Pin-up girl tells how she spotted suitcase stuffed with cash

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/oct/05/argentina.venezuela



The 'suitcase girl' who discovered $800,000 in cash and ignited a political scandal across South America - then capitalised on it to forge a career as a Playboy pin-up - has relived her moment of glory in a Miami courtroom.

María del Luján Telpuk, 28, an Argentinian former airport security officer, is testifying in court about the moment she intercepted a suitcase and provoked a row between the governments of Argentina, Venezuela and the US. Claims of high-level corruption, cover-ups and vendettas have followed and commentators have dubbed the scandal 'Maletagate'; maleta is Spanish for suitcase.

The furore catapulted Telpuk to stardom as a glamour model, dancer and television celebrity. Telpuk, who promptly underwent breast augmentation surgery, has since appeared on the cover of several magazines, including the Argentinian edition of Playboy in which she appears naked, holding a suitcase, under the headline 'Corruption Laid Bare'.

She told a Miami court on Friday what happened at Buenos Aires airport on the night of 4 August, 2007, when passengers disembarked from a flight chartered by Venezuela's state oil company, PDVSA.

Telpuk asked a Venezuelan-American businessman, Guido Alejandro Antonini Wilson, what was in his suitcase. 'At first he said books,' she told the court. 'Then he said "just some papers".' Antonini's demeanour changed when she ordered him to open it. 'He became serious and he was staring me straight in the eye. That's when I got a suspicion that something was going on,' said Telpuk. It was packed with wads of $50 bills.




.............


The luxury business jet carrying a suitcase filled with $800,000 in bribes whose discovery last August kicked off the Suitcase-Gate Scandal had the same American registration, or" N" number, as that of a plane flying for a CIA contractor in Iraq, the MadCowMorningNews has learned.

The so-called Suitcase-Gate Scandal is playing out in a trial currently underway in a Federal courtroom in Miami.

Newspaper photos taken of the Citation X top-of-the-line business jet right after the ill-fated suitcase flight show ‘N’ number N5113S on the tail.

But a Florida-based CIA air contractor called Air-Scan Inc. is assigned that tail number, according to FAA records, for a Cessna 182 flying in Iraq.

Air-Scan Inc. is an American military contractor which has—even for an American military contractor—a checkered past. Still, there has been no mention during the trial so far of the murky provenance of the plane.

http://english.eluniversal.com/2008/10/03/en_pol_esp_suitcase-affair-defe_03A2040483.shtml

Suitcase affair defendant held military intelligence badge
The judge found enough sufficient evidence against one of the owners of Venoco


But the main assets of the prosecution office were not mere words. The prosecution also showed key evidence: the badge as "commissioned intelligence officer of the naval command headquarters intelligence" in the name of Franklin Deivis Duran Guerrero. This military intelligence badge, along with a personal ID with photo, was in a briefcase on December 11, 2007, the day of Durán's detention. FBI agent Lawrence Lynn, who is in charge of the case, showed a Miami jury the badge. One by one, all the members of the jury saw the accreditation which read "Naval command headquarters, intelligence;" the number (0367), the issue date (05/10//07) and the expiration date (05/10/09). On the back of the badge: "Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela. Ministry of Defense."

The defense lawyers (if they decide to continue with the trial) will begin presenting their witnesses on Friday, including former Argentinean police officer María del Luján Telpuk.


http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601086&sid=a.oA0427RjZ4&refer=latin_america

`Suitcase' Scandal Defendant Had Intelligence Badge, Agent Says

By Carlyn Kolker and David Voreacos

Oct. 3 (Bloomberg) -- A Venezuelan man on trial for acting as an illegal agent for his country as he tried to cover up the origins of an Argentine election scandal carried a military intelligence badge, an FBI agent testified.

The defendant, Franklin Duran, carried the badge in a black Prada bag that he had with him when he was arrested Dec. 11 in Miami, a Federal Bureau of Investigation agent testified as the final government witness in the federal trial.

``The translation reads, naval command headquarters, intelligence,'' FBI agent Lawrence Lynn said yesterday, showing a Miami jury the badge, which included a photograph of Duran and described him as a ``commissioned intelligence officer.''

Duran, 41, is accused of trying to silence Guido Alejandro Antonini Wilson, who was caught carrying a suitcase containing $800,000 at a Buenos Aires airport on Aug. 4, 2007. Duran pressured Antonini not to reveal the source and destination of the cash, prosecutors argue. The cash was sent by the government of Venezuela to support Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner, witnesses have said during four weeks of testimony. Fernandez was elected president of Argentina Oct. 28

After the suitcase was seized, Antonini returned to his home in Florida, where he began cooperating with the FBI, secretly recording conversations with Duran and other South American men.

Sounds like a set-up to me. :eyes: :think: B-)

As you may recall, Wallace Hillard, owner of a certain flight school, got busted on July 25, 2000 with 43 pounds of heroin. Sadly there wasn't enough "evidence," so the case was closed prematurely. The weird thing is that the pilot was Diego Levine-Texar who was a pilot for Airforce One in Venezuela (The co-pilot worked for the DEA which was kind of peculiar as well)

Excerpt in German:


P.S. K&R to SLaD

send an intelligence officer complete with id through an uncontrolled customs checkpoint carrying a suitcase packed with dollars for bribes.

Filthy commies.

http://www.panactual.com/noticias_detalles.asp?noti_code=51510


El Nuevo Herald reported last September that Feris Dominguez was negotiating with U.S. prosecutors to tell all about the alleged involvement of Venezuelan officers involved in drug trafficking.

He dubbed them “The Clan of the Generals.”





Feris Fernandez is also a key player in the CIA Drug Plane Scandal which began two years ago when a DC9 airliner (N900SA) was caught carrying 5.5 tons of cocaine at a tiny out-of-the-way rural airport on the back side of the Yucatan.

http://www.eluniversal.com.mx/nacion/162152.html

Last week Mexico City newspaper El Universal reported that The European Organization for the Safety of Air Navigation has begun an investigation one of the planes, the cocaine-laden Gulfstream II business jet (N987SA), for suspected use in CIA "rendition" flights in which prisoners are covertly transferred to a third country or US-run detention centers.

The plane crash-landed after running out of fuel in the jungle near the small town of Tixkokob, 40 miles outside the Yucatan capital of Merida on September 24th of last year.

Now THAT makes sense as a rational for the drugwar.

I must have been hiding under a rock or something :P I hadn't heard about this yet. Thanks!

Let's declare war on cash-laden suitcases!

"LV-BRJ New reg. on a.net. Former N5113S seen here on short final to rwy 31 at AEP "
http://myaviation.net/search/search.php?view=®nr=LV-BRJ

Could that mean that Air-Scan Inc. was able to use the now available tail number "N5113S" to register a new Cessna 182?

It seems that Air-Scan Inc. had nothing to do with the Citation X business jet.


BTW, Telpuk seems to contradict Antonini's testimony: