BY KAREN BRANCH

 Armed with celestial ``Pray for Elian messages and posters of Attorney General
 Janet Reno with diabolical horns sprouting from her head, about 60 demonstrators
 took their frustrations Wednesday to Reno's Kendall home.

 Their only audience, blocking the driveway, was a battalion of police officers.

 ``There very easily could have been 20-plus officers, said Sgt. Pete Andreu of
 Miami-Dade Police, dispatched to join FBI agents guarding the entrance to the
 woodsy lot. ``It was very peaceful.

 The two-hour demonstration broke as the noontime news crews departed.

 A woman who declined to identify herself later at Reno's home said it was vacant
 during the protest: ``We weren't here.

 The exile group Vigilio Mambisa moved its protest to the street across from Cuba
 Paquetes, 7135 W. Flagler St. Ostensibly, its message was to challenge the
 business that ships packages to Cuba.

 But the pro-Elian and anti-Reno posters are what prompted an endless blasting of
 horns by those driving past demonstrators, who had dwindled to 40. Jose Antonio
 Freijo, 63, first said the group wasn't trying to link Cuba Paquetes with Elian's
 fate.

 Then he changed his mind: ``It has to do with Castro! Castro has to do with
 everything!

 Vigilio Mambisa President Miguel Saavedra shouted through a bullhorn the
 anti-Cuba-Paquetes and anti-Reno statements. ``Janet Reno doesn't want to give
 Elian his day in court, he said.

 Again, seven uniformed Miami officers were the witnesses.

 Cuba Paquetes, open earlier in the day, shuttered its storefront for the two-hour
 event. The group, undeterred, returned to their preferred target: Reno.

 Several said they've dedicated the last four months to joining Elian protests and
 standing vigil at the home of his Miami relatives.

 ``Fifteen of us go there every night to pray, said Aida Taylor, 45. ``I'm a Christian,
 and I believe God will perform a miracle.

 Barbaro Rodriguez, 57, a butcher by trade, took six months leave to protest.

 ``It's no sacrifice. We have to help Elian, said Rodriguez, whose wife also wanted
 to take leave from her accounting job. ``I told her no, because we both can't stop
 working. We have two kids, 5 and 7 years old.

 Rodriguez berated Reno and challenged her judgment because of the Parkinson's
 disease, diagnosed in 1995, that causes her to tremble.

 ``Naturally, it's affecting her judgment, because it's impossible that such a woman
 could violate the rights of child like this, he said.

 Eugenio Perez, 72, took the barb one step further.

 ``That problem she has must make her psychotic, Perez said. ``She's acting like
 a wretch. Why else would she do this?

 Reno's communications office did not return phone calls for comment.

 Rodriguez also proudly waved the poster of Reno with horns. He said a woman
 distributed them Tuesday outside the home of Elian's family.

 The posters were glued to paint sticks from the O-Gee Paint Co. Owner John
 Schultz said a man named Eliut Prada in the past few days bought 400 sticks --
 their traditional use to stir paint.

 There was no answer at Prada's home phone.

 ``That's unintended advertising, but we'll take it, said Schultz, who had no idea the
 sticks would become handles for the anti-Reno posters.

 ``My mother, Peggy Schultz, went to school with Janet Reno and we supplied the
 paint for Janet Reno's house, so she told me to let you know she had no part in it.

                     Copyright 2000 Miami Herald