The_Info_Web/60 - PLACES/REGIONS/Cabazon Indian Reservation.md

title	aliases	created	updated	tags	category	summary	location
Cabazon Indian Reservation	Cabazon Indian Reservation Cabazon reservation	2026-05-17	2026-10-09	Geography Intelligence Military UnitedStates California 1980s ContraWar PROMIS DarkAllianceInvestigation	Region	Sovereign tribal territory near Indio, California used during the 1980s as a site for a CIA-linked Wackenhut Corporation weapons development and PROMIS software modification joint venture.	Indio, California

The Cabazon Indian Reservation is located near Indio, California, and is home to the Cabazon Band of Mission Indians. Its sovereign nation status played a crucial role in a joint venture with Wackenhut Corporation, allowing the parties to operate outside typical federal jurisdiction and congressional prohibitions. During the 1980s, the reservation was used as a site for developing weapons for Third World armies, including the Contras.¹²

Joint Venture with Wackenhut Corporation

On April 1, 1981, the Cabazon Band of Mission Indians formalized a joint venture with Wackenhut Corporation, primarily to establish a production facility named "Cabazon Arms" on the reservation. This partnership was designed to manufacture high-tech arms and explosives for export to third-world countries, including the Contras in Nicaragua and nations in the Middle East, effectively circumventing U.S. arms export regulations. The San Francisco Chronicle described the venture as "a series of international military and security projects that seem to be lifted from the pages of a spy novel."¹²

Dr. John Nichols, the Cabazon tribal administrator and a former Central Intelligence Agency agent who claimed involvement in the agency's Chilean destabilization program in the 1970s, was instrumental in this venture. He obtained a Department of Defense secret facility clearance for the reservation to conduct various research projects. Nichols proposed to Wackenhut the production of a range of weapons systems, including 120mm combustible cartridge cases, 9mm machine pistols, laser-sighted assault weapons, sniper rifles, portable rocket systems, night-vision scopes, and battlefield communications systems. The joint venture also explored the development of biological weapons.¹²

The Justice Department's special counsel, Nicholas J. Bua, reported that "During early 1981 the Cabazons formed a company known as Cabazon Security Corporation ("CSC")." According to Robert Frye, as the report records, CSC solicited capabilities statements from a number of security firms, and Frye, then president of Wackenhut Services, responded for Wackenhut. The report states that "The joint venture agreement indicates that it was the primary purpose of the joint venture to 'qualify for, bid on, and obtain government guard service contracts.'"³ A Los Angeles Magazine article by Jan Golab, September 1983, describes "the Cabazon Indian Security Corporation, a joint venture with Wackenhut that handles security at the reservation and bids for government contracts set aside for minority groups."⁴

The Bua report states that Wackenhut was interested because Cabazon Security Corporation, as a qualified minority contractor, would be eligible for government contract work under set-aside programs, and that the joint venture bid on two government security contracts that it did not receive. It states that Wackenhut's files contain documents showing Nichols's efforts to market night-vision goggles and rifle scopes to individuals identified as representatives of the governments of Guatemala and Honduras, and that "It was Nichols' view that the Cabazon's, as a sovereign nation, were not subject to the usual export and import controls." The files also contain internal Wackenhut memoranda expressing the opinion that such sales would require State Department approval and preliminary applications filed with the State Department; "As far as we could tell, no sales were ever made."³

The report places the September 10, 1981 night-vision demonstration at the Lake Cahuilla gun range in Indio.³ FBI FD-302s of interviews with Wayne Reeder, Indio police chief Sam Cross and Sergeant Dave Baird, conducted in October 1992, place it at the Indio Police Department range. Cross told agents that he assigned four or five officers to attend and that, if automatic weapons were present, they were expected to arrest Nichols.⁵

In May 1983, the Cabazons solicited San Diego arms manufacturer Tim LaFrance to build an arms factory on their reservation. Their letter to LaFrance Specialties stated: "We need the know-how from an organization engaged in the manufacturing of armaments of various types, all consisting of technology not currently found on the marketplace."²

The casino's first cardroom manager was Rocco Zangari, who managed the cardroom from September 1980 until his discharge in November 1981.⁶ Cheri Seymour wrote that he was a former bookie.¹ In 1988 he pleaded guilty to federal racketeering charges in Los Angeles; the 1989 Press-Enterprise reports the plea, a sentence of five years' probation and a $2,000 fine, and an indictment that identified him as an associate of Peter Milano.⁷

Wayne Reeder, a real estate developer, told FBI agents on October 5, 1992 that he had built the casino for the Cabazon Indians and had received a percentage under an agreement made when he built it.⁸ The Bua report describes the casino building as the only building on the reservation in the early 1980s, with a mobile trailer behind it used as a small office for the Cabazons and the casino operation.⁹

Casino Establishment and Bankruptcy

In October 1980 the Cabazon Band established on the reservation the Cabazon Indian Casino, an unincorporated company consisting of a card parlor, restaurant and bar, employing about 75 people whose wages were paid from casino revenues.¹⁰ The casino was located on tribal trust land. On December 10, 1981, the casino filed a petition for reorganization under Chapter 11. The petition was signed by John Paul Nichols as "Project Manager," and it described the casino as a co-partnership whose listed members included the tribal chairman and other tribal members alongside Nichols, a non-Indian.⁶

A Ninth Circuit bankruptcy appellate panel reversed summary judgment in a suit brought by the discharged cardroom manager in 1983, finding a material question of fact about whether the casino was a partnership with members outside the protection of 25 U.S.C. § 81.⁶ In February 1986 a Ninth Circuit bankruptcy appellate panel affirmed a ruling that the casino was not exempt from federal unemployment and employment taxes, on an Internal Revenue Service proof of claim for 1981 employment taxes of $181,530.24 (FICA) and $5,614.11 (FUTA).¹⁰

A March 20, 1988 article reports that the tribe then owed casino debts of $567,577 to 45 creditors against assets of $123,859, and that settlement of the case depended on a $200,000 loan from Southwest Gaming Inc.¹¹

Cardroom Management Agreement

The Bankruptcy Appellate Panel for the Ninth Circuit wrote that "Although this agreement appears to have been only between Zangari and PN Associates, Inc., a Delaware corporation, it was also signed by Arthur Welmas, Chairman of the Cabazon Band of Mission Indians." The agreement was dated September 25, 1980. The panel stated that it did not have "a sufficient record to determine whether Zangari's agreement was with the Casino or only with PN Associates, Inc." It noted that the casino's Chapter 11 petition described the casino as "a co-partnership consisting of" a list of members that included "Arthur Welmas, President/chairman" and "John Paul Nichols, Project Manager/Employee." The panel stated: "If it were merely one enterprise of the Cabazon Band, as its counsel argues, the filing should have been on behalf of the entire tribe."⁶

Raids and Litigation, 1980 to 1988

On May 24, 1980 the Cabazon Band enacted Tribal Ordinance No. 5.7, which regulated the card games of draw poker, lowball draw poker and panguingue and provided for card clubs on the reservation. On October 18, 1980 Indio Chief of Police C. Samuel Cross and several members of the Indio Police Department entered the card club and issued citations to more than 100 members, employees and non-members of the Band. The Band sued in October 1980; the district court denied a temporary restraining order, granted a preliminary injunction, then granted summary judgment to the City of Indio, and later restored the injunction pending appeal. On December 14, 1982 the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed in Cabazon Band of Mission Indians v. City of Indio, 694 F.2d 634, holding the city's 1970 annexation of part of the reservation void for want of the consent of the United States and the Band.¹²

Dr. John Philip Nichols told Los Angeles Magazine in September 1983 that on the night the casino opened "the city police came out in force" and "They had riot guns, helmets."⁴ On November 5, 1984 Judge Laughlin Waters ruled in Los Angeles for the Cabazon and Morongo Band of Mission Indians bands against Riverside County and the state, and the Ninth Circuit affirmed in Cabazon Band of Mission Indians v. County of Riverside, 783 F.2d 900 (1986).¹³¹⁴ The Supreme Court affirmed in California v. Cabazon Band of Mission Indians, 480 U.S. 202 (February 25, 1987), holding that "the State's interest in preventing the infiltration of the tribal bingo enterprises by organized crime does not justify state regulation of the tribal bingo enterprises in light of the compelling federal and tribal interests supporting them."¹⁵ The Indian Gaming Regulatory Act was enacted on October 17, 1988 as Public Law 100-497.¹⁶

Contra Connection

Contra leader Eden Pastora visited a firing range near the reservation for a weapons demonstration in 1981, a claim Pastora has both confirmed and denied on separate occasions. Wackenhut was using the Cabazon reservation's tax-exempt status and its freedom from federal oversight to gain a competitive advantage in soliciting federal weapons projects.²

Desert Oasis Indian Casino and Southwest Gaming

In July 1986 Don Speer of Southwest Gaming Inc. of Las Vegas, Nevada entered into a contract with the Cabazons and renamed the poker club the Desert Oasis Indian Casino. According to court papers cited by the Press-Enterprise, the contract was approved by the Bureau of Indian Affairs and Speer's background was cleared by the FBI before he joined the venture. The article describes a five-year management contract under which the tribe was initially guaranteed $225,000 a year; the reorganization plan filed with the bankruptcy court guaranteed the Cabazons $765,000 on the first $3,656,000 or less of gross revenues in the first year.¹¹ Southwest Gaming lifted the tribe out of bankruptcy court in March 1988 by providing a loan to pay off creditors.¹⁷ On July 20, 1989 Speer pleaded innocent in Los Angeles County to charges of conspiracy to commit grand theft, grand theft and attempted grand theft in connection with operations at the California Bell Club, which Southwest Gaming also managed; on September 20, 1989 the Press-Enterprise reported that the charges would be dismissed on September 28 when Speer and a Southwest Gaming vice president repaid around $70,000 they had been accused of embezzling, under a civil compromise with no admission of wrongdoing.¹⁷¹⁸

PROMIS Software Modification

Michael Riconosciuto stated in a March 21, 1991 affidavit that he had served as the Director of Research for this joint venture; the report of Judge Nicholas J. Bua found no evidence that he was employed by Wackenhut or the joint venture, which had no employees.¹⁹ He claimed to have modified the proprietary PROMIS computer software at the Wackenhut facility on the reservation. This modified software, allegedly made available by Earl Brian through Peter Videnieks of the Department of Justice, was intended for worldwide implementation in law enforcement and intelligence agencies, leading to the PROMIS Software Scandal. Riconosciuto's affidavit detailed specific modifications for the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and the Canadian Security Intelligence Service in Canada.¹

Frequent visitors to the Wackenhut-Cabazon joint venture included Peter Videnieks and Earl Brian. The venture maintained close liaison with elements of the United States, including representatives of intelligence, military, and law enforcement agencies.¹

Danny Casolaro Investigation

Investigative journalist Danny Casolaro was investigating the Cabazon/Wackenhut projects as part of his "The Octopus" investigation at the time he was found dead in a West Virginia motel room in 1991. He had told friends he was convinced that "spies, arms merchants and others were using the reservation as a low-profile site on which to develop weapons for Third World armies, including the Nicaraguan Contras." His notes contained cryptic references to slow-acting brain viruses, like Mad Cow Disease, which he believed could be used against targeted individuals, and he was concerned he might have been a target of such a virus. The notebooks Casolaro left behind contained the name of former CIA officer John Vandewerker.¹²

The Bua report states that the West Virginia State Police Crime Laboratory found a folded piece of paper inside Casolaro's left shoe, indented as if something had been written on a page on top of it, and reproduced the impressions. The report states that the writing was Casolaro's and gives the text, which includes the lines "Outline Chapter on 1980," "John Philip Nichols after arrival Indian Reservation," "Fred Alvarez" and "Finish up chapter w/ Paul M. & Fred A." The report states that there is no indication when Casolaro wrote the words or why he placed the paper in his shoe.³

Termination and Investigations

The Wackenhut/Cabazon Joint Venture was terminated on October 1, 1984. Following its termination, the activities conducted on the Cabazon Indian Reservation became the subject of numerous investigations by various governmental and law enforcement bodies, including the U.S. Department of Justice, the United States House of Representatives Committee on the Judiciary, U.S. Customs, and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, as well as police agencies and media worldwide.¹

On February 8, 1989, the Special Committee on Investigations of the Select Committee on Indian Affairs, chaired by Senator Dennis DeConcini, heard a witness listed under the fictitious name "Marty." The Press-Enterprise reported that he said the Cabazon reservation was involved with organized crime and gave no specifics on Cabazon.⁷ Robert Morehouse of the California Attorney General's office submitted a paper to the same hearing describing the casino's hiring of Zangari, the 1981 bankruptcy and John Philip Nichols's May 1985 plea of no contest to two charges of solicitation for murder.²⁰ Arthur Welmas replied in writing that the testimony was unsubstantiated hearsay.²¹

The House Judiciary Committee's 1992 report on the INSLAW matter refers to "a number of speculative reports and fragmentary records purporting to link Robert Booth Nichols, through a company called Meridian Arms Corporation, and Michael Riconosciuto to certain covert intelligence activities."²² In its section on a possible connection between Earl Brian, Michael Riconosciuto, Robert Booth Nichols and the Cabazon reservation, the report states that in a sworn affidavit of April 2, 1991, Brian "stated that he had never heard of, or was associated with, the so-called Wackenhut/Cabazon Indian joint venture," and that "the committee is not in a position to make findings of fact on Dr. Brian's role."²²

Footnotes

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1. Seymour, Cheri. The Last Circle: Danny Casolaro's Investigation into the Octopus and the PROMIS Software Scandal. TrineDay, 2010. ↩︎

2. Webb, Gary. Dark Alliance: The CIA, the Contras, and the Crack Cocaine Explosion. Seven Stories Press, 1998. Chapter 6: "They were doing their patriotic duty." ↩︎

3. United States Department of Justice, Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of INSLAW, Inc. (March 1993), section "(i) The Wackenhut-Cabazon Joint Venture," printed pp. 55 to 58; Casolaro paper, pp. 166 to 167. https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

4. Jan Golab, "Close-Up," Los Angeles, September 1983, pp. 116 to 128. Reprinted in Federal Bureau of Investigation, Los Angeles, file 183A-LA-1746, Section 1. https://archive.org/details/JohnPhilipNichols ↩︎

5. Federal Bureau of Investigation, Los Angeles, FD-302s, file 74-86438: Wayne Reeder (interview October 5, 1992), Sam Cross and Dave Baird (interviews October 6, 1992). https://archive.org/details/INSLAW-CabazonWackenhunt ↩︎

6. Zangari v. Cabazon Indian Casino (In re Cabazon Indian Casino), 35 B.R. 124 (B.A.P. 9th Cir. December 29, 1983), BAP No. CC-82-1578-GVAb. https://static.case.law/br/35/cases/0124-01.json ↩︎

7. The Press-Enterprise (Riverside, California), February 9, 1989, p. A-1, "Cabazon bingo casino listed as Mafia-tied." Reprinted in FBI Los Angeles file 183A-LA-1746, Section 1, https://archive.org/details/JohnPhilipNichols ↩︎

8. Federal Bureau of Investigation, Los Angeles, FD-302 of the interview of Wayne Reeder, October 5, 1992, file 74-86438. https://archive.org/details/INSLAW-CabazonWackenhunt ↩︎

9. United States Department of Justice, Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of INSLAW, Inc. (March 1993), section "(i) The Wackenhut-Cabazon Joint Venture." https://archive.org/details/doj-oip-inslaw-1993 ↩︎

10. In re Cabazon Indian Casino, 57 B.R. 398 (B.A.P. 9th Cir. February 5, 1986), BAP No. CC-85-1006-MVAb. https://static.case.law/br/57/cases/0398-01.json ↩︎

11. The Press-Enterprise (Riverside, California), March 20, 1988, p. B-1 with jump page, "Manager proposes plush Indian casino, club," by Mike Kataoka. Reprinted in FBI Los Angeles file 183A-LA-1746, Section 1, https://archive.org/details/JohnPhilipNichols ↩︎

12. Cabazon Band of Mission Indians v. City of Indio, 694 F.2d 634 (9th Cir. Dec. 14, 1982). https://static.case.law/f2d/694/cases/0634-01.json ↩︎

13. The Press-Enterprise (Riverside, California), November 6, 1984, p. B-1, "Judge upholds Indian bands right to operate bingo parlors." Reprinted in Federal Bureau of Investigation, Los Angeles, file 183A-LA-1746, Section 1. https://archive.org/details/JohnPhilipNichols ↩︎

14. Cabazon Band of Mission Indians v. County of Riverside, 783 F.2d 900 (9th Cir. 1986). https://static.case.law/f2d/783/cases/0900-01.json ↩︎

15. California v. Cabazon Band of Mission Indians, 480 U.S. 202 (1987). https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/480/202 ↩︎

16. Indian Gaming Regulatory Act, Pub. L. 100-497, § 2, Oct. 17, 1988, 102 Stat. 2467, codified at 25 U.S.C. § 2701. https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/25/2701 ↩︎

17. The Press-Enterprise (Riverside, California), July 29, 1989, p. B-1, "Poker club firm chief accused of embezzling," by Mike Kataoka. Reprinted in Federal Bureau of Investigation, Los Angeles, file 183A-LA-1746, Section 1. https://archive.org/details/JohnPhilipNichols ↩︎

18. The Press-Enterprise (Riverside, California), September 20, 1989, p. B-1, "Felony charges being dropped in poker club case." Reprinted in Federal Bureau of Investigation, Los Angeles, file 183A-LA-1746, Section 1. https://archive.org/details/JohnPhilipNichols ↩︎

19. United States Department of Justice, Report of Special Counsel Nicholas J. Bua to the Attorney General of the United States Regarding the Allegations of INSLAW, Inc. (March 1993), printed pp. 42 to 43 and 55 to 58, footnote 35. Official finding, placed as the position of the body that issued it. https://documents.theblackvault.com/documents/nsa/DOJ-OIP-INSLAW_1993.pdf ↩︎

20. Federal Government's Relationship with American Indians, Hearings before the Special Committee on Investigations of the Select Committee on Indian Affairs, S. Hrg. 101-126, Part 2 (February 2, 6, 7, 8, 9, 1989), Robert Morehouse, "High Stakes Bingo on Indian Reservations in California," pp. 417 to 419. https://archive.org/details/micro_IA41152832_0182 ↩︎

21. The Press-Enterprise (Riverside, California), February 11, 1989, "Indians deny link to crime," by David Boyles. Reprinted in FBI Los Angeles file 183A-LA-1746, Section 1, https://archive.org/details/JohnPhilipNichols ↩︎

22. United States House of Representatives, Committee on the Judiciary, The INSLAW Affair, H. Rept. 102-857 (1992), pp. 72 to 73. https://archive.org/details/InslawAffairInvestigativeReport ↩︎