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One of the two owners of the DC9
(tail number N900SA) busted at an
airport in Ciudad del Carmen in
the state of Campeche, Mexico last
week freighted 5.5 tons of cocaine
had been appointed in 2003 to the
Business Advisory Council of the
National Republican Congressional
Committee by then-Congressional
Majority Leader Tom Delay, The
MadCowMorningNews can
exclusively report.
The
plane's registered owner, “Royal
Sons LLC,” a Florida air charter
company, was at one time housed
in a hanger at the Venice Fl. Airport
owned
by infamous flight school Huffman
Aviation.
Also of major significance is the
fact that photos of the DC9, seized
last Monday in Ciudad del Carmen,
reveal that the plane is painted
with the distinctive
blue and white color color scheme
of official U.S. Government planes.
Moreover, to reinforce the effect,
or subterfuge, the plane carries
an
official-looking Seal painted on
its side, which reads: SKY
WAY AIRCRAFT, PROTECTION OF AMERICA'S
SKIES, around an image of a federal
eagle clutching the familiar olive
branch in its talons. Many have
been fooled into concluding that
the plane belongs to the U.S. Transportation
Security Administration.
This has obvious and highly
serious national security implications,
which go well beyond the
obvious glee involved in playing
political "gotcha" with
people caught face-down with their
noses buried, Tony Montana-style,
in over five tons of cocaine.
Who, exactly,
are the "Royal Sons?"
The
DC9 was purchased several years
ago in a partnership between "Royal
Sons Motor Yacht Sales, Inc. DBA
Royal Sons" and a company owned
by Brent Kovar called
Skyway Communications Holding Corp,
which jointly signed a loan with
United Bank and Trust Company in
St. Petersburg, FL. for $1.5 million.
Skyway Communication's principal
Kovar must have been looking
well forward to justify
the purchase; the company was then
in the middle of losing $40 million
in less than three years, between
2002 and its last annual report
before bankruptcy in January 2005.
Not that
Tom DeLay seemed to mind. He and
buddy Brent Kovar's press release
deserves special mention.
"Congressman
Tom Delay, Majority Leader, has
appointed Brent C Kovar to serve
as the Honorary Chairman, Business
Advisory Council,” read the headline
of an August 7, 2003 release from
PrimeZone Media newswire and press
release service. 
The Business
Advisory Council, explained the
release, was part of the National
Republican Congressional Committee,
“dedicated to making sure that small
business has a voice in Washington.”
Kovar
was appointed “in recognition of
his valuable contributions and dedication
to the Republican Party,” and was
"expected to play a
crucial role in the party's efforts
to involve top businesspeople in
the process of government reform
both at the state and federal levels."
While the release left the
specific nature of Kovar's
"crucial role in the GOP' efforts"
a bit vague, a look at the other
owner of the DC9, dubbed
"Cocaine One," offers
clues which help fill in the blanks.
"Protection
of America's Skies?"
But the "Royal Sons"
connection may prove
even more enlightening...
While
Huffman Aviation's familiar blue-awning
flight school was at 400 E Airport,
its hangar (see picture below)
was several hundred feet down the
runway, at 224 E Airport Ave. Royal
Sons used this same address, apparently
during the same time frame that
the flight school was serving as
the home-away-from-home of terrorist
ringleader Mohamed Atta.
A
close look at Royal Sons reveals
evidence indicating that the firm
is part of a cluster of related
air charter firms being used as
dummy front companies to provide
“cover” for CIA flights.
The companies involved include
Royal Sons, Express One International,
Genesis Aviation and United Flite
Inc.
All four companies appear to be
engaged in an inter-locking and
time-honored Agency scheme going
back 50 years: using frequent cosmetic
transfers of aircraft title to make
positively identifying the ownership
of any one plane at any given time
as difficult as finding the pea
under the shell in a game of three-card
Monte.
While none of the firms has been
identified as a CIA aviation contractor,
they have also not previously been
the focus of the sort of unwelcome
attention that getting caught with
five tons of cocaine provides.
Tell
us again...What happened
to the pilot?
When the story first broke, observers
immediately noted that it was embarrassingly
thin in certain crucial details.
For example, initial reports stated
that the Mexican Army had been waiting
for the plane when it landed.
Yet when Mexican Gen. Carlos Gaytan
held a news conference, he told
reporters that his soldiers had
unfortunately been unable to apprehend
the plane’s pilot.
Somehow,
Houdini-like, the slippery fellow
had gotten away.
Amazingly, the “disappeared"
DC9 pilot who slithered through
a crack in the line of Mexican troops
ringing the airport had also
had the presence of mind to
take his name with him when
he fled. Almost ten days later,
the pilot remains unidentified.
To compensate, General Gaytan quickly
pointed out that his men had, at
least, managed to arrest the plane's
co-pilot. But suspicion
had already been aroused. It seemed
almost exactly like what had happened
when terror flight school owner
Wally Hilliard's Lear jet got busted
with 43 pounds of heroin aboard.
Somehow, his
pilot got off scot-free, too.
"Being connected means never
having to say you're sorry."
Could the reason involve some official
sanction enjoyed by the drug trafficking
operation involved? This explanation
would seem to be ruled out, wouldn't
it, if the traffickers get
caught?
Maybe
not...There's another major "anomaly"
in the story, which points towards
a simpler explanation, which credits
the sharpness and dedication to
their jobs of low-level agents or
grunts, foot soldiers, literally,
in the drug war. The record is replete
with examples of how these people
regularly stumble onto situations
they were never meant to see...like
an illicit but 'protected' operation.
The result is that, sometimes, cases
get made, and people get arrested,
by mistake...
While
initial news accounts indicated
the bust was the result of a tip
to Mexican authorities from U.S.
officials, later reports from reporters
on the scene tell a far different
tale, one indicating that the chain
of events was triggered, not by
high-level contacts between two
vigilant drug-fighting governments,
but by soldiers patrolling the airport.
Only then did local army officials
deploy troops to the airport.
Here's what the soldiers saw: two
Mexican pilots arriving in a small
Falcon business jet and spending
several days conspicuously slouching
around the airport. While they probably
didn't say what for, they didn't
have to... Because they did
offer to pay for the DC-9 to make
an emergency landing, at a time
when the airport was officially
closed.
Du-uh.
John Gotti would had called the
two pilots "fucking dunskies."
Nobody knows what their bosses are
calling them now, but the men would
be well-advised to consider how
it was that they got...literally...caught
holding... while the
gringo pilot got away.
Carrying water for somebody, sure.
But who?
Both of the detained Mexican pilots,
published reports at the end of
last week revealed, were employees
of the Mexican government's Federal
Water Commission. But they may not
be the only pilots drawing government
paychecks who participated in the
massive drug move.
The
pilot of the DC9 may also be cashing
checks which--while not stamped
with Uncle Sam's name on the front--are
still ultimately being drawn from
U.S. government funds.
Another anomaly reinforced
this suspicion. While the Venice
Airport is a tiny facility with
barely a dozen businesses strewn
along the runway, no one we spoke
to at Royal Son's
former Venice Airport address could
recall the company having been there.
Nor did the names of the firms two
principals, Frederic Geffon and
Ron Gregory, ring any bells.
“Royal Sons”
would not be the first
phantom firm
discovered hiding inside Huffman
Aviation.
Britannia
Aviation, once “housed”
inside the flight school, was later
revealed to be all-but non-existent
during a major brouhaha in
Jerry
Falwell’s Lynchburg Virginia
after being awarded, for no apparent
reason aviation observers were able
to fathom, a fat government aviation
contract for which a local Lynchburg
firm was clearly much better qualified.
“Don’t touch my bags if you please, Mr. Custom's Man"
Of course,
as the MadCowMorningNews
has been pointing out to anyone
who'll listen,
Huffman Aviation's
owner Wally Hilliard had his own
Lear jet busted by DEA agents, during
the same month Mohamed Atta arrived
at his flight school, unhappy to
discover 43 pounds of heroin aboard.
The Orlando Sentinel
called it “the
biggest heroin bust in Central Florida
history.”
Two surreal details of the
5-ton cocaine bust deserve mention...
Being connected
to two such world-class
drug busts in a matter of only a
few years does not by itself
indicate that the sleepy
retirement community of blue-haired
widows is about to replace Palermo
or Caracas as the place to
see
and be seen in the international
narcotics trade, it seems fair to
say the tiny rural Venice
Airport is clearly the
“Little Engine
That Could.”
But the
most surreal detail this side of
the Salvador Dali museum is that
the cocaine was packed into 128
identical black suitcases...
Clearly every baggage handler's
worst nightmare.
But the surreal part is this: stenciled
on the side of each of the 128 pieces
of identical black luggage is the
word
“Private."
We're at a loss to
understand what this means. A libertarian
battle cry? Or an admonition
to nosy Customs agents:
“Gentlemen
do not search each other's luggage."
Stay tuned.
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