Longtime Nicaraguan fugitive back in New Orleans to face racketeering charges
BY JIM MUSTIAN | JMUSTIAN@THEADVOCATE.COM JAN 16, 2017 - 6:15 PM (0)
Jim Mustian

A Nicaraguan fugitive wanted in New Orleans for nearly two decades on federal racketeering charges was arrested last month in Mexico and handed over to United States authorities.

The fugitive, Erwin Jose Mierisch Jr., was indicted in 1999 in a money-laundering and drug-trafficking scheme that resulted in the conviction of Roberto Gambini, a prominent businessman and importer credited with revolutionizing the New Orleans coffee trade.

Mierisch's uncle, Jose Esteban McEwan, of Managua, also was charged in the case but died before setting foot in an American courtroom.

Story Continued Below

A fourth suspect, according to news accounts at the time, was Joseph Marcello Jr. — a restaurateur and brother of well-known mob boss Carlos Marcello — who died about a month before the indictment was handed up.

The recent arrest revived an all-but-forgotten prosecution that lay dormant for years as Mierisch, 48, remained in his native Nicaragua, which refused to extradite him.

He was taken into custody last month by Mexican authorities, who denied him entry into that country and, in light of the unresolved charges, flew him to Miami.

Mierisch since has been returned to New Orleans, where he pleaded not guilty last week in U.S. District Court and was ordered held without bail.

His defense attorney, Matt Coman, declined to comment on the charges.

The age of the case is likely to present significant hurdles for federal prosecutors, who will be tasked with tracking down scattered witnesses and dusting off aging evidence if Mierisch does not accept a plea bargain. U.S. District Judge Sarah Vance set a March 20 trial date.

The 1999 indictment did not spell out Mierisch's alleged role in detail but accused him of distributing more than 99 grams of cocaine and paying $20,000 to undercover FBI agents to "have a battery committed" upon a Texas man's spouse. The assault was intended to coerce the man into dropping a lawsuit against a Gambini associate, prosecutors said.

Mike Fawer, a veteran defense attorney who represented McEwan, said Mierisch was accused of only "peripheral" involvement in the case. "The culpability was rather attenuated," Fawer said, adding that Mierisch was acquitted of similar charges in Nicaragua.

Gambini, who owned Silocaf and Coffee House Inc. of New Orleans, pleaded guilty in 1999 and was sentenced to 5½ years in federal prison. It marked a sharp fall from grace for an importer who arrived in the city in 1990 and rose to prominence as New Orleans became the largest coffee-importing port in the country.


At the time of Gambini's arrest, The Times-Picayune reported that he had taken over "203 old grain silos at the Nashville Street wharf and refurbished them to process and store coffee."

But in conversations with undercover agents he believed to be drug dealers, Gambini boasted that his experience as an international coffee broker afforded him the opportunity — and know-how — to falsify shipping documents and funnel money through Nicaragua and Panama.

In addition to laundering nearly $900,000 in what he believed to be drug proceeds, Gambini admitted paying undercover agents to set fire to a Miami warehouse full of coffee beans in a bid to commit insurance fraud.

Federal authorities seized nearly two dozen firearms from Gambini's home as part of their investigation. They also targeted a business, Gambini & Mierisch, that prosecutors said had been used "by members of the enterprise to advance its goals and purposes."

Gambini was deported to Italy in 2004 after being released from federal prison.

McEwan, who died several years ago, remained on his coffee plantation in Nicaragua but sought unsuccessfully to clear his name from afar.

That effort drew vigorous opposition from Assistant U.S. Attorney Michael McMahon, who in a 2008 letter to Vance warned against establishing an "absurd and dangerous precedent of allowing foreign defendants, such as narco-traffickers or terrorists, to be able to challenge their indictments from the safe haven of their native lands