by Jason Ryan
“I can really understand why the public kind of holds lawyers in with the little bit of respect that they do, rather than the great respect that they would have, when they come here and sit and hear them accuse one another of matters such as I have heard during these arguments,” said Hawkins. “If I had been the government attorneys, I suspect you would have had a lot more objections and grounds for mischarge, if … I had had the abuse heaped on me that was piled on them here last night and today.”
Hawkins’s diatribe, part cathartic, part scolding, weighed heavily on the defense counsel. The next day, the lawyers returned to court and apologized to Hawkins, informing him that they had also made peace with the prosecutors. Hawkins accepted their apology, but said he was concerned about a trend he had observed in his courtroom. More and more lawyers were embracing hardball tactics, he said, and their behavior often suffered from a lack of respect. Zwerling engaged him on this point and said some government prosecutors could be similarly heavy-handed, mentioning a client he represented in Virginia who was threatened with a barrage of charges and a prison term in a maximum-security facility if he did not cooperate with the government. Zwerling said he perceived this as an example of a distressing imbalance in the legal system, where the government can offer a defendant rewards for testimony, whether it be dropped charges, immunity from prosecution for other offenses, or furloughs to visit with spouses. Defense lawyers, Zwerling noted, could offer none of that.
Zwerling’s observation was not without example. Earlier in the trial, fellow defense lawyer John Keats mentioned the difficulty he had in trying to subpoena testimony from smuggler Clark Swift.
“He told us, in no uncertain terms, that he didn’t want to testify, that he was sorry he had ever talked to us in the first place. That he didn’t care, of course, what happened to our client. As far as he was concerned, they could all do forty years apiece,” said Keats. “And, more importantly, if we tried to put him on the witness stand he would take our case and—I’ll use the term ‘screw it up’; he used a little bit more infamous expletive than that—and warned us repeatedly, if we, in any way, attempted to secure his testimony on the record, in this case, he was going to do everything within his power to literally sink our ship.”
Having Hawkins’s ear, Zwerling continued to air his own grievances about the legal system. It was an inspired speech, but one made as an aside at the conclusion of a trial, outside the presence of the jury. As an anxious courtroom awaited the jury’s return and word on the defendants’ fates, Zwerling raged against the government’s habit of enlisting, and rewarding, suspects in order to enable their investigations and bolster their cases against those who choose to exercise their Sixth Amendment right to a speedy and public trial by jury.
“There’s been a change in the last two years, and people aren’t allowed to just plead guilty and do their time; if subpoenaed, come in and testify to the truth,” said Zwerling.
“There is tremendous pressure being put on people, not only to plead guilty and tell the truth if subpoenaed, but to come in and, for whatever they’re going to get out of it, make a cooperating agreement and have to go through the debriefings and the polygraphs and all of this other thing.
“It’s not, ‘I did wrong. I want to do my time. And if I’m subpoenaed, I will tell the truth,’ ” said Zwerling. “That’s no longer good enough.”
With so much bargaining occurring between suspects and the government, Zwerling lamented, justice was traded away. Pity the last man standing, for he will have nothing to bargain with and everyone against him.
Chapter Twelve
Willie Frank Steele sat in a county jail in October 1983. He’d already decided to help the government, admitting his guilt as a drug kingpin and agreeing to serve as the lead witness in the second trial against his former smuggling colleagues, which was in progress a few miles away in downtown Columbia. The government didn’t need him today, but still he wanted to talk. He placed a call to Jackpot investigator and DEA agent Dewey Greager.
When court finished for the day, David Forbes and Greager paid Steele a visit. The prisoner asked for a favor, and told his company it’d be worth their while. Bring me a copy of the latest yachting magazine, he said, I have something to show you. Forbes and Greager scoured local bookstores and newsstands and soon returned to the jail with the requested copy. Steele took the magazine in hand and flipped to the classified ads in back. He stuck his finger against a page, pointing to a particularly fine-looking sailboat listed for sale in Antigua. Although the advertisement didn’t list the vessel’s true name, Steele was certain it was Bob “The Boss” Byers’s eighty-five-foot steel-hulled sailboat, La Cautiva.
“That’s her,” Steele said. “She’s one of a kind.”
The agents didn’t doubt him. Steele was in love with the worldclass sailboat and likely smarting over the fact that he’d never again take her helm. With lustful eyes Steele stared at the small magazine picture and gabbed to Forbes and Greager. Find the boat, he told the government agents, and you’ll find Byers.
Steele’s motivation for sharing this tip is unclear. Divulging the whereabouts of La Cautiva was not part of his plea agreement with the government. The disclosure wouldn’t necessarily result in reduced prison time, either, though prosecutors could emphasize his exceedingly cooperative spirit to Judge Falcon Hawkins when it came time for Steele to be sentenced. Perhaps Steele wanted to clear his conscience, or maybe he just couldn’t keep the magazine advertisement to himself. It’s possible he was exacting revenge on Byers, his former friend, who was still on the lam. Before returning to Florida, where he was arrested two months earlier, Steele had been living in Grenada but was running out of cash. He asked Byers for money owed to him, but Byers said he’d have to come to the United States to collect. Now Steele found himself in a jail cell, and still without the money owed him. One smuggler speculates it was Steele’s drug-addled brain that made him tell on friends without even wincing, recalling Steele telling him proudly that he “handed [the feds] Bob Byers on a plate.”
“He was a druggie,” says the smuggler, “and druggies do weird shit.”
In any case, Steele was unabashed about his cooperation, and later trumpeted it throughout federal prison, which was bewildering to smuggler Ken Smith, who worked with Barry Foy and Les Riley on their early Jamaican ventures, and was an acquaintance of Steele.
“You don’t talk about snitching people out when you’re in the joint,” says Smith. “As informal as we may have made it, it’s still fucking federal prison, and you can die there very, very quickly.”
Smith recalls running into Steele in prison, just before Smith was due to be released for drug offenses outside the scope of Operation Jackpot. As Smith passed by a cell holding Steele and six other men, Steele called out loudly to him.
“Dude, did you tell them everything?” asked Steele, approaching the bars that separated them and putting Smith instantly on guard.
“No, Frank, I didn’t tell them everything. I hardly told them anything at all.”
“Man, I did,” said Steele.
Smith was incredulous. He leaned in closely and spoke very seriously to his friend.
“Frank, stop talking like this, man. You’re not at the fucking Howard Johnson’s.”
“Oh, fuck these guys. I’m on my way to [ federal prison in ] Tallahassee.”
“That’s great. You need to get out of here,” said Smith, preparing to walk away. “You need to shut your mouth.”
Steele, however, still wanted to talk.
“Did you tell them about Europe?”
“No, Frank, I didn’t tell them about Europe,” said Smith, now frightened he might be given more time due to Steele’s revelations. “What did you tell them about Europe, because you didn’t have a fucking thing to do with me going to Europe?”
“Well I had to tell them when I went there for Les.”
“And?”
“Well I had to tell them that you’re the one that
did it first and showed us it could be done.”
If Steele was plagued by logorrhea, agents like Forbes and Greager weren’t about to offer him any remedy. Upon hearing the information about Byers and his boat, they quickly hatched a plan, one that violated protocol. Since Byers was on the run, says Forbes, they should have turned their sailboat tip over to the U.S. Marshal Service, the agency charged with finding fugitives. The Jackpot task force feared Byers would not be considered a priority, however, so Greager and Forbes decided to take action themselves. They would travel to Antigua and pose as businessmen interested in purchasing a luxury sailboat, hopefully meeting Byers on board the boat or on the island. Using an undercover DEA phone line, Greager quickly called the boatyard listed in the ad, asking when La Cautiva could be seen. Not yet, said the broker, since the boat was in Grenada having her hull repainted. But he would call back, he promised, when she and her owner returned to Antigua.
Grenada, like other former British colonies in the Caribbean, had recently earned its independence. Five years after that, in 1979, the new government was overthrown by Marxists in the New JEWEL Movement, led by Maurice Bishop, a lawyer educated in London. Popular at home, his actions as prime minister alarmed other Western leaders. Under Bishop’s leadership, Grenada suspended its constitution, created an army, outlawed opposition political parties, and welcomed assistance from Cuba. The United States and other Caribbean nations grew concerned about the militarization of the country, the absence of political freedom, and Cuba’s influence on the island. Through Cuba’s assistance, a new airport was being built, and the American government feared it could be used to support Soviet aircraft. U.S. President Ronald Reagan mentioned the airport in a March 1983 speech on national security that has since become known as the Star Wars speech, based on its emphasis on creating a network of ground- and outer space–based defenses to protect against nuclear missile attacks:
On the small island of Grenada, at the southern end of the Caribbean chain, the Cubans, with Soviet financing and backing, are in the process of building an airfield with a 10,000- foot runway. Grenada doesn’t even have an air force. Who is it intended for? … The rapid buildup of Grenada’s military potential is unrelated to any conceivable threat to this island country of under 110,000 people and totally at odds with the pattern of other eastern Caribbean States, most of which are unarmed. The Soviet-Cuban militarization of Grenada, in short, can only be seen as power projection into the region.
Six months later, in October 1983, Grenada’s government showed signs of severe stress, as relations between Bishop and other party leaders soured. It was about this time when Byers returned to the island to ready La Cautiva for sale. He had kept it docked in Grenada for a year and was keen on selling it to replenish his diminishing cash reserves. Although he was famously secretive, friends guessed he was selling off his assets in preparation for setting sail to Fiji and leaving the smuggling business behind. Among La Cautiva’s needs was a fresh coat of bottom paint. Byers had her hauled out of the water so workers could access the hull. There it sat on a lift, suspended in the air, when troubles began on the island. Byers later recounted:
There was quite a civil uprising there at the time. Maurice Bishop was in control of the island at the time, and he was having a tendency to swing away from communism, was the nearest I could tell, and they took him prisoner and they put him under house arrest. There was a lot of demonstration going on in the streets at the time, and I was there getting the boat ready to sail out of the country when the shooting started, and I was more or less—not a hostage—but … caught in the crossfire.
While the military wanted Bishop held under arrest, the public wanted him freed. The protesting crowds succeeded in having him released on October 19, 1983, but soldiers captured him hours later. Along with other leaders, Bishop was stood against a wall before a firing squad as the fighting worsened. Byers said he witnessed some of the violence, seeing soldiers attack civilians. American students from St. George’s University Medical School begged Byers to ferry them off the island when his boat was operable.
“The Grenadians started shooting up schoolchildren and people protesting,” said Byers, “and they ended up eventually shooting the prime minister, Maurice Bishop.”
Following Bishop’s death, a general appointed himself ruler of the island and imposed a four-day curfew. Anyone who violated it, he said, day or night, could be shot on sight. Meanwhile, the execution of Bishop and associated fighting had unnerved the United States. A U.S. invasion of the island was feared, and Grenadian soldiers prepared themselves for more fighting. Byers said:
Radio Free Grenada was advising us that an invasion was imminent, and they were telling everybody to come and pick up guns. They were going to push the capitalist pigs back into the sea. Most of the boats that were capable of leaving left and most of the Americans that could leave left on boats. My boat was out of the water. It was high and dry on the synchrolift and the bottom was being painted. When the curfew was invoked, they shut off the electricity and the workers couldn’t come to work because of the curfew.
On October 25, six days after Bishop was killed, a team of Navy SEALS and more than one thousand Marines and Army Rangers invaded the island. Soon after, paratroopers landed on Grenada, bringing the invading force to six thousand U.S soldiers and three hundred troops from other Caribbean nations. Over three days of fighting, eighteen Americans, sixteen Grenadians, and fourteen Cubans were killed as American forces took control of Grenada.
Although the island was stabilized, Byers’s boat still could not be lowered into the water, and the medical students Byers had promised to evacuate were airlifted off of Grenada by the American military. La Cautiva was not completely useless though, as its vittles and sophisticated electronic equipment were attractive to American soldiers. According to Byers:
When the invasion was over and our troops started to infiltrate the particular part of town I was in, I did assist them in locating a downed helicopter, and they came to me and asked me to translate for them on various occasions. They said that even though those West Indians were speaking English, they had a hard time understanding them. I helped the United States SEAL team on several occasions with reconnaissance. They came to me and asked my opinion of what the attitude of the Grenadian people was in the city, and if I thought it was safe to enter the harbor and move their manpower into the city.
I dealt with several colonels and a couple of captains, but I didn’t take their names to any effect where I could remember who they were. They came by several times and had beers and drinks with me and I supplied them with what cigarettes I could get them. I bought cases of Coca-Cola and Sprite for them and gave them directions.
No matter his patriotism, Byers was first and foremost a businessman, even when his country’s military was serving as protector. In exchange for soft drinks, cigarettes, Heinekens, and advice, Byers was given a portable rocket launcher, ostensibly to repel potential pirate attacks in the Caribbean. The lightweight rocket launcher, known as a LAW, or light anti-tank weapon, fired a single sixty-sixmillimeter rocket capable of penetrating an armored vehicle. Fired into a boat, it would easily blast a hole through the hull and likely scorch and fragment what, or who, was inside.
As life returned to some normalcy in Grenada and the shooting stopped, Byers finally had his boat lowered into the water and set sail for the nearby island of Bequia. On board with him were several Grenadians who feared for their lives and wished to flee the island, including two doctors, a family, and others. After reaching Bequia, he headed to Antigua, where he cleared customs and immigrations through the use of a fake passport in the name of William Dennis Wilcox. After his arrival he heard from the yacht broker. Someone was interested in looking at La Cautiva.
Back in South Carolina, closing arguments were made in the second Jackpot trial. At their conclusion, the jury was sent off to decide the fates of Kenny Gunn, Mike Harvey, Bruce MacDougall, and Skip Sanders, charged to determine the exten
t, if any, of their involvement in the alleged long-running marijuana and hashish smuggling conspiracies. After nearly twelve hours of deliberation, the jury returned to the court. The men were found guilty on each and every count.
The prosecution “just bowled us over with evidence,” said jury foreman Leon Temples. In the case of Gunn and MacDougall, Temples said, they “didn’t have a dog’s chance” of escaping conviction. Following announcement of the verdict, Hawkins raised the men’s bonds to amounts that all but Gunn were unable to immediately post, sending them to jail to await sentencing. Justice moved swiftly. As the men were led away and the courtroom cleared, defense lawyers said they expected such a verdict and vowed to appeal on grounds of double jeopardy. On the government side, U.S. Attorney Henry McMaster seized on the momentum, telling reporters the convictions sent “a message to all the millionaire smugglers and their jet-set henchmen.
“We’ve had twenty-four convictions or guilty pleas, seized more than $5 million in property, and have had only three acquittals. I guess the score now is twenty-four to three,” said McMaster. “The key has been our personnel. We’ve got the best lawyers and the best agents in the country.”
Next for the government was the trial of another five defendants, including Les Riley’s younger brother, Roy. Months earlier, Roy had agreed to a plea deal with the government and participated in two days of debriefings before he and prosecutors reached an impasse. The government was dissatisfied with the information he shared, complaining his recollections were incomplete and lacked detail. They also took issue with his refusal to discuss his finances and assets—a deal breaker for the prosecution. Such lack of cooperation, the government argued, constituted a breach of his duties, and they moved to dissolve the agreement. In hearings prior to Roy’s trial, Hawkins sympathized with the government, ordering Riley to stand trial. He pleaded not guilty to the alleged drug offenses.