Elian Seized,
Returned to Dad
By PAULINE JELINEK
Associated Press
04/22/00
ANDREWS AIR FORCE BASE, Md. -- Seized
by armed agents before dawn, Elian Gonzalez
(photos
| audio
| video)
was reunited with his father today after a frantic and
forceful end to a five-month standoff between the
government and the Cuban boy's Miami relatives.
Federal agents seized the boy from the
home of his Miami relatives, firing pepper spray into an
angry crowd as they took away the crying and screaming
6-year-old boy for a reunion with his Cuban father.
The father, Juan Miguel Gonzalez, was
waiting at Andrews Air Force Base near Washington when
Elian arrived from Miami.
A motorcade pulled up to a building on
the base, and a man carrying a child was seen entering.
Their identities could not be immediately confirmed.
It would be the first time father and
son have seen each other since Elian was rescued off the
Florida coast on Thanksgiving Day, after the boat
carrying him, his mother and other would-be refugees
from Cuba sank. Elian's mother perished.
A sole protester dressed in a devil's
costume showed up outside Andrews, a secured base used
for the president in his domestic and overseas travels.
Agents Make Surprise Entry
In the pre-dawn hours, more than 20
agents in several white vans arrived at the home of the
Miami relatives who had been caring for Elian since his
rescue. They used rams on the home's chain-link fence
and front door to get inside. The boy was being hidden
in a bedroom closet by his great-aunt and Donato
Dalrymple, one of the fishermen who rescued him on
Thanksgiving Day.
 |
| Juan Miguel Gonzalez holds
his son Elian after a reunion at Andrews Air
Force Base.(AP) |
In the bedroom, an agent in green riot
gear and goggles and holding an automatic rifle
confronted Dalrymple holding the frightened child, an
image captured by an Associated Press photographer and
broadcast around the world. Agents then took Elian out
of Dalrymple's arms.
A short time later, a woman and man
brought Elian out of the home and put him in one of the
vans, which sped off. Maria Elena Quesada, who was at
the home, said Elian was screaming "Help me! Help
me! Don't take me away!'' in Spanish.
Elian Goes to Washington
By 6 a.m., Elian was on a government
plane headed for an airport near Washington and a
reunion with his father. Juan Miguel Gonzalez was told
about the raid as soon as Elian was safe and will meet
his son at the airport, officials said.
"Juan Gonzalez wants to be with
his son, and that will happen now,'' Attorney General
Janet Reno said. She said she "did until the final
moments try to reach a voluntary solution,'' but over
the weeks and months the dispute has gone on, "the
Miami relatives kept moving the goal post and raising
the hurdles.''
She said the boy would stay in the
United States pending further court action over the
question of asylum, as the federal appeals court ruled.
"Elian is safe and no one was
seriously hurt,'' she said.
Doris Meissner, commissioner of the
Immigration and Naturalization Service, said the
Spanish-speaking, female agent who carried the boy had a
soothing message -- worked out in advance: "This
may seem very scary. It will soon be better.'' The boy
was told he would be taken to "papa,'' the word he
used for his father.
Elian was given a physical by a
government doctor before he got on the plane, a
government official said earlier, speaking on condition
of anonymity. On the plane were the female immigration
agent who carried Elian from the house, a psychiatrist,
a flight surgeon and the immigration agent who commanded
the operation.
Elian was described as subdued and
calm on the plane.
He was given a play kit including
toys, Play-Doh, an airplane, a map and a watch, the
official said.
Cuba, U.S. Reacts
In Havana today, Cubans wept in
happiness. In an official statement read over state
radio stations, the government urged Cubans to
"maintain calm and avoid public displays'' over the
event
But in Miami, under a brilliant, clear
sky, crowds began to gather in Little Havana as the city
slowly awoke to the realization that Elian was gone. By
midmorning, drivers on one highway demonstrated with a
slowdown.
Police closed off 35 blocks around the
home after dawn as people at a street intersection
burned debris and yelled at a line of officers in riot
gear.
"We have our office in full
mobilization,'' said Lt. Bill Schwartz, a police
spokesman. "They're getting ready to form two field
forces to take their positions if necessary.''
Family Emotions Run High
The siege appeared to catch the family
completely off guard. After daylight, the boy's cousin
Marisleysis Gonzalez came out of the house and shouted
to the crowd in words sprinkled with patriotic
references to freedom and the land of opportunity.
She said the agents broke down the
door yelling, ''`Give us the (expletive) boy. We'll
shoot. We'll shoot. We'll shoot,''' as she begged them
not to take him or let him see the guns.
"How can this boy be OK when he
had a gun to his head?'' she said. "I thought this
was a country of freedom.''
But Reno said, "the Miami
relatives rejected our efforts, leaving us no other
option but the enforcement action.'' She also said the
gun was not pointed directly at the boy.
But Ms. Gonzalez and Kendall Coffey,
an attorney for the Miami relatives, said they were in
the middle of negotiations and had been put on hold by
the mediator when the agents arrived.
"We're angry and disgusted,''
Coffey said. "We were in communication with the
mediator handling negotiations and discussion with the
government when they knocked the door down.''
It was a swift and violent step in the
international custody dispute over the little boy
rescued off the Florida coast nearly five months ago.
His Miami relatives have sought to retain the temporary
custody they were granted in November, while the U.S.
government has sought to reunite the boy with his
father.
"Assassins!''
 |
| Elian Gonzalez is held in a
closet by Donato Dalrymple, one of the fisherman
who rescued the boy from the ocean, right, as
government officials search the home of Lazaro
Gonzalez Saturday morning. (AP) |
yelled some of the approximately 100
protesters, some of whom climbed over the barricades in
an attempt to stop the agents. The agents, wearing
Immigration and Naturalization Service shirts, were
armed with automatic weapons.
"The world is watching!'' yelled
Delfin Gonzalez, the brother of the little boy's
caretaker and great-uncle, Lazaro Gonzalez.
Ramon Saul Sanchez, leader of the
anti-Castro Democracy Movement, was bleeding from one
ear after the raid. He said he was knocked out by an
agent using a rifle as a club.
"They were animals,'' said Jess
Garcia, a bystander. "They gassed women and
children to take a defenseless child out of here. We
were assaulted with no provocation''
Miami police executives, including the
chief, had some notice of the raid but officers at the
scene had only a moment's notice, said Schwartz, the
department spokesman.
The raid came amid reports of progress
in talks to immediately transfer custody of the boy to
his father. Reno was at her office early this morning
engaged in a long-distance negotiation that began Friday
afternoon.
All of that ended in failure early
today.
| |
"They took this kid
like a hostage in the nighttime''
— Carlos Gonzalez on
Saturday's raid. |
|
Carlos Gonzalez said he and several
others tried to form a human chain in front of the door
but were forced back at gunpoint.
Inside, Dalrymple held Elian in his
arms as the agents arrived. He said agents told him
"give me the boy or I'll shoot you.''
"They took this kid like a
hostage in the nighttime,'' he said.
The government and Juan Miguel
Gonzalez insisted that any deal contain an immediate
transfer of custody of Elian to him, but the Miami
relatives defied Reno's order switching custody.
The relatives have cared for Elian
since he was found clinging to an inner tube in the
Atlantic after a boat carrying his mother and other
Cubans capsized, killing her and 10 others. They and the
hundreds of Cubans who gathered for days outside their
home don't want the boy returned to a Cuba ruled by
Fidel Castro.
The deal that was under discussion
called for Juan Miguel Gonzalez and Elian, Lazaro and
Marisleysis to move to one of two foundation-owned
conference centers near Washington, according to a
government official, who spoke on condition of
anonymity.
The plan called for formal custody to
transfer immediately from the Miami relatives to the
father, the official said. The two sides also couldn't
agree on how long they might live together pending the
end of the court battle.
The Miami relatives lost a U.S.
District Court battle to get a political asylum hearing
for Elian. An appeals court has ordered Elian to stay in
this country until it hears that case, but did not bar
Reno from switching custody.
Reno met for briefly Friday at the
Justice Department with Juan Miguel, who asked Reno to
give him a date certain when he would get his son back.
Afterward, Reno said she told him
"that I could not commit to a particular course of
action or timetable.''
------
EDITOR'S NOTE -- AP Writer Michael
J. Sniffen in Washington contributed to this report.
TOP
