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CUBA
NEWS
The
Miami Herald
'Worst is over' for pitcher comforted
with his family
By Kevin Baxter, kbaxter@herald.com.
Posted on Thu, Jun. 24, 2004.
For the first time since he defected from
Cuba's national baseball team more than
20 months ago, New York Yankees pitcher
José Contreras awoke under the same
roof as his wife and two daughters Wednesday
morning. But six hours later, he was still
trying to convince himself it was true.
''This is what I've been dreaming about
for two years,'' said Contreras, flashing
an uncharacteristic smile. "This is
the happiest day since I've been here. My
children, they've grown. And my wife, I
can hug them all. They're one of the reasons
I came here. To take care of my family.
"And now to enjoy all this with them?
I'm very happy.''
The reunion could have gone more smoothly.
First, Contreras' wife, Miriam Murillo Flores,
her sister, the two girls, a brother-in-law
and five family friends were part of a group
of Cuban migrants that spent three hours
outrunning more than a half-dozen Coast
Guard boats and a helicopter to reach Big
Pine Key just before dawn Monday.
BACK TO IMMIGRATION
Then, after spending a day-and-a-half being
processed by immigration officials, most
of the group was forced to return to the
immigration office Wednesday because of
a clerical error in their forms. They also
obtained identification forms that would
allow them to leave South Florida for New
York, where they will watch Contreras pitch
at Yankee Stadium on Saturday.
But those were just minor inconveniences,
Contreras said.
''It's been pretty emotional,'' he said.
"I have the people I love at my side.
My family, my friends. It's going to be
a lot more peaceful.''
Contreras said his wife never told him
of her plans to leave Cuba, even though
the trip was probably months in the planning.
''My wife was afraid to tell me,'' he said.
AT THE SAME TIME
So he took the mound Sunday at Dodger Stadium
at almost the exact same moment his wife
and children were stepping into the boat
that would whisk them to freedom.
''At first, I didn't believe it,'' Contreras
said of the Tuesday afternoon call informing
him his wife and daughters were in the United
States. "But when I saw them here.
. . . ''
Here Contreras stops talking and just smiles.
The family spent their first night together
talking until nearly dawn, then put plans
to go shopping on hold because of the immigration
paperwork problems.
Contreras said he was surprised at how
his daughters, Nailan, 11, and Nailenis,
3, have grown, but he had no doubt they
would recognize him -- or at least his voice.
They have spoken daily by phone since he
walked away from the Cuban baseball team
during a tournament in Saltillo, Mexico,
in October 2002.
''I never thought it would take this long.
I thought maybe six months, a year at the
most,'' Contreras said of the reunion. "It's
been very difficult. For me, for my children,
for my family.''
Contreras, 32, met his wife when he was
12 and she 11 and attending the same school.
They quickly became sweethearts and then,
four years later, were married. Except for
the pitcher's trips abroad with the Cuban
national team, the two were never apart
until Contreras defected.
Since then, Murillo had been harassed by
Cuban officials who accuse her husband,
once a national hero favored by Fidel Castro,
of being a traitor. She had been followed
when she left the house and, even though
she was twice given permission by the Nicaraguan
government to emigrate to the Central American
country, Cuban officials repeatedly told
her it would be five years before she would
be allowed to leave.
NEW BEGINNING
And now, the difficulties of separation
are just beginning for Ramón Calá
and Roberto Crespo, childhood friends who
came with Contreras' family when they fled
Cuba on Sunday night. As the three lunched
on hamburgers and chicken wings on a patio
at the Loews Hotel in Miami Beach on Wednesday,
the two men broke down in tears as they
spoke to relatives in Cuba on Contreras'
cellphone.
Contreras couldn't suppress an uneasy laugh.
''I've been there,'' he said.
''Calm down. Everyone's fine,'' Calá
told his family. "Have faith in us.''
Finally Contreras took the phone, only
to hear a frantic voice on the other end.
''The worst has passed,'' he said. "They're
here with me. The worst is over.''
That certainly would seem to be true for
Contreras, who says his first nine months
in the United States were hell.
A devoted father who loved to cook for
his daughters and help the eldest with her
homework, Contreras said he often thought
about his family when he took the mound.
As a result, he struggled -- something
the Yankees blamed on physical problems
and mechanical flaws in his windup. Privately,
however, the team conceded what everyone
else knew: Their $32 million pitcher was
homesick.
''I thought of them a lot when I was on
the mound,'' Contreras said. "Last
year it affected me a lot.''
This season Contreras said he was able
to leave his emotions in the dugout when
he pitched, but not when he returned to
his spacious New Jersey home and found that
the bedrooms he had reserved for his girls
were still empty.
HOME IN TAMPA
He also has a four-bedroom home in Tampa,
where the family will live during the offseason
and where his daughters will attend school.
In Cuba, the girls shared a tiny two-bedroom
apartment in an aging government-owned apartment
building on the outskirts of Pinar del Río.
''Now it's going to be much better,'' Contreras
said. "After a game I'll go to my house
and have the family support that everyone
has, in the good times and bad. It's like
someone lifted a huge weight off me.
"That's going to relax me a lot.''
The Yankees are certainly hoping so. Contreras
was 117-50 with a 2.82 earned-run average
in 10-plus seasons in the Cuban League but
has won just four of seven decisions and
posted a 6.18 ERA in 11 starts with the
Yankees this season.
Despite the hardships of the past two years,
Contreras says he has no regrets about defecting.
Especially now.
''One of the reasons I left was I wanted
to play against the best in the world. I
wanted to test myself as a pitcher,'' he
said. "The other reason was I wanted
a better future for my children.''
And just the thought of that made him smile
again.
Boaters may face charges of smuggling
Posted on Thu, Jun. 24,
2004
Miami's U.S. attorney said those who brought
the family of Cuba-born pitcher Jose Contreras
to South Florida may be prosecuted for smuggling.
By Luisa Yanez And Lisa Arthur. lyanez@herald.com.
Boaters who took the family of a New York
Yankees pitcher from Cuba to South Florida
could face prosecution -- despite their
high profile passengers, U.S. Attorney Marcos
Jiménez said Wednesday.
''We prosecute these cases without regard
to nationality or the individuals who are
being smuggled into this country,'' Jiménez
said, speaking from Washington, D.C., where
he was attending a conference.
Jiménez, whose office has cracked
down on those who smuggle human cargo into
South Florida, stressed that José
Contreras' celebrity status would have no
effect on any decision to move forward on
the case.
''It's a crime,'' he said.
BACK OFF LABEL
But other federal authorities in Miami
seemed to back away from labeling the two
boaters ''smugglers.'' The boaters initially
caught the eye of law enforcement by trying
to run away from the group of migrants as
they were being rounded up on Big Pine Key
early Monday.
It remained unclear Wednesday night if
the unidentified men were still in federal
custody or had been released.
Carlos Castillo, spokesman for the U.S.
attorney's office in Miami, declined to
comment on the case. But he said the men
had not been criminally charged.
Ana Santiago, spokeswoman for Citizen and
Immigration Services, said there is an ongoing
investigation by Immigration and Customs
Enforcement.
The high seas drama involving Contreras'
wife, two daughters, five other relatives
and 11 others ended at dawn in some mangroves.
MAKE IT TO SHORE
The ''go-fast'' boat they were on managed
to outrun a U.S. Coast Guard cutter and
other government boats to land. Since the
migrants made it to shore, they became eligible
to stay in the United States. In the past
two weeks, some 60 Cuban migrants have made
it to South Florida shores, authorities
said.
The public reunion of the ball player and
his family is only one of countless stories
of family's separated by Cuban history,
said Ramón Saúl Sánchez,
president of Democracy Movement.
''When you see a family reunite, whether
the family of a celebrity or the family
of a peasant or fisherman, it's like a feast
in our hearts,'' said Sánchez, who
left Cuba as a child. The publicity surrounding
Contreras and his reunited family has its
benefits, too, he said.
''As this became national and international
news, people around the world learn about
these families that are separated and what
the reasons and dimensions are,'' he said.
The U.S. Coast Guard said Wednesday it
tried to stop the boat carrying Contreras'
wife, Miriam Murillo Flores, and others
after they first spotted it about 15 miles
southwest of Key West. ''We have tactics
we use to stop boats that try to evade us,''
said Petty Officer Sandra Bartlett.
Authorities took the migrants to the Marathon
Coast Guard station and then transported
them to Krome. They were released Tuesday.
José Contreras later reunited with
his family at a South Beach Hotel. The other
passengers were also released to family.
DEATHS PROSECUTED
In the past, smugglers whose voyages ended
in deaths have been prosecuted.
In July 2002, two men involved in one of
the deadliest smuggling runs out of Cuba
-- a journey that killed five -- were sentenced
to prison after they pleaded guilty.
U.S. District Judge Shelby Highsmith sentenced
Osvaldo Fernandez Marrero, who lost his
wife and two young daughters on the ill-fated
voyage, to two years and nine months in
prison. Roberto Montero Dominguez, who was
paid $8,000 to make the trip, received a
four year, nine month term.
In November 2002, a Cuban-American smuggler
who left a woman to die on a Bahamian spit
of sand was sentenced to life plus five
years -- the most severe sentence ever handed
out to a human smuggler in South Florida.
Jorge Aleman, a Miami man, was charged
with smuggling more than 100 Cuban nationals
in five separate voyages. But the sentence
was based largely on the Jan. 14, 2001,
trip that resulted in the death of the 48-year-old
woman.
Staff writers Jay Weaver and Tere Figueras
contributed to this report
When it comes to defections, media keep
Cubans in dark
Posted on Thu, Jun. 24,
2004.
HAVANA - (AP) -- The well-publicized reunion
of Cuba-born New York Yankees pitcher José
Contreras with his wife and daughters in
the United States was virtually ignored
Wednesday on the island of his birth.
Cuba's government-controlled news media
didn't carry a word about how Contreras'
wife, Miriam, and daughters Nailan, 11,
and Nailenis, 3, left the island on a boat
Sunday night and arrived in Florida the
following day.
Even die-hard baseball fans who gather
daily in a Havana park to discuss sports
weren't talking about the family's departure.
Most said they didn't even know about it.
Cuba's communist government often does
not comment publicly on defections of well-known
sports figures, let alone their relatives.
But President Fidel Castro, who opposes
professionalized sports, has repeatedly
criticized agents who try to woo the island's
finest athletes with huge sums of money.
U.S. Coast Guard repatriates 17 Cuban
migrants
Associated Press. Posted
on Wed, Jun. 23, 2004.
MIAMI - Seventeen Cuban migrants who were
found on four separate vessels at sea have
been repatriated, the U.S. Coast Guard said
Wednesday.
The migrants returned to Bahia de Cabanas,
Cuba, on Tuesday. They had been intercepted
during the previous week.
Three migrants were found on a homemade
vessel about 38 miles south of Big Pine
Key. Five others were found on a rustic
raft 11 miles south of Key West. A third
group of eight migrants were discovered
65 miles south of Key West.
The final migrant was found 30 miles south
of Long Key with four others, who were repatriated
earlier.
Under the United States' wet-foot, dry-foot
policy, Cubans who are intercepted at sea
are usually returned, while those who reach
land are usually allowed to stay.
The Coast Guard has repatriated more than
630 Cuban migrants this year.
Cuba inspired Garcia film
Associated Press. Posted
on Thu, Jun. 24, 2004.
Andy Garcia says a longing for his native
Cuba is the guiding force behind his next
movie, which will be filmed in the Dominican
Republic.
Garcia, 48, was born in Havana but left
Cuba with his family when he was 5 for Miami
Beach.
The Lost City will focus on the transition
from the rule of dictator Fulgencio Batista
to Castro's takeover. Garcia's character,
a cabaret owner, eventually leaves the country
to go into exile in New York.
Novelist Guillermo Cabrera Infante, a Cuban
exile who is, like Garcia, a critic of Castro,
wrote the script.
''I told Guillermo my dream of making a
movie about this time period, about the
Cuba that I left very young but that I have
a lot of nostalgia about,'' Garcia said
recently.
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