Just like the Rocha pleaded simple of jail recently to help you 15 government counts , FBI and you will State dept. detectives have been working to decipher brand new case’s greatest forgotten bit: just what longtime diplomat many years investigations, challenging from the have a tendency to-murky intelligence globe, which is likely to capture age.

S. counterintelligence authorities, Cuban cleverness defectors, and you may family relations and you may colleagues away from Rocha to help you piece together what exactly is identified yet of his so-called betrayal, and the skipped clues and red flags that could has helped him avoid analysis for many years.

It was not just Rodriguez’s tipster – who the guy would not choose on the AP but states was recently interviewed because of the FBI. Officials advised the new AP you to definitely as soon as 1987, the latest CIA try alert Castro had a great “extremely mole” burrowed strong from inside the U.S. bodies. Some today suspect this may was Rocha hence just like the at the least 2010 he may have been on an initial list made available to brand new FBI away from you’ll be able to Cuban spies high up for the overseas coverage circles.

Rocha’s attorneys don’t address texts seeking to opinion. Brand new FBI and CIA denied so you can comment. The official Agency said for the an announcement it can still work at associated providers in order to “completely assess the international rules and you will national coverage ramifications of them costs.”

“This really is an effective monumental screw-upwards,” told you Peter Romero, a former assistant secretary away from condition to possess Latin America who spent some time working with Rocha. “We’re all starting enough soul-searching and you can nobody can put together some thing. He did an amazing occupations level his songs.”

Humble Roots

He had been created in the Colombia at years ten gone with their widowed mommy and two sisters to New york. It resided for a while within the Harlem if you’re his mommy has worked from inside the a great sweatshop and you may got by the with eating seal of approval.

A skilled sports user having a sharp intelligence, the guy acquired a scholarship having minorities in the 1965 to go to The latest Taft School, a top-notch boarding university in Connecticut. Overnight he was catapulted as to the he titled a beneficial “ghetto” engulfed during the battle riots in order to a processed arena of Western wide range.

However, as one of never assume all minorities within university, Rocha says he sustained discrimination – including a beneficial classmate exactly who refused to room that have your – something which fueled a grudge one family relations think may have provided your so you can respect Castro’s revolution.

Of Taft, he decided to go to Yale, in which the guy finished having honors with a degree when you look at the Latin-american studies, after which on to scholar focus on Harvard and you will Georgetown.

It is far from clear exactly how Rocha might have been employed by Cuba however, prosecutors state it just happened a bit from the seventies when he had been nevertheless accumulating level and you can American university campuses were teeming with college students sympathetic to leftist factors.

Inside the 1973, the year the guy finished off Yale, Rocha traveled to Chile, where prosecutors state he turned into good “high friend” from Cuba’s cleverness department, the overall Directorate from Intelligence, or DGI. One same seasons, the newest CIA assisted topple the brand new Castro-recognized socialist regulators out of Salvador Allende, substitution they which have a brutal military dictatorship.

Inside the exact same date, Rocha registered the initial out of their three marriage ceremonies, so you can an adult Colombian lady he scarcely spoke going to loved ones, and you can that is now not as much as analysis having you’ll ties so you’re able to Cuba, considering whoever has become expected by the FBI. The newest AP are incapable of achieve the woman otherwise discover people number of its relationship.

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Shortly after joining the brand new international services in the 1981, among Rocha’s very first to another country posts are once the a political-armed forces products manager in the Honduras, in which he advised this new Contras in their fight against Cuba-supported leftist rebels within the neighboring Nicaragua.