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| Author | Comment |  joeb
Registered: 11/14/05
Posts: 2,929 |  06/10/07 at 08:53 PM |  #1 |
2 EASY READS
FBI Secrets: An Agent's Expose by M. Wesley Swearingen, 1994 Reviewed by Jon Roland Wes Swearingen served as an FBI agent from 1951 until he retired in 1977. During that period he perpetrated or witnessed numerous violations of law by FBI agents and their operatives, heard revealing statements by other agents about their illegal activities, and read files which documented violations of the rights of American citizens. The activities of FBI agents and their "informers" include warrantless break-ins, theft, fraud, kidnapping, perjury, fabrication of evidence, suborning of witness perjury, and murder. The targets were political dissidents: anyone FBI agents didn't like. Swearingen details how members of the Black Panthers were murdered by FBI operatives, another was framed for a murder he didn't commit, and still others were prosecuted on trumped up charges. He does not mention anything about the deaths of John or Robert Kennedy or Martin Luther King, but he describes an agency so deeply involved in criminal activity of every kind as to be capable of causing the deaths of those men and others who have died under mysterious circumstances. He describes various files on political dissidents, called the "Security Index" and the "Reserve Index", which eventually included about 500,000 names, and which were the persons to be arrested without warrant and taken to detention areas in the event of a national security emergency. For those who are inclined to dismiss such concerns as paranoid, here is supporting evidence, notwithstanding the repeal of authorizing legislation in 1971, which would not stop people like these. Swearingen provides an insider's view of the COINTELPRO program of suppression of political dissidents, but also tells us that the program continues to this day under another name, apparently without a paper trail. He paints a picture of an agency riddled with corruption, incompetence, and inefficiency, composed of men who may have once been patriots, but who have been reduced to common criminals, whose crime fighting activities are limited at best and largely for show, with political repression being the primary mission. Some may suggest that the FBI may have been reformed since Swearingen left the agency in 1977, and no longer does the things he describes. Certainly there have been some reform efforts, particularly during the period Edward Levi was Attorney-General, and we would expect another generation of agents to have taken the place of those Swearingen worked with, but available evidence, including continuing harassment of Wes by his former agency, indicate it has not been reformed at all. There have been other books by former FBI agents that have told similar tales, such as William Turner, author of _Hoover's FBI: The Men and the Myth_, and books by former agents of the CIA, such as those by Philip Agee, John Stockwell, Victor Marchetti, Frank Snepp, and Ralph McGehee. It seems likely that similar books remain to be written by agents of almost every agency of the U.S. government, revealing them as criminal enterprises and implicating almost every employee as criminal conspirators. Such agents should read this book and begin gathering the evidence they will need to take out with them. Even Swearingen still speaks with pride of his crimefighting activities, seemingly oblivious to the fact that there is no constitutional authority or federal jurisdiction for statutes against the offenses he was investigating, making enforcement in federal courts itself a criminal violation of the civil rights of the targets, even when they really are bad guys who deserve to be prosecuted under applicable state laws. The most important thing this book reveals is the mindset of government agents, and the way otherwise good men get corrupted by the system of which they become a part. They are totally ignorant of the principles of constitutional republic government, and willing to do whatever works, regardless of legality. Their arrogance was revealed in a statement by Special Agent Joseph G. Deegan in 1977: "We are the only ones who know what is good for the country, and we are the only ones who can do anything about it." After reading this book and others, it is clear that this statement reflects a dangerous delusion of grandeur. Anyone who is involved in any kind of politically significant activity, or who is concerned about the future of this country, needs to read this book to learn how government agents operate and how citizens can defend themselves against them, both in court and in the field. These agents are not very effective, and people should not be awed by them. Standing up to them works if one exercises a few simple precautions, such as taping all encounters and having witnesses around at all times. Going armed at all times may not be a bad idea, either. Available from: South End Press
116 Saint Botolph St
Boston, MA 01225
Several years ago Vermont filmaker Roz Payne sat down with
retired FBI agent Wesley Swearingen and interviewed him .
He discusses the FBI policy of assassinating black leaders.
and the agents he knew who were involved in these policies.
His interview is part of a 4 DVD set released this year by Roz Payne
with 12 hours of footage about the Black Panthers,
including two blockbuster interviews with retired FBI agents.
Roz shot much of the footage of the Black Panthers in the 60's.
visit her site http://www.newsreel.us/
| joeb
Registered: 11/14/05
Posts: 2,929 | | 03/05/08 at 01:46 AM | #2 |
The FBI FRUHMENSCHEN program was created back in the 1940's
to target black leaders and elected officials in sting operations because the FBI feels blacks are incapable of governing.
FRUHMENSCHEN is a german word that means ape man.
The FBI file called RACIAL MATTERS is one of the files FBI agents keep on black americans.
Attorney William Pepper's book ACT OF STATE presents the evidence
attorney Pepper used to convince a jury in Memphis during the summer of 1999 that FBI agents assassinated Martin Luther King.
couple of easy reads funded by your white tax dollars.....
1st read
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&client=firefox-a&channel=s&rls=org.mozilla%3Aen-US%3Aofficial&q=hirsh+friedman+fruhmenschen&btnG=Search
2nd read
MBA group gets recognition
Tue, Mar. 04, 2008
Miami Herald Staff Report
The South Florida Chapter of the National Black MBA Association has received the FBI Director's Community Leadership Award that recognizes individuals and organizations that positively impact their communities through community-based programs.
The FBI's Miami Division nominated the chapter for its support of initiatives such as the Leaders of Tomorrow mentoring and tutorial program, and the Jacki Tuckfield Memorial Graduate Business Scholarship Fund, according to an announcement from the group.
The chapter was cited also for its ''support in the furtherance of the FBI's commitment to increase awareness as an equal opportunity employer in local underserved communities,'' the announcement said.
The award was presented in February at a monthly networking event of the chapter at The Old Dillard Museum in Ft. Lauderdale.
3d read
THERE WAS REASON NOT TO TRUST THEM
By PATSY SIMS; PATSY SIMS IS THE AUTHOR OF ''THE KLAN'' AND ''CAN SOMEBODY SHOUT AMEN! INSIDE THE TENTS AND TABERNACLES OF AMERICAN REVIVALISTS.''
Published: July 9, 1989
LEAD: ''RACIAL MATTERS'' The FBI's Secret File on Black America, 1960-1972. By Kenneth O'Reilly. 456 pp. New York: The Free Press. $24.95.
''RACIAL MATTERS'' The FBI's Secret File on Black America, 1960-1972. By Kenneth O'Reilly. 456 pp. New York: The Free Press. $24.95.
One of the sad truths surrounding the civil rights movement is the growing realization that the Federal Bureau of Investigation may have been as great an enemy to the struggle for black freedom as the Southern segregationists who openly challenged it in the streets.
At the time, the civil rights activist Fanny Lou Hamer said of the Federal agents sent to investigate her beating in a Mississippi jail: ''I just don't trust 'em.'' And a growing body of evidence demonstrates there was good reason not to. For as Kenneth O'Reilly notes, when the F.B.I. showed up in the trouble spots of the South, most often it was not to protect those struggling for black freedom but to spy on them, even to harass them and, at times, to sow dissent and incite violence.
In '' 'Racial Matters,' '' Mr. O'Reilly traces the long, tortured relationship between the F.B.I. and black America, from the bureau's covert surveillance during World War I to the dismantling of its controversial intelligence apparatus in 1972. During that time, the bureau amassed dossiers bulging with rumor and allegations, all kept under the heading of ''Racial Matters.''
It is from these recently declassified files that Mr. O'Reilly, the author of ''Hoover and the Un-Americans,'' draws much of his material. Using F.B.I. files, transcripts of wiretapped and bugged conversations, confidential office memorandums and interviews with former F.B.I. executives and field agents (among others), he presents a remarkable look at the inner workings of the bureau and the often flawed, petty, irrational thinking behind its relentless drive to destroy the civil rights movement and its most visible leader, Martin Luther King Jr. From the beginning, J. Edgar Hoover used the argument of states' rights to justify his refusal to protect civil rights activists, while spying on many of them under the pretense of weeding out Communists and other subversives. As the movement grew, he turned to more drastic measures, broadening covert surveillance and ordering counterintelligence programs designed to disrupt the movement. In short, he engaged in the kinds of activities that we, as a nation, have long condemned in less democratic societies.
Mr. O'Reilly shows us a less heroic F.B.I. than the one glorified on television and in scores of books and articles surreptitiously authorized and edited by agency officials. For example, he portrays an F.B.I. that failed to take measures to prevent the bloody assault on Freedom Riders at a Birmingham, Ala., bus station in 1961 even though the bureau knew in advance of the promise of the city's police commissioner, Eugene (Bull) Connor, to keep his men away long enough for the Ku Klux Klan to act; an F.B.I. that planted false rumors that members of the civil rights vanguard were Government informers; an F.B.I. that shared movement strategies with groups like the Klan and the National States' Rights Party; an F.B.I. that fed internal rivalries between the movement's various factions, sometimes provoking conflict and violence that might have been avoided.
Many of the F.B.I. files the author gained access to bore scribbled evidence of what Mr. O'Reilly calls the director's ''primitive'' racism. To Hoover, King was a ''burr head,'' ''a 'tom cat' with obsessive degenerate sexual urges.''
Ever since the full extent of the F.B.I.'s program to destroy the movement began trickling out of its Washington headquarters, many observers have pointed to Hoover as the sole cause of the bureau's actions, and certainly he was the motivator and guiding force, fully deserving much of the blame. But as Mr. O'Reilly, like others before him, makes clear, Hoover did not act alone. The men around him shared his preference for segregation. While there were exceptions, most F.B.I. agents willingly - sometimes enthusiastically - carried out Hoover's directives, seldom questioning their wisdom or morality. And they succeeded, Mr. O'Reilly argues, only because ''responsible government officials allowed them, and encouraged them, to do so.'' | joeb
Registered: 11/14/05
Posts: 2,929 | | 03/09/08 at 08:40 PM | #3 |
spinorama time
SPLC and FBI agents have been in bed since the center was started
The Southern Poverty Law Center Manipulates Crime Data and Terminology in Last-Ditch Attempt to Stop the Immigration Debate, Asserts the Federation for American Immigration Reform
|
WASHINGTON, March 9 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The following statement
is being issued by the Federation for American Immigration Reform.
Today the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) issued a misleading
release announcing a significant increase in the number of hate groups and
hate crimes over the last few years. The release then suggests that our
national debate over immigration reform has fueled the increase in both.
Offering no criteria as to what constitutes a hate group, manipulating the
data for self-serving purposes, and then making broad, unsubstantiated
conclusions, this latest release from the SPLC constitutes one of its most
reckless charges to date. It is calculated to be inflammatory, tarnish the
reputation of leading immigration reform groups, and shut down meaningful
public policy debate about immigration reform.
When examined responsibly, the FBI hate crime data show a dramatically
different story than the one the SPLC portrays. First, in order to suggest
an artificially large increase in the raw number of hate crimes, the SPLC
selects 2003 as its base year, one of lowest years on record for hate
crimes against Hispanics. If one compares the number of hate crimes between
1995 (the earliest report available on the FBI's website) and 2006 (the
most recent statistical year available), one would see that the number of
hate crimes has increased only 17 percent.
But even this is not the whole story. The SPLC conveniently forgets to
index the raw hate crime data with the population, a step always taken by
the FBI to more accurately depict an increase or decrease in crime. Thus,
when one indexes a 17 percent increase in hate crimes against Hispanics
with a 67 percent increase in the Hispanic population between 1995 and
2006, it becomes clear that the rate of hate crimes against Hispanics has
in fact dropped dramatically -- by about 40 percent.
This reduction in the rate of hate crimes against Hispanics is even
more apparent when one considers that the number of law enforcement
agencies that participate in the FBI's hate crime data collection program
increased 33 percent between 1995 and 2006. Between 2003 and 2006 alone,
the number of law enforcement agencies participating in the FBI's hate
crime data collection program increased by over 700.
Finally, the SPLC claims that there has been substantial growth in the
number of "hate groups" since 2000. However, the SPLC provides no
definition of a "hate group" and offers no objective criteria that it uses
to classify organizations as such. The SPLC appears to think that it can
stick this label onto any organization it wishes, including long-standing,
highly-regarded immigration reform organizations such as the Federation for
American Immigration Reform (FAIR) without being challenged as to its
motivations or methodology. FAIR is confident the media and the American
people will see through the SPLC's deceitful tactics.
"There is no level of hate crime that is acceptable -- period," says
Dan Stein, President of FAIR. "However, the SPLC's calculated abuse of the
term 'hate group' and manipulation of hate crime data for self-serving
political interests is an affront to hate crime victims and those who
advocate on their behalf. The SPLC manipulates data to reach deceitful
conclusions, tosses the term 'hate group' at highly-respected organizations
like FAIR, and then mixes the two in an attempt to stop our national debate
over immigration reform. But this is consistent with the SPLC's growing
practice of making allegations with no factual basis, no criteria and
sadly, no one challenging their increasing habit of playing fast and loose
with the facts. Unfortunately, it is the American people who suffer most
through this irresponsible behavior."
ABOUT FAIR
Headquartered on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., FAIR is the largest,
oldest and most respected immigration reform group in America. With over
250,000 members, FAIR advocates for non-discriminatory immigration polices
that protect American jobs, wages, the environment, and national security.
As a bipartisan organization free from special interest influence, FAIR is
regularly sought by Congress and the media for its objective analysis and
for its fair, practical and effective policy solutions.
| joeb
Registered: 11/14/05
Posts: 2,929 | | 03/12/08 at 05:50 PM | #4 |
| |  Stetson Kennedy was born in Jackson, Florida, in 1916. After graduating from the University of Florida he joined the Federal Writers Project (1935-39). While working on the project Kennedy was deeply influenced by the book, You Have Seen Their Faces (1937), a documentary account of impoverished living conditions in the South, that had been produced by the novelist, Erskine Caldwell, and the photographer, Margaret Bourke-White.
Kennedy became a newspaper reporter and wrote investigative articles for the New York Post. His first book, Palmetto County, was published in 1942. A member of the NAACP, Kennedy was a strong opponent of racism and in 1950 "campaigned for the U.S. Senate from Florida as an independent 'colour-blind' candidate on a platform calling for a 'live and let live' foreign policy and total equality at home."
As an investigative journalist, Kennedy joined the Ku Klux Klan. Articles about his activities appeared in the New York Post. He also supplied information of its illegal activities to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the House of Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) but both organizations showed little interest in what he found. Kennedy also wrote several books about racism such as Southern Exposure (1946), I Rode With the Klan (1954) and Jim Crow Guide to the U.S.A (1959).
Kennedy's latest book, After Appomattox: How the South Won the War (1995), explains how the Old South converted military defeat into political and social victory. Kennedy was also featured in Coming of Age (1995) by Studs Terkel. In 2001 was given the Benjamin Spock Peacemaker of the Year Award.
Bill Mauldin, "Bloodstains Again" (1946) Stetson Kennedy Forum Debates Who Killed Martin Luther King? Deaths of Civil Rights Workers Rosa Parks James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Michael Schwerner Segregation in the United States Ku Klux Klan Lynchings in the United States James Earl Ray
(1) Stetson Kennedy, I Rode With the Ku Klux Klan (1954)
In delving into both old and new outrages perpetrated by the Klan, I was soon struck by one all-important fact - almost all the things written on the subject were editorials, not exposes. The writers were against the Klan, all right, but they had precious few inside facts about it. Their punches consequently lacked the dynamite I knew it would take to score a knockout blow against the Klan.
The need, obviously, was not just for more words, but legal evidence on the Klan's inside machinations - evidence which could be taken into court and used to put the Klan's leaders behind bars where they belonged. To get such evidence - just as obviously - somebody would have to go under a Klan robe and turn the hooded order's dirty linen inside out for all the world to see. (2) After joining the Ku Klux Klan, Stetson Kennedy was able to informally interview Cliff Carter, the Night Hawk of the Klan.
The Kloran of the Klan defines a Klavalier as the soldier of the Klan. We take our name from the cavalier - a courtly, polite, cultured and very courageous and skillful soldier of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.
As the Military Department of the Invisible Empire, we Klavaliers also serve as the secret police of the KKK and are entrusted with carrying out all "direct-line" activity. We are a militant army, serving our country in peacetime as the U.S. Army does in wartime! Our country was founded by a white Protestant nation, and we intend to maintain it as such! Any attempt to influence its affairs by inferior racial minorities or persons owing allegiance to foreign prelates or potentates will not be tolerated!
All hyphenated groups - whether they be Negro-Americans, Jewish-Americans, Catholic-Americans, Italian-Americans or whatever must become American-Americans, or leave the country! The Ku Klux Klan is an American-American organization. As the Army of the Klan we Klavaliers are dedicated to saving America for Americans! (3) Stetson Kennedy was present when an African American cab-driver was murdered by the Ku Klux Klan for carrying a white woman in his cab.
The Negro man watched out of the corner of his eye. But the fear he must have felt upon discovering he was in the hands of the Klan did not show in his face.
We turned off the highway and on to a clay road that threaded off through the pine flatwoods. When we came to a clump of hardwood trees at the head of a branch, Randal stopped the cab. Reaching over and opening the door, he gave the Negro a shove that sent him sprawling face first on to the ground. Almost before I knew what was happening, both carloads of Klavaliers had swarmed around him, and were kicking at his prostrated form amid a torrent of profanity. The Negro groaned and doubled over to protect his groin, but he made no plea for mercy.
Randal, meanwhile, was standing on the sidelines, calmly putting on his robe. That done, he stepped up, and the kicking subsided. "You'd better say your prayers, nigger!" he said. "Your time has come." (4) In his book, I Rode With the Ku Klux Klan, Stetson Kennedy described the election of Gene Talmadge, the Governor of Georgia.
Talmadge was elected Governor of Georgia after a whirlwind campaign of Klan terror aimed at keeping Negroes from going to the polls. On the eve of the election, fiery crosses had flamed on court-house lawns all over Georgia. Notices signed "KKK" were tacked on to Negro churches, warning, "The first nigger who votes in Georgia will be a dead one." Other warnings were sent to Negroes through the U.S. mails, and others were dropped from airplanes over Negro neighbourhoods.
On election day, thousands of Negroes awoke to find miniature coffins on their doorsteps. My union friend Charlie Pike led his locals, white and Negro alike, to march to the polls and vote as a body. And though many thousands of Negroes defied the Klan and voted for the first time, in the end the forces of hate carried the day, Talmadge was elected, and the liberal supported by Governor Arnall was defeated. (5) In his book, I Rode With the Ku Klux Klan, Stetson Kennedy wrote about the murder of his friend, Harry T. Moore, on 25th December, 1951.
Terrorists planted a bomb under the bedroom of Mr. and Mrs. Harry T. Moore, Negro residents of Mims, a small town north of Miami. Moore was killed instantly. His wife died after a week of suffering. Even though Mrs. Moore said she had a "good idea" who planted the bomb, neither the local police nor Governor Warren's special investigator Elliott nor the F.B.I. bothered to take any statement from her before she died.
Moore was a two-fisted saintly fighter for democracy, who throughout his life was in the forefront of the struggle of his people for a greater measure of justice. at the time of his death he was not only state secretary of the N.A.A.C.P. but also leader of the Progressive Voters League of Florida. (6) Working undercover as a member of the Ku Klux Klan, Stetson Kennedy discovered the organization switched its support from the Democratic Party to the Republican Party when Dwight Eisenhower was selected as its presidential candidate in 1952.
It was Eisenhower's record as an enforcer of racial segregation in the U.S. armed forces, that opened up the possibility of swinging the traditionally Democratic South into the Republican camp. "My policy for handling coloured troops will be absolute equalitative treatment, but there will be segregation where facilities are afforded," Eisenhower had said in 1942 - and the Klan proceeded to make much of this fact.
On July 16th of that same year, a directive bearing Eisenhower's signature went out to the red Cross clubs in London, ordering that, "Care should be taken so that men of two races are not needlessly intermingled in the same dormitory or at the same tables in the dinning-halls."
Finally, when in campaigning for the presidency Eisenhower announced his opposition to civil rights legislation by Congress, the Klan took off the wraps and went all out for Ike. On election day, more Negroes than ever before in American history defied the Klan terror and marched to the polls - but nevertheless at least five million were kept from voting. The hate propaganda did its work, and Kludd Shuler's prediction that five Southern states would go for Eisenhower came true. (7) Stetson Kennedy, I Rode With the Ku Klux Klan (1954)
Another signal for the Ku Klux Klan ideology is represented by the McCarran Immigration Act. sponsored by Republican Senator Pat McCarron - who is also the author of the U.S.A.'s concentration camplaw - and Republican Congressman Francis Walter, the new law bars coloured races almost entirely, while favouring immigration by north Europeans. Instead of working for repeal of this racist law, Eisenhower has asked for special quotas to let in migrants from eastern Europe, most of whom are diehard German Nazis.
Available from Amazon
Educational Websites Standards Site, BBC History, PBS Online, Open Directory Project, Virtual Library,
Education Forum, History GCSE, Design & Technology, Learn History, Music Teacher Resource,
Freepedia, Teach It, Science Active, Geography IST, Brighton Photographers, Sussex Photo History,
Compton History, Universal Teacher, English Teaching, English Online, History Learning Site,
History on the Net, Black History, Greenfield History, School History, Active History, I Love History,
E-HELP, Ed Podesta Blog, Macgregorish History, Historiasiglo20, Sintermeerten, ICT4LT | | |
| joeb
Registered: 11/14/05
Posts: 2,929 | | 03/16/08 at 01:44 PM | #5 |
Wiretapping's true danger
History says we should worry less about privacy and more about political spying.
By Julian Sanchez
March 16, 2008
As the battle over reforms to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act rages in Congress, civil libertarians warn that legislation sought by the White House could enable spying on "ordinary Americans." Others, like Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), counter that only those with an "irrational fear of government" believe that "our country's intelligence analysts are more concerned with random innocent Americans than foreign terrorists overseas."
But focusing on the privacy of the average Joe in this way obscures the deeper threat that warrantless wiretaps poses to a democratic society. Without meaningful oversight, presidents and intelligence agencies can -- and repeatedly have -- abused their surveillance authority to spy on political enemies and dissenters.
The original FISA law was passed in 1978 after a thorough congressional investigation headed by Sen. Frank Church (D-Idaho) revealed that for decades, intelligence analysts -- and the presidents they served -- had spied on the letters and phone conversations of union chiefs, civil rights leaders, journalists, antiwar activists, lobbyists, members of Congress, Supreme Court justices -- even Eleanor Roosevelt and the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. The Church Committee reports painstakingly documented how the information obtained was often "collected and disseminated in order to serve the purely political interests of an intelligence agency or the administration, and to influence social policy and political action."
Political abuse of electronic surveillance goes back at least as far as the Teapot Dome scandal that roiled the Warren G. Harding administration in the early 1920s. When Atty. Gen. Harry Daugherty stood accused of shielding corrupt Cabinet officials, his friend FBI Director William Burns went after Sen. Burton Wheeler, the fiery Montana progressive who helped spearhead the investigation of the scandal. FBI agents tapped Wheeler's phone, read his mail and broke into his office. Wheeler was indicted on trumped-up charges by a Montana grand jury, and though he was ultimately cleared, the FBI became more adept in later years at exploiting private information to blackmail or ruin troublesome public figures. (As New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer can attest, a single wiretap is all it takes to torpedo a political career.)
In 1945, Harry Truman had the FBI wiretap Thomas Corcoran, a member of Franklin D. Roosevelt's "brain trust" whom Truman despised and whose influence he resented. Following the death of Chief Justice Harlan Stone the next year, the taps picked up Corcoran's conversations about succession with Justice William O. Douglas. Six weeks later, having reviewed the FBI's transcripts, Truman passed over Douglas and the other sitting justices to select Secretary of the Treasury (and poker buddy) Fred Vinson for the court's top spot.
"Foreign intelligence" was often used as a pretext for gathering political intelligence. John F. Kennedy's attorney general, brother Bobby, authorized wiretaps on lobbyists, Agriculture Department officials and even a congressman's secretary in hopes of discovering whether the Dominican Republic was paying bribes to influence U.S. sugar policy. The nine-week investigation didn't turn up evidence of money changing hands, but it did turn up plenty of useful information about the wrangling over the sugar quota in Congress -- information that an FBI memo concluded "contributed heavily to the administration's success" in passing its own preferred legislation.
In the FISA debate, Bush administration officials oppose any explicit rules against "reverse targeting" Americans in conversations with noncitizens, though they say they'd never do it.
But Lyndon Johnson found the tactic useful when he wanted to know what promises then-candidate Richard Nixon might be making to our allies in South Vietnam through confidant Anna Chenault. FBI officials worried that directly tapping Chenault would put the bureau "in a most untenable and embarrassing position," so they recorded her conversations with her Vietnamese contacts.
Johnson famously heard recordings of King's conversations and personal liaisons with various women. Less well known is that he received wiretap reports on King's strategy conferences with other civil rights leaders, hoping to use the information to block their efforts to seat several Mississippi delegates at the 1964 Democratic National Convention. Johnson even complained that it was taking him "hours each night" to read the reports.
Few presidents were quite as brazen as Nixon, whom the Church Committee found had "authorized a program of wiretaps which produced for the White House purely political or personal information unrelated to national security." They didn't need to be, perhaps. Through programs such as the National Security Agency's Operation Shamrock (1947 to 1975), which swept up international telegrams en masse, the government already had a vast store of data, and presidents could easily run "name checks" on opponents using these existing databases.
It's probably true that ordinary citizens uninvolved in political activism have little reason to fear being spied on, just as most Americans seldom need to invoke their 1st Amendment right to freedom of speech. But we understand that the 1st Amendment serves a dual role: It protects the private right to speak your mind, but it serves an even more important structural function, ensuring open debate about matters of public importance. You might not care about that first function if you don't plan to say anything controversial. But anyone who lives in a democracy, who is subject to its laws and affected by its policies, ought to care about the second.
Harvard University legal scholar William Stuntz has argued that the framers of the Constitution viewed the 4th Amendment as a mechanism for protecting political dissent. In England, agents of the crown had ransacked the homes of pamphleteers critical of the king -- something the founders resolved that the American system would not countenance.
In that light, the security-versus-privacy framing of the contemporary FISA debate seems oddly incomplete. Your personal phone calls and e-mails may be of limited interest to the spymasters of Langley and Ft. Meade. But if you think an executive branch unchecked by courts won't turn its "national security" surveillance powers to political ends -- well, it would be a first.
Julian Sanchez is a Washington writer who studies privacy and surveillance.
| joeb
Registered: 11/14/05
Posts: 2,929 | | 03/16/08 at 02:09 PM | #6 |
two reads funded by your tax time....
the primary consumer of the criminal-justice system is the voter-taxpayer
1st read see link about FBI agent Swearingen's book
http://www.constitution.org/col/mwswear.htm+swearingen+fbi&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=2&gl=us&client=firefox-a
Several years ago Vermont filmaker Roz Payne sat down with
retired FBI agent Wesley Swearingen and interviewed him.
He discusses the routine murdering of black leaders by FBI agents.
His interview is part of a 4 DVD set released this year by Roz Payne
with 12 hours of footage about the Black Panthers,
including two blockbuster interviews with retired FBI agents.
Roz shot much of the footage of the Black Panthers in the 60's.
visit her site http://www.newsreel.us/
FBI Secrets: An Agent's Expose by M. Wesley Swearingen, 1994 Reviewed by Jon Roland Wes Swearingen served as an FBI agent from 1951 until he retired in 1977. During that period he perpetrated or witnessed numerous violations of law by FBI agents and their operatives, heard revealing statements by other agents about their illegal activities, and read files which documented violations of the rights of American citizens. The activities of FBI agents and their "informers" include warrantless break-ins, theft, fraud, kidnapping, perjury, fabrication of evidence, suborning of witness perjury, and murder. The targets were political dissidents: anyone FBI agents didn't like. Swearingen details how members of the Black Panthers were murdered by FBI operatives, another was framed for a murder he didn't commit, and still others were prosecuted on trumped up charges. He does not mention anything about the deaths of John or Robert Kennedy or Martin Luther King, but he describes an agency so deeply involved in criminal activity of every kind as to be capable of causing the deaths of those men and others who have died under mysterious circumstances. He describes various files on political dissidents, called the "Security Index" and the "Reserve Index", which eventually included about 500,000 names, and which were the persons to be arrested without warrant and taken to detention areas in the event of a national security emergency. For those who are inclined to dismiss such concerns as paranoid, here is supporting evidence, notwithstanding the repeal of authorizing legislation in 1971, which would not stop people like these. Swearingen provides an insider's view of the COINTELPRO program of suppression of political dissidents, but also tells us that the program continues to this day under another name, apparently without a paper trail. He paints a picture of an agency riddled with corruption, incompetence, and inefficiency, composed of men who may have once been patriots, but who have been reduced to common criminals, whose crime fighting activities are limited at best and largely for show, with political repression being the primary mission. Some may suggest that the FBI may have been reformed since Swearingen left the agency in 1977, and no longer does the things he describes. Certainly there have been some reform efforts, particularly during the period Edward Levi was Attorney-General, and we would expect another generation of agents to have taken the place of those Swearingen worked with, but available evidence, including continuing harassment of Wes by his former agency, indicate it has not been reformed at all. There have been other books by former FBI agents that have told similar tales, such as William Turner, author of _Hoover's FBI: The Men and the Myth_, and books by former agents of the CIA, such as those by Philip Agee, John Stockwell, Victor Marchetti, Frank Snepp, and Ralph McGehee. It seems likely that similar books remain to be written by agents of almost every agency of the U.S. government, revealing them as criminal enterprises and implicating almost every employee as criminal conspirators. Such agents should read this book and begin gathering the evidence they will need to take out with them. Even Swearingen still speaks with pride of his crimefighting activities, seemingly oblivious to the fact that there is no constitutional authority or federal jurisdiction for statutes against the offenses he was investigating, making enforcement in federal courts itself a criminal violation of the civil rights of the targets, even when they really are bad guys who deserve to be prosecuted under applicable state laws. The most important thing this book reveals is the mindset of government agents, and the way otherwise good men get corrupted by the system of which they become a part. They are totally ignorant of the principles of constitutional republic government, and willing to do whatever works, regardless of legality. Their arrogance was revealed in a statement by Special Agent Joseph G. Deegan in 1977: "We are the only ones who know what is good for the country, and we are the only ones who can do anything about it." After reading this book and others, it is clear that this statement reflects a dangerous delusion of grandeur. Anyone who is involved in any kind of politically significant activity, or who is concerned about the future of this country, needs to read this book to learn how government agents operate and how citizens can defend themselves against them, both in court and in the field. These agents are not very effective, and people should not be awed by them. Standing up to them works if one exercises a few simple precautions, such as taping all encounters and having witnesses around at all times. Going armed at all times may not be a bad idea, either. Available from: South End Press
116 Saint Botolph St
Boston, MA 01225
$13.00 + S&H
2nbd read
March 16, 2008 at 09:48:39
15 year-old killer "turned" Black Panthers in COINTELPRO case to escape threatened execution in Nebraska murder trial
by Michael Richardson
http://www.opednews.com
Duane Peak, a 15 year-old dropout with reported substance abuse problems, took out his angst against the world on August 17, 1970, when he killed an Omaha, Nebraska police officer, Larry Minard, the father of five young children. Police had been lured to a booby-trapped vacant house with a false report of a woman screaming. Instead of a rape victim, the eight responding patrolmen found only a suitcase. Officer Minard was killed instantly when the dynamite-rigged suitcase blew up in his face. Seven other officers were injured.
Two years earlier, J. Edgar Hoover, the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation had ordered FBI field offices to "disrupt" the Black Panthers, a group Hoover had declared the most dangerous in America. Code-named COINTELPRO, the secret operation against the Black Panthers used illegal tactics and engaged in a wide range of misconduct against numerous individuals around the nation. When reports came in about the lethal trap that took Minard's life the Omaha district office sprang into action and assisted the Omaha Police throughout the investigation.
After an intensive police sweep of Omaha's Near-Northside and the arrest of over a dozen individuals, the investigation focused on Peak who had been seen by witnesses with a suitcase around the time of the bombing. While under interrogation Peak gave a half-dozen different versions of the crime but failed to name the two individuals police wanted most. Ed Poindexter and Mondo we Langa (formerly David Rice) were leaders of Omaha's Black Panther chapter, the National Committee to Combat Fascism, and had been COINTELPRO targets for two years.
Finally, during his last interrogation, Peak implicated Poindexter and Langa as his accomplices. That version of the crime was to be the script for Peak's preliminary hearing except that the murderous state's witness didn't stick to his story. When Peak failed to name the two Panther leaders in his morning testimony the prosecution called for a recess. When Peak returned to the stand he was wearing sunglasses and was "shaking and nervous."
When defense counsel David Herzog had Peak remove his sunglasses his eyes were red and puffy. The courtroom testimony follows:
Defense Attorney: What happened to make you shake and bring your nervous condition about now?
Duane Peak: I don't know.
Defense Attorney: You had a conversation between the time you were placed on the witness stand this morning and the present time now, isn't that correct?
Duane Peak: Yes.
Defense Attorney: And there were the same things that the police officers told you about what would happen to you, like sitting in the electric chair, isn't that correct?
Duane Peak: I didn't have a chance.
Defense Attorney: You didn't have a chance did you?
Duane Peak: No.
Defense Attorney: You are doing what they want you to do, aren't you.
Duane Peak: Yes.
After implicating Poindexter and Langa, in the solitude of his jail cell, the young killer would express remorse in a letter, known to the prosecution but withheld from the defense.
"The Lord knows I tried but something happened which forced me to realize that I had no alternative but to say what I said. No matter what anyone says from now on I refuse to call myself a man, or anything close to a man because I did what I did. Even though there was no other way, because they already had enough evidence to convict those other two bloods."
Peak continued his lament trying to explain his testimony.
"I not only turned against those two bloods, but I turned against myself and my own people. I could have denied everything and all three of us would have gone up to the chair. And then again if I denied everything one of those other bloods would have gave them a story and sent me and the other dude up."
Peak ended up getting his deal and was sentenced as a juvenile delinquent serving just 33 months before his release.
Two Omaha detectives, Jack Swanson and Robert Pheffer, gave conflicting testimony both claiming to have been the one who discovered dynamite at Langa's house. Pheffer would later contradict his own trial testimony and embellish his tale with finding wired suitcases that were never listed on any police inventory sheets and not seen by anyone else.
Assistant Chief of Police Glenn Gates later would ask the Special Agent-in-Charge of the Omaha FBI office to forget about a tape recording of the emergency call that led Minard to his death. Gates had sent a tape into FBI headquarters for analysis but lost interest when it was determined the tape would be "prejudicial" to the prosecution because the voice on the tape did not match Peak, leaving an unidentified accomplice on the loose.
The police case against the two Panther leaders would unravel if a search for all involved was conducted. The request by Gates to ignore the deadly tape recording was sent directly to J. Edgar Hoover who personally monitored developments in the COINTELPRO operation.
The supplier of the dynamite that killed Larry Minard was a suspected police informant, Raleigh House, who only spent one night in jail for the crime and was never formally charged or brought to trial.
Ed Poindexter and Mondo we Langa were convicted of first degree murder and sentenced to life imprisonment and are presently incarcerated in the maximum-security Nebraska State Penitentiary. Both men deny any involvement in the death of Minard.
A request for a new trial by Poindexter is pending before the Nebraska Supreme Court. No date has been set for a decision.
| joeb
Registered: 11/14/05
Posts: 2,929 | | 03/19/08 at 11:46 AM | #7 |
| For Immediate Release
March 19, 2008
| Washington D.C.
FBI National Press Office
(202) 324-3691 | Michelle Ann Jupina Named SAC of Washington Field Office's Intelligence Division Michelle Ann Jupina has been named Special Agent in Charge (SAC) of Intelligence for the Washington field office. Director Robert S. Mueller, III appointed her to this position to replace SAC Timothy Healy, who is returning to FBI Headquarters as the Deputy Assistant Director of the Directorate of Intelligence. In this position, Ms. Jupina will oversee the Washington field office's Intelligence Division. Ms. Jupina entered on duty as a special agent with the FBI in 1996. Upon completion of training at the FBI Academy in Quantico, Virginia, she was assigned to the Washington field office, where she conducted investigations in cyber, white collar crime, criminal, and counterintelligence matters. While at Washington Field, she received the United States Attorney's Award for leading a high-profile cyber investigation. Ms. Jupina later became a Supervisory Special Agent in the National Infrastructure Protection Center, and later in the FBI's Cyber Division, where she focused on computer intrusion and malicious code investigations. During her career with the FBI, Ms. Jupina also served as Special Assistant to the Executive Assistant Director (EAD) of the National Security Branch (NSB), the EAD of Intelligence, and the Deputy EAD of Administration. In those positions, she played a key role in strengthening the FBI's intelligence program and in the establishment of the Directorate of Intelligence and the NSB. Prior to her appointment as SAC, Ms. Jupina served as the Section Chief of the NSB Executive Staff. In that position, she oversaw the coordination of the national security budget, performance metrics, strategy, training, human resource matters, information technology matters, communications, and policy issues that cut across the five NSB components: the Counterterrorism Division, the Counterintelligence Division, the Directorate of Intelligence, the Weapons of Mass Destruction Directorate, and the Terrorist Screening Center. Ms. Jupina has more than 17 years of federal government service. Before joining the FBI, she worked for the Department of Defense. She is a graduate of Virginia Tech University and the Pennsylvania State University. Ms. Jupina holds a Master's degree in Engineering, a Bachelor of Science degree in Mathematics, and a Bachelor of Science degree in Education. | joeb
Registered: 11/14/05
Posts: 2,929 | | 03/20/08 at 01:18 AM | #8 |
Police review board is back in businessSalt Lake City mayor, police chief make a pledge for openness Article Last Updated: 03/19/2008 08:40:56 PM MDT
Posted: 8:41 PM- Salt Lake City's Civilian Review Board, which was rendered inoperable last year by a series of resignations, met again today and prepared for a new series of investigations into police conduct.
It was the board's first official meeting in 11 months. They did not consider any misconduct cases but heard Mayor Ralph Becker and Police Chief Chris Burbank commit to the board's success.
Becker said the board must safeguard the Bill of Rights and public confidence in the police. Burbank pledged to give the panel full access to police reports and evidence. Burbank said he relies on panel's judgment in helping adjudicate allegations of misconduct and has cited the members' rulings when he has terminated police officers.
"There are times when an officer's judgment is so far outside of what I consider reasonable, I ask them to leave," Burbank said.
Most of the 14-appointed-member review board resigned or stopped attending meetings in 2007. There had been simmering complaints from members about having their findings overruled by Burbank and the former chief, Rick Dinse, and complaints the police department was not sharing evidence with the board.
Conflict peaked in April when someone disclosed to The Tribune that the review board sustained an allegation of excessive force used against a Korean War veteran. The information would have been announced publicly a few days later, but the city investigated who leaked the news early. The source of the leak was never uncovered but the suspicion angered board members and spurred enough resignations to prevent a quorum.
The review board has had critics as well. The president of the police officers' union assailed the board over the leak in the war veteran case and accused board members and the board's former investigator, Ty McCartney, of being biased against accused officers. Becker took office in January and opted not to retain McCartney.
The board's new investigator, recently-retired FBI agent Rick Rasmussen, said today he has received access to all police materials.
The review board still has five vacant seats and discussed today how to solicit applicants. The quorum today also decided not to retroactively review cases it missed in the last 11 months and which have been adjudicated by Burbank. Instead the board will begin from scratch by taking new cases as they arrive.
The board's vice chair, Claudia Hope O'Grady, after the meeting acknowledged board members were frustrated to see their rulings vetoed by police chiefs, but hoped better access to police evidence will solve that problem.
"If we have the same information, then we should agree," O'Grady said. | joeb
Registered: 11/14/05
Posts: 2,929 | | 03/21/08 at 03:48 PM | #9 |
For Immediate Release
March 21, 2008
| Washington D.C.
FBI National Press Office
(202) 324-3691 |
Clayt Q. Lemme Named SAC of Washington Field Office's Counterintelligence Division Clayt Q. Lemme has been named Special Agent in Charge (SAC) of the Counterintelligence Division for the Washington field office. Director Robert S. Mueller, III appointed him to this position to replace SAC Kevin Favreau, who was recently named Deputy Assistant Director of the Counterintelligence Division at FBI Headquarters. Most recently, Mr. Lemme served as Chief of the Counterespionage Section of the Counterintelligence Division at FBI Headquarters. Mr. Lemme has over 30 years of service in the FBI, with over 20 years of experience in espionage and foreign counterintelligence investigations. Mr. Lemme entered on duty with the FBI in August 1977 as a fingerprint examiner, and was assigned to FBI Headquarters until he became a special agent in January 1984. Upon completion of training at the FBI Academy in Quantico, Virginia, he was assigned to the Cincinnati Division, where he investigated white collar crime and violent crime matters. Mr. Lemme then transferred to the Washington field office, where he worked primarily foreign counterintelligence and espionage cases, with intermittent assignments in support of counterterrorism investigations such as the Oklahoma City bombing, the embassy bombings in Africa, and the Atlanta Olympics bombing. He became Supervisor of a Washington field office counterintelligence squad in 1993. In January 2001, Mr. Lemme transferred to the Counterterrorism Division at FBI Headquarters. While there, he supervised infrastructure protection matters and participated in the management of the 9/11 investigations in the weeks following the attacks. He was then assigned to work with a number of federal agencies to develop and implement procedures for the identification and protection of critical national assets. In February 2003, he returned to counterintelligence, becoming Unit Chief of a counterespionage unit at FBI Headquarters. He was promoted in July 2003 to Assistant Section Chief for counterespionage matters. He remained in that position until he returned to the Washington field office to serve as Assistant Special Agent in Charge for Counterintelligence in May 2005. In May 2006, he was promoted to Chief of the Counterespionage Section in the Counterintelligence Division at FBI Headquarters. Mr. Lemme was born in Springfield, Illinois, and raised in nearby Jacksonville. He received bachelor's degrees in psychology and business finance from the University of Maryland in 1981. He is married with three children. | joeb
Registered: 11/14/05
Posts: 2,929 | | 03/25/08 at 07:01 PM | #10 |
Second National Fusion Center Conference Held to Foster Greater Collaboration Mar 25, 2008, Second National Fusion Center Conference Held to Foster Greater Collaboration More than 900 federal, state, and local law enforcement and homeland security officials attended this week the National Fusion Center Conference here to further the U.S. government's plans to create a seamless network of these centers.
The second annual conference was jointly sponsored by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, U.S. Department of Justice, U.S. Department of Homeland Security, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Office of the Program Manager for the Information Sharing Environment, and the Global Justice Information Sharing Initiative. Participants discussed how to best incorporate fusion centers at the state level and in major urban areas into national plans to improve the sharing of information related to terrorism - a key goal of a strategy that President Bush released last October.
After the 9/11 attacks, states and various U.S. localities established information fusion centers to coordinate the gathering, analysis, and sharing of homeland security, terrorism, and law enforcement intelligence. Today there are more than 50 operational centers in 46 states.
"Working together - leveraging federal as well as state and local networks; moving relevant information and intelligence quickly; enabling rapid analytic and operational judgments - that is what this network of centers is all about," said Charles E. Allen, Homeland Security Undersecretary for Intelligence and Analysis, in his opening remarks at the conference, which was held March 18-20 at the Hilton San Francisco.
Added Russell M. Porter, Director of the Iowa State Fusion Center: "Establishing a national, integrated network of fusion centers isn't solely a federal effort.
"State, local, and tribal officials have been and will continue to be actively engaged in every step of the process," said Porter, who also serves as Chair of the Criminal Intelligence Coordinating Committee.
Arthur M. Cummings II, Executive Assistant Director of the FBI's National Security Branch, emphasized the importance of maintaining a unified front. Fusion centers, he said, "are an effective and efficient mechanism for exchanging information by merging data from a variety of sources to produce actionable intelligence for consumers, such as the FBI's Joint Terrorism Task Forces and local police departments."
Moreover, stakeholders must stay vigilant, said Bart R. Johnson, ODNI's Director for Homeland Security and Law Enforcement Support and Outreach.
"Terrorism remains a credible and ongoing threat to our country," he said. "The ODNI and all of the relevant federal, state, local, and tribal agencies must maintain the focus on and commitment to collaboration to mitigate this threat."
To that end, bureaucratic turf wars would be extremely counterproductive. "Law enforcement and justice agencies at all levels need to find ways to overcome obstacles to sharing information - and the U.S. Justice Department is committed to providing the resources and assistance necessary to make sharing as easy as possible," said Domingo S. Herraiz, Director of the Office of Justice Programs' Bureau of Justice Assistance at DOJ.
On the whole, fusion centers play a decisive role, said Ambassador Thomas McNamara, Program Manager for the Information Sharing Environment. "They are a critical part of President Bush's National Strategy for Information Sharing," the ambassador said. "They strengthen the nation's ability to protect communities from future attacks." | joeb
Registered: 11/14/05
Posts: 2,929 | | 04/01/08 at 08:42 PM | #11 |
ACLU: Military Skirting Law to Spy By LARRY NEUMEISTER – 40 minutes ago NEW YORK (AP) — The military is using the FBI to skirt legal restrictions on domestic surveillance to obtain private records of Americans' Internet service providers, financial institutions and telephone companies, the ACLU said Tuesday. The American Civil Liberties Union based its conclusion on a review of more than 1,000 documents turned over by the Defense Department after it sued the agency last year for documents related to national security letters. The lawsuit was filed in Manhattan federal court. The letters are investigative tools used to compel businesses to turn over customer information without a judge's order or grand jury subpoena. ACLU lawyer Melissa Goodman said the documents the civil rights group studied "make us incredibly concerned that the FBI and DoD might be collaborating to evade limits put on the DoD's use of NSLs." It would be understandable if the military relied on help from the FBI on joint investigations, but not when the FBI was not involved in a probe, she said. The FBI referred requests for comment Tuesday to the Defense Department. A request for comment from Justice Department lawyers for that agency was not immediately returned. Goodman, a staff attorney with the ACLU National Security Project, said the military is allowed to demand financial and credit records in certain instances but does not have the authority to get e-mail and phone records or lists of Web sites that people have visited. That is the kind of information that the FBI can get by using a national security letter, she said. "That's why we're particularly concerned. The DoD may be accessing the kinds of records they are not allowed to get," she said. Goodman also noted that legal limits are placed on the Defense Department "because the military doing domestic investigations tends to make us leery." In other allegations, the ACLU said: _ The Navy's use of the letters to demand domestic records has increased significantly since the Sept. 11 attacks. _ The military wrongly claimed its use of the letters was limited to investigating only Defense Department employees. _ The Defense Department has not kept track of how many national security letters the military issues or what information it obtained through the orders. _ The military provided misleading information to Congress and silenced letter recipients from speaking out about the records requests. Goodman said Congress should provide stricter guidelines and meaningful oversight of how the military and FBI make national security letter requests. "Any government agency's ability to demand these kinds of personal, financial or Internet records in the United States is an intrusive surveillance power," she said. | joeb
Registered: 11/14/05
Posts: 2,929 | | 04/11/08 at 07:07 PM | #12 |
Rep. Doyle Issues Statement On Wecht RetrialPOSTED: 3:59 pm EDT April 11, 2008 PITTSBURGH -- Rep. Mike Doyle issued a statement Friday about the retrial of former Allegheny County coroner, Dr. Cyril Wecht."I am very reluctant to intervene in a judicial proceeding - and like most people have watched quietly as the government's case against Cyril Wecht was made - but after seeing news reports from jurors, I have serious concerns about the appropriateness of a retrial.Specifically, I have concerns about the government's decision to seek a retrial before even interviewing the Wecht trial jurors. Had they done so, they would have learned, as reported by the jury foreman, that a majority of the jurors were voting not guilty on the charges and that many had come to the conclusion that the case was politically motivated.It also concerns me greatly that the FBI contacted jurors at their homes to request interviews about why they deadlocked. That would be intimidating to just about anyone.If what is being reported is true, it is my intention to contact the Attorney General's office to ask him to review this case to determine whether justice would be served and taxpayers' money well spent by seeking a retrial." | joeb
Registered: 11/14/05
Posts: 2,929 | | 04/15/08 at 12:30 AM | #13 |
WEB EXCLUSIVE: An Interview with Bill Fletcher Jr. By Nicholas Powers
From the April 14, 2008 issue | Posted in National | Email this article Bill Fletcher Jr. is one of the Left’s intellectual elders. A long time union activist and former president of TransAfrica forum, Fletcher is a fixture at Leftist gatherings and his articles fill pages of internet. I first saw him at the Left Forum in hand on chin, busily making notes for his presentation. We talked and kept in touch. Over the years, with each conversation I saw how his words make a clear line to the core of the question. As the 40th anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr’s assassination and the now mythic year of “68″ approached, I interviewed him on the state of black radicalism.
Q: You recently participated in the Left Forum at Cooper Union. What did you make of it?
A: Mostly it was a success. One could see large numbers of young people but still the Left Forum has not tapped into large numbers of people of color. It’s not “racism” as such; there is a tendency for groups to reproduce themselves and their cultures unless dramatic actions are introduced. I believe that Left Forum has more work to do and I say that as a board member of the Forum. Secondly there is a tendency to self-isolation by some black radical activists. When in a white setting, we can hold high the red-black-green as a way to carve out a space to be heard. We don’t always challenge for the right to talk about other things, which connects to the last reason for the absence of people of color. This must change. There are many of us who do not wish to be pigeon-holed and we resist such efforts. Black radical activists have a lot to say about a variety of issues.
Q: Your answer brings up the question of post-racial politics, which the mainstream media has used to describe Newark Mayor Cory Booker and of course Sen. Barack Obama. Is there meaning in that phrase?
A: First there is no post race politics in the U.S. politics because racism was and is the primary means of social control. A useful distinction is that we are in a post Civil Rights politics not a post race politics. So the new crop of black politicians like Booker and Obama say they are taking the Black Freedom Movement to the next level but it becomes a politics of the elite not the black working class majority. Previous Civil Rights and Black Power activists had to at minimum pay lip service to the people.
Q: Why is there less of a need for the post Civil Rights black politicians to reflect the masses of working class people?
A: Several reasons, first during the Cold War the anti-Communist McCarthyism destroyed the Black Left so discussion of class was cut from black political discourse. Second, the Counter Intelligence Program–COINTELPRO–of the FBI of the 60’s and 70’s sowed rivalry and violence in the freedom movement. Third our own mistakes caught up to us. We were ideologically unfocused and many of us saw race only. In the 80’s and 90’s segments of the Black Freedom Movement were influenced by Neo-Conservatives. Finally, the freedom movement was in part a victim of its own victories, which created a black middle class whose interests were often detached from the black working class.
Q: It seems the narrative that radicals offer the working poor demands they recognize the system’s rigged which competes against the narrative of “making it” as seen in popular imagery and celebrities like Russell Simmons, 50 Cent, BET’s Bob Johnson or NBA’s Michael Jordan.
A: Individuals can and do triumph. What is misleading is that when the masses identify with them it doesn’t offer them any explanation for why they didn’t “make it” and why their lives are getting harder. It leads to people blaming themselves. People can be ’screwed up’ but the problem is not in them; the problem rests with the way that the system operates. What you’re going through, millions of others are going through. It’s not that you don’t have a work ethic, it’s that there’s no work. The consequence of our focus on individual achievement is that the enemy becomes less clear and the enemy is a social system led by a sector of transnational capitalists. We have to re-focus people to see who the enemy is because at the most basic level the role of organizers is to gather people together to identify a problem and solve it.
Q: Do you see these contradictions reflected in the recent speech on race that Sen. Obama gave?
A: The irony of Obama’s speech is he ran a campaign where racial justice was not involved but he was forced to confront it after his pastor’s sermon became a media controversy. I thought it was a brilliant speech. He did not “diss” his pastor but the one problem in his speech is he framed the sermon as a relic of the past that did not reflect today’s America .
Q: Why was that a problem?
A: The rage expressed in the sermon is not a relic of the past; it is with us today. Hip Hop is full of anger. Black on black crime is anger unfocused and turned against our selves. It’s why the Nation of Islam could organize the Million Man March because it is linked to and articulates this rage. | joeb
Registered: 11/14/05
Posts: 2,929 | | 04/17/08 at 09:25 PM | #14 |
U., APR 17, 2008 - 4:46 PM Moe: Underground figure remains relevant Doug Moe The emergence of Bill Ayers as a controversial figure during Wednesday night's debate between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton reminded me of when Ayers came through Madison a couple of years ago and said something startling. He said it to me and I was startled, anyway. Ayers is currently a professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago. During the Vietnam War era, he was a member of the Weather Underground, a radical group that advocated and practiced violence against establishment targets. Ayers was indicted in 1970 for inciting to riot and conspiracy to bomb government buildings, but he was never tried. He was a fugitive for more than a decade but, when he turned himself in, the charges were dropped due to misconduct by his pursuers. "The Bureau had recklessly tapped phones," Ayers wrote in a 2001 memoir, "broken into people's homes, even written a plan to kidnap (his wife) Bernadine's infant nephew." While promoting that book, titled "Fugitive Days," Ayers told the New York Times: "I don't regret setting bombs. I feel we didn't do enough." During Wednesday night's debate, George Stephanopoulos of ABC News asked Obama about Ayers. Obama downplayed their relationship, saying that Ayers lives in his neighborhood but they're not close. He called Ayers "somebody who engaged in detestable acts when I was 8 years old." Hillary Clinton then noted that Obama and Ayers had served together on the board of a do-gooder group in Chicago. Obama shot back that Clinton's husband had commuted the sentences of two other members of the Weather Underground, at which point the candidates pretty much moved on to other topics. Ayers and his wife, Bernadine Dohrn, were in Madison in October 2006 for the Wisconsin Book Festival. They were promoting a new book, "Sing a Battle Song: The Revolutionary Poetry, Statements, and Communiques of the Weather Underground, 1970-1974." I had a chance to interview Ayers prior to their appearance and he seemed to scale back just a bit from some of the more radical ideas of the Weathermen. He said neither he nor Dohrn were "nostalgic" for that era and that "some of the rhetoric" from that time "now seems overheated." But he added: "We continue to believe that empire building and occupation is wrong." I wanted to interview Ayers for one reason: My enduring interest in whatever became of Leo Burt, Madison's most famous fugitive. Burt is more than that: He's the great unfinished story of my half century in this city. Ayers had been underground for 11 years; Burt has now been a fugitive for nearly 38 years, since he and three others (all eventually apprehended) set off a bomb targeted at the Army Math Research Center in Sterling Hall on the UW-Madison campus. The 1970 blast killed a young researcher, Robert Fassnacht, and caused millions of dollars of damage. When I began to ask Ayers about Burt, something unexpected happened. It became clear Ayers didn't realize Burt was still a fugitive. At that point, it had been 36 years. "That's amazing," Ayers said, after I filled him in. Then he repeated it: "Amazing." I said: "You really didn't know?" "I remember who he is," Ayers said. "I'll be damned." I guess I figured that '60s radicals would always keep tabs on each other, not like old high school teammates exactly, but one way or another. I suppose it says less about Ayers than it does about my own obsession with Burt. I've written two long magazine pieces about him. The first was for Madison Magazine in 1996. It was memorable because I speculated that Burt was the Unabomber. The piece ran a few months before they caught the real Unabomber. In my defense, the Burt-as-Unabomber theory had also been embraced by Tom Bates, the author of "Rads," now deceased. The other magazine story was for the Wisconsin Alumni Association's quarterly, On Wisconsin. It ran in the summer of 2005 on the 35th anniversary of the bombing and was perhaps most notable for something that happened during my research. While I was interviewing a retired FBI agent who had worked a decade on the case, he collapsed with a heart attack. I did nothing admirable other than call 911, but the Middleton EMTs were great. It was touch-and-go for 24 hours, but they saved his life. We may yet get a definitive take on Burt if an Eastern writer named Joe Brennan Jr. ever publishes the book on Burt he's been researching for years. Tentatively titled "The Last Radical," I would have thought it might be out by now, but I 've lost touch with Brennan and have heard nothing lately. Speaking of Burt, Bill Ayers told me: "If he has survived and led a decent life, that's good. I wouldn't want to see him caught." I asked Ayers: "How hard was it staying underground?" "It's difficult in some ways," he said. "In other ways, it was as easy as falling off a log." | joeb
Registered: 11/14/05
Posts: 2,929 | | 04/19/08 at 07:36 PM | #15 |
In this informative newsletter sent as an e-mail yesterday evening, Cynthia McKinney describes her recent trip to a workers summit held in Mexico. She also describes her regret for a past mistake which has steeled her determination to take personal responsibility in these times of widespread distraction and global irresponsibility.
Although former U.S. Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney is a Green Party candidate running for president, she reveals herself here as a true global citizen who is deeply interested in a more productive and healthy forms of patriotism.
Hello all! I was invited to deliver an Earth Day message to the students at Cal State Northridge. I hope you enjoy my remarks:
Earth Day Celebration
California State University, Northridge
April 15, 2008
I would like to thank the students at Cal State University, Northridge for inviting me to speak on campus today. I have just returned from an exciting trip to Mexico City and I'd like to share some of my observations with you this afternoon.
First of all, it is important to note and ask the question why is it that the corporate press are not even touching the events playing out right now in the capital city of our neighbor to the south and their importance to us? Had I not actually been there myself, I would be hard pressed to convince any audience that events of this magnitude were actually taking place anywhere in the world, let alone in a country as important and close to us as Mexico.
A quick review of today's press shows us that we are currently being titillated by news of sex tapes featuring Marilyn Monroe and another such tape featuring an unnamed British Royal. The top of the news hour greets us with information of an intemperate statement made by a former television executive about a current Presidential candidate; video is plentiful of the contorted Presidential theatrics around the Olympic Games Opening Ceremony in Beijing. We were treated today to the visual of the Pope descending from the Alitalia jet. But, while we have more television stations that feed us 24-hour news, we are less informed. We have more and more political pundits feeding us, what Fred Hampton described as "explanations that don't explain, answers that don't answer, and conclusions that don't conclude."
CNN even tells us in a feature story who suffers as a result of a choice made by our policy makers to emphasize ethanol as a preferred method of weaning a hulking, overfed economy off its petroleum-based consumption habit. But they forgot the other half of that equation: who's winning? And it's the "who's winning" part that is just about always the key piece of information, that could guide us, especially when the choices of our elected leadership diverge from the core values of the voters who elected them.
And yet, as we speak, the Mexican Senate Chamber has been occupied. The massive rally held today has probably just ended, and some of the opposition Members of the Mexican Congress are inside the building on the dais and have announced a hunger strike. Days ago, one of the leading papers in Mexico City had a photo of the Chamber of Deputies of the Mexican Congress with an unfurled banner covering the Speaker's Rostrum, proclaiming the Chamber "Closed." The banner was hung by elected Members of the Mexican Congress who constitute the Frente Amplio Progresista that has dared to draw a line in the sand against U.S.-inspired legislation just introduced to allow foreign corporate ownership of PEMEX, Mexico's state-owned oil company.
Mexican women are energized around the idea of nation. The idea of patria. I wrote my Master's Thesis on the "Idea of Nation." And to see the women, in their t-shirts and kerchiefs, so committed to their country, their nation, their identity. To them, that's Mexico's oil, natural gas, electricity, land, and water and it ought to be used by the Mexican people first and foremost for their own national development. But sadly, it's the public policy emanating from Washington, D.C. that threatens that.
But to tell that story accurately, would also require that the U.S. corporate press expose why this citizen outrage exists in the first place. And to tell that story, they would have to expose the fact of a stolen Presidential election, where a private U.S., Georgia, corporation, possibly played a role in stripping citizens of their right to vote and have their votes counted. Well, while that might sound like what happened in the United States, centering in Florida, in the U.S. 2000 Presidential election, I'm really talking about the 2006 Mexican Presidential election in which the popular candidate didn't win because all the votes weren't counted.
According to Greg Palast, the U.S. corporation involved in the Mexican move was none other than that now infamous Georgia-based company: Choicepoint. We know that in Florida, Choicepoint, then doing business as DataBase Technologies, constructed an illegal convicted felons list of some 94,000 names, many of whom were neither convicted nor felons. But if your name appeared on that list, you were stopped from voting. Greg Palast tells us that for most of the names on that list, their only crime was "Voting While Black."
Under a special "counter-terrorism" contract, the U.S. FBI obtained Mexican and Venezuelan voter files. Palast learned later in his investigation that the U.S. government had obtained, through Choicepont, voter files of all the countries that have progressive Presidents. Many Mexicans went to the polls to vote for their President, only to find that their names had been scrubbed from the voter list, and they were not allowed to vote. So now, not only in the United States, but in Mexico, too, one can show up to vote and not be sure that that vote was counted, or worse, one can show up duly registered to vote, and not even be allowed to vote.
I guess this is the way we allow our country to now export democracy.
Unlike in the United States in 2000, Mexico City was shut down for 5 months when Lopez Obrador, Mexico's Al Gore, refused to concede and instead, formed a shadow government.
The issue in the 2006 Mexican election was privatization of Mexico's oil; it is the riveting issue taking place in Mexican politics today. Teachers on strike at the same time as the Presidential elections in Oaxaca, one of the poorest states in Mexico, began their political movement as a call for increased teacher salaries and against privatization of schools. Due to heavy-handed tactics used by the government against the teachers, tens of thousands of citizens joined them and took over the central city area of that state. Today, after Mexico has added teachers and those who support teachers to its growing ranks of "political prisoners," teachers are still protesting their conditions, the reprisals taken against them for striking, and now, the teachers' union is a committed part of the national mobilization against privatization of PEMEX.
I was invited to participate in the Second Continental Workers Conference. The first meeting was held in La Paz, Bolivia. And so, people from all over Mexico and eight different countries told of their struggles, their hopes, their ideals, their values, their patriotism, their desire for peace—no more war.
Representatives from Chiapas, another one of Mexico's poorest states, told us of the indigenous struggle for land and self-determination, the low-intensity warfare waged against them, and how now they, too, count themselves a part of the national mobilization against PEMEX privatization.
While I was there, mine workers had taken over the mines, and so, could only send a handful of inspiring representatives. They are pressing for the right to unionize, denied to them by the Government. And the mine workers are a part of the solid front forming in Mexico to protect this powerful idea of nation.
I participated in one of the many rallies organized by opponents of the government's plan to offer up Mexico's patrimony to the insatiable multiple U.S. addictions. One woman removed her brigadista t-shirt and gave it to me—proud that a citizen of the United States came to stand with them.
Today's front page of La Jornada says that the women, who marched 10,000 strong on the day that I was there, have renewed their protests and civil disobedience. The threat of violence and bloodshed is very real.
Now, why should this massive social, political, and economic upheaval in Mexico, aside from its human rights implications, be important to us up here in the United States?
Because the sad truth of the matter is that, in many respects, it is our military and economic policies that are causing it. Of course, I recognize that all the way back to the practice of Manifest Destiny and the declaration of the Monroe Doctrine, U.S. policy decisions have at times sent shock waves to places outside our borders. You could say that the modern version of that is NAFTA.
In 1993, the Democratic majority in the United States Congress supported then-President Bill Clinton's push for passage of the North American Free Trade Agreement. The stated purpose of the legislation was to remove barriers to trade and investment that existed in North America. The propaganda had it that the objective was to lift all boats, in Canada, the United States, and Mexico through trade and investment. The result is the stripping away and transfer of Mexico's patrimony in terms of their natural and human resources. And the Mexican people are taking a stand against it. They are taking the same stand that the little people in Haiti, Venezuela, Brazil, Chile, Bolivia, Nicaragua, Ecuador, and Argentina have taken. With the power of the vote, the people of these countries dared to believe that they could peacefully defeat the colossus to the north. And they did.
And so, in a way, now, I guess I understand why the corporate press can't tell you and me the truth about the valiant stand for dignity that's going on in Mexico, because to truly cover the story, they'd have to uncover and point out some inconvenient truths.
One of those inconvenient truths particularly meaningful to me: There comes a time when silence is betrayal.
We, the little--and yet so powerful--people in this country have been way too silent for way too long on all the issues that mean so much.
Dr. King also said that our lives begin to end the day we become silent about the things that matter.
On one of my early days in Congress, I was late for a vote. I looked up on the board and only saw green votes; I presumed that the vote was a non-controversial item on the calendar. Since I was among the last to vote, there was no time to inquire. I pressed my green button. Afterwards, I learned that the vote might have been what others would have called an "easy" yes vote, but for my conscience it was a no vote. Later that night, my heart sank as I watched the news. One man of 78 years was so angered by that vote that he threw stones. Only thing, he had a heart attack throwing stones, and died.
My heart sank. I felt personally responsible for that man's death and vowed that I would never cast what they call easy votes, again. My one vote would not have changed the outcome of the tally on the resolution. But my one vote would have been true to my values and my ideals that everyone is entitled to human rights that are to be respected.
I got into trouble often after that, because I recognized my responsibility to read the legislation, think analytically, question critically, and vote independently.
That was while I was in Congress. But now that I'm not, does that mean that the responsibility is gone? No.
I happened to vote against NAFTA, and I'm glad for that. But imagine if the all the voters in the entire United States understood that something as simple as a vote in a federal election might determine who lives and who dies in another country. Imagine, if we in the United States were as certain of the possibility of peaceful change through the vote as were the people of Haiti, Mexico—despite having their election stolen from them, Venezuela, and the rest. Then we would vote Members of Congress out of office who support Plan Colombia. We would vote Members of Congress out of office who support Plan Mexico—which like its Colombian counterpart, is the military answer to the cry of the people for dignity, self-determination, and that idea of patria. We would not vote for any political party that did not have as its agenda extending the same respect and love of life to all others as we reserve for ourselves.
And so I come to the additional meaning of Earth Day, today. I met people in Mexico City who are willing to die in this struggle—But they shouldn't have to because the United States wants their oil. Let us express our respect for the planet that sustains us by first showing love to our brothers and sisters beside us. We voters in the United States do have as much power as the voters in all those other countries. All we have to do is believe in ourselves and use it.
Finally, I'd like to recognize the role of student activists in promoting change. Of course, it was high school students who faced the water hoses and the dogs in the civil rights movement. It was the university students who faced the riot gear and the bullets in the anti-war movement. The current anti-globalization, pro-peace rallies are all organized and led by young people. Keep it up and don't ever give in.
Remember that Bobby Kennedy always said "Some men dreams of things that are and say why, I dream of things that never were and say why not."
Thank you.
Cynthia McKinney
--
[Quotations]
"And advanced forms of biological warfare that can 'target' specific genotypes may transform biological warfare from the realm of terror to a politically useful tool."
PNAC, Rebuilding America's Defenses, p. 60
The argument that the two parties should represent opposed ideals and policies, one, perhaps, of the Right and the other of the Left, is a foolish idea acceptable only to doctrinaire and academic thinkers. Instead, the two parties should be almost identical, so that the American people can "throw the rascals out" at any election without leading to any profound or extensive shifts in policy.
-- Carroll Quigley, Tragedy and Hope: A History of the World in our Time | joeb
Registered: 11/14/05
Posts: 2,929 | | 04/20/08 at 12:24 AM | #16 |
2 reads
Published Sunday | April 20, 2008
Chambers' unprecedented State Capitol career
In short
First elected in 1970.
Won re-election nine times, including a write-in candidacy in 1988 when he made a simultaneous bid for U.S. Senate.
Longest-serving Nebraska state senator.
A barber with a law degree who came of age politically in the 1960s. The FBI opened file on him in 1961 and kept him under surveillance for a decade.
Inspired to run for the Legislature, he said, after the incumbent senator, a black man, said on the legislative floor: "If it was God's plan that the white man was to be in command, then there's nothing we can do about it."
Wrote laws that
Instituted district elections to foster black representation on the Omaha City Council, the Douglas County Board and the Omaha school board
Banned corporal punishment in Nebraska schools
Eliminated the sales tax on groceries
Required grand jury investigations of deaths of people in law enforcement custody
Established government liability for innocent bystanders injured in police chases
Demanded investigations of scandals and alleged wrongdoing, including:
Mock lynching of a black Nebraska National Guardsman in 1976.
1984 shooting death of Cairo, Neb., farmer Arthur Kirk in a standoff State Patrol.
Allegations about the business dealings of former Attorney General Paul Douglas with the failed Commonwealth Savings Co. That led to Douglas' impeachment in 1983.
Sexual misconduct allegations arising after the 1988 failure of Franklin Community Credit Union in Omaha.
Campaign finance violations that led to the 2006 impeachment of NU regent David Hergert.
Stopped legislation to
Switch Nebraska from the electric chair to lethal injection.
Allow police to stop people merely for failure to wear their seat belts.
Create religious exemptions from infant metabolic screening.
Authorize specialty license plates honoring Shriners or other private groups.
Amend the constitution to protect hunting, fishing and trapping.
Sought discipline or removal of judges, including
Former Douglas County Judge Richard "Deacon" Jones, who was removed in 1998 for undignified and abusive behavior, such as signing orders with false names and setting nonsensical bail amounts, and using epithets toward female court employees and a female judge.
Former Seward County District Judge Bryce Bartu, who retired in 1996 amid allegations of sexual impropriety.
Former District Judge Orville Coady, who retired in 2003 after he referred to blacks as "chocolate people" and made a disparaging remark about Hispanics.
Failed with efforts to
Repeal the death penalty. Came closest in 1979, when the Legislature passed his repeal bill, but Gov. Charles Thone vetoed it. Chambers did narrow capital punishment's application with bills barring execution of juveniles and those with mental retardation.
Block construction in the 1980s of the North Freeway, which cut his district in two and took homes and businesses.
Legalize sports betting in Nebraska.
Pay University of Nebraska football players.
2 Minneapolis cops put on leave pending investigation
The Associated Press - Sunday, April 20, 2008 MINNEAPOLIS
Two Minneapolis police officers were put on administrative leave pending an investigation, the police department confirmed Saturday. Sgt. William Palmer, a police spokesman, said Officer Mike Roberts and Lt. Lee Edwards were placed on paid administrative leave, but reasons behind the move were not disclosed. Palmer said he had "absolutely no idea" why the officers were put on leave. He said no additional information was available. WCCO-TV and the Star Tribune reported on their Web sites Saturday that the officers were under a federal criminal investigation. The nature of that investigation is unclear. Paul McCabe, and FBI spokesman, wouldn't confirm whether the agency was involved in an investigation of the officers. Edwards is one of five black officers suing the police department over allegations of race discrimination. Andrew Muller, an attorney for Edwards, said the investigation into the undisclosed allegation is "baseless." Muller released a statement, saying that Edwards was removed from duty on Friday. "The intent of the allegations against Lt. Edwards can only be to punish and intimidate those on the MPD who speak out against discrimination," the statement said. Muller also said that there is no connection between Edwards and officer Roberts. Roberts is a 29-year veteran of the department. It was unclear whether Roberts has an attorney and a phone listing for Roberts was not immediately available Saturday. | joeb
Registered: 11/14/05
Posts: 2,929 | | 04/21/08 at 08:47 AM | #17 |
He leads the feds' area crime fight
By Peter Dujardin | 247-4749
April 21, 2008
NORFOLK - Alex J. Turner is one of the main men in charge of fighting crime in Hampton Roads.
As the newly appointed special agent in charge of the FBI's local region, Turner leads 140 agents, analysts and other staffers operating in the region. He's also in charge of the region's joint terrorism task force, a multi-agency group. With everything from cybercrime to mortgage fraud to gang violence on the rise these days, Turner says, the FBI's links with local law enforcement agencies and individual citizens will go a long way to help fight them off.
Q: How did you end up going into criminal justice after wanting to be a pilot?
A: When I was in high school, having been an Air Force brat, I had a love of flying. My father was a pilot, and after being around military bases, airplanes were my life. I also had a desire to go into law enforcement at the federal level. I went to the Air Force Academy. When I was there, I lost my 20/20 vision , which was a requirement at the time to be a pilot. And my intent was to major in criminology. But when I was at the Air Force Academy, the school of criminology closed. I felt that going to a regular college was probably better for me since I wasn't going to have the Air Force career.
Q: You had your own security business at one time. How'd that come about?
A: When I was in college (in Maryland), I started working at a hotel. ... The owner of the hotel was an independent chain owner, and he contracted with me. The company was Turner and Associates. You had these schools coming in to D.C. in April and May, and the kids would go rampant in the hotel. … I said you don't have to worry about chaperons staying up all night. I'll have security guards, exterior and interior. It generated enough money for me to pay for college until the end.
Q: Did you go right into the FBI after school?
A: No. I had the opportunity to talk to an FBI agent. He indicated that you have everything, but you don't have the work experience that we'd like to see. But if you become a police officer, do that for a few years, you'll improve your chances of being hired. I really didn't have any problem with it and thought it was a good idea. So I joined the Greenbelt (Md.) Police Department. I loved every minute of it. Every facet of walking the beat, getting to know the residents. My beat was a very large territory mostly composed of apartment complexes where students from the University of Maryland resided. It was a small police department but had a little bit of everything going on. ... I did that from 1981 to 1985 and then (joined the FBI).
Q: What's your best career achievement?
A: In Atlanta, we had a multi-agency task force — federal, state, local. We worked an organization that literally had taken control over a whole sector of Atlanta. They were headquartered in a housing project. And not only did they have control of the sector, but they were getting their dope over the fence into the penitentiary. After an exhaustive three-year investigation, we took them down, and that entire area was revitalized. Having that kind of community impact, that's a big achievement in my book. I was the lead agent, I was the trial agent. That case was one of the longest trials in the Atlanta federal court system. It took six weeks. There were 30 federal defendants, 60 state and local defendants. The top dogs got 30-plus (years in prison), so we got some good sentences out of that.
Q: What are your biggest priorities, in terms of battling crime?
A: Post 9/11, our number one priority is counterterrorism and addressing the threats that may exist — and in a proactive manner, I might add. We're not waiting for something to happen. We're developing intelligence to identify those who might be involved in terrorism activities before they do something. You have gang activity, which directly impacts the quality of life of the citizens in Hampton Roads. That's a security issue in and of itself. You have white-collar crime. Mortgage fraud is our focus right now because of what's happened in the real estate industry. You have individuals who conspired with others to set appraisals at much higher than the real value of the home is. They conduct a transaction, and then the profit off of that, they stick in their pocket. Somebody, either a bank or an individual, gets stuck with a property that's overvalued. Cybercrime is a huge area, in terms of everything from identity theft to child exploitation. So we are working with our state and local partners in that vein, as well. There's a big problem with child pornography. We as an agency focus more on the production and dissemination of that type of material. But included in that, of course, you also have what you call travelers — individuals who go online, interact with kids, then cross state lines to sexually exploit that child.
Q: What's your day-to-day style in the office?
A: On a day-to-day basis, I go around and interact with other people in the office. I don't shut myself in the office, or I try not to. Sometimes the (paperwork) becomes a little bit of a burden, but I try to get out and walk around and interact with my folks. They can ask me a question and get a direct answer right back. Or if I don't know the answer, I can tell them to let me go find out, and I go get an answer. Every now and then, I'll do what we call an all-hands meeting, and you have them all come in. … You try to be somewhat of a cheerleader. You pick a topic, you try to cheerlead on that, and inspire about something that I really need everybody to understand what the task is and to really work at it. ... A fair leader — a fair but firm leader — is, I guess, my style.
Q: Should people feel safe at night with you in charge?
A: I certainly hope they will. My experience as a police officer gave me an insight into what communities feel when crime is at their door — whether it be a white-collar crime matter or a violent-crime matter. I think I understand what the local citizen feels. ... One of my goals is to get out in the community and make sure people understand what it is the FBI does. Because a lot of people don't even understand something that basic. I want to make this office more part of the community, have more of my staff out to community events.
Q: Do you have someone you look to for inspiration?
A: My father. Not in my early age because he was gone flying missions. But probably in my middle school years, his influence really started to come to bear on my life. My father was very — I don't want to say strict — but was very high on self-discipline. He taught me a lot about the importance of self-discipline. I think I've had those same characteristics. My father, as an African-American male, was one of the rarities as an Air Force pilot. He wasn't one of the Tuskegee Airmen, not that type of pioneer. He came into the Air Force in 1945 as a noncommissioned airman and four years later became a pilot in the Air Force. That (a black pilot) was still a rarity at that time. And through that, he basically taught me directly that I could do whatever I wanted to do if I set my mind to it. He's always been my hero and always will be.
Q: When he died, you became sort of a father figure to your brother?
A: I have a brother who is much younger than I am. He was 7 years old when my father died. When he in was high school, in 10th or 11th grade, he was getting in trouble, starting hanging out with the wrong crowd. So I moved him from D.C. to Atlanta, moved him down there with me to raise him. One of the reasons he moved back (to D.C.) was because I got married. He didn't feel comfortable living with us, so he moved back. But by then, he was back on the straight and narrow. He's now a police officer in Washington, D.C.
Q: What do you do for fun — and is there anything that would surprise people about you?
A: Golf. Or at least, I try to golf. I hit the ball and chase it into the weeds. They call that golf in some places, I think. ... More so than anything else is just being with family. Going out to dinner and those kinds of things. ... I'm a big NASCAR fan, a big fan of Tony Stewart. Since NASCAR is not a big sport for African Americans, I think people would probably find that somewhat surprising.
Alex J. Turner
Age: 51
Family: Wife, Kim; son, Alex, 17; and daughter, Alesia, 14
Education: Degree in criminal justice from University of Maryland, 1980
Work experience: Police officer, Greenbelt, Md. He has had 23 years in the FBI, mostly in Atlanta and Washington. Among other roles, he's been a drug squad supervisor, undercover agent, assistant special agent in charge of the Washington field office and a section chief in charge of providing money, agents and material to fight gangs, drugs and major theft programs nationwide. | joeb
Registered: 11/14/05
Posts: 2,929 | | 05/13/08 at 09:29 AM | #18 |
Counter-Intelligence is FBI speak for assassinations in the defense of corporations.
Instead of teaching history why not join a death squad and make history.
All funded by your tax dime.
see if you can detect the smirk..2 reads
John O. Chadwick
 Upper St. Clair FBI agent enjoyed every aspect of his work By Brian C. Rittmeyer
TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Monday, May 12, 2008 In an understatement full of meaning, John O. Chadwick was known around the Pittsburgh FBI office as a "good guy" other agents enjoyed working with, his son said. "Even though it seems like an off-hand comment, it's actually a true compliment, because in the law enforcement world, that means that they absolutely trust that person with their lives," said son David Chadwick, 35, of Quakertown, Pa. John O. Chadwick of Upper St. Clair died Friday, May 9, 2008 at home from pancreatic cancer. He was 65. A native of Columbus, Ga. who was raised in Alexandria, Va., Mr. Chadwick joined the FBI in 1969 as a special agent and retired in 2000. He served in New Haven, Conn. before being transferred to Pittsburgh in 1971. He lived in Mt. Lebanon before moving to Upper St. Clair in 1979. Born in a poor rural area, Mr. Chadwick believed education was the key to furthering himself and embarked on a career as a history teacher in Fairfax County, Va. Public Schools before a high school friend recruited him to the FBI. "That was not something he had considered prior to that. I guess his friend kind of sold him on some of the missions and goals of the FBI," David Chadwick said. "One of the best parts of his job was he got to meet new people every day. Some of them were bad guys, others were just regular, everyday people he would have to go interview for various cases he was working." Mr. Chadwick first worked in fugitives, later transferring to counterintelligence. "I really don't know a whole lot about that work because most of that work is still classified," David Chadwick said. While in Connecticut as a first-year agent, Mr. Chadwick arrested a suspect then on the FBI's 10 most wanted list. In Pittsburgh, he served on the Special Weapons and Tactics Team for more than 20 years and was a firearms instructor and fitness coordinator. At 6 foot 7, Mr. Chadwick was an imposing man, but he had a thoughtful and gentle personality, said his co-worker and friend, Jerry Pino, 66, of Shaler. Both were officers in the Pittsburgh chapter of the Society of Former Agents of the FBI. "He enjoyed his work. He had a variety of work and enjoyed 99 percent of it, and looked forward to going to work as most agents do. He looked at is as one of the better jobs people paid you to do. It's something you could be proud of," Pino said. Mr. Chadwick was proud of his work and disappointed at having to leave at the mandatory retirement age, relatives and friends said. After retiring, Mr. Chadwick, a father of three boys, worked until last year selling uniforms to police, fire and ambulance departments just to stay in touch with law enforcement. "He was a good father. He always took an interest in what the boys were doing. He took us to our soccer games and Little League games," David Chadwick said. "He was always aware of the criminal element. He was always aware and cautious of things and taught us boys to be that way also." In addition to his son, Mr. Chadwick is survived by his wife, Elizabeth Chadwick, of Upper St. Clair; two other sons, Michael Chadwick of Swedesboro, N.J., and Andrew Chadwick of Silver Spring, Md.; his mother, Lydia Chadwick of Alexandria, Va.; and three grandchildren. He was preceded in death by his father, Jack B. Chadwick, and a brother, Conrad Chadwick.
Wecht investigator's discipline file opened U.S. judge orders FBI records unsealed Thursday, July 12, 2007 By Paula Reed Ward, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette A federal judge yesterday unsealed records revealing that the lead FBI agent in the criminal case against Dr. Cyril H. Wecht was disciplined elsewhere for forging other agents' names and initials on chain-of-custody forms, evidence labels and interview forms. Further, in September 2001 Special Agent Bradley W. Orsini was demoted and received a 30-day suspension without pay for a series of policy violations that occurred from 1993 through 2000, which included having an inappropriate relationship with a subordinate; making improper vulgar and sexual comments; threatening a subordinate with violence; and improperly documenting the seizure of a weapon and ammunition from a search. "We're pleased this information is now available to the public for its own analysis and understanding of its impact on the case," said Dr. Wecht's defense attorney, Jerry McDevitt. "The report speaks for itself." The U.S. attorney's office filed Agent Orsini's records under seal on April 7, 2006, asking U.S. District Judge Arthur J. Schwab to determine if it was required to turn them over to Dr. Wecht's defense attorneys. What followed was a 15-month legal battle that ended this week when the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals issued a final order in the case, making the disciplinary reports public. Judge Schwab unsealed the records late yesterday afternoon. He also vacated a previous decision in which he'd ordered a contempt hearing for the defense attorneys for their failure to follow his orders. He wrote "this Court considers the 'time-out' caused by the interlocutory appeal to the Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit as providing an opportunity for a 'fresh start.'" He also ordered a hearing in Dr. Wecht's case on Sept. 18 that will allow the defense to use the Orsini reports in their examination of him. Agent Orsini has been an agent for more than 18 years, and he has spent much of that time, including in Pittsburgh, working public corruption cases. All of the allegations included in the two disciplinary reports occurred while he was working in the FBI's Newark, N.J., office. U.S. Attorney Mary Beth Buchanan would not comment on the reports' release. It was unclear if she was aware of Mr. Orsini's background before he became the lead agent in the case against Dr. Wecht, who is charged with 84 counts of misusing his public office for private gain. The first time Agent Orsini was disciplined was Nov. 2, 1998. He received a five-day suspension without pay for signing other agents' names to evidence labels and custody forms from May 1995 to January 1997. He explained that he and another agent, on limited occasions, signed each other's names on evidence "to save time." Though the investigator from the Office of Professional Responsibility found that Agent Orsini did not intend to jeopardize the evidence or cases involved, his actions could have called the integrity of the bureau into question, he wrote in his report. A 28-page report issued Sept. 24, 2001, by the assistant director of the Office of Professional Responsibility described additional transgressions. The first violation listed dated to Nov. 2, 1993. Agent Orsini failed to obtain the proper consent form while searching a man's home for illegal firearms and failed to properly document the ammunition seized. Agent Orsini was found to have falsified at least six FBI interview forms in 1993 and 1994 by writing other agents' initials on them. He said in a statement that he didn't believe there would be a problem with that provided the information in the body of the interview form was accurate. "I have no idea how many times I may have done so," he said. He said he did so for "convenience and a shortcut." Throughout the Wecht case, defense attorneys have argued that the government based part of the charges against their client -- that he exchanged unclaimed bodies from the county morgue for lab space from Carlow University -- on a single interview form filled out by Agent Orsini. The disciplinary report next goes into great detail about a relationship Agent Orsini had with a subordinate agent, from April 1998 through early 2000. The document indicates that other agents in his squad believed Agent Orsini was favoring the woman and gave her premium assignments. It also details gag gifts exchanged at the squad's Christmas parties in 1998 and 1999. One, given to the woman, was a pet collar, with a note that said, "If found, return to Brad Orsini." "By their very nature, the public notoriety attached to the gag gifts would have put even the most insensitive person on notice of this perception of favoritism," the assistant director wrote. By January 2000, when supervisors in the Newark office learned of the relationship, Agent Orsini was reassigned. But before that, he approached one of the agents in his squad and accused him of revealing the relationship. During the meeting, Agent Orsini threatened to hit his subordinate but quickly added that he was kidding. Newark's assistant agent in charge reported that Agent Orsini "has an aggressive personality, and I would characterize him as a bully." Other substantiated allegations in the report included that Agent Orsini punched at least one hole in the wall in the Newark office, and threw and broke chairs. He also jokingly called fellow supervisors "homosexuals," and even used a bullhorn to make his comments. For those actions, the Office of Professional Responsibility said he failed to prevent the development of a "locker room atmosphere" in his squad that repressed professional conduct. In addition to the suspension and demotion, Agent Orsini was ordered to serve 12 months' probation and to attend mandatory sensitivity training. Ray Morrow, special agent in charge of the FBI's Pittsburgh office, defended Agent Orsini yesterday, calling him one of the best investigators he's seen. "Early on in his career, he made some bad decisions," Agent Morrow said, noting that nothing Agent Orisini did was criminal. "He has deeply and dearly paid the price -- both personally and professionally."
| joeb
Registered: 11/14/05
Posts: 2,929 | | 05/16/08 at 10:22 AM | #19 |
May 13, 2008
Kinneweb3
DEMOCRACY NOW! EXCLUSIVE: Fmr. Military Intelligence Sgt. Reveals US Listed Palestine Hotel in Baghdad as Target Prior to Killing of Two Journalists in 2003
Last month marked the fifth anniversary of the US military shelling of the Palestine Hotel in Baghdad. The attack killed two journalists: Reuters cameraman Taras Protsyuk and Jose Couso, a cameraman for the Spanish television network Telecinco. The Pentagon has called the killings accidental, but in this broadcast exclusive Army Sgt. Adrienne Kinne (Ret.) reveals she saw secret US military documents that listed the hotel as a possible target. Kinne also discloses that she was personally ordered to eavesdrop on Americans working for news organizations and NGOs in Iraq. [includes rush transcript]
Adrienne Kinne, former Army sergeant who worked in military intelligence. Served for ten years, from 1994 to 2004.
Rush Transcript
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Related Democracy Now! Stories
* Hotel Palestine: Killing the Witness–Documentary Exposes the Truth Behind the Attack (3/23/2005)
* U.S. Accused of Lying About Its Troops Killing Journalists in Iraq (1/16/2004)
* Family of Spanish Journalist Killed by U.S. Forces in Baghdad Accuses U.S. of War Crime (11/23/2004)
* Wounded Spanish Journalist Olga Rodriguez Describes the U.S. Attack on the Palestine Hotel That Killed Two of Her Colleagues (3/23/2005)
* Brother of Slain Journalist Jose Couso Calls for Prosecution of Those Responsible for U.S. Attack on Palestine Hotel (3/23/2005)
AMY GOODMAN: There’s been much attention paid to the fifth anniversary of the invasion of Iraq. What went almost unnoticed was another anniversary. It happened a few weeks after the invasion. It was April 8th, 2003, when the US military shelled the Palestine Hotel in Baghdad, killing two journalists: Reuters cameraman Taras Protsyuk and Jose Couso, a cameraman for the Spanish television network Telecinco.
Just over a year ago, a Spanish judge indicted three US soldiers in the killings: Sergeant Shawn Gibson, Captain Philip Wolford and Lieutenant Colonel Philip DeCamp. The three men were charged with homicide and committing a crime against the international community.
The Bush administration has refused to hand over the soldiers for trial and has not charged them here in the United States. The Spanish Supreme Court recently affirmed Spain’s jurisdiction over the case.
The Pentagon has defended the attack on the Palestine Hotel, calling the killings accidental. The soldiers involved claim they were targeting insurgents who had fired rocket-propelled grenades.
But several holes have emerged in the US account. The Palestine Hotel was a well-known place for journalists covering the Iraq war. The US tanks were at too far a distance to be hit by rocket-propelled grenades from the hotel. Witnesses reported hearing almost no gunfire from the area around the hotel in the hours leading up to the US attack. And earlier that day, two other media outlets had also been hit by US strikes: the Abu Dhabi television network, and the satellite network Al Jazeera, killing correspondent Tareq Ayoub.
In a few moments, I’ll be joined by an Iraq war veteran who says she has new information that could point to a deliberate US attack on the Palestine Hotel.
But first, I want to turn to the documentary Hotel Palestine: Killing the Witness, produced by Jose Couso’s network, Telecinco. It was broadcast on Spanish television. It includes interviews with numerous journalists who were inside the Palestine Hotel and helped rush Jose Couso to the hospital. This clip begins with scenes taken inside the Palestine Hotel moments after the US attack. A warning to our television audience: some footage contains graphic images.
NARRATOR: The shell explodes before hitting the hotel facade and sprays the upper floors with shrapnel. The Reuters room suffers the dramatic consequences. Near the balcony, the cameraman Taras Protsyuk receives the full blast and collapses, mortally wounded. Paul Pasquale finds himself on the floor, covered with blood.
JON SISTIAGA: [translated] I couldn’t believe that it was the Americans until I reached Couso, who was conscious, who was awake, and he told me it was the tank.
ANTONIO BAQUERO: [translated] Suddenly we saw a damaged balcony. It was the fifteenth floor. I started to count. One, two, three, four, five…fifteen. They hit the Reuters room. The first I thought was, “Damn it, Couso is right below there.”
JON SISTIAGA: [translated] It was a tank, because Couso saw how they shot him. He was looking at the tank when he was hit. He was aware of who killed him.
ANTONIO BAQUERO: [translated] And then I saw the camera on the floor, destroyed, and the pool of blood. That moment is frozen in my mind. I remember I stopped saying, “My god, my god.”
NARRATOR: Several people help prepare Couso for transport to the hospital. They place him on a mattress and tie an emergency tourniquet. If they fail to stop the bleeding, he won’t make it to the hospital.
JON SISTIAGA: [translated] An Iraqi man who I didn’t know at all and who we should be grateful to the rest of our lives offered me his car, an old Soviet Lada, and we managed to put Couso inside with the help of Jorge Pliego, a Mexican cameraman who was extremely close to Couso.
JORGE PLIEGO: [translated] We pulled him into a car, and the whole time I was talking to Couso. I knew him pretty well. I knew his wife’s name was Lola and he had two children. On the way to the hospital, I spoke to him. “Couso, you have to put your strength into this. You have two children. Lola’s waiting for you. You have to fight hard.” I told him it had to be like in the movies. He couldn’t fall asleep or faint. He had to keep talking, so he could reach the hospital strong and determined. And he agreed. He said, “Fine, then,” just like in the movies. At one point he said, “My leg is a mess, isn’t it?” “No! When we get there, we’ll sew it up,” I said. I was especially struck by the fact that Couso complained.
JON SISTIAGA: [translated] Then he said, “Why did the tank fire at us? Where are you taking me? What’s happening? Are they filming me? Are they not filming me? Don’t let my family see it. Don’t let my children see me.”
AMY GOODMAN: Jose Couso died in the hospital. Scenes from the attack on the Palestine Hotel from the documentary Hotel Palestine: Killing the Witness. It was produced by Jose’s network, Telecinco in Spain.
I’m joined now by Adrienne Kinne. She’s a former Army sergeant who worked in military intelligence in Iraq. She served in the military for ten years, from 1994 to 2004. She joins us now from Burlington, Vermont.
We welcome you, Adrienne Kinne, to Democracy Now! Adrienne, can you hear me? We will go to a music break. Adrienne, can you hear me?
ADRIENNE KINNE: Yes, I can.
AMY GOODMAN: Thank you very much for joining us.
ADRIENNE KINNE: Thank you for having me.
AMY GOODMAN: Adrienne, can you talk about your work in military intelligence in the lead-up to the invasion and after the invasion? Tell us what you were doing and where you were.
ADRIENNE KINNE: I was stationed at Fort Gordon, Georgia, and I was actually mobilized shortly after 9/11 with a group of reservists who were eventually sent to Fort Gordon to work a mission, that it was actually a brand new mission. It was something not like anything I had done in military intelligence previously. And this new mission involved the intercept of satellite phone communications in Iraq and Afghanistan and basically a huge swath of the region around those two countries. It was really brand new, and basically there were about twenty of us who were put in charge of this new mission, to stand it up.
In the very beginning, basically what we did was that we would have a front end, which intercepted satellite phone communications in that region, and then it would transmit the satellite phone conversations back to the United States, where it would just fill up this queue in our computer, and we would just go through. And all the numbers were unidentified. So, at the beginning, it was just a matter of sifting through thousands upon thousands of unidentified satellite phone communications, as we kind of tried to sort out what phone number belonged to who and kind of go through the process of identifying phone numbers in the search for intelligence that might be related to operations in Afghanistan and, later on, Iraq.
AMY GOODMAN: And when were you listening to Iraq?
ADRIENNE KINNE: We started listening to the entire region pretty much immediately. I think this was December of 2001. And I was mobilized from October 2001 through August of 2003. So I was working that mission pretty much from December through August of 2003.
And over the course of my time, as we slowly began to identify phone numbers and who belonged to what, one thing that gave me grave concern was that as we identified phone numbers, we started to find more and more and more numbers that belonged not to any organizations affiliated with terrorism or with military—with militaries of Iraq or Afghanistan or elsewhere, but with humanitarian aid organizations, non-governmental organizations, who include the International Red Cross, Red Crescent, Doctors Without Borders, a whole host of humanitarian aid organizations. And it also included journalists.
AMY GOODMAN: Journalists where?
ADRIENNE KINNE: I remember bits and pieces of what we listened to while I was activated. I’d just like to say that at the time I took my clearance incredibly seriously. I had a very high clearance, military intelligence. And I never took notes. I never brought anything outside of our building. I never talked about my experiences with my friends or family. But there were certain things that happened over the course of our mobilization that struck me as being very wrong, and I remember them very specifically.
One of the instances was the fact that we were listening to journalists who were staying in the Palestine Hotel. And I remember that, specifically because during the buildup to Shock and Awe, which people in my unit were really disturbingly excited about, we were given a list of potential targets in Baghdad, and the Palestine Hotel was listed as a potential target. And I remember this specifically, because, putting one and one together, that there were journalists staying at the Palestine Hotel and this hotel was listed as a potential target, I went to my officer in charge, and I told him that there are journalists staying at this hotel who think they’re safe, and yet we have this hotel listed as a potential target, and somehow the dots are not being connected here, and shouldn’t we make an effort to make sure that the right people know the situation?
And unfortunately, my officer in charge, similarly to any time I raised concerns about things that we were collecting or intelligence that we were reporting, basically told me that it was not my job to analyze. It was my job to collect and pass on information and that someone somewhere higher up the chain knew what they were doing.
AMY GOODMAN: Who was the officer in charge? Who did you tell?
ADRIENNE KINNE: My officer in charge for the duration of my mobilization was Warrant Officer John Berry.
AMY GOODMAN: Now, when you saw this list that you say, a list of targets, and Hotel Palestine was on it, why would you see this? Where were you? How did you pick up this piece of paper?
ADRIENNE KINNE: It was actually an email. And I worked in a secure building, and we were given updates about what was going on. I actually am not sure why we were emailed this list of potential targets, and I’m not even sure in what context it was mailed—emailed to us. I would assume it was just an effort to let people know what was going on in the area, considering our mission. But the only reason now that I really remember that specific email is because I knew, having listened to journalists staying at the Palestine Hotel, talking with their families and loved ones and talking about whether or not they were safe and trying to reassure their family and co-workers and loved ones that they were safe, when I saw that hotel listed, I thought there was something that was going terribly wrong.
AMY GOODMAN: We’re talking to Adrienne Kinne, military intelligence, formerly a sergeant. We’re going to go to break, and we’ll come back to this conversation. Stay with us.
[break]
AMY GOODMAN: Our guest is a former Army sergeant, worked in military intelligence, served for ten years in the military, from ’94 to 2004. Her name is Adrienne Kinne, joining us from Vermont.
That list that you saw that you got in an email, what else? What were the other targets on the list? Do you remember?
ADRIENNE KINNE: I can’t remember. The only reason why I remember that hotel specifically is because I knew that there were people staying there who thought they were safe. And that’s really the only reason why I remember that specific target.
AMY GOODMAN: And when you say they thought they were safe, can you remember what the conversations you overheard that you were eavesdropping on?
ADRIENNE KINNE: Basically, a lot of them were just kind of, you know, workers there, journalists who were calling their friends, family, loved ones to include phone calls to the United States, and we could hear both sides of the conversation. And basically it would just be, you know, people calling their loved ones in basically the middle of the night and talking to them and just—I mean, people were so concerned, knowing that we were building up to Shock and Awe and that Baghdad was going to get really severely hammered by our military, that everybody worried about their safety. And the journalists staying at the hotel were no different.
AMY GOODMAN: Now, you’re an Arab interpreter, translator. Why were you listening to conversations in other languages?
ADRIENNE KINNE: Basically, when we were given this mission, it was unlike anything I’d ever done before. I had actually worked in the same building previously on active duty. And at that point in time, everything was very structured. People were given specific missions, specific targets in their language, and there was a lot of guidance as to how you were to proceed through collection of intelligence. And things were very closely monitored.
I remember in probably 1997 that I was listening to a military intelligence cut from a Middle Eastern country, and at that point in time, during the situation report, the person relayed the fact that an American was visiting the Middle East on a diplomatic mission. And because an American’s name was referenced in this particular transmission, we felt that it was a violation of our directive, which forbade the collection on American citizens. And as a result, we deleted every evidence that that intercept had ever taken place.
After 9/11, when we were mobilized and given this new mission, it was very—starting something from the bottom up, and it was really striking that in intercepting all these satellite phone communications, the majority of the traffic was not Arabic. It was languages beyond our translation capabilities. We would get Chinese, Japanese, Tagalog, Tadzhik, a lot of Dari, Persian, Pashto, some minimal Arabic, but really not that much. And so, we would just go through this process of going through and identifying who belonged to what. And as we began to identify different phone numbers which belong to these humanitarian organizations and journalists, we actually had the capability to block those phone numbers from being intercepted, but due to guidance given to our officer in charge, we did not do that.
AMY GOODMAN: You were listening to NGOs speaking to each other?
ADRIENNE KINNE: Yes.
AMY GOODMAN: That isn’t legal. You’re not supposed to be eavesdropping on them.
ADRIENNE KINNE: Right. And actually, over the course of our mobilization, I actually listened to a conversation between an American and a British aid worker. And during the course of the conversation, the British aid worker told the American—
AMY GOODMAN: We just lost that satellite. We will try to get Adrienne on the telephone to continue this conversation right now. Adrienne Kinne, former Army sergeant who worked in military intelligence, served for ten years, from 1994 to 2004.
I want to turn back now to the documentary Hotel Palestine: Killing the Witness, that was produced by Jose Couso’s network, Telecinco. In addition to interviewing numerous journalists who were inside the Palestine Hotel, we also hear from two of the soldiers wanted in Spain: Staff Sergeant Shawn Gibson and Lieutenant Colonel Philip DeCamp.
NARRATOR: Gibson swings his cannon toward the hotel and requests Captain Wolford’s permission to fire, but he still hesitates.
SGT. SHAWN GIBSON: And I still hesitated. Do you hear me? I hesitated.
PASCALE BOURGAUX: I know.
SGT. SHAWN GIBSON: OK? And I took my time, and I called it up to ensure what I seen, and it was clarified with another set of eyes.
NARRATOR: The decision was not taken in the heat of battle. Ten minutes go by until Gibson receives the order to open fire.
SGT. SHAWN GIBSON: We did not know that they had reporters in the Palestine Hotel. If we would have known that, we would not have fired a round over there. I don’t even know if that information was given to the US Army. I do not know that. OK? If it was, it didn’t get down to my level.
CHRIS TOMLINSON: What Colonel Perkins and Colonel DeCamp have told me is that they did not have any information about the Palestine Hotel or the location of Western journalists prior to coming into Baghdad on April 7th.
NARRATOR: When Colin Powell visits Spain on May 2nd, he confirms what everyone had assumed. The military command was perfectly aware that the journalists were based at the Palestine Hotel.
COLIN POWELL: We knew about the hotel. We knew that it was a hotel where journalists were located, and others, and it is for that reason it was not attacked during any phase of the aerial campaign.
NARRATOR: The generals monitoring the fighting from their headquarters in Qatar soon watched the incident broadcast worldwide on television and called Baghdad demanding an explanation.
CHRIS TOMLINSON: That image got out on satellite television, and their senior commanders at the two- and three-star general level, messaged them and said, “What are you doing shooting the Palestine Hotel?”
NARRATOR: Tomlinson overhears radio communications discussing the incident. Lieutenant Colonel DeCamp is informed of the attack by his superiors and shouts over the radio.
LT. COL. PHILIP DeCAMP: Who just shot the Palestinian Hotel?
NARRATOR: Tomlinson hears how DeCamp, clearly upset, asks Wolford:
LT. COL. PHILIP DeCAMP: Did you just shoot the Palestinian Hotel?
CHRIS TOMLINSON: The way he asked the question was a little misleading. When he asked Captain Wolford, did you shoot the Palestine Hotel, he assumed knowledge that Captain Wolford didn’t have.
SGT. SHAWN GIBSON: I wish it would have never happened, but it has happened. And I pray to God and I ask God for His forgiveness, and my sincere apologies and grievances to their families. It was not done intentionally.
CHRIS TOMLINSON: There was the sense throughout the chain of command, from Perkins to DeCamp to Wolford, all the way down to Shawn Gibson, that they had done something very bad, that they—I can tell you that Captain Wolford was visibly upset when I saw him an hour—two hours later. He was very upset about it. Sergeant Gibson is very upset about it. Colonel DeCamp obviously was very angry, he was upset.
NARRATOR: Spanish journalists are not as understanding as Tomlinson about the military officer’s behavior. The three attacks on journalists on April 8th lead them to think that US forces did not want witnesses.
JON SISTIAGA: [translated] What’s my opinion? My opinion is that there was a deliberate intent to fire on the journalists’ hotel.
JOURNALIST: [translated] So, they had to know perfectly well where we were, and there was no mistake. There could be no mistake.
JON SISTIAGA: [translated] First, they get rid of the offices of Al Jazeera TV. Half an hour later, they shoot at the offices of Abu Dhabi TV. And half an hour after that, the same tank—why not?—shoots at the hotel where other international journalists are staying.
JOURNALIST: [translated] I don’t know to what extent the Americans knew that the final stages of the war would be so easy for them.
JON SISTIAGA: [translated] And what they did not want under any circumstances was almost 300 journalists, non-American and not under their control, that is, who would not exercise patriotic self-censorship, ready to cover whatever might happen.
AMY GOODMAN: That, an excerpt of the Telecinco documentary on the killing of the two journalists at the Palestine Hotel April 8th, 2003. Jose Couso worked for Telecinco.
Adrienne Kinne is joining us on the phone right now from Vermont. We lost the satellite signal. The former Army sergeant who worked in military intelligence, served ten years, from ’94 to 2004, was an Arab translator and says that she received an email, a list of targets. She had—what kind of security clearance did you have, Adrienne Kinne?
ADRIENNE KINNE: I actually had a top-secret FBI clearance.
AMY GOODMAN: And as we listen to this, the confusion on the ground supposedly, the soldiers who have now been indicted in a Spanish court say, the question was why they weren’t told from their higher-ups immediately what the Palestine Hotel was, who was in the Palestine hotel. And you contend that the list came—you saw this list before April 8th, 2003, before it was attacked.
ADRIENNE KINNE: Yeah. I can’t be a hundred percent positive as far as the timeline, but to the best of my memory, it was in the buildup and before Shock and Awe. So I believe that if it had been after the attack had already taken place, it would have been very much a moot point.
AMY GOODMAN: And you say you were listening to conversations of journalists in the Palestine Hotel before, saying—explicitly saying they felt they were safe, reassuring loved ones they were having conversations with. And this was on just satellite phone technology?
ADRIENNE KINNE: Yeah, that’s what our mission was post-9/11, was intercepting satellite phone communications, to include any email and faxes that were transmitted over satellite phone connections.
AMY GOODMAN: I also, Adrienne Kinne, wanted to go back to this point of eavesdropping on international aid organizations, on NGOs. Can you explicitly say what you heard and why you were listening to these conversations?
ADRIENNE KINNE: Definitely. During that one conversation between a British aid worker and the American aid worker that I was talking about previously, the British aid worker basically told the American, “Be careful what you say, because the Americans are listening to us.” And they weren’t talking about anything that would have warranted their concern. There was—it was just kind of mundane office goings-on. And so, the American actually responded and said, “They can’t listen to me. I’m an American citizen. I’m protected by USSID 18.” And USSID 18 is basically a directive which is given out to military intelligence which bars the collection on American citizens, to include allies of other countries who we’ve signed binding agreements with. And when I heard that transmission and that conversation, I—kind of it caused me to raise my eyebrow, because here we were, we were listening to Americans, and we were collecting on them.
And so, I brought that particular intercept to the attention of my officer in charge. And actually, rather than be concerned that we were actually spying on Americans and violating the law and the Constitution, he was actually outraged that an American would reference USSID 18 to a non-American, and as if this American was somehow betraying some classified information that Americans have a right not to be spied upon.
And it was shortly thereafter that we were given a verbal waiver that we could listen to Americans and other ally citizens of allied countries for whatever—from whatever organizations, humanitarian aid organizations, journalists, NGOs, because—and then we were given two reasons that we could listen to Americans and these ally citizens. One was that they were eyes on the ground, and they could stumble upon the location of weapons of mass destruction, and if they should pass the location on over the phone to co-workers or what have you, that we would have to be listening in order to find out where the weapons of mass destruction were located, and we could pass that location on to higher-ups. The other rationale that we were given in order to kind of justify spying on Americans was that the organization or the individual could lose their satellite phone, and a terrorist could pick it up and then start using it. And we would have to monitor all these phones in order to make sure that if that took place, we could be there to listen to the terrorists.
And, you know, when this was going on, I had absolutely no idea what was going on in the rest of the military intelligence, the rest of our government. Everything is so compartmentalized that you don’t really know necessarily what the person next to you is doing, let alone in a different room in a different building in a different location. And so, it really wasn’t until the New York Times piece came out about the NSA’s domestic wiretapping that I really began to think about what we were doing and my mission and that we were collecting on Americans. And we were doing so for the flimsiest of reasons.
After watching the documentary recently called No End in Sight, in that documentary, there were actually people on the ground in Iraq who would come across the location of weapons caches, and they would call our military and report their location, thinking that it might be a good idea to secure those weapons caches. And our military just did not have the capability to go out to all of these locations. So there were people on the ground who were trying to tell our military where these weapons were, and we couldn’t really necessarily do anything about it. So why that excuse was used to justify listening to these people in their satellite phone conversations, I just have a hard time understanding anymore.
AMY GOODMAN: Adrienne Kinne, who gave the verbal waiver that you were to listen in?
ADRIENNE KINNE: Pretty much everything that I was ever directed or told came from my warrant officer, John Berry, who was our officer in charge for the duration of our mobilization.
AMY GOODMAN: Did you know it was illegal?
ADRIENNE KINNE: I definitely knew that that was something that military intelligence was not supposed to do, and I had never done that in the previous—by then, I think I had been in the military for about six-and-a-half years, and I was in active duty for four. And that was something we took incredibly seriously.
But people took 9/11 and the fear of terrorism to such extremes. My warrant officer actually said in the buildup to Shock and Awe that this was basically final retribution for 9/11 and that we were going to bomb those barbarians back to Kingdom Come. And this is the kind of guidance that was coming from our highest, highest person in charge. And talk about the racism and dehumanization that is just rampant in our military, it affects everybody everywhere, not just on the ground in Iraq or Afghanistan, but even working in an office building in the United States of America. And people took this fear and the fear of the unknown, and believing the administration when they said that Iraq was tied to 9/11, they basically used that to justify doing a lot of things that we should not have been doing.
AMY GOODMAN: Adrienne Kinne, what exactly—if you might go back and talk about what you heard of the NGOs talking to each other, explicitly, that you were listening to, which NGO were you listening to?
ADRIENNE KINNE: I really only remember bits and pieces, different names. I remember seeing—because we would have a queue, where all the—basically on our computer screen, where all of the conversations would pop up, and it would have the number, the time of the cut and the name of the organization, if we had identified who the phone number belonged to. A lot of our conversations were left unidentified, because we just did not have the people, manpower, needed to get through everything. And I think that that’s one of the reasons why it’s just so unfortunate that our government has set the net so wide that it will collect on organizations like Doctors Without Borders, the International Red Cross, Red Crescent. Those were the two that I remember most, but I know there were others.
And because we were listening to those conversations instead of blocking them from our system, which was possible, there were so many unidentified cuts that we never had time to get to. And I think that’s part of the problem with our government casting the net so wide and intercepting such a vast degree and amount of conversations, that there’s so much stuff that just slips through the cracks, and that if we could kind of get back to the basics of trying to collect on the terrorists instead of American citizens, we might actually have the opportunity to collect more intelligence that would be of actual value.
AMY GOODMAN: At what point did you start shifting your eavesdropping from Afghanistan to Iraq?
ADRIENNE KINNE: To the best of my knowledge, our—the satellite phone system picked up basically satellites that covered a huge swath of the region. And so, the way I remember it, basically, our mission was basically the entire area—Iraq, Afghanistan and all surrounding areas—for the entire duration of our mobilization. I do remember it shifting somewhat in focus from Afghanistan to Iraq, and this was definitely previous to our invasion and Shock and Awe. But as far as like an exact moment, I can’t remember that for sure.
AMY GOODMAN: Can you talk about prewar intelligence, what information you were getting, what you were translating as an Arabic translator?
ADRIENNE KINNE: Previous to 9/11, when I was on active duty, everything seemed incredibly legitimate. We were collecting military targets in the Middle East relevant to our language. There was oversight. There were senior linguists, who would go through and quality control our translations. There were specific guidelines. There were—there was a lot of basic guidance and oversight as we worked through military intelligence.
And I don’t know if it was just the lack of having enough people, having enough guidance, if everything was just so chaotic in our military that all the rules basically went out the window after 9/11, but so much of that oversight and guidance—and we didn’t even have senior linguists in our mission who could go through and quality control our translations. It was basically, you know, a couple dozen reservists who were mobilized and basically put in charge of this new mission without really very much to any oversight throughout the duration of our mobilization.
AMY GOODMAN: You translated information for the Iraqi National Congress?
ADRIENNE KINNE: Yes. During the course of our mobilization—I think it might have been right after Shock and Awe—we received a fax. It was a multi-page fax, which, as we began to translate it, we realized that it basically laid out the location of all of the weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. And due to the nature of the contents of that fax, as soon as we realized what the fax contained, that translation was sent via a critic report directly to the White House. And then we went through and continued to translate the fax and kind of send updates as need be. A critic—basically, if you find something that meets a critic criteria, then you have fifteen minutes to relay the information to the White House. And that’s what we did.
And actually, when I first started translating this fax with my fellow Arabic linguists, for a moment I thought maybe—maybe the administration was right, maybe our military was right, maybe Iraq did have all these weapons and they did have the intent to use them, and maybe the invasion was justified. I was against the invasion of Iraq. I was actually against the invasion of Afghanistan, because I thought we were doing things for the wrong reasons. But when we started to translate that fax, I thought maybe I was wrong.
And then, it took me maybe like ten minutes, and then I started thinking about the source of the fax and realizing that just because something is transmitted on a piece of paper does not mean it’s true. And when I basically shared my concern to our officer in charge, again I was told that “your job is to collect, you are not an analyst,” that other people will analyze the information. “You just collect and pass on, collect and pass on.” And that was always the guidance we were given.
Shortly after I was demobilized, I was reading a news magazine, and I saw a little blurb where it is said that the—we newly discovered that the Iraqi National Congress was actually feeding us misinformation. And I immediately, when I read that, thought to that fax and that critic report and really wondered to what level that intercept had been used to further justify the invasion of Iraq. And doing research about the Iraqi National Congress since then, I found out that senior military advisers and analysts were actually trying to make the case since December of 2002, or previously, that the Iraqi National Congress was not reliable and was not a reliable source of information.
And so, why we would allow information like that to be passed on to justify this invasion? To the best of my knowledge, if you find out that a critic is false, then you cancel the critic. So by the time we ended our mobilization, my officer in charge said that our critic was one of the only critics that had never been canceled. And so, even in August of 2003, people were still passing that intelligence off as valid. And meanwhile, come to find out, people knew for a long time that the Iraqi National Congress was not a reliable source of information.
AMY GOODMAN: Adrienne Kinne, we have to break again, but we’re going to come back to you to finish up this conversation. Adrienne Kinne is a former Army sergeant, worked in military intelligence, served for ten years, from 1994 to 2004. When we come back, I want to ask why you have chosen to speak out. This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, the War and Peace Report. We’ll be back with Adrienne Kinne in a moment.
[break]
AMY GOODMAN: Our guest for this hour is Adrienne Kinne, former Army sergeant who worked in military intelligence. She served for ten years, from 1994 to 2004. She is speaking to us from Vermont.
Adrienne Kinne, why did you decide to speak out? And welcome back to the satellite.
ADRIENNE KINNE: Hi. Thank you.
AMY GOODMAN: Why did you decide to speak out?
ADRIENNE KINNE: Oh, OK, sorry. Basically, when I left the military, I saw what was going on, but I kind of decided that I wanted to better serve my fellow soldiers in uniform by working at the VA, and so I put a lot of energy into finishing my degree and getting a job through the VA hospital.
And doing activist work for a long time, I thought that being an activist meant trying to advocate for change in Congress and our government, and so I was really very committed to trying to see change in our Congress, shifting the balance of power from the Republicans to the Democrats. That’s basically what I spent a lot of time doing in 2005 and 2006, building up to the election. When the Democrats took control of Congress in 2006, I really thought that something would change, and I was very hopeful that finally the wars would be ended. And it was about that time that I moved to Vermont, and the beginning of 2007, I had moved up to Vermont, I was kind of looking for something new, something changing in our government and our society. And then the escalation was announced, and Congress went along with it. And that’s when I realized that if you want something to change, you have to be a part of demanding that change.
And I ended up going to my first demonstration against the war in Washington, D.C., on January 27, 2007, and I joined Iraq Veterans Against the War that day. And it was a very life-changing moment for me. And I know I just became a part of something, a struggle, with fellow veterans who had all been affected by the war on terror, fellow veterans and soldiers.
And, you know, we come from such a diverse background, so many different life experiences. We have everything ranging from anarchists to Socialists, Libertarians, Republicans, conservatives, liberals, Democrats, Greens—everything from one spectrum to another. And yet, we’re all committed to achieving IVAW’s three points of unity, which are immediate withdrawal from Iraq, reparations for the Iraqi people and full veterans’ benefits.
And to see so many people coming together in an organization that is just continuing to grow through such amazing grassroots organizing, it’s just something that really makes you feel like you can be a part of something better and be a part of the change that you want to see. And so, I’m very thankful that I found Iraq Veterans Against the War and that they made a space for me to be a part of their organization, considering that I did not serve on the ground in Iraq, but I definitely, through my service, supported the war in Iraq, and I am as committed as every other member of IVAW to seeing that this occupation ends.
AMY GOODMAN: Are you concerned, Adrienne Kinne, about speaking out now, having a top security clearance, being in military intelligence to now?
ADRIENNE KINNE: Most definitely. When I first joined IVAW, I really wouldn’t tell anybody what I did in the military. I basically told them that I listened to phone conversations in Iraq, and that was about the extent of it.
It was last year, the summer of last year, I was attending the US Social Forum, and it was just being part of that atmosphere where there are so many organizations and people committed to trying to make a difference and speaking out against torture, speaking out against spying, that I realized that I kind of knew something, and I had experienced something that not everybody else had, and that by sharing my experiences, if I could in any way encourage people that they are doing the right thing in speaking out against what our government is doing today, that I needed to do it.
And I certainly have gone through many phases of being very concerned and worried about what the reaction of our government might be. But I feel very strongly that if our government had upheld the Constitution, instead of violating it, that I never would have been put in this situation, and that by breaking that oath to the American people and by violating the Constitution, our government has created this situation, and not me.
AMY GOODMAN: Finally, as we go back to the beginning of this broadcast, saying you saw the target list, that the Palestine Hotel was on it, hearing the documentary that we played that came from Telecinco, Hotel Palestine: Killing the Witness, your thoughts about the deaths on April 8, 2003, of the Reuters cameraman Taras Protsyuk and Jose Couso of Telecinco?
ADRIENNE KINNE: It’s just so frustrating, I think, in many ways, not knowing whether or not we could have prevented it; never knowing what really was going on on the ground, whether or not people were told that the Palestine Hotel was a potential target, and that’s why it was eventually attacked; not knowing whether or not—who made the decision where. I mean, I was a very low rung on the whole totem pole of the military intelligence, and I can speak to my experiences and what I saw and what I witnessed, but not knowing, I think, what is going on in the higher levels, and I think that’s part of the reason why I did decide to speak out, because I really hope very strongly that other people who know a lot more than what I know will choose to do the same thing for the right reasons. And if by speaking out you can encourage other people to kind of follow suit, I think that’s part of what’s all about, as well.
AMY GOODMAN: Adrienne Kinne, I want to thank you very much for being with us. Is this the first time that you have described the seeing of this target list and what you saw about the Hotel Palestine in a national broadcast?
ADRIENNE KINNE: Thank you.
AMY GOODMAN: Thank you. Adrienne Kinne, former Army sergeant, worked in military intelligence.
| joeb
Registered: 11/14/05
Posts: 2,929 | | 05/18/08 at 03:06 AM | #20 |
Civil Rights Workshop planned The Madison County NAACP will host an eight-hour Civil Rights Workshop on Friday, June 27, at the New Hope Family Life Center, 812 W. 13th St., Anderson. The workshop will be facilitated by the FBI and will include the topics of Violet Crime and Hate Crime. The workshop is open to the public and the $10 registration fee includes lunch. Deadline is Friday, June 20. For further information or to register, call Rosetta Minnefield at (765) 644-1876, Jackie German at (765) 643-6194, or President James Burgess at (765) 643-9100. | joeb
Registered: 11/14/05
Posts: 2,929 | | 05/24/08 at 02:44 AM | #21 |
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121147753768014697.html?mod=googlenews_wsj | joeb
Registered: 11/14/05
Posts: 2,929 | | 06/07/08 at 10:30 AM | #22 |
School teachers and FBI agents refuse to discuss the leadership role FBI agents played in assassinating Dr. Martin Luther King , Malcolm X and their destruction of the Black Panther Party.
School teachers and FBI agents also refuse to discuss the files FBI agents keep on Black Americans in a program called Racial Matters and documented in a book by that same name written by Kenneth O'Reilly.
You won't hear teachers and FBI agents in this inner city classroom talk about the FBI FRUHMENSCHEN program which was created by the FBI to target black politicians in sting operations without proabable cause because the FBI feels blacks are incapable of governing.
Teachers allow FBI agents into their classrooms to indoctrinate these children because they
are fulfilling their roles of dumbing us down as documented in John Gattos's book DUMBING US DOWN.
Voters and taxpayers co-enable teachers and FBI agents by funding these behaviors with their tax dollars.
a couple of reads
1st read
Sixth-graders from rough D.C. neighborhoods complete FBI's junior special agent program
Jun 7, 2008 by Scott McCabe, The Examiner
Washington, D.C. (Map, News) -
The head of the FBI's Washington office on Friday swore in 148 junior special agents who demonstrated that they had what it takes: integrity, self-respect and the ability to discern between a salad fork and a dinner fork.
Over the last year, sixth-graders from some of the roughest neighborhoods in D.C. and Alexandria were exposed to new people and new places. They met FBI agents and businesses leaders who had overcame obstacles. They walked the Civil War battlefield at Gettysburg, visited Ellis Island in New York, saw George Washington's teeth at Mount Vernon, exercised at the FBI Academy at the U.S. Marine Corps Base at Quantico and learned table manners at a fancy restaurant.
"It was amazing," said Erika Ventura, 11, a sixth-grader from Bancroft Elementary School in Alexandria. "It taught us to stay on the right track, be honest, resist peer pressure, and the importance of integrity."
One of the most rewarding experiences, she said, was going to Baltimore to meeting with Dr. Ben Carson, the neurosurgeon who made history in 1987 by operating to separate a pair of Siamese twins who were joined at the head.
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"He lived a poor life, a hard life growing up. He made some bad choices but realized his mistakes," she said. "His slogan is 'Think big.' "
Malik Woods, 11, of J.O. Wilson Elementary in Northeast Washington, said he learned several "fun facts" about the dangers of smoking. His favorite? "A lot of people die from smoking each year. It showed me not to smoke."
On Friday, the students, wearing crisp white shirts and black ties and black pants or skirts, took the pledge to become junior special agents, promising to be good citizens and practice nonviolent behavior in handling difficult situations.
Joseph Persichini Jr., the head of the FBI's D.C.-area field office, attended all the field trips and helped in the classrooms, He called the mentor program "an insurance policy" that shows children there are other alternatives to the streets.
"You start that by building respect for life and showing that they have a future," Persichini said.
2nd read
Mrs. Harriette V. Moore
June 19, 1902 - January 3, 1952
Mr. Harry Tyson Moore
November 18, 1905 - December 25, 1951
By DeLaura Junior High School
Multicultural Research Project, 12/25/95
"Harriette and Harry T. Moore are unique in American history as being the only husband and wife team to have sacrificed their lives through assassination, for championing the ideals we as Americans have been taught is our birthright. It remains a matter of pride that they are from Brevard, but, equally, it is a matter of shame that they were slain here. Those responsible for this terrible crime were never brought to justice." 1
Mrs. Harriette V. Moore was born June 19, 1902, in Mims to Mr. and Mrs. David and Annie Simms. Mr. Harry Tyson Moore was born November 18, 1905, in Houston, Florida which is near Tallahassee. His father died in 1915 and his mother Mrs. Rosa A. Moore supported the family by teaching school. Mr. Harry T. Moore, finished high school in Houston and attended the Florida Normal College there. He continued his education and graduated from Bethune-Cookman College with a Bachelor of Science Degree. He taught school in Houston, Titusville, Cocoa, and Mims, Florida.
Mr. and Mrs. Moore grew up in rural Florida at a time when there was no Civil Rights movement. It was a time when there was no such thing as Black Rights, as any Black person who dared to use a "White" restroom or drink from a "White" water fountain, might get tossed into jail for "creating a disturbance". If a Black person tried to vote they might get a visit and a beating or worse from the Ku Klux Klan.
Although few Blacks in those days were willing to challenge, for obvious reasons, the concept of White supremacy, Mr. Harry T. Moore, a shy, soft-spoken and studious man and his wife became the first American Civil Rights leaders to be assassinated because they dared to speak out for freedom and justice for all. Their martyrdom need remind us all of the sacrifices that have been made and the need for seeing that equality for all becomes a reality.
In 1934, Mr. Moore's cousin was frightened when he told Mr. Moore that he had received some pamphlets from the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) but Mr. Moore said "This is what I've been looking for." 2 As Mr. Moore experienced firsthand the inequities of the Jim Crow educational system in Florida, with hand-me-down books and ramshackled schools where Black teachers were routinely paid less than White teachers. Within the year, Mr. Moore had founded the Brevard County Branch of the NAACP and had begun to gather evidence to prove that Black teachers were being discriminated against.
In 1938, which was sixteen years before Brown vs. Board of Education which brought about the desegregation of schools, Mr. Moore launched the first lawsuit to challenge payment schedules for Black teachers in Florida. This case failed, but it led to another case that started the process for equalizing teachers salaries among the races.
The work on behalf of the Black teachers eventually cost Mr. Moore his job as principal of the three-room elementary school in Mims, Florida where he and his wife taught with one other teacher. Mrs. Moore along with teaching, cooked in a makeshift kitchen in a cloakroom adjoining her classroom, which was for many of the children their only hot meal of the day.
After school and on weekends, the Moore's would crisscrossed the state trying to start new chapters of the NAACP. It was dangerous work, but Mrs. Moore insisted on going along as she wanted to be there if anything happened to her husband. "He said time after time that he knew someone would kill him, but in the face of this impending tragedy, he went on with his work fearlessly."3 His daughter, Evangeline, remembers fearfully riding with him on the long, lonely, county roads on the darkest of nights, sometime being followed out of town or beyond county lines. At the county lines, the headlights would abruptly disappear, but the message remained: Get out and stay out.
Mr. and Mrs. Moore "gave up the beauties of a simple family life, including the lazy evenings and weekends spent merely with family doing fun activities because there was work to be done -- meetings to attend, letters to write to aspiring public officials, lynchings to be investigated, briefs to be prepared in preparation for suits to be filed against blatant injustices"3
In 1941, Mr. Moore was named president of the Florida NAACP and remained a key figure in the organization until he was killed. Although Mr. Moore would occasional receive an anonymous threat, most segregationists left him alone as they figured what could one Black man do in a small rural community. It was not until 1944 that Mr. Moore became insnarled in a collision course with one of Central Florida's most powerful politicians, Sheriff Willis V. McCall, of Lake County. Sheriff McCall was a six foot two, hefty man who wore a six-gallon white Stetson hat and size thirteen boots. He bragged about being investigated more than 37 times by civil rights and other groups, and the signs outside his office designating "White Waiting Room" and "Colored Waiting Room" remained until 1971, when a federal judge finally ordered him to remove them. .In 1944, the U.S. Supreme Court decision abolished the White Primary, which had excluded Blacks from the Democratic Party Primaries. Mr. Moore, helped organize the Florida Progressive Voters League, which registered Black voters and endorsed Political candidates, serving to increase the number of registered Blacks in Florida from 49,000 in 1947 to 116,000 in 1950.
Mr. Moore's activities became too much for the all-White Brevard County School Board, which fired the Moore's in 1947 and made it impossible for him to find another job teaching. The lack of a job did not stop Mr. Moore who now could devote his full time to churning out pamphlets on a home mimeograph machine, endorsing candidates, registering voters, challenging segregated colleges and trains, and investigating police brutality.
One of the police brutalities that Mr. Moore investigated in 1949, concerned a 17-year-old White woman who accused four young Black men of raping her after her car stalled on a rural road, in Groveland, which is in Lake County, under the control of Sheriff McCall. Sheriff McCall led a huge posse along with sheriffs from three adjacent counties who chased one suspect, Mr. Ernest Thomas to a field, where they riddled him with bullets until he died. The other three suspects were put on trial.
The case became know nation wide as Florida's Little Scottsboro, because of the infamous Alabama case in which young Black men were falsely charged with rape. During the trial of the three Florida men, there was no medical testimony to prove that a rape had even been committed. The defense was not permitted to present testimony that the suspects were badly beaten by Sheriff McCall's deputies and they were even denied counsel for 26 days. It only took 90 minutes for the all-White jury to convict the three young Black men, one of whom was only 16 years old.
It took two years and four months of hard work before the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the convictions of the lower court and ordered a new trial because Blacks had been excluded from the jury. Sheriff McCall, who was a member of the National Association for the Advancement of White People and president of the Florida Sheriff's Association, drove on the night of November 6, 1951, two of the Black men who had been ordered a new trial by the U.S. Supreme Court, from the state penitentiary in Raifors to Lake County where they were to face a new jury. The two Black men were manacled in the back seat of the police car.
Sheriff McCall claimed that he stopped to check what he thought was a flat tire on the police car that he was driving on a particularly lonesome stretch of road and let the Black prisoners out to go to the bathroom and one of them hit him with a flashlight. So Sheriff McCall opened fire with his .38-caliber Smith and Wesson pistol. One of the Black men survived by playing dead. The surviving man reported that minutes later, Sheriff McCall's deputy arrived and discovered that he was not dead, and shot him again, this time in the neck.
These shootings brought a mob of reporters to Lake County as the NAACP demanded that Sheriff McCall and his deputy be removed from office and charged with murder and attempted murder. Mr. Moore was the most vocal in leading the campaign to raise money for the defendants and had monitored the case from the beginning. In speeches at protest meetings along Florida's East Coast, Mr. Moore demanded that Sheriff McCall and his deputies be prosecuted.
On December 2, 1951, Mr. Moore wrote a letter to Governor Fuller Warren stating that "Florida is on trial before the rest of the world" "Only prompt and courageous action by you in removing these officers can save the good name of our fair state."4 Three weeks and two days later a bomb exploded destroying the lives of Mr. and Mrs. Harry T. Moore.
As Mr. Moore traveled extensively for the NAACP and Mrs. Moore and their daughter Annie taught school in others parts of the state, they were all looking forward to getting together at this time of year. The Moore's were to be together with their daughters and family, for the brief Christmas holidays, and to celebrate Mr. and Mrs. Moore's twenty-fifth wedding anniversary, December 25. The presents had not been opened in the parlor, as they were waiting for the next day when their daughter Evangeline would arrive from Washington, D.C. After have a dinner that evening with Mrs. Simms, Mrs. Moore's mother, the Moore's returned home along with their daughter Annie and Mr. Moore's mother who were to spend the night in the guest room that had been added on to the back of the house.
Mr. and Mrs. Moore retired to the front bedroom and Mr. Moore's mother went to bed in the back bedroom. In between the back guest bedroom and Mr. and Mrs. Moore's bedroom was a bathroom and their daughter's bedroom. Their daughter Annie had crawled under her covers and opened a book to read for a few minutes before she turned out the light. Then there was the indescribable sound of a bomb going off in her parents bedroom, memories of which made it impossible for her to sleep in the dark for the rest of her life.
The bomb exploded about 10:20 p.m. on Christmas night. The explosion threw the bed in which Mr. and Mrs. Moore were sleeping smashing through the pine planks of the ceiling before it crashed back into the ground, burying Mr. Moore and his wife under the mass of debris. The bedroom was completely demolished as every board in the bedroom was torn almost to splinters. There were planks of wood and broken beams on the front porch and which were also scattered throughout the yard. The windows in the master bedroom had been blown out of their frames and dust floated through the heavy fog.
Mrs. Moore's bother, Master Sergeant George Simms who lived about 800 yards from the Moore's, was home on rotation leave after fourteen months of fighting for American in Korea, and he was the first to give aid to Mr. Moore. Another brother, Mr. Arnold Simms lifted the dying Mr. Moore and afterward said that "He didn't feel like there was an unbroken bone in his body."5 The two brothers carried Mr. and Mrs. Moore into a car and raced to the nearest hospital, which was thirty miles away in Sanford. There was only one local ambulance company and it wouldn't transport Blacks. On the way to the hospital, Mr. Moore died in his mothers arms. His wife died in the hospital nine days later, but before she died, she mustered every ounce of her strength to go see her husband's body at the Burton's Funeral Home in Sanford, Florida. In the hospital she not only endured the pain and suffering of her bodily injuries, and the immeasurable grief in the loss of her husband, but the repeated questioning by the FBI.
On January 2, 1952, the day before she died in the hospital, the FBI interrogators stated in their report that: "Mrs. MOORE was shown the glass fragments and the heavy rubber washer and was quite positive that her husband had never had anything similar to a test tube around the house. She said she was quite familiar with what a test tube is as she had taken chemistry in college and to her knowledge she had never seen anything resembling a test tube.." She died January 3, 1952 which was two days after her husband was buried.
The funeral service for Mr. Moore was held at the St. James Missionary Baptist Church in Mims, instead of the Methodist church where Mr. Moore was a member to try and accommodate the hundreds of people that came. State investigators and Mrs. Moore's brothers checked the church for explosives before the service. The flowers were brought from Miami to cover Mr. Moore's casket because local flower shops refused to deliver them to a Black funeral.
The assassination of the Moore's made front pages news around the world, and was discussed at the United Nations, where U.S. delegate Mrs. Eleanor Roosevelt warned, "The harm it will do us among the people of the world is untold."6 Yet this warning did not stop the killings, tortures, and dehumanization that continued to take place throughout the United States. Many became martyrs following in the Civil Rights footsteps of the Moore's.
The Moore's murderers were never brought to justice. Mr. Jim Clark a reporter for The Orlando Sentinel obtained an uncensored set of FBI's investigative files on the Moore case that had been setting in a box in the Brevard /Seminole State Attorney's office for more than a decade. He reported that those files showed that six days after Mr. Moore's death, the FBI focused its investigation on the huge Orange County Klan and the FBI spied and tapped phones and were thus able to come up with three suspects. One of the suspects committed suicide after being questioned by the FBI and the other two were listed as having died of natural causes within a year after the murder.
Although the first thing that the FBI did was to interview every Black resident of Mims, they afterward focused on the huge network of the Central Florida Klan but the problem was that nobody would talk. Sheriff McCall admitted that he went to a Klan meeting in Astatula shortly after the bombing and told Klan members that they did not have to talk to the FBI or even give their names. He denied that he was ever a member of the Klan, but admitted that he may have spoke at a Klan meeting where he ended up by chance.
Another journalist and author who had been a friend of the Moore's, Mr. Stetson Kennedy, helped to keep the case alive even though, in 1955, the case of the murder of Harry and Harriette Moore was officially closed. In Miami, a federal grand jury considered the Moore's case and a rash of other terror bombings but produced no indictments, except that six of the Klan members who had been called before the grand jury were indicted on charges that they gave false testimony. They were indicated in 1952 for perjury but were never prosecuted, as the indictments were thrown out by a judge who ruled that the grand jury had no jurisdiction and the U.S. Department of Justice didn't bother to appeal that decision. Mr. Frank Meech, one of the lead FBI agents on the Moore case said "There was no reason to further prosecute. After a few years, the Department of Justice had them (the indictments) quashed for the tranquillity of the South."6 Mr. Clark and Mr. Kennedy were successful in seeing that in September 1991, the Moore's case was reopened by order of Florida's Governor Lawton Chiles. In November 1991, Mr. Stetson Kennedy held a press conference at the NAACP's state convention in Fort Lauderdale and declared that Law Enforcement at all levels had whitewashed the Moore case. The media attention again focused on the Moore case, Geraldo Rivera did a story, but the status of the case remains the same, as stated by the North Brevard County Branch of the NAACP.
* "No one was ever prosecuted for the murders, the case is still officially listed as unsolved.
* In 1978, Raymond Henry, Jr. confessed to making the bomb that killed Harry T. & Harriette Moore, he implicated Sheriff Willie McCall, other lawmen, grove owners, ranchers, and businessmen.
* The FBI refuses to release the taped confession, saying there is not sufficient public interest."
The death and life of Mr. and Mrs. Moore, which is still not in most histories of Florida or even the nation's civil rights movement, remains as a symbol of how much of the history of the the Black's in America is unrecognized. The Moore's greatness and the sacrifices that they made are just now gaining a fragment of appreciation and recognition that they deserve due to the unswerving efforts of those who knew and loved them.
Mr. Clarence Rowe, who is President of the Central Brevard County Branch of the NAACP and has for the past twenty-five years been an employee at Patrick Air Force Base in Satellite Beach, Florida was told May 18, 1992 by his supervisor to remove a photograph of Mr. Moore from where he was working although it was not against the rules to have photos in the area and other workers displayed pictures.
Mr. Rowe had to remove this black-and-white photograph of Mr. Moore, which was devoid of any name or slogans, because the supervisor told him that some of his fellow employees found it offensive. The Florida Today newspaper on June 18, 1992 quoted Captain Ken Warren, a base spokesman, as stating that: "There were some people who were concerned the individual in the photograph was Malcolm X"
Mr. Rowe was given permission to re-hang the photograph of Mr. Moore after the media brought it to the public attention. The Florida Today, in this same article, also quoted Brig. Gen. Jimmey Morrell, 45th Space Wing Commander, in a press release which said: "Neither Mr. Rowe nor anyone else's job will be in jeopardy by expressing their views." Brig. Gen. Jimmey Morrell has since retired and Mr. Rowe's job as of 1995 became null and void.
Mr. Rowe has continued to campaign for years along with Mr. Michael Fitzgerald, esquire, who is Chairman of the Harry and Harriette T. Moore Justice Center and other local civil rights activist to see that an edifice be named in honor of the Moore's. In 1993, a milestone was accomplished by the decision of the Brevard County Commission to name a new courthouse for the slain couple. The future Harry and Harriette T. Moore Justice Center will join the proposed Harry and Harriette T. Moore Multicultural Center on the Brevard Community College's Cocoa campus, along with a park at the Moore's home place to be as living memorials to the couple's dedication and sacrifice.
The Moore's battle for equality continues today. A step towards that goal is the rightful and long overdue recognition of the Moore's in our schools history books. We, the students at DeLaura Junior High School therefore dedicate this supplementary history book to Mr. and Mrs. Harry T. Moore. The Moore's were not violent people, but people who did not let the fear of financial or bodily harm control their lives. The fear that kept them going, was that if they did not stand up and speak out that nothing would ever change. Because of their valiant efforts, changes have been made for the better. They are true heroes and an inspiration to us all.
The students at DeLaura Junior High School, in Satellite Beach, Florida, see a need for a change and it is hoped that this book7 serves as a catalysis to bring about a change in the textbooks within our public schools. Many African-American as well as other minorities have and continue to be robbed of their history in the public school system. A small segment of our school year is set aside for Black History, which is a step, just as is this small supplementary history book. These are only nuggets in a wealth of education about the heritage, struggles, and accomplishments of Americans who have been left out of our history books due to ignorance and prejudice. We have encluded a Ballad of Harry Moore that was written by Mr. Langston Hughes, as it is time that not only our history books, but our literature, math , and science books also reflect the achievements and those that made them.
© 1995 - DeLaura Junior High School,
This paper may be printed and used for research, provided it is kept in one piece, including the 7 footnotes. It may be quoted from in the usual and accepted manner.
1quote from letter written by Representative Jim Bacchus to Brevard County Commissioner Karen Andreas, October 4, 1993.
2quote taken from article written by Ms. Karen Dukess and Mr. Richard Hart for Tropic, February 16, 1992
3quotes taken from letter written August 2, 1993 to Brevard County Board Commissioner Karen Andreas by the only surviving member of Mr. and Mrs. Harry T. Moore's family, Ms. Juanita Evangeline Moore
4 quote from article written by Ms. Karen Dukess and Mr. Richard Hart for Tropic, February 16, 1992
5 quotes from articles printed in The Florida Times-Union, Jacksonville, Thursday, December 27, 1951
6quotes from article by Ms. Karen Dukess and Mr. Richard Hart for Tropic, February 16, 1992
7 "Those Left Out - Famous People Left Out Of The History Books," DeLaura Junior High School, Multicultural Research Project, Satellite Beach, Florida, December 25, 1995. Short biographies of 95 historical figures
3rd read
see link about FBI agent Swearingen's book
http://209.85.165.104/search?q=cache Pv6Du53uRUJ:www.constitution.org/col/mwswear.htm+swearingen+fbi&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=2&gl=us&client=firefox-a
Several years ago Vermont filmaker Roz Payne sat down with
retired FBI agent Wesley Swearingen and interviewed him.
He discusses the routine murdering of black leaders by FBI agents.
His interview is part of a 4 DVD set released this year by Roz Payne
with 12 hours of footage about the Black Panthers,
including two blockbuster interviews with retired FBI agents.
Roz shot much of the footage of the Black Panthers in the 60's.
visit her site http://www.newsreel.us/
FBI Secrets: An Agent's Expose
by M. Wesley Swearingen, 1994
Reviewed by Jon Roland
Wes Swearingen served as an FBI agent from 1951 until he retired in 1977. During that period he perpetrated or witnessed numerous violations of law by FBI agents and their operatives, heard revealing statements by other agents about their illegal activities, and read files which documented violations of the rights of American citizens.
The activities of FBI agents and their "informers" include warrantless break-ins, theft, fraud, kidnapping, perjury, fabrication of evidence, suborning of witness perjury, and murder. The targets were political dissidents: anyone FBI agents didn't like.
Swearingen details how members of the Black Panthers were murdered by FBI operatives, another was framed for a murder he didn't commit, and still others were prosecuted on trumped up charges.
He does not mention anything about the deaths of John or Robert Kennedy or Martin Luther King, but he describes an agency so deeply involved in criminal activity of every kind as to be capable of causing the deaths of those men and others who have died under mysterious circumstances.
He describes various files on political dissidents, called the "Security Index" and the "Reserve Index", which eventually included about 500,000 names, and which were the persons to be arrested without warrant and taken to detention areas in the event of a national security emergency. For those who are inclined to dismiss such concerns as paranoid, here is supporting evidence, notwithstanding the repeal of authorizing legislation in 1971, which would not stop people like these.
Swearingen provides an insider's view of the COINTELPRO program of suppression of political dissidents, but also tells us that the program continues to this day under another name, apparently without a paper trail.
He paints a picture of an agency riddled with corruption, incompetence, and inefficiency, composed of men who may have once been patriots, but who have been reduced to common criminals, whose crime fighting activities are limited at best and largely for show, with political repression being the primary mission.
Some may suggest that the FBI may have been reformed since Swearingen left the agency in 1977, and no longer does the things he describes. Certainly there have been some reform efforts, particularly during the period Edward Levi was Attorney-General, and we would expect another generation of agents to have taken the place of those Swearingen worked with, but available evidence, including continuing harassment of Wes by his former agency, indicate it has not been reformed at all.
There have been other books by former FBI agents that have told similar tales, such as William Turner, author of _Hoover's FBI: The Men and the Myth_, and books by former agents of the CIA, such as those by Philip Agee, John Stockwell, Victor Marchetti, Frank Snepp, and Ralph McGehee. It seems likely that similar books remain to be written by agents of almost every agency of the U.S. government, revealing them as criminal enterprises and implicating almost every employee as criminal conspirators. Such agents should read this book and begin gathering the evidence they will need to take out with them.
Even Swearingen still speaks with pride of his crimefighting activities, seemingly oblivious to the fact that there is no constitutional authority or federal jurisdiction for statutes against the offenses he was investigating, making enforcement in federal courts itself a criminal violation of the civil rights of the targets, even when they really are bad guys who deserve to be prosecuted under applicable state laws.
The most important thing this book reveals is the mindset of government agents, and the way otherwise good men get corrupted by the system of which they become a part. They are totally ignorant of the principles of constitutional republic government, and willing to do whatever works, regardless of legality. Their arrogance was revealed in a statement by Special Agent Joseph G. Deegan in 1977: "We are the only ones who know what is good for the country, and we are the only ones who can do anything about it." After reading this book and others, it is clear that this statement reflects a dangerous delusion of grandeur.
Anyone who is involved in any kind of politically significant activity, or who is concerned about the future of this country, needs to read this book to learn how government agents operate and how citizens can defend themselves against them, both in court and in the field. These agents are not very effective, and people should not be awed by them. Standing up to them works if one exercises a few simple precautions, such as taping all encounters and having witnesses around at all times. Going armed at all times may not be a bad idea, either.
Available from:
South End Press
116 Saint Botolph St
Boston, MA 01225
$13.00 + S&H
4th read
Remembering Harry and Harriette Moore
Brown, Luther Jr
It could not be in Jesus' name,
Beneath the bedroom floor,
On Christmas night the killers
Hid the bomb for Harry Moore.
It could not be in Jesus' name
The killers took his life,
Blew his home to pieces
And killed his faithful wife.
- Ballad of Harry Moore
by Langston Hughes
Long before Medgar Evers, Malcolm X or Martin Luther King Jr., there was Harry T. Moore, perhaps the first martyred leader of the 20th Century's nascent civil rights movement in the United States. Poet Langston Hughes memorialized Moore, a scholarly but shy school teacher, and his wife, Harriette, shortly after they were murdered in 1951 and an international clamor about racial injustice in the U.S. ensued. But as with so much of African American history, the story of Harry and Harriette Moore receives little notice in the history books.
That may be about to change. At a recent meeting of the NAACP's regional council in Miami, Stetson Kennedy, a white former FBI agent and one-time informant for civil rights groups, donated over 2,000 pages of official and unredacted FBI documents concerning the murders of the Moores to NAACP Chairman and CEO Julian Bond, President Kweisi Mfume and Florida NAACP President Leon Russell. When the official FBI investigation of the murders was completed, Kennedy continued to investigate them on his own, filing and obtaining Freedom of Information Act requests and retrieving all manner of other documents related to the case.
In a statement, the ailing Kennedy said, "I am very happy and thankful that the documents are in the hands of Mr. Moore's own people and that eventually these documents will be placed with the NAACP's papers in a location for access by all Americans. I am convinced that this is in the public interest and the national interest and in the interest of better law enforcement."
The story of Harry Moore is representative of all that was woefully wrong about life in the U.S. for its black citizens. On December 21, 1951, at 10:20 p.m., a bomb exploded beneath the Moores' bedroom in Mims, Fla.(pop. 1,081), some 40 miles due south of Daytona Beach. Set by unknown conspirators, the bomb killed them both as they and their two children lay sleeping. The children survived. It was the Moores' 25th wedding anniversary. The bombers have never been brought to justice. One white man who saw the wreckage of the home commented, "That's one coon who will keep his mouth shut."
The outcry over the murder was startling. Blacks were routinely lynched for far less crimes than political activism, so the murder of yet another black was nothing new. But the cowardly slaying of the Moores was different. Newspapers around the globe reported the atrocity. Communist organizations used the story for recruitment and anti-American propaganda. At the United Nations, Russia led other countries in condemning the U.S. for permitting such heinous acts.
Eleanor Roosevelt warned: "That kind of violent incident will be spread all over every country in the world, and the harm it will do us among the people of the world is untold."
When Kennedy released the papers, Leon Russell observed: "We believe the motive for the assassination was his (Moore's) work in the political arena. Harry Moore had filed a lawsuit that ended the lily white Democratic primary in the State of Florida, which obviously gave African Americans an opportunity to vote in the state.
He was also a champion of challenging police brutality and police use of force."
The challenge to police power may have been the strongest catalyst for the Moores' murder. In one case in Groveland, Fla., two black rape suspects suspiciously ended up with bullets in their heads in the back of a sheriff's car. Harry Moore had called for an independent investigation at a time when blacks were loathe to fight back so publicly. He also championed bills in the state legislature to increase the pay for black teachers, who were paid about half that of their white counterparts. To many observers, including many foreign countries, Harry Moore died for those efforts.
The FBI's J. Edgar Hoover was said to be very disturbed by the killings and ordered an investigation, but no one was ever indicted, despite the dozen FBI agents assigned to the case. The papers provided by Stetson Kennedy purport to be the full story of that investigation.
"It is said that the FBI had in fact identified suspects in the case," Russell said. "But ... J. Edgar Hoover decided at the time to end the investigation in order to maintain good order in the South."
Julian Bond has known Kennedy for years and worked with him to obtain the papers.
Bond said, "For one of the first times, people outside of law enforcement circles are getting an opportunity to see what happened in the investigation and in the words of the people who conducted it. Harry was one of our own, and we are determined that he not be forgotten in history. While they may not be a literal smoking gun, these papers will give us an opportunity to understand better than we do now what this was all about."
The papers will be housed in the library at the NAACP's headquarters in Baltimore. There are other efforts to honor the memory of Harry and Harriette Moore. The site of their bombed home is now a park where a replica of their house is to be built. There is a movement to have the Moores placed on an official U.S. postage stamp. Much has changed in the almost 48 years since they were murdered. When they were killed, no local ambulance would take the couple to the nearest hospital in Sanford because of their color. No local florists would deliver flowers to their funerals for the same reason. Now, however, the Brevard County Courthouse is named for them, as is the multicultural center at Brevard Community College.
As NAACP President Kweisi Mfume said on receipt of the documents, "The ghosts of 1951 are here in these files. This horrific tragedy, the tremendous pain, the impact on human life and the loss of that life, a family long since removed, cannot be lost in this moment. We do a disservice if we don't find a way in the coverage of this to remind Americans of all walks of life that this happened in America, the greatest democracy on earth, and it still remains unresolved.
"So," Mfume continued, "the ghosts of that era, I think, require all of us to take receipt of this material for scholars to study and also for the FBI to want to find a way to look at it and revisit it many years after the fact. There are many Americans of all walks of life who want some assurance that this sort of thing will happen never again, never ever."
Langston Hughes felt the same way when he wrote:
And this he says, our Harry Moore,
As from the grave he cries:
No bomb can kill the dreams I hold
For freedom never dies!
Freedom never dies, I say!
Freedom never dies!
Luther Brown Jr. is a writer and television producer who lives in Atlanta.
| joeb
Registered: 11/14/05
Posts: 2,929 | | 06/08/08 at 11:28 PM | #23 |
2 easy reads about your bodyguards...
1st
James Earl Ray's brother pens book on King assassination
Associated Press - June 8, 2008
QUINCY, Ill. (AP) - James Earl Ray's oldest brother has written a book that he says explains who really killed civil rights leader the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr.
John Larry Ray has lived in Quincy for about four years.
The 75-year-old told The (Alton) Telegraph for a story in Sunday's editions that his book "Truth at Last" reveals information about the King assassination that he's kept to himself for decades.
He claims his brother, James Earl Ray, had ties to the FBI and CIA and fled Memphis after the assassination out of fear for his life.
The book also discusses the boys' early life in Quincy and Alton.
James Earl Ray died of liver disease in Nashville in 1998 while serving a 99-year prison sentence for King's 1968 murder.
2nd
Hilary's FBI FILES
The 967 FBI files found in the White House
Is your name here?
Do you think these are all they had?
1. Carol Blym Aarhus
2. Hellen Theresa Abdoo
3. Lunelisa Suralta Abiera
4. Douglas Conrad Adair
5. David Spears Addington
6. Joseph Whitehouse Agin
7. Frederick Leonard Ahearn
8. Clifford Thomas Alderman
9. Gary Warren Aldrich
10. Cara Leslie Alexander
11. James William Allen
12. James Newby Allison
13. Melissa Co Allison
14. David Ernest Alsoorook
15. Richard Gus Alvarez
16. Douglas Randolph Ambrose
17. Deborah Ann Amend
18. Joan Marie Amick
19. L. Linus Amorsingh
20. Ann Elizabeth Anderson
21. Curtis Wiley Anderson
22. Debra Rae Anderson
23. Delores Mary Anderson
24. Ellis Alphonso Anderson
25. John David Anderson
26. Marcy Jeanne Anderson
27. Rebecca Lee Anderson
28. Stanton Dean Anderson
29. Susan Elizabeth Anderson
30. Gary John Andres
31. Edward Appell
32. Michele Lorraine Archambault
33. Kirsten Clark Ardleigh
34. Jacqueline Grace Arends
35. Linda Lugenia Arey
36. Jocelyn Argarrin
37. Rebecca Anne Armendariz
38. Robert Kelly Armfield
39. Patricia Sue Aronsson
40. Leslye Alene Arsht
41. Marion Louise Asare
42. Hosea Asberry Jr.
43. Marc Anthony Ashley
44. M. Adel Aslani-Far
45. Michael James Astrue
46. Carolyn Florence Atkinson
47. Dennis Maurice Atkinson
48. Lisa Benkert Auel
49. Barbara McCauley Augustine
50. Tammy Bloo Aupperle
51. Susan Marie Auther
52. Leonid Avrashov
53. Donald Belton Ayer
54. Polly Barragan Baca
55. Charles Edward Bacarisse
56. Cristena Lynn Bach
57. Christine Anne Baer
58. Shelton Ray Bagley
59. Mary Stewa Smallpage Bailey
60. Shirley Doretha Bailey
61. Yvonne Gil Bailey
62. Barbara Wash Baker
63. James Addison Baker
64. Jane E. Baker
65. Kathleen Margaret Baker
66. Sarah Lane Baker
67. Kyle D. Bakke
68. Jean Ann Balestrieri
69. Deborah Balfour
70. Roy Kenneth Baliles
71. Patricia Kristeen Ballard
72. Patria Gaspar Balod
73. Charlie Will Banks
74. Michael Philip Baril
75. Kathryn Anne Barletta
76. Joan Marie Barnes
77. Karen Lee Barnes
78. Edward Barnett
79. Edward Barnett
80. Jane Elizabeth Barnett
81. Patricia Ann Barnett
82. Roosevelt Barnhart
83. Bart Christopher Barre
84. Donna Louise Barron
85. Shanette Michaele Barth
86. Herbert Henry Bartlett
87. Gregory David Bassuk
88. Paul William Bateman
89. Charles Edward Bates
90. David Quentin Bates
91. Lorri Jeanine Bates
92. Melinda Naumann Bates
93. Rochelle Heidi Batt
94. Lisa Maria Battaglia
95. Frankie Battle
96. Gayle Bauer
97. Julia Harmon Baughman
98. Matthew Scott Baumeyer
99. Amy Meredith Baumstein
100. Kathleen Elizabeth Baur
101. Brian Callaway Baynard
102. Chester Paul Beach
103. Eileen Ferne Bean
104. Jayson Frank Beatty
105. Thomas Luther Becherer
106. Heather Marie Beckel
107. Jean Loretta Becker
108. Jerome David Becker
109. Catherine Therese Bedard
110. James Edward Beers
111. Patrick Adam Beers
112. Kateri Ray Belby
113. James George Bell
114. Lillie Mae Bell
115. Louise Helen Bell
116. Mariam McKowen Bell
117. Robert Gregory Bell
118. Antonio Benedi
119. Mary Lee Benjamin
120. Caroline Clare Berezny
121. Eric Berry
122. Retha Elizabeth Berryman
123. Rudy Max Beserra
124. Anita Carol Bevacqua
125. James Michael Bieda
126. Elizabeth Ann Binion
127. Mary Ursala Binns
128. Debra Bird
129. Danica Bizic
130. Mark Gustav Bizic
131. David Lee Black
132. Judy Ann Black
133. Barbar Ann Blackburn
134. Virginia Mae Blackwell
135. Pearlena Blake
136. Marion Clifton Blakey
137. Anthony David Blankley
138. Suzette A. Blodgett
139. Gary Robert Blumenthal
140. Elizabeth Iden Board
141. George Hubert Bohrer
142. Joshua Brester Bolton
143. Carolina Orgeira Bonino
144. Debra Anita Boozer
145. Susan Aileen Borchard
146. Gladys Rebecca Bostick
147. Sharon Marie Botwin
148. James Bowen
149. Janet Virginia Bowen
150. Ann Rosemary Bracken
151. Frank Alexander Bracken
152. Margaret Louise Brackney
153. Ellen Lorraine Bradley
154. James Scott Brady
155. Katherine Chrystie Brady
156. Phillip Donley Brady
157. Barnaby Lair Brasseux
158. Harleen Marie Breaux
159. Richard Carroll Breeden
160. Stacey Lynn Breen
161. Carl Ray Breining
162. Bettina Christina Brena
163. Marjorie Anne Bridgman
164. Terheran Janes Brighthaupt
165. Cecil Luther Briscoe
166. James Elmore Briscoe Jr.
167. Raymond Joseph Briscuso Jr.
168. Ann Cathey Brock
169. Crystal Lynn Brooks
170. John Henry Brooks
171. Sylvena Carter Brooks
172. Michelle Marie Brott
173. Cornell Marshall Brown
174. Emmett Robinson Brown
175. Ennis Waldon Brown
176. Gregory Payne Brown
177. James Brown
178. Ronald James Brown
179. Steven Lee Brown
180. Susan Karen Brown
181. Sara Ann Browne
182. Patricia Mack Bryan
183. Chester Corbett Bryant Jr.
184. Todd Glenn Buchholz
185. Catherine Eleanor Bull
186. Katja Bullock
187. Jean Marie Bunton
188. Mary Lee Burch
189. Rita Daiva Bureika
190. Mary Jane Burgess
191. Janice Less Burmeister
192. Nealton Jay Burnham
193. Francine Maria Burns
194. Michael Joseph Busch
195. Sandra Kay Bushue
196. Bruce Irving Bustard
197. Judith Ann Butler
198. Lisa Butler
199. Renea Annette Butler
200. Dianne Burch Butterfield
201. William Joseph Butterfield
202. Jay Scott Bybee
203. Phyllis McCommons Byrne
204. Margaret M. Caccia
205. William Burns Caldwell
206. Lane Felice Calhoon
207. Nicholas E. Calio
208. Lorraine R. Camarano
209. Martha Reed Cammack
210. Frances Loretta Campbell
211. Joyce Diane Campbell
212. Sarah Louise Campbell
213. Victoria Zima Campbell
214. Shirley Ann Campolieto
215. Jose Julio Canales
216. William James Canary
217. Daniel Lee Carlson
218. Kathleen Shaughnessy Carlson
219. Nichol Leigh Carlson
220. Terry Alan Carmack
221. Ann Mildred Carmichael
222. Kelly Hawkins Carnes
223. David Michael Carney
224. Howard Albion Carney
225. Lucy Cole Carney
226. Andrew Michael Carpendale
227. Judith Lee Carpenter
228. Margaret Van Wagenen Carpenter
229. Bobby Gene Carr
230. Christopher Steven Carr
231. Edwin George Carr
232. Michael Damon Carr
233. Sallie Wenner Carr
234. John Gerand Carriere III
235. Flora Jenice Carroll
236. Jeremy Ethridge Carroll
237. Mary Kate Carroll
238. Rita Ravel Carroll
239. Sally Claude Carroll
240. Allyson Webb Carter
241. Russell Edward Carter
242. Tommy Jackson Carter
243. James Carville
244. Bayani Garica Casanova
245. Erlinda Elizabeth Casey
246. Sheryll Denise Cashin
247. Daniel Anthony Casse
248. Ann Marie Castagnetti
249. Anita Sanabria Castelo
250. Shara Ann Castle
251. Joseph Nelson Cate
252. Roland Harrison Caton
253. Ann Marie Cattalini
254. George Gray Caudill Jr.
255. Julian Attaway Cave
256. Sara Joan Cavendish
257. Carolyn Marie Cawley
258. Gregory Philip Celemtano
259. Clarissa Cerda
260. Joseph Walter Cerrell
261. Dolores Lumina Chacon
262. Alyson Hillary Chadwick
263. Richard Lee Chambers
264. Julia Eden Chamovitz
265. Florence Champagne
266. Alfred Wei-Kaung Chang
267. Jennifer Chang
268. James Daniels Chapman
269. John Cranbrook Chapman
270. Robert Thomas Chapman
271. Thomas Leo Chappelear
272. Logan Stanley Chapell
273. Peter Farnam Charles
274. Robert Bruce Charles
275. Tyron Leon Chase
276. Keredith Ferguson Chen
277. Mary Elizabeth Child
278. Douglas Wayne Chirdon
279. Jill Melissa Chodorov
280. Gloria Jean Chonka
281. Theresa Marie Christoff
282. Katherine Clare Chumachenko
283. Marjorie Heins Ciarlante
284. James William Cicconi
285. Aida Marie Cipriani
286. Sharon Elizabeth Clark
287. Paul Clarke
288. Elizabeth Hope Clayton
289. Catherine Cleale
290. Phillip Patrick Cleary
291. John Anthony Cline
292. Mary Berta Cobbs
293. William Mathaniel Cobbs
294. Lawanda Anntinette Cobey
295. Terri Lynnette Cobey
296. Jane Rusk Cocking
297. Scott Andrew Coffina
298. Bennedict Simms Cohen
299. Karen Joyce Cohn
300. Noah Phillip Cohrssen
301. Clifford William Colby
302. Lisa Tower Coldwell
303. Herbert Holt Coleman
304. Christopher David Colley
305. Adam Reed Collick
306. Gail Arden Collins
307. Laura Jean Collins
308. Paul Joseph Collins Jr.
309. Tracey Regene Collins
310. Elizabeth Margaret Compton
311. Jenny Marie Condlin
312. Karen Ann Connell
313. Patricia Lynn Conrad
314. David Lawrence Cook
315. Michelle Diane Cook
316. Julie Cooke
317. B. Jay Cooper
318. Janet Felton Cooper
319. Marshall Cooper
320. Susan Ann Cornick
321. Michelle Lynn Coster
322. Julia Marie Cottrell 323. Catherine Crowley Coughlin
324. Jack L. Courtemanche
325. Pamela Jean Covington
326. Carl David Covitz
327. Emma Jean Cox
328. Patricia Helen Cox
329. Susan Alpert Coyle
330. Charlene C. Cozart
331. Lynn Allison Crable
332. Bernard James Craig
333. Graven Winslow Craig
334. Judy A. D. Craig
335. Kelly Ann Crawford
336. Danny Lee Crippen
337. Caroline Madden Critchfield
338. Traci Michelle Critton
339. Francez Gabrey Croft
340. Carol Catherine Cronheim
341. Stephanie Marguerite Cross
342. Janie Shaw Crouse
343. Matthew Elton Crow
344. Shelly Lynn Crow
345. Amanda Faith Crumley
346. Allison Wheatland Cryor
347. Laszlo Thomas Csorba
348. Connie Kay Cudd
349. Lue Culbreath
350. Lue Addie Culbreath
351. Leslee Blair Cullen
352. Arthur Boggess Culvahouse
353. Claudia Lynn Cummins
354. Erin Michelle Cunningham
355. Carolyn Curiel
356. Alease Selma Curley
357. Betty Williams Currie
358. Dorothy Jane Curry
359. Joseph Philmore Curseen
360. Theodore Charles Curtin
361. Emily Jane Curtis
362. Janet Flora Curtis
363. Richard Edward Curtis
364. Jeffrey Andrew Cushman
365. Ellen Mary Custer
366. Jennifer Lee Cutshall
367. Rachel Rae Cutshall
368. W. Bowman Cutter
369. Brian Daniel Dailey
370. Billy Ray Dale
371. Sharon Ruth Dale
372. John Joseph Daley
373. Alison Michelle Daly
374. Dolores Margot Daly
375. John Augustine Daly
376. David T. Damn
377. Julie Mead Damgard
378. Kristin Ann Damico
379. Timothy Edward Dana
380. Stephanie Clune Dance
381. Justine Dandrea
382. Brenda Joyce Daniels
383. Hillard Daniels
384. Hillard Daniels Jr.
385. John David Dannerbeck
386. Stephen Ira Danzansky
387. Douglas Alexander Davidson
388. Arlene Poindexter Davis
389. Carrie Lou Davis
390. Ethela Anna Davis
391. James Davis
392. Mark William Davis
393. Patrick Joseph Davis
394. Porter Manvel Davis
395. Reba Holland Davis
396. Samuel Davis
397. William Hal Davis
398. Calvin Dawkins
399. Rhett Brewer Dawson
400. Susan Bradshaw Dawson
401. Benjamin Paul Dean
402. Bernice Elizabeth Dean
403. Donald Ray Dean
404. Joan Chenery Decain
405. Sarah Gawthmey Decamp
406. Kris Marie Dee
407. William Edward Deese Sr.
408. Linda Susan Dehart
409. Michael Erin Dehart
410. Stacey Kay Del Grosso
411. Dorothy Rhea Dellinger
412. David Franklin Demarest
413. Susan Russel Denniston
414. Mary Kathryn Dewhirt
415. Julia Lynne Diaz
416. Francis Joseph Dietz
417. Kristine Marie Dietz
418. William Donald Dietz
419. Richard William Diguiseppe
420. Daniel Clifford Diller
421. Diana Elizabeth Dillon
422. Elma Sara Dirolf
423. Viola Elizabeth Dixon
424. Faith Elaine Doffermyre
425. Juanita Mae Doggett
426. Eileen B. Doherty
427. Anthony Rossi Dolan
428. Marla Murphy Donahue
429. Helen Colle Donaldson
430. Frank Joseph Donatelli
431. Charles Anthony Donovan
432. Teresa Ann Donovan
433. Peggy Ann Dooley
434. Nancy Patricia Dorn
435. Celestine Smith Dorsey
436. Matthew John Dorsey
437. Keri Ann Douglas
438. John Joseph Douglass
439. Lawrence Clifton Downes
440. Ingried Marlene Downs
441. Megan Eileen Doyle
442. Diane Elizabeth Dracos
443. Philip Charles Droege
444. Christopher Morin Dube
445. Kenneth Marc Duberstein
446. Edward George Dudley
447. Stanley Lawrence Dufrane
448. Patricia Joan Dugan Pigott
449. Joseph Patrick Duggan
450. Juanita Donaghey Duggan
451. Claudia Ann Dumm
452. Robert Michael Duncan
453. Debra Roma Dunn
454. Elizabeth Brooks Dunn
455. Janey Laroy Dunnington
456. Charles Kerwin Dutcher
457. Douglas Patton Duvall
458. Jacqueline Andrea Duvall
459. James Kenneth Dyson
460. Lerma Dimaculangan Ecle
461. Laura Hersloff Eddy
462. Jean Rochelle Edeson
463. Joan Kay Edwards
464. William Kenneth Edwards
465. Johnnie Lewis Eiland
466. Lucy Mae Elkins
467. Cathleen Marie Ellis
468. Nancy Gaylon Ellis
469. Pamela Koehler Elmets
470. Sara Currence Emery
471. Daniel Joseph Engler
472. Marcia Jean Enthoven
473. Amy Heydenriech Erben
474. Jane Isaacson Erkenbeck
475. Christina Lucille Erland
476. Clark Kent Ervin
477. Magdalena Lanuza Esmedia
478. Audrey Esquivel
479. Gwen Lorraine Estep
480. James William Estevez
481. Gregory Charles Evans
482. Madalne E. Evans
483. Thomas Coo Evans
484. Wanda Madeline Evans
485. Mary Anne Fackelman-Min
486. Laura Rice Farish
487. William Stamps Farish
488. Chad Dalen Farmer
489. Henry Edward Farmer
490. Julie Elizabeth Faulk
491. Linda Faulkner
492. Jill Suzanne Faunce
493. Jennifer Lynn Fearing
494. John Fee
495. Charles Wakefield Feeney
496. Sarah Shill Fehrer
497. Alvin Stephen Felzenberg
498. Gary Ellis Fendler
499. Anne Claud Fennell
500. Andrew Ferguson
501. Rogers Lee Ferguson
502. Vincent Jason Ferrara
503. Susan Beatrice Fertig-Dukes
504. Valry Kei Fetrow
505. Jeanie Lucille Figg
506. Christopher Dana Finch
507. Heidi Ann Fincken
508. Donald Cameron Findlay
509. Aileen Beth Finger
510. Laurie Ann Firestone
511. John Howard Fish
512. Everlene Beatrice Fisher
513. James Richard Fisher
514. Gregory Harland Fitch
515. James Alan Fitzhenry
516. Sharon Ann Fitzpatrick
517. Nicholas Ruster Flangler
518. Martin Alvin Flannes
519. Frances Steele Flautt
520. Sheli Estelle Fleming
521. Debra Ann Fletcher
522. Jeanne Diane Fletcher
523. Lee Fletcher
524. Lynne Margaret Fletcher
525. Marilyn Anne Fletcher
526. Heather Gwen Flick
527. John Allison Flippen
528. Robert Anthony Flower
529. Theodore James Focht
530. David Louis Fogel
531. Joe Louis Fogle
532. John Patrick Foley
533. Matthew Todd Foley
534. Clayton Sem Fong
535. Jessie Tsui-Shih Fong
536. Steven Mark Foonberg
537. Joseph Ford
538. Joseph Kenneth Ford
539. Clifton Leo Foreman
540. Michelle Catherine Fort
541. Gary Layne Foster
542. Patricia Helen Foster
543. Paul Thomas Foster
544. Andrew James Francis
545. Mark Alexander Frantz
546. Charles Martin Free
547. Judith Bjorkman Freeman
548. Myra Bright Freeman
549. Mary Eliza Fritz
550. Karen Hart Fuller
551. Ysella Ayn Fulton
552. Diana Elizabeth Furtchtgott-Ro
553. Elizabeth Brinton Gable
554. Christophe William Galen
555. John David Galetta
556. Alice Mae Gamble
557. Kelley Lynn Gannon
558. Craig James Garnder
559. John Stepher Gardner
560. Margaret Danaher Garikes
561. Audrey Joyce Garlington
562. Barbara Jean Garner
563. Sonja Helena Garner
564. Charles Henry Garrett
565. Tracy Davis Garrett
566. Tyler Garvens
567. Carolyn Sue Gay
568. Kristen Moreau Gear
569. Ronald Rudolph Geisler
570. Spencer Evan Geissinger
571. Christopher L. George
572. Joey Russe George
573. Leah Mercer Geraghty
574. Constance Gerrard
575. Gary Jay Gershowitz
576. Thelma D. Geter
577. Shahrokh Abdol Ghaffduai
578. Doris Michel Gibbons
579. Fannie Gibson
580. Joan Ghering Gibson
581. Stevan William Gibson
582. Michael Louis Gilbert
583. Reves Lane Gillespie
584. Katherine James Gillette
585. Allyson Bertrand Gilliland
586. Karen Rosalie Giorno
587. David Lawrence Gitlin
588. Jon David Glassman
589. Alixe Reed Glen
590. Ellen Janyce Gober
591. Karen Lynn Goff
592. Gail Theresa Golay
593. Catherine Anne Goldberg
594. Julie Anne Goldberg
595. Terry Warren Good
596. Martha Hodges Goodwin
597. Janet Virginia Gordon
598. Dolores Edelin Gorham
599. Teresa Agnes Gorman
600. Stanley P. Gorski Jr.
601. Kenneth Earl Grace
602. Robert Edward Grady
603. Lottie Boatwright Graham
604. Juan Ramon Granados
605. Eula Dean Graves
606. Annie Mae Green
607. Eva Harmon Green
608. Galen Homer Green
609. Kenneth James Green
610. Wanda Ree Green
611. Mildred Ethel Greenwell
612. Ophelia Louise Grier
613. Elizabeth Round Guyon
614. Keith Dennis Hahn
615. Cleo Elizabeth Hall
616. Richard Lee Hall
617. Walter Louis Hamilton
618. Kenneth Lester Hammonds
619. Edward Arnold Hampton
620. Larry Eugene Handeland
621. Dale Franklin Haney
622. Teresa Lynn Harding
623. Sallie Ida Harling
624. Michael Edward Harman
625. Claudia Mae Harris
626. Delores Ann Harris
627. Gregory Darnell
628. Rosco Harris
629. Joseph Emile Hartge
630. Qamar Hasan
631. Robert Lee Hash
632. Gladys Beulah Hawkins
633. Richard Paul Hays
634. Mary Lee Head
635. Clayton Lemuel Heard
636. Andrew Charles Hegedus
637. Frank Ralph Henderson
638. Muriel Shiell Henderson
639. Linda Gayle Hennessy
640. Samuel Allen Henry
641. Charles Francis Herr
642. Mildred Juanita Hill
643. Loyce Hilliard
644. Arthur Joey Holman 645. Claria Elizabeth Honemond
646. Luvenia Palmer Hood
647. John Edward Hopcroft
648. Anne Courtenay Horel
649. Doris Sharon Hoskins
650. Evertt D. Houser
651. Robert C. Houser
652. Morris Emanuel Howe
653. Willie C. Howell
654. Francis J. Huber
655. Cornelious Hudley
656. Maureen A. Hudson
657. Williazm Leonard Imes
658. Bobby Ray Inman
659. Charles Carnel Isom
660. Daryl Clinton Isom
661. Betty Lee Jackson
662. Cyntia Denise Jackson
663. Darrell Cleveland Jackson
664. Raymond Gilbert
665. David Elmer Jeremiah
666. Airel Johnson
667. Barbara Jean Johnson
668. Celestine Coleman Johnson
669. James M. Johnson
670. Rogenia Tomines Johnson
671. Roy Johnson Jr.
672. Selena Virginia Johnson
673. Paula Collette Johnson-White
674. Carl A. Jones
675. Harold Jackson Jones
676. Margaret Marie Jones
677. Robert Clinton Jones
678. Roland Jones
679. William Jones
680. Dominador Teodore Julian
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684. Mildred Chandler Keel
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687. Thomas Kennedy
688. Janet Ellen Kenoyer
689. Andrew S. Kerr
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691. Linda Kay Kinsman
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693. Walter George Krause
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696. Joseph David Kunysz
697. William Frederick Lackman Jr.
698. Joseoh Salvador Lagana
699. Patricia Ann Lamar
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702. Bessie Mae Lattimore
703. Michael Daniel Lawn
704. Ang Shiao Lay
705. Mattie Oree Leacraft
706. Mary Susan Leander
707. Dora Lee
708. Timothy William Lewandowski
709. Nicole Renee Lindsay
710. William Fuller Lines
711. Richard Little
712. Raymond Thomas Littleton
713. Markk David Los
714. Janes Arthur Lowery
715. Susanna M. Ludwig
716. John Charles Marsh
717. Thomas Martinez
718. Arthur Sylvanus Mathews
719. Dean William McCauley
720. Frederick Herbert McCray
721. John Berkeley McCready
722. James Irwin McDaniel
723. Machael R. McElhaney
724. Thelma McGee
725. Robert Lee McIntyre
726. Bertha Ross McKenzie
727. Owen Corle McKenzie
728. Estella McKnight
729. John Henry McKnight
730. Cornelia Jewell Means
731. Manuel Anthony Mendoza
732. Oscar William Merritt
733. Jason Deleon Wilton Miller
734. Kathy Mirabella
735. Vito Mitrione
736. Kevin Edward Moley
737. Delores Amy Monroe
738. Leatha McGhee Moore
739. Jeter Anthony Morris
740. Joseph Breneman Morris
741. Suzanne Marie Morris
742. Lawrence Donald Moy
743. Scott Anthony Munck
744. Felice Michael Muollo
745. Joseph Donald Myers
746. Kenneth William Nell
747. Sylvia Nelson
748. Mildred Newman
749. Arlette Nickens
750. Andre Norwood
751. Ellen Eckert Olcott
752. James William Oliver
753. Jerry Ray Orfield
754. Mike A. Ortega
755. James William Owens
756. Theodore Owens
757. Frank Padgett
758. Baily Pair
759. Herbert Leon Pankey
760. Diane Levern Parker
761. Willis Rudolph Parrotte
762. John Gerald Patten
763. Clara Mae Patterson
764. Ben Douglas Payne
765. Rose Marie Peck
766. John Walter Peggins
767. Clyde Robert Perkins Jr.
768. Deborah Wood Perroy
769. Janet M. Philips
770. Janet McConnell Christia Philips
771. Joseph Philip Pistorio
772. Polly Frances Pitchford
773. Margaret Pitt
774. James Constantine Plakas
775. Lucia Portanova
776. Frank Reginald Posey
777. Floyd Lee Price
778. Francis Floyd Price
779. Lucille Bryant Price
780. Lee Prince
781. Carlo Nicholas Proctor
782. Mary Callie Proctor
783. Domingo Amor Quicho
784. Roderick Earl Quick
785. Ondra Carl Rawls
786. James M. Reagan
787. Robert Harrison Reever
788. James M. Reid
789. Cheryl Ann Reynolds
790. Daniel Michael Rhea
791. Earlene F. Rick
792. Leonard Franklin Riddle
793. Oscar Eugene Riggleman
794. Christopher Callen Riggs
795. Kitty Lane Roberts
796. William Eugene Roberts
797. Charles Barnwell Robinson
798. Joseph Joel Rock
799. Carl Eugene Rodman
800. James Raymond Rogers
801. Linda Margaret Rogers
802. Alfonso Molina Roman
803. Eugene Romaniello
804. Noel Mason Rose
805. J. James Donald Rosenberg
806. James Donald Rosenberger
807. Cassandra Alfelro Rosier
808. Ronald William Roskens
809. Elizabeth Anne Round
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811. Ronald Earl Russell
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813. David Russell Sager
814. Rayford Anthony Sampson
815. Ricardo Javier Sanvictores
816. G. Timothy Saunders
817. George Everett Saunders
818. Joseph Lewis Sawyer
819. Marsha Lucille Scamihorn
820. Elisabeth M. Schilling
821. Ludwig Adolph Schneider
822. J. Odell Scott
823. Reginald Antonia Scott
824. M. Dennis Sculimbrene
825. Michael Girard Sedlock
826. Charles Raymond Seltzer
827. Sheree Francine Senn
828. Raymond Jacob Seroski
829. John Douglas Seward
830. Homer Nelson Sewell
831. Julie Marilyn Shae
832. Ralph Emerson Shaffer
833. Russell Alan Shaffer
834. Shirley Mae Shannon
835. Michael A. Sharp
836. Thomas Joseph Shea
837. Dennis Charles Shipp
838. Cynthia L. Shourds
839. Wendy Wamsley Showers
840. Ivaniz Moraes Silva
841. Larry Bernard Simpkins
842. Robert Marshall Simpson
843. Wandra E. Simpson
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845. Claudia Virginia Skinner
846. Florine Jones Skipwith
847. Gregory Moneta Sleet
848. Arnette Frost Slight
849. Bernice W. Smith
850. Edith Maralit Smith
851. James Marshall Smith
852. Matthew Dunlap Smith
853. Virginia L. Southerland
854. Dana William Spencer
855. Delbert Leon Spurlock Jr.
856. Bruce Lillard Steward
857. Donald Lillard Steward
858. Sean Jerome Steward
859. Annie Stewart
860. Sean Jerome Stewart
861. Jennifer Streets
862. William Oliver Studeman
863. George Edward Sturgess
864. Matthew Henry Sullivan
865. Michael John Sullivan
866. Michael Turner Summerlin
867. Margaret Mary Suntum
868. Marylin Annette Swan
869. Melva Dramaine Swann
870. Wilbert Lee Swann
871. Hugh Taggart Jr.
872. Milton Richard Talley
873. Matthew John Tanis
874. A.C. Tarver
875. Chinita Denise Taylor
876. Dorie Catherine Taylor
877. James Harland Taylor
878. Joseph Louis Taylor
879. Kevin Wade Tennyson
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882. Edward Allen Thomas
883. Edwin R. Thomas III
884. Gerald Ronald Thomas
885. Harold Walter Thomas
886. John Silas Thomas
887. Richard Allen Thomas
888. James Edward Thompson
889. Ola Mae Thompson
890. Tina Ann Thorne
891. Anthony Quinton Tillery
892. John Renard Tillery
893. Elizabeth Jane Tipton
894. Kimberly Theresa Toland
895. Edward L. Tolbert
896. Milton Theodore Townsell
897. Joseph Carroll Townsend
898. William Eugene Toyer
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900. Linda R. Tripp
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902. Florine Gilchrist Tyler
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904. Florence Delores Underwood
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906. Shawn Vance
907. Thomas Bradford Vance
908. Ronald Leroy Vandevander
909. Ponifilio Ventresca
910. Vernon McClain Vines
911. Janice H. Vranich
912. Valon J. Wadsworth
913. Sharon E. Wagner
914. Viola Belt Wall
915. Michael Francis Wallace
916. Alexander Wallington
917. John Francis Walsh
918. Peter Henry Walsh
919. Dianne Walters
920. Agnes Charlescraft Warfield
921. Jerome Elijah Warren
922. Anthony Harrison Washington
923. Maurine Elizabeth Washington
924. Ruby Lee Washington
925. Gwendolyn Schroeder Watson
926. Julie A. Watson
927. Julie A. Nash Watson
928. Beatrice Watts
929. William James Wedge
930. John Griffen Weinmann
931. Michael Alan Wells
932. Freances R. Wessel
933. Mark Westcamp
934. Dorothy Marie Whitaker
935. Geneva White
936. Pernell Douglas White
937. Sandra Faye White
938. John Cunningham Whitehead
939. Samuel Purnell Whiting
940. Rosell Whitmyer
941. Sheila Marie Wilkins
942. Carroll Bernard Williams
943. Cynthia Boone Williams
944. Geraldine A. Williams
945. Harry Lee Williams
946. Irvin Martin Williams
947. Louis Williams Jr.
948. Patricia Williams
949. Sherman A. Williams
950. Debbie Brown Willis
951. Charles Michael Wilson
952. Henry Dennis Wilson
953. Waymond Maurice Wilson
954. Barbars Ann Windsor
955. Steven Andrew Wingate
956. John Oliver Wise
957. Nettie Sanders Wise
958. Lafayette Alvin Witherspoon
959. Lafayette Witherspoon Jr.
960. Shirley Chandler Womack
961. C. Norman Wood
962. Emma Elizabeth Yates
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965. Ralph Robert Yost
966. Patricia Luetta Young
967. Richard Neil Zare
| joeb
Registered: 11/14/05
Posts: 2,929 | | 06/16/08 at 02:16 AM | #24 |
http://www.opednews.com/articles/Omininus-ruling-by-Nebrask-by-Michael-Richardson-080615-185.html
| June 15, 2008 Ominous ruling by Nebraska Supreme Court against Black Panther in COINTELPRO case puts new trial request in doubt By Michael Richardson 
Ed Poindexter
The Nebraska Supreme Court denied a pro se parole bid by Ed Poindexter in a decision many expected was a foregone conclusion. However, in denying a request for parole eligibility the state high court signaled the difficulty Poindexter faces later this year when his request for a new trial is argued by Lincoln attorney Robert Bartle. Poindexter was convicted in 1971 for the bombing murder of an Omaha policeman, Larry Minard, in a controversial trial marred by conflicting police testimony, withheld evidence, and tainted assistance by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Poindexter and co-defendant Mondo we Langa (formerly David Rice) both deny any involvement in the crime and were both targets of FBI director J. Edgar Hoover under the infamous Operation COINTELPRO which targeted the Black Panthers for "no holds barred" treatment. Poindexter's request for a new trial comes after sophisticated vocal analysis by voice analyst Tom Owen in 2006 revealed that the confessed bomber, 15 year-old Duane Peak, did not make the emergency call that lured Minard to his death. Peak implicated Poindexter and Mondo we Langa making his credibility critical…and leaving an unknown caller at large. Retired Omaha detective Robert Pheffer also contradicted his own trial testimony about finding dynamite that was allegedly used in the fatal bomb in a dramatic and emotion-charged hearing in Douglas County District Court last year before Judge Russell Bowie. At the time of the trial Omaha was gripped by racial tension. Former Nebraska governor Frank Morrison was Poindexter's court-appointed public defender. Morrison described Omaha in a 2003 deposition. "There was tremendous racial feeling. North Omaha was one of the hottest spots in the whole United States for racial violence. In fact, when in 1966 we had to call out the National Guard, they set fire to North Omaha and we had to bring in the National Guard and take over to preserve order. There was terrible racial feeling….I don't have words to describe it, but there was terrible discrimination and hatred of African-Americans, terrible." The "terrible racial feeling" Morrison described was fueled in part by COINTELPRO dirty tricks initiated by the FBI to disrupt the Black Panthers. Both Ed Pointdexter and Mondo we Langa had been secret targets of Hoover's clandestine operation but the compromised role of the FBI was unknown by Omaha police who were assisted by the federal agents in the search for Minard's killers and unknown by jurors who convicted Poindexter unaware of Hoover's secret directives against the Black Panthers. The FBI, in cooperation with Omaha Assistant Chief of Police Glenn Gates, kept the recording of the emergency call from defense attorneys while the jurors who decided the fate of the two Black Panther leaders never heard the voice of the anonymous caller. A secret COINTELPRO memo obtained after the 1971 trial under the Freedom of Information Act revealed that release of the emergency tape recording would be "prejudicial to the police murder trial" case against Poindexter and Langa. The jurors also never knew that Peak, the confessed bomber, brokered a deal where he served 33 months of juvenile detention and then walked free in exchange for his testimony against Poindexter and Langa. Nor did the jurors know that Raleigh House, the supplier of the dynamite, would never be formally charged and only spent one night in jail before being released on his own signature because the police wanted to claim Langa supplied the dynamite. In fact, Omaha Police Captain Murdock Platner did indeed make such a claim in sworn testimony to a Congressional committee contradicting actual trial testimony about the dynamite. Details about the compromised FBI role in the case did not come until years after the trial and only judges, not jurors, have since been told about the withheld evidence, conflicting and contradictory police testimony, about the deal with Peak, and about the voice analysis that contradicts the story of the state's chief murderous witness against Poindexter. The Nebraska Supreme Court ruled that Poindexter's bid for parole must fail because the Board of Pardons has not commuted his life sentence to a term of years thus depriving the Board of Parole the ability to grant a parole request. In responding to Poindexter's arguments that numerous other prisoners serving life sentences have been released on parole after serving less time than he has the court said that a commutation of sentence was a "discretionary state privilege" and that even if "granted generously in the past" Poindexter had no legal entitlement to similar consideration. While the expected ruling against parole for Poindexter does not presage the outcome of his pending new trial request some of the language in the decision does suggest that attorney Robert Bartle will have his work cut out for him during oral arguments scheduled for this fall. In the ten-page decision there were three references to the underlying crime, the murder of Larry Minard. In the opening summary of the decision the Nebraska Supreme Court properly noted, "In 1971, a jury convicted Edward Poindexter of first degree murder." However, two later references were less neutral and potentially betray a bias of the court to the prosecution case. The court discussed sentencing statutes, "in 1970 when Poindexter committed his offense." In the conclusion of the decision the court repeated the bias and used the statement "when Poindexter committed his crime" to describe the killing of Minard. Nebraska newspapers, which have not reported on the COINTELPRO manipulation of the case against Poindexter, brandished headlines about Cop-Killer Poindexter Denied Parole following the language of the court decision. Meanwhile, Ed Poindexter and Mondo we Langa remain imprisoned at the maximum security Nebraska State Penitentiary serving life sentences while three of Minard's killers, Duane Peak, the confessed bomber; Raleigh House, the supplier of the dynamite; and the unknown emergency line caller walk free. Last week in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, federal Magistrate Christine Nolan recommended that Black Panther Albert Woodfox, serving a life sentence at Angola State Prison, should be granted a new trial. U.S. District Judge James Brady has yet to rule on Nolan's recommendation. The new trial recommendation followed a state court denial of a new trial request last month for co-defendant Herman Wallace. Wallace and Woodfox were held in solitary confinement for 36 years and only recently have been moved to regular maximum security cells. The two men, leaders in a prison chapter of the Black Panthers, were convicted for the murder of a prison guard during a riot at the prison in 1972 on the testimony of another prisoner released in exchange for testimony against the Panthers. In Nebraska, a decision on Poindexter's request for a new trial is expected later this year. Permission granted to reprint
Authors Bio: Michael Richardson is a freelance writer based in Boston. Richardson writes about politics, election law, human nutrition, ethics, and music. Richardson is also a political consultant on ballot access. | | joeb
Registered: 11/14/05
Posts: 2,929 | | 06/21/08 at 09:33 AM | #25 |
Lawmaker pushes prosecutions in 1946 lynchings
Online Athens, GA - 7 hours ago June 21, 2008
But on Friday, Brooks said he couldn't say whether any of the five identified in a 1946 FBI report will actually be prosecuted. "I cannot guarantee anything ...
Lawmaker sees progress in '46 case Augusta Chronicle
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