0:00

Murder in Miami is a production of

0:02

I Heart Radio. Previously

0:05

on Murder in Miami. Well,

0:08

the world knows me as Happy

0:11

Miles. If you'd wager a former

0:13

cocaine smuggler with eighty three

0:15

years under their belt would have some pretty

0:18

interesting stories to share with Happy,

0:20

you'd hit the jackpot. Lamar Chester

0:23

had a bunch of airplanes he couldn't

0:25

pay for, so I bought them,

0:28

and that's how I met Lamar. Yeah,

0:31

Lamar wasn't afraid of anything.

0:34

One time I went up to his apartment

0:37

and he opened a foot locker and

0:40

got a couple of machine guns out

0:42

of it. He was flying guns

0:44

then to Nicaragua.

0:48

And did he tell you who he

0:50

was running the guns for? The

0:53

c I A. I would imagine

0:55

the CIA was running

0:58

that show. Hey,

1:04

I forgot to tell you something, but I'll

1:07

tell you tomorrow. Remind me borg,

1:14

Hey, you wanted me to remind

1:16

you to tell me a story about

1:18

landing on the Mars Island. Lamar

1:21

Chester he never run any

1:23

single grass until I turned

1:25

over that load of coke to him on the

1:27

island, So this would have been one

1:29

of his first Do

1:31

you think that's the first time that he ever rand

1:34

coke. Yes, I

1:37

know it, because he told me that

1:40

he had made more money off

1:42

of that run than

1:45

he had made his entire life running

1:47

grass out of Colombia and

1:50

Jamaica. Wow, I'm

1:57

Lauren Bread Pacheco, and this is

1:59

murder in Miami. The

2:08

story Happy is about to share about setting

2:10

Lamar up with his first load of cocaine

2:13

is set in n Now.

2:15

Just explained to me you were running coke from

2:18

where South America

2:20

From Colombia. The trip

2:22

had gone kind of ragged

2:25

the trip before I barely got

2:28

off this muddy levy bank,

2:31

and I knew I couldn't

2:33

come out with full fuel because

2:36

it had been raining ever

2:38

since the last trip, and

2:40

it would even be muddier, and

2:42

so I decided I would only come

2:44

out with a partial load of fuel.

2:47

Weather had already complicated happiest

2:50

departure from Columbia in terms

2:52

of flying out with a full tank of fuel, which

2:54

would have made the plane too heavy to take off.

2:57

But after he fueled up in South Cacos

3:00

weather it would also complicate handing

3:02

off the load in Florida to

3:04

his associate Dawn too well.

3:07

The weather was so bad in Florida

3:10

that down didn't think I

3:13

was gonna come or where

3:15

the hell could I have gone. I mean, the

3:18

trip was on, I was leaving

3:20

Columbia. I needed

3:22

to get there, and my plan was

3:24

to land, give the load

3:26

to Dawn and him get out of there

3:29

right away. Well, they went

3:31

to lunch while his cocaine

3:34

unloading crew was lunching. Happy

3:36

says he encountered a different sort of welcoming

3:38

committee, and not the sort he

3:41

welcomed. As

3:43

I crossed the channel from

3:46

Bemany to Oballoca,

3:49

I realized they were

3:51

on me, and

3:54

I finally found it what frequency

3:56

they were working on, and I was listening

3:58

to him in hell, there was a dozen

4:01

of them on me, and

4:03

they were coordinating. A dozen

4:05

planes were following you. Yeah,

4:08

everything D e A and Customs

4:11

had was on me, and some

4:13

state birds too. So

4:16

you had gotten all the way back to Florida

4:18

and realize that you have everybody

4:21

on your tail. Exactly. So,

4:24

a rather unhappy Happy

4:27

was left to formulate an escape on

4:29

the fly. Literally. I

4:33

turned around and headed east, not

4:35

knowing what I was gonna do, And

4:38

as I came out of a cloud, I was

4:41

noticed to know that they're lowch

4:43

helicopter and the

4:45

helicopter. I mean, we weren't

4:48

three hundred five hundred feet away

4:50

from each other with a closure rate

4:52

of over three hundred miles an

4:54

hour. Oh my gosh. So you come out

4:57

of a cloud and you are facing a

5:00

a helicopter. Yes,

5:03

So he dropped the collective

5:06

and went right under me, and I went right

5:09

over the top and

5:11

he landed in a field,

5:14

and I circled them, and he was

5:16

throwing up in the middle of the

5:19

field because he thought he was going to die.

5:22

Yeah. And

5:24

so then I decided, well,

5:27

I'll go out to the Bahamas and probably

5:30

end up ditching the airplane in deep

5:32

water somewhere, but close enough

5:35

that I can swim to the shore and

5:38

the airplane will be so deep that

5:40

they'll never be able to get it, or

5:43

they won't go get it, and

5:45

I'll be going free. Well,

5:49

I realized I had the two

5:51

airplanes still following me.

5:54

The jet Star was on me, and

5:56

the arrow commander was on me. Well,

5:59

there, commander, I knew you didn't

6:01

have radar and had to

6:03

stay on me visually. And

6:06

then I heard the jet Star

6:09

land and your NASA

6:11

and he told the tower, it's

6:14

an emergency. Can you get us a

6:16

fuel truck out and

6:18

the guy in the tower said, mon, who

6:21

you think I is? You fuel

6:23

lucky, get

6:25

your own fuel truck. That

6:29

is Mr Miles impersonation

6:31

of a Bahamian accent. So

6:34

I knew you'd be on the ground for a

6:36

while trying to get fuel. So

6:39

the whole time they're following you, you're

6:41

going through the different frequencies and picking

6:43

up there transmissions.

6:46

You're E's dropping on them. Yeah, I'm he's

6:48

dropping on them. So there's

6:51

a great big thunder cloud between

6:54

me and NASA,

6:58

and I'm headed like I'm going to

7:01

Hawksville. Ron Elliott's

7:03

Island property is hotel.

7:07

So I flew right

7:09

into the thunderstorm,

7:11

which they will never do because

7:14

if you're not lucky, do

7:17

get sucked up in the vortex

7:19

and spit out at forty thou feet

7:22

in pieces. Until

7:24

the minute I went in, they

7:27

went around to the north. It

7:29

was the shortest distance around the thunderstorm,

7:33

and the minute I was in and they couldn't

7:35

see me, I made

7:38

a ninety degree turn to the right

7:40

and came out the bottom of the thunderstorm

7:43

headed south. So

7:47

I've been in the air for over

7:49

ten and a half hours at that

7:51

time, and

7:53

I only had eleven hours

7:56

of fuel. And

7:58

that is the point that Happy says. He happened

8:00

upon international drug smuggler

8:02

Lamar Chester, who happened

8:05

to own two nearby islands.

8:08

I come up on Captain America

8:10

Lamar's red, white and blue two oh

8:13

seven. Just happened to pass him

8:15

in the air. It just happened

8:17

to be overtaking him. Yeah. He

8:19

was headed from NASA to

8:22

his island. And when

8:24

you're coming on an airplane from

8:27

the back, you don't have anything to

8:29

see. It's very hard to see

8:31

an airplane from the bat He

8:33

got a rudder and an horizontal in

8:35

a wing, but nothing of mass.

8:38

And I almost ran him over and came

8:41

within a quarter of a mile

8:43

before I would have run him over, and

8:46

I saw him, so I pulled up alongside

8:49

of him, and we finally

8:51

found each other on an obscure

8:53

frequency and I said, hey,

8:56

and I want to rent a boat. He

8:59

said, I don't know if you can

9:01

afford it. And I said,

9:03

we'll put an M on the end, and

9:06

that should make you happy. What

9:09

runway do you want me to use? And

9:12

by putting an M on the number, Mr miles

9:15

means one million dollars

9:18

barely couldn't make up his mind, the big

9:20

island, the little island, and finally at

9:22

the last minute he said, land on the

9:25

on the short strip. Well, he

9:27

only has about nine hundred feet

9:30

up there by the house on

9:32

the hill, and you can land

9:34

the command she in six or seven

9:37

hundred feet eight out of ten times.

9:40

But the other two times are going to get

9:42

you. The airplane is gonna float and

9:45

you're not gonna make it. And

9:47

it ended into a blunt

9:50

cliff, so you

9:52

know you're gonna die. So

9:55

I went in and I was only

9:57

a few hundred feet from landing,

9:59

and the left engine quit ran out

10:01

of fuel. Well, when

10:04

that happens, the air plane veers

10:06

right away. So I had

10:08

a hell of a time getting it back

10:11

on track and a couple of hundred feet

10:13

and still landed and

10:16

lefty I touched down right at the

10:18

start of the runway where

10:21

it went straight after it came out

10:23

of his under grown hangar,

10:26

and Bucky airplane

10:28

stopped and six hundred feet So

10:33

he said, what have you got? And I said, well,

10:36

I've got four hundred and forty

10:38

pounds of stuff. I need you

10:40

to fly it in for me. He

10:42

said, well, I'll fly it to Georgia.

10:44

So I don't give a ship where you fly it. Just

10:47

take it in for me and I'll

10:50

give you a million bucks. That's

10:53

what happened. So

10:57

you offered Lamar a million

10:59

dollars to land at his island and

11:02

to bring the coke back to the United

11:04

States, right, and

11:06

that million it came out of the shipment.

11:09

Happy was flying for Pablo Escobar.

11:12

Yes, that Pablo Escobar,

11:15

the Colombian drug lord and narco

11:17

terrorist who founded the Medayen

11:20

cartel. Even

11:22

when I took a million dollars a coke

11:25

out of the load, I wasn't

11:27

worried about getting

11:30

rubbed out or anything because

11:32

it was a legitimate expense.

11:34

I mean I was resourceful

11:37

enough to still get the majority

11:39

of the load through. I

11:42

had two hundred and twenty keys and

11:44

I lost thirty five of them to

11:47

pay Lamar. Big deal. Uh,

11:50

it is a big deal that Happy

11:52

lived to tell about it. But that's

11:54

another story. I mean, I did what I

11:57

had to do and it worked out.

12:00

You've got to have like a cat, but

12:02

instead of nine lives, you must have like nine.

12:06

By the way, Happy says, he shared

12:08

the same story about losing a

12:11

dozen government agency planes trailing

12:13

him with the federal agents who helped

12:15

broker his equally incredible

12:18

immunity deal, which will cover

12:20

later. While the agent prefers

12:22

not to be named, he was able

12:24

to verify it. When started

12:28

to tell the story I had told

12:30

him to his go hearts, they

12:33

said it never happened. He's

12:35

full as ship. So I

12:37

went down and trace my

12:40

steps and finally found

12:42

my motel receipt for that night

12:45

when I was going back to Miami.

12:48

And then he found the guys

12:50

that were flying that day, and they said,

12:52

oh, yeah, but Billy wrote the report.

12:55

Go to Billy, Billy, did you rite

12:57

note Harry who was going to

13:00

the report? Go to Harry. No,

13:02

Chari was gonna write the report.

13:06

They never wrote a report

13:09

on it. I was worried

13:11

they had my INN number, but

13:13

they never wrote a report

13:16

on it. Why do you think, Oh,

13:18

they had so much egg on their face that

13:20

I could screw them all over

13:23

by flying into that storm cloud. I

13:27

mentioned earlier that Happy's dabbled in the film

13:30

business before well. He sent me

13:32

a DVD that contained a movie he made

13:34

about the Bahamas Family Island Regatta,

13:36

a celebrated sailing event. And

13:39

crowd pleaser since nineteen fifty four.

13:41

Happy footed the bill for the extravagant production,

13:44

which he places at a quarter of a million

13:46

dollars, and opens with a very

13:48

formal Mr Miles promoting

13:51

his signature plane in conjunction

13:53

with the film. This is the p v Y and

13:55

I'm Happy Miles. Together we fly

13:58

around the world to experience it's

14:00

a joy of fulfillment in communities

14:02

both large and small. Happy

14:04

walks as he reads his lines, frequently

14:07

stopping and changing directions

14:09

along with the camera, making for

14:11

some amusing edits. Come

14:14

with me to see what it is that rewards

14:17

men and women with the sense of knowing they

14:19

are the best that they can be. When

14:21

you're doing your stand up and they have

14:24

you walk three feet this way and

14:26

then stop and then walk three feet that way

14:28

to camera. Oh, because you should

14:30

see the outtakes. I'm

14:33

fucking this lexic and

14:35

I can't read chew cards. We

14:39

have just come from lunch and I've had

14:41

about more Roman Cokes,

14:45

so I've had a hell of the time

14:47

getting my lines done. What

14:50

follows is a lush and slick

14:52

overview of the regatta, but what

14:54

makes the footage exceptionally interesting

14:57

is the access that highlights between Happy

14:59

and the Amian government. The

15:03

stage is sent as Prime Minister Linden

15:05

Pindling, along with the visiting dignitaries

15:08

and island officials, gathered for speeches

15:10

and congratulations to all regatta participants.

15:15

Do you know that I'm the only

15:17

America allowed to race

15:19

with the Bahamians? Is that

15:21

still true? Yeah? I'm

15:23

a citizen one week out

15:26

of the year and that

15:28

week to be designated by

15:30

out Island Regatta. How

15:32

did you pull that off, oh

15:35

Pendling, the Prime Minister. Yeah,

15:39

we just made a declaration. Prime

15:43

Minister Pendling acknowledges the people of

15:45

Exuma and all of those who have maintained

15:48

the high standards over the years for the Family

15:50

Island Regatta. Linden

15:54

Pendling is perhaps the most famous

15:56

and controversial Bahamian politician.

15:59

He served as the first black Premiere of

16:01

the Colony of the Bahama Islands from nineteen

16:03

sixty seven to nineteen sixty nine

16:06

and as Prime Minister of the Bahamas from

16:08

nineteen sixty nine to nine two.

16:11

Known as the Father of the Nation, he's

16:13

also known for helming the darkest

16:15

period in modern Bahamian

16:18

history nineteen seventy seven

16:20

to ninety two, a time when the

16:22

Bahamas served as a convenient and

16:24

corruptible stopover for contraband

16:27

bound for the US,

16:29

something exposed in a nineteen eighty three

16:32

NBC investigative piece titled

16:34

the Bahamas a Nation for Sale.

16:37

The report alleged, among other things, that

16:39

Carlos later the German Colombian

16:42

drug lord, and members of his infamous

16:44

made Eying Kartel, used Norman's

16:47

Key in Exuma as a layover point

16:49

to traffic cocaine into the United

16:51

States. It also implied

16:53

the Bahamas government and Pendling

16:56

profited by turning a blind eye to drug

16:58

smuggling, assisted by a prominent

17:01

Bahamian attorney named Nigel

17:03

bow Well. Nigel was

17:05

an attorney who was

17:08

Kindling's bag man. Mainly

17:10

for somebody who doesn't understand that expression,

17:13

what does bag man mean? Well,

17:15

it means that when later

17:18

moved into the Bahamas,

17:20

he paid a lot of money

17:23

to be able to operate out enormous

17:25

ski like he did, and

17:28

Nigel would go over and pick up

17:30

the money and deliver it to Kindling.

17:33

So bagman is the guy who's transporting

17:36

the money from one party to the other. Yeah,

17:39

So whatever Nigel said with

17:41

the police or customs

17:44

or anything was the

17:46

same as probably Kindling

17:49

saying it. He had a lot

17:51

of cloud So if somebody wanted

17:53

to get away with something illicit in

17:55

the Bahamas, Nigel was the person

17:58

you had to go through. He was the

18:00

man. It was the man, Yeah,

18:03

without a doubt. Though

18:05

Pendling and Bow denied the accusations,

18:08

the public outcry led to the creation in four

18:11

of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into drug

18:13

trafficking and government corruption in the Bahamas.

18:17

A review of Pendling's personal finances

18:19

by the Commission found that he had spent

18:21

eight times his reported total earnings

18:24

from nineteen seventy seven to finding

18:28

the Prime Minister and Lady Pendling have received at

18:30

least fifty seven point three million

18:32

dollars in cash explanations.

18:35

First, some of these deposits were given but

18:37

could not be verified. And

18:39

also pulled into that inquiry a former

18:41

Eastern Airlines pilot Lamar

18:44

Chester. So how

18:46

did Chester end up getting pulled into

18:48

the Bahamas inquiry? Anyway,

18:51

I'm really not sure just how

18:53

he got pulled into it, but he certainly wanted to

18:55

go. He had to get permission from

18:58

the judge in his trial. He had already been indicted

19:01

to leave the country, and after

19:04

going through the ropes on that he

19:06

did flew down there. Remember,

19:09

having been indicted in the US,

19:11

Chester would have needed court permission to

19:13

leave the country. As he knew

19:16

at the time it was his chance to make

19:19

a public statement of his

19:21

gray male defense. That he did it for the CIA.

19:24

He also knew that

19:26

there weren't going to be any legal consequences

19:29

for him, certainly in the Bahamas, because

19:31

the inquiry didn't have the authority

19:33

to indict anyone anyway. That's really

19:35

interesting. So it's possible

19:38

that Chester was just incentivized

19:41

to go there because it provided him with a platform

19:43

and a megaphone to state

19:46

the gray mail defense. Yeah,

19:48

I'm sure he has assumed that he would

19:50

get national publicity.

20:01

One of the most significant things in

20:04

this whole case was

20:07

Lamar Chester's appearance before

20:09

a Royal Commission of Inquiry in

20:12

the Bahamas, and that was

20:15

at the time a really

20:17

upsetting thing for the Bahamas

20:20

because it was their version of Watergate. That's

20:23

Atlanta based journalist, producer

20:25

and documentarian CB Hackworth.

20:28

Sir Lyndon Pendling was the hero

20:31

of Bahamian independence and

20:35

there were swirling allegations

20:37

that he was corrupt or receiving

20:41

payoffs through an attorney

20:43

named Nigel Bow who

20:45

also represented lamar Chester, that

20:48

those payments were to permit drug

20:51

smuggling in the Bahamas. Today

20:53

CB presents as a seasoned Southern

20:56

journalist with at certain angles a

20:58

passing resemblance to Robin Williams,

21:00

which is reinforced by his fondness for

21:02

suspenders, even when wearing jeans

21:04

and a T shirt. But when Hackworth's

21:07

path first crossed with lamar Chester and

21:10

subsequently the Coconut Grove Guys, he

21:13

was a twenty five year old reporter working

21:15

at the Gainesville Times, a local paper

21:18

in Georgia. I became aware

21:20

of lamar Chester both

21:22

through some earlier reporting in

21:24

the newspaper where I was working, and

21:27

because I was covering a cocaine

21:30

smuggling trial in

21:32

federal court in which

21:35

one of the defendants ended

21:37

up being an an indicted

21:39

co conspirator in the lamar Chester

21:41

case. So that was a tie between

21:44

those two cases. And who was the

21:46

tie in that was Grover Alexander,

21:48

who was a local individual. Grover

21:51

Alexander had been convicted

21:54

of murder at some point but was

21:56

a car dealer in White County,

21:59

and he had repeatedly

22:01

been arrested and was

22:04

indicted with lamar Chester. It was

22:06

not convicted in the case that

22:08

I was covering, But

22:10

while covering the biggest

22:13

drug smuggling case in Georgia history,

22:16

I overheard some conversations

22:19

in which Lamar Chester's name came

22:21

up, and some federal officials

22:24

were speculating that lamar

22:26

Chester was going to be indicted soon. So

22:29

with those nudges, I looked took

22:31

another look at what had already been

22:33

reported, which was pretty

22:36

substantial and the work

22:38

of a local reporter named Lavinia

22:40

Miyes. Lavinia Miyes

22:42

was the correspondent in White County.

22:45

I knew her, I came to know her well.

22:48

We've really worked together very closely

22:51

in the Chester case, and

22:53

I give her a real tip

22:55

of the hat. Lavinia wrote

22:58

about the River Hills project

23:01

in White County,

23:03

which was ill fated.

23:06

River Hills was a short lived concept Chester

23:08

apparently created as a campsite for college

23:11

kids, but was suspected to be a

23:13

money laundering front. But

23:15

that's not what upset local folks. It's

23:18

strange because apparently, by

23:21

the time the controversy arose.

23:24

They actually already had opened River

23:26

Hills for a season,

23:29

I'm not sure how many weeks, and it

23:31

had lost money. The River Hills

23:33

had intended to be a

23:36

an outdoor recreational

23:40

area for college students

23:42

to come and drink and

23:44

probably whatever else they wanted to do,

23:47

and folks in White County aren't

23:50

going to stand for that going on in

23:53

their river. I mean, the people

23:55

in North Georgia are kind of what you would

23:57

expect, mostly salt of the earth, hard

23:59

working. One of the county commission

24:02

members was very upset

24:04

by a flyer that he had

24:06

found for River Hills, and he brought it up

24:09

in a County commission meeting and

24:11

it was come and drink and float

24:13

down the river, and the

24:15

county commissioner he was just pretty

24:18

upset. If River

24:20

Hills didn't exactly sit well with the locals.

24:23

It would prove very valuable to the

24:25

federal investigators driving Operation

24:28

Lone Star. You'll eventually hear

24:30

more about Leslie Bickerton, the

24:32

woman Chester brought in to oversee the

24:34

River Hills project. She would become

24:37

a very valuable and very controversial

24:39

witness for both the prosecution and

24:42

the defense. But we'll get into

24:44

all of that a bit later. Back to CB

24:46

Hackworth, Lavinia had been speaking to

24:48

Chester for a year or

24:50

more. I mean, she had been trying

24:53

to tell us, trying

24:55

to tell the world this

24:57

was a really big story, and

25:00

nobody was really paying

25:02

attention to her because

25:04

she was just, you know, the

25:06

White County correspondent. But

25:08

CB Hackworth says her journalistic instincts

25:11

were on point. Here's Lavinia Maize

25:13

Hex in her own words, sharing

25:16

her written thoughts on Lamar Chester.

25:18

Personally, I do not know whether or not Chester

25:21

was guilty of the charges in the nine All

25:24

Aged Drugs Movement indictment. He

25:26

claimed he was innocent and he

25:28

had been working for the government and the CIA.

25:31

He told me that the CIA had been attempted

25:34

to overthrow the government in the Bahamas,

25:37

and it was such a huge story

25:40

that it sounds fantastical at

25:42

first. Blush, but I've got to tell

25:44

you she had kept clippings

25:46

and she had dug

25:48

up incorporation papers, and

25:51

it was one of the best guides

25:53

and briefings I've ever had. I referred to

25:56

it throughout the

25:58

next year and a half that I

26:01

ended up covering the Chester case

26:03

on a Daily Basis. Lavinia

26:06

Mayes provided CBS introduction

26:08

to Lamar Chester. At that

26:11

time, Lamar was under

26:13

very strict orders not

26:16

to talk to reporters

26:18

anyone connected to the media anyone

26:20

period outside of his

26:23

family and his legal team, and

26:26

he violated that as

26:28

much as he could. I think

26:30

it was as much to prove

26:33

that the government couldn't make

26:36

him be quiet as it was to

26:38

disseminate information. I also

26:40

believe he enjoyed the coverage

26:43

and being a local celebrity.

26:46

That was his ego, and Chester

26:49

did not disappoint in person.

26:52

The first time I met him, I drove up to White

26:54

County and out to the

26:57

dirt road where his farm was. And

26:59

I use the word farm very liberally

27:03

because it

27:05

was a sprawling piece of property with

27:08

a grass landing strip.

27:11

It's the biggest house in White

27:13

County. Although not gaudy

27:16

in any way, it was actually very tastefully

27:18

done, but it was just so

27:21

huge. The main room where I

27:23

sat was enormous, and

27:26

it was a combination of a huge

27:28

living room and a

27:31

huge dining area. And

27:34

Lamar met me, shook my

27:36

hand. He had a very

27:38

warm, magnetic personality.

27:42

I think he knew that and was

27:44

able to use it to his advantage

27:46

in many many situations,

27:48

including dealing with the media. He

27:51

had compromised some people

27:54

who had reported on him,

27:56

and I knew that Lamar was

27:59

tall, he had a mustache,

28:02

and he struck me as a man's

28:04

man. Lavinia had

28:07

described him in an article as

28:10

a Marlborough man, really

28:12

alpha male. I've

28:14

met a few people like that. Sam

28:17

Elliott is like that. You know, I'm in

28:19

the presence of a real man. I

28:21

remember Lamar smiling a lot,

28:23

even though the circumstances you

28:25

would think we're kind of grim

28:28

for him. I know there was a lean on

28:30

the farm that had been placed

28:32

by his lawyers, and

28:34

of course it was facing indictment,

28:38

and CB knew the meeting was serving a purpose,

28:40

at least on Chester's end. Lamar

28:43

was very open to meeting

28:45

with me, and he was very open when

28:48

I met him. I never

28:50

made any agreement, nor was

28:53

I asked to to protect

28:55

him from himself from

28:58

the fact that he was violating

29:01

a court order and he had

29:04

already been significantly

29:06

warned because of

29:08

a television report that freest Sawyer

29:11

had done on W

29:13

A G A t V in Atlanta.

29:16

Phil Stanford has already referenced that

29:18

infamous interview, but I'll let

29:20

CB reminds you of what Chester claimed

29:22

during it. Well, he boasted to Farrest

29:25

Sawyer, and he said to me separately,

29:29

he said that he had flown

29:32

a shipment of marijuana, a large

29:34

shipment, directly over wherever

29:37

Ronald Reagan, who was then president

29:40

was speaking at the time. I think it was Homestead

29:42

Air Force Base, and that

29:44

he could have showed the bail

29:46

out and dropped it at the President's

29:49

feet if he wanted to. That's

29:52

my recollection. He completely

29:55

admitted to being one

29:58

of the world's most prolific drugs egglers.

30:01

That he had smuggled large

30:03

shipments of marijuana from

30:05

the Bahamas into the

30:08

United States Florida, but

30:10

primarily Georgia. Two

30:13

hundred shipments or more is

30:15

what I think he said, And

30:17

the reaction that statement received

30:20

seemed to be the intention behind making

30:22

it. Lamar was talking to a

30:24

lot of reporters and

30:27

he wanted to stir this up. I

30:31

wasn't oblivious to any of that stuff,

30:33

even though I was young. But did

30:35

you have any idea when

30:38

you left his farm that day

30:41

how intense and complicated

30:44

your relationship with him would get well.

30:47

You would think I would answer no, but

30:50

I kind of did. The

30:52

scope of what he had laid out was huge.

30:56

Chester's interaction with Hackworth would intensify

30:59

as the legal proceedings advanced.

31:02

Lamar would call me often

31:04

late at night, and sometimes,

31:08

if not usually after he'd been drinking.

31:11

Now I'm not saying he

31:13

was bad to drink. I don't

31:16

know that to be a fact, but I do know

31:18

that sometimes he drank at night and sometimes

31:20

he called me. And these

31:22

were not short little conversations.

31:25

Well, you would discuss what was

31:27

going on with the case. He

31:30

guided me towards things. I

31:33

recorded all of my conversations

31:36

with the Marchester George

31:38

is a one party consent state. You

31:41

do not have to have permission

31:43

from another person to record a

31:45

conversation as long as you are

31:48

a participant in that conversation.

31:52

Shut down until

31:58

after elections.

32:00

They wanted just

32:05

what you are listening to are the recordings

32:07

of those actual conversations

32:10

which CB Hackworth is sharing

32:12

for the first time. Washington

32:14

was prepared to set one plea to

32:16

anything anything with a five

32:18

year calt stand silent

32:21

at sentison, so they just could let me walk

32:23

out or

32:27

sends being no more than five years, which you

32:29

know dou turn for a month. But Washington

32:32

would take a plea to anything types

32:35

of vation at this point. And

32:37

bear in mind this is June is

32:39

invited in most Yeah,

32:42

but they'd take anything. And if

32:44

I give him minds a bull, I could walk clean this

32:47

month. Now. They

32:49

also made this offer, getting they

32:52

make this off the boat ard just prior to them.

32:55

They want the Prime minister also come. Lamarchester

32:59

is claiming the prosecutors offered to drop

33:01

charges against him if he turned on

33:03

the Bohemian attorney Nigel bow and

33:06

Prime Minister Pendling. But

33:08

again, never once, despite

33:11

everything he ever said to me, he never

33:13

once did he say,

33:15

hey, don't put this in the paper. Not

33:19

once. When I wrote a five

33:21

part series on Lamarchester,

33:24

the heading on that rat card said

33:27

master criminal or secret agent.

33:31

It was pretty dramatic, as

33:33

would be the travel assignment Hackwarth's

33:35

paper Greenlet. As the young reporter

33:37

continued to cover Chester, he

33:40

told me he was going to testify

33:43

before this Royal commission, and

33:46

he told me what he was going to say,

33:49

and he told me f Lee Bailey

33:51

would be the attorney for

33:53

the Prime Minister of the Bahamas. Then he

33:55

would be doing the questioning. I

33:58

played a very short,

34:01

perhaps sixty excerpt

34:05

of that conversation with

34:07

Lamar for the publisher of

34:09

the newspaper. Through my relationship

34:11

with the government of Bahamas and businessmen there

34:13

in elsewhere, I have contacts all over

34:15

the world and to take the Central and South America,

34:18

Europe in the place, and

34:20

they supported my outrageous

34:23

quest for this story.

34:26

The publisher he told me to

34:28

go to the Bahamas when Lamar

34:30

was there to testify this

34:32

was not a newspaper that routine. Lee sent a

34:34

reporter to the Bahamas. I

34:37

stayed at the same resort

34:39

hotel that Lamar stayed at.

34:42

His lawyers did not know I

34:45

was going to be there. They did not know

34:47

the extent to which

34:49

he was talking to me and likely

34:52

others. His lawyers

34:54

could not control him.

34:57

CB also taped the proceedings, and

34:59

he's has those recordings on microcassettes,

35:02

which he shared with me. When we met in person,

35:06

he was being questioned by f Lee Bailey,

35:09

who, not by accident,

35:11

was one of the most famous lawyers in America,

35:15

extremely talented, brilliant

35:17

man wa Cherry,

35:21

Yeah, very well about airport

35:24

here, Attorney eff Lee Bailey

35:26

questions Chester about his interaction

35:29

with a man named Morgan Cherry's

35:33

saying, did you watch him to you

35:36

really didn't want me to come by, but I did not

35:39

reveal his I didn't believe you

35:42

not reveal Morgan Jerry Cherry.

35:45

But his request was that you go

35:47

back on your promises commission and where

35:51

you used the words keep your shots

35:55

indicated lay his employers

36:00

and interested silence, and was just they

36:04

just didn't want to know that they were engaged or

36:06

that they then uh

36:09

instrumental in the Brian Ross the

36:12

Brian Ross report that was

36:16

NBC investigative piece titled

36:18

the Bahamas a Nation for Sale

36:21

and the man named Morgan Cherry.

36:23

Chester's referring to is his

36:25

allegedly c I a connected

36:28

link to the assignments he claims

36:30

to have conducted on behalf of the US government.

36:33

F Lee Bailey, he was very good

36:35

that day. He was representing the Prime

36:37

Minister of the Bahamas. Simas

36:40

added that Mortgage Cherry claimed to be a

36:42

person who went the NBC

36:44

broadcast beginning whose

36:47

clients were profited by an investigation.

36:49

She would have follow such a prodcast to the

36:51

point where good promise you Macie's

36:54

representation that pretty much suns

36:56

the same

37:00

day that was taped. Cbe recalls

37:02

a very interesting interaction which

37:04

led to an after court meeting

37:06

at the hotel casino with Chester

37:09

and two young women. Lamar

37:13

went to get a drink of water and he

37:15

said, if you have any questions,

37:18

I'll be in the casino tonight at ten

37:20

thirty in the hotel where

37:22

we were staying. So did you go down

37:25

to the casino at ten that night? Yeah,

37:28

I went down to the casino. I think I had

37:31

sixty four dollars

37:33

that I was going to gamble

37:35

with. I'm twenty five years

37:37

old, working for a small daily newspaper,

37:40

paying child support. So

37:43

all I had on my first

37:45

trip ever anywhere

37:48

out of the country sixty

37:50

four dollars to gamble with. I

37:53

got there early, and my

37:55

sixty four dollars did not last long.

37:58

I blew that money at the

38:01

roulette wheel very quickly. So

38:04

I did find Lamar standing

38:06

at a slot machine, the one

38:09

that you sed dollar tokens

38:11

in three at a time. I

38:13

had played the slots earlier

38:16

with quarters, and to

38:19

me, this was like bordering on real

38:21

money. And not only was he doing that,

38:23

he was winning you know, he put three

38:25

things in and we were beginning to talk,

38:27

and he pulled the lever and be

38:30

about dnswer question and tokens

38:32

would pour out. He

38:34

didn't care about the money that he was winning. He didn't

38:37

care about the money he was putting into the slot machine.

38:40

He just radiated wealth. And that's part of

38:42

what I think made him attractive to a

38:45

lot of people, men as well

38:47

as women. I don't mean sexually,

38:49

but I mean wanting to

38:51

be in his inner circle. And

38:53

we weren't standing there very long before

38:57

a young lady walked up

38:59

and just started hanging around

39:01

him. At first, I

39:03

thought it might be someone he knew, or

39:06

a legal assistant or something, but

39:08

it wasn't. She was a stranger. I

39:11

guess it was. You know, people have

39:13

described him as good looks

39:15

or magnetic personality, whatever.

39:18

And in addition the

39:21

fact that money kept pouring out of this slot

39:23

machine, I think the sound

39:25

was some sort of mating

39:28

call. But uh,

39:30

since I was standing there, I guess young

39:33

lady said, well, I'll be right back, and

39:35

she came back with her friend. They

39:38

were both pretty, they were both young,

39:41

just having a good time

39:44

on vacation in the Bahamas. There

39:49

was a bar overlooking the

39:51

casino. Next thing, I know, the

39:54

drink I was supposed to have with Lamar,

39:57

because we've already said we're gonna go upstairs and have a

39:59

drink, ends up being these

40:01

two young ladies following us

40:04

up there. So it's starting to feel like a double

40:06

date. Yeah, and

40:09

that bothered me because,

40:12

you know, on the one hand, I was a

40:15

year old, fairly recently

40:17

divorced young man and

40:20

you know, a beautiful young woman

40:22

sitting next to me. I

40:24

remember what I was thinking was,

40:27

you know, they didn't really cover

40:30

this specific thing in

40:32

journalism school, in any of the classes

40:34

I took, But I am

40:37

fairly sure you're not

40:39

allowed to pick up girls with

40:41

the drug smuggler that you're covering.

40:45

And at the same time,

40:47

it's very socially awkward

40:50

because it was superficially a

40:52

very nice, happy little

40:55

group. But fortunately

40:57

for me, as I'm sitting there

41:00

trying to think how am I going to get out of

41:02

this gracefully, Lamar actually

41:05

provided me with the inspiration,

41:07

not intentionally, and apparently

41:10

did so with his signature style.

41:13

When the conversation fairly

41:15

quickly led to you

41:17

know, who are you and what do you do? After

41:20

they have talked about being a nurse

41:22

and et cetera, well

41:24

who are you? And Lamar said something

41:27

pretty instantly about, well, I'm

41:30

one of the biggest drug smugglers

41:32

in the world, and this guy is

41:34

a reporter that has been following

41:36

me, and you know, he writes about a lot

41:38

of the things that I do. And

41:41

I don't think that they believed in did

41:43

they just kind of laugh at I think they kind of laughed

41:45

it off, like oh sure,

41:49

I was like, well, damn, that

41:51

doesn't scare him off. And some people

41:53

who I've told this story too, has

41:56

said that may have made somebody more attracted.

41:58

Well, it didn't really, It was

42:01

that they didn't believe it. I don't

42:03

think the way that he said it, and

42:06

again it's consistent with

42:08

what he always said. He

42:10

never shied away from it. You just can't

42:12

believe that anybody

42:15

was this upfront. But I guess that was his strategy.

42:17

If you know you're going to be accused of

42:19

smuggling massive amounts of marijuana,

42:22

get in front of it. I think that was what

42:25

he tried to do always. And it's

42:27

not as if these ladies had like cell phones

42:29

in their hands where they could google it quickly,

42:31

couldn't google it. That's when

42:34

CB realized he could actually

42:36

prove Chester's claim to their

42:38

doting wanta be dates

42:40

my secret weapon. I suddenly

42:43

realized it was like a lightbulb going

42:45

off over my head. I

42:47

had a major series

42:50

about Lamar Chester, five

42:52

part series called Citizen Chester,

42:55

was running in my newspaper.

42:58

I ran up to the room and got the

43:01

card that has inserted into a

43:04

newspaper rack that you put

43:06

money in and pulled down the front

43:08

of and get a paper out of. And

43:11

this one had a photograph of Lamar Chester

43:13

that I had taken on that first

43:15

visit to the house, with a

43:18

banner headline master criminal

43:20

or secret Agent. And I took

43:22

it out, went back downstairs, went

43:25

right up to that table and unrolled

43:27

it. I

43:29

don't think I'm exaggerating to

43:32

say that the color drained from their faces.

43:36

There may have been women who would

43:38

have been attracted by that, but these

43:40

two were not. They

43:42

soon made excuses to leave a

43:45

night, and you know what, I

43:47

don't think that bothered lamar

43:49

Chester at all. I think he was very

43:52

happy that they knew who he was.

44:01

So at the time that the

44:04

inquiry was happening in the Bahamas. Were

44:06

you even aware that it was going on? No,

44:09

I wasn't following it. I was back

44:11

in d C for a few months,

44:13

and my mind was elsewhere

44:16

when it was happening, and I wasn't even aware

44:18

of it. Later, when I came back and Bob Adams

44:21

came up to me and said, do you know who Morgan

44:23

Cherry is? Well, it was shortly

44:25

after this that the mysterious Morgan

44:28

Cherry mentioned that I got a call

44:30

from Bob who said that Lamar

44:33

wanted to hire me as

44:35

a consultant. There was going to be a

44:37

pre trial hearing in Atlanta

44:40

and he wanted me to be there as a consultant. I

44:42

said, what he said, you know, look

44:44

over transcripts, catch

44:47

inconsistencies, that sort of

44:49

thing. He said he'd paid me a couple hundred

44:51

dollars a day plus travel. I

44:53

decided, I guess I could

44:56

be a consultant after all. Consultant

44:58

for what using your ex ortise as

45:00

a journalist, because it almost seems as if

45:02

it would be more a legal standpoint.

45:05

Well, I was used to looking over government

45:08

documents and finding discrepancies and that

45:10

sort of thing, believe it or not,

45:12

at this point, It still didn't seem

45:15

real to me that they thought

45:17

I was with the CIA. So

45:21

it was just an extension of the

45:23

craziness that had begun when

45:25

I started working for Intercept and

45:27

started getting paid for blowing assignments,

45:30

and if they wanted to pay

45:33

me, I figured why not. Of

45:35

course I shouldn't have done it. I

45:37

knew it had something to do with their

45:40

belief that I was with the C. I A. Yeah,

45:42

you know, a couple of hundred dollars a day plus travel

45:45

doesn't sound that bad and probably

45:47

seemed like much more in the early

45:49

eighties. It was certainly enough for me, that's

45:51

for sure. And if they did believe you were with

45:54

the CIA, they might have thought

45:56

they were compromising you. At the same time

46:00

they did compromise me that I wasn't with

46:02

the CIA. I mean, I was digging

46:04

myself in pretty deep

46:06

with people who I really didn't

46:08

want to offend. Yeah, that's the

46:11

other thing I would point out. You didn't

46:13

worry that you were getting into something

46:16

that you might not escape from.

46:19

I just sort of walked right into it, and

46:22

that seems to have been the plan. Here's

46:24

Chester talking to CB about

46:26

Phil Stanford. I

46:29

have a guy

46:32

to get our

46:37

agreement

46:41

operating. I

46:47

am not by any means

46:50

currently than

46:57

guy coming. You

47:01

heard that right, lamar Chester claims

47:04

someone working with the CIA

47:06

confirmed Bill Stanford

47:08

was also in the agency's employ

47:12

On the next murder Miami, Bill

47:15

Stanford leaves the Amsterdam Palace for

47:17

a farm in Georgia. It was kind

47:19

of strange. First thing. They put Bob up

47:21

in the guesthouse and I'm staying at the main

47:24

house with Lar and artists,

47:26

who I can tell right off really doesn't

47:28

want me at all. As the scope

47:30

of operation Loan Star titans around the

47:32

Marchester. Frankly, with what the

47:34

government stating witnesses

47:37

fed to alligators, I could

47:39

not understand how

47:42

someone who had just made

47:44

a deal to testify against Tom

47:46

would be anywhere nearing. But I

47:48

was going to find out and reignites

47:50

a cold case mystery from Miami. And

47:53

this was right out of the blue because we've never

47:55

spoken about Clay Williams, the interc

47:57

detective who was found dead in the Everglyn

48:00

we will wait. I'm sorry he brought

48:02

up play Williams, leading

48:05

to a possible break in the Clay Williams

48:07

murder that leads back to Intercept.

48:13

Murder of Miami is a production of I Heart

48:15

Radio. Executive producers

48:18

are Lauren Bright Pacheco, Taylor she

48:20

Coogne, and Phil Stanford. Written

48:23

by Phil Stanford and Lauren Bright Pacheco,

48:26

Audio editing and sound design by Nicholas

48:28

Harder, Evan Tyre and Taylor Kogne,

48:32

featuring music by Evan Tyre, Phil

48:34

Mayor, John Murchison and Taylor

48:36

Scogne. For more podcasts

48:38

for my Heart Radio, visit the I heart Radio

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48:43

you get the stories that matter to you