Interview with John Kniffin

John if it is one of the eight people that was indicted by the federal grand jury in Tallahassee Florida in July of this year and conspiracy charges disrupt the Republican National Convention in August when Beverly was one of the 23 people called before the grand jury to testify and spent 35 days along with three other brothers in the Leon County jail for refusing to testify before the grand jury is finally freed by an order from Justice Douglas. The people these people are on a tour of the Ohio area. They just came up from Cincinnati neighborhood speaking in Dayton and on the radio newspaper and so forth the last couple of days just introduce John and let him take it from here John. Scary sad on one of the latest indictees in the government's latest dipshit conspiracy. Officially I suppose on the regional coordinator for the Texas region of Vietnam Veterans Against the War

and the all that don't know a whole lot about DVA I to briefly go into a little bit of background of the V.A. to abuse an organization. First of all we call ourselves Vietnam Veterans Against the War but our position is that everybody in this room and everybody in this country is a veteran of the war in Indochina and is a prisoner of the war Bynoe China. Now I have a book here. It's a point of the Vietnam Veterans Against the War. And the one I'd like to read you it's really short but it was written by a 16 year old high school girl in Norwalk Connecticut. He says I'm a veteran of Vietnam. I've been from Hamburger Hill to the DMZ and back again with a mere flick of my wrist through my own eyes I've seen people tortured bombed burned destroyed beyond any hope of recovery while I sit contentedly and let it go on

TV. Debbie initially came together as an organisation and one of the first national functions we had was called The Winter Soldier Investigation. This happened in Detroit Michigan January 30 1st February 1st and 2nd of 1971. We had veterans from all over the country and from representatives of most of the units that served in Indochina. The ranks ranged all the way from P.S. these two major and the testimony we gave we were trying to counter what the government was doing at that time and trying to say that Lieutenant William Calley and what happened in My Lai was an isolated incident. It was the act of one lieutenant that freaked out and wasn't the order of the day. The film we have tonight goes into that a little more in-depth. We publish this book. It's handled by Beacon Press. And in addition the testimony of the Winter Soldier was reprinted in the April 16 7th Congressional Record. I'll read you one short part of this testimony to give you an idea of some of the things that went on

there. This was by Lieutenant Mark Lennox who was with the 9th Infantry Division in Vietnam. He says that in November of 968 in an area called the wagon wheel which is northwest of Saigon while on a routine search and destroy mission gunships which were providing security cover for us in case we had any contact and were circling overhead. Well no contact was made in the gunships got bored so they made a gun run on a hooch with many guns and rockets. They left the area we found one dead baby. A very young child very young in its mother's arms. We found a baby girl about 3 years old also dead. Because these people were bored they were just sick of flying around doing nothing. When it was reported to battalion the only reprimand was to put two bodies on the body came on board and add them up with the rest of the dead people. There was no reprimand. There was nothing. We tried to call the gunships off but there was nothing you could do. He made his run and dropped his ordinance and left. And there we were a man.

The mother was of course hysterical how would you like it if somebody shot your baby. And there was nothing we could do man I just watched it nothing happened. I have no idea what happened to the helicopter pilot or any of the other gunships. It was gone. Things like this happen. I'm sure more than once because if I saw it I know a lot of other veterans who aren't here saw it. And this is why we have to stop the war because not only are we killing our brothers and sisters in the armed services but brothers on the other side we're killing innocent people may an instance of the INS who were just standing by and happen to be at that place at that time and for no other reason than one that dead. The position of the V.A. had to be at that time. Was that a lot of vets had come back to this country very disillusioned by their participation in the war in Indochina. And we understood that we had been sent to Vietnam to preserve democracy and we've been turned into murderers. But we hadn't really equated it with the social conditions here in the United States is the idea to be continued to grow as an organization as

we continued to rap with our brothers and sisters in the community. Then we realized that the war in Vietnam didn't happen in a vacuum. It happened as a direct result of what's going on in this country. But the racism that we were raised with in our schools the racism that we were taught in the military caused what happened in My Lai and cause what happens in Indochina every day. The next national action of the V.A. to be at that time was in April of 1071. We called it a limited incursion into Washington D.C. which is a military term that you probably hear an awful lot. We made a limited incursion into Laos and Cambodia. Now. At the time TV had to be first came together the government's official policy was that they'll just ignore us and maybe will go away. We went to Washington D.C. and turned in our decorations in protest of what has happened in Indochina what's going on in this country today. It made a profound impact on the media and we got an awful lot of media

coverage. So the government found it a little bit hard to simply ignore us. So their position at that time was that they're not really veterans. We don't read such terms in newspapers is use in hippie attire pseudo veterans alleged veterans etc.. So it became a standing policy that we would never go anywhere without some documentation as proof of our service in Indochina. We were in Washington D.C. for Dewey Canyon three it became the practice of some of the brothers there. As this photograph shows up in their DD 214 their military identity cards on the front of their uniforms. So there was no doubt in anybody's mind that came up to them that they were exactly what they pretended to be they were exactly what they said they were. They were veterans of Indochina and they were speaking from first hand testimony. The indictments against us are logical escalation of the government's policies when it didn't work to ignore us when it didn't work to deny our existence.

When Didn't work to arrest us in regions and states all over the country. The next thing they had to do was a conspiracy. This is a conspiracy but it's a conspiracy against the people here in the United States. And we went before a federal grand jury in Tallahassee Florida. We were summoned to appear before them on July 10th. The date of the beginning of the Democratic Convention we told them at that time that we felt the grand jury was being conveyed convened as a misuse of grand jury power that the grand jury was being used as a tool to stop us from going to Miami Florida to participate in democratic convention the Republican National Convention. The response was This is purely a coincidence and has nothing to do with the convention. The testimony of the 23 subpoenaed veterans is necessary for the investigation of violations of federal law. Yet even though our testimony was necessary between the 10th when we were subpoenaed and the 13th the

date of the end of the Democratic convention when we were released from subpoena of those 23 brothers nine were never called before the grand jury at all 11 recalled and simply asked their name and were never called back. The grand jury in the United States today serves two purposes it serves as an indictment mail to generate generate really bullshit indictments with no substantive substantives basis whatsoever. The more important it serves as an intelligence gathering mechanism. And the victims of this intelligence gathering are the people of the United States. Frank Donner in an article in The Nation January 3rd 973 did extensive research in the grand jury and more in particular. And Guy Goodwin who is headed the political grand juries in the last few years. He says in his article that the information called for by Guy Goodwin request a startling variety of biographical detail about the witness. It's all manner of friendships affiliations communications meetings travels finances beliefs and

habits. This personal and seemingly innocuous data isn't fed into and their divisional intelligence unit data bank which uses a separate file for each name an event mentioned grand jury testimony is thereby integrated with intelligence gathered from all other sources including illegal electronic surveillance conducted by state as well as federal authority. The end product of all this programming is something the intelligence experts call associate Graham. It is a construction designed to reproduce graphically the Letts patterns of living a framework of facts and assumptions not only on a political level but on a personal and private level to facilitate the pursuit of a new radical quarry. That new radical quarry the people of the United States. Only thing you have to do to be a little computer cardan guy good guy good wins bank is to participate no anti-war demonstration to write a letter to your newspaper to write a letter to your congressman. Almost anything the possibilities are endless and you will be on a little card file somewhere on the seventh

floor in Washington D.C. and sometime if you or your friends become a little bit too effective in communicating your message to the people of the United States their little subpoena mail is going to start grinding off subpoenas and the people right here in this room can face up to 18 months in jail at the whim of a fascist magistrate such as Judge Middlebrook in Florida. When we appeared before the grand jury we refused to cooperate with them completely and in total. Now a lot of people have asked if you really didn't have anything to hide then why didn't you just cooperate why didn't she just ask you answer their questions. That was the government's position. If you people really want to go to Miami then just answer all of our questions and you'll be free to go. First of all the function of the grand jury is to sustain evidence for an indictment. It is to protect the individual from illegal and unjust harassment and prosecution on the part of the government. Once an indictment has been delivered the grand jury's

duties are it in-and the grand jury in our case is still sitting in Florida. It is still rounding up people. It is still subpoena people. So in our position it makes it a little bit colorable the Grangers being used for other purposes. The grand jury is being used to attempt to put together evidence for a conviction in a trial which is against the United States Code which is against the purposes of the grand jury. In addition Everyone's heard about your Fifth Amendment rights the Fifth Amendment was one issue that we raised before the grand jury but it was by no means the most important issue. We felt that our First Amendment guarantees to free speech and free assembly would be in violated in that we had to appear before a grand jury instead of going to Miami where we felt that we could deliver a message to the American people. We felt that our Fourth Amendment guarantees the right to counsel were being violated on the grounds that 23 people were rounded up in three days time in order to appear in Tallahassee all the same date

and we had between four and six attorneys to attempt to represent all of these people none of whom had ever met each other before. We felt that our right to privacy had been violated on the grounds that the government had extensive extensive illegal electronic surveillance on chapters and read news all over the United States. One of the brothers that appeared before the grand jury John Chambers rather than just sitting there saying I refused to answer on the grounds of my first fourth fifth sixth seventh eighth and ninth amendments attempted to try to educate the members of the grand jury as to what they were there for. Wayne also attempted a similar education process. They spent 35 days in jail for their efforts. The chant the statement the John read is this. I would like to remind you that the members of the grand jury that you have an important responsibility are protecting the rights and privileges of people like yourself and myself. The courts I am told have constantly emphasized that the grand jury is not and they are tool of the prosecution. In

fact the historic function of the grand jury has been to protect you and me from illegal and oppressive conduct of misguided public officials. You therefore have the responsibility by your oaths to refuse to participate in any action which is an abuse of the grand jury function. What is happening here in this city in this courthouse is the most outrageous abuse of the grand jury process. You're being asked to aid and abet the federal government as it attempts to take keep us from going to Miami to simply dissent to a war all of us are sick and tired of. I am here because of the subpoena that has been issued on your behalf. It has been explained to me that you have power over that subpoena. I ask you then for the sake of justice and humanity to dismiss my subpoena and prevent the government from misusing you. In closing the best way I can sum it up is from a quote from John Kerry's speech to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in May of 1071 where he said when in 30 years when we walk down the streets without arms and without legs and little children ask why we can say Vietnam and not mean a dirty obscene want memory of the

useless and pathetic war. But a place where America turned and its veterans and the people can help in the turning. I would like that this time to ask a grand jury to take a vote as to whether I should be here or not. The grand jury's Foreman's response was that he agreed with everything the government prosecutor did. John Chambers spent 35 days in jail and was released along with Wayne Bruce Morton and Jack Jennings. By order of Supreme Court Justice Douglas Douglas is written. He says that there were two areas that bothered him. First of all was the question concerning of electronic surveillance of petitioners attorneys on which I think a hearing is required. And he goes on to say moreover I'm deeply troubled by the charges that enough evidence has been found to sustain an indictment making colorable the use of grand juries for further purposes. The response by Judge Middlebrook to Justice Douglas was the Justice Douglas had thwarted the statute

that we couldn't find relief for many of the other justices in Supreme Court so we had to seek out Justice Douglas on his mountaintop in California. Now the conspiracy has been with us in law for a long time. The meaning of conspiracy is to breeze together. But the meaning in legal terms is a thought crime pure and simple. It is crossing state lines in a particular state of mind. You have a conspiratorial agreement and then to prove this conspiratorial agreement you have what are known as overt acts to give you an example of overt acts. These are what we're charged is overt acts in the Oakland seven case the chartering a bus is to take people to Oakland distributing leaflets opening an account at a bank in the name of stop the draft week transporting loudspeaker equipment making speedy speeches and renting a hall for a meeting. Our

indictment names 15 overt acts of those 15. The bulk of them consist of that we either met in one place together or that we crossed some state line interstate commerce. There is no mention of any illegal acts. I mentioned earlier that this was a part of a conspiracy on the part of the government has been under surveillance by the government for a long time. As I explained but there were a little bit of a loss of exactly how to go about dealing with this. There was a joint services staff college meeting after VVA Debbie A had been National Steering Committee meeting in Houston in April of 1071. It appears the DVA Debbi along with some other organisations formed what was called the ad hoc military build up committee and we were effectively and efficiently monitoring the military buildup in the United States during the spring offensive in Indochina.

But more important and more dangerous we were telling the American people what was happening so that they didn't have to wait two years before disgruntled employee of the RAND Corporation got around to publishing the Pentagon Papers. We're doing it here and now. So the government decided at that time that something had to be done to stop the V.A. dead. One of the defendants in the Watergate case a man named Alford said that he was hired by McCord and according to Baldwin's account and McCord brought him into the espionage operation as a wiretap monitor on May 10th and 11th and told him he would be assigned the same task in Miami during the Democratic National Convention. Baldwin also said he was assigned by McCord to infiltrate Vietnam Veterans Against the War for the purpose of been bear assing the Democrats at the Veterans demonstrated the Republican convention. The Committee to Re-elect the President and the Republican National Party had all kinds of little fronts going form one of them is selling

priceless to try to generate some sort of misplaced sympathy for the prisoners of war in Indochina. The money doesn't go to the prisoners of war in Indochina or even to their release. It goes to the Republican Party. Among other things they published a pamphlet entitled fifty two reasons why McGovern must be defeated. I have some really neat reasons on here for instance. Reason Number seven is that George McGovern is a favorite candidate in the national homosexual lesbian society. Reason number thirty two is that during the McGovern convention in Miami plotters were caught conspiring to blow up the Republican Convention says that they were caught conspiring to blow up. They were arrested and taken to Tallahassee where six had been indicted. But these dynamiters and gun shooters and plotters were glorified with the consent of Mr McGovern in the convention. The whole basis of the charges against us rests on a few

informants that have penetrated BVA Debbie and been working for the government for a long time. Now the role of an informant is very simple. Usually he is an individual that has some sort of pressure put on him by the government. Boyd Douglas his case in the Harrisburg conspiracy. He had indictments and on felony charges and he was facing long terms in prison. He didn't cooperate in our case there's a similar situation. The most important an informer for his own well-being his own preservation has to feed back information to the government. They want to hear. Otherwise he's of no value to him. The informer Robert Hardy in the Camden case conspiracy to destroy a draft board. I really felt that the government was not going to do anything to his friends and his brothers and sisters in the camp in case the government had convinced him that all they were going to do was quote teach these peace people a lesson unquote. When he found out

that the government's lesson was to put these people in jail for long terms parties signed an affidavit in his affidavit he says that I had a leadership role from the first night I was in it. Many of them knew me and my abilities. It was difficult for me because of my nature not to assume leadership. He goes on to say that he provided 90 percent of the tools necessary for the action. They couldn't afford them so I paid the paid in the FBI reimbursed them. It includes hammers ropes drills bits etc they couldn't use some of the tools without hurting themselves so I taught them my van was used on daily bases. The FBI paid to gas our rented trucks for dry runs and provided 20 to 40 dollars worth of groceries per week for the people living at Dr. Anderson's. This was all my expenses and was paid for by the FBI. He had obviously been having problems with the former's and Agent Provocateur ever since we've been an organisation. Basically we tend to ignore them because in general

they can hurt us and sometimes they can even help us. Most of the brothers that are working in VBA to be as an organisation are donating any money that they have into the organisation. So if you have an informer coming in it's making in the vicinity of $100 a month and he has all kinds of resources open he can be an asset to the organisation. So we've never worried about him particularly except to identify who they were which is usually easy by the easy by their rhetoric and just keep an eye on them. For example here in Ohio it can state one informer attempted to sell members of weapons. He said that what we ought to be doing is we ought to be blowing up things we ought to be blowing people away. Now's the time the revolution is here let's get on the streets and kill people. He produced an AK 47 assault rifle which as any veteran knows most of us have gone up against and it's a damned efficient weapon. He also produced an

RPG and a tank weapon. The brothers in VBA said well why don't we take these weapons and take pictures of them and then we can distribute them in a pamphlet. The individual in kent state says OK that's right on. When he showed up with the weapons he was arrested he was released immediately because it appeared that he had been working for the government and he had been ordered to attempt to sell weapons to the V.A. did a similar thing happened in Oregon. Agents attempted to sell a truckload of hand grenades and explosives. This conspiracy to blow things up is a figment in the mind of the government. Brother in California named Gary Lawton. Gary had a janitorial service out there and he became interested in working in the black community because he recognized the oppression of people in the black community. The first move was to completely destroy his janitorial service by a selective boycott against him. When this didn't work it seemed like two white policemen were shot down.

The initial report said that it was a black man with an Afro haircut 5 8 to 5 11 and 2 white men wearing fatigues. Gary Lawton is over 6 feet and is bald but he was arrested. The witness against him a drug addict was sat down in showed a mug book in the file and the police department. She went through the book and passed by a picture of Gary Lawton. The police stopped her and made her look at him again asked her again if she knew it. She said she did not. They asked her again. She said she did not. And finally under coercion of the police department she agreed to testify against him. When she got on the stand she told the truth. And it looks like Brother Gary is in a little bit better shape in Kansas. Their four brothers that have been indicted again by a grand jury on charges of conspiring to blow up public buildings in Cincinnati. There is a black community organizer who after making an inflammatory speech against the

administration was arrested on charges of burglary. It goes on all over this country. Sometimes the victims are fortunate enough to have an organization behind them so that they can travel so that they can get exposure as we have so that we can get the word out. Many times they're simply put in jail. I spent about 10 days in jail in Tallahassee and it was really an opening an awakening experience for me. There was a black man in jail he had been there for five months. He was charged with armed robbery. Out of that five months he had been in jail he had been in solitary confinement for three months. Reason Well he's an agitator and he stirs up the other prisoners. We attempted to get some literature into him. We were told that the only books that that guy can read are the Bible. We've attempted to find out if he had adequate legal representation. He told us that he had a court appointed public defender and he had seen him once and it was just prior to his own Rayment.

Under four more years under Mr. Nixon I think all of us are going to come into an awful lot of heavy circumstances and we can relate to it as individuals or as tribes or we can try to come together and we can relate to it cohesively as a unit and try to get the people to stand up and say they're not taking any more. There was a study done in Boston a few years ago. What they were attempting to prove in that study is that there was a mental attitude of Nazi Germany in the 30s and 40s that allowed them to follow the whims of a dictator like out of Hitler and that this doesn't exist in the United States the way they attempted to prove this was to set up a climate where they had a stooge that was strapped down to a simulated electric chair and then a subject would come in and would be put before a panel that had one button and it will gauge the gauge was calibrated volts and part of the gauge was portioned off in a red area that was marked danger. The idea was to see how long the

individual would push this button shocking the person in the electric chair whether or not the individual would go ahead and crank the dial up into the danger area and continue to push it on response from authority the individual in the room that was telling her to or him or whether or not the individual would respond to humanity in the cries of the subject who was sitting in the chair screaming that they were being killed. They found out that 80 percent of the people they tested responded to authority not to. We as veterans are particularly aware of that for too damn long we responded to authority. We are a program computerize automate tons. We drove around in our tanks nor have tracks in our helicopters and our bombers are walked around with our weapons were pointed in a certain direction and we were told to kill and we did so without question. Men women children. It didn't really matter. And if we've learned anything we've learned that we do not have to exist that way in society. I don't have to be a computer. I don't have to be categorized. I don't have to be labeled. I don't have to be put

in a box. And for sure I'm never going to allow myself to have have that happen to me again. Wayne spent 35 days in jail because a computer put him in a box. And I'd like him to go into that a little bit to just let you know what's in store for you. Under four more years of Mr. Nixon his policies. When I get through I hope that I'll have some questions who will be able to have a good discussion here. There's a lot of things that John and I both could tell you about both what's going on in and around the trial. There's a lot of things about the V.A. that both John and I got one of our national officers by the way is here another regional coordinator is here tonight to. So you know if there's any questions when

I you know when I finish up what I'm going to try to tell you about the grand jury and why we feel the Nixon administration is using Granger's know the tools like that right now and they wouldn't have a good discussion on round the seventh eighth and ninth. As John explained there was 23 of us subpoenaed to appear before the federal grand jury. At that time the government was claiming that it was purely coincidental that we had to be there during the time of the Democratic convention. He said our testimony was Vialli needed had to have it out of those 23 people and were never called in front of that grand jury. Eleven were released after being asked their name in four of us went to jail for contempt of court. During the several days we were there we were never told by the federal government or indeed

their prosecutors what we were there for. The only thing we were ever told was it was an investigation into serious violations of federal law. All of us had been kind of expecting something like this sooner Bill namer told us earlier that this type of thing might happen that the V.A. Debbi leadership would be rounded up immediately before the Democratic Convention when he told us this was part of a larger plot to assassinate people and start riots. We kind of blew it all I guess we should have Fortunately the second part didn't happen. The grand jury experience is a very frightening thing. Most of us don't know anything about grand juries. Not many lawyers even in this country know anything about Granger's. That's one of the reasons that the government's been so successful with their indictments in their contempt cases in the past four years. In the grand

jury was originally conceived as a device or an instrument to protect the people from its government protect the people's good names. If you're worried about reputation that was the reason for the secrecy. John explain it. Once a grand jury has enough evidence what they consider enough evidence to hand down an indictment. That it no longer should sit on that case. In our case it's you know it's obviously it's still sitting on the first day was pretty frightening. We got in there guy Goodwin who's a U.S. attorney who's very very good at this he's a parson that did the grand juries for Leslie bike and he did the grand jury in Phoenix he did Harrisburg grand juries Camden grand jury. He's never failed to get an indictment out of any grand jury that he's conducted. And he's also never got a conspiracy conviction out of any trial that resulted out of

a conspiracy indictment. Any right they played little games with us in the grand jury room tried to try to make us believe that we couldn't leave. You don't have a lawyer in there. You know you're all by yourself. You're facing somewhere around 20 some odd people and you were from two three or four government attorneys. In our case a grand jury's age with 55 most of people there was two people in the whole ranger that was I'd say under 30. They're somewhere between 25 and 30. Seven black people whose average age was somewhere around 60 or 65. The people in the grand jury slept read newspapers magazines books. One woman brought her knitting. It was pretty obvious from the beginning that we were being rubber stamped. The second day I tried to explain to the grand jury the reasons why I was refusing to answer questions.

One of the things that we all learn by watching all the nice criminal shows and shit on TV all the 0 0 movies and stuff is when somebody gets on the stand and refused to stand your questions and gives legal reasons then he's obviously guilty. What we're doing in our case is going in there and say we refuse to answer the questions on the grounds that it violates our first fourth fifth sixth eighth and ninth amendment violation of the U.S. Code constitutes an abuse of the grand jury. I mean it was pretty obvious to us that you know this is really turning the people in the grand jury all begin with how many people in this room know what those amendments are. You know these people in the grand jury damn sure did know they you know they didn't care. So we went in there and I got together with the lawyers and decided one of the things it might be a good idea is try to put very briefly what these amendments were

and how it did violate the U.S. Code and how it did constitute an abuse of the grand jury process. Well I got part of the way through the First Amendment in the Gabun am accrues U.S. government attorney jumped up started screaming hollering SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT UP. I never did take orders too well. Even less now. I didn't shut up I kept on reading. He. Came running over the chair still hollering shut up I'm a Cali U.S. Marshals. He drew back his fist and cocked his arm back like he's going to hit me. I just kind of smile and Capone read reading. U.S. marshals came in the room grabbed me by the arm and come with me. That ended the attempt of the explanation to the grand jury. Also three out of the four of us were told we were potential defendants in the grand jury which I don't know whether they did that on purpose or whether it was a mistake it was certainly a legal mistake.

I want to tell you that it makes you essential they're essentially they're telling you that you're a target of the grand jury. Legally the grand jury has no right to even subpoena somebody that they're considering indicting. I was later named in three counts of the indictment as a coconspirator or was never indicted which is another little trick that the government likes to use in conspiracy cases. All six people that were indicted will all eight now were called before that same grand jury. One other person John Briggs is a non veteran. I don't know. I met him one day before he went to jail. John's a personal friend of Scott Camille's And that's that's about all that anybody can ever figure. They called him from the grand jury. He refused to testify also on the same grounds we did he went to jail for eight days and government said

he'll drop your appeal drop our our case against him. And this is after we had already already been let out the four of us had already been let out on appeal. So we thought that was a great victory except the government evidently didn't think it was so great a victory and they get kind of pissed dolphins who would just indict John Briggs. And it did. When John Riggi that statement that John Chambers wrote John and I both John Chambers and myself both made statements to the grand jury that day. That was the last time that we made statements to that grand jury. What we did is we asked a grand jury to release this from our subpoenas explained briefly our moral feelings and didn't even didn't really go into legal details. At any rate we were summarily jailed after that.

The history of the thing went didn't like I went to jail for five days was released judge Middlebrooks was ordered by the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals to give us a proper hearing. We had the so called proper hearing it which Judge Middlebrooks again refused to listen to arguments by our attorneys threatened our attorneys again with investigations with disbarment proceedings with jailing bread and water. And put us back in jail who remain in jail for 30 days and going through appeal processes for as John explained. Justice Douglas let us out. After we were let out in the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals again overturned Middlebrooks hearing and ordered it with an order but said there should be another hearing this time dealing with the wiretap in the phone our attorneys. Fortunately or fortunately whichever may

be seen is how the government lies a lot. They haven't chose to take this back into court again. I think perhaps the government has tells so many lies in this case so far that they're afraid to tell any more that they might might really get caught with their how is it Porter said it tonight pins down and he is talking on TV. At any rate. The whole case when it comes right down to it is not a it's not really a criminal case in the sense of the word DVA Debian it's in his history going back to nine thousand nine hundred sixty seven. Never been an evolving demonstration has never participated in a violent demonstration. One of the unfortunate things about the Miami thing in Barry Romo Stanback in a back to back of the room had and I could tell you a lot about it. VVA Deb you get put in the role of the pig down there.

I don't think Debbie acted as pigs in the hope that the brothers that were there did. We unfortunately did have to act in a very calm and collected way. There was a lot of troublemakers down there's people like Tom facade. People people like Tom facade is number one on Richard Nixon's list number 10 on ours at any rate. They facade tried to get his little group a Zippy's to do some of the things that VBA Debbie was accused of plotting to do at the Republican convention is how the government couldn't get anybody in VBA Debbie to do things like that. Like we've all seen an awful lot of violence and we know what violence is like we lived with it. John John lived for 32 months. It makes an indelible mark on a parson. It's something you never forget

something you have to live with all the rest of your life. I've seen enough violence in my lifetime and the last two and three lifetimes. And I certainly don't intend to cause any more. We made war on innocent peoples. We made war on peoples because we were told to. We're not going to be pushed into that type of position anymore. We're certainly not going to make war on innocent people in our own country. The government would like for the people of this country to believe the DVA Debbi is a bunch of dot dynamiters and plotters and gun shooters and things like that when in fact. We were exactly that when we were in Vietnam and we're not going to do that anymore. We're not going to be forced into that position anymore. A lot of people in this country like to believe where there's smoke there's far. And now mother the conversation that I had with her about three weeks ago.

So you must have done something. The government is charging you with this. And that's a very disheartening thing to hear from your own parents probably as government would like to try to prove in this case you're not going to be able to do it but they will be able to do is tap a lot of time and a lot of energy a lot of money that could be spent for other things instead of sitting here or standing here trying to tell you people about a. Case you know a trial that that should never taken place a grand jury hearing that should have never happened. You know we should be sitting here telling you about the people that are dying in Vietnam right now. That's you know that's that's a crime in it's being committed in in our name. You know in your name when we were talking to the news people today in this this news man said that you know it

seems that the war is not an issue anymore that it is just you know talking into a vacuum that people don't care anymore. And I would like to believe that that's not true. I know that Dick Nixon and his propagandists have done a very good job of telling people that they don't care anymore. Perhaps people are beginning to believe that they don't care anymore I know everybody's tired of hearing about Vietnam. I'm tired of hearing about Vietnam. I'm tired of hearing about people being killed in my own country and I'm tired of seeing hunger and starvation in my own country. But that doesn't mean I'm becoming apathetic about it. What's happened in this trial frightens me very much. The things that I see happening in my country frighten me very much. You know the fact that the government we have right now pays no attention to the Constitution pays no attention to the Bill of Rights frightens me very much. The fact that out of

90 some odd governments that our country supports Sixty eight of them are military dictators. You know that frightens me very much. But it's not going to frighten me into shutting up. Thirty five days in jail didn't frighten me into shouting and it's not going to. Regardless of what the government tries in this case they're not going to shut up the V.A. they're not going to destroy the V.A. Debian because we're not going to allow it in any way possible. Our country had to become involved in any more Vietnam's like you're doing in South Africa in Mozambique in Ethiopia in Chile. South America you know they're trying and they'd like to do it you know whether it's through business ventures or military expeditions to back up those business ventures. And stay out of things. Once you sit down

and. Go back there and get John to put some water. Back there hadn't you know why. I guess it's I don't want everybody to get really down and think that you know things are super bad. You know the government's all powerful in that no matter what you do you beat your head up against a brick wall. Vietnam has been going oh is going to continue to go on no matter what you do. I don't think that's true. You know the thing about it is maybe one of the things that frightens this government so much is that just there are people that that won't quit. You know no matter how bad things look in you know I would like to point out that the government makes a lot of mistakes. Government's not infallible in that by everything we've talked about so far and in a very serious vein. And you know you can't really help but be very serious it's

very serious to all of us. You know some of the things that happen around the grand jury which in effect we were serious. Are funny and I to relate a few of the things that happened just to show you that they are on the path. The potent and all powerful government is not to really together. We had one person one member of VVA Debbie testified to the grand jury. The reason we felt that he should go ahead and testify is the fact that he didn't know anybody nobody knew him. He felt that there's no possible way that anything he said to government could use. I disagree with that but he is right in his decision to do that and he did it after consulting with lawyers. He went to the grand jury. The first thing that they asked they did was after they asked him his name was threw out a whole bunch of pictures on the

table lerne. So you defy these people. They looked at a couple on the started laughing. This is now this is I sure can't so happen that the pictures were all. Pictures that were taken while we were in the service bootcamp except for you know with the no hair and very clean shaven. He promptly told the grand jury that the reason he couldn't identify him as everybody out there had hair down their ass and beards down their navels and they would no way that anybody look like that now and this guy Goodwin not appreciating that too much just felt that he had a real real winner and he drew out a picture of John John defending myself which was taken at Fort Hood during the Christmas holidays. We did an action up there and he said Well how about these. He looked at him kind of smile. Yeah. I know these do you go on the turn he's got real big smiles and says

wow we get somewhere now. He says Yes I just met him in the hall about five minutes ago. I think they thought he was being kind of sarcastic and didn't like that too much to ask them when he joined BVA Debian and he says well I joined in Alabama there after Jethro Tull concert says Jethro Tull. Was he the regional coordinator of Alabama after he got through rolling around the floor and beat his fist on the table leg and laughing for about 30 minutes they decided they didn't want to talk to anymore nice anyway. Few other things have happened you know I've been in relationships which are a little more serious name they're still kind of kind of odd or funny or what do you call in this. We live in day to day paranoia you know with the fact that all of our phones have been tapped for so

long that you know we get to where we don't really pay that much attention to it. But at Tallahassee they either had so many agencies tapping our phone or they had so many inexperienced people that they just didn't do a very good job. And what you consider they're tapping our phone now while this Granger is going oh the lawyers are at our house and we're talking to the lawyers on this phone. One of the first things that happens we couldn't we had an awful lot of problems getting long distance phone calls local wasn't too bad at long distance. I guess everybody cut their tap in when they were a lot of long distance from draining all the juice out and you had to holler back and forth over. That it was quite a problem we could have had in little cliques and clatters and problems with the phones we call the FBI up and down so we don't mind to tap their phones on the freesheet if you do get a good tap on. It. Phone service improved the next day. Not a lot but some. At any

rate the phone company called us in because we've been complaining about phone service. So we're going to come out and we're going to you know work when you found it came out worked on phone didn't do any good. And kept telling us it was not you people. You know I don't think this is a fact and you know you need to hunt down all these taps on the phones and get these people to correct them in a line when it came out. You know just kind of laugh and says Ya know. John was trying to make a phone call one night and couldn't get a dollar so they hooked a dart of tape recorder up to the phone in turn the volume all the way up and put the receiver right next to the front of it says got an ISO Hallinan feedback and you can hear this kind of a plaintive little voice urgently you know very swiftly come on the other end saying 13 0 1 13 0 1. Whenever I try to talk to you know I want to talk to you and talk to anybody. One of the last things that did happen down there

which we did we took to court. Was the recording that we made. I'm sorry. If you stay out of things you wouldn't get hurt. Sit down look at you don't. Want you go sit down let me let me talk to these people some more is our right. Yeah considering we were having problems with that phone conversation we were talking the phone company and all this and the phone just kind of went dead. And it was a little conversation in the background. The next thing that we heard was kind of a click in the phone you know sounding real clear. Some guy came on the other end. Is this Mr. So-and-So assistant director of the FBI in Jacksonville Florida committed to give about a two minute report. All right farmers it had been she a sac bombers because they were disturbing their cows or something there.

There was about seven people in the room you know we were all rolling on the floor and idiots are really screwing up out here. And we got it on tape. We submitted it is evidence in our nice little Judge Carol chorus Wells handpicked successor says an 8 year old wouldn't believe that and refused to allow it as evidence. Which is kind of been the case with their thing that we've tried to put in court that any right you know I think we're going to beat the charge. You know when it comes to comes to court we're going to need is a lot of support from people like you. We're going to need you know a publicist that we haven't gotten you know like people that do see the thing in the newspapers when it came out nationally all they saw was Vietnam veterans accused of this and that

no explanation from our side no you know nothing but just basic facts from the government side in the case you know and the things that you know we talk about with life we do to pass on. There's a lot of things that I think that the VFW could help you people wouldn't you communities and I think you should you know call of the V.A. You say hey you know can you get this information for us can you do this force or whatever. And if they can't then maybe they can find somebody that can. One of the things Giada considers contacting the National Lawyers Guild or people of the grand jury grand jury packets and things like that. So I think that if you're involved in a movement in which most of you probably are to some extent you wouldn't be here tonight. You can look forward to one maybe in your community especially in the next four years and they're under Tricky Dicky. You know if if we can do anything for you then we like for like to be able to do it

and what we like to do for us is to pass on the word when you get information. When you find out something you know like the things that we've told you tonight if they're new you know don't sit on it. You know don't say wow I know this and keep it you know keep it all locked up in your head. Tell your brothers and your sisters about it you know go home visit your folks tell you folks about it where they believe it or not. That's about the only way considering the way the things you go with the press now that the words are going to get around this country can see that. I think Bloxam like 20 reporters and in the author's absence this summer and I'd like to open it up you know is if anybody's got any questions John and I need the VAB members here the lead dancer with I know that there's a lot of things we didn't cover in this case and there's a lot of things that we uncover about DVA Debbie. Hopefully some I've got some questions here.

Yeah. There's a couple three or four really. John you explain as you probably will close or connect whatever the case the long lost was a quarrel when they were shot away twice today. What he said because of our number one military treat very hard. Right away he's undergone since Sept. 11 successful operations like he became addicted to downers. So. You want to

win the grand jury's hands with all these approaches but today's the day. Can you hear Martin they told him that unless he agreed to testify against Scott Camille the rest of the needed new numbers that he would be arrested in charge of the sessions they'll be drug he said at that time that he didn't have a driver's license it doesn't matter as we have contacted our attorneys our attorneys advise him to get out of Miami. Come on again. Yes he did he was indicted along with the 13 was arrested released so far no charges in the indictment. Rearrested by the same two agents in Dade County for sale of one camp ability to undercover agents. You can't help where you comes there. Turn in the case of mine.

Even cancer was not allowed to practice law in this case the rounds that are used to plan boy personality and then his personality and his patients with unduly affected yours Salton went to court on the 19th without any legal representation at all. He was found guilty. Now he'll. Be saying to you but. You're. OK with that one. We've had attorneys working with this in the past in various things. When this happens you know it just happens a suddenly sort of caught unaware. The national office of the head of the contact the Center for Constitutional Rights and now we have attorneys from the Center for Constitutional Rights William cancers working in all Tim's case he's sort of advising in our case for not really participating in addition we have more to say this one of the founders of the Center for Constitutional Rights. Nancy Stearns an attorney with the center that's been active in the abortion issue. Joining us

James Reid a constitutional law expert. Doris Peterson a constitutional law expert who was involved with the appellate work in Chicago a case we also have to return to Texas living working the good of the G.I. movement. They're campaigning here in Brady home and Laurie Turner a local attorney. Mark. Joan you tell me the judge orders you to. You know Scott on the drug charge. Yeah. Oh. Well. You know I said earlier he's as I said earlier after the initial let's ignore maybe they'll go away phase the government then decided to start a series of harassment arrest Scott Camille was arrested for transfer and sale of dangerous drugs to an undercover agent with no other witnesses

involved. He was acquitted on this charge. When are indictments first came out there was also a story released to the Miami Herald. It alleged that deviated he was part of the new international drug conspiracy. And this really particularly seems ironic to most people who deviated because VVA to be as an organization of one of its key projects is working in the field of drug rehabilitation. We had a hell of a lot of brothers who'd been addicted to opiates and other dangerous drugs while in service. I know in my own unit there were some of the brothers who just couldn't take being put in combat situation anymore and the only way they knew to get out of it was to shoot up the morphine cigarettes.