JEWELER CLEARED OF MONEY LAUNDERING

Source: Sun-Sentinel
Date: Friday, March 4, 2005
Written By: Ann White
 

A federal jury took four hours to clear a Miami jewelry supplier and his sales manager of charges they laundered more than $8 million in cocaine profits for Colombian drug lords.

After Thursday's verdicts, jurors emerged from the Miami courthouse to find defendant Raphael Adouth, his family and members of his Bal Harbour synagogue rejoicing and dancing on the courthouse steps. They joined in with warm embraces.

"It was sweet," said defense attorney Howard Srebnick.

Adouth and Lourdes Challiol were accused in an indictment last year of meeting with two dozen cocaine traffickers who exchanged drug money for gold, exporting it to Colombia.

Adouth took over Rosenthal Jewelers Supply Corp. after the 1987 death of his grandfather, a Jewish watchmaker who emigrated from Hungary to Havana to Miami. The jewelry supply business, one of the nation's largest, also was acquitted of money laundering charges.

The acquittals capped a three-week trial featuring some of Miami's top criminal defense attorneys, who vigorously attacked the motives and veracity of an undercover Internal Revenue Service operative.

The defense alleged that anti-Semitism drove the investigation, telling jurors Adouth was referred to on surveillance tapes as "the Jew." The investigation itself was dubbed "Operation Goldstar," which defense attorneys said rekindled memories of how the Nazis forced Jews to wear gold stars.

Adouth was represented by Srebnick and his partner, Roy Black, and Challiol by Jane Moscowitz. Mark Schnapp and Stephen Binhak defended the company.

A spokesman for the U.S. Attorney's Office had no comment.