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Giving in to the temptation December 1, 1998 Rene De La Cova was a highly respected supervisor with the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration in 1994, working undercover in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. Five years earlier, it was De La Cova who had been selected to serve an arrest warrant on Manuel Noriega after American forces invaded Panama. De La Cova and his partners routinely investigated and arrested people who might bring in more money in a month or a week, or a day than the agents earned in year. Or five years. In a 1994 operation, De La Cova and his partners were working under cover and had agreed to launder $3 million for a Houston drug operation. Once they got the money, they began arranging for the drug dealer’s arrest. Then De La Cova got a late-night call. There was another $700,000 to launder, a drug dealer told him. Could he do it? De La Cova should have obtained authorization to continue the investigation. Instead, he flew to Houston without telling anyone. He stuffed the money into his luggage, flew back to Miami, and stashed some of the cash in safety deposit boxes. The rest went into stock brokerage houses and banks across the country. De La Cova got caught. Just how isn’t clear — a judge sealed his case file shortly after he pleaded guilty in 1995. He was sentenced to three years in prison. Under federal sentencing guidelines, someone convicted of engaging in a drug- or money-laundering conspiracy involving that much money would normally face more than 20 years in prison. Still, De La Cova’s arrest ruined not only his career, but his wife’s. Theresa De La Cova, a nine-year DEA investigator, resigned after her husband’s arrest.
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