Aid to Cubans tracked to office of Posada pal

Fundación Rescate Juridico, the group the Cuban government has linked to U.S. payments to dissidents on the island, is in a busy Hialeah strip mall near Westland Mall.

Its precise location, 4225 W. 16th Ave., Second Floor, turns out to be the office of Santiago Alvarez -- a developer who is the chief South Florida benefactor of Cuban exile militant Luis Posada Carriles. Repeated knocks on the door Tuesday went unanswered.

The same address is listed in the Florida incorporation records for Caribe Dive & Research Foundation which owned the shrimping boat Santrina that the U.S. and Cuban governments allege was used by Alvarez and other exiles to smuggle Posada into the United States in March 2005.

Alvarez is now serving a 10-month federal sentence for refusing to testify against Posada in a case in El Paso, Texas, where the exile militant was indicted for allegedly lying to immigration officers about how he sneaked into the United States. A federal judge last year dismissed the Posada indictment, but the Justice Department appealed.

Posada maintains he entered the United States via the Mexican border. But federal prosecutors said they have evidence Posada was brought to Miami aboard the Santrina.

The Cuban government released e-mails and other documents it said proved the top U.S. diplomat in Cuba helped dissidents get money through Alvarez's group. According to the documents, the outgoing head of the U.S. Interests Section -- Michael Parmly -- delivered money from Alvarez's group to former Cuban political prisoner Martha Beatriz Roque.

Also among released documents was an e-mail to Roque from Carmen Machado, the principal South Florida e-mail contact between Roque and Fundación Rescate Juridico. Machado, an employee of Aventura Hospital and Medical Center, did not return a call to her office.

Peter Jude, a hospital spokesman, said the hospital is likely to ''discipline'' Machado for using office e-mail to communicate with Roque. Jude declined to discuss Machado's office duties.

Florida Division of Corporations records show Fundación Rescate Juridico was incorporated in June 2005, five months before Santiago was arrested in a separate weapons case. Juan Zorrilla, a Miami attorney, was listed as the group's registered agent.

''It's a . . . charitable organization with the mission statement basically to provide financial support and legal assistance . . . to all people persecuted by despotic governments,'' Zorrilla told The Miami Herald. ``I know he has a role in the organization with several other people. I believe he's a founder of the organization.''