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Sailing Cuba
More trash, when will this end???
May 2004 SOUTHWINDS www.southwindssailing.com 48 FLORIDA KEYS SAILING I t was a humid Easter Sunday when I headed into Key West’s waterfront for an exclusive interview with Mr. Peter Goldsmith of the Conch Republic Cup. Taking place for eight years, this race to Cuba from Key West experienced diffi-culty last year when officials from the Department of Commerce seized the private property of returning sailors. The stolen personal items have not yet been returned. Early this year, a grand jury convened in Key West and people, confused by the government’s treatment of a group of American citizens who love to race sailboats and had raced to Cuba, wanted to learn more. I sat with Peter in the spacious loft of Geslin Sailmakers overlooking the bight. Soon, I learned of the events that may have led up to the current prosecution of sail-ors involved in the race. The sailors had held their public skipper’s meeting in Key West the night prior to the race on May 21st of 2003. Accompanied by four men who were wearing guns, Jonathan Barnes, from the Department of Commerce, came to the skipper’s meeting and was shown all relevant paperwork. A lawyer was present along with the issuer of the ex-port license, and these individuals con-vened with Jonathan for at least a half an hour. According to Peter, all Mr. Barnes would say before he left the meeting was, if this is what you think you need to go to Cuba. The sentence ended right there. The next morning while the Conch Republic Cup boats were casting off their lines to start the race, officials showed up at the docks and handed out papers that required the boats to obtain another type of export license. The rac-ers were told not to go to Cuba. It is not known why officials waited until the boats were casting off when there had been sufficient time months in advance and an opportunity at the last night’s skipper’s meeting to give sailors notice of this previously unknown requirement. After the race, when the sailors re-turned to Key West, authorities searched the boats and seized various personal items belonging to the sailors. By Feb-ruary of 2004, various people involved in the Conch Republic Cup were called to testify before a grand jury in Key West. The situation seems to concern an export license requirement that the sail-ors were not aware of and did not have. Actual details of the grand jury’s inten-tions are not known. Peter told me that Jonathan Barnes had stopped by his house just before the grand jury convened. He asked Jonathan why wasn’t anyone informed of the additional export license during the skippers’ meeting when all paper work was shown, verified and checked over. Jonathan’s response was to say that it wasn’t his job; it was someone else’s department. “That’s like entrapment,� Peter told me. “But entrapment’s not a legal argument anymore so there’s really nothing we can say. We just have to go through the process, and this grand jury is trying to determine whether we did something criminal or not.� For the eight years of racing, was part of it to bring medicine, humani-tarian aid? (In 2003, a number of boats carried aid, but this is not considered to be part of the violation; just the boats and their destination are.) “No. I’m not political about this. We’re not doing this race for any political reasons. I’m in it because I like sailing and racing sail-boats. Racing around here gets old, and we were invited to race down there.� You were invited? “Yes, the com-modore from Club Nautico at Marina Hemingway invited us.� Peter went on to explain that the racers were fully hosted by Cuba. Eight years ago, the Conch Republic Cup was first started when a letter of invitation from the Cu-ban commodore was sent to Key West sailors at their local club. The Key West Sailing Club backed out of all involve-ment with the race after receiving cease and desist orders from the Treasury De-partment. Peter ended up with the race. Was a specific reason given for the cease and desist orders? “Basically, they didn’t want us to go. Here’s what we based the race on for all these years. First is our constitu-tional right to travel. Second was that the embargo on traveling to Cuba has never been challenged in a court of law. So this is what we based the race on until they came up with this export license last year. So we got an export license. But it wasn’t good enough. Can you imagine? That they’re convening a grand jury over this?� Obviously confounded, Peter plunked down his cigar, threw his hands up in the air and said that he’d heard of a person from the South Pacific who was subpoenaed and has to be flown over to testify. People from all over the coun-try are being subpoenaed. That’s a lot of work over a group of sailboats just trying to do a race, isn’t it? Peter shrugged and told me about one of his fellow sailors, Mark, who was called in to testify. Mark told the pros-ecution that he thought the export li-cense the sailors had was sufficient; oth-erwise, they wouldn’t have gone to Cuba. Why wouldn’t the license be good? Mark had asked. Prosecution’s response was that the license wasn’t good enough, and the sailors needed this other license. Mark’s response was to say that it’s just a technicality, right? Peter shakes his head over the rec-ollection of Mark’s words. He couldn’t believe that a grand jury would convene over a trivial matter such as a technical-ity, or that people would be prosecuted for having the wrong license when they had not been aware that it was wrong in the first place. Is this really what this whole thing is based on? A wrong license? “Well, you never know where a grand jury is coming from. They hide their real inten-tions and they don’t tell you right away because that would give you time to set up a defense. With grand juries it’s to-tally one-sided. You can’t go in with a lawyer. You’re sitting there with the jury and thirty-some people working for the government, and these people are all trying to convince the jury that you did something wrong. This seems so uncon-stitutional and against everything that’s American.� Peter didn’t believe that there was anything in the Constitution that supported the convening of a grand jury, nor that there was anything mor-ally or ethically correct about the government’s actions against the sailors. Do you think that the government is doing this because they’re worried Interview with Peter Goldsmith, Organizer of the Conch Republic Cup Race to Cuba: Sailors Intimidated by Authorities — Race Cancelled By Rebecca Burg |
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