 Yanny Aguila Urbay, 24 |
In Miami a Palestinian national and a Cuban migrant negotiated with undercover police officers last year to buy 300 high-powered firearms, explosives and remote-control detonators — a deadly weapons cache they said was destined for the West Bank, according to federal charges made public Tuesday.
Abdalaziz Aziz Hamayel, who attended Hialeah Senior High, told a cop posing as a weapons dealer that the M-16s, AK-47s, grenades and other items “were for his people, and would be sent outside of the United States’ to the Palestinian Authority, a criminal complaint states.
Hamayel, 23, was arrested at Miami International Airport on Aug. 30 after flying in from Amman, Jordan, according to authorities. His co-defendant, Yanny Aguila Urbay, 24, was arrested Monday at his Hialeah home. Aguila arrived from Cuba seven years ago. The charge: conspiring to possess stolen weaponry for export to the West Bank. Sources close to the investigation said the case is being handled as a terrorism-related matter.
In Little Havana Tuesday, Guillermo Quintana, 62, a friend of Aguila’s, was flabbergasted by news of the arrest. “Crazy, crazy, this is crazy,’ said Quintana, who last spoke to Aguila two days ago.
The pair met through a mutual friend, and the young man occasionally crashed at Quintana’s apartment for more than two years.
Aguila, a native of Caibarién in Villa Clara, told people he laid carpet for a living. He met a woman about seven months ago and moved in with her, Quintana said.
“I am adventurous, I like danger, I am not afraid of anything or anyone,’ reads Aguila’s biography on his Facebook page.
The defendants are being held at the Federal Detention Center in downtown Miami, authorities said Tuesday. Aguila is expected to have a pre-trial detention hearing on Friday and Hamayel’s is set for Monday.
There was no answer at Hamayel’s address Tuesday night.
According to two FBI complaints, it was Aguila who first reached out to a confidential government source in April 2009 on Hamayel’s behalf to buy weapons and explosives.
Hamayel contacted the source and requested 300 M-16 rifles, 9mm handguns, Uzi submachine guns, silencers and grenades, indicating that he would be able to pay in advance.
“Hamayel explained that a `family friend’ . . . from the same village in the West Bank would provide the necessary funds for the purchase of the weapons and explosives,’ according to the complaints. “Hamayel indicated the `family friend’ lives in Miami.’
Later that April, Hamayel asked the government informant if he had found a potential supplier. Hamayel said he had a “contact’ in New York who was a “member of his group’ and had done similar transactions in the past.
The following month, the informant set up a meeting with Hamayel and Aguila so they could meet an undercover police officer posing as the supplier.
Hamayel told the supplier that he was interested in buying the firearms, grenades, silencers and handmade bombs that could be detonated with a cell phone. He also asked about prices, according to the complaint.
Hamayel and Aguila met several times with the undercover cop and a second police officer posing as a weapons broker between May and June 2009 to discuss logistics. The meetings were secretly recorded.
During one meeting on his own, Aguila told the undercover cops he had been to the home of Hamayel’s “buyer’ and recalled that he lived in Coral Gables. That person was not identified.
In another meeting, one of the cops told Hamayel that the weapons were “stolen’ and he responded: “I know, I know,’ the complaints state.
As they haggled over prices, Hamayel and the cop discussed cell phone detonators.
“Hamayel stated that the detonation device did not need to be a phone, only something which would allow his people enough time to get out of the area before the bomb exploded,’ according to the complaints.
Hamayel said he was buying the weapons for a man who owned a warehouse in Fort Lauderdale. He added that he has been dealing with the son because the father is “strong’ and no one sees him, the documents state. Those men were not identified.
In June, the cop showed Hamayel a variety of weapons and two types of remote detonators — cell phone and hand-held radio. It was then that Hamayel told him the cell phone detonator “would not work `over there,’ ” referring to the West Bank. Parts of that area are governed by the Palestinian Authority.
Hamayel also asked if the undercover officer could obtain C-4 explosives.
The complaints said the purpose of the “weapons flash’ was to provide a “visual sampling.’ All the weapons had been disarmed in advance.
After the June 11, meeting, Hamayel asked one of the undercover officers for a picture of the weapons to show his people — “proof’ for the money supplier that the weapons and explosives were available.
A week later, Hamayel contacted one of the government informants to ask for help in obtaining a fraudulent driver’s license, saying he was going on a trip to Chicago for two weeks. Instead, Hamayel left for the West Bank, according to the complaints.
More than a year would pass before federal agents learned of his whereabouts. On August 30, he left Jordan, for Chicago. That same night, he traveled to Miami, where he was arrested.
