Arrested pilot flew charters in luxury jets owned by Clinton White House official

Daniel Hopsicker reports in the 19 Feb. issue of Madcow Morning News :

Michael Francis Brassington, the pilot arrested two weeks ago on felony charges in the February 2005 crash of a Challenger business jet at New Jersey's Teterboro Airport, flew illegal charter flights for corrupt Premier Michael Misick of the Turks & Caicos Islands on Gulfstream jets owned by a former White House aide to President Bill Clinton.

A British Commission of Inquiry into corruption in the Turks & Caicos Islands last week heard testimony that former Guyanese military pilot Brassington, currently facing a 23-count indictment in Federal Court in Newark for endangering passengers lives, has since several months after the Challenger jet crash been in business with Misick,  who was just forced to resign, using jets provided by Jeffrey Watson, a former Clinton Aide and now a Washington lobbyist.

The Commission heard testimony that Brassington and Turks & Caicos Premier Michael Misick conspired to induce the island's government to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars a month to Watson to lease two high-end Gulfstream III luxury business jets.

The men engineered an air charter deal that paid Watson more than $160,000-a-month from the coffers of the Turks & Caicos' nearly-bankrupt  government, which was at the same time eliminating all student scholarships.

Watson  is a former housing official in Miami who became a Special Assistant t0 Clinton in the White House, where he was responsible for doling out $75 million in Federal government largesse after the devastation of Hurricane Andrew.

"The hurricane plan was shaped in part by Florida's insider at the White House: Jeffrey Watson,"  reported the April 29 1993 Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel.

"Lifestyles of the Rich & Shameless"

The British Commission of inquiry probe uncovered evidence of massive corruption by Misick, whose assets of $50,000 when he took office six years ago multiplied like loaves and fishes on steroids from A-Rod's cousin in the Dominican Republic until today he is worth an estimated $80 million, according to the testimony of his estranged wife, Hollywood actress Lisa-Raye McCoy.

The inquiry also revealed that Brassington, a former Guyanese military pilot with a very checkered U.S. aviation career, continues to fly illegal charter flights in and out of the United States  despite government sanctions by both the FAA and NTSB which have included  rare emergency cease-and-desist orders as well as orders affirming the emergency revocation of his pilot's license.

Aviation observers have long been puzzled as to what, or who, has been keeping Brassington flying.  Some no doubt suspected he had high-level government connections.

They point to his seeming impunity with the FAA, U.S. Customs, and the DEA,  despite frequent incidents any one of which would have forever grounded most pilots.

That it took Federal officials four years--and a change of Administrations--to charge Brassington did nothing to change their opinion.

Brassington had also suffered no ill effects from being the co-pilot in July of 2000 on a Lear jet which belonged to Wally Hilliard, owner of the Venice flight school which had enrolled Mohamed Atta in its flight training program earlier that month, when the Lear was seized by DEA agents in Orlando, who found 43 lbs. of heroin onboard. The event would almost certainly guarantee most pilots some state-sponsored downtime... but not Brassington.

His name didn't even appear in newspaper accounts of the bust.

Had it been known that he was flying jets belonging to an influential lobbyist and former official in the Clinton Administration, it would have cleared up considerable confusion.

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