Simón Trinidad
[3] After graduation, he returned to Valledupar and started working for the government-owned agrarian savings bank Caja Agraria del Cesar as a financial adviser.
By September 1981, Palmera, Jaime Sierra, Tomás Agudelo and Federico Palacios Romaña had created a group named Los Independientes (The Independents) of Marxist-Leninist orientation.
This party was subject to political violence from drug lords, paramilitaries and military agents, leading to the forced disappearances, kidnappings and assassinations of many of its members, while others later became active guerrillas or refugees overseas[according to whom?].
In 1987, after a peasant strike in the Alfonso López plaza in Valledupar, Palmera stole 30 million pesos from the bank where he was working as a manager and escaped into the mountains, apparently joining the FARC at this time.
By then he was believed to be in command of FARC's Front 41, created by Palmera in June 1990, which operated in the area of the Serranía del Perijá mountain range.
Palmera had adopted the aliases of Simón Trinidad and Federico Bogotá, and later also became part of the Bloque Caribe (Caribbean Bloc of the FARC-EP) in the Northern coast of Colombia.
In May 1992, Palmera and Abelardo Caicedo (aka "Solís Almeida"), ordered the kidnapping and later the murder of Colombian Navy Lieutenant Álvaro Fernando Morris Piedrahíta.
On December 11, 1995, Colombian authorities learned that "Simón Trinidad" had become the sixth commander in-line of the FARC's Caribbean Bloc, being in charge of guerrilla propaganda.
[7] On July 4 of the same year, while in San Vicente del Caguán, Caquetá and acting as FARC's speaker, he announced that the group was going to attack any aircraft or troops that performed any fumigation on coca or poppy plantations in southern Colombia.
In a communique dated November 28 but released on December 3, the FARC declared that Trinidad's extradition would be a serious obstacle to reaching a prisoner exchange agreement with the Colombian government.
The FARC did not accept this demand, and Palmera himself had previously stated that he considered his future extradition and prosecution in the U.S. an opportunity to publicly protest against the Uribe administration.
In February 2005, Ricardo Palmera appeared before a Washington court for a pre-trial hearing, where he pleaded not guilty to the prosecution's charges of drug trafficking and terrorism.
[10] Palmera has also been accused of "hostage taking" because of his alleged complicity in the capture of three U.S. contractors, who crashed while conducting surveillance over rural areas under FARC influence and control.
Palmera has been related to this case due to his alleged admission that he had traveled to Ecuador, where he was arrested, in order to arrange for the negotiation of a prisoner exchange with the Colombian government.
[12] On October 30, 2006, a former female guerrilla who claimed to operate Trinidad's radio during his time as commander of the FARC's Front 41 in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, testified against him.
[22] In October 2007, Simon Trinidad again achieved a hung jury, in his third month-long trial, this time for involvement in the FARC's drug trafficking activities.
The group considers Palmera to be "one of Latin America's most important leftists," stating that "everyone who is against injustice and who wants to oppose the imperial arrogance of the Bush administration should join [them] in the effort."
The Committee supports the FARC's activities in Colombia, describing its leadership as "incorruptible through forty years of struggle" and the rebel group as one that is "fighting for national liberation".
