Bail to Be Set for 4 Held in Stolen Jet Parts Case

A federal judge hearing the case of four men charged with selling stolen U.S. Navy aircraft parts to Iran said Tuesday he will send the case back to a magistrate so bail can be set for each defendant.

The four--Franklin P. Agustin; his brother, Edgardo; Primitivo B. Cayabyab, and Pedro M. Quito--are being held without bail after Magistrate Roger C. McKee ruled last month that they were flight risks. But after a two-day hearing, U.S. District Judge Leland Nielsen said, “At the moment my feeling is that I will refer this matter back to the magistrate for setting of some kind of bail.” He is expected to issue a written order to that effect this week.

Nielsen’s order will be a victory for defense attorneys, who argued that their clients were being held without bail solely on hearsay evidence presented by federal prosecutors. Now it is up to the attorneys to persuade McKee to set a reasonable bail for each defendant.

On July 18, McKee, a Navy reserve officer, admonished the defendants that the case had serious consequences and was not a matter of a “midnight requisition,” a Navy term for the unauthorized transfer of parts.

Two additional defendants in the case, Julie Agustin, who is Franklin’s wife, and Antonio Rodriguez, are scheduled to appear Monday at a separate bail review hearing.

Nielsen’s order to send the case back to McKee for bail setting came after a frustrating day for Assistant U.S. Atty. Phillip Halpern. Halpern relied on three expert witnesses to convince Nielsen that the alleged ring members should be jailed without bail.

One witness, U.S. Customs Special Agent Roman Buyson, said he was born in the Philippines and testified that he monitored and transcribed some of the recorded conversations held by the alleged ring members, who speak Tagalog and a Filipino dialect identified as Pampango.

But after consulting a translator, defense attorney Lonn Berney of New York asked Buyson if he knew the meaning of the Tagalog word kalayaan. Buyson replied that he did not, provoking laughter from the defendants, who were sitting behind their attorneys’ table. A smiling Berney then asked his own translator to explain the word in English.

“It means freedom,” he said.

Earlier, Buyson testified that he transcribed a recorded conversation where Frank Agustin, speaking in Pampango, discussed an F-14 part that he was going to ship to an alleged Iranian contact in England. But when Berney asked the agent to pronounce the part in Pampango or Tagalog, Buyson said he could not.

Another witness called Tuesday by Halpern was Internal Revenue Service Agent Stephen R. Gelman, who also testified on Monday. Gelman testified about parts shipments sent by Edgardo Agustin in 1981 to Iranian air force officials in London. Agustin insured the parts for $400 but sent a $196,000 invoice to the Iranians, said Gelman, and the invoice was included in Agustin’s tax return for that year.

The ring members are charged with stealing several aircraft parts, including parametric amplifiers, which are used in the guidance system of the Phoenix missile. Berney asked U.S. Customs Agent Kenneth Kilroy if he was aware that parametric amplifiers can be bought through civilian electronics dealers and wholesalers.

Kilroy said he was not, but Halpern conceded that such parts can be bought through civilian outlets.

A spokesman at Broadcast Microwaves Services Inc. in Kearny Mesa contacted by The Times said the amplifiers are low-noise devices that amplify microwave and ultra-high frequency (UHF) signals and are available to the public.

However, the spokesman, who did not want to be named, said he is not sure whether parametric amplifiers similar to the ones allegedly stolen by ring members from the Navy are available to the public.