SMUGGLER PLEADS GUILTY; HUSBAND LED DRUG BATTLE

NEW YORK - The wife of the former commander of the U.S. Army's anti-drug
operation in Colombia pleaded guilty yesterday to drug charges and said her
husband knew nothing of a plan to smuggle $700,000 worth of heroin.

"I never told him what I was doing," Laurie Anne Hiett, 36, told reporters
after pleading guilty in federal court.

Still free on bond, she faces up to nine years in prison when sentenced
April 28.

Hiett -- whose husband, Col. James Hiett, headed U.S. anti-drug operations
in Bogota -- talked with reporters about her past drug addiction and said
she was sorry her case made headlines as the United States wages a costly
war on drugs.

"There are people dying every day to fight this, and then I did what I
did," she said. "I'm not proud of it. . . . I just truly apologize."

Hiett surrendered to federal authorities in August after they intercepted
two 2 1/2-pound packages of heroin she had mailed to New

York from the U.S. Embassy in Bogota.

She pleaded innocent and was freed on bond. In recent months, her attorney
sought a plea bargain.

One of her co-defendants, Hernan Arcila, 54, pleaded guilty Jan. 5 to drug
conspiracy. Another co-defendant is on the run.

Colonel Hiett, cleared by an Army investigation, has been reassigned at his
request, to Fort Monroe, Va.