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Saturday, July 26, 2008

N.M. Has Had Some Colorful Cases

By Journal Staff Report

      The following are memorable cases FBI agents have investigated in New Mexico. The information comes from the FBI and Albuquerque Journal archives.
    ■ 1949: The FBI learned that the secret of how the atomic bomb was built had been stolen and turned over to a foreign power. A German-born British atomic scientist, a Philadelphia chemist, a U.S. Army soldier, a former Soviet vice-consul in New York City, a Naval Ordnance engineer and a radar engineer were identified as being involved in the spy network that was stealing secrets out of Los Alamos National Laboratory, where the bomb had been engineered. Americans Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were identified as the leaders of the network and were executed.
    ■ 1950: Doña Ana County Sheriff A.L. "Happy" Apodaca and former State Police Chief Hubert Beasley were convicted of federal civil rights charges in connection with torturing a black man to obtain a murder confession.
    ■ 1969: Robert Bolivar DePugh, acknowledged leader of the Minutemen, a militant anti-communist group formed in the early 60s, and one of his assistants were arrested near Truth or Consequences for their involvement in a bank robbery conspiracy with seven Seattle men. The men planned to rob three banks across the country to finance the group's activities.
    ■ 1971: New Mexico State Police officer Robert Rosenbloom was fatally shot as he was driving back to Albuquerque along Nine Mile Hill. Nineteen days later, three men believed to be the killers hijacked a TWA flight and flew to Cuba. The men never faced charges in New Mexico.
    ■ 1972: Four-year-old Barbara Jean Coca was abducted from a relative's home while visiting in Albuquerque. A wrong number dialed by an individual apparently reached the victim, who answered the telephone. The caller, realizing help was needed, contacted the telephone company. By keeping an open line on the telephone and using sirens on FBI cars to establish the child's whereabouts, Coca was rescued.
    ■ 1979: Four armed men entered the caverns at Carlsbad Caverns National Park, taking a park employee hostage and trapping 105 visitors in an adjacent area. The captors demanded $1 million and flight passage to Brazil. FBI agents negotiated the release of the park employee and a newspaper reporter who also had been taken hostage. The hostage-takers surrendered.
    ■ 1980: Eugene Aloys Tafoya was arrested in Truth or Consequences after Libyan exchange student Faisal Abdulaze Zagallai was shot at least twice in the head. FBI agents found materials at Tafoya's home that led to identification of Libyan terrorist networks in the United States.
    ■ 1985: Ed Howard, a former CIA spy who later went to work for the New Mexico Legislative Finance Committee, fled to Russia. The FBI learned he sold several government secrets to Russia, including the identities of several U.S. intelligence agents. While the FBI was investigating him. Howard was able to elude FBI surveillance and flee the country.
    ■ 2000: Los Alamos scientist Wen Ho Lee, suspected of espionage for the Chinese, was indicted on 59 counts related to copying classified information with intent to harm the United States. He pleaded guilty to one count of mishandling classified information and was sentenced to time served. Lee had spent nine months in solitary confinement.
    ■ 2006: Two former state treasurers were convicted and sent to prison as a result of an FBI investigation into public corruption. Michael Montoya, the former state treasurer, pleaded guilty to extortion and admitted to taking more than $2 million in kickbacks. Robert Vigil was forced out of office as the elected treasurer after being convicted of attempted extortion. Vigil is serving a 37-month sentence. Montoya was sentenced to 40 months.