Posted on 04/19/2003 2:01:53 PM PDT by Luis Gonzalez
Forty-two years after a Cuban firing squad executed an American businessman, his family won a $67 million judgment against the Cuban government.
But the struggle for the widow and four children of Howard Anderson now turns to the United States and whether the Treasury Department will release money seized decades ago from the island nation to cover the judgment.
A circuit judge in Miami, Ellen Leesfield, ruled late Thursday that Anderson's children and his widow, Dorothy Anderson McCarthy of Pompano Beach, Fla., qualify for the compensation under a law that allows Americans to sue foreign countries for acts of terrorism.
Gary Anderson, a 57-year-old businessman living in Houston, said: "I look at it as vindication."
He was 15 when his father was imprisoned by the Cuban government and executed for allegedly helping to plot against Communist leader Fidel Castro's administration.
Howard Anderson's trial was held at the same time as the Bay of Pigs invasion, and his prosecutor echoed the government's anti-American rhetoric by yelling, "Death to the American" at the end of the trial, according to a Swiss diplomat who attended the trial and took notes.
While the crime Howard Anderson was convicted of committing carried only a nine-year imprisonment, he was condemned to death.
The family had requested $600 million in damages, but Leesfield awarded them $40 million in economic losses after she heard evidence from an accountant about Howard Anderson's earning potential, had he survived, and the value of his businesses.
Howard Anderson, who was 41 when he was killed, owned a boat-building business, auto dealership and service stations in Cuba. Leesfield awarded his wife $7 million in damages for pain and suffering.
She awarded $5 million for pain and suffering to each of the four children: Gary Anderson, Lee Anderson of League City, Bonnie Anderson of Atlanta and Marc Anderson of Dunnellon, Fla.
The Anderson family's attorneys hope to collect the money from bank assets frozen by the United States after President Kennedy severed economic ties with Cuba.
While a 1996 law allows Americans to sue terrorist-sponsoring countries for murder and torture, there's no guarantee the families will ultimately be compensated.
The Cuban government was accused of executing Howard Anderson for a crime that carried a maximum nine-year prison sentence under Cuban law, his son Gary Anderson said. No evidence was presented against him during his trial, according to the family's lawsuit. The Andersons, and others, hope to tap a fund holding an estimated $150 million of Cuban assets frozen in U.S. bank accounts after Fidel Castro took control. The United States seized the funds after President Kennedy severed economic ties with the country.
So far, $99 million of that money has been doled out to the families of three pilots the Cuban military shot down. The pilots were volunteers for Brothers to the Rescue, a group that searches for Cuban rafters off the coast of Florida. The U.S. government condemned the attack as an act of terrorism, and the families of the victims later won a judgment against Cuba. However, even after that judgment, the money was still frozen because the U.S. government planned to continue to use it as a bargaining chip in dealings with the island nation.
While many exiles have filed claims against Cuba, the families of the three pilots are the only ones to ever receive compensation for their losses. Each family received $33 million. The Andersons could be the next family to be compensated. "If you want to hurt terrorism, let's hurt Fidel and hit him in the pocket," said Gary Anderson, a 57-year-old owner of a power equipment business in Houston.***
Is Gary Anderson organizing a petition drive or phone Bush campaign?
Does he have contact info?
I'd rather send Castro his bullet but taking the money he stole is good.
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