AGENTS DIG UP DRUG-RELATED STASH OF CASH

A modest Flagami home could be added to the fabled history of Miami's
cocaine cowboys. Law enforcement agents dug up the backyard of the
one-story home Wednesday in search of money tied to alleged drug lord Sal
Magluta.

According to a source close to the investigation, the search yielded
hundreds of thousands of dollars hidden on the property at 6420 SW Fourth St.

A large section of the home's backyard was turned into an excavation site
after U.S. marshals served a search warrant at the home, which according to
county records was bought by its current owners in 1994 -- long after
Miami's storied cocaine cowboys helped cement the town's notoriety as a
sun-drenched crime capital.

The current owners could not be reached for comment. A man and a young
woman at the home said the family had nothing to say.

The U.S. attorney's office and the Drug Enforcement Administration in Miami
had no comment Wednesday.

The possibility that the home was used as a stashing place for illicit
gains cropped up during Magluta's jury-tampering and money-laundering
trial, which ended in August with a dozen convictions.

Magluta, who also was acquitted of paying for the murders of three
witnesses, was sentenced to 205 years in prison and ordered to pay the
government $63 million in fines.

The conviction came six years after Magluta and partner Willy Falcon, two
high school dropouts known simply as "The Boys" to law enforcement
officials, were acquitted in a tainted 1996 drug-smuggling trial after the
jury foreman was bribed.

Falcon's trial on money-laundering and jury-tampering charges is scheduled
for July. Magluta's son and father are also facing money-laundering charges.

Sources said the cash found Wednesday is tied to a former associate of
Magluta and Falcon -- Luis Valverde, a one-time refrigerator mechanic for
Miami-Dade County schools who forfeited more than $7 million in assets to
authorities, $6.1 million of which was found in the attic of his home at
8401 SW 78th St. in 1999.

Valverde is among five convicted underlings of a massive organization,
allegedly run by Magluta and Falcon, charged in a 1999 indictment alleging
a $25 million conspiracy to launder drug money, obstruct justice, bribe
jurors and intimidate witnesses in an effort to get their bosses out of jail.