Videotape Rejected in Jewelry Mart Case : Law: The defense in the federal money-laundering proceedings says the surveillance was illegal. A judge agrees.

A federal judge in Los Angeles has ruled that prosecutors cannot introduce hundreds of hours of video surveillance tapes of defendants in a multimillion-dollar money-laundering case scheduled for trial in May.

U.S. District Judge Consuelo B. Marshall agreed with defense lawyers that there was no statutory authority for blanket videotape surveillance other than in cases involving foreign espionage.

Tuesday’s ruling was seen as a major victory for 11 people indicted last year on charges of laundering $312 million through the Los Angeles Jewelry Mart as part of an international drug ring.

Federal authorities said that the Jewelry Mart money-laundering scheme was one of the largest and most elaborate of its kind ever uncovered in the United States. The government also indicted 10 other men working for a different downtown jewelry company on charges of laundering $350 million in drug proceeds. That case is scheduled to go to trial April 17.

The surveillance was conducted at different locations in New York and Los Angeles.

In a novel move, federal agents tapped into the closed-circuit security systems at Ropex Corp., a jewelry merchant that had headquarters in the International Jewelry Center at 550 S. Hill St., as well as offices in New York and Houston.

The same technique was used to monitor employees and customers at Andonian Bros., at 220 W. 5th St.

The lead defendant is Wanis Koyomejian, 47, the owner of Ropex, who faces 14 counts of money laundering, conspiracy and assisting drug transactions.

In legal documents, Koyomejian’s attorney, Steve Cochran, had argued that video surveillance for domestic law enforcement purposes is prohibited by federal statute. He also said that such surveillance is so indiscriminate that it cannot be justified under the Constitution.

“We believe that the videotapes are all the evidence the government has against some of these defendants. The decision could wipe out the government’s case against some of these defendants,” said Vicki I. Podberesky, a lawyer for another defendant in the case. She called the judge’s decision “courageous.”

Cochran had urged Judge Marshall to throw out the videotapes, claiming they raised the specter of government intrusion similar to that found in the futuristic novel “1984” by George Orwell.

“Without statutory authority, the government subjected Wanis Koyomejain and other defendants to the type of surveillance most feared by proponents of civil liberties in modern Western society,” Cochran wrote in a legal brief. “Television surveillance is, by nature, thoroughly intrusive and indiscriminate.”

Defense attorneys said they plan to ask that other evidence now be thrown out as well because it was obtained on the basis of the videotapes. That evidence, which includes searches and wiretaps that were authorized on the basis of the videotapes, is “the fruit of a poisonous tree,” according to defense lawyers.

Assistant U.S. Atty. Mark J. Werksman said prosecutors will appeal the ruling.

“We don’t think we’ve done anything illegal,” Werksman said.

Werksman said that three federal appeals courts in other parts of the country have upheld videotape surveillance in similar circumstances. However, he said, the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco has not yet ruled on the issue.

In recent years, federal law enforcement agencies have increasingly utilized high technology surveillance techniques in investigations. Videotaped evidence has been used in a number of high-profile cases, including Abscam, and in the unsuccessful drug prosecution of auto executive John Z. DeLorean.

However, Cochran said, the use of videotaped evidence in those cases was different than in the Jewelry Mart case. In those prosecutions, the videotapes were admitted as evidence because they showed specific conduct by defendants--rather than the random comings and goings of a variety of people.

In the other pending Jewelry Mart case, U.S. District Judge William Keller denied defense motions last December to suppress evidence from electronic surveillance and a variety of searches. However, the defense lawyers in that case did not raise the arguments about videotaping that were made in the Koyomejian case.

Federal agents have alleged in affidavits that drug dealers sent millions of dollars in cash to Jewelry Mart offices in Los Angeles. The money was wired to contacts in Uruguay and Panama and used to export more cocaine to the United States.

Most of the defendants have pleaded innocent in both cases. However, seven defendants have pleaded guilty in the Koyomejian case and it is expected that one of them, Sergio Hochman, a Uruguayan believed to be the second-in-command of the money-laundering network, will be a prosecution witness.