Velez v. Nelson, Civ. No. B-78-260
| Decision Date | 31 July 1979 |
| Docket Number | B-78-229 and B-78-349.,Civ. No. B-78-260 |
| Citation | 475 F. Supp. 865 |
| Court | U.S. District Court — District of Connecticut |
| Parties | Raymond Bayron VELEZ, Petitioner, v. W. R. NELSON, Warden, Federal Correctional Institution, Danbury, Ct., Griffin Bell, U.S. Attorney General, United States. Efran Morales CABAN, Petitioner, v. W. R. NELSON, Warden, Federal Correctional Institution, Danbury, Ct., Griffin Bell, U.S. Attorney General, United States. Pedro ROSADO, Petitioner, v. W. R. NELSON, Warden, Federal Correctional Institution, Danbury, Ct., Griffin Bell, U.S. Attorney General, United States. |
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Raymond Bayron Velez, David S. Golub (appointed), Ernest Teitell, Stamford, Conn., pro hac vice, Efran Morales Caban, Andrew B. Bowman, Federal Public Defender, Steven B. Duke, Dennis E. Curtis, Yale Law School, New Haven, Conn., Eric Freedman, Robert Suomola, Law School Interns, for plaintiffs.
Richard Blumenthal, U. S. Atty., Diana Garfield, Asst. U. S. Atty., New Haven, Conn., for defendants.
Petitioners Raymond Bayron Velez, Efran Morales Caban, and Pedro Rosado, American citizens, are in the custody of the United States serving the remainder of Mexican-imposed sentences pursuant to the American-Mexican Treaty on the Execution of Penal Sentences, Nov. 25, 1976, T.I.A.S. No. 8717 (Treaty).1 While incarcerated at F.C.I., Danbury, petitioners filed the instant actions for habeas corpus relief challenging their custody in the United States under the Treaty. Petitioners specifically contend that the intolerable conditions surrounding their arrest and confinement in Mexico effectively coerced them into consenting to transfer to this country. The government in response maintains that the duress admittedly experienced by petitioners fails to render their consent to transfer involuntary. Thus, this Court addresses the essentially factual issue of the voluntariness of petitioners' consents.2 Schneckloth v. Bustamonte, 412 U.S. 218, 226, 9 S.Ct. 2041, 36 L.Ed.2d 854 (1973); U. S. v. Thompson, 356 F.2d 216, 226 (2d Cir. 1965).
II.
The following facts are virtually undisputed.3 Petitioners Caban and Velez became acquainted while flying from New York City to Acapulco, Mexico in November of 1975. While stopping over in Mexico City, six armed men in civilian dress arrested petitioners.4 The men did not produce an arrest warrant. Nevertheless, they detained, searched and interrogated petitioners at the Mexico City airport.5 Caban was handcuffed and his legs bound. When, in response to questioning, he denied knowing a certain individual, an electric cattle prod was applied repeatedly to his mouth and testicles. The interrogators beat Caban with their fists and threatened to kill him. Unable to extract a positive identification, they hung Caban by one arm from the ceiling for the entire day. As a result, he suffered intermittent loss of consciousness, his arm broke, and his hand ripped apart from his wrist.6 During this time, Velez was heard screaming in a nearby room as he received similar treatment.7 Confessions were not forthcoming, however, and the men took petitioners to an interrogation center in Mexico City known as Los Separos.
On the same day, petitioner Rosado was arrested in a similar manner after arriving in Acapulco on a direct flight from New York City.8 The arresting men transported Rosado to Los Separos as well. There, he was shown an individual with a battered face, whom he did not know. He later learned his name was Caban. He heard constant screaming. Under these circumstances, the interrogators asked Rosado if "he was ready to tell the truth." (Tr. 52, Nov. 20, 1978). Rosado asked the nature of the information sought. In response, the interrogators beat him, ordered him to drop his pants, and applied the electric cattle prod to the lower parts of his body. Simultaneously, they put a plastic cover over Rosado's head and began to choke him. Rosado was on the verge of passing out but they continued to interrogate and beat him.9 Petitioner maintained his innocence throughout.
The petitioners remained confined at Los Separos for eight days. They were imprisoned in tiny cells. Cement slabs served as beds, the stench of human excretion permeated, and the food was inedible. Each day, the authorities subjected petitioners to further torture.10
On the eighth day, November 26, petitioners were taken to the district attorney's office in Los Separos. The prosecutor showed them individually drafted confessions which stated that they were guilty of conspiring to import and possess narcotics, and told them that signing the statements was in their best interest. Each petitioner refused and instead offered their own. At no time during the apparent arrest and subsequent interrogation and detention had the authorities appraised petitioners of the charges against them or permitted them to obtain legal counsel.
Petitioners soon found themselves being transported to Lecumberri, a Mexican prison commonly known as the "Black Castle." At Lecumberri, petitioners were crowded into small, unheated, windowless cells.11 With the approval of the prison administration, a group of inmates known as the "Major" and his men controlled through terror the other inmates. They forced petitioners to work "faena," whereby for hours at a time, prisoners would squat and move across the prison floor wiping up the soap and water which the guards deliberately poured over them. Failure to move quickly or steadily resulted in crippling punishment.12 In addition, they required petitioners to pay large sums for the basic necessities including food, clothing, and cell space, and to escape "faena." Every day, the Major's men would beat openly those inmates who were unable to make the requisite payments. Petitioners obtained large sums of money from their families to meet the weekly payment schedule.13
In December of 1975, after nearly one month at Lecumberri, petitioners for the first time were notified of the formal charges against them.14 The guards brought petitioners to "los hugados," where a Judge's secretary, amidst a noisy and chaotic setting, advised them that they were charged formally with conspiring to import cocaine. Petitioners, unable financially to afford the exorbitant fees requested by local counsel, denied the charges on their own behalf.15 The proceeding lasted approximately ten minutes and was not recorded.
The following month, petitioners attended a second proceeding at "los hugados." There, the same law secretary read from a document which appeared to be analogous to an indictment. The law secretary offered Caban assistance regarding the charges in return for payment, but Caban refused. In addition, the presiding prosecutor presented for petitioners' ratification falsely signed versions of the confessions that petitioners had refused previously to sign at Los Separos. Each petitioner disclaimed the confession and signed the charges as required to preserve their appellate rights.
Two weeks later, the authorities brought petitioners to "los hugados," on a third occasion allegedly for the purpose of trial. However, no judge or jury was present. The law secretary merely read the charges and asked the three arresting officers present to verify them, which they did. The secretary refused to allow petitioners, who did not have counsel, the opportunity to speak and offer evidence on their own behalf or cross-examine the officers. The proceedings lasted less than fifteen minutes.
Petitioners remained imprisoned at Lecumberri nearly eight months before the authorities again called them to "los hugados." The secretary on this occasion summarily informed petitioners that they had been found guilty of conspiring to import cocaine and that each petitioner had been sentenced to nine years.16 The judge, who purportedly had convicted and sentenced petitioners, was not present. In fact, during the four proceedings, petitioners never had come in contact with the presiding judge.17 The petitioners remained confined at Lecumberri until it was closed down in October of 1976. They were then taken to Oriente prison, a more modern facility. However, after petitioners had spent ten months there, they were transferred to an old prison, Santa Marta, in July of 1977.
The conditions at Santa Marta resembled those at Lecumberri. When petitioners arrived, they were placed in the hole, an extremely cold cell which had neither light, heat, nor windows. Petitioners soon became aware of the notorious "Fourth Guard," the Santa Marta counterpart of the Major and his men. During one of the first nights in the hole, petitioners heard screaming from an adjacent cell. They learned that an inmate, who had disobeyed the Guard's unwritten rules, had been stabbed repeatedly. The inmate was left in the hole without medical attention and subsequently died. On another occasion, the Guard viciously beat an American prisoner in front of petitioners in order to teach them a lesson. These beatings occurred regularly.18
Moreover, as in Lecumberri, the prison officials in conjunction with the Guard would demand monetary payment in return for basic life necessities. In petitioners' case, the sub-director of the prison demanded two thousand dollars from each petitioner in return for removing them from the hole.19 The petitioners stated that they would pay the promised payment. However, petitioners were unable to make the promised payment. They believed that as a result, the Fourth Guard would kill them.
It was at this time that representatives of the United States government approached petitioners about the possibility of transferring to the United States to serve the remainder of their sentences. They presented petitioners with an information booklet (Ptrs. exh. 1) and spoke with them about the terms of the Treaty. In addition, attorneys from the Federal Public Defender's Office advised petitioners individually of the...
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Rosado v. Civiletti
...he concluded, "petitioners would have signed anything, regardless of the consequences, to get out of Mexico." Velez v. Nelson, 475 F.Supp. 865, 874 (D.Conn.1979) (footnote omitted). 10 In view of our duty to make an independent determination of the voluntariness of petitioners' consents to ......
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Connally v. Reno
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