BY ALFONSO CHARDY

 U.S. District Judge Joan Lenard will hold a hearing today to decide whether
 Brothers to the Rescue leader José Basulto, witness in an ongoing Cuban spy
 trial, violated a court gag order by announcing plans to fly over the ocean where
 Cuban MiGs shot down two Brothers planes five years ago.

 The Feb. 24, 1996, shoot-down is at the heart of the U.S. government's case
 against five defendants accused of trying to infiltrate U.S. military installations and
 Cuban exile organizations in South Florida.

 Lead defendant Gerardo Hernández is specifically charged with conspiracy to
 commit murder by allegedly giving Cuba the flight plan of the Brothers planes
 involved in the fateful episode.

 Basulto, who plans to be at today's hearing, piloted one of the three planes but
 survived because his aircraft was not shot down.

 Basulto told The Herald last week that his plan to overfly the shoot-down site Feb.
 24 is aimed at commemorating the four people aboard the downed planes -- not to
 interfere with the spy trial. He plans to drop anti-Castro leaflets at the site, which
 he called Martyrs' Point.

 But Paul McKenna, Hernández's defense attorney, asked Lenard to enforce her
 earlier ruling ordering witnesses not to discuss the case in the media. In court
 papers, McKenna suggests that Lenard should halt the flyover.

 ``This sensationalistic grandstanding to the mass media in direct contravention of
 this court's gag order must be immediately addressed and halted in order to
 prevent any future prejudice to the defendants in their attempt to receive a fair
 trial,'' McKenna wrote in a court motion. ``The fact that Mr. Basulto would at this
 juncture propose another Cuba leaflet drop and announce same to the mass
 media and further condemn the government of Cuba and request further
 indictments shows his utter disregard for this court's gag order.''

 In response, Basulto's lawyers, Sofia Powell-Cosio and Silvia B. Piñera-Vazquez,
 asked Lenard to deny McKenna's motion, saying Basulto's ``right of free
 expression and right of assembly'' must be protected.