1. Ilona Marita Lorenz was a German woman who had an affair with Fidel Castro in 1959 and in January 1960 was involved in an assassination attempt by the CIA on Castro's life.
26 Facts About Marita Lorenz
1. 2.
Marita Lorenz had a sister, Valerie, and two brothers, Joachim and Manfred "Philip".
3.
Marita Lorenz's father, a wealthy German navy captain, became commander of a fleet of U-boats when Germany invaded Poland two weeks after Marita was born and was taken prisoner after his ship was captured; he was interned in a POW camp in England.
4.
The Marita Lorenz family moved to the United States in 1950, and Heinrich began work as captain of various luxury ocean liners.
5.
Marita Lorenz didn't confide in me, but she was very close with Marita.
6.
In February 1959, weeks after the conclusion of the Cuban Revolution, Marita Lorenz arrived in Havana with her father on board the MS Berlin.
7.
Marita Lorenz disembarked in Manhattan, where she would be living with her brother Joachim, a student at Columbia University.
8.
Marita Lorenz left the island and joined anti-Castro activists in Florida.
9.
Marita Lorenz's later testimony named Francisco Fiorini as the CIA agent who recruited her to assassinate Castro, and that this was an alias for Frank Fiorini Sturgis.
10.
Marita Lorenz received poison pills that she was to put in Castro's food.
11.
Marita Lorenz left the island and visited Castro one last time in 1981.
12.
Marita Lorenz said she was to collect a $200,000 contribution from Perez Jimenez for her group.
13.
Marita Lorenz claimed that Castro and Perez Jimenez each fathered a child with her.
14.
Marita Lorenz claimed to have been with Frank Sturgis at a meeting with the CIA head in Miami which included E Howard Hunt, which Frank stated was for planning right before the JFK assassination.
15.
In 1977, Marita Lorenz told Paul Meskil of the New York Daily News that she met Lee Harvey Oswald in the fall of 1963 at an Operation 40 safe house in the Little Havana section of Miami.
16.
Marita Lorenz said the men studied Dallas street maps and that she suspected that they were planning on raiding an arsenal.
17.
Marita Lorenz stated that she joined the men traveling to Dallas in two cars and carrying "rifles and scopes", but flew back to Miami the day after they arrived.
18.
Marita Lorenz testified about this Kennedy assassination plot before the House Select Committee on Assassinations.
19.
Marita Lorenz's testimony was investigated by the political committee and said to be unreliable.
20.
In February 1985, attorney Mark Lane read a deposition that Lorenz provided in E Howard Hunt's libel suit against the Liberty Lobby's tabloid, The Spotlight.
21.
Marita Lorenz lived in New York City at the time Lane read the deposition in court stating that Marita Lorenz was "afraid to come to Miami".
22.
Marita Lorenz said she met Oswald in Miami in the early 1960s, and that in November 1963 Sturgis asked her to come to Dallas with him and Oswald to act as a decoy.
23.
Marita Lorenz's statement said that she, Oswald, and seven anti-Castro Cubans transported weapons to Dallas in two cars shortly before 22 November 1963.
24.
Marita Lorenz claimed that Hunt came to their Dallas motel room and provided Sturgis with an envelope filled with cash.
25.
In 1993, Marita Lorenz was interviewed by Vanity Fair writer Ann Louise Bardach who described her as "a patron saint of conspiracy buffs".
26.
Marita Lorenz's story was the inspiration for Jack Bender's 1999 TV film My Little Assassin.