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By DAVID ADAMS
© St. Petersburg Times, published May 3, 2001
The net finally may be closing on the most wanted man in the Americas -- the disgraced former Peruvian spy master, Vladimiro Montesinos.
Montesinos has been on the run since October, dodging an international hunt that now includes police from at least three countries, including the FBI.
Known by his critics as "Rasputin," Montesinos, 56, was the former head of Peru's Military Intelligence Service, or SIN. A month after his mysterious disappearance the government of President Alberto Fujimori collapsed in a stunning morass of scandal and corruption, most of it hinging on the Machiavellian misdeeds of Montesinos.
He is wanted in Peru on multiple charges of corruption and embezzlement of public funds, as well as for his alleged role in arms dealing, drug trafficking and ordering the torture of political opponents and other human rights abuses.
Despite a $5-million reward offered by Peru for information leading to his arrest, Montesinos has had no problem eluding his pursuers. A master of subterfuge, Montesinos is alleged to have used several fake passports and identities, while also calling on a network of well-placed friends for help. Peruvian officials are convinced he is hiding in Venezuela after undergoing plastic surgery there.
At first, investigators had no idea where to look. A search of his beach house revealed a secret hatch under a pink bathtub, leading to an escape tunnel. It was only after several former bodyguards testified that officials were able to begin tracking his movements.
His escape from Peru was the stuff of James Bond, whisked away by bodyguards aboard a yacht with a mystery woman. His two-mast sailboat, Karisma, slipped out of Peru Oct. 29 under the cover of a regatta headed for Ecuador. Out at sea, the Karisma left the other boats and steered toward the Galapagos Islands, 600 miles out in the Pacific.
After reaching the island of Isabela, a group of Montesinos associates took refuge at a secluded beachfront hotel called the Ballena Azul, or Blue Whale. A few days later they sailed northward to Costa Rica's Cocos Island, an almost deserted national park 350 miles off the mainland.
Later that same day he boarded a small plane that took him to the Caribbean island of Aruba. He used a false Venezuelan passport bearing the name Manuel Antonio Rodriguez to fly on to nearby Venezuela.
After that the trail went cold.
Venezuela's foreign ministry said it had no record of anyone entering Venezuela under the name of Manuel Antonio Rodriguez, or Vladimiro Montesinos. It added that Venezuela would immediately deport Montesinos to Peru if he were found.
Others suspect Venezuela's government may know more than it is saying. They say that Venezuela is a good place to hide for someone of Montesinos' standing.
"He's got money and he's in Venezuela where anything's for sale if you know the right people," said Dennis Jett, dean of the International Center at the University of Florida and a former U.S. ambassador to Peru who met Montesinos on several occasions.
Peruvian officials have openly expressed suspicions that the Venezuelan government of President Hugo Chavez, a former military coup leader with close ties to Peru, is protecting Montesinos. Links between the two go back at least to 1992. That year Fujimori closed down the Peruvian Congress and then-Lt. Col. Chavez and his military allies attempted to overthrow the Venezuelan government.
Peruvian officials became convinced of his whereabouts after an employee at the Caracas clinic of a plastic surgeon described seeing a man resembling Montesinos. Further investigation revealed that Montesinos arrived in Venezuela from Aruba on Dec. 7. He stayed in the Hotel Avila in Caracas, and on Dec. 13 he underwent surgery to change his appearance at the Instituto Diagnostico clinic. He left three days later.
That is about as much as Venezuelan officials have been prepared to concede.
Last week, Peru's interior minister, Antonio Ketin Vidal, delivered photographic evidence of Montesinos' whereabouts to embarrassed officials in Venezuela, according to AgenciaPeru.com, a leading Internet news Web site. The surveillance photos apparently showed Montesinos holed up at a remote ecological tourist resort about four hours south of Caracas.
The ranch was raided by Venezuelan police last week, who found no sign of the fugitive spy chief. Journalists in Venezuela and Peru have alleged that Venezuelan authorities delayed the raid until Montesinos was tipped off and allowed to escape.
Peruvian officials are not giving up. A former top policeman, Interior Minister Ketin headed the special unit that spent two years tracking down and capturing Abimael Guzman, the ruthless leader of Peru's Shining Path guerrillas.
Peru also has enlisted U.S. assistance to find the onetime CIA informer who helped coordinate U.S. drug policy with Peru in the 1990s. FBI counter-terrorism agents based in Miami were called in after Montesinos was linked to the smuggling of thousands of AK-47 assault rifles to Colombian guerrillas in return for cocaine.
A prominent international arms dealer, Sarkis Soghanalian, has described meeting Montesinos in his Lima office to organize the arms sale, thinking it was an official delivery for the Peruvian military.
The FBI is also investigating allegations that Montesinos laundered his ill-gotten gains through U.S. banks in Miami.
"We are convinced that, sooner or later, the long arm of justice will reach Vladimiro Montesinos," Ketin said last week after meeting Venezuelan officials.
But that may be easier said than done. Montesinos spent a career in the shadows working in military and intelligence matters. A lawyer, he also operated a practice that specialized in defending drug traffickers.
As intelligence chief, Montesinos avoided public appearances where his photo might be taken.
Money would appear to be no problem for the former civil servant who, it has since emerged, lived well beyond his official means. The president of the congressional commission investigating allegations of government corruption estimates that Fujimori -- who fled to Japan -- and Montesinos may have made off with as much as $2-billion between them.
Swiss judicial authorities last week froze $25-million in Geneva and Zurich bank accounts as part of an investigation into Montesinos. The Swiss Justice Ministry said $105-million has now been frozen on accounts linked to him.
"With that kind of money," Jett said, "there are enough places in this world you can go as long as you are willing to keep a low profile."
- Times correspondent Phil Gunson in Caracas contributed to this report.
Dealing with nasty friends gets Washington burned (September 23, 2000)
Bribery scandal one too many for Fujimori (September 18, 2000)