CIA Drug Plane Probe Targets 9/11 Figure
Does Dept. of Homeland Security Threaten Homeland Security?
January 31, 2008
by Daniel Hopsicker
New revelations in the broadening scandal kicked off by two CIA and Dept
of Homeland
Security-linked airplanes busted in Mexico with multi-ton loads of
cocaine point to a level of
criminality and turpitude well beyond the corruption at U.S. Customs in
South Florida to which
officials have already admitted.
A central figure in the Customs corruption probe is Guyanese pilot Michael
Francis Brassington,
the MadCowMorningNews has learned, a name familiar to readers who have
followed the unfolding
and still largely untold story of the activities and associates of the
terrorist hijackers
while in Florida...
Michael Brassington was the co-pilot on a drug running Lear jet (N351WB)
caught by DEA agents
at Orlando Executive Air****t in July of 2000 carrying 43 pounds of heroin.
The Lear jet’s owner, Wallace J Hilliard, also owned the Venice FL flight
school where, at
that very moment, the two terrorist pilots who crashed airplanes into the
World Trade Center
Towers, Mohamed Atta and Marwan Al-Shehhi, were receiving flight training.
Today's $64,000 Question
In the current Customs scandal Brassington is under suspicion for
trafficking drugs, pass****ts,
people, currency, and diamonds into the U.S. through two air****ts in Fort
Lauderdale, Florida,
with the assistance of high-level officials in U.S. Customs and the FAA.
Discovery of Brassington’s participation in the rampant Customs corruption
in South Florida
raises questions about whether the criminal turpitude of officials there
may have contributed
to the breech in American national security which allowed 19 terrorist
hijackers, whose
identities in some cases were already known to authorities, to roam freely
in the U.S. before
the 9/11 attack.
In other words, was a dirty operation engaged in drug trafficking and
weapons smuggling, run
with assistance from the highest levels of the U.S. Government,
responsible for creating the
opening which allowed 19 terrorists to murder 3000 people?
The Alphonso Bowe Smuggling Group, LTD.
We first learned of Brassington’s recent activity from a former Customs
Agent, who was able to
confirm that Brassington was the co-pilot when Wally Hilliard’s Lear jet
was busted in Orlando.
When Brassington entered the U.S. through Customs at Fort Lauderdale
International Air****t on
April 6th, 2004, the agent on duty was a rookie Customs inspector working
the night ****ft at
the General Aviation Facility.
J. L. Sanders was the unlucky Inspector charged with checking Brassington
through Customs that
night. When he entered Brassington’s name into his computer, the July
2000 heroin bust came
up on his screen.
Nor was that Brassington's only red flag.
“In the 'active lookout' it stated Brassington was known for bringing in
suspect passengers,”
Sanders told us.
“Brassington handed me a manifest for the flight from Executive Flight
Sup****t, which I found
out later was owned by Wally Hilliard, and managed by Afphonso Bowe,”
Sanders stated. "So
Brassington apparently still has some kind of financial relation****p with
Hilliard.”
Huffman Aviation flight school owner Wally Hilliard is the owner of
Executive Flight Sup****t
FBO (fixed base of operations) in Nassau. Alphonso Bowe manages the
facility for him.
“The charter company Brassington was flying for is controlled by a family
suspected of running
an organized drug ring," said Sanders.
“In the Customs computer system, the terminology used to describe the
criminal organization
associated with Executive Flight Sup****t is the ‘Alfonso Bowe Smuggling
Group.’
"Here's my card. Call us when she comes out of the coma."
Other indications that Michael Brassington might be operating with a wink
and a nod' from
corrupt government officials can be found in recent do***ents.
An “unusual” relation****p between Brassington and U.S. officials is hinted
at in the sometimes
harsh wording of an NTSB decision affirming an emergency order of
revocation issued against
the pilot in 2005 for a variety of violations, including a spectacular
near-fatal crash at
Teeterboro Air****t in New Jersey in February 2003.
The airplane accident for which he was facing the music was so colorful it
led the local
evening news that night in New York City...
Brassington's much-maligned charter company was flying a Challenger
business jet which overran
the runway during an aborted takeoff, ploughed through the air****t fence,
and went flying
across a busy highway, slamming into a moving automobile before coming to
rest after cra****ng
into a warehouse.
The plane was demolished. Injuries were remarkably few, except for an
innocent civilian driving
down the street minding his or her own business…
“One passenger in the car remains in a coma,” a story about the crash
re****ted dryly, “while
lawyers wait in the wings.”
For all this, Brassington's punishment seemed remarkably light to one NTSB
administrator, who
put his feelings into a dissenting opinion...
“My expectation of the Administrator in pursuing egregious safety
violations of this nature is
that she would pursue every violation demonstrated by the evidence. (Yet)
for reasons not
explained in the record, (italics ours) the Administrator chose to allege
a violation of the
safety check requirement for only the flight on January 2, 2005.”
Magically Mushrooming
The CIA drug plane scandal began when two American-registered planes with
ties to the CIA and
the Dept of Homeland Security were caught in Mexico’s Yucatan, a popular
refueling stop between
Colombia and the U.S.
The first, a DC9 airliner (N900SA) busted carrying 5.5 tons of cocaine,
had been painted to
impersonate aircraft from the Dept of Homeland Security.
The Gulfstream II business jet (N987SA) caught in September with at least
4 tons (estimates
vary) had been used in the CIA’s extraordinary rendition operation for
several years. Prior to
that, pilot Greg Smith flew for both the CIA and DEA in operations in
Colombia during the
1990’s, Narco News re****ted, and mainstream media sources in Colombia
state the Gulfstream was
often seen there.
The scandal mushroomed exponentially last month when Mexico’s Attorney
General announced that
the sale of the two drug running American planes had been part of a huge
50-plane deal between
Mexico’s dominant Sinaloa cartel, and unnamed sellers.
The Mexican Attorney General’s announcement diplomatically left the
American side of the
equation unstated. But if the Sinaloa Cartel hadn’t purchased the 50
planes from the pages of
Trade-a-Plane, they had, presumably, dealt with as-yet unnamed drug lords
in the U.S.
Drug Lord-less U.S. goes it alone... again.
The problem is immediately obvious. Top DEA officials have stated
categorically that there are
no American drug lords.
Once again, the U.S. is alone among nations.
The scandal also claimed its latest victim yesterday, with the arrest of
the Chief of Staff and
head of intelligence of the Judicial Police, Ricardo McGregor, in Mexico
City.
McGregor is accused of giving a “heads up” to suspected Sinaloa cartel
money man Pedro Alphonso
Alatorre to move large sums from one of his money exchanges in advance of
the arrest for
paying $50 million in laundered money to buy 50 planes in the U.S.
Customs corruption in Mexico and Latin America is an ingrained and decades
old practice
historically used by political leaders there for personal purposes and to
pay off political debts.
But in the case of the two downed American planes, Mexican authorities
have so far charged, in
addition to McGregor, dozens of government employees and officials, from
local police officers
to Federal Police, Civil Aviation officials, Air****t Administration
personnel, and even two
pilots working for Mexico’s National Water Commission.
A pilot who 'disappears'
This is not to say that things are jes’ all right south of the border, and
that no sleight of
hand is being practiced.
One example: when the Gulfstream business jet crashed, Mexican newspapers
re****ted that
government authorities caught the pilot, Edic Munoz Sanchez, who had been
injured in the crash.
They even published his mug shot.
In later re****ts, however, his name has been completely dropped. When
seven people were charged
with being present at the scene recently, his name was absent.
He has been "disappeared."
In stark contrast, American authorities have been totally silent. No
officials have been
charged, with no indication given that even the American owners of the two
planes at the time
they were caught are under suspicion.
"Eleven months and change and we're gone"
Well, maybe not entirely silent. There has been a certain amount of
discreet passing-the-buck
at the DEA in the form of denials by officials there of either any DEA
investigation or
involvement in the case.
Several DEA sources have stated that the reason there is no DEA
investigation ongoing is that,
because the case involves corruption in a U.S. Custom’s “rogue operation,”
it is being
investigated internally by the Inspector General’s Office in the Dept. of
Homeland Security.
However, the MadCowMorningNews has learned that the existence of any
federal investigation in
the scandal remains a matter of speculation.
An official in the Dept. of Homeland Security’s Inspector General’s
office, Tamara Faulkner,
told the MadCowMorningNews in a phone call last week that the Department’s
practice is to
neither confirm nor deny the existence of any internal investigation
conducted by the Inspector
General’s office.
So, let's see... Two American planes carrying ten tons of cocaine worth at
least several
hundreds of millions of dollars get caught red-handed. No Americans are
charged with any crime.
And you and I, the American people, are not entitled to know if there's
any federal investigation.
What we want to know is: how does that make you feel?
But don't tell us. Tell them.
http://www.madcowprod.com/01312008.html
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