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Bay Area men involved in Cuban gunship encounter
Bay Area men who are being called terrorists by the Cuban government and heroes by others were involved in a deadly shootout with the Cuban military as they infiltrated Cuban waters. FOX 13’s Evan Axelbank reports.
TAMPA, Fla. - Three men from the Bay Area are being called heroes by local anti-communist organizers after they were fired upon by the Cuban military.
The boat they were on encroached upon Cuban waters on Wednesday. Four were killed and six were taken into custody.
READ MORE: Cuban Coast Guard kills 4, injures 6 in gunfire with Florida-based boat
The Cuban government labeled the incident a "terrorist incursion."
The backstory:
Michel Ortega Casanova of Tampa was among 10 people aboard a speedboat that was reported stolen out of the Florida Keys.
Courtesy: Casa Cuba de Tampa
As the boat neared Cayos Falcones, its 90-or-so mile journey ended in a shootout with Cuban officials.
Cuba's government called it a "terrorist infiltration."
Ortega Casanova was killed, while a Tampa man named Leo Gomez was injured.
Both had visited Casa Cuba de Tampa, which organizes against Cuba's regime.
Pavel Alling Pena is also listed by the Cuban government as having died.
Courtesy: Facebook/Pavel Alling
Alling Pena’s Facebook page says the 45-year-old lives in Clearwater, and has a post that says, "Cuba will soon be free, and that the time has come for dictators who stole our country."
What they're saying:
The flags are at half-staff outside their building on Curtis Street in Tampa.
"They are heroes to us," the club president of Casa Cuba de Tampa, Angela Chaviano, said. "Michel's not a terrorist, keeping in mind he's just a real person, a normal person that just wants to have the country free."
Casa Cuba de Tampa Vice President Rene Montas de Oca, who himself had been a political prisoner in Cuba, says the men had not told the group about their plan.
"It's not that we went into details," Montas de Oca said. "I haven't seen Ortega in two months, it was more than maybe five or six months since I saw Leo. Maybe they didn't like it because I told them that it was a suicide mission."
Both the Cuban and American governments say they are investigating, while officials on the American side are insisting that Cuba will lie about what they've found.
"It's very important because I know that they are going to discover the truth, and they are not going to be able to lie," Chaviano said.
Dig deeper:
Until then, the precise goal of the speedboat mission may remain a mystery.
Will the six who were captured talk to Cuban authorities?
A longtime political organizer of Hispanics in Tampa Bay says the best of American intentions don't erase the Castro regime's hold.
"I would love nothing better than Cuba to become a thriving democracy," Victor DiMaio, the chair of the Hillsborough County Democratic Caucus, said. "But it's just not going to happen. It's not going [to] happen easily."
What's next:
Members of Casa Cuba de Tampa say that Ortega Casanova had a wife and family, with one of his daughters about to give birth.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio says the U.S. is running its own investigation.
The Source: Information for this story was gathered from interviews with the president and vice president of the Casa Cuba de Tampa club, an interview with the chair of the Hillsborough County Democratic Caucus, and previous reporting from Fox News Channel.