ARUBAN BUSINESSMAN PLEADS GUILTY IN MIAMI LAUNDERING CASE

MIAMI - An Aruban businessman accused of climbing to the
heights of the drug-money laundering world has reached a plea bargain
calling for an 11-year prison term instead of risking a life sentence
at trial.

Randolph Habibe, who was extradited after losing a five-year legal
battle, acknowledged laundering $11 million in drug profits in his
guilty plea Thursday to racketeering conspiracy rather than the $800
million initially alleged by prosecutors.

Attorneys on both sides will recommend an 11-year prison term at
sentencing April 27, but U.S. District Judge Ursula Ungaro-Benages has
discretion over the prison time. By treaty, Habibe would be allowed to
serve the balance of his term in Aruba.

The case dating back to 1993 was a test of U.S. power to prosecute
foreign nationals for offenses committed by drug rings distributing in
the United States. Several Caribbean countries have been targeted by
U.S. law enforcement agencies as money-laundering havens.

``The case is an important model,'' defense attorney Arturo Hernandez
said Friday. ``I'm not going to comment on whether or not it's a
successful model.''

Habibe faced a ``difficult decision'' on the plea bargain and ``viewed
it as a favorable disposition of his current situation in the United
States,'' Hernandez said.

Habibe was accused of serving as the chief financial officer of La
Costa drug cartel based on Colombia's north coast and working with
both the Medellin and Cali cartels in the 1980s and early 1990s.

Smuggling operations allegedly tied to the funds involved 85 tons of
cocaine and 125 tons of marijuana.

The indictment charged Habibe laundered money through many of his own
businesses, including a car dealership, eight banks and a frozen-food
company.

Habibe allegedly shipped cash, used drug profits to buy and ship
consumer goods to Colombian drug producers and exchanged pesos for
dollars at a black-market discount.

Aruba, a Dutch island 20 miles off the Venezuelan coast, has been on a
State Department list of leading money-laundering centers.