Fox 5, New York: U.S.-Cuba talks: Will fugitives be extradited?

From Fox 5 New York, May 20, 2015

“If we give in to Cuba on fugitives, on freedom its not negotiating, its capitulating.  And my father deserved better…”Fox 5 May 2015

For the full piece, please click the link below or on the photo to the right.

http://www.myfoxny.com/story/29120191/us-cuba-talks-fugitives

The United States and Cuba head into a fourth round of talks aimed at restoring diplomatic ties between the two countries. However, one major sticking point in the discussions is Cuba’s harboring of American fugitives convicted of or linked to murder.

From the streets of Havana, Cuba, our latest Fox Doc took you inside the push to return one of American’s most notorious fugitives: Joanne Chesimard, convicted in the killing of a New Jersey State Trooper in the 1970s. She has lived freely on the streets of the island nation after escaping prison in the 1980s.

Joe Connor is intimately familiar with the hunt for wanted criminals in Cuba. His family has been trying to get William Morales extradited since the 1990s. Morales is thought to have built a bomb and possibly orchestrated an attack at the Fraunces Tavern in lower Manhattan in 1975. The explosion killed Frank Connor, Joe’s dad, along with three other people.

Within minutes of the explosion, a Puerto Rican terrorist organization known as FALN took responsibility for the attack. Though no one was ever convicted of the crime, by 1978 the group’s chief bomb maker William Morales would become a prime suspect.

Morales was later convicted on separate explosives charges but never fulfilled his prison sentence because he escaped from Bellevue. He eventually travelled to Mexico and later to Cuba, where he has lived as a free man ever since.

Before the United States takes bigger steps toward repairing diplomatic relations with the Communist country and discussing the possibility of re-opening an embassy there, families like Joe’s want their voices to be heard.

 

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