Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, July 11, 1990 TAG: 9007110449
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A/3 EDITION: EVENING
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: Medium
Robert Mance, one of Barry's lawyers, asked Hassan Mohammadi at the mayor's cocaine and perjury trial Tuesday what would happen if he were sent back.
"I would be prosecuted" by the "new regime" in Tehran for having worked for the deposed government of the late Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi at the Iranian Embassy here, Mohammadi replied.
Mohammadi testified that he supplied cocaine and opium to Barry at least 30 times. He said he and the mayor snorted cocaine in the upstairs bathroom at Barry's home while 200 guests were outside the house at a summer crab feast.
He said he and the mayor smoked opium repeatedly at locations around Washington.
Mohammadi said initially that he used cocaine only with Barry. Under questioning from Mance, he acknowledged that he did use it once with a woman who was with Barry on a 1987 trip to the Bahamas.
Mohammadi testified that a woman he knew as Miss T was frequently Barry's companion when drugs were being used. On one occasion, Miss T wasn't interested in opium and so she snorted cocaine instead, he said.
U.S. District Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson issued a bench warrant for the woman, Theresa Southerland, when she failed to appear in court due to a scheduling mixup with her lawyer.
Jackson told the jury she would be on hand today.
Under defense questioning, Mohammadi acknowledged he had pleaded guilty and cooperated with the government in a prosecution involving payoffs to an immigration official. The bribes were on behalf of wealthy Iranians seeking permanent resident status in the United States.
"Every time that you get into trouble . . . you get out by cooperating," Mance told Mohammadi.
In connection with the probe of Barry, Mohammadi has pleaded guilty to conspiring to possess cocaine.
If Mohammadi is found to have cooperated fully with the government, the Justice Department will recommend that he not be deported.
Mance suggested that Mohammadi's differing stories influenced by his tenuous status in the United States and his desire to please prosecutors by telling then what they want to hear.
Mohammadi detailed at the trial how the mayor shoved cocaine into a marijuana cigarette and smoked it, calling it an "M.B. Special." Mance noted that Mahammadi didn't mention the incident in his grand jury testimony in April.
Mohammadi said he didn't tell the grand jury about it because he wasn't asked about it.
He said he lied to police in February 1989 by denying that the mayor was involved with drugs, then reported back to Barry on what questions the police had asked.
"I covered wherever I could," said Mohammadi. "I was a true friend for Mr. Mayor; I was always there for Mr. Mayor."
Barry is charged with 10 counts of cocaine possession, one count of conspiracy and three felony counts of lying to a grand jury about his drug use.
by CNB