Prosecutors said Faget lied to the FBI and disclosed classified information.

BY DAVID KIDWELL

 Attorneys for jailed immigration supervisor Mariano Faget angrily told jurors in his
 espionage trial Thursday the ``outrageous and slanderous'' case was woven
 together by frustrated FBI agents acting on ``perceptions, noninformation and
 innuendo.''

 ``They thought this man over here was a Castro agent!'' attorney Ed O'Donnell
 screamed in the courtroom, pointing to his client. ``They know, they have to know
 now, that's not true. Now they say he did it for money, influence and access.

 ``That's where they are going now because they know they were dead wrong!''

 Jurors listened Thursday through nearly four hours of closing arguments in the
 case before beginning deliberations at 1 p.m. At 4:30 p.m. they quit until
 Tuesday.

 Faget, 54, a high-level Immigration and Naturalization Service veteran with an
 otherwise unblemished 34-year career, faces about five years in federal prison and
 the loss of this $47,000-a-year pension if convicted.

 Faget admits he lied to the FBI and that he disclosed classified information
 without permission -- two things that lay the foundation for the government's case.
 Where the two sides differ is on his motive.

 Faget says he did it to protect a lifelong friend and business partner. Prosecutors
 say he did it for greed, and to court favor with Cuban officials he viewed as
 prospective business contacts.

 SMOKE SCREEN

 Federal prosecutor Richard Gregorie urged the 11-woman, one-man jury --
 including six jurors of Cuban descent -- to look through ``the smoke'' being thrown
 by O'Donnell.

 ``Ladies and gentlemen, the crimes are right there in front of you on tape, it
 couldn't be more clear,'' Gregorie said, referring to secretly recorded FBI
 videotapes of Faget's disclosures. ``Don't let him deceive you. This whole case is
 about deception.''

 Federal agents suspected Faget since they spotted him meeting with a Cuban
 Interests Section official at a Miami airport bar more than a year ago. They
 arrested him in February after they ran a sting operation, called a ``dangle.''

 On Feb. 11, FBI Special Agent in Charge Hector Pesquera made an
 unprecedented appearance in the INS office of Faget to ask for help preparing
 immigration documents in a ``highly sensitive'' and top secret Cuban defection.

 `KNOWN OFFICER'

 The defector was identified as Luis Molina, one of two ``known Cuban intelligence
 officers'' seen meeting alone with Faget at two different Miami nightspots over the
 past year.

 ``Let me tell you something,'' Faget told Pesquera while cameras rolled. ``I don't
 know if this is going to make a difference, I've met this guy before. . . . He was at
 the Interests Section in Cuba, in Washington, D.C., and I went to a dinner here
 one day and he happened to be there.''

 ``That's it?'' Pesquera said. ``That's your only contact with him?''

 ``That's the only contact.''

 According to prosecutors, that was the first in a long succession of lies told by
 Faget. He's charged with two. The other alleged lie came in May 1998 when he
 denied any ``foreign business contacts'' on his reapplication for a security
 clearance.

 At the time, Faget was secretary and vice president for a company called
 America Cuba, Inc. formed in 1993 to act as a conduit for American retailers
 looking to enter Cuba after the fall of Fidel Castro's communist regime.

 Faget argues the lie to Pesquera was immaterial, that he voluntarily disclosed the
 relationship, and that America Cuba is a Florida corporation that had done no
 business at all -- let alone in a foreign country.

 Within 12 minutes after Pesquera ``dangled'' the bogus defection secret, Faget
 telephoned his longtime friend and America Cuba parter Pedro Font. Font was set
 to meet that day with another Cuban Interests Section official they both knew,
 Jose Imperatori.

 Faget argues his motive was to warn Font to be wary, not so Font could pass
 along the secret. Prosecutors argue Faget intended the secret to curry favor with
 Font, and in turn Cuban officials.

 ``It's not a defense in this case, it's just an excuse,'' prosecutor Curt Miner told
 the jurors.

 Prosecutors argue that if Faget were innocent, he would have informed the FBI
 about his concerns for Font's safety.

 O'Donnell argues it was the FBI that was deceitful by not considering Faget's 34
 years of loyalty and his family's ardent anti-Castro history.

 ``Not one file Mr. Faget has ever touched has ever been compromised in any way
 and they know it,'' said O'Donnell.