Madison, Wisconsin.. Eugene Hasenfus, who played a key role in exposing the Iran-Contra affair after his CIA-backed supply plane was shot down over Nicaragua in 1986, has died.
Hasenfus died on November 26 in Menominee, Michigan, after a nine-year battle with cancer, according to the British Daily Mail. His obituary From the Hansen-Onion-Martelle Funeral Home in Marinette, Wisconsin. He was 84 years old.
Hasenfus was born on January 22, 1941 in Marinette. He served with the Marines in Vietnam and pursued a private aviation career before becoming a key figure in the Iran-Contra scandal during the Cold War in 1986.
In 1981, President Ronald Reagan authorized the CIA to support a right-wing anti-communist guerrilla force known as the Contras who were operating against the Sandinistas in the Nicaraguan government. Congress cut off all military aid to the Contras in 1984.
Months before the supplies were cut off, senior officials in the Reagan administration had ramped up a secret supply network directed from the White House to the Contras. The day-to-day activities of the operation were handled by National Security Council Assistant Oliver North. The goal was to keep the Contras operational until Congress could be persuaded to resume CIA funding.
The Northern Network’s secrecy was exposed after one of its planes with Hasenfus on board was shot down over Nicaragua in October 1986. Three crew members were killed, but Hasenfus parachuted into the jungle and evaded authorities for more than 24 hours.
He was arrested by Nicaragua’s leftist government and charged with several crimes, including terrorism.
Hasenfus said after his arrest that the CIA was supervising supply flights to the Contras. Initially, Reagan administration officials lied by saying that the plane had no connection to the US government.
Congress, stung by the controversy surrounding Hasenfus’s flight, eventually launched an investigation.
Hasenfus was convicted in Nicaragua on charges related to his role in delivering weapons to the Contras and sentenced to 30 years in prison. Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega pardoned Hasenfus a month later and he returned to his home in northern Wisconsin.
In 1988, he filed an unsuccessful lawsuit seeking $135 million against two men and two companies linked to Iran-Contra arms deals.
In 2003, he pleaded guilty in Brown County Circuit Court to a charge of lewd and lascivious conduct after exposing himself in a grocery store parking lot. His probation was revoked in 2005 and he spent time in prison, according to online court records.
He is survived by his four children and eight grandchildren.