http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/18/national/18marshals.html
February 18, 2006 Testimony on 2 Air Marshals Hints at Wider Drug Inquiry By THAYER EVANS
HOUSTON, Feb. 17 - Testimony on Thursday at the arraignment of two federal air marshals charged with using their credentials to engage in a cocaine smuggling conspiracy suggested that the case might involve other marshals as well.
Stuart Maneth, an agent with the inspector general's office of the Homeland Security Department, testified that one of the suspects had told the authorities that after their arrest last week, he was warned by his co-defendant against "giving up other F.A.M.'s."
The accused - Shawn R. Nguyen, 38, and Burlie L. Sholar III, 32 - were taken into custody after an informant delivered to Mr. Nguyen's home in Houston what the authorities described as 33 pounds of cocaine, to be smuggled to Las Vegas, and $15,000 as partial payment for the job.
The government maintains that Mr. Nguyen recruited Mr. Sholar, who was also based in Houston, to help carry the cocaine and that the two men agreed with the informant to bypass security at Bush Intercontinental Airport here and smuggle the drugs on board a plane in exchange for $4,500 a kilogram, about 2.2 pounds.
Mr. Nguyen, a former agent for the Drug Enforcement Administration, told investigators that once in custody, Mr. Sholar warned him that his life "wasn't worth anything" if he disclosed information about other air marshals, Mr. Maneth testified on Thursday.
Mark McIntyre, the federal prosecutor questioning Mr. Maneth, did not ask him whether additional marshals were in fact under investigation, and neither of them would comment when asked later by a reporter.
Mr. Nguyen and Mr. Sholar are charged with conspiracy to possess cocaine with intent to distribute. If convicted, each could be sentenced to a prison term of 10 years to life and be fined as much as $4 million.
At Thursday's hearing, their lawyers called a series of character witnesses in a quest to have them released on bond, which the government opposed. In the end, Magistrate Judge Stephen W. Smith, though requiring that they be monitored electronically, set bond for each at $100,000. Magistrate Smith stayed his decision pending the outcome of an appeal by the government, however, and the defendants remained in custody.
The case dates from November, when, Mr. Maneth testified, the inspector general's office received a tip about Mr. Nguyen from the informant, described in the criminal complaint as an associate of a known drug trafficker and as a figure in mid-1990's credit card fraud. The informant, the government says, reported that Mr. Nguyen had been dealing in the sale of narcotics. Over the next three months, the informant taped conversations with Mr. Nguyen, and the authorities later wiretapped Mr. Nguyen's telephone.
Through the informant, the authorities say, they set up operations in which Mr. Nguyen bypassed airport security in December with a package containing $25,000 that was represented as drug proceeds. He also bypassed security with two kilograms of cocaine and $12,000 for the informant in January, the authorities say. On those occasions, the government's account says, he handed the money and drugs back to the informant once they were on the secure side of the airport terminal.
Mr. Maneth testified that in conversations with the informant, Mr. Nguyen, who became an air marshal in 2002 after five years with the drug enforcement agency, bragged about smuggling drugs to other airports including La Guardia in New York, having a "golden badge" to do so and being able to "kill and get away with it."
He also threatened the informant, Mr. Maneth testified, at one point saying: "If you tell anything, I'll put you to sleep. I swear to God." The other defendant, Mr. Sholar, is a former member of the Capitol Police and the Los Angeles Police Department. His lawyer, George Parnham, dismissed any account of a threat directed at Mr. Nguyen by Mr. Sholar.
"I think that any comments by Mr. Nguyen fit into the same category of what I'd call either boasting or just making up stories," Mr. Parnham said, "making up statements, telling people what he thinks they want to hear."