Iran Arms Smuggler’s Hopes for Retrial Fade

An Encino businessman who was convicted in September of smuggling embargoed military equipment to Iran apparently lost his bid on Monday to win a new trial in light of recent disclosures of covert government arms sales to Iran.

The motion for a new trial by Iranian-born Hassam Kangarloo, 27, is part of a nationwide rush of appeals in several pending and past arms cases asking for new trials, dismissal or reduction of charges or sentences because of the disclosure of U.S. arms shipments to Iran.

Federal prosecutors have conceded that the revelations may damage the Justice Department’s stepped-up efforts to prosecute cases of illicit arms exports to Iran.

Trial Delayed in N.Y.

In a similar case in New York, a federal judge delayed the trial of an alleged arms-smuggling ring, declaring that he plans to order the federal government to disclose the contents of any communications between White House officials and international arms merchants involved in the Iran arms affair.

In Los Angeles, however, U.S. District Judge V. Stephen Wilson said he saw no merit in the defense contention that Kangarloo was denied a fair trial because federal prosecutors failed to inform him of the government’s Iranian arms transactions.

Nor was he impressed, Wilson said, with the argument pressed by Kangarloo’s attorney, Donald B. Marks, that the government nullified the ban on weapons shipments to Iran by conducting its own covert arms deal.

“The purpose of the statute is to control private actions,” Wilson said.

The government, he said, was allowed to waive the restrictions in certain specific instances in the interest of controlling foreign policy.

Wilson stopped short of denying the motion for a new trial, however, giving Kangarloo’s attorney until the end of the week to come up with new arguments.

Marks said he will file new written arguments later in the week.

Change in Climate

In an hourlong hearing Monday, Marks argued repeatedly that the ongoing revelations about Iranian arms sales arranged by Reagan Administration officials have created a climate in which it would now be difficult to convict his client.

“I don’t think the government will have the courage to prosecute any more of these cases,” he said.

In support of that contention, Marks filed with the court a declaration in which one of the jurors said she was “disturbed by what I have learned about recent arms sales to Iran.”

In the declaration, juror Frances Muir said it would have been “very difficult to convict if this information had been known at the time.”

During the trial, Marks said, he specifically requested information on any government arms sales to Iran and was told there were none.

“The jury was misled,” he said. “The whole thing about an embargo was just not true.”

Marks said he did not think Assistant U.S. Atty. Jeffrey Modisett intentionally misrepresented the facts.

“I think he was kept in the dark by his attorney general,” Marks said.

Marks said he based that opinion on published reports that Attorney General Edwin Meese met with President Reagan in January of 1986 when the President signed an executive finding waiving the restrictions on government-arranged Iranian arms sales.

Wilson said, however, that it is still not clear who knew what and when about the government’s arms transactions with Iran, and that he would have to subpoena Meese and others in the Administration to find out.

“That would be a real grandstand play,” he said. “That is not going to happen.”

At another point, Marks suggested that his ignorance of government arms sales during the trial prevented him from developing the possible defense that Kangarloo didn’t really think that what he was doing was wrong.

Statement Not Believed

Marks said Kangarloo testified that he had talked to international arms merchants Adnan Khashoggi and Manucher Ghorbanifar, both of whom have been linked to the Administration’s Iranian arms sales, and that they told him they were selling arms to Iran.

“That statement was met with disbelief in this courtroom,” Marks said. He said he didn’t even believe it himself at the time.

Nevertheless, Wilson said Kangarloo’s actions showed he knew what he was doing was illegal, and that others may have been doing the same thing with government approval would have no bearing on his guilt or innocence.

At best, he said, the argument that the law was being widely violated would weigh as a consideration in a motion to reduce the 30-month sentence Kangarloo is now serving in federal prison.

Marks said he will consider filing a motion to reduce Kangarloo’s sentence.

To do so, however, he would have to drop the appeal of Kangarloo’s case that is now pending, he said.