Seller, Broker Disagree Over Who Knew Buyer
When a jet at the heart of a major cocaine bust left St. Petersburg-Clearwater International Airport April 5, it was headed to Venezuela for painting and refurbishing, according to a man who says he sold the plane 10 days before it was seized by Mexican authorities.
The seller and the man who brokered the deal for the twin-engine DC-9 say that what happened after takeoff is a mystery to them. The two disagree sharply, however, over which of them knew what about the new owner.
Mexican and U.S. law enforcement officials are trying to determine who is responsible for taking the plane from Venezuela to an airport in Ciudad del Carmen, near the Gulf of Mexico.
Fred Geffon, president of Clearwater-based Royal Sons Inc., said he was paid in full for the 40-year-old airliner on March 30 and turned it over to Jorge Corrales, a Simi Valley, Calif., aircraft broker.
Geffon said that once the deal was completed and the plane was shipped to Venezuela, his involvement ended.
Corrales, Geffon said, was acting on his behalf to sell the airplane. Geffon said he does not know who ultimately purchased the plane and would not reveal the sales price.
Mexican law enforcement seized 5.5 tons of cocaine from the airplane April 10 and arrested the copilot as well as the crew of another plane apparently waiting to pick up the drugs.
The DC-9’s pilot escaped by climbing a fence, Mexican officials said.
Geffon provided the Tribune with a copy of what he says is a bill of sale he turned over to his title company. It had no information about the purchaser.
Corrales “did not want me to know” who bought the aircraft “and I didn’t care anyway,” he said.
Corrales, who owns Corrales and Associates, disagrees. He said Geffon does know who purchased the aircraft. It was a Venezuelan company, Corrales said.
Royal Sons, he said “got a crew that flew the aircraft” to Venezuela. Royal Sons, he added, also obtained the permits needed to fly the plane out of the country.
Corrales said that he did not know why Geffon claims not to know who purchased the DC-9.
Geffon said he was contacted in November by Corrales, who wanted to buy the aircraft. “We agreed on a price and then he disappeared on me for a while. He reappeared in March.”
The deal was then struck, said Geffon, who provided the Tribune with another document: a “buyer’s certificate of delivery & installation.” The document, which appears to be signed by Corrales, lists the Simi Valley broker as the buyer.
Geffon said he “hired someone to find a flight crew to take it down there.”
Geffon would not identify that individual, saying only that the man is in Europe and unavailable for comment.
The Federal Aviation Administration is unable to untangle this knot.
“We don’t get involved with the sale of aircraft, only their registration or deregistration,” FAA spokesman Roland Herwig said.
Herwig said the FAA received a copy of a letter from Royal Sons, dated April 7, asking that the plane be exported to Venezuela and that the FAA officially took Royal Sons’ name off the books three days after the cocaine bust.
