much the trips cost, Mas
Santos said he couldn't say. But when asked if an estimate of about $10,000 was accurate, Mas Santos did not challenge it.
Other unestimated expenses: the reassignment of the foundation's security chief -- a bodyguard for Mas Canosa and then his son -- to Lazaro's house.
Federal agents involved in raid planning said they were particularly concerned about Miranda because fellow agents dispatched to do pre-raid surveillance of the house remember him carrying a weapon -- an allegation he denies.
Besides Miranda, another top foundation official involved in helping the Miami family is Lombardo Perez, a foundation director and president of Metro Ford. Soon after Elian was rescued, Perez hired Lazaro Gonzalez to do body work at his car dealership.
TAXABLE INCOME
Direct contributions of money and services to the Miami family could be considered taxable income, Internal Revenue Service spokesman Bob Firman said.
After Elian's father, Juan Miguel Gonzalez, arrived April 6 he stayed at the home of Fernando Remirez, head of the Cuban government's diplomatic mission in Washington. Then when Elian was seized and was flown to Andrews Air Force Base outside Washington, the family moved into base housing.
On Tuesday, they moved to the Wye Plantation, a compound on Maryland's Eastern Shore 70 miles from Washington where owners of a guest house have allowed the family to stay free of cost.
Lawyers for the Miami relatives say they are providing their services free, but some legal expenses are being paid from the Elian Gonzalez Defense Trust Fund that has taken in more than $200,000 in donations since March, Gutierrez said.
Juan Miguel's lawyer, Gregory Craig, is being paid out of a fund set up with the help of the Rev. Joan Brown Campbell, until recently general secretary of the National Council of Churches, which has been closely involved in helping reunite Elian with his father.
Herald staff writers Frances Robles, Manny Garcia, Ana Acle, Andres Viglucci and Mark Silva contributed to this report.
Police experts defend raid as textbook tactics
Commanders, experts answer raid questions
By David Kidwell . dkidwell@herald.com
On a sunny April morning in 1986 in South Dade, FBI agents armed with 9mm handguns and 14 rounds each met up with what they thought were run-of-the-mill bank robbers in a stolen car.
They were not expecting to face two .357 handguns and a Ruger Mini-14 assault rifle with a banana clip filled with wall-piercing .223 caliber rounds. Five minutes and 131 shots later, the bloodiest FBI shooting in history was over: two agents and two suspects dead, five other agents wounded just
south of the Suniland shopping center in Pinecrest.
That is the kind of tragedy that frames the way law enforcement officials think.
Last week, congressional leaders promised -- then indefinitely postponed -- hearings to investigate what many critics suggest was an excessive show of force that played out on national television and on newspaper front pages around the country.
Politicians lamented it. Civil libertarians screamed about it. The Miami relatives of Elian Gonzalez felt violated by it.
But the commander of the Border Patrol Tactical Unit, or BORTAC, that stormed the Gonzalez home is unapologetic.
In addition, more than a dozen experts on police tactics -- including two Cuban-American federal agents who believe the April 22 early-morning raid in Little Havana was premature and unnecessary -- agree that it was a classic, by-the-book ''dynamic movement'' in which everything agents did had a
legitimate reason, from the weapons they chose to the intimidating commands they screamed.
''People are trying to shade this case anyway they can for their own reasons, and it's regrettable,'' said Tom Cash, former special agent in charge of the Miami office of the Drug Enforcement Administration. ''I've been in charge of literally thousands of these types of raids, on search
warrants, and I'm telling you it was textbook.
KNOCKING FOR 25 SECONDS
''You do not wave a red flag in front of a bull and expect him to sit there and shrug his shoulder,'' Cash said. ''People joining arms, throwing a sofa in front of a door, a crowd throwing stuff and still [the federal agents] pounded on the door for 25 seconds.
''Go look at your watch and stand at the door -- that's an eternity under those conditions.''
Philip Grivas, a retired SWAT team commander for the FBI in New York, agrees.
''When that [1986] massacre happened down there with the FBI, everybody's heart sank,'' Grivas said. ''People have to realize that we show that kind of overwhelming, intimidating force to prevent violence.
''The problem you have is that nothing you can say and nothing I can say to people can make them understand or justify that picture we all saw,'' he said. ''Not unless you've been there and done it.''
Tactical experts interviewed by The Herald -- while differing in their opinions about whether the raid was necessary -- say that once it was ordered, it went by the book. They say the tactics used were justified because overwhelming force is safer for everyone than marginal force.
NO TIME FOR COFFEE
''The intimidation is by design,'' said Bob Hoelsher, a semiretired Miami-Dade Police tactical team commander who started the force's SWAT team and commanded it for 10 years. ''They don't have time to sit down and have coffee or watch them hug goodbye. Not when you might have a crowd of hundreds
of protesters amassing outside.''
Said one Cuban-American agent who sympathizes with the Miami relatives and believes Attorney General Janet Reno should have waited and relied on negotiations: ''As much as I would like to be able to point you to the regulation they violated, there just isn't one. I think they should have waited,
but once the order came, it was pretty much by the book.''
Both Jim Goldman, on-scene operations commander for the Immigration and Naturalization Service, and the BORTAC commander who spoke to The Herald on the condition he not be named, agree.
''This operation was as close to flawless as I have seen,'' the BORTAC commander said. ''There were no critical failures, no minor failures.''
Said Goldman: ''I've witnessed this from A to Z and I am 100 percent convinced it was the right thing to do.''
Law enforcement experts agree that critics in Congress will be hard pressed to find any regulation, policy or procedure that was violated in this case.
''They're in trouble because their political skirts are showing, not their knowledge,'' Cash said. ''The worst they [agents] could have done was tarried and sat down in there to discuss their options. Obviously, they did their homework.''
NAGGING QUESTIONS
Here are some questions about the way the raid was conducted and answers from the agents who carried it out:
Why break down doors, shout commands and generally treat the home's occupants like criminals?
''For this operation, speed and surprise were critical. We literally wanted these people frozen with fear; that is the whole point of a show of force in any operation,'' said the BORTAC commander. ''We are not negotiators. Our only purpose is to get in and get out as fast as we can, and with as
little resistance as possible.''
Law enforcement experts agree that what appears to lay people as a bunch of out-of-control agents on testosterone overload is in truth a tactic taught at every SWAT and police training facility.
The manual of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms calls it ''command presence.''
''This means that the entry team attempts to break the subjects' will to resist through the team's appearance, voice commands and physical and weapons skills,'' the manual says.
Goldman and the BORTAC commander said no obscenities were used and no one threatened to shoot family members during the raid -- as family members have suggested.
''Profanity and obscenities get in the way and they can cause confusion,'' the BORTAC commander said. ''We don't have time for that, but we have to make them understand we are serious.''
Why not try a more subdued approach?
Goldman said his planners studied all options, but given intelligence reports of ''orchestrated resistance'' at the home all the less forceful options were quickly eliminated.
As it turned out, Goldman said, there was a human chain, the family resisted by barricading and locking doors and protesters swarmed the yard as the team's caravan arrived.
''It became clear very early that four guys in suits knocking on the door was going to be too risky,'' he said. ''The mission was clear, and we realized this was a one-shot deal. We were not going to go in there and come out empty-handed.
''If operational security had been breached, we would've been doomed.''
Goldman and his team were prepared to allow the Gonzalez family to peacefully turn over the boy, he said in an interview.
Goldman and the ''breach team'' pounded on the door of the Gonzalez home for more than 25 seconds as rocks and bottles were thrown and immigration agents used pepper spray to deter surging protesters, he said.
''I was prepared to go to the door, bang on the door, explain my purpose in being there and if they opened the door, to allow them to produce the child,'' said Goldman, who had a search warrant to enter the house. ''Instead, I heard them moving around inside. As it turned out, they were moving a
sofa in front of the door.''
Why not snatch the boy when he left the home?
Elian didn't leave the home after the April 13 turnover deadline set by Reno. ''The only time Elian left the house was to play in the backyard,'' Goldman said.
Goldman said no thought was ever given to taking Elian on April 12, when he traveled to the Miami Beach home of Barry University President Sister Jeanne O'Laughlin for a meeting with Reno.
''That was still too early,'' Goldman said, adding the Gonzalez family was not in violation of any laws at the time.
Why go at night?
Predawn is the preferred time for all such raids because people are asleep and easily disoriented and traffic patterns are light, experts say. In this case, the crowd of protesters outside the home was at the lowest number during the day.
Why use submachine guns against an unarmed family?
The Border Patrol entry team was armed with Heckler & Koch MP5 submachine guns, the preferred weapon of SWAT teams throughout the nation. It is more accurate and less apt to spray 9mm bullets at unintended targets than a handgun or more powerful weapons.
The weapon has a selector switch on the frame above the trigger with settings for safety, single- or three-round bursts or fully automatic.
''The weapon is intimidating,'' the BORTAC commander said. ''But we didn't go in with that weapon because it is intimidating. We used it because it serves a purpose. Its intimidating look was only an added benefit.''
The purpose, he said, is to quickly and accurately shoot anyone who poses a life-threatening risk. Team members were ordered to keep the safeties on until such a threat presented itself. It never did.
Why point the gun at the boy?
The Border Patrol said the weapon was never aimed at the boy, and pointed to the entire sequence of eight pictures taken over a period of seconds by Associated Press photographer Alan Diaz inside the bedroom where Elian was taken.
''You'll notice that Dalrymple and the child are all the way in the closet before the agents come in,'' the BORTAC commander said. ''When the agent comes in, his shoulder is hugging the wall and his line of sight into the closet is obscured.
''At that point, he sees a head pop out of the closet and go back in.''
''As soon as he realized who was in front of him,'' the commander said, ''you will see that the gun does an immediate circumference away from the boy.''
Thousands Protest Seizure.
Separate rally backs Reno's action
Published Sunday, April 30, 2000, in the Miami Herald
By Sara Olkon, Diana Marrero And Elaine De Valle . edevalle@herald.com
A week after a federal raid swept Elian Gonzalez out of Miami, Calle Ocho turned into a river of outrage, unity and mourning Saturday as close to 100,000 people poured onto Little Havana's main street to demonstrate their anger at the U.S. government and support for the little rafter boy's Miami
relatives.
''I don't think Elian should be returned to a repressive government. He will just become a puppet of the state,'' said Ruben La Rosa, 35, of Miami Shores.
Early arrivals waving Cuban and U.S. flags gathered around the Bay of Pigs monument on 13th Avenue, near a picture of Elisabeth Brotons -- Elian's mother -- who died in the voyage from Cuba last November. Beneath the photo lay flowers, a silver cross and a Cuban flag wreath of red, white and
blue carnations.
Many wore black despite temperatures in the high 80s. Some cooled themselves with circular paper fans that read ''I vote Republican.''
''We have suffered from the heat, but the clothes are a sign of grief regardless of whether it's warm or not,'' said Maria Mesa, 55, a social worker. ''We didn't come here for a picnic or for joy.''
Eighteen people were treated on the scene, mostly for fainting or heat exposure, said Danny Maree, Miami Police Fire-Rescue chief.
Miami Police Lt. Rene Landa said about 100,000 people attended the event.
Elian's Miami relatives, great-uncle Lazaro Gonzalez and his family, were not there. Family spokesman Armando Gutierrez, who did attend, said they were still recuperating from the shock of the raid April 22 that removed the child from their home.
Several smaller counterdemonstrations in support of the government's action also took place around the county. The largest, along U.S. 1 in South Dade, attracted about 2,500 people, police said. It was largely peaceful, with two arrests late Saturday for battery and disorderly conduct.
MANY CRITICIZED
Many demonstrators there railed against local Cuban-American politicians and said it was the Gonzalez family that broke the law. Hundreds waved American flags. A handful displayed Confederate flags.
At the Little Havana demonstration, many demonstrators wore ribbons -- white for peace, black for mourning and green for hope, such as the one on Ana Bonnin, 56, of Miami Beach, who came from Cuba when she was 18.
''I know God will still do a miracle. I believe he does things his own way,'' said Bonnin, who showed bruises on her ribs and legs that she said came from being kicked by police officers at a previous protest.
LEFTOVER ANGER
Some protesters were tense when they arrived because of clashes with police officers during protests last week. Some demonstrators have complained of police brutality.
Urpi Byron, 25, a student at Florida International University, carried a sign that read ''Please don't hurt me. I'm peacefully protesting.'' She said her mother was pepper-sprayed in the eyes last weekend.
Fellow protesters carried signs that read: ''Say no to police donations,'' and ''We demand respect, we pay taxes.'' But others said they saw few officers on the street.
Pembroke Pines resident Ann Sigler, 42, walked from Le Jeune Road to south of Fourth Avenue carrying a picture of a crying President Lincoln and said she did not see one officer in 38 blocks, which delighted her.
The isolated incidents of vandalism on April 22, she said, were ''provoked by police who had zero tolerance.''
Miami Police Lt. Bill Schwartz said that there were actually ''several hundred officers,'' including those from Miami-Dade Police and Florida Highway Patrol, at the event and that more field forces were ready just in case. They had not changed their strategy, he said.
''This is how we would approach any type of peaceful demonstration,'' he said, adding that there were no arrests or incidents. ''We've had nothing but good reports. Some officers are reporting that people are going up and hugging them.''
City Manager Donald Warshaw said later Saturday that he had fulfilled his promise.
''I committed to the Miami City Commission [Thursday] that this event would show the entire world that Miami is a peaceful and wonderful community,'' Warshaw said. ''I am convinced those wounds [from last week's protests] were quickly healed.''
OLIVE BRANCH
So is Officer Richard Perez, who had a brief, tense moment about 5:30 p.m. as people leaving the area swarmed around his car that was parked at Southwest Eighth Avenue since 9 a.m.
''At first I was uneasy, but I realized they didn't want to hurt me. On the contrary, they were there to shake my hand and hug me,'' Perez said. ''It was a great feeling, being Cuban American and raised in this community. Today was a great day.''
Lt. Landa, who coordinates police plans for special events, echoed that sentiment. He said most officers did not expect any mayhem.
''The crowd that comes out for these events, like the prayer vigil a few weeks ago, are there for the real cause, are the people we never have problems with,'' said Landa, who called the few who set fires and threw rocks last week ''thugs and antagonizers.''
Miami-Dade Mayor Alex Penelas said he was impressed with the number of people of all ages and all nationalities who attended the main protest. He was also glad that the image portrayed to the world was one of a solemn and serene mood.
''It was a strong expression of emotions, but it was done peacefully. It was done in calm, in a nonviolent fashion,'' Penelas said.
''That's the kind of image that is important to send out to the rest of the country.''
SENSE OF BETRAYAL
Still, the word on protesters' lips was betrayal.
''[Last] Saturday was the marking day for the death of liberty,'' said Emiseo de la Guardia, 45, who lives near Homestead and works for the county water and sewer department.
He brought his two daughters -- Vanesa, 15, and Natalie, 13 -- to present a positive, peaceful image of the Cuban community, which he said had been maligned.
Arturo Campa, 56, a black Cuban who came to the United States in 1959, said he wanted to reach out to Miami's blacks.
''My message to the rest of the community, especially the black community in Miami, is to help us out with our struggle for freedom because they, better than anyone, should understand that obtaining freedom is indeed a struggle,'' said the music producer for the Miami Latin Jazz Festival.
''I also want to make them aware that the resistance leaders in Cuba today are black.''
The protest culminated at Fourth Street about 4 p.m. at a large stage with a podium where exile activists and several religious leaders of different races spoke and prayed.
Exile radio commentator Armando Perez Roura said Cubans had been stigmatized.
''Cubans are decent people and we respect the laws. They are accusing us of many things to weaken our cause and to separate us.''
That was why Nieves Lopez traveled from her Boynton Beach home to take part in the march, the first protest she has attended.
''There are a lot of layers to this story that the average American can't understand. The Cuban people have been presented as boorish, dumb, reactionary, and that's just so unfair,'' said Lopez, an English teacher who grew up in Ohio.
''I have found more veiled racism here. I've heard people say, 'All those Cubans should go back in a boat,' and they're calling us reactionary? Some people complain that they have given Cubans everything. My father wasn't given anything. [My parents] came to this country poor. They worked at
very menial jobs and saved to send me to college.''
OPPOSITION
The crowd cheered as two Brothers to the Rescue planes flew overhead. But moments earlier, they booed as planes flew across the cloudless sky at about 4:30 p.m., with a sign that read, ''Don't fight your battles here, go home and fight your war.'' Another banner read: ''America loves Janet
Reno.''
''Very rude,'' said Hialeah-born Gloria Martinez, 35. ''We would go back if we could.''
Two who don't agree with protesters found themselves on Calle Ocho at 3 p.m. anyway. Hugo Miranda and Augusto Montecinos, 24-year-old students from Bolivia, live nearby and went to grab a bite at their favorite neighborhood eatery, Taquerias El Mexicano.
''We strongly believe the boy does belong with his father,'' Miranda said. ''It's hard to see it any other way.''
Carlos Leon, 38, said most people do not understand that the father has no rights in Cuba, the homeland he left when he was 8. ''Kids belong to the state,'' he said.
''It's not that he shouldn't be with his dad,'' said Kathy Pereda, who said she wanted the courts to decide.
Herald staff writers Ivette M. Yee, Tyler Bridges, Marika Lynch and Barbara de Lollis and Herald writers Jasmine Kripalani, Mireidy Fernandez and Janice Gallagher contributed to this report.
At counterrally, protesters show their support for U.S.
By Peter Whoriskey, Draeger Martinez And Eunice Ponce . pjwhoriskey@herald.com
A rally described by organizers as pro-American drew about 2,500 demonstrators to the sidewalks of U.S. 1 in South Dade on Saturday afternoon, an outpouring of support for the government's action in the Elian Gonzalez case that took the form of enthusiastic horn honking and a mile-long gauntlet
of people waving American flags.
The size and duration of the demonstration, which had received almost no notice on television or radio, surprised police and even the organizers.
''They have woken a sleeping giant,'' said Joan Ponce, 35, a bookstore clerk standing in front of a Texaco station at Southwest 170th Avenue with her son, Marcus, who carried a sign that said ''God Bless America.''
''There have been a lot of people who have just been sitting back watching all this who decided it was time to unite and express another point of view.''
A DIVERSE CROWD
The demonstrators were a diverse crowd. There were teenagers with pierced tongues. White bearded motorcycle guys. Secretaries, engineers, laborers and shop owners. There were whites and blacks. A handful flew Confederate flags. Some held Bibles aloft. But they sounded two common themes:
First, they said they were incensed to see the American flag burned and flown upside down by protesting Cuban Americans last week.
Second, they were offended that Cuban immigrants and local leaders -- they frequently singled out Miami-Dade Mayor Alex Penelas and Miami Mayor Joe Carollo -- were rallying behind a family they believe had defied the U.S. Department of Justice.
''I was disgusted when I saw the flag burning,'' said Lisa Snow, a bartender at the Red Rooster, who ran off 100 fliers announcing the rally. ''Don't they love being in this country?''
Their signs broadcast a variety of responses: Proud to be American. Stop the Banana Republic. This is America, Speak English. America: Love it or Leave it.
THREE MEN
The event appears to have started with three men: James Cross, a Homestead-based operator of heavy construction equipment; his son, Paul, a cook at Ruby Tuesday's; and Rick Hartwell, who has a restaurant cleaning business.
''We were all sitting around at a friend's house playing cards -- crazy eights and stuff like that -- and we all thought it was so stupid what was going on,'' said James Cross, an Army veteran and a self-described redneck. ''We decided that we just had to do something about it.''
The group called television stations to attract some publicity. For the most part, the stations ignored them, until Saturday, when the showing was too big not to notice. The Herald carried only one paragraph in advance of the demonstration.
Cross said his group is planning a similar event for next Saturday in Goulds.
''I don't think anyone thought we'd have such a big turnout today,'' Cross said late Saturday. ''I guess it was a surprise to me, too, to see so many working people give up their Saturdays for this.''
Between 50 and 100 demonstrators showed up for another counterdemonstration in Coconut Grove's Peacock Park on Saturday, assembled by a few citizens planning a petition drive to recall Carollo.
The main event, however, unfolded in South Dade.
FROM FRIENDS
Denise Mackens, a math teacher who attended, said she heard about it from friends. She waved a sign that said, ''Thanks, Reno.''
''I know that whites and blacks have had their problems in the past,'' said Mackens, who is black. ''But I'm glad we got together today.''
Vicky Reidenger, also of Cutler Ridge, had not heard about the rally until she drove by.
''I saw all these folks and it made me feel really good about my country. So I got out and became part of it. I bought my flag at a store down there.''
There were at least a few Cuban Americans in the crowd.
Beatriz Mendoza-Lanese, 39, a customer service representative, waved a sign that said, ''This Cuban American Supports Janet Reno.''
''What happened in the raid was violent, and I kind of choked when I saw it, but it was necessary,'' she said. ''I support her action.''
KEEPING QUIET
She said many other Cuban Americans share her feelings, although often they don't like to advertise them for fear of starting arguments.
''Put it this way,'' she said, ''I didn't tell my mother I came out here.''
Not everyone who supported the government agreed with the rally. Joseph Adler, of South Miami, said he supports the decision to return the boy, but believes Saturday's counterprotests were a way for people to express their ill will toward Cuban Americans.
''I see anger in those people. They wave the Confederate flag and that's not the answer. . . . This should be a time to heal,'' Adler said.
Police estimated the crowd at 2,500. They made two arrests late Saturday, one for simple battery and one for disorderly conduct.
''They got only limited publicity, but they got a good crowd,'' said Metro-Dade police spokesman Pat Brickman, about 6:30 p.m. on Saturday. ''We thought it would run about an hour, but it's still going on.''
South Florida Catholic Church breaking silence in Elian case
By D. Aileen Dodd. adodd@herald.com
For months, the good shepherds of South Florida's Roman Catholic Church stood vigil outside the temporary Little Havana home of Elian Gonzalez, offering prayer for the family while deliberately taking no public position on the custody battle.
But recently, their veil of prayerful silence was broken by a letter to President Clinton.
Fifty-four priests -- Hispanic and non-Hispanic -- signed the letter of protest, faxed from parish to parish. It was crafted without the approval or input of the leadership of the Archdiocese of Miami, a powerful voice some Catholics say has been sorely missing from the debate surrounding Elian.
``We have to fight for what we believe in, not wait for people to do something. The bishops are the leaders, but the church is more than the bishops,'' said the Rev. Jose L. Menendez, pastor of Corpus Christi Catholic Church of Hialeah. ``A group of us came together because we were horrified
with what happened and felt in a way discriminated against that this would go on during the three most sacred days of our faith. Elian was like our own kid.''
Though the United States arm of the Roman Catholic Church, the National Conference of Catholic Bishops, helps to resettle about one-third of the 80,000 refugees admitted into the country every year, the church rarely intervenes in individual custody cases, even if those cases attract
international attention.
THE BIG PICTURE
Instead, the church focuses mainly on the big picture, tackling national policy toward refugees, seeking humanitarian aid for Third World countries, and working to mediate the fall of communism in places seeking a democracy.
The Archdiocese of Miami has neither praised nor criticized the priests' letter to the president. It has simply accepted the message as a clerical form of free speech.
``Every person can express what he thinks,'' said Auxiliary Bishop Agustin Roman, a leader in the Cuban exile community who helped to mediate an end to Mariel detainee riots at two Southern prisons in the 1980s. ``I think our role is to pray. We are present as a church and have been praying from
the beginning.''
The Elian case is not being totally ignored by the national church, but its leaders have chosen to keep a low profile on the issue, unlike the vocal backers of Elian's father, Juan Miguel Gonzalez, among the National Council of Churches.
``We have not been approached by the family to be involved,'' said Mark Franken, executive director of Migration and Refugee Services for the Catholic Conference. ``There is so much we don't know. There are a lot of details and facts that need to be explored. In a situation like this, they are
usually explored in a court of law.''
The church's middle-of-the-road position shouldn't be viewed among lay members as a slighting by their hierarchy, said Christine Gudorf, professor of religion at Florida International University.
`GOD ON OUR SIDE'
``Everybody always wants their religious leaders to support their position so they can say God is on our side,'' said Gudorf. But ``the Catholic Church is not going to take a position in one part of the world that discredits the faith to Catholics in other parts of the world.''
Still, the silence of some of the church's South Florida immigrant advocates is ``interesting,'' said Rey Terry, assistant professor at FIU. ``Some of Miami's bishops historically have been very active in immigration advocacy, especially [Auxiliary] Bishop Thomas Wenski for Haitians and Bishop
Roman for Cubans. They have enormous influence.''
The case has prompted national church immigration officials to look more closely at the treatment of children who arrive at U.S. shores without documentation, a parent or a guardian.
``We hope that given this experience and the exposure this case has given to children without parents in a migration setting, that first and foremost [the government] should not place these children in detention facilities,'' Franken said. ``In pursuing the child's best interest, immediately
there should be efforts taken to reunify the child with parents or guardians.''
INTERNATIONAL WORK
Internationally, leaders of church agencies like Catholic Relief Service's Cuban counterpart, Caritas Cuba, which helps Cuban Catholics provide assistance to Cubans by donating about $5 million in food and medical supplies to the island, are also monitoring the situation.
``We are talking about looking at the migration of Cubans and family dislocation like you saw in the case of Elian,'' said Tom Garafola, country representative for Cuba from his Washington, D.C., office.
Behind the scenes, the Catholic Conference has been involved with the Elian case since the boy arrived. Officials worked through the Archdiocese of Miami's Catholic Charities agency to conduct home visits with the Gonzalezes and help them get the assistance they needed to act as Elian's guardian
in case of medical emergencies.
INS holds `Rescue Reunion' picnic in Broward County
While people in Miami-Dade County demonstrated about the Immigration and Naturalization Service raid that removed Elian Gonzalez from his Little Havana relatives, the INS held its annual picnic in Broward County.
Latin music blared and couples danced cumbias Saturday afternoon at C.B. Smith Park in Pembroke Pines. Several hundred people attended.
Pembroke Pines police stood guard and demanded to see either an INS badge or a yellow invitation. Broward Sheriff's Office deputies patrolled the area.
``I was a little scared when I saw the banner that said `Operation Rescue Reunion,' '' said Monica Gomez, a Miami-Dade resident sitting across from the pavilion. ``There were pictures of the boy Elian and his father on the wall. I didn't know what was going on over there.''
Several agents involved in the raid on the Gonzalez home posed for photographs.
-- WANDA DEMARZO
Reconstructing The Raid
Agents' gaffes heightened chaos
By Carol Rosenberg. crosenberg@herald.com
When federal agents stormed the block around Lazaro Gonzalez's Little Havana house last weekend, they employed a long-established assault doctrine of using overwhelming force to stifle resistance.
But hours of analysis of videotapes and photographs taken from different angles by nine news photographers reveal key mistakes that caused chaos during the mission -- from agents' failing to seal off an obvious pocket of resistance to failure to film or videotape their 57 seconds inside the
house.
An example: Agents made no effort to challenge a gray-haired man who stood calmly at the foot of the house's front steps while agents were inside searching for Elian.
Unmolested, the man made a last-ditch effort to prevent Elian's removal from the house, dragging Immigration and Naturalization Service agent Betty Mills and Elian into the bushes before agents went in to retrieve them. No effort was made to detain the man and INS officials say they do not know
his identity.
Another example: Not all the federal agents -- and none of the Miami Police on the scene -- were equipped with gas masks. Some federal officers are captured on film retreating from close-encounter clashes with protesters to recover after inhaling pepper spray, leaving people from the
neighborhood to continue struggling with fewer federal agents on Gonzalez's front lawn.
In the end, no major injuries were reported, and Elian was brought out of the house unharmed -- exactly 57 seconds, by a stopwatch, after agents used a battering ram to crack open the Gonzalezes' front door.
But video footage taken from several angles shows the armed agents had to expend enormous effort to reach the door.
As many of the 131 agents involved in the raid were arriving, the tapes show, 22 protesters rushed through an open gate to beat federal agents to Lazaro Gonzalez's front lawn and establish a human chain. More jumped a fence and arrived later.
Among those who entered the lawn at the start of the assault was Democracy Movement leader Ramon Saul Sanchez, who swung the gate shut, but did not lock it.
Sanchez can later be seen on unedited CBS News footage, struggling inch by inch, sumo-style, to block the small federal force that actually invaded the lawn.
JOURNALISTS STOPPED
At one point Sanchez shoved and pushed Mills as she raced to the front door, in plainclothes, a gun on her hip, carrying the white blanket she would eventually toss over Elian.
The federal force had more success dealing with the media encampment opposite the Gonzalez house, where officers stopped reporters and camera crews in their tracks. Only freelance photographer Alan Diaz -- who eventually snapped the seizure's signature shot of Elian and Donato Dalrymple face to
face with an armed federal agent -- managed to beat the agents inside the house.
Other photographers were forced to retreat from positions near the house to the media area -- making some key moments of the raid difficult to spot in spite of several different angles.
The INS might have benefited from having more photographers present to record the agents' behavior.
Several hours after Elian was evacuated, Marisleysis Gonzalez alleged on live television that the agents broke the door to her mother's bedroom in half during the raid. She pointed to the broken door lying on the floor.
Authorities have no independent record to dispute it -- though still photos shot by Diaz in the room suggest the door was not as seriously damaged as the later TV tour of the house would indicate.
Diaz's photos show the agents arriving in the bedroom -- and retreating with the child -- beside an intact door. Diaz, for his part, did not reply to a question about how the door was broken in two.
News video from outside the house shows a clearly terrified Elian emerging in the arms of Mills, who rushes down the steps surrounded by other agents -- and briefly disappears from view behind a bush on Gonzalez's front lawn.
That was the moment Mills was apparently grabbed by the gray-haired man standing near the steps, but no videographer caught what was going on.
The man can be seen in much of the footage of the incident. Videotape shot by CBS News early in the raid shows him on the fringes, climbing over a fence from the neighboring house to the west. He can then be seen in several versions standing near the front door.
Agents ignored him throughout the entire retrieval episode.
PROTESTER DOWN
On the ground in front of the gray-haired man, Sanchez was flat on his back, apparently unconscious. A blond woman in olive green shorts was ministering to Sanchez. Behind that scene, a red-shirted young man was hanging from the front steps, trying to grab an agent using a battering ram to open
the door -- until a green-clad Border Patrol agent delivered a full-force punch that knocked the red-shirted man to the ground. The knockout was recorded by both WTVJ-NBC 6 and WFOR-CBS 4.
But no one pushed the gray-haired man out of the way; in fact, once the agents charged inside, the man, who was wearing jeans, a button-down shirt and white sneakers, crossed the walkway, apparently to get a better look.
As agents emerged ahead of Mills and Elian, the man could be seen clearly grabbing at them. They in turn pushed him away, into the bush. Suddenly, it appears on the WTVJ-NBC 6 videotape that he had pulled the woman agent and child into the bush, too. Two armed agents briefly disappeared into the
bush as well, pulled Mills out with the child and pushed her toward the waiting van.
MYSTERY PAIR
As they are seen climbing aboard, the background of a tape recorded at 5:21 a.m. by WSVN-FOX 7 shows the gray-haired man emerging from the bushes, perhaps shoved by a federal officer, who moved away.
The blond woman who had been kneeling over Sanchez appeared to lunge toward Mills, too, as the agent carried the boy down the steps. WFOR-CBS 4 videotape shows an agent knocking her away with his forearm.
Lazaro Gonzalez and others who were inside the house at the time of the raid could not identify either the man or the woman from photos shown them by The Herald. Neither could people who were outside the house at the time of the raid -- or in days leading up to it -- although some people thought
the young woman lived near the Gonzalez house, in Little Havana.
Department of Justice spokeswoman Carole Florman said Friday that the man's presence had been noted, after the fact, and it was determined he was not with federal authorities.
The videotapes show clearly that some of the confusion outside the house during the raid was caused by the large number of bystanders who made it to the front lawn ahead of agents.
CROWD REACTS
A CBS News photographer posted on a platform above street level began videotaping as the INS vans were moving down the street, but before they arrived at the house. That tape, and one recorded by WFOR-CBS 4, shows the lawn empty. Then, people keeping vigil on the street began rushing past police
barricades and through Lazaro Gonzalez's front gate.
They include activist Silvia Iriondo and six black-clad members of her Mothers Against Repression movement -- who, from a window in an apartment building next door, saw the vans pull up.
But the federal agents didn't post a guard by that building, to stop the women in black from joining the fray. In all, the tapes show, at least 22 people made it through the gate into the yard before the agents were deployed.
Among the participants: Rosa de la Cruz and Olga Saladrigas, whose husbands are civic leaders who had been inside throughout the night, attempting to negotiate with federal authorities.
Agents eventually forced the women to leave the yard, seconds before agent Mills emerged with Elian in her arms.
AGENTS' EXIT
The videotapes later show de la Cruz, hit at close range with pepper spray, falling in the middle of Northwest Second Street -- after stretching her arms out in what she later said was a Christian cross of prayer.
As de la Cruz was convulsing on the street, federal agents had already backed the white van carrying Elian down Northwest Second Street to speed toward Watson Island and the helicopter that spirited the boy to Homestead Reserve Air Force Base and a flight to suburban Washington, D.C.
Vans carrying support agents similarly had to back down the street to exit, and had several false starts -- giving more protesters time to pelt the vehicles and agents with rocks, lawn chairs and milk crates -- before they sped away.
The gray-haired man can be seen standing on the street watching the scene. Finally, he hurled a water cooler in the direction of one of the vans. Then he could be seen walking to the front door of the apartment building next to Lazaro Gonzalez's house, where he picked up a bottle of water and
doused his face, appearing to wash away traces of pepper spray.
To write this report, The Herald studied raw and edited video footage from WFOR-CBS 4, a CBS affiliate; WTVJ-NBC 6, an NBC affiliate; WSVN-FOX 7, a Fox TV affiliate; WPLG-ABC 10, an ABC affiliate; footage from CBS News; and still photographs from the Associated Press and Herald staff
photographer Jon Kral.
Congress hearings on Elian seizure might not happen
GOP leaders postponed action
From Herald Wire Services
WASHINGTON -- A key Senate Republican acknowledged Sunday that Congress might never hold hearings on whether the government used excessive force to seize Elian Gonzalez in Miami and return him to his father.
Judiciary Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch of Utah said he had postponed the hearings until he sees Justice Department documents about the operation to determine whether such proceedings are warranted.
``Once we get those, I think we can make an intelligent appraisal as to whether hearings should be held or not. Whether we should go forth, whether we shouldn't,'' Hatch said on NBC's Meet the Press.
Asked if hearings might not be held at all, he replied: ``If they're not justified, I guess there won't be.''
The possibility of holding no hearings is a stark departure from the demands of Republican congressional leaders last week, who accused Attorney General Janet Reno of prematurely cutting off negotiations with the Cuban boy's relatives in Little Havana and ordering an excessively forceful strike
on their home April 22.
NBC POLL
A new poll released Sunday showed that most Americans disagree with Republican congressional leaders and anti-Castro Cuban Americans who oppose Elian's return to Cuba and have called on lawmakers to look into the dramatic raid.
The NBC survey found that 62 percent of respondents said they saw no reason for hearings on the raid, compared with 30 percent in favor.
On Sunday, Hatch denied that the delay was in response to a lack of public support and reiterated that lawmakers had to look into whether Reno acted legally when she dispatched heavily armed federal agents to the Miami home.
In a letter Thursday to Reno, Hatch gave the Justice Department 24 hours to turn over all documents related to the raid. The Justice Department said it was unable to comply with the request, and with the blessing of Republican leaders, Hatch postponed the hearings.
He revealed Sunday that those proceedings might never take place.
Still, he and other Republican leaders said, questions still need to be answered about the legality of the agents' search warrant, among other things.
``The ends don't justify the means here,'' Hatch said. If he schedules any hearings, Hatch said he would ask Reno to testify, but probably not Elian's Miami relatives.
GRACEFUL WAY
Democrats said the lack of cooperation by the Justice Department gives Republicans a graceful way to bow to public opinion, which overwhelmingly opposes a congressional inquiry.
``I doubt there will be hearings and there shouldn't be hearings,'' the top-ranked Democrat on Hatch's committee, Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., said on the same show.
Republicans kept up their attacks on Reno, saying photos showing gun-toting agents grabbing a sobbing Elian raise questions about whether the Constitution still protects Americans against the government's excessive use of force.
The Clinton administration seems ``to only have two speeds: either warped speed, aggressive all-out send-in-the-storm-troopers, or no speed at all, as in the investigation of campaign-finance abuses and Chinese involvement,'' Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott said on Fox News Sunday.
Asked whether there would be hearings, Lott replied: ``We have a commitment to have the hearings. But it is hard to go forward with hearings when basic documents you requested have not been received.''
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