From: [C reuters] at [clari.net] (Reuter / David Morgan) Newsgroups: clari.news.crime.top,clari.usa.law.misc,clari.news.alcohol+drugs,clari.news.front_page,clari.usa.law Subject: Judge says Noriega trial may have had legal error Organization: Copyright 1996 by Reuters Date: Wed, 4 Dec 1996 15:42:35 PST Expires: Wed, 11 Dec 1996 13:50:12 PST ATLANTA (Reuter) - The federal judge who sentenced Manuel Noriega to 40 years in prison in 1992 may have made a legal error in denying the deposed Panamanian strongman a new trial, a U.S. appellate judge said Wednesday. At a 1 1/4 hour hearing before the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, a three-judge panel heard defense arguments aimed at overturning Noriega's conviction on U.S. drug and racketeering charges. Defense attorneys said the conviction should be thrown out because Noriega was barred from testifying about a $10 million sum he claims to have received in the 1980s for being a paid CIA informant. The omission enabled prosecutors to attribute Noriega's wealth to payoffs from drug smugglers, they argued. But the main issue of Wednesday's hearing was a separate defense motion for a new trial in which Noriega accused prosecutors of suppressing evidence that a key witness had received a $1.25 million bribe from the Cali drug cartel. ``The U.S. government wanted a conviction in this case so badly that they were willing to go to a criminal organization to obtain a witness,'' Noriega attorney Jon May told the panel. ''We have an agreement here with a criminal organization that was hidden from the jury and the result was a $1.25 million bribe,'' he said. May and defense co-counsel Frank Rubino say the Cali cartel came up with the bribe after the U.S. government agreed to shortened the prison sentence of a man linked to the cartel from 23 years to eight years. The defense did not learn of the alleged payoff until after Noriega's conviction, he said. Last March, the attorneys asked U.S. District Judge William Hoeveler in Miami to grant their client a new trial on the grounds that the disclosure of bribery constituted new evidence. But Hoeveler, who sentenced Noriega after a seven-month trial, denied the motion, saying the defense failed to show another trial would produce a different result. ``My preliminary thoughts are that the district court (judge) may have made a mistake when he said third-party agreements were somehow outside the scope,'' U.S. Circuit Judge J.L. Edmondson said Wednesday. He also quoted Hoeveler as saying the witness, convicted Medellin drug trafficker Ricardo Bilonick, was important to the prosecution's case because his testimony was not strongly challenged by the defense in cross-examination -- in a trial that often turned on questions of witness credibility. ``Had the defense had this information, he might have been more subject to cross-examination,'' Edmondson speculated. Bilonick, a U.S.-educated lawyer, owned an airline called Inair that flew tons of cocaine between Panama and the United States in the 1980s. After surrendering to U.S. narcotics agents in Panama in 1991, he testified that Inair's DC-8 cargo jets made 19 flights of cocaine from Panama to Miami between 1982 and 1984. For allowing each flight to use Panama's main airport, he said, Noriega received $500,000. Bilonick was set free after serving a three-year sentence and has since returned to Panama. Two men have since testified that Bilonick agreed to appear in court after being bribed by the Cali cartel. Assistant U.S. Attorney Dawn Bowen, asked repeatedly by the panel why prosecutors did not disclose the allegations during trial proceedings, said there was no hard evidence that a bribery had ever occurred. -- C O P Y R I G H T * R E M I N D E R This article is Copyright 1996 by Reuters. All articles in the clari.* news hierarchy are Copyrighted and licensed to ClariNet Communications Corp. for distribution. Except for articles in the biz.clarinet.sample newsgroup, only paid subscribers may access these articles. Any unauthorized access, reproduction or transmission is strictly prohibited. We offer a reward to the person who first provides us with information that helps stop those who distribute or receive our news feeds without authorization. Please send reports to [r--wa--d] at [clari.net.] [Use [i--o] at [clari.net] for sales or other inquiries.] Details on use of ClariNet material and other info can be found in the user documentation section of our web page: . You can also read ClariNet news from your Web browser.