Release Set, Then Blocked in Drug Case

A Temple City businessman accused of supplying weapons to a narcotics organization with suspected ties to the murder of U.S. drug agent Enrique Camarena was ordered released Tuesday on $200,000 bail, but the decision was almost immediately stayed by a federal judge.

Shortly after U.S. Magistrate John R. Kronenberg had granted bail for Ricardo Garcia, one of eight Mexican nationals indicted last week for their alleged roles in a major international cocaine trafficking ring, U.S. District Judge Edward Rafeedie temporarily blocked his release at the urging of angry federal prosecutors, who had walked out of the courtroom earlier in the day without signing bond documents to implement Kronenberg’s order.

Rafeedie scheduled a hearing on the government’s appeal for 4:30 p.m. today.

“The government wound up getting legally what they had, in effect, achieved against the rules,” complained Garcia’s attorney, Dominick Rubalcava, criticizing U.S. attorneys’ refusal to comply with Kronenberg’s order earlier in the day.

But Assistant U.S. Atty. Joyce Karlin said that the more than 100 weapons that Garcia allegedly purchased for the narcotics ring--including Uzi rifles and AR-7 assault weapons--were evidence that he is dangerous and likely to flee if released.

None of the eight men indicted last week on narcotics conspiracy charges has been charged with the kidnaping and slaying of federal Drug Enforcement Administration agent Camarena in 1985.

But one of them, Rafael Caro Quintero, is the man who has been held without charges by Mexican authorities for the last two years in connection with the murder. And two others, Jesus Feliz Gutierrez and Ines Calderon Quintero, are accused in the U.S. indictment of helping Quintero flee from Mexico to Costa Rica shortly after the murder.

Karlin said federal prosecutors expect another indictment soon charging one or more of the narcotics ring suspects with involvement in the torture murder of Camarena, whose body was found with that of a Mexican pilot at a remote ranch in the Mexican countryside.

Called Key Figure

Garcia, who operates a Mexican food import/export business in the San Gabriel Valley, has not been named as a suspect in the Camarena case. But federal prosecutors say he was a key figure in the narcotics trafficking ring headed by Gutierrez and Caro Quintero, purchasing more than 90 firearms for the organization between 1982 and 1986.

“In light of the fact that he had purchased the number of weapons that he did, and at least some of those weapons subsequently ended up in the hands of co-conspirators in the narcotics organization, raises a very strong issue as to him being a danger to the community,” Assistant U.S. Atty. Jimmy Gurule said.

But Rubalcava, who claims that his client purchased the weapons as gifts, said Kronenberg was persuaded by the representations of Garcia’s family, who appeared at Tuesday’s hearing to plead for his release. Kronenberg allowed Garcia’s five brothers and sisters to personally guarantee half the bail, with Garcia putting up the equity in his two homes for the remainder.

“The government tried to make my client look as bad as he could look . . . and the magistrate agreed with us and set bail,” the lawyer said. “After he issued the order, Ms. Karlin left the court very quickly. She refused to sign the bond paper work that has to be signed for release, and they thereby got, by what in essence is a pocket veto, what they couldn’t get in court.”

Property Review

Gurule replied, “We were to review the property that was being put up as to whether we felt it was adequate. We chose not to do that in light of the fact that we are seeking to have the magistrate’s order reversed.”

Kronenberg, a U.S. magistrate since 1973, drew fire from federal prosecutors in 1985 when he ordered an accused child molester released on bail, postulating that the man was not a threat to the community because local standards on sexual conduct are “practically non-existent.”

Later that year, Kronenberg was removed from an extradition case involving Nazi war criminal Andrija Artukovic after indicating he might grant bail for the aging former government official, who was later extradited to Yugoslavia, found guilty and sentenced to death.