Across the Nation

High Court to hear advertising case

WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court agreed yesterday to use a cigarette-advertising dispute to consider giving commercial speech broader protection against regulation - closer to the free-speech status of political and artistic expression.

The justices said they will hear tobacco companies' challenge to limits on cigarette and cigar advertising at retail stores in Massachusetts.

In recent years the court has boosted the free-speech protection for advertising, most notably in a 1996 ruling that struck down Rhode Island's ban on liquor price ads. The law aimed to promote sobriety, but the justices said it violated free-speech rights.

In 1998, the tobacco industry agreed to pay the states almost $250 billion and to stop advertising on billboards or on signs posted in shopping malls, arenas and stadiums. The agreement allowed stores that sell cigarettes to display outdoor signs of no more than 14 square feet.

The Supreme Court will also hear the case of a woman who claims her male co-workers sabotaged her work and decide whether to limit the amount of money she can receive in damages.

Sharon Pollard says she endured years of mounting abuse that left her traumatized and unable to continue work at a DuPont chemical plant, and that the company did nothing to help her.

Harassment began in 1987, Pollard alleged, when a male co-worker opened a Bible on her desk to the passage, ``I do not permit a woman to teach or have authority over man. She must be silent.''

Fugitive continues to elude the law

SAN DIEGO - Depending on which tips you believe, the most hunted fugitive along this piece of the U.S.-Mexico border has been skiing in Wyoming, gambling in Las Vegas or swapping e-mail in a lonely-hearts chat room.

Wherever he is, accused Tijuana, Mexico, drug lord Ramon Arellano Felix has stayed a step ahead of the law, despite a massive three-year manhunt by U.S. authorities, a $2 million reward and the arrests in Mexico last year of two of his gang's alleged top figures.

Sightings in Tijuana have dwindled so markedly that many suggest he has left altogether. Authorities in Mexico say he may be living in the United States. But U.S. law enforcement officials are convinced that Arellano and brother Benjamin, both of whom face federal drug-trafficking and conspiracy charges in the United States, continue operating in Baja, California. A multi-agency U.S. task force targeting the cartel has gotten fresh word of sightings in Mexico in recent weeks.

"It's home for them. They're comfortable there, with family contacts and corrupt officials that help them," said FBI Special Agent Donald Robinson Jr., a member of the task force.

There is "credible evidence" that Ramon, considered the most outgoing of the brothers, has crossed into the United States during the last year, most likely by using false papers, agents say.

U.S. officials say the cartel, arguably the most powerful in Mexico, seems to have weathered the arrests by Mexican soldiers early last year of Jesus Labra and Ismael Higuera Guerrero. Labra is said to be a founder of the cartel, and Higuera, who faces U.S. charges, allegedly headed daily operations.

The arrests, during separate actions in March and May, were seen by U.S. authorities as serious blows to cartel leadership and the most promising sign of Mexico's willingness to take on the organization that controls the lion's share of narcotics smuggled into California.

Soon after, U.S. authorities unsealed federal charges against Benjamin Arellano Felix and appealed anew for help in locating 36-year-old Ramon, indicted and placed on the FBI's Ten Most Wanted list in 1997. They and a third brother have been sought in Mexico in connection with the 1993 killing of Roman Catholic Cardinal Juan Jesus Posadas Ocampo, slain in a shootout at Guadalajara's airport.

But to the dismay of U.S. officials, the brothers have gone untouched. American officials say, however, that drug-smuggling operations were jolted by the arrests of Labra and Higuera.

"It's thrown them off balance," said a knowledgeable U.S. official. "They're still in the business, but it did set them back a bit. They relied on (Higuera) for a lot of day-to-day operations."

Mexico's new president, Vicente Fox, has vowed a fresh offensive against crime syndicates, the Arellanos included. Fox told the daily newspaper Reforma last month that he would send 1,000 to 2,000 federal agents to Tijuana to "eradicate" the gang. That will hinge on a push to recruit as many as 15,000 new federal police agents during the next six months to take on cartels and other crime groups.

Adolfo Aguilar Zinser, Fox's national security adviser, told reporters to expect "some spectacular blows" against organized crime.

The Tijuana mob has outlived past threats, aided by payoffs, official incompetence and violence. A Mexican prosecutor and two anti-drug agents were tortured and killed last year during a hunt for the top cartel bosses. U.S. agents who worked with the trio said the investigators were closing in on the drug ring's leaders before the agents' bodies were found in a ravine outside Tijuana.

Mexican authorities last year attributed a spate of killings - including the shooting of Tijuana Police Chief Alfredo de la Torre Marquez - to a turf battle between the cartel and traffickers from Sinaloa state. Skeptical U.S. agents said the violence appeared instead to be the result of factional housecleaning inside the Tijuana cartel.

Things have quieted down since, leading U.S. officials to conclude that organized crime bosses smoothed over conflicts and returned to the lucrative business of moving cocaine, marijuana and methamphetamine into the United States.

"Some arrangement has been made, because nobody's dying over it," Robinson said.

North of the border, about 30 U.S. agents - mainly from the FBI, Drug Enforcement Administration, Customs Service and Internal Revenue Service - follow up on tips to a toll-free hot line and from other sources.

Tipsters have placed the Arellanos in San Diego, Los Angeles, Las Vegas, New Jersey, Minnesota, Spain, Central America and South America . There are what the agents call ``Elvis sightings," such as the report that Ramon was giving a religious talk at a Chula Vista church. It turned out to be someone with the same last name.

Agents said about 50 leads could be corroborated sufficiently to pursue.

Mexico has no similar hot line, and U.S. agents lack authority to carry out investigations there. Instead they relay news of reported sightings of the brothers or associates in Mexico to Mexican investigators by way of the U.S. Embassy in Mexico City. That approach relies on Mexican investigators, often undertrained and ill-equipped, to follow up. It also can be time-consuming.

``It's a little more complicated than picking up the phone and calling the Tijuana police," said John Blake, an FBI supervisor.

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U.S. investigators say the success of the hunt depends in great part on Mexican authorities, whose past efforts have been spotty. A sticking point is Mexico's traditional unwillingness to extradite drug lords for prosecution in U.S. courts.

The arrests of Labra and Higuera last year did not produce a quick capture of the Arellano Felix brothers, as some hoped. But the surprise actions remain a source of guarded optimism among U.S. agents.

``Where there's a will, there's a way," said the U.S. official. ``You can see in past apprehensions that things can be done. ... We keep plugging away."

La. Gov. sentenced to 10 years in prison

BATON ROUGE, La. - Former Gov. Edwin Edwards, the silver-haired gambler who wisecracked his way through two dozen investigations, was sentenced to 10 years in prison and fined $250,000 yesterday for extorting payoffs from businessmen applying for riverboat casino licenses.

Edwards showed little emotion as the decision was read. His daughters and wife sobbed behind him.

"A long sentence is effectively a death sentence," said Edwards'' lawyer Dan Small, who immediately filed notice of appeal.

Edwards was ordered to report to prison Feb. 5, but a court battle is expected over whether he can remain free while he appeals.

With a gag order finally lifted, Edwards gave a long interview on the courthouse steps, flatly denying the allegations.

With characteristic wit, he also joked: "I have to make arrangements to find Candy a new husband and pay my bills."

Edwards was convicted in May of 17 counts of racketeering, extortion, fraud and conspiracy. His son Stephen and three other figures were also found guilty.

The younger Edwards was sentenced to seven years in prison and fined $60,000. His lawyer, Jim Cole, called it guilt by association.

"The jury's verdict is largely a product of Stephen Edwards' last name," he said. "He's swept along by whatever they think of his father."

The casino schemes took place after the Democrat was out of office in 1991, and continued through his fourth and final term as governor from 1992 to 1996 and after he left office but retained considerable political clout.

The case came to light in 1997, when FBI agents raided Edwards' home and office, seizing records and more than $400,000 in cash. Prosecutors built their case on 1,500 hours of telephone conversations secretly recorded by the FBI and testimony from businessmen such as former San Francisco 49ers owner Eddie DeBartolo Jr., who said Edwards extorted $400,000 from him.

Defense attorneys said there was no smoking gun tying Edwards to the scheme.

Edwards used an uncanny political sense to become the most powerful Louisiana politician since Huey Long. The sharp-witted Cajun was a nonsmoking, Scripture-quoting teetotaler who loved high-stakes gambling, beautiful women and ribald jokes. And he was surrounded by hints of scandal.

Grand juries looked into his finances and campaign contributions in the early and mid-1970s. He was indicted in 1985 on racketeering charges stemming from hospital and nursing home investments. The first trial ended in a hung jury and the second in an acquittal. He arrived at court one day in a mule-drawn carriage, saying it represented the pace of the trial.

The sense of humor never disappeared. In the latest case, after learning that the federal charges carried up to 350 years in prison, Edwards said: "I can truthfully say if my sentence is 350 years, I don't intend to serve."

So much information was amassed from the investigation that two more indictments followed the casino license charges. Edwards and others were accused of insurance fraud; two defendants have pleaded guilty. A third indictment accused former Houston Mayor Fred Hofheinz and others of bribery; Edwards was not charged but prosecutors said he profited from the scheme.

Last month, U.S. District Judge Frank Polozola threw out six fraud convictions against the Edwardses. But he let stand the more serious racketeering and extortion counts against them. U.S. Attorney Eddie Jordan said he hasn't decided whether to retry the men on those charges.

At Edwards' sentencing, federal prosecutor Jim Letten said Louisiana owes much of its reputation as a corrupt state to Edwards.

"People to this day think, thanks largely in part to Edwin Edwards and his co-defendants in this case, that Louisiana is a hostile and dangerous place to do business. It's the Edwards legacy," he said.

The Edwardses' co-defendants, former gubernatorial aide Andrew Martin, cattleman Cecil Brown and businessman Bobby Johnson, all were sentenced to around 51/2 years in prison and fined $50,000 each.