AIRPORT STING A TALE OF CHAOS, AUDACITY

Agents of the Drug Enforcement Administration rolled their eyes three years
ago as a longtime informant -- a fat man with an annoying habit of spitting
in agents' faces as he talked -- began to spin a yarn of rampant corruption
on the ramps at Miami International Airport.

He talked of scores of $10-an-hour part-time baggage handlers getting
wealthy, walking pretty as you please through the airport with knapsacks
crammed with cocaine, driving fancy cars and living large on almost
poverty-level wages.

The fat man told agents he could win them entree into an underworld of
greedy airport crews, corrupt law enforcement, and a decades-old airport
culture where for the right price anything -- anything -- could pass without
detection onto any flight they fancied.

Fugitives, drugs, explosives -- anything.

They shrugged.

"Nobody wanted to deal with the guy, I mean he's obnoxious," said one law
enforcement source close to the case. "But he had good information in the
past. We figured he was exaggerating, but there was probably something there."

It was there, and then some.

Records and interviews with more than a dozen federal law enforcement
sources involved in Operations Ramp Rat and Sky Chef reveal new details of a
2 1/2-year undercover sting that last week left 58 people -- mostly American
Airlines ramp employees -- indicted, and the entire federal law enforcement
community shaking their heads in disbelief at what they see as a complete
lack of control at MIA.

What they describe is chaos.

Almost as revealing as the charges that were filed are the leads that
weren't followed, because the investigation had neither the financial
resources nor the manpower. Consider:

Some immigration officers responsible for deporting illegal aliens were
reportedly smuggling them in instead. William Segarra, 35, an Immigration
and Naturalization Service deportation officer -- one of three law
enforcement officers charged with smuggling drugs through the airport --
told DEA sources that "he and his friends" could escort anyone, including
fugitives or cartel bosses, through the airport by pretending to have them
in custody. The price tag: $20,000 per individual. Segarra could not be
reached for comment.

The money crunch forced agents to ignore the larger, better-established
smuggling organizations at MIA -- some of which refused to consider loads
less than 50 kilograms, at a price of $3,500 per kilo. Some ramp crew chiefs
wield so much power and money that they can bribe operations dispatchers
with $50,000 -- sometimes $100,000 -- simply to ensure that a specific plane
is assigned to a specific gate.

Among the other allegations that weren't investigated: that flight
attendants were used to smuggle drug money back to South America, and that
100-kilo shipments of cocaine were regularly stashed in cargo holds. So
strapped for cash were investigators that they turned to an ex-drug
counterfeiter in Colombia for help. He agreed to manufacture 400 kilograms
of quality sham cocaine for about $20,000. The DEA lab quoted the price at
more than $100,000.

No easy task

The investigation was a struggle from the start.

DEA bosses knew from experience how difficult it is to make successful cases
in the secretive airport culture -- even if the fat man's outlandish tips
proved true.

Then, the probe was plagued by problems, even tragedy. The original case
agent -- Shaun Curl -- was shot and killed in the middle of the
investigation by a fellow agent drunk from a Christmas party who awoke in a
stupor and opened fire. In addition, most of the first year of the
investigation ended as a waste because of false leads.

The sting began when undercover Miami Beach Detective Luis King, assigned to
the task force, was introduced as a drug smuggler to the first target in
March 1997. To keep it credible, Agent Henry Cuervo posed as his boss from
Colombia.

Jannette Colmenares, 36, who authorities say got to know many airport
employees while living in a Miami Springs apartment complex in the 1980s,
described in detail her ability to smuggle without complications through the
airport, according to records and sources. Neither Colmenares nor her lawyer
could be reached for comment.

She allegedly told the undercover agents she had Immigration and Customs
inspectors on the payroll, and her going rate was $3,500 a kilo.

Customs participated

The DEA-led task force called U.S. Customs Internal Affairs. DEA provided
wiretaps and electronic surveillance. Customs sent in help -- Internal
Affairs Agent Luis Pacheco, Supervisor Jack Devaney and lots of cash.

One problem: Colmenares was telling false tales from the start. "But she
knew things and was able to accomplish things that made us believe her," one
law enforcement source said.

There were always tidbits to encourage them. For instance, one of the calls
made from her DEA-supplied cellular phone was to a telephone in the Cargo
Clearance Center building at MIA, which houses Customs' elite Contraband
Enforcement Team. Also, Colmenares always came through with problem-free
deliveries as promised.

Agents used Colmenares to run three loads of illegal drugs totaling 33
kilos, with bills to her for $115,000. Still, they were no closer to proof
of any wrongdoing at Customs. Desperate to keep the investigation alive,
agents and federal prosecutor Ann Taylor turned to an undercover policewoman
in Santiago, Chile, for help.

In an attempt to draw a corrupt inspector into the open, agents told
Colmenares that a woman was coming through Miami with two kilos of heroin
strapped to her waist and that she needed the inspector to escort her
through the airport.

When she arrived, there was no escort.

Courier observed

But both agencies watching the undercover courier were stunned when she was
able to walk through checkpoints at both INS and U.S. Customs unheeded.
Colmenares contended she had done her job. Agents thought she had
successfully banked on incompetence.

They decided to arrest her and confront her with her crimes.

"She told us it was all a lie," one source said. "She said she concocted the
stories about corrupt law enforcement to jack up her prices."

Colmenares was led to believe by the new DEA case agent, Eric Shufflebottom,
that authorities were investigating the smuggling operation that was really
being run by undercover agents King and Cuervo.

They let her go home, with the promise that she keep quiet about the probe.
The agents then turned their attention to employees of American Airlines.

A turning point

Their tenuous success to date made money even tighter, and bosses even more
skeptical. That's about when agents got their first big break.

One of Colmenares' smugglers -- a longtime American Airlines ramp employee
well trusted by co-workers -- agreed to turn informant in exchange for an
immunity agreement. The source confirmed what the fat man said, and agreed
to turn the trust earned from years working the ramps against colleagues.

"From then on, we couldn't keep up with the business that was coming in,"
one source said. "In the end, we had to turn people away because we didn't
have the money to pay them."

The new source put the word out about a connection that wanted to move drugs.

The crews were sharp. They never wanted to meet outside the safety of
airport grounds, and never with newcomers. Secrecy was so ingrained, sources
said, that it would have been impossible to do an undercover sting without
help from inside.

Cuervo posed as the Colombian who supplied the drugs. King portrayed the
drug smuggler at the other end who collected the drugs and paid corrupt
airport couriers at destination cities around the country.

Audacious actions

Some of the corrupt members of ramp crews -- who normally worked with
members of their own ethnic groups -- surprised agents with their audacity.
Not only did they smuggle drugs through the terminal unchecked, they would
use their employee benefit of free plane rides -- often paying the $5 fee
for an employee upgrade to first class while they smuggled, authorities said.

During one such trip, accused smugglers Jose Rodriguez and Orlando Rodriguez
swiped about two dozen miniature liquor bottles from the plane and jokingly
tossed them to an undercover agent when they dropped off the drugs after the
flight, sources said. Neither of the Rodriguezes, who are not related, could
be reached for comment.

Ramp workers were also adept at spotting valuables in luggage. In one
instance, DEA agents working on an unrelated case in New York tipped Miami
agents that a shipment of $100,000 in drug cash was coming through in luggage.

Agents watched as a frantic cash courier desperately searched the
baggage-claim carousel for his missing luggage, in vain. It was stolen by
baggage handlers in transit. Said one source: "Poetic justice."

Most often, corrupt employees would carry the dope on the plane in
knapsacks, but there were some ingenious methods of concealment. In one
case, the smugglers removed an exit-sign panel above the rear emergency exit
and hung the drug packets on string inside the cavity.

"We call it dope on a rope," one source said.

A quest for coffee

In April 1998, the pilot of American Airlines Flight 960 from Cali, Colombia
- -- frustrated because the water on board was not running -- demanded that
the flight attendants find water for coffee. He took one sip and handed it
back. It was so weak it was undrinkable.

Flight attendants opened the coffee filter to investigate the reason and
found a packet of heroin. Ramp mechanics had turned off the water supply to
ensure that the passengers would not be served coffee and the heroin would
not be detected.

The 15 pounds of heroin found in the coffee filters kicked off Operation Sky
Chef.

Working separately from the agents in Operation Ramp Rat, Customs Agents
John Reddin and Kandice Barr, along with an undercover agent from Miami-Dade
Police, Abe Herrera, began investigating alleged corruption among employees
of Sky Chef, the company that supplies airplanes with in-flight meals for
passengers.

At a price of between $2,500 and $3,500 per kilogram, Sky Chef employees
would board the plane, retrieve concealed drugs from international flights,
and walk them out the front door of the airport.

Their favored method of smuggling was to conceal the drugs inside the food
carts used to bring passenger meals on board.

In one instance, Sky Chef employees delivered an entire food cart they
believed to be loaded with cocaine to an undercover Customs van outside the
airport.

"One Sky Chef truck parked alongside to block the view, and another truck
backed right up to the van," one source said. "A guy got out of the truck,
threw the cart into the van, got back into the truck and went right back to
work."

Airline makes changes

In 1995, according to airline records, there was an internal effort to
address at least one aspect of the problem. American Airlines management
replaced all the employees in the Line Control center -- known as the "war
room," where planes and crews are dispatched to gates -- with management
personnel.

Within weeks, the managers assigned to the war room were being asked by
corrupt ramp chiefs to take bribes of $50,000 to $100,000 to make sure that
certain planes and certain crews were assigned specific gates. The managers
made internal reports, which went to the DEA. But by early 1997, grievances
filed by the local Transport Workers Union prevailed, and American allowed
the nonmanagement employees back into the war room. The reports dried up.

"I remember there were a lot of allegations and rumors flying around about
that," local union President David Bates said. "Nobody could ever provide me
any proof. I can tell you the union doesn't condone that kind of activity
any more than the airline does."

In a statement released Friday, American Airlines acknowledged "a major
challenge" with drug smuggling.

"But placing blame on one company -- or even one industry -- for problems
which our greater society has been unable to solve, is misplaced and
shortsighted," the airline said.

Federal law enforcement authorities argue there is plenty of blame to go
around at MIA.

"It is a deep, dark place," one said. "And we have only scratched the
surface. There might as well not be any security at all at MIA. It's a
complete joke."

Herald staff writer Ronnie Greene contributed to this report.
dkidwell@herald.com