--- alias: - Sherman Kaminsky category: Organized Crime created: 2026-09-21 location: New York City summary: Racketeer and fugitive who, awaiting sentence in the Metropolitan Correctional Center in 1978, heard Alvin Ross talk of the Letelier bomb and testified against him, a use of informants the appeals court found unlawful. tags: - Person - ShermanKaminsky - Informant - OrlandoLetelier - AlvinRoss - UnitedStatesVHenry updated: 2026-09-21 --- Sherman Kaminsky was convicted of racketeering and extortion in 1966 and fled. Arrested and brought to [New York](/places/new-york-city/) for sentence, he was held at the Metropolitan Correctional Center, where he informed on other inmates: threats to a judge and an undercover policeman, and a planned escape from Danbury. At his sentencing on June 14, 1978, the prosecutor said his cooperation was continuing. The judge, "expressing contempt for his conduct," suspended the prison term on part of the charges and deferred the rest for six months "to see how far he goes." Ross had heard that he was a former member of the Haganah.[^1] ### Ross [Alvin Ross](/people/alvin-ross/) of the [Cuban Nationalist Movement](/organizations/cuban-nationalist-movement/), moved to the center at his lawyers' request, then began talking to him. "I never initiated any conversation with Mr. Ross, but there is no need to initiate a conversation with Mr. Ross. Mr. Ross will talk and talk and talk as long as you are able to listen. There were times when I literally had to run to get away from him." Over June and July 1978 Ross spoke of an alliance between the movement and [Chile](/places/chile/), of a meeting where [Michael Townley](/people/michael-townley/) said that [DINA](/organizations/dina/) and General [Manuel Contreras](/people/manuel-contreras/) wanted "a Marxist agent" killed, and of the two wires he had contributed to the bomb that killed [Orlando Letelier](/people/orlando-letelier/). In August Ross said he planned to blow up Russian ships in American harbors. Kaminsky wrote notes and gave them to his lawyer, William Aronwald, asking that the [CIA](/organizations/central-intelligence-agency/) be told, "because he felt that Ross was a dangerous man." The notes did not mention Letelier by name but recorded Ross saying "that a person blown up in Washington was a double agent of the CIA." They reached the prosecutor [Eugene Propper](/people/eugene-propper/) on August 28. Kaminsky first met Propper on October 31, when an agreement was proposed that he "would report what he heard and possibly testify," and he was warned not to start conversations or discuss the defense.[^1] ### Henry He testified at the trial in January 1979 to the conversations before October 31. The convictions of Ross and [Guillermo Novo](/people/guillermo-novo/) were reversed on September 15, 1980, under *United States v. Henry*, the court holding that his testimony, and one statement Novo made to a second informant, Antonio Polytarides, had been obtained in violation of the right to counsel. The government's petition for rehearing argued that, unlike the paid informant in *Henry*, Kaminsky had no government instruction when Ross spoke to him. The petition was denied on December 9, 1980.[^1][^2] [^1]: Petition of the United States for Rehearing and Suggestion for Rehearing En Banc, *United States v. Sampol,* Nos. 79-1541 and 79-1542 (D.C. Cir., October 29, 1980), https://www.latinamericanstudies.org/MNC/Letelier-rehearing.pdf [^2]: Motion for bail and for reassignment, *United States v. Sampol,* Nos. 79-1541 and 79-1542 (D.C. Cir., 1981), https://www.latinamericanstudies.org/MNC/Letelier-bail.pdf; Motion for bail, defendant Alvin Ross Diaz, Crim. No. 78-367 (D.D.C., 1980), https://www.latinamericanstudies.org/MNC/Letelier-alvin-bail.pdf