DEAsupervisor exposes cover-up U.S. agents' role/mass murder

House of Death exploded by former DEA supervisor's revelation
By Bill Conroy,

Posted on Fri Feb 18th, 2005 at 12:28:42 AM EST

A startling claim has surfaced in a document filed in federal court by a former DEA supervisor. The claim raises serious questions about a U.S. Attorney’s handling of evidence in the case of accused murderer and drug-trafficker Heriberto Santillan-Tabares.

Former DEA agent Sandalio Gonzalez drops the bombshell on the U.S. Attorney’s Office in San Antonio in one short paragraph tucked into the pleadings of an employment discrimination case he has pending against the Department of Justice.

Gonzalez, who, until his retirement last month, oversaw the DEA’s El Paso field office, makes the following assertion in a motion filed earlier this week in federal district court in Miami:

On August 20, 2004, Defendant (the Department of Justice) continued to retaliate against Plaintiff (Gonzalez) for exercising his protected rights by issuing him a Performance Appraisal Record that was a downgrade from his previous outstanding appraisal due to Defendant’s unfounded allegations that Plaintiff exercised “extremely poor judgment” when Plaintiff issued a letter to the Special Agent in Charge of the Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), El Paso, Texas Field Office, and the Office of the United States Attorney (USAO), Western District of Texas, expressing his “frustration and outrage” at the mishandling of an informant in a drug investigation that resulted in several preventable murders in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico and endangered the lives of DEA Special Agents and their families assigned to duty in Mexico.

In plain English, Gonzalez claims he was retaliated against by DEA brass because he ruffled the feathers of a big-shot U.S. Attorney in San Antonio, according to sources.

The reason Gonzalez was slapped for writing the letter, according to the sources, is that the U.S. Attorney’s Office in San Antonio was concerned that it “created discoverable material” in the Santillan murder case.

“The U.S. Attorney’s Office cannot prosecute someone for murders that could have been prevented by the government,” explains one law enforcement source.

In other words, Gonzalez’ letter, which was penned sometime in February 2004, represents evidence that the government screwed up, and the U.S. Attorney’s Office didn’t want that letter being thrown in their faces during a trial. As a result, Gonzalez was told to shut up, his work record tarnished in retaliation and the letter buried -- until now.

Although the actual letter sent by Gonzalez to the U.S. Attorney’s Office has not yet surfaced, it’s a sure bet it soon will, now that court documents reveal that such a letter does exist -- a fact that prosecutors in the case can no longer hide.

The murders

U.S. prosecutors allege Santillan is a top lieutenant in Vicente Carrillo Fuentes’ Juárez drug organization. He is charged with cocaine and marijuana smuggling along with five counts of murder allegedly carried out as part of a continuing criminal enterprise – a crime that can get him a death sentence in the U.S. justice system. His case is currently pending in federal district court in San Antonio and is slated for trial in May, after two prior postponements.

A confidential informant, who allegedly had attained high standing within the Juarez organization, played a critical role in snaring Santillan.

The informant’s name is Jesus Contreras, who is also known by the nickname “Lalo.”

Narco News published a major exposé in late April of last year (called The House of Death) that revealed Contreras, as part of his role in infiltrating the Santillan organization, was implicated in a series of murders in Ciudad Juárez -- located just across the border from El Paso, Texas. [more]

http://narcosphere.narconews.com/story/2005/2/18/02845/5390
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ONLINE JOURNAL

Special Report

DEA supervisor exposes cover-up of U.S. agents' role in mass murder in Mexico

By Bill Conroy
Online Journal Contributing Writer

April 1, 2005—DEA supervisor Sandalio Gonzalez hit a nerve when he fired off a letter in February 2005 to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials in El Paso, Texas.

Gonzalez' letter blew the whistle on the alleged cover-up of ICE agents' complicity in multiple murders in the Mexican border town of Ciudad Juárez. The homicides were tied to an investigation into Heriberto Santillan-Tabares, who U.S. prosecutors claim is a top lieutenant in Vicente Carrillo Fuentes' Juárez drug organization.

Santillan has been charged with cocaine and marijuana smuggling along with five counts of murder—a crime that can get him a death sentence in the U.S. justice system. His case is currently pending in federal district court in San Antonio, Texas, and is slated for trial in May.

A confidential informant, who allegedly had attained high standing within the Juárez organization, played a critical role in snaring Santillan. The informant's name is Jesus Contreras, who is also known by the nickname "Lalo."

Between August 2003 and mid-January 2004, a dozen people were tortured, murdered and then buried in the yard of a house in the Mexican border town of Ciudad Juárez. Contreras, according to sources, participated in many of those murders.

The informant's handlers, agents and supervisors with the El Paso office of ICE, were allegedly fully aware of Contreras' complicity in the murders, yet did nothing to stop the killing for fear of jeopardizing the Santillan case and a separate cigarette-smuggling case that they were trying to make with the informant's help.

The Santillan case falls under the jurisdiction of U.S. Attorney Johnny Sutton, who is considered to be "wired" into the current Bush
administration. Sutton, a former policy coordinator for the Bush-Cheney Transition Team, served as the Criminal Justice Policy director from 1995-2000 for then-Governor George W. Bush.

On Jan. 14, 2004, the door was blown wide open on the death-house
operation in Juárez. That day, three people were tortured and murdered, but not before one of them gave up an address to a marijuana stash house in Juarez. Santillan's operatives went to the house and banged on the door.

But it was the wrong door. It was not the home of a drug dealer, but rather of a DEA agent and his family. That knock on the door set off a sequence of events that led to the agent and his family being confronted by Mexican police on the payroll of Santillan. [more]
http://www.onlinejournal.com/Special_Reports/040105Conroy/040105conroy.html

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