The Foreign Service Journal, September 2005

F O C U S 40 F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L / S E P T E M B E R 2 0 0 5 Belize definitely falls into the “something else” cate- gory. The small U.S. mission to this former British colony is housed in a quaint, wooden building near the Caribbean coast. In effect, it ends up straddling what are almost two separate nations inside this tiny country of 280,000 people. The poor and violent Belize City is plagued by gun crimes, the latest trend being “pedal-by” shootings, gangland-style assassinations by bicycle-riding gunmen. The other side is what the predominantly American tourists see, where snorkelers and windsurfers dot the clear blue waters around sun-kissed islands. While some fugitives appreciate the chaos of the capital, most are drawn by the sun. “The fugitives come for the same reasons as the tourists,” says Gerald Westby, Belize’s police commissioner. “It’s English-speaking and close to Mexico.” A fter an Ecuadorian named Angel Mariscal was arrested in Miami in September 2002, police searching his house found almost 500 hours of videotape depicting children having sex. For U.S. postal investigators trying to crack a mail-order child pornography ring, this was a huge breakthrough. But when they sat down to examine the tapes, they became concerned. The footage had apparently all been filmed in Cuba. With no U.S. diplomatic presence in Cuba, authorities feared that it could complicate the prosecution. After all, the Cuban government, which harbors dozens of American fugitives, rarely cooperates with U.S. law enforcement. Indeed, U.S. diplomats there are routinely harassed by Cuban security ser- vices. And the State Department publicly accuses Havana of tol- erating widespread child prostitution and trafficking in children. It fell to Patrick Durkin, the Regional Security Officer (and the only Diplomatic Security agent) in the U.S. Interests Section in Havana, to try to persuade Cuba to assist in the sensitive inquiry. “It was lose-lose for them,” he says. “If they didn’t cooperate, it would confirm that they make no effort to combat the problem. If they did, they could expose themselves to a problem they don’t acknowledge — sexual tourism.” When Durkin first viewed stills from the tapes, he immediately recognized several Cuban landmarks; one was a high-rise on his morning commute. The most heartbreaking clips showed very young, naked Cuban girls with forlorn expressions. In all, some 120 girls and boys were shown exposing themselves or having sex with Mariscal and two other adults. It turned out later that some of the girls were under 12 years old — the youngest was 7. The tapes had been made over the course of several years — and some of the same girls showed up over and over. Mariscal had been charging as much as $1,000 per tape. But to make an airtight case, Durkin needed evidence that placed Mariscal in Cuba — and, more importantly, positively iden- tified at least some of the children as real people and verified their ages. Authorities also hoped that the Cuban police would arrest Mariscal’s local accomplices. It could have gone either way, but after a series of diplomatic meetings, Cuba decided to cooperate. “It goes up to the top,” says Durkin. Cuban leader Fidel Castro “has to sign off on it.” After several months of negotia- tions and investigation, the Cubans were able to supply copious detail on Mariscal’s move- ments in Cuba, from immigration to hotel records. “They had every phone call over seven years,” he says. “They keep everything down there.” Establishing the exact times that Mariscal was in Cuba was key to placing him at the scene, because many of the videos had dates electronically embedded in them. Authorities also helped identify the victims and some of Mariscal’s associates. Durkin even did some sleuthing on his own, photographing the landmarks from the sites and some of the rooms where the sex scenes were filmed. Then came the most sensitive part: the Justice Department wanted Durkin to interview some of the victims so that he could testify at Mariscal’s sentencing. The Cuban government agreed, but set several conditions, permitting only gentle questions and requiring the girls’ fathers to be present for the sessions at a Cuban protocol office. He ended up interviewing two girls and one little boy. Durkin was limited to seven questions for each child, includ- ing their names, ages and whether or not they remember meeting Mariscal. “The kids were tentative and scared,” says Durkin. “I told them they didn’t do anything bad.” One 14-year old girl, who first appeared in Mariscal’s tapes when she was 9, told him that her aunt introduced her to Mariscal. “She is probably scarred for life,” Durkin says. One father broke down and started weeping during the session. Even worse, medical tests had revealed that Mariscal was HIV- positive. It was Durkin’s job to inform the Cuban government, which later claimed that the girls all tested negative. “Let’s hope that’s accurate,” he says. At his trial, Mariscal was found guilty. On Sept. 24, 2004, he was sentenced to 100 years in jail. At the sentencing, Judge Cecilia Altonaga said his crimes were so reprehensible “that it gravitates at or near the bottom rung of human behavior.” — Kevin Whitelaw Unlikely Allies It fell to the RSO to try to persuade Cuba to assist in the sensitive inquiry.