Gómez spoke December 12 as federal prosecutors were demanding in hearings before U.S. District Court Judge Joan Lenard that the harshest sentences possible be imposed on the five. The press conference took place as court proceedings on the sentencing of the Cuban patriots, imprisoned on a range of frame-up charges from "conspiracy to commit espionage" and "conspiracy to commit murder," got under way.

Gerardo Hernández, the first to be sentenced, faces life imprisonment. All objections by Hernández's attorneys to stiffer sentencing guidelines were rejected by Judge Lenard.

The press conference was sponsored by the Antonio Maceo Brigade; Alianza Martiana; Alliance of Workers of the Cuban Community; Casa de las Americas in New York; the Cuban-American Coalition; the Cuban-American Defense League; Rescate Cultural Afro-Cubano; the Miami Coalition to End the U.S. Embargo of Cuba; and the International Action Center.

Speaking of the five Cubans, former U.S. attorney general Ramsey Clark sent a statement explaining that the "federal authorities who have accused them well know that their mission was to defend their country against violent attacks." Clark added that over the past four decades, "countless attacks on Cuba, many with deadly consequences, have originated from Florida.... Truth, justice, and peace can only be truly served by releasing these five Cubans and freeing them to return to their country."

The courtroom was packed with people for the sentencing hearings. On the prosecution side of the courtroom were seated several FBI agents along with relatives of the four rightists who piloted planes of the counterrevolutionary outfit Brothers to the Rescue.

On the other side were family members of four of the Cuban prisoners who flew in from Cuba. These included Carmen Nordelo, the mother of Gerardo Hernández; Magali Llort, mother of Fernando González; Irma Sehwerert and Irmita González, mother and older daughter of Rene González; and Mirta Rodríguez, mother of Antonio Guerrero. Ramón Labaniño's wife, Elizabeth Palmeiro, did not receive a U.S. visa in time to come to the hearing.

At the Miami court house Carmen Nordelo said that her son "was just trying to protect his country. He is not a criminal." "Our sons did nothing wrong," agreed Magali Llort, mother of Fernando González. "They were defending their country...they are patriots."

Despite six months of solitary confinement, all five Cuban patriots entered the packed hearing room in high spirits, smiling and waving at family and friends, who reciprocated in kind.  
 
Frame-up convictions
In 1998, the FBI announced it had discovered a "Cuban spy network" in Florida and arrested 10 people. They were charged with trying to "infiltrate" the U.S. Southern Command, passing U.S. "military secrets" to Havana, and "infiltrating and "disrupting" right-wing Cuban-American groups in Miami that seek to overthrow the revolutionary government of Cuba. The charge of "conspiracy to commit murder" was added later.

The arrests and convictions of the five constituted an attack directed not only at revolutionary Cuba but at democratic rights in the United States. FBI agents broke into their homes repeatedly over the three years prior to the arrests, violating the Fourth Amendment protection against arbitrary search and seizure. The prosecution "evidence" consisted of information the FBI claimed to have collected in these raids, and from short-wave radio transmissions assertedly intercepted between Havana and the defendants. The judge refused a defense motion to move the trial out of Miami. And the big-business media all but convicted the five as spies even before the trial began.

The FBI has also arrested and jailed Ana Belen Montes, a senior analyst for the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency, for allegedly providing classified information to the Cuban government. FBI break-ins into Montes's apartment and electronic eavesdropping are also featured in government actions against her.

On June 8, a jury in a federal courtroom here handed down guilty verdicts against the five men on all 23 charges of "spying" for the government of Cuba. Hernández was found guilty of the unprecedented charge of "conspiracy to commit murder" for allegedly providing Cuban authorities with flight plans of the four Brothers to the Rescue pilots whose planes were shot down in 1996. A number of defense witnesses offered ample evidence that these rightists repeatedly violated Cuban airspace and refused to heed warnings to head back before they were downed near Havana.

Three of the Cuban patriots--Gerardo Hernández, Ramón Labaniño, and Antonio Guerrero--were convicted of "conspiracy to commit espionage" and "conspiracy to act as an unregistered foreign agent" and could get life imprisonment. Fernando González and Rene González, convicted of "conspiracy to act as an unregistered foreign agent," face possible 10-year sentences.

The defense argued that the five men on trial were seeking information, all of which was available to the public, about the terrorist Cuban-American groups in Miami in order to prevent further attacks on Cuba. The Cuban government also issued a statement, published in the June 20 issue of the Cuban daily Granma, saying the five Cubans were part of an operation to "discover and report on terrorist plans hatched against our people."

A national Free the Miami Five committee and affiliated local groups have publicized the case, including through public meetings in California, New York, Florida, and elsewhere.

As the Militant went to press on December 12, Judge Joan Lenard sentenced Gerardo Hernández to life without parole.

Rebecca Arenson is reporting from Miami. Patrick O'Neill is reporting from New York.  
 
 
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