"The information indicates that Seal was an informant for DEA at the time but also working as an operative of the CIA. "Allegations later surfaced that many of the gun shipments sent to Nicaragua as part of the Iran-Contra Affair were sent from the Mena Intermountain Municipal Airport. No one responded when she asked if the newly arisen concerns might be political., In the Arkansas Times article, Leveritt pinned her hopes on the new Cruise movie, which opened in 2017 to good reviews. They also claimed that the pilot who died lacked the necessary experience for the flight. Eventually, Brown recalls, Seal startled him by yelling, Well, you all hang on. It does seem, however, that Clinton was far less cautious. The name of another person under investigation was redacted. In another deposition in the Reed case, Russell Welch, an Arkansas state police investigator who has looked extensively at Mena, says that Young asked him in 1992 if Clintons name had ever come up in connection with Mena. It alleges, explicitly and implicitly, that an aircraft operated by a CIA front company in 1984 used the airfield at Mena, Arkansas, as a stating point for weapons supply flights to the Contras in Nicaragua; on the return flights from Honduras, the aircraft allegedly carried illegal narcotics to Mena. The gunman hurried into a waiting Buick, which sped away. "Tom Cruise doesn't look like Barry Seal. "Little Rock [FBI] is attempting to establish that [redacted] modified, maintained and stored Seal's aircraft with the knowledge that he was involved in cocaine smuggling activities prior to Seal's plea bargaining agreement on March 24, 1984," according to the memo. The real Barry Seal never had a brother-in-law who was killed by a car bomb. Debbie became Barry's third wife. Ochoa was arrested in Spain on a U.S. warrant, but due to pressure from the cartel was never extradited to the U.S. -Court Documents (STATE of Louisiana v. Miguel VELEZ, Bernardo Vasquez, and Luis Carlos Quintero-Cruz), Yes. Adler Berriman "Barry" Seal (July 16, 1939 - February 19, 1986) murdered in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. However, the U.S. needed a way to covertly get the funds and weapons to the rebels. In essence, not only was the airport used to smuggle illegal drugs into the United States, but it was also a departure point for weapons used to arm the Contras in Nicaragua.". He was unaware that a Colombian assassin was hiding behind one of the donation drop boxes. Patterson said he had overheard conversations about large quantities of drugs being flow into Mena airport, large quantities of guns, that there was an ongoing operation training foreign people in the area. When asked, Were any of these conversations in the presence of Gov. In 1986, Colombian hitmen caught up with Seal in Baton Rouge, shooting him to death in his white Cadillac. Later, after Seal's cover was suspiciously blown, President Reagan used the photo shown below in a 1986 television address to the nation. A Baton Rouge, Louisiana native, Barry Seal was eventually forced to move his drug smuggling operation after he drew the attention of Louisiana authorities. Mena, Arkansas, as a staging point for weapons supply flights. A month before that, the Southwest personnel representative for the CIA, Ken Cargile, in a letter to Brown, wrote that I am pleased to nominate you for employment with the Central Intelligence Agency. Another entry in Browns daybook indicates that he had met with another CIA representative only a few days before that. In 1986, he was convicted of drug distribution, and lost his state securities license. Clinton had been asking him a similar question for months, ever since, with Clintons encouragement, he had applied for a job with the CIA. Seal's mysterious activities have spawned books, movies and a cornucopia of conspiracy theories. -Daily Mail Online. -The Independent, In the movie, Barry Seal (Tom Cruise) starts working for the Medelln Cartel after they abduct him while he is refueling his plane and then make him an offer he can't refuse. ga.src = ('https:' == document.location.protocol ? "Little Rock [FBI] is attempting to establish that [redacted] modified, maintained and stored Seal's aircraft with the knowledge that he was involved in cocaine smuggling activities prior to Seal's plea bargaining agreement on March 24, 1984," according to the memo. The Sandinistas overthrew Nicaraguan President Anastasio Somoza Debayle in 1979, ending 46 years of dictatorship by the Somoza family. Two years later, he would be shot dead in Louisiana. "According to some reports, the [Mena] airport, from 1981 to 1985, was a major transit point for the entrance of cocaine and heroin into the United States," Sherwood wrote. He was hired by Trans World Airlines (TWA) in 1964 and at age 26 became one of the youngest Captains operating a Boeing 707. Vincent G Mena, Age 54. Dan Lasater, of course, was the celebrated Little Rock bond daddy. The real Barry Seal claimed that he started running covert operations for various government agencies as early as the late 1950s, while he was a member of the Civil Air Patrol in New Orleans, well before he became a TWA pilot. Then, he started the engines, and Brown remembers, ThisI mean just thunderous noise. Asa Hutchinson was U.S. attorney for Arkansas' Western District in the early 1980s. foundations, and corporations and are tax-deductible to the extent allowed by law. -Smuggler's End: The Life and Death of Barry Seal. The photos quickly leaked, boosting Washingtons anti-Sandinista effort but likely putting a target on Seals back: to his drug-running friends in South America, there could be no question where the photos came from. "I resigned from the office in November of 1985, and my successor took over the investigation. By 1983, his earnings totaled $60 million, making him one of the wealthiest people in America. In 1983, the DEA arrested him on drug smuggling charges. "He would tell me, 'I'm going to such and such places,' and I wouldn't see him for days. Material from the Associated Press is Copyright 2023, Associated Press and may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. Magruder, Brown says, asked him if he would be interested in paramilitary, counterintelligence and narcotics. Brown, who had worked in narcotics enforcement as a police officer, said he was interested. -Daily Mail Online. Author Del Hahn, a former FBI agent who wrote the book about Seal titled Smuggler's End: The Life and Death of Barry Seal, told Vice, "Seal thought he was smarter and cleverer than the Ochoas," who are one of the founding families of the Medelln Cartel. Meanwhile, Brown says, he confronted Clinton, asking him if he knew that Seal was dealing in drugs and unreported currency. Benjamin /Mary Seal son Adler M 1940 census address 315 Lovers Lane Baton.Rouge Louisiana (next hwy73/North blvd).lovers lane White house Barry was the 1st son.Seal Entrepreneur.Texaco Service station .called B.C. "I trusted him so I didn't ask questions," says Debbie. attorney.". It aborted the scheduled trial of Casper W. Weinberger which had been schedule to begin on January 5, 1993. In February 1986, Seal was killed in a hail of machine-gun fire outside a Baton Rouge Salvation Army halfway house. is above the law! Associated Press text, photo, graphic, audio and/or video material shall not be published, broadcast, rewritten for broadcast or publication or redistributed directly or indirectly in any medium. The book was killed at the last minute. Barry Seal's smuggling operation began in Louisiana, and like in the American Made movie, he sometimes pushed packed duffel bags full of drugs out of his plane and into the Atchafalaya basin, to be collected by associates on the ground. Other photos like the one below show Federico Vaughan (center, striped shirt), a man that Seal claimed was a top aide of Tomas Borge, the Sandinista Minister of the Interior. Arcadia Inc Plant / Vernon. CIA and DEA activities flowed out of Mena in the Clinton years. According to investigative records compiled by the Arkansas State Police and other agencies, the Mena Intermountain Municipal Airport served as a second home for Barry Seal, a. An "extensive joint investigation" by the FBI, Arkansas State Police and IRS revealed that Barry Seal used the Mena airport for "smuggling activity" from late 1980 until March 1984, according to an internal FBI document released last week. In exploring the American Made true story, we discovered that Doug Liman's father, lawyer Arthur L. Liman, ran the Senate investigation into Iran-Contra. This draws the attention of the CIA. No other name is perhaps more associated with the Iran-Contra affair than Oliver North, but his involvement in exposing Barry Seal's mission and blowing his cover is unknown and entirely speculation. -Vulture.com, Yes. After a barrage of requests from different people and media outlets under the federal Freedom of Information Act, on Wednesday the FBI released more than 1,000 pages of its file on Seal: vault.fbi.gov/recently-added. I started it and pursued it but was unable to complete it because I left the office. })(); Yes. No. The gunman was later identified as Luis Carlos Quintero-Cruz. Judicial Watch Victories: Courts Declare California Quota Laws Unconstituti BEST OF: Top Anti-Corruption Victories in 2022. The movie proposes that Barry Seal's first foray into smuggling drugs happened in 1980 after he was kidnapped while refueling his plane in Colombia. the Colombian drug cartel led by Pablo Escobar Biography When he was deposed, Bender was shown a photograph of Buddy Young. I guess he also thought Colombians would stick out like a sore thumb in Louisiana and they wouldn't come here." In its review of the 2017 movie "American Made" -- about Seal -- the New York Times called it the Conspiratorial Industrial Complex. It may also never be known whether CIA officials approved or knew of Seals activities, or whether he was operating on his own. The scene was actually inspired by something that happened while director Doug Liman and Tom Cruise were training for the movie. A C-123K cargo plane, like this one, was out tted at the Mena airport and ew with various cameras to obtain photographic evi- dence of the Sandinistas in the act of smuggling narcotics, according to an entry in the Encyclopedia of Arkansas(Arkansas Democrat-Gazette file photo). The second is the article they reference. JB is fictional. Lasater went to jail for a cocaine connection, as did his friend, Roger Clinton, Bill Clintons brother. He said parts of it could have been provided to people under previous information requests. Meanwhile, others are now coming forward to confirm a Clinton connection to Mena. After being caught in Honduras with 40 kilograms of cocaine in 1979, Barry spent nine months in a Honduran jail. Seal Texaco.located corner Acadian Thruway andGoverment Street ,Baton Rouge La.Father Benjamin C Seal and the Sons Benjy Jr,Dean ,Jason ,Aaron, Curtis R,Wendell K, work the gas . In 1981, Seal set up shop at Mena. At present, although there is no reason to believe any of the allegations, we are declining to comment publicly, pending exhaustive searches of DO files, as tasked by ICA. Barry arrived that evening at approximately 6 p.m. and backed his white Cadillac into a parking space. "We're talking about one of the largest drug smugglers in America, and these agents loved him." Executing secret missions for the government in the movie might add a sort of patriotism and redeeming quality to his character, but in real life Barry Seal was a drug smuggler first and foremost. All were wearing jeans, T-shirts, and sneakers. -The Independent, Not likely. I mean I didnt have a chance to tell him anything about it. When Wattenberg reported this, an angry Tucker retaliated against Brown by demoting him from white-collar investigations to highway patrol. His daybook records one visit to Mena by Clinton on May 21, 1984, and he says that he accompanied Clinton to Mena on several other occasions. Yet, some believe that Seal was working for the CIA in the 1980s to fly guns and money to Nicaraguan rebels, a detail that the movie embraces. Cocainea lot of itflowed in. He concluded by saying that Mena was a federal, not a state, matter. var s = document.getElementsByTagName('script')[0]; s.parentNode.insertBefore(ga, s); About 25 pages of that trove refer to Arkansas or Mena. BARRY SEAL: He imported drugs and laundered money while working for the federal government. Though the Clinton machine feared him the most, he showed no intention of breaking his silence until a chain of random events made it inevitable. He had already been flying planes for nearly half his life, earning his student pilot's license at age 15 and pilot's license at 16. Reply HELP for help, STOP to end. Judicial Watch, Inc. is a conservative, non-partisan educational foundation, which promotes transparency, accountability and integrity in government, politics and the law. Connor Hagan, a spokesman for the FBI in Little Rock, said the release of so much information into the FBI's public "vault" doesn't mean that the documents haven't previously been made public. "At the time Seal started cooperating with DEA Miami, he had an established base at Rich Mountain Aviation and had frequent contact with subjects," according to the document. Suddenly, though, the Arkansas State Police were uncooperative. Seal, a pilot, moved much of his smuggling operation from Baton Rouge to Rich Mountain Aviation at the Mena Intermountain Airport, according to the May 1986 FBI memo. "Tom did all his own flying in the movie," says director Doug Liman, who is a pilot himself (Vulture.com). In the 2017 Doug Liman-directed movie "American Made," which was previously titled "Mena," Deborah DuBois, the third wife of Barry Seal, was portrayed by the character Lucy. He suspected a CIA involvement, although his brother did not confirm it. "Tom did all his own flying in the movie," says Liman. Brown still has books that Clinton gave him, one being a bar exam study book in which the politician had made some ironic under-linings. According to a 1988 Senate Foreign Relations Committee report, Seal's associates at the Mena airport were also being investigated. _gaq.push(['_setAccount', 'UA-17438127-1']); Follow him on Twitter @micah_morrison. Seal, Brown says, had also prescribed the dress code, and insisted that no one carry identification, not even keys or jewelry. Current Address: HERA E Avalon Dr, Phoenix, AZ. "The apparent reason was that the prosecution might have revealed national security information, even though all of the crimes which were the focus of the investigation occurred before Seal became a federal informant.". Bill Clinton's Mena, Arkansas drug smuggling and money laundering operation through the Arkansas Development Finance Authority (ADFA).. Seal was a Green Beret in the Vietnam war and later a pilot for TWA. The mysteries of Mena revolve around a drug-smuggling pilot named Barry Seal. Brown says he realized then that everything is going to come out. Nonetheless, he still seemed reluctant to disclose all he knew. Over a quarter of a century ago, George H.W. The New York Times and "West 57th," a CBS television news show, were working on stories about CIA activities at the Mena airport, according to a 1987 FBI memo released last week. In essence, not only was the airport used to smuggle illegal drugs into the United States, but it was also a departure point for weapons used to arm the Contras in Nicaragua.". AboutPressCopyrightContact. Indeed, when Clinton was a law professor in Fayetteville, Brown was working on an off-campus magazine, the radical Grapevine. He said, according to Brown, Thats Lasaters deal, thats Lasaters deal.. The book was to be called, The Mena File: Barry Seals Ties to Drug Lords and U.S. Officials. Leveritt knew the story well and had researched it earlier, writing about Seals murder and other related events. Well take it from here. Creating Epstein: Bill Barr Leslie Wexner & the CIA, Bonnie's Clyde: The True Story of Jeffrey Epstein & Ghislaine Maxwell, Revisiting Mena, Bill Clinton, the CIA & Barry Seal. In court documents, the family alleged that "lapses in planning, coordinating, scheduling, and flight safety" contributed to the fatal crash in the mountains of Colombia. Brown says Seal told him theres good money to be had. But Brown, says he was out of that game for good. Dwayne Brown says he knew his brother had made some unexplained trips out of the country. Using pilots like Barry Seal was a means to an end. As Slate notes, Seal stuck a plea deal, where he testified in three major drug trials and got five years' probation and six months at a halfway house. 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