Defense lawyers: Vagos leader drunk when approached for deal by undercover agent

A Vagos motorcycle gang leader appeared drunk when he agreed to participate with an undercover officer in what he thought was a major cocaine deal, according to government surveillance video of the conversation.

The 2013 videotape was played in court by defense lawyers Thursday in a rare joint hearing by two federal judges trying to determine whether government misconduct occurred in a three-year undercover investigation of the Vagos gang.

Anthony McCall, 56, who was president of the Sin City chapter of the Vagos organization at the time, is seen on the video with a drink and slurring his speech in the garage of the undercover officer, Agostino Brancato. A bottle of vodka also is seen nearby on a table.

Brancato — a deputized agent with the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives — portrayed himself as a courier for a Mexican drug cartel and told McCall that he needed protection when a 10-kilogram shipment of cocaine was to be delivered to him.

He appealed to McCall during a February 2013 conversation to “watch his back” so he wouldn’t “wind up in a barrel in Mexico.”

McCall appeared a willing player in the drug deal, discussed as the two men sat across from each other at a table in front of hidden government cameras. He told Brancato, ”I’m into that,” and, “I’m not above doing that.”

In another secretly recorded meeting in Brancato’s garage two weeks later, McCall and two other Vagos club members agreed to accept $1,000 each to provide the protection Brancato said he wanted.

What Brancato didn’t tell the defendants was that the cocaine deal, which later took place at a Searchlight airstrip on March 2, 2013, was a sting set up by Brancato’s ATF-led task force. The task force provided the cocaine, the private Cessna plane to transport the drugs to the airstrip, the pilot and everything else needed to complete the phony deal.

McCall’s attorney Craig Drummond used the video Thursday in a bid to get the criminal drug and weapons case dismissed against McCall because of what he alleged was outrageous government conduct on Brancato’s part. Drummond contended that McCall, though a felon, had no inclination to get involved in drug trafficking until Brancato broached the idea after McCall had been drinking.

When Drummond questioned Brancato on the witness stand Thursday, the undercover officer at first said he didn’t think McCall was drunk in the garage. But then Drummond played another portion of the videotape showing Brancato at least twice asking McCall if he needed a ride home, as McCall was leaving.

Later on the witness stand, under questioning from Assistant U.S. Attorney Cristina Silva, the undercover officer said McCall was always able to “communicate” with him when he drank.

In both of the meetings, Brancato testified, McCall never said he wanted to back out of the staged cocaine deal.

Another former Vagos leader charged in the drug sting, Jeremy Halgat, and his lawyer Melanie Hill also are trying to get his case tossed out of court because of alleged misconduct by Brancato. The third defendant pleaded guilty.

Halgat, 36, a former Vagos regional sergeant at arms, also has accused Brancato of wrongdoing in a separate cocaine trafficking case stemming from his dealings with Brancato. In that case, a federal magistrate judge found that “outrageous government conduct” occurred and recommended U.S. District Judge Andrew Gordon dismiss the case.

Brancato, who became a member of the Vagos motorcycle club while working undercover, is a veteran Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputy brought to Las Vegas to infiltrate the Vagos gang.

His alleged wrongdoing during the investigation, dubbed Operation Pure Luck, has been the focus of the joint hearing before Gordon and U.S. District Judge Jennifer Dorsey, who are weighing whether to dismiss their respective cases against the defendants.

U.S. Magistrate Judge Cam Ferenbach concluded that Brancato manufactured the cocaine trafficking case against Halgat, though Halgat had no criminal record and repeatedly told the agent in secretly recorded conversations that he did not want to traffic in drugs.

Ferenbach also said that Brancato “falsified” a report of one of the alleged drug transactions and that supervisors of his ATF-led task force “did not dissuade him” from doing it.

Brancato, however, repeatedly denied wronging during two days of testimony this week.

Silva presented evidence Thursday showing that both McCall and Halgat had committed crimes in the past and in their dealings with Brancato.

Contact Jeff German at jgerman@reviewjournal.com or 702-380-8135. Find him on Twitter: @JGermanRJ.