Herald Staff Report

 Hours before Border Patrol agents snatched Elian Gonzalez from the home of his Miami relatives, an ``angry'' and ``frustrated'' Juan Miguel Gonzalez was ready to come to Miami and demand that his Miami relatives give him his son, attorney Gregory Craig said.

 ``He had concluded that the only thing left for us to do was to travel to Miami, go to Lazaro's house, knock on the door and ask for his son,'' Craig said.

 Craig said that he told the Justice Department on Friday night that Juan Miguel was willing to make the trip to the Little Havana home of Elian's great uncle, Lazaro Gonzalez.

 Justice Department spokeswoman Carole Florman said U.S. officials did not know whether to take seriously Juan Miguel's idea that he would go to Miami, a move he had always resisted. It came up Friday night, she said, but it did not become a major issue because Craig did not pursue it.

 The Miami relatives had often said that Juan Miguel Gonzalez should come to Miami, but it was not clear that they were willing to surrender custody of Elian to him even if he made the trip. After Juan Miguel arrived in Washington for a promised reunion with Elian, the Miami relatives insisted he come to their house for dinner to talk things over but would not commit to turning over the boy to him.

 Family spokesman Armando Gutierrez could not be reached for comment.

 A proposal that the Miami relatives had faxed to Attorney General Janet Reno earlier suggested the two branches of the Gonzalezes live in a facility in Miami-Dade County for an unspecified period of time, but did not say the family would surrender custody of Elian.

 Craig said that Juan Miguel Gonzalez would have been satisfied only with the immediate surrender of his son.

 ``The plan was not to have a family reunion, i.e., to sit down, break bread and sing songs with the Miami relatives,'' Craig said in an e-mail response to written questions. ``It was a plan aimed at getting custody of Elian ourselves.''

 Craig and Juan Miguel Gonzalez apparently discussed the possible danger of a Miami trip, but said the fear was overcome by the father's frustration.

 ``Our safety would be the responsibility of both local and federal law enforcement,'' Craig said. ``If the plan failed -- i.e., we didn't get Elian -- it would have dramatized the lawlessness of Lazaro's conduct.''

 For months, the Miami relatives had criticized Gonzalez for not coming to Miami. It was not until April, four months after his son was plucked from the sea, that he came to the United States and then he went straight to Washington.

 In the hours before the raid, Reno and a group of Miami mediators were debating whether a reunion of father, son and Miami relatives would take place in Miami or Washington. In the end, Reno told the primary mediator, attorney Aaron Podhurst, that such a reunion could only take place in Washington and that the family had to surrender the boy to the INS immediately.

 Craig said that during the final negotiations, Reno never faxed him a copy of a proposal from the Miami relatives that called for a Miami meeting and left vague what precisely would happen to Elian during that meeting. Had he seen the proposal, he said, he would have broken off negotiations then.

 ``Had we been shown the proposal that he [Podhurst] submitted at 8 p.m. on Friday night signed by the three relatives, we would have had nothing to do with the negotiations,'' Craig said. ``That proposal -- which they characterized as a `joint custody' proposal and which simply did not include clear, unambiguous, unconditional transfer of Elian's custody -- was unthinkable. It was five steps backward . . . It was not a breakthrough but an invitation to capitulate. In short, it would have been impossible to use as a starting point.''

 Craig pointed out that the proposal to have Juan Miguel Gonzalez join his relatives at a Miami location for an extended stay was much less acceptable than the deal brokered two weeks ago by Sen. Bob Torricelli of New Jersey.

 After meetings at the Vatican Embassy in Washington, that deal was announced by the Cuban American National Foundation but rejected an hour later by Lazaro Gonzalez.

                     Copyright 2000 Miami Herald