Saturday, August 22, 2015

Woman who married Cuban spy suing JPMorgan for $57M for hiding country's cash

Woman who married Cuban spy suing JPMorgan for $57M for hiding country's
cash
BY DAREH GREGORIAN NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Friday, August 21, 2015, 9:44

Ana Margarita Martinez won a $7.1 million judgment against the Cuban
government for 'emotional distress' in 2001, after she found out her
husband, Juan Pablo Roque, wasn't the man she thought he was.
A Miami woman who was married to a Cuban double agent wants JPMorgan
Chase to pay through the nose for allegedly hiding Cuban cash.

Ana Margarita Martinez won a $7.1 million judgment against the Cuban
government for "emotional distress" in 2001, after she found out her
husband, Juan Pablo Roque, wasn't the man she thought he was.

She'd met Roque in 1992, after the former Cuban Air Force major made
headlines for allegedly braving shark infested waters to swim to Gitmo
seeking political asylum in the U.S.

They dated for three years before getting hitched.

Unbeknownst to Martinez, Roque was an FBI snitch – and an undercover
Cuban agent who'd been sent to gather intel on the Cuban exile community
in Miami. She found out both after he snuck out of their home one night
in 1996, and then appeared on CNN in Cuba a few days later crowing about
his accomplishments.

Adding insult to injury, when asked what he missed about Miami, he said
just one thing: "My Jeep."

Martinez, who'd been born in Cuba, said she'd been completely duped.
"She believed that Roque shared her anti-communist ideals," court papers
say.

A federal judge in Florida found Cuba liable for Roque's actions, saying
he was "especially offended that Cuba – a country that disregards human
rights – has callously trampled the rights of one of our own citizens on
our own soil in furtherance of a vile criminal conspiracy."

Martinez, 55, tried to collect on her judgment by getting orders against
banks that might have been holding some of the country's assets when the
country was designated a state sponsor of terrorism by the US.

JP Morgan Chase told her in 2007 it didn't have many Cuban assets - but
the suit notes that in 2011, the bank struck a deal with feds agreeing
to pay $88 million in fines for having handled $178 million in wire
transfers involving Cuba and Cuban nationals between 2005 and 2006.

The suit seeks a total of $57 million in damages from the banking big.

A rep for JP Morgan Chase declined comment.

Source: Woman who married Cuban spy suing JPMorgan for $57M - NY Daily
News -
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/woman-married-cuban-spy-suing-jpmorgan-57m-article-1.2333928

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