Injustice Doesn't Get Any Plainer
Than Leonard Peltier's Case
The Orlando Sentenal Newspaper
Tuesday, February 08, 2000
Charles Reese
For those who were in diapers 25 years ago, Leonard Peltier, who has been rotting away in Leavenworth Prison the past 24 years, was one of the leaders of the American Indian Movement. He was convicted of the murder of two Federal Bureau of Investigation agents during a gun battle involving 30 Indians and later about 150 FBI and other law-enforcement officers.
All indications are that Peltier is innocent and is in fact a victim of a federal-government vendetta. There is a petition for clemency on the president's desk, and supporters of Peltier want people to write the president, urging him to grant it. Peltier is now 54 and in poor health.
The best evidence of his innocence is a statement in the record made by the man who prosecuted Peltier during a hearing on appeals. He said flat-out that the U.S. government did not know who killed the agents. Of course, at Peltier's trial he had looked the jury in the face and said Peltier killed them. The jury that convicted Peltier was not told that two other Indians, also charged with the agents' murders but tried separately, were acquitted after evidence of FBI misconduct was brought to light.
There is plenty of evidence that the FBI disgraced itself by suborning perjury and concealing evidence from Peltier's defense. For example, he was extradited from Canada on the basis of an affidavit from an Indian woman who said she was Peltier's girlfriend and had been at the scene of the shooting. She later admitted that she did not even know Peltier and that she was not present. She said she had been terrorized by the FBI. The U.S. government, however, refused to let her testify to this at Peltier's trial, on the grounds that she was mentally incompetent.
Testimony by a ballistics expert was found, through the Freedom of Information Act years later, to have been inaccurate. The tests did not tie the rifle alleged to have been Peltier's to the killing. There were no witnesses who could testify they saw the killings committed. No one could place Peltier near agents until after the killings. In short, as the prosecutor belatedly admitted, the FBI doesn't know who killed the agents. But government lawyers convicted Peltier and have continued vigorously to oppose clemency or parole.
I used to have great faith in the FBI, but the agency has squandered trust by its misbehavior not only in this case but in several incidents since. Even today the FBI continues to refuse to release 6,000 documents concerning Peltier's case, though there is certainly no danger to national security 25 years after the fact. Unless the next president cleans house and insists on reforms, Americans are going to have to reconcile themselves to the fact the United States, like other authoritarian governments, has a political police.
Peltier has become an international celebrity, and his release has the backing of Amnesty International and Nobel Laureate Bishop Desmond Tutu to cite just two. A book about Peltier is In the Spirit of Crazy Horse by Peter Matthiessen.
But fat lot of good that does. Peltier's suffering the results of a botched prison surgery. He was put into an isolation cell infested with roaches in which to recover.
The issue for us is plain. No American can sleep secure if the U.S. government is allowed to abuse the law, suborn perjury, doctor evidence and lie to cover it up just to seek vengeance.
If you're predisposed to help, the local contact is:
Ms. Carol Avant
The Zuni Connection
3665 S. Orlando Dr.
Suite 132
Sanford, Florida 32773
Phone: 407-320-7318
The Orlando Sentinel Newspaper
Tuesday, February 08, 2000
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