Poli and A. J. finally had a run of luck. Sitting in the Dallas office was beautiful Susan Rivera, a Chicago agent going over the transcripts from the wiretap. A. J. looked her up and down and then approached her to see if she could speak Spanish and if she had undercover experience.
“Mr. Irwin, I started taking Spanish in the 3rd grade. Our INS office in Omaha had a Cuban detained, and that’s when everybody started relying on me to interpret,” Rivera explained in Spanish.
“Great! And, what a great accent!”
“Well, sir, I’m also married to a Mexican. No one else in his family speaks English, so I get lots of practice.”
“Well, have you ever worked undercover before?”
“Claro que sí. I did some small document cases, you know, taking down guys that sell counterfeit documents out in front of Mexican supermarkets . . . ”
“That’s good,” A. J. said. “Uh, reading these transcripts . . . uh, you’re probably already familiar with this case. You think you could help us out . . . go undercover for us?”
“Absolutely.”
“Okay, we’re gonna have to get approval from your supervisor. Uh, what’s your name again?”
“Susan Rivera. My supervisor’s Dave Fermaint.”
Irwin went straight from the conference room to Mike Ryan’s office and told him, “Amanda Reed is out. Her bosses at Postal Inspections wanted to send an entourage of postal inspectors as chaperones. You know that won’t work undercover. So we want Susan Rivera. She’s in the conference room right now.”
For once in his life, Ryan was working on all cylinders and got on the horn to clear permission. In a few minutes, he got approval. Susan was on the case.
It turned out, there was only one setback: Susan had a horrible fear of flying.
Slim, athletic with a beautiful smile, A. J.’s first impression was that she was a Sports Illustrated swimsuit model—with a gun. An all-American girl from Lincoln, Nebraska. Best of all for the team, she acted like “one of the guys.” When she met Poli at the airport in September 1998, he immediately went into one of his rituals: he hit the ground and started pumping out pushups. So she followed him down and pumped out as many as he did: some twenty-five. She thought to herself already familiar with Poli’s reputation “Posing as his girlfriend, how hard can that be?” From that point on, Poli and she developed wonderful chemistry together. Susan’s briefing began at the airport gate. She was to accompany Poli as his girlfriend to meet with Nick Díaz in Quito, where he was meeting with Maan Singh about the Bahamas connection. Poli needed a good-looking girlfriend as an excuse for not participating in the type of illicit activities, such as frequenting brothels and snorting cocaine, that would seriously compromise an investigation and potential prosecution. Besides, Poli would much rather be in a lounge with A. J., planning or working on strategy.
During the connecting flight from Panama City to Quito, Poli and Susan were finally able to have a drink after the intense briefing that had continued all the way from Houston to Panama. The drink helped Susan relax from her fear of flying. A. J. and Joe Aponte were flying to Quito from Dallas with surveillance equipment. Aponte was the technician to be in charge of bugging and videoing the meetings. Throughout the flight, Aponte drowned himself in booze, hoping to relieve the stress of his family in Puerto Rico suffering a direct hit from Hurricane Georges. A. J., on the other hand, tried to ignore him and slept throughout the journey—finally feeling relief from the chaos he had experienced in the Dallas office over the last year. When they arrived at the Quito airport, Aponte was so nervous about bringing illegal surveillance equipment into Ecuador that he was literally shaking in his boots. So A. J. took the metal case of $10,000 worth of cameras, microphones, recorders and wiring through Customs . . . and of course, they were stopped by officials who had A. J. open the metal cases.
On seeing the contents of the cases, a Customs agent with a bulging belly, challenged him in Spanish, “What the heck is this?”
“It’s surveillance equipment. I work for the U.S. embassy,” he answered in Spanish. “I’m supposed to train some Ecuadorian police officers on how to use this stuff.” A. J. smiled, trying to legitimize his fabrication. “You’re welcome to attend the sessions. Just tell them that I invited you.”
The agent took out a piece of paper and wrote down A. J.’s name and said, “Thank you. Puede pasar.”
Then A. J. turned and pointed to Aponte behind him and said, “He’s with me.” And that was that. Home free and out to the taxi stand.
Babaco had warned A. J. and Poli that the Alameda Hotel, in central Quito, would be under surveillance by Nick Díaz’s people. Babaco, who was never afraid to look directly into the dragon’s fire spewing mouth, was afraid of Díaz, and he communicated his fear to the guys. The main setback, however, after A. J. and Aponte arrived at the hotel was that Aponte got into the surveillance room and passed out on the bed. With little time to waste, A. J. had to set up the sound and video equipment, something he was not trained to do. This included pulling up carpeting to hide wires and setting up a pin camera where it would not be discovered in Poli and Susan’s room next door. A. J. decided to hide the camera on the desk, inside a paper pyramid advertising the club bar’s “pisco sours.” Pisco is a type of Andean brandy.
While A. J. was busy at work in the rooms, Babaco picked up Poli and Susan at the airport, and he immediately developed a crush on her. Babaco had made the arrangements at the hotel, using assumed names for the couple and renting adjoining rooms. Their room would be the stage on which to engage Nick Díaz. The curtain went up with Babaco calling Nick Díaz and telling him that “Fernando” had arrived and was ready for the meet.
As they were waiting for Díaz, Susan confessed, “Poli, I’m a little nervous.”
“Just be natural and we’re gonna be good,” Poli advised.
“I’ll just take my key from you,” she said, “I’ll be okay.”
“Good, good.”
When Díaz knocked on the room door, Susan’s nervousness seemed to have evaporated. She got up and moved confidently to the door, opened it and greeted him and Babaco warmly in Spanish, giving them a whiff of her Chanel.
Díaz was a slim 5’9” and wore his long jet-black hair pulled back in a ponytail. He had no facial hair. He was good-looking enough to be a Bollywood star. Like many a gangster, he sported gold jewelry and a tight T-shirt, and strutted in arrogantly.
Susan led Nick to Poli as “Fernando” and introductions were made. They had left an open seat facing the camera for Díaz to occupy. But the best laid plans . . . no one had anticipated that Díaz would be accompanied by his lieutenant, Isan Chaudry, and the camera angle and seating were not adequate to capture both of them. Nor had they anticipated that Díaz and Chaudry would do a thorough search of the room for recording devices. Luckily, the pisco sour hideout for the pin camera had worked, despite Chaudry even looking directly into that camera numerous times.
Susan asked Díaz and Babaco, “Can I fix you anything to drink?”
Díaz did not say anything until they finished his sweep and sat down.
Babaco asked for a soft drink, which Susan delivered from the minibar.
Finally, Díaz was ready to open up. “Fernando, I know who you are . . . and I know you’ve been very successful in moving people. Everyone from Mexico knows you,” obviously confusing this “Fernando” with a legendary smuggler from southern Mexico—a stroke of good luck for the agents.
“Why is it you want to meet with me?” Díaz asked. “I already told you on the phone, I don’t need anyone. I don’t like to meet people. The U.S. government has been after me for many years but not even the fucking CIA has a picture of me.”
In the next room, A. J. said to himself, “We do now, motherfucker.”
Susan walked around trying to distract Díaz from discovering the pin camera.
“And, I don’t need you!” challenged Díaz.
“I don’t need you either,” rebuked Poli, “
but Babaco told me about your operation, and we’ve been moving aliens for Maan Singh . . . ”
“Fuck Maan Singh. I’m the Pablo Escobar of smuggling, the biggest in the world. Maan Singh ain’t shit.”
“Look, Nick, forget Maan Singh. I told you that I have an airplane, and we travel to the Dominican Republic every week. Every week, that plane comes back from the D. R. empty. It’d be just as easy for us to stop in the Bahamas and pick up some of your clients. . . . ”
“How many can you bring back . . . eight, ten, fifteen,” asked Díaz, and then his arrogance kicked in, trying to go one up on Poli: “I can provide you as many clients as you want.”
“We can do a test run on our next trip. I can pick up eight.”
“I’ll pay you a thousand a head, and I’ll pay you up front.”
“Okay, just let me know when you’re ready,” Poli capped the agreement.
After that, everyone relaxed, Susan served everyone a celebratory drink and then sat on Poli’s lap. After a while, Susan announced, she wanted to do some shopping. All got up, Díaz and Chaudry left followed by Susan and Poli, holding hands.
“When you’re sleeping with somebody,” she whispered to Poli, “you interlock your fingers when holding hands. So hold hands like you mean it,” then she leaned her head over onto Poli’s shoulder.
“Well, that’s a good start,” Poli said as he turned and looked at her.
“That’s as far as it gets, bud.”
They both laughed and kept on walking.
That hand-holding nuance was a new one for Poli, and it served them well during the remainder of the operation.
Babaco lingered, actually standing guard to make sure no one entered the rooms.
The meeting had been a great success. It was all on video. Susan had passed her test with A. J. and Poli, who were very experienced undercover agents, but more importantly she had passed with Nick Díaz, the smuggler. The group of four agents and Babaco celebrated by going to a club for drinks and dancing. First A. J. cut the rug with Susan, but Aponte finally came to life, grabbed Susan and salsaed the night away, not giving his partners a chance with the lovely agent.
The next morning they all got up early and left Quito, Ecuador, as if they had never been there. The agents were now thoroughly excited and were anxious to give the news to the task force. They had the goods on Nick Díaz. On the flight to Dallas, they started to formulate plans.
“We’re gonna get the motherfucker,” announced A. J. “He’s gonna fall right into our hands. We’re gonna bring him to the States and prosecute him.”
“I still have no idea, Poli, how we’re gonna get Maan Singh . . . How are we gonna lure Maan Singh out of Ecuador to someplace we can put the cuffs on him? Almost anywhere will do, except England and India,” continued A. J.
“Let’s get him to Panama. Panama will kick his ass out,” said Poli, always with an answer for everything. “Don’t worry about it, A. J. I’ve already got it set up.”
CHAPTER 7
With the team confident that Nick Díaz was pretty much in the bag, the priority then became luring Maan Singh to Panama, where he could be arrested and his expulsion from the country could be arranged. A. J. and Poli decided that they could propose an alternate smuggling route through Panama, and that they could invite Singh to Panama City to discuss it. Months earlier, A. J. had developed a relationship with Margarita Fernández, Maan Singh’s collector and facilitator. During the transit of the clients from Miami to Dallas, A. J. as “Andrés,” “Fernando’s” right-hand-man, would call her for instructions on how to get paid and where to send the passengers on the next leg of their trips. The plan was to solicit Margarita’s help in inviting Maan Singh to Panama. Forthwith, Margarita set up a three-way teleconference with Maan Singh.
“Thank you, Andrés, for helping us to move our passengers,” said Singh in broken Spanish, heavily inflected with Punjab. But then he abruptly switched to English and asked, “Are you a cop?”
“No, sir. Jeez, why would you even ask me that?”
“Maan, this is inappropriate,” broke in Margarita. “I have been dealing with Andrés for a long time, and he has been very dedicated to moving the boys. We need to trust him.”
“Okay, if Margarita trusts you, that’s good for me. How can we work more together?”
“Well, yes, there is something we’ve had on the back burner and now it’s time to get it fired up.”
“Yes?”
“It’s time to get a better route for the ‘boys.’”
“Hmm.”
“Just listen for a minute. We can bring the passengers in through Panama. We’ve got great connections there, and it’s a lot closer and shorter.”
“Don’t tell me you want to shut the Miami to Dallas route down,” said Maan Singh.
“No, we’re gonna keep that route open, but the Panama route would be easier, faster and we could move more people.”
“Hmm. I guess I like that idea,” said Singh.
“Good.”
“Can we move women and children on that route?” asked Singh.
“Sure,” answered A. J. confidently, but thinking to himself that it would never be approved. “They’ll be traveling like any tourists.”
“I like that. Yes, we can make a lot more money on moving women . . . more than men,” said Maan Singh, dollar signs in his eyes.
“Can you come up to Panama for a meeting?”
“Yes, I travel there all the time. Let me see how I can fit it into my schedule.”
Having tentatively agreed to a meet up in Panama City, the trio took leave from the phone conference. A. J. was the most elated of the three.
Twenty minutes after the call, Margarita called A. J. back and reported that Maan Singh had liked him.
It was then that A. J. intuited that Margarita was not a seasoned criminal yet and that she wanted to show off to her boss that she was dealing at a higher level than Babaco.
“Is he going to meet us in Panama?” asked A. J.
“I think so. He’s not here right now.”
“In Ecuador?”
“No.”
“Where is he?” asked A. J.
“He’s somewhere else, getting more passengers,” she answered, suddenly becoming tight-lipped.
“Should we set up the meeting in Panama for two weeks from now?”
“Yes, go ahead,” Margarita instructed.
“Okay, I’ll do that.”
A. J. got together with Poli after the conversation and began to put plans in motion: permissions, approvals, travel arrangements, preparing Joe Aponte to smuggle the equipment into Panama.
But a week later, Margarita called A. J. and said, “Andrés, I’ve got some bad news,” she said in Spanish.
“Yeah, what?” said A. J.
“Maan Singh’s not gonna make it to Panama.”
“Oh, no. Why not?”
“Well, I also have some good news.”
“What’s that?”
“I’m coming for him,” Margarita said seductively.
“Great!” A. J. emoted, thinking, “Oh shit,” to himself. Then again, he thought, maybe she’ll bring Maan Singh to us down the road.
Poli “Fernando”, A. J., Susan and a team of INS agents headed for Panama City and set up as much as they had in Quito: adjoining rooms at the Cesar Park Hotel. Poli and Susan would go down as lovers, while A. J. supposedly would stay in Dallas to coordinate the passengers in route from Miami.
Poli and Susan had arranged to meet Margarita on October 15, 1998, at 12:35 pm in front of the Cesar Park. They took her back into their hotel room, where they discussed the details of moving people from Cuba to the Bahamas to Panama, all duly recorded and videotaped from the adjoining room. The outcome of the meeting confirmed that now Margarita had become a significant player in Maan Singh’s operation. The team conjectured that she just might be the key needed to get at her boss.
After the meeting, Susan began teasing A. J. that he and Margarit
a would make the perfect couple. Women’s point of view, their sensitivity to emotion and psychology, now took the lead with Susan’s insight, and it occurred to A. J. that he could begin to flirt with Margarita during their phone exchanges.
In their next phone conversation, Margarita opened with, “I met Fernando and his girlfriend. I was sooo disappointed you weren’t there so that I could meet you in person.”
“I was there,” answered A. J. assuming the Don Juan characteristics of “Andrés.” “I saw you.”
“No, you’re teasing!”
“Yes, I was there,” insisted A. J.
“I don’t believe you. Describe me.”
“First, you’re very pretty. You have long black, wavy hair. And . . . a pretty smile.”
“What was I wearing?”
“A flowery sun dress with straps . . . light green. It was very sexy.”
“Oh, Andrés, why didn’t you come and talk to me?”
“Because I had to be the security for Fernando and Susan.”
“I can’t believe I didn’t meet you,” she pouted. “What do you look like?”
“I’m handsome.”
“Ha-ha-ha-ha! Ay, qué lindo.”
“I’m five-eight, I’m stocky, black curly hair, mustache . . . ”
“Why didn’t you come up and introduce yourself in Panama, bad boy?”
“Because I couldn’t leave my job . . . I’m there to protect you just as much as Fernando.”
“¡Ayyy, qué lindo!”
“But I tell you what, your next trip to Panama, I’ll be there for you,” A. J. promised her, from the Crystal Palace Hotel phone in the Bahamas.
Now in the Bahamas, Nick Díaz was not available. It seems he was in Quito because he was trying to insulate himself at that time from his illicit activities in the Bahamas. So A. J., Poli and Susan were about to meet Nick Díaz’s second-in-charge, Abdul Farooqi, a.k.a. Gulu. An accountant from India, Gulu was dark, overweight, rigid. His purview included running the stash houses in the Bahamas. Díaz had instructed “Fernando” to meet Gulu when he was ready to move people by plane. Upon arriving in Nassau on October 17, 1998, Poli called Gulu, who informed that a group of aliens were due in from Cuba the next day. Poli invited Gulu to come by the hotel to go over the last details—and hopefully to be recorded from the adjoining room. “Meet us by the pool. You’ll recognize us: my girlfriend will be wearing a tan bikini.”
The Hunt for Maan Singh Page 7