Part 39

Agents trailed Bourbonnais when he drove from the airport. He drove a devious route to an apartment house in Queens. He stood at the entrance of the building looking furtively about before entering.

“That guy is really jumpy,” an agent remarked to another. “Do you think he knows we are on his tail?”

“I don’t know,” was the answer, “but we’d better drop the surveillance. He’s suspicious of something. He could have spotted us.”

The surveillance was called off temporarily. It wasn’t until later that the agents learned that Bourbonnais’ wariness had nothing to do with narcotics peddling. On this particular occasion he was on his way to a rendezvous with a girl friend--and he merely wanted to be certain that he wasn’t being followed by private detectives hired by his wife.

At the same time, Customs agents began checking into the background of Mauricio Rosal, who they found had been a frequent visitor to the United States. Leafing through old files one day, Agent Mario Cozzi found a report showing that almost twenty years earlier Rosal had been under investigation for alleged smuggling, although nothing had ever been proved against him.

He had arrived in New York City aboard the SS Nyassa on August 9, 1941, carrying papers which identified him as a Guatemalan chargé d’affaires. He had claimed--and been granted--diplomatic courtesies when passing through Customs with his wife. His declaration showed that he was enroute from Lisbon to Mexico City on his way to Honduras.

The Rosals had remained in New York only a few days and then had departed with their seventeen pieces of luggage, none of which was subjected to Customs examination.

A few days after their departure, Customs agents were informed by a tipster that Rosal had carried essential oils worth $40,000 and diamonds worth $37,000 into the city. A diamond dealer was found who admitted that Rosal had brought the diamonds to him and offered to sell them.

“I refused to buy unless Rosal could produce receipts showing he had paid the customs duty,” the dealer said. “When he could not show me a proper clearance from Customs, I turned down his offer.”

Customs, however, had reason to believe that Rosal had disposed of the essential oils and the diamonds before he left the city. Months later, Customs Agent Salvador Pena had interviewed Rosal in Mexico City, inquiring about his reported failure to list the dutiable imports on his declaration.

Rosal blandly admitted he had carried the oils with him in a wooden box. “I brought them over from Vichy for a friend,” he said, “and delivered them to his brother at the Waldorf-Astoria. I was assured the duty had been paid and I never dreamed, of course, there was anything irregular.”

As for the diamonds, Rosal admitted he had approached a dealer and offered to sell him several diamonds. But he insisted that when no agreement was reached, he had taken the gems on to Venezuela, where he had disposed of them. Had he made the sale in New York, he added with a shrug, he would naturally have paid the required customs duty.

There was nothing further that Customs could do about the matter and the case was closed. The report was filed away to gather dust until Rosal’s name was linked with that of Tarditi.

On September 30, six weeks after Cozzi had found the old report, the Sûreté advised the Narcotics Bureau that Rosal and Tarditi had purchased tickets for a flight to New York and it was suspected they would be carrying narcotics. Tarditi was booked to arrive at Idlewild International Airport on October 1, and Rosal was due to arrive a day later. Bourbonnais was scheduled to leave Paris a short time after Tarditi as the steward aboard TWA’s Flight 801.

As the original tip on the case had come to the Narcotics Bureau, the investigation was in the hands of District Director George H. Gaffney, a veteran agent, with Customs playing a supporting role.

Thus began one of the most remarkable cases of Federal agency cooperation in the war against smuggling. Gaffney laid his plans well, and when TWA’s Flight 801 touched down at Idlewild at 5 P.M. on October 1, a squad of Narcotics and Customs agents was waiting to place Tarditi under surveillance. Customs inspectors had been alerted to signal an identification when Tarditi handed over his baggage declaration, and to make only a cursory examination of a single piece of his luggage.

Tarditi stepped from the plane wearing a trench coat and a pork-pie hat set jauntily at an angle. He seemed unconcerned when the inspector asked him to open the single bag he carried to the inspection station. The inspector noted on his declaration that his destination was the Sherry Netherlands Hotel.

And so it was that Tarditi passed through Customs with no hint given that several pairs of eyes were watching every move he made. A porter carried Tarditi’s luggage to a waiting taxi while a radio message was flashed from Idlewild to a squad of agents in midtown Manhattan that the suspect was enroute to the Sherry Netherlands. Agents were instructed to keep him under surveillance when he reached the hotel.

The taxi driver stowed Tarditi’s bag into the trunk of his cab and slid behind the wheel. He said, “Where to, sir?”

Tarditi replied, “To the Savoy Hilton.”

The driver noted the destination on his trip sheet. He also scribbled the words “Savoy Hilton” on a piece of paper which he wadded into the palm of his left hand. The driver was Narcotics Agent Francis Waters.

As Waters drove from the loading platform, he placed his left hand carelessly on the doorframe and dropped the piece of paper from the car window. He noted with satisfaction in the rear-view mirror that the car behind him stopped suddenly and a man jumped out to pick up the note.

At the Savoy Hilton, Tarditi was given Room 1337. The guest in 1339 was a Narcotics Bureau agent.

Bourbonnais arrived on schedule about an hour after Tarditi.

The next afternoon, Sunday, agents were stationed at strategic points when Rosal walked from the Pan American jet and made his way to the Customs barrier where Inspector Pasquale Cammello had been assigned to weigh and clear his luggage.

Discreet inquiries at the State Department in Washington had disclosed that Rosal was not accredited in any way as a diplomat to the United States, and, further, that the Guatemalan embassy knew nothing of his trip to this country.

Under these circumstances, Rosal was travelling as a private citizen with no legitimate right to the courtesies usually accorded visiting diplomats. Nevertheless, he boldly claimed the privilege of immunity for the four suitcases which accompanied him and Inspector Cammello gave no hint that the claim was anything but routine.

Cammello noted that the bags weighed 19, 25, 50 and 52 pounds when he placed them on the scales. He chatted pleasantly with the diplomat and then waved Rosal on his way. A Pan American passenger representative was waiting to drive the Ambassador to the Plaza Hotel near the Savoy Hilton.