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74 A.B.A. J. 62 (1988)
Ohhhhh, Miami

handle is hein.journals/abaj74 and id is 496 raw text is: i A A BY DAVE VON DREHLE eal Sonnett's latest client is the dictatorial ruler of Panama, Gen. Manuel Antonio Noriega. Alleged crime: Turning his nation into a free zone for gunrunners and cocaine smugglers, a service for which he was paid handsomely in million- dollar bribes. When his deal threat- ened to go sour, Noriega is supposed to have enlisted Fidel Castro as his emissary to the smugglers. Meanwhile, Jose Quinon handles the trial of neo-Nazi Carlos Lehder, a man with a life-sized nude statue of John Lennon at his home in Colom- bia. Alleged crime: Buying a Baham- ian island and turning it into a clearinghouse for cocaine on behalf of a cartel of Colombian drug lords that is the world's richest organized crime ring. And Roy Black advises a shad- owy CIA operative under investiga- tion, but not yet charged. Suspected crime: Recruiting double agents on behalf of the Cuban government. These are cases with every- thing-headlines, drama, stimula- tion and big fees. What more could a criminal defense attorney desire? In- credibly, cases like these seem to grow on the swaying palm trees of the sub- tropical city that Sonnett, Quinon and Black call home. Is it any wonder they love Miami? Miami is, they say, a criminal de- Dave Von Drehle is a reporter for the Miami Herald. fense attorney's paradise a Shan- gri-la of sophisticated sin; a Valhalla of exotic vice; where money, geog- raphy and politics combine to pro- duce a boggling banquet of crime. Where the case of a lifetime is old news by the end of the week. A criminal lawyer's dream come true, says Black, a homegrown ge- nius of cross-examination who is among the best of South Florida's burgeoning defense bar. What inter- ests the true professional are the most unusual and arcane cases, and that's what we have in Miami. Take my practice right now, Black continues. I have no major trials going, but I'm working with a CIA agent who is under investigation for running double agents into Cuba. I'm working with a number of local elected officials who have some trou- ble with the FBI. And I'm talking to several prominent foreign officials who may be looking at indictments. Most jurisdictions are indicting peo- ple who do burglaries or boost cars. Quinon agrees. Two years ago, I got a case where the guy was in- dicted for conspiracy to import 300 kilos of coke. But it didn't stop there. It turned out he intended to use the profits to kill the president of Hon- duras. You don't see that kind of case anywhere else. The pages of the local newspa- pers are filled with an endless saga of unusual crime and spectacular trials. In recent weeks, for example, the Miami Herald scrambled to keep up with enough dream cases to last a decade in most American cities: the trial of Carlos Lehder-America's most important drug case; the brib- ery trial of Alberto San Pedro, the Grand Corruptor, whose influence reached all the way to the governor's bathroom; the latest installment of the River Cops saga, the nation's most expansive police scandal since Pro- hibition; the first-ever indictment of a foreign head of state by a U.S. grand jury; the return to Miami of fugitive Orlando Bosch, patriot or terrorist, still believed by many to have mas- terminded the 1976 bombing of a Cu- ban airliner in which 73 were killed as an anti-Castro gesture. And there is more where that came from. The rumor wire is humming with word that top Haitian officials are under investigation by federal agents in Miami. Published leaks say that the Honduran Army brass may be in for the same treatment. Meanwhile, local police are ham- mering away at the usual supply of dramatic murders. Like the case of social pillar Stanley Cohen, whose wife refused to let police examine her husband's corpse for half a day while she consulted with her lawyer. And the case of millionaire Don Aronow, designer of the super-fast speedboats preferred by cocaine smugglers, who was gunned down by a calm stranger in a brand-new black luxury sedan. In spite of it all, Miami's civic ti- tans squeal with outrage at the image of their city as a hive of crime. When The New York Times recently put Miami on the cover of its Sunday magazine-A City Beset with Drugs and Violence, said the headline-a squad of boosters hopped the next 62 ABA JOURNAL I APRIL 1. 1988Photo Greater Miami Convention and Visitors Bureau 62 ABA JOURNAL / APRIL 1, 1988 Photo; Greater Miami Convention and Visitors Bureau

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