July 31, 1974

By Hilda Inclan

Showing no emotion, Cuban revolutionary figure Humberto Lopez Jr., 33, stared at the table in front of him yesterday while his lawyer told a 12-member jury the prosecution had failed to prove his client had possession of unregistered military firearms.

After many witnesses for the prosecution failed to identify the weapons submitted by U.S. Assistant Attorney William Northcutt as the same weapons found in Lopez home on June 29, 1973, a federal agent identified them yesterday.

A special agent for the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, Robert Schmidt, testified before

U.S. District Court Judge Joe Eaton that he had jotted down the serial-numbers of the weapons found at the Lopez residence, taken custody of them, and later filed a report on them.

He said the weapons carted into the courtroom yesterday by the prosecutor showed the same serial numbers.

Found in the Lopez utility room, according to several witnesses, were a finished 20 mm cannon, a .50-caliber machine gun, a smaller M-3, a .45-caliber submachine gun, better known as a "grease gun," and two M-14 automatic rifles.

Northcutt submitted the five weapons to the court as state exhibits over defense objections.

''The chain of custody has been established and the exhibits are admissible," Judge Eaton ruled.

Defense Attorney Melvin Greenspahn said no one had yet proven Lopez knew the weapons were stored at his house. The state had to prove him knowingly guilty of possession. The only evidence submitted to show Lopez could have known about the weapons was Schmidt's testimony to the effect that the utility room also contained a trunk with legal documents bearing Lopez' picture, plus some U-Haul equipment. Lopez is a U-Haul supervisor.

Anyone living in the house or having access to the utility room could have put the weapons there," the defense attorney suggested.

Hialeah Fire Department Lt. Donald Fogel, in charge of the fire-fighting operations that day, noticed the two rifles wrapped in plastic and turned them over to Lopez for safe-keeping.

"I thought they were hunting rifles," he testified.

Later he saw the cannon standing in a corner and called Hialeah police to investigate. He was one of many state witnesses who identified the weapons shown in court as similar to those they saw at Lopez' home.

"But I can't say they are the same weapons," he said under cross-examination from Greenspahn.

The state presented seven witnesses - all fire, police or Treasury Department officers. Greenspahn cross-examined them. The defense presented no witnesses.

Lopez became a hero among exile anti-Castro circles March 20, when a bomb police said he and a friend, Luis Crespo, were making inside the garage of a Little Havana home blew up. Lopez is still recuperating at home from the loss of his left eye and three fingers of his left hand, plus throat and shoulder injuries. Police said both he and Crespo were members of the National Cuban Liberation Front (FLNC). The group has claimed it bombed several Cuban consulates around the world.