Snapshot · Stuff You Should Know
CIA operative Edwin Wilson, part of the illegal arms network used by Oliver North, was sentenced to 52 years for supplying Libya with 10,000 machine guns and 20 tons of C4.
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At 34:50 · chapter starts 32:04
The Contras had $32 million but no way to spend it — they lacked the black market contacts to buy weapons. Oliver North turned to Richard Secord, a retired Air Force Major General who had been forced out of the service because of his connection to CIA operative Edwin Wilson, himself later sentenced to 52 years for arming Libya with 10,000 machine guns and 20 tons of C4. Secord partnered with Iranian-American businessman Albert Hakim to create the Stanford Technology Trading Group — universally known as the Enterprise — a private arms company using Swiss bank accounts to move untraceable funds. Secord and Hakim marked up every shipment by up to 300%, reinvesting profits into planes, airstrips, staff, and contracted airlines. As the south Nicaraguan Contra faction proved unable to manage its own procurement, North moved Secord into the role of direct manager: buying the arms himself, then dropping them from planes over Contra camps. Any remaining pretense of arm's-length legality evaporated.
Over just two years, Saudi Arabia alone donated $32 million to the Contra rebels, giving loosely affiliated factions millions they had no way to spend on arms.
CIA operative Edwin Wilson armed Muammar Gaddafi with 10,000 machine guns and 20 tons of C4 hidden in barrels of mud and flew them to Libya himself. He was sentenced to 52 years and served 12 in solitary. He was also a founder of the same arms network Oliver North contracted for the Contras.
Richard Secord and Albert Hakim set up the Stanford Technology Trading Group — known as 'the Enterprise' — with untraceable Swiss bank accounts to funnel money and arms to the Contras.
Secord and Hakim set up the Stanford Technology Trading Group — 'the Enterprise' — with Swiss bank accounts, bought planes, rented airstrips, hired staff, and marked up every arms shipment by up to 300%. They were running a fully operational illegal arms company with the White House as their client.
Richard Secord and Albert Hakim marked up their arms shipments to the Contras by as much as 300%, making enormous personal profits from the covert operation.
US prosecutors sought a 186-year prison sentence for Kim Dotcom, largely because of his financial support for WikiLeaks.
Mario Tabraue, a central figure in Monsters of God linked to drug trafficking and murder, was sentenced to over 100 years in prison but served only 12 years.
Zelig Williams disappeared on October 3rd, 2024 after leaving his mother's home in Columbia, South Carolina and has not been seen since.
Dateline: Missing in America Season 5 features six new unsolved missing-persons mysteries, hoping a listener may hold a crucial clue.
At a high school party, Strickland broke one victim's nose, jaw, and knocked out teeth requiring multiple reconstructive surgeries, resulting in two felony GBI charges.
Joyce LePage's murder has remained unsolved for 55 years despite active investigation from the start.
Joyce's own letter revealed that Mark Wadley had once stayed at a mental institution for trying to strangle people — a detail investigators apparently never followed up on.
At least one set of Joyce's car keys was found inside the apartment she shared with Bruce Bierbaum, raising questions about who moved her car.
On January 21, 1994, a jury found Lorena Bobbitt not guilty by reason of temporary insanity, recommending she be committed to a psychiatric facility for evaluation.
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