Michigan Missionaries fined $5,250 for travel to Cuba
Friday, February 11, 2005
BY BREE FOWLER
ASSOCIATED PRESS
An attorney for a Michigan couple fined $5,250 for traveling to Cuba said Friday they likely will appeal the ruling.
"The fine is pretty excessive. It's much higher than we expected," said Kurt Berggren, an attorney for Michael and Andrea McCarthy. "Their reason for going was certainly altruistic, and they got zapped."
The McCarthys, of Port Huron, went to Cuba through Canada in April 2001. They are devout Catholics who considered the trip a missionary effort as well as a vacation. They brought medicine to a group of nuns in Havana, as they had done on similar trips to Mexico and Haiti, and participated in religious services.
(more)
This law has been on the books for a while but just in the past 2 years has the Government actually enforced it with fines. I am glad I went just before that...
BY BREE FOWLER
ASSOCIATED PRESS
An attorney for a Michigan couple fined $5,250 for traveling to Cuba said Friday they likely will appeal the ruling.
"The fine is pretty excessive. It's much higher than we expected," said Kurt Berggren, an attorney for Michael and Andrea McCarthy. "Their reason for going was certainly altruistic, and they got zapped."
The McCarthys, of Port Huron, went to Cuba through Canada in April 2001. They are devout Catholics who considered the trip a missionary effort as well as a vacation. They brought medicine to a group of nuns in Havana, as they had done on similar trips to Mexico and Haiti, and participated in religious services.
(more)
This law has been on the books for a while but just in the past 2 years has the Government actually enforced it with fines. I am glad I went just before that...
posted by leftside at
10:04 AM
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