Rafael Cornejo was a major [[cocaine]] trafficker in the [[San Francisco]] Bay Area and a distributor for [[Norwin Meneses]] since the mid-1970s.[^2] His trafficking territory stretched from the Bay Area to Portland, Oregon. His father had been a sergeant in [[Anastasio Somoza|Somoza]]'s National Guard. Cornejo was at the center of the legal case that brought the [[Dark Alliance]] story to [[Gary Webb]]'s attention.[^1] Cornejo said of Meneses: "You can say what you want about that man, but his heart and soul was into the movement, and that was his priority more than anything else. It's kind of hard to be kicked out of your own country and that's what his passion was. He was straight-up pro-Somocista."[^3] ### Criminal History Cornejo was convicted of cocaine trafficking in [[Panama]] in 1977, when he was arrested, tortured, and jailed by [[Manuel Noriega]]'s men while smuggling cocaine through Panama for Norwin Meneses.[^2] He also served time in a [[United States|U.S.]] prison for income tax evasion. In 1992, Cornejo was indicted as the alleged head of a large cocaine distribution ring on the West Coast following an eighteen-month [[Federal Bureau of Investigation]] investigation.[^1] Federal prosecutors described him as a suspected drug kingpin involved in a major cocaine pipeline from [[Cali, Colombia|Cali]], [[Colombia]], to several West Coast cities, importing millions of dollars worth of cocaine via [[San Diego]] and [[Los Angeles]] to the Bay Area. He owned several homes and commercial properties in the Bay Area, including "the most gorgeous house out in Lafayette" that the government seized and sold under asset forfeiture laws. ### Prison Break Plot While awaiting trial, Cornejo was indicted for conspiracy to escape from the federal lockup in Pleasanton using C-4 plastic explosives and a helicopter that would have taken conspirators to a Panamanian cargo ship at sea. The [[San Francisco Chronicle]] reported the group also considered killing a guard. The escape charges were later thrown out of court on grounds of prosecutorial misconduct, and prosecutor [[David Hall]] was referred to the [[Department of Justice|Justice Department]] for investigation by federal judge Saundra Brown Armstrong.[^1] ### Connection to the Dark Alliance Cornejo's girlfriend contacted Gary Webb in July 1995, telling him one of the government's witnesses against Cornejo was a [[Central Intelligence Agency]]-connected drug trafficker.[^1] The witness was [[Danilo Blandon|Danilo Blandón]]. The government ultimately dropped Blandón as a witness rather than release uncensored [[DEA]] and FBI files that Cornejo's attorney had won the right to obtain through a court motion. ### Conviction Cornejo was convicted of income tax evasion in San Francisco in 1985. He was later convicted of cocaine trafficking in 1992 and sentenced to thirty years in 1996.[^2] ### Footnotes [^1]: Gary Webb, *Dark Alliance*, Prologue: "It was like they didn't want to know" [^2]: Gary Webb, *Dark Alliance*, Cast of Characters [^3]: Gary Webb, *Dark Alliance*, Chapter 6: "They were doing their patriotic duty"