Biography
Juan Galloza Acevedo is the only person ever convicted for the December 3, 1979 Sabana Seca ambush, in which Machetero, FARP and OVRP militants opened fire on a U.S. Navy bus near the Sabana Seca communications station, killing petty officers John Ball and Emil White and wounding ten other sailors — an attack claimed as retaliation for the death of Ángel Rodríguez Cristóbal in federal custody weeks earlier. A Machetero sympathizer from about 1969 who became active around 1978, Galloza rode in the front passenger seat of the van from which the gunmen fired; he left the group three weeks after the attack over its tactics and spent decades working in a purse factory. DNA evidence recovered after the case was reopened in 2001 led investigators to him; he admitted his role to naval investigators in July 2013 and cooperated. In May 2014, at age 78 — thirty-five years after the attack — he pleaded guilty in Brooklyn federal court to racketeering conspiracy, murder and robbery conspiracy and was sentenced to five years in prison, the judge crediting his minor role, remorse and cooperation. The killing of the two sailors is stated plainly here; the attack was politically framed by its authors, and his case is included as a politically motivated prosecution outcome of that event.