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Miami man who hid $22.6 million cash in Home Depot buckets faces federal charges

Miami man who hid $22.6 million cash in Home Depot buckets faces federal charges The man found with $22.6 million in suspected marijuana cash stuffed in buckets inside his Miami Lakes home wants to start his trial in state court next month. Uncle Sam, however, wants him first. A federal grand jury has indicted Luis Hernandez-Gonzalez on money-laundering charges, prompting a U.S. district court judge last week to order that he be moved from a Miami-Dade county jail to a federal detention center. The decision prompted a legal showdown of sorts on Monday, as his defense lawyers rushed to court to try and convince a state judge to order that the Miami-Dade jail refuse federal authorities attempts to transport him. “There are important constitutional rights at stake,” defense lawyer Philip Reizenstein told the judge. “We have the law on our side. This stinks.” Miami-Dade Circuit Judge Nushin Sayfie, who heads the criminal division, was sympathetic but couldn’t do much. “Federal law is the supreme law of the land,” she said, adding: “I just don’t think I am the appropriate tribunal given where I fall in the pecking order.” His lawyers are planning to file an emergency appeal to the Third District Court of Appeal, a state court. The legal jockeying adds another twist to the high-profile saga of Hernandez-Gonzalez, who was arrested by Miami-Dade Police in June in a record-setting bust. Most of the cash was found in 24 orange “Homer’s all purpose buckets” from Home Depot, which were hidden in a secret compartment inside his Miami Lakes house. Miami-Dade police hauled away the money in a pickup truck, with narcotics detectives spending more than a day exhaustively counting the stash. The department released photos of the buckets hidden in the room – and the immense pile of cash once the bills were removed from the buckets. Hernandez-Gonzalez ran Blossom Experience, a North Miami-Dade store that sells fans, lights and other equipment for indoor gardening. Cops believe that the business, while legal, caters to marijuana traffickers growing weed in clandestine labs inside homes. Investigators raided his businesses and home after he was caught on a phone wiretap giving growing advice to Miami marijuana growers arrested by federal agents in Tennessee. But his defense team insists that the money was legitimately earned from selling equipment. However, because he sells to legal growers in other states, no banks would take his cash, they claim. Hernandez-Gonzalez remains jailed and is charged in state court with marijuana trafficking and money laundering. However, last month, federal authorities unsealed a grand-jury indictment stemming from the same cash seizure. He is accused federally of laundering the money and conducting illegal financial transactions to hide the money. A federal prosecutor, appearing by phone in state on Monday, could not say why the U.S. Attorney’s Office could not wait until the end of the state trial in December. “It’s unfortunate that it may cause a delay in the proceedings but we do have an interest in bringing him over here and prosecuting him federally,” federal prosecutor Elijah Levitt said. miamiherald.com Latest Posts School fight caught on cameraAugust 18, 2023 Cops took $22 million cash stuffed in buckets from his home. But he won’t lose it all.February 7, 2018 10th Sentence Handed Down In Fla. Health Care Fraud CaseJuly 20, 2017 Man identified as Colombian judge accused in arms-shipment case in MiamiJune 11, 2017 Archive February 2018 July 2017 June 2017 November 2016 October 2016 March 2016 February 2016 April 2014 March 2013 June 2012 March 2012

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$22 million cash hidden in buckets is all legit, defense lawyers say

$22 million cash hidden in buckets is all legit, defense lawyers say The Miami Lakes man who had $22.6 million cash stuffed in buckets inside a secret room says the money is all legit — earned from sales of equipment to legal marijuana growers in other states. Lawyers for Luis Hernandez-Gonzalez offered their defense in court as a Miami-Dade judge on Tuesday lowered his bond to $2 million. He remains jailed. “The prosecution of our client amounts to what we think is a war on marijuana and a war on legitimately earned cash,” defense lawyer Philip Reizenstein said after Tuesday’s hearing. The defense aired its strategy just weeks before trial for Hernandez-Gonzalez, who was arrested in June after Miami-Dade police, in a record-setting bust, found the suspected drug cash, most of it stuffed in 24 orange buckets inside his Miami Lakes house. Hernandez-Gonzalez, 44, remains jailed in a case that drew worldwide attention. He was originally being held on a $3 million bond. He is charged with money laundering and marijuana trafficking. Miami-Dade police hauled away the money in a pickup truck, with narcotics detectives spending more than a day exhaustively counting the money. The department released striking photos of the money hidden in the room — and the immense pile of cash once the bills were removed from the buckets. The police department has asked a Miami-Dade civil court to give the $22.6 million to the government under forfeiture proceedings. That legal fight is still ongoing. Hernandez-Gonzalez ran Blossom Experience, a North Miami-Dade store that sells fans, lights and other equipment for indoor gardening. Cops believe that the business, while legal, caters to marijuana traffickers growing weed in clandestine labs inside homes. Investigators raided his businesses and home after he was caught on a phone wiretap giving growing advice to Miami marijuana growers arrested by federal agents in Tennessee. Medical marijuana is legal in 25 states. Four states plus the District of Columbia have legalized the drug for recreational use. Defense lawyers Reizenstein and Frank Gaviria told a Miami-Dade judge this week that the equipment sales were all legal. But his customers in other states had to pay him in cash because federally sanctioned banks won’t take their money — and in turn, South Florida banks closed his accounts because they deemed his deposits suspicious, the lawyers said. “That’s why this money was in the buckets,” Reizenstein told the court. He said financial records will prove the money is clean. “We can show where this money came from. Purchase orders, sales, shipping records, they are going to see $50-60-70 million worth of orders, legitimate,” Reizenstein said. But Miami-Dade prosecutor Helen Page Schwartz said three witnesses have come forward to say that Hernandez-Gonzalez used to set up illegal marijuana grow houses, then as his business grew, he began selling his customers equipment at a reduced cost in turn for buying the drug cheaply. Selling to hydroponics labs purportedly growing vegetables is just a front for the dirty money, she said. “Sixty … seventy million … that’s a lot of money for cucumbers and tomatoes,” Page Schwartz said. miamiherald.com Latest Posts School fight caught on cameraAugust 18, 2023 Cops took $22 million cash stuffed in buckets from his home. But he won’t lose it all.February 7, 2018 10th Sentence Handed Down In Fla. Health Care Fraud CaseJuly 20, 2017 Man identified as Colombian judge accused in arms-shipment case in MiamiJune 11, 2017 Archive February 2018 July 2017 June 2017 November 2016 October 2016 March 2016 February 2016 April 2014 March 2013 June 2012 March 2012

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Fla. man faces charges in heist from truck headed for Mass.

Fla. man faces charges in heist from truck headed for Mass. A Florida man orchestrated the heist of gold bars worth millions of dollars from a tractor trailer headed to Massachusetts last year by hatching an elaborate plan to force the crew to pull over in North Carolina, authorities said in court papers. The allegations against Adalberto Perez, 46, of Opa Locka, Fla., were made public in papers unsealed Thursday in US District Court in Miami, where he is charged with masterminding the March 2015 robbery in North Carolina, in which three gunmen made off with $4.8 million in gold bars. Perez was ordered held Thursday on charges of conspiring to commit the robbery and to possess a gun to further the crime, pending a detention hearing scheduled for Tuesday. He did not enter a plea. His lawyer, Frank J. Gaviria, declined to discuss the specific allegations but said Perez intends to “vigorously fight against these accusations.” According to a complaint filed in the case, the robbery of the truck belonging to the Miami-based shipping company TransValue Inc. occurred on March 1, 2015 on Interstate 95 in Wilson County, N.C. The truck was bound for the Bridgewater area, records show. A person identified only as a cooperating source told the FBI in January that Perez planned the caper and robbed the truck with two other men, the complaint said. The source had a “close, personal relationship” with Perez and lived with him for a time, records show. The source told agents that Perez indicated that before the robbery, he placed a GPS device under the trailer to track its location, and that he and his two accomplices also placed pepper spray inside the truck, the complaint said. Perez could release the pepper spray remotely, the source said, and the employees inside the truck stopped on the interstate because they began to feel sick. The robbers set upon the two employees at gunpoint and bound them before fleeing with the gold, records show. In addition, the thieves ignored containers of silver and went directly for the canisters of gold, suggesting they knew what they were looking for, according to legal filings. Perez told the source that the three men split the gold equally, and Perez began selling his share, using the proceeds to buy three Nissan vehicles, three homes, and a boat, according to the complaint. The records did not indicate how Perez allegedly gained access to the trailer before the robbery, and a spokeswoman for US Attorney Wifredo A. Ferrer declined to comment. It was not clear on Friday if prosecutors know the identities of the other two gunmen or if anyone else will be charged. In July, another man, Miguel Bovar, pleaded guilty to an extortion charge related to the robbery, records show. Jay Rodriguez, chief executive of TransValue, said in an e-mail that Perez is not a former employee, and the company is “looking into all possible scenarios.” bostonglobe.com Latest Posts School fight caught on cameraAugust 18, 2023 Cops took $22 million cash stuffed in buckets from his home. But he won’t lose it all.February 7, 2018 10th Sentence Handed Down In Fla. Health Care Fraud CaseJuly 20, 2017 Man identified as Colombian judge accused in arms-shipment case in MiamiJune 11, 2017 Archive February 2018 July 2017 June 2017 November 2016 October 2016 March 2016 February 2016 April 2014 March 2013 June 2012 March 2012

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