“After five days in the trunk, they were freezing, exhausted and louse-infested…”
The ENQUIRER gets first look inside new Super-Feds reality show!
Hollywood is buzzing over a hot new reality TV show that’s “COPS,” “America’s Most Wanted” and “CSI” all rolled into one!
A group of retired federal agents are pitching a program that takes viewers behind the scenes of America’s biggest criminal cases through documents, secret photos and shocking videotapes.
In this exclusive ENQUIRER sneak peek, Martin Ficke, who served as the Special Agent in Charge New York Field Division for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), reveals details of three headline-making busts.
CASE OF THE NORTE VALLE CARTEL:
The Colombian Norte Valle Cartel smuggled 1.2 million pounds of cocaine worth more than $10 billion into the U.S., but getting the money back to Colombia proved their undoing.
To sidestep federal regulations requiring detailed paperwork for large wire transfers, a network of New York-based money wire stores sent the loot to Colombia, claiming it came from numerous individuals sending small amounts.
ICE special agent Romedio Viola was able to prove the store owners were part of a vast money laundering network, and the money trail led to the top of the Norte Valle Cartel in Colombia.
Cartel kingpin Arcangel de Jesus Henao Montoya, known as “El Mocho” or “The Amputee,” was extradited to New York in January 2004 – and special agent Viola was at his side to lead him to prison.
THECASE OF OLYMPIC STAR MARION JONES
Olympic gold medalist Marion Jones was the fastest woman in the world, but she couldn’t outrun investigators when they discovered she was part of a huge money laundering ring!
Incredibly, by 2006, the sprinter who once raked in up to $80,000 a race was heavily in debt and popped up on the radar of the El Dorado Task Force, the nation’s largest multiagency money laundering task force.
By July of that year, criminal charges were filed against Jones for her involvement in a money laundering scheme, including a $25,000 check that was deposited into her bank account.
Jones pleaded guilty to lying about her knowledge of the scheme and using steroids to El Dorado lead investigator, special agent Erik Rosenblatt, in 2007. She was later sentenced to six months in prison for perjury. She was also forced to return her Olympic medals for using steroids.
THE CASEOF THE RUDDER TRUNK
In January 1991, a pair of drug smugglers planted themselves and three duffel bags stuffed with $4.2 million of cocaine into the rudder trunk – a six-foot-wide pocket above a ship’s rudder – of the oil tanker Bright Eagle before it left Cartagena, Colombia, for New York.
They planned to swim to shore with the cocaine once the ship docked but were nailed by a Ficke-led operation.
“They had food and the propellers churned up fresh air,” he said.
“But after five days in the trunk, they were freezing, exhausted and louse-infested.”
