"We do not tolerate corruption" says US Ambassador

In 1999 Col. James C. Hiett, was the commander of the US anti-drug operations in Columbia. His lovely lady wife, Laurie Ann Hiett, pleaded guilty to shipping $700,000 worth of heroin and cocaine to NY City in Diplomatic bags, she got 5 years in prison.

Subsequently it became apparent that Laurie had previously been treated in an Army hospital for drug addiction. It was some time later that Col. Hiett was named by the Army as head of the U.S. Military Group, based at the fortresslike U.S. Embassy building in Bogotá , which trains Colombians in the finer points of drug interdiction. The couple went -- even though Laurie had lapsed back into addiction, snorting cocaine in front of her husband.

The couple's Colombian chauffeur told U.S. investigators that while the Colonel was at work, Laurie Hiett asked the driver to help her score hard drugs in Bogotá's trendy Zona Rosa district. Then, last May, a random search of cargo at Miami International Airport uncovered more than 2.5 pounds of drugs in a brown-paper package bearing Laurie Hiett's return address. This proved to be heroin and six further packages were discovered. Initially She has denied the charges, claiming she sent the parcels without knowing their contents as a favor to the chauffeur, Jorge Alfonso Ayala, who dropped out of sight in Colombia after talking to U.S. investigators. Hiett was originally released on $150,000 bail.

Judge Korman contrived to sentence Laurie Hiett to two years less prison time than called for in federal sentencing guidelines, and Col. Hiett himself was indicted for the smallest offense prosecutors could find on the books. Laurie Hiett's "mule," Hernan Aquila, a Colombian-born resident of Queens recruited to transport her coke after its arrival in New York, received a longer prison term than her employers for initiating the scheme.

James fell on his sword and pleaded guilty to helping his wife launder $25,000 in illicit profits and was given a five-month prison term although the military recommended that Col. Hiett receive only probation.

On the 28th March 2005 Five U.S Army soldiers were arrested for allegedly trying to smuggle 32 pounds of cocaine.The five U.S. Army personnel were arrested after 35 pounds of cocaine were found aboard a U.S. military plane that flew to El Paso, Texas, from a base in Colombia. This was confirmed by Lt. Col. Eduardo Villavicencio, a spokesman for the U.S. military's Southern Command in Florida. He claimed the the five were being held, "in the United States."

The U.S. ambassador to Colombia ruled out extraditing American soldiers accused of cocaine trafficking to stand trial in Columbia, citing a treaty that gives them immunity from Colombian laws. (There is regular traffic in drug dealers being extradited to the US from Columbia)

William Wood said a bilateral agreement provides U.S. military personnel stationed in Colombia the same “privileges and immunities” as U.S. diplomatic staff. He insisted that any soldiers implicated in drug smuggling would feel the full force of the U.S. justice system.

“We do not tolerate corruption,” Ambassador Wood said in a statement Wednesday.
Colombia's Defense Ministry the basic details but would not discuss any further details.

Jairo Clopatofsky, a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, claims that some of the soldiers were originally detained by US Authorities in Columbia and then whisked away to the United States to be arrested, which he said flies in the face of international law.

Last week 2 Green Berets were arrested and accused of selling thousands of rounds of ammunition to right-wing death squads. Warrant Officer Allan N. Tanquary and Sgt. Jesus Hernandez - members of the 7th Special Forces Group based at Fort Bragg, N.C. - were arrested last week at a luxury gated estate where authorities discovered more than 40,000 rounds of ammunition allegedly destined for a paramilitary group, which considered a terrorist organization by the United States. The outlawed paramilitary factions have been waging a dirty war against leftist rebels and their suspected collaborators.

They are said to have have diplomatic immunity and were flown to the United States.

This week Gen. Bantz J. Craddock, head of U.S. Southern Command (SOUTHCOM)during a visit to Sumapaz, a high-plains region south of Bogota, where he toured a Colombian army base and inaugurated a new elementary school partially funded by the United States head of U.S. Southern Command, insisted the arrested soldiers will face justice.

``I can assure you that within the U.S. military investigations will be thorough and complete,'' said the commander of all U.S. military operations in Latin America and the Caribbean. ``The required persons will be held accountable.''

``We are initiating a complete review of our procedures, processes and security standards in order to preclude any recurrences'' of wrongdoing by U.S. service members in Colombia, Craddock told reporters.

Craddock, wore a dark beret and immaculate combat fatigues, chatted to smiling school kids, patted Colombian soldiers on the back and whispered words of encouragement to them. Colombian forces, aided by billions of dollars in U.S. aid and training, are battling a 40-year-old leftist insurgency fueled by drug trafficking.

The tour by Craddock, recently appointed head of the Miami-based Southern Command, was clearly aimed at repairing the U.S. military's battered image in Columbia. Probably in his scheme of things a bit of high spirited entrepreneurial drug dealing and gun running beats looking sideways whilst they boil the odd terrorist suspect or two.

Hundreds of American troops are based in Colombia as part of a $3.3 billion, five-year military aid program to train local forces and provide logistical support and intelligence.

Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice had a Police guard of 200 police when she passed by Bogota on April 27^th on her drive by diplomacy trip taking in South America. Colombian Justice Minister Sabas Pretelt talked to her about US aid to build an air base in southwestern Colombia to step up a campaign to destroy illegal drug crops.

Since 2000, Washington has given Bogota $US3.3 billion ($4.25 billion) through the Plan Colombia aid package to fight drug trafficking and guerrillas.

The US has also financed Uribe's Plan Patriota, a 16,000-soldier military offensive targeting the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia's jungle hideouts.

"It's a tough fight, but the United States has been providing: economic, and military, assistance of roughly $600 million a year. We would hope to sustain something like that because we know that this is a long fight. But we believe that we have a Colombian Government that is being successful in fighting these scourges against democracy,” she said to El Tiempo.

R Castellanos Columbian Army with
U.S. Southern Command Army Gen. Bantz J. Craddock during a visit to the Sumapaz region near Bogota, Colombia, Wednesday, May 11, 2005.