Jury decision is victory for Simón Trinidad

After deliberations, on Oct. 4 a Washington, D.C., jury did not agree with the United States government’s charge of drug trafficking against Colombian Ricardo Palmera. This verdict forced Federal U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth to declare a mistrial in the case.

Palmera, whose nom de guerre is Simón Trinidad, was the peace negotiator of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia-People’s Army, FARC-EP. He has been incommunicado in U.S. federal prison since he was illegally extradited from his homeland on Dec. 31, 2004, on charges of kidnapping, terrorism and drug trafficking.

The trial, which began last Aug. 20, was meant to “prove” that Trinidad—and therefore the FARC-EP—were involved in the cocaine trade. He had been accused of conspiracy in the production and smuggling of drugs. It was part of the U.S. demonization campaign and all-out war against the Colombian insurgency because this insurgency and the unarmed social movement in Colombia are the defenders of that country’s sovereignty and are preventing the robbery of their country’s vast resources by rapacious transnational companies, predominantly those from the U.S.

The current neoliberal Colombian government, allied to the U.S. government, is selling out the country’s resources to foreign companies while privatizing essential services like health care and education, leaving the majority of the population in dire need.

In its quest to win a conviction and consequently toughen the war against the FARC-EP, the U.S. government, which did not have a shred of evidence against Trinidad, used mostly paid informants from Colombia, who gave implausible and ridiculous “facts” in their testimony.

The government’s case was based only on their alleged finding of a laboratory for the processing of cocaine in the region of San Vicente del Caguán between 1998 and 2002. Since this zone was previously controlled by the FARC-EP and Trinidad was a key member in the peace negotiations that were held in that zone with then-Colombian President Andrés Pastrana, the U.S. government illogically concluded that Trinidad was involved in the drug trade.

The prosecution brought 20 witnesses from Colombia, among them several who are said to have been in the FARC-EP, but have now joined Colombian President Álvaro Uribe’s program of demobilization.

But the prosecution did not have any physical evidence. None. No documents. No videos. No photos. Only the untrusted word of these unreliable witnesses.

The prosecution tried to use the terrible drug crisis affecting so many poor communities in the U.S. During his opening, Jim Faulkner, the prosecutor, mentioned that 75 percent of the Colombian cocaine reaches the U.S. and that this cocaine is used to produce crack cocaine.

In spite of this, the mostly African-American jury handed a victory to Trinidad and a defeat to the U.S. government. Seven of the jury members voted for Trinidad’s innocence, and according to an article in the Colombian newspaper El Tiempo, of the five who believed he was guilty, “even they had doubts.”

This trial is the third for Trinidad in U.S. District Court in Washington. The two previous ones were for the charges of kidnapping and terrorism.

In a moral victory for the FARC-EP and Trinidad, the first trial had to be declared a mistrial because the jury did not reach a unanimous verdict. This, in spite of 21 witnesses and mountains of videos, photos and documents that the government hoped would “prove” their case.

Before the second trial began, the judge in the first trial had to recuse himself because of preferential treatment towards the prosecution. It was only in a second trial that, after fierce attempts by the prosecution, Trinidad was pronounced guilty of “conspiracy to take hostages” mainly because he is a member of the FARC-EP.