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"Miami's ex-DEA chief charged with shredding documents for disgraced banker Allen Stanford"

That's the headline from this Miami Herald article about Tom Raffanello, who was Stanford's security chief after leaving the DEA five years ago. The superceding indictment, which added Raffanello, was filed today. Interestingly, the co-defendant's case is set for trial September 18. Raffanello's lawyer Kendall Coffee filed a speedy trial demand today when the superceding indictment was filed saying that he is prepared to try the case with the co-defendant on September 18 even though the indictment was only issued today. The pleading says that the "unusual case" is "a serious mistake" and that Raffanello was simply throwing out the garbage and was not at all obstructing justice. He claims that all of the paper documents that were shredded have electronic backups which were maintained and that there is absolutely no motive or reason that he would shred documents to obstruct an investigation. From the Herald:

The 61-year-old former DEA chief said he was prepared to turn himself over to federal agents Friday on charges of conspiracy and obstruction.
``No one is sorrier than me that it came to this -- after spending 32 ½ years working for the government,'' he told The Miami Herald. ``But I'm prepared to fight this. I still believe in the system.''

This should be an interesting one. The case is assigned to Judge Zloch.

Full post as published by Southern District of Florida on September 11, 2009 (boomark / email).