They said their clients were suffering from emotional anxiety and paranoia as a result of extended stays in prison isolation.įederal agents labeled the two men ``extreme escape risks″ who have manipulated the prison system, reached out to intimidate or harm witnesses and corrupted prison staffers to get everything from cell phones to family visits. In September 1989, two years before the Falcon and Magluta arrests, Juan Acosta, an attorney who allegedly helped them create dozens of corporations to hide drug profits, was killed, allegedly on orders of cocaine cartel chieftains as he prepared to appear before a grand jury.ĭefense attorneys, who deny Falcon and Magluta are linked in any way to the attacks on the witnesses, sought unsuccessfully to delay the trial. _ Lazaro Cruz, co-defendant of Gonzalez who cooperated with prosecutors, wounded outside his Hialeah home, May 1992. _ Government witness Juan Barroso, wounded at a West Miami gas station as he changed a slashed tire, four days after Escobedo’s killing in August 1992. _ Co-defendant Luis Escobedo, shot to death outside a Coconut Grove nightclub, August 1992. Fatally shot behind a barbed wire fence at his home, June 1993.
_ Bernardo Gonzalez, boyhood pal who allegedly helped arrange drug shipments then agreed to cooperate after a plea deal.
#WILLY FALCON TRIAL#
Attorney Kendall Coffey said it was ``one of the most significant drug cases brought to trial in the country during the last 10 years.″Īmong the government witnesses attacked after Falcon and Magluta were arrested in October 1991: If convicted in a wide range of charges _ from running a continuing criminal enterprise to drug conspiracy to importation and distribution of cocaine _ they could be sentenced to life in prison.įew federal officials will talk about the sensitive case, but U.S. Like characters in a ``Miami Vice″ script, Willy Falcon and Sal Magluta, both 40, lived in palatial homes, invested in choice South Florida real estate and, prosecutors say, laundered millions of dollars in drug money through dozens of offshore corporations and banks. A perilous pretrial period has dragged on since their 1991 indictments: At least two government witnesses have been killed, two others wounded other witnesses have been moved to government protection, and prosecutors even requested a secret jury.
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