Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, September 27, 1993 TAG: 9309270076
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-2 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Knight-Ridder/Tribune
DATELINE: LENGTH: Short
Brown has vehemently denied the conspiracy allegation, which is under investigation by the FBI and a federal grand jury in Miami.
That the three meetings occurred contradicts statements that Brown's spokesman at the Commerce Department made on several occasions in March to two Miami Herald reporters. The spokesman, Jim Desler, said Brown did not know the businessman, Nguyen Van Hao of Coral Springs.
The Herald has learned that one of the meetings occurred in February at Brown's office at the Commerce Department in Washington. A government limousine was dispatched to bring Hao and two friends of Brown to the department, sources said.
Brown, while previously denying "any kind of business relationship, any kind of financial relationship, any kind of relationship of any kind on this matter," has never publicly stated whether he has met Hao.
Hao's former business associate, Ly Thanh Binh of Tamarac, Fla., says that Hao told him Hao met Brown in November and December to discuss a scheme for cornering business deals in Vietnam after the U.S. trade embargo is eventually lifted. In exchange, Brown was to receive business concessions and $700,000 in a Singapore bank account, according to Binh.
Brown could not be reached for comment about what was discussed at the meetings. He has hired a Washington-based criminal defense attorney, Reid Weingarten, who said that the allegations were "preposterous."
by CNB