The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Jurors told faked info aided Cuban players
Agent charged with trainer in running smuggling network.
The federal trial over the smuggling of Cuban players to the United States has revealed that officials with the U.S. government and Major League Baseball missed a lot of red flags over how the athletes arrived.
Hundreds of documents shown to jurors in the first week of the trial of sports agent Bartolo Hernandez and baseball trainer Julio Estrada in Miami contain what prosecutors say are lies and deceptions intended to illegally speed up the process. The two are charged with conspiracy and alien smuggling and face potentially long prison sentences.
A State Department agent, Bryan Baer, testified Thursday that officials depend on the reliability of these documents to allow Cuban players into the country.
Every one of Hernandez’s Cuban players got into the U.S. and signed a pro contract. Some signed multimillion-dollar deals, such as Jose Abreu of the White Sox and Adeiny Hechavarria of the Marlins.
The roughly two dozen Cuban players represented by Hernandez had to obtain documents from third countries — chiefly Mexico, Haiti and the Dominican Republic — showing they had established residency there and were no longer living in Cuba. Most had defected by boat and were taken captive in smuggling networks overseen by Hernandez and Estrada, prosecutors say.
The players also had to get visas to enter the U.S. and had to prove to MLB officials they were eligible to negotiate contracts as free agents.
But the players’ documents raised many questions, even though they were issued by government agencies and not forged. For example, almost all of them put down the same O-positive blood type. They often listed the same home address in their adopted country. In order to establish residency, they claimed to have what appeared to be phantom jobs, such as “area supervisor” at a Cancun, Mexico, water sports business.
Treasury Department investigator Timothy Smith said there appeared to be too many similarities for the papers to be legitimate.
Marlins: Owner Jeffrey Loria has a “handshake agreement” to sell the team for $1.6 billion, according to Forbes, which cited two unnamed sources. Marlins president David Samson said he had “no comment at all” on the report. Forbes said the agreement is with a real estate developer based in New York who doesn’t have enough cash to buy the team, meaning the deal likely would require more debt than MLB would like. The Associated Press said the deal could fall through because the final price hasn’t been determined.
Pirates: Acquired righthanded reliever Pat Light from Minnesota for a player to be named or cash. Light pitched in 15 games for Minnesota in 2016, going 0-1 with a 9.00 ERA in 14 innings.
Mets: Left-handed reliever Jerry Blevins finalized a $6.5 million, one-year deal to stay with the Mets. He went 4-2 with a 2.79 ERA in a careerhigh 73 games last year.