Hernando County, Florida -- Investigators on Tuesday announced the details of a 2011 raid of two homes in Brooksville. Hernando deputies say the raid from last March recovered nearly $1 million in assets from two people who assumed the identities of dead children, and were involved in international money laundering and illegal narcotics activity.
Photo Gallery: Brooksville $1 million raid
The multi-agency takedown was initiated after the U.S. Department of State Diplomatic Security Service (DSS) discovered 66-year-old Eugene Paull and 32-year-old Subrena Spence were using passports under the names Robert Harris and Carla Mennefee. Harris died at age 2 in 1945 and Mennefee at age 10 in 1988.
Detectives believe Spence's uncle was married to Mennefee's mother, which is how she obtained the fake identity. Paull, convicted on various drug charges, had fled to Jamaica in 1973, which is where he later obtained Harris' identity.
Investigators say Paull met Spence in Jamaica, where he had amassed his fortune by drug trafficking and running a hotel. When the two returned to the United States, they settled in Brooksville under their new identities and purchased property, vehicles, and formed "shell" corporations to help launder their illegal funds into the country.
At one point, Spence married her brother, Martin Spence, who moved from Jamaica with his family to live with couple. This was how she legally obtained the name, Carla Spence.
During the investigation, numerous items adding up to nearly $1 million were seized, including two homes, three vehicles, two custom motorcycles, two campers, a 47-foot yacht, numerous firearms and cash. One home contained a secret room, as well as an unfinished escape tunnel that was planned to stretch from the home to a field a hundred yards away.
Two offshore bank accounts were also located in Jamaica and the Cayman Islands, but could not be seized due to International banking laws.
Subrena Spence was convicted on Federal and State charges and deported back to Jamaica after she agreed to forfeit all of her assets.
Eugene Paull, who used the identity of Robert Edward Harris, after his arrest on March 3, 2011 for Identity Theft, was arrested in South Florida while on probation after explosives and a large amount of money in gas cans in hidden compartments were found in his home.
He is currently living in the Miami area on probation.