First Lady’s Maid, Three Men Indicted on Munitions Charges

A federal grand jury Wednesday indicted Nancy Reagan’s personal maid and three men on charges they conspired to illegally export ammunition without a license from Richmond to Paraguay.

Anita Sanabria Castelo, 45, of Takoma Park, Md., was charged with conspiracy to export ammunition without a license and exporting ammunition without a license, an expansion of charges filed against her earlier this month.

Also named in the seven-count indictment were Julio Cesar Baez Acosta and Hernan Perdomo Duarte, Paraguayan residents who worked aboard a Paraguayan freighter, and Eugenio Silva, a Richmond automobile mechanic.

Traces Shipments

The indictment charged that Silva and Castelo bought .22-caliber ammunition that Acosta and Duarte took to Paraguay aboard a freighter that left from Deepwater Terminal in Richmond. There has been no indication for whom the ammunition was intended.

Castelo, a Paraguayan native who frequently traveled with the First Lady on foreign trips, was charged earlier by the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms with aiding and abetting the export of munitions without an export license. That charge was issued in a complaint and the additional charges were handed down by a grand jury that met in Norfolk.

No arraignment was scheduled, said Gregory Welsh, assistant U.S. attorney in Richmond.

The White House put Castelo on administrative leave Aug. 7 after learning that she had been charged in the complaint. She will continue to collect her $17,430 annual salary while the case is pending, officials said.