SAN SALVADOR -- By most accounts, Raul Ernesto Cruz is an honest man who lied about a trip to Cuba, a loyal friend who kept secrets from his pals, a hard worker who spent far more than he earned.

More than three weeks after Cuban police arrested Cruz for six bombings in Havana, the 26-year-old Salvadoran remains a riddle, a man with no obvious political baggage.

Extensive inquiries in El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras have so far uncovered no hard evidence linking Cruz to the blasts or to any Cuban exiles in El Salvador or Miami.

But while some Salvadoran officials and Cuban exiles in Miami insist Cruz is an innocent man being railroaded by Havana, the evidence points to a puzzling attempt to shroud his trips to Cuba in secrecy.

Most intriguing are the events surrounding his first known visit to Havana July 9-14, during which Cuban police say he placed two small bombs that injured three people in the Nacional and Capri hotels.

Sudden decision

Although Cruz had never expressed an interest in Cuba and was known as a highly reliable worker, he announced he was going to Havana only four or five days before he left and did not tell his boss, said friends and relatives.

Cruz claimed that a friend had won a Cuban vacation in a raffle, but could not go and sold it to him cheaply, said his brother, William, 21, and a friend and co-worker, Roberto Ascencio, 26.

But there was no raffle or discount, said the San Salvador travel agent who handled the reservations for Cruz's July 9-14 and Aug. 31-Sept. 6 trips to Havana.

Two different men paid cash for each of the $1,125 ticket-and-hotel packages, and a third man picked up the ticket and vouchers for the July visit on the eve of the trip, the agent, who asked for anonymity, told The Herald.

The agent said Cruz came to his office only once, on Aug. 30, to pick up his documents for the Aug. 31 trip. Cruz was arrested Sept. 4.

`Brother' calls

On July 14, the agent recalled, a man claiming to be Cruz's brother phoned him to say he was at the airport to meet Cruz but could not find him. He asked if Cruz had changed his flight.

The agent said the ``brother'' called again around Aug. 10 to book Cruz's second trip to Cuba, and said he had simply missed Cruz at the airport on July 14. But he spoke as though he knew Havana, the agent added.

``He said the only good hotels were the Cohiba and the Nacional, and that the rest were hostels that felt like prisons,'' the agent said.

William, Cruz's only brother, said he did not go to meet him at the airport on July 14, and that neither he nor Cruz's friends ever knew the name of the travel agency.

``There were a lot of different people paying for the tickets, picking them up and telephoning me,'' the travel agent added. ``Whatever he was doing, he was not alone.''

Ascencio and another co-worker, Eduardo Merino, recalled that after he returned from Cuba in July, Cruz once pointed out a chubby man who visited him at work four or five times and said he was the man who had won the Cuba vacation in a raffle.

Cruz never introduced the man or explained who he was. They've been asking all of Cruz's friends, Merino said, ``but no one seems to know anything about him.''

Elated return

Cruz returned from Cuba elated with the island and its people, bearing Montecristo cigars for his friends, snapshots of beautiful girls in skimpy bathing suits and plans to return as soon as possible.

He flew back Aug. 31, just two days after he finished escorting a Mexican circus on a two-month tour of El Salvador as an agent for Salvadoran promoter Mario Villacorta.

Relatives still wonder how Cruz could afford the two Cuban vacations when his personal finances were in shambles.

Cruz's 1994 car was nearly repossessed last December, and he was three months behind on payments for a $350 RCA color television he bought in June. The set was repossessed Saturday.

Cruz also owned a fancy ACER desktop computer, a three-foot high personal refrigerator, a video camera and a 35mm camera with a telephoto lens, all highly expensive items for a middle-class Salvadoran.

If he was being paid $4,500 per bomb, as the Cubans allege, the money must be hidden somewhere. His only known bank account today holds about $125, said his mother, Ester.
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William said his brother told him that when the bombs went off at the Capri and Nacional hotels in July, he had been ``scared like the rest of the tourists. Everybody was very afraid.''

He also told friends he could not understand how such a beautiful island, rich in beaches and friendly people, could be so poor. And those are the only semi-political comments on Cuba anyone remembers him making.

Salvadoran police confirmed Cruz had a permit for a 9mm automatic pistol -- like many men in crime-ridden San Salvador -- but friends said he seldom carried it and never when escorting artists for Villacorta.

Most friends and relatives describe Cruz as easygoing and even a tad guileless.

``He was a charming young man, very noble, who never hit on the girls,'' said Yamilet, a 24-year-old Cuban acrobat with the circus interviewed between shows in Guatemala. She asked that only her stage name be used.

Although initial media reports said Yamilet had invited Cruz to visit Cuba in July, she and a dozen other performers said Cruz sought out Yamilet and another Cuban acrobat and announced he was going four or five days before he left.

Errands in Cuba

Yamilet said she asked him to deliver a letter and clothes to a sister in Havana. He did, and brought back snapshots.

``We really only got to know him well after he came back from Havana so excited,'' a Cuban acrobat who uses the stage name of Richard Richard said. ``He talked about the beaches, the girls, the nice people, the girls again . . .''

``Raul was just the nicest person, hombre,'' said Carlos, half of a Colombian mind-reading act that bills itself as the Astral Brothers.

So, could he use his telepathic powers to solve the mystery of who placed those bombs in Cuba?

``Oh,'' said Carlos, smiling. ``Oh, that's a good one.''

Herald staff writer Glenn Garvin contributed to this report.

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Copyright © 1997 The Miami Herald