The Saga of Luis Posada Carriles

It happened in Texas, but it might as well be Little Havana:

A Texas jury on Friday acquitted an 83-year-old anti-Castro Cuban exile and former CIA operative, considered an archfoe by Havana, of charges he lied to U.S. authorities about his role in bomb attacks against tourist areas in Cuba in 1997.

Attorneys said the federal jury deliberated for three hours after a 13-week trial in El Paso and acquitted Luis Posada Carriles of 11 counts of perjury, obstruction of justice and immigration fraud.

Posada, who had been active in anti-communist operations across Latin America for decades, is described as a "terrorist" by Cuba's communist leadership.

In Havana, the government website Cubadebate scathingly reported the acquittal, calling it "Justice made in USA."

Although Posada is wanted in Cuba and Venezuela for allegedly masterminding the bombing of a Cubana Airlines plane, killing 73 people, this trial had nothing to do with that incident. This case centered on charges that Posada lied in order to the get into the U.S., along with his role in a series of bomb attacks in Havana in the late 1990’s.

Posada has eluded justice on several occasions – he escaped from a Venezuelan prison in 1995 after being convicted in the Cubana Airlines case, and was arrested on immigration charges here in the U.S., but later had the case tossed out.

Most interesting about this case is that prosecution witnesses included Cuban government officials, something that made the Cuban exile community in Miami none-too-happy:

Prosecution witnesses included a former New York Times reporter, Ann Louise Bardach, who said the Cuban exile militant claimed credit for bombings in Cuba in 1997 and two Cuban government officials – Lt. Col. Roberto Hernandez Caballero and Dr. Ileana Vizcaino Dime — who described the bombings and the autopsy of the sole fatal victim, Italian tourist Fabio Di Celmo.

Another key prosecution witness was a former crew member of the converted shrimper Santrina, Gilberto Abascal, who said Posada sneaked into the United States aboard the boat in 2005.

The wide chasm that in reality is only a 90 mile stretch between Miami and Cuba, just deepened yet a little bit more.