We agreed that everything be settled by the mediators in your Court as you suggested, but the INS announced on Good Friday that it was unwilling to participate in your mediation process.

Following this Court’s recommendation in the April 19th Order, [we] contacted the Court’s mediation office the following morning to request that it initiate mediation…. Disappointingly, on the following morning of Good Friday, the mediation office informed [us] that the INS said it was unwilling to participate in the Court’s mediation process. [The Court had stated in its April 19 Order, "Nevertheless, we encourage the parties to avail themselves voluntarily of this Court’s mediation services."]

* * *
More than twenty of Miami’s civic leaders had started to negotiate with Janet Reno. Most of them had known her for years. No politicians were involved.

Fortunately, or so it seemed at the time, another negotiation and mediation process was quietly underway directly with the Attorney General. Acting on their own initiative, the foremost leaders of Miami’s business, education, and legal communities had begun their own dialogue with the Attorney General, someone they had known and trusted for many years. These leaders included Edward "Tad" Foote, the President of the University of Miami, Aaron Podhurst, one of the most respected lawyers in this country, Carlos de la Cruz, prominent businessman, former United Way Chair and chairman of the Board of Trustees of the University of Miami, and Carlos Saladrigas, co-founder of the largest Hispanic-owned company in the United States. These leaders, in turn, had without fanfare obtained support for their efforts from twenty more of Miami’s most respected community leaders. Politicians were not involved. This was instead a spontaneous commitment of civic leaders to deal with the anguish of a child, his family, and our entire community.

* * *
The negotiators believed they had brokered an agreement satisfactory to both parties by 5 p.m. on Good Friday. After a conversation with them and Janet Reno about 1:30 a.m., the negotiators were confident that an agreement had been made.

By mid-afternoon on Good Friday, the Lazaro Gonzalez family met with counsel and agreed to all six of the elements of the proposal [which Reno had already agreed to]. The Attorney General asked for a document to be faxed to Washington by 5:00 p.m. confirming their agreement with the apparent solution.
Before 5:00 p.m. on Friday, the negotiators, believing that they had reached an agreement in principle with the Attorney General, faxed her a written "term sheet" outlining the six points. [citation]  Pursuant to the Attorney General’s request, the Gonzalez family later signed the term sheet and faxed it at approximately 8:30 p.m. on Friday night…. Subsequently, during the evening and throughout the night, discussions continued among the Miami leaders, separated by various intervals as they awaited response from the Attorney General. Following the negotiators’ conversation with Mr. Podhurst and the Attorney General at about 1:30 a.m., they were confident that a deal was indeed being reached.  The negotiators and the Gonzalez family waited to hear back from the Attorney General for confirmation.

* * *
About 4:30 a.m. the demands from Janet Reno changed substantially, but the negotiators told Janet Reno that they would recommend that the family agree to the new terms.

They were left to wait until about 4:00 a.m., at which time Mr. Podhurst called with the Attorney General on the other line.  Mr. Podhurst "indicated that her [the Attorney General’s] tone of voice had changed; that she seemed to him to be under enormous pressure; and that the deal had changed substantially." [citation] After detailing the INS’s eleventh-hour demands, Mr. Podhurst called again and said that "the Attorney General had indicated to him that we had only five minutes to agree to the new conditions." [citation] The negotiators awoke the family to discuss the Attorney General’s latest unexpected demands.  At 4:30 a.m., during the middle of these discussions, Mr. Podhurst, who had the Attorney General on the other line, told the negotiators and the family that ‘we were running out of time.’  [citation] The negotiators informed the Attorney General, through Mr. Podhurst, that they were in the process of speaking to their abruptly awakened clients and would be recommending agreement to the INS’s main sticking point.

While the negotiators were still on the telephone talking to Janet Reno, the INS burst through the door, filling the house with tear gas.

Shortly after 5:00 a.m., while negotiators were still on the phone with Mr. Podhurst and with the Attorney General on the other line, the INS forces burst through the door, filling the house with tear gas.

* * *
At 4:15 a.m. the Miami Police Chief had received a call that the house would be raided at 5:15 a.m.

At 4:15 a.m., at the same time that Mr. Podhurst was communicating the Attorney General’s latest demands to the negotiators in the Gonzalez house, Miami Police Chief William O’Brien "received a call at his ... home from Assistant Chief John Brooks, [advising that] [f]ederal agents would raid the house at 5:15 a.m."

* * *
Janet Reno says that "time ran out" and the Gonzalez family "kept moving the goalpost." Bill Clinton says that the raid occurred after "all efforts failed." Those statements were blatantly false.

Remarkably, the Attorney General announced during a press conference later that day that, "Time ran out," on the negotiations and that mediation was impossible because the Gonzalez family "kept moving the goalpost."  President Clinton stated in a separate press conference that the INS’s armed raid occurred after "all efforts failed."  Those statements, to say the least, were not accurate.
* * *
On the day after the raid, Janet Reno had a two-hour teleconference with some of the Miami leaders and said she had no knowledge at that time as to who was with Elian and she had no authority to limit access to the child. This raises the question of who did know and who has that authority if she doesn’t?

The Attorney General "replied that she had no knowledge of who was with the child and had no authority to limit access to the child."
* * *
The INS had decided on December 1 to keep Elian in the U.S. so that the family courts of Florida could decide what was best for him. But that was changed four days later when Castro got angry.

[T]he INS committed on December 1 to keeping Elian here so that the family courts could handle the issues of Elian. Castro’s tirades began four days later and, to say the least, things have never been the same.
* * *

Although Janet Reno has made much of the fact that the agent pointing his M-5 submachine gun at Elian had his finger at-the-ready alongside the trigger, she has not revealed that another masked agent can be seen in the pictures with his weapon pointed directly at Elian’s five-year-old cousin with his finger on the trigger. That child ingested substantial portions of tear gas, was later stabilized but has remained incommunicative and withdrawn due to the shock.

[T]he wider-shot of the same scene shows a masked gunman in the background of the photograph pointing his M-5 submachine gun at Elian’s five-year-old best friend and cousin - - and that this gunman has his finger on his trigger, positioned to mow down a child, hardly a threat worthy to justify this shameful display of United States military might. [citation] That child ingested substantial portions of tear gas, was later stabilized but has remained incommunicative and withdrawn due to the obvious shock.
 
 
 

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