The Attorney General’s 50th Awards Ceremony
July 17, 2002
Constitution Hall
1776 D St NW, Washington, DC 20006
Pat Diaz
Detective Miami Police Department
The recipients have worked diligently and relentlessly to disrupt and dismantle the international Detective trafficking organization led by Augusto Guillermo Falcon and Salvador Magluta. Falcon and Magluta controlled one of the largest identified cocaine importation and distribution networks in the country from a base of operations in Miami. The Falcon-Magluta drug trafficking organization was responsible for the importation and subsequent distribution of over 110,000kilograms of cocaine while amassing an estimated $2 billion and related assets. Falcon, Magluta, and other members of the organization were arrested in 1991 and charged with numerous narcotic-related charges. In spite of a 1996 acquittal of Falcon and Magluta, these investigators persevered through numerous other trials. Charges ranged from firearms violations, passport fraud, harboring fugitives, bond-jumping, money laundering, and the murder of three witnesses. The combined efforts of these individuals resulted in forty convictions. Falcon and Magluta remain in federal custody awaiting trial scheduled to commence in April 2002, for money laundering, obstruction of justice, and related charges. The work of these individuals resulted in the disruption and dismantling of a priority target drug trafficking organization operating out of Florida with distribution ties throughout the Nation.