# 'International Illicit Narcotic Cases 1951 to July 1963' by Commissioner Henry L. Giordano: the Havana cases of 1956-57 (Senate narcotics hearings, pp. 789-804)

Canonical: https://mobfiles.org/items/psi-1964-giordano-international-cases-havana/

A Bureau of Narcotics summary printed in the 1964 hearing record reports that an undercover agent went to Havana in December 1956 and, 'Working in cooperation with the Cuban police,' bought cocaine from Jose Flaifel Moubarak on 4 February 1957, and that the Herran Olozaga defendants were arrested in Havana by Cuban police on 24 December 1956.

The document headed "International Illicit Narcotic Cases 1951 to July 1963, by Henry L. Giordano, Commissioner of Narcotics," from the Treasury Department's Bureau of Narcotics, begins on printed page 789 of the hearing record (NCJRS PDF page 885). The research record places it after the hearing heading of 30 July 1964; that is the date used here, and the document's own title gives its span. The Commissioner's oral testimony of 28 July 1964 is [filed separately](/items/psi-1964-giordano-testimony/). It states that from the start of the Bureau's foreign program "to July 1, 1963, a total of 510 defendants have been arrested, in 165 cases."

Under the heading for Cuba (printed page 804; the text layer reads "aURA"), it reports that, after information obtained by an undercover agent of the Bureau's Beirut office, "the agent went to Havana, Cuba, in December 1956. Working in cooperation with the Cuban police, the undercover agent introduced a second agent, who negotiated with Moubarak, for delivery of a large quantity of cocaine. This case was successfully concluded on February 4, 1957," when Moubarak delivered about 1 1/2 kilograms of cocaine and two other defendants were arrested.

Two other entries touch Havana. Under Colombia (page 804), the Herran Olozaga defendants of a Medellin laboratory case "had been arrested in Havana by Cuban police on December 24, 1956, when Tomas Herran was found in possession of about 800 grams of heroin," and a Cuban national was arrested at Havana in the case. Under Italy (page 797), the El-Serouji morphine-base case "began in February 1957, when an undercover agent working in Havana Cuba, received 1 1/2 kilograms of cocaine" from Moubarak.

These are the Bureau's own case summaries, entered in a Senate record. They are not court records of the cases, and they do not concern the Havana casinos.

## Sources

- National Criminal Justice Reference Service, scan of the printed hearings (NCJ 119303): https://www.ojp.gov/pdffiles1/Digitization/119303NCJRS.pdf
- NCJRS catalog record (NCJ 119303): https://www.ojp.gov/ncjrs/virtual-library/abstracts/organized-crime-and-illicit-traffic-narcotics-hearing-us-senate