Happy Holidays from Leonard Peltier
December 23, 2009
Greetings and happy holidays. I hope this letter finds you all enjoying the spirit of the season with family and friends.
My August parole denial was appealed in short order. We are expecting a response to that appeal sometime very soon. It has occurred to me that the viciousness of this system knows no bounds, and so I believe strongly in the coming days we will hear of another loss, another denial. This one will be timed and intended specifically as a twisted Christmas present for me, such is the nature of those in charge. With no sense of balance, fairness, or decency, I await my own personal stocking stuffer.
We all know the so-called justice system of this country is more about revenge and retribution than finding true and just resolution. It doesn’t take into account the plight of the wrongfully convicted, nor does it allow flexibility as human endeavors always require. This system has always been about making money at the top, furthering careers in the middle, and forgetting those at the bottom.
Their reason for denying my parole is that I refuse to admit guilt and show remorse for the deaths of two FBI agents. I know the righteousness of my situation. I know what I did and didn’t do. I will never yield.
I also know what this country did and continues to do to me and many others. While they demand I make a false confession for the sake of my freedom, they show no remorse for the loss of much of my life, or the lives of Joe Stuntz and countless others they have murdered over the generations simply for being who they were. Those lives are meaningless when compared to their precious FBI, I guess. And now, some of the very ones responsible for the deaths and suffering of so many of my people, are peddling books and claiming to be a friend of the Indian. We’ve seen this before, and I’ll speak more about this soon.
I remain proud of what I have stood for and mindful of what real justice is. In this season of love and forgiveness, please say a prayer for all of those who never knew justice and others who have such difficulty in finding it still today.
My love and my prayers go out to all of you.
Happy Holidays.
In the Spirit of Crazy Horse,
Leonard Peltier
Time to set him free… Because it’s the RIGHT thing to do.
Friends of Peltier - www.FreePeltierNow.org
ZOOM IN: Focus on Executive Review
November 15, 2009
Zoom In: Focus on Executive Review
A new campaign sponsored by the Leonard Peltier Defense Offense Committee (LP-DOC) with Friends of Peltier and the International Peltier Forum
The United States courts have acknowledged that Leonard Peltier was the victim of official misconduct and convicted on the basis of fabricated and suppressed evidence, as well as coerced testimony. However, the courts have not granted Leonard a new trial.
Attorney General Eric Holder can conduct an Executive Review of the Peltier case and provide a remedy. In fact, he has said that in the face of misconduct by Department of Justice officials, it’s his job to do the right thing. That’s why we’ve renewed the call for an Executive Review of the Peltier case.
Join us in our new campaign to demand equal justice for Leonard Peltier.
The Campaign
People often ask… “Who are those Peltier supporters, anyway?” We’re all just ordinary folks from all around the world. We’re a diverse group, representative of all races/ethnicities, religions, social classes, political beliefs, etc. Yet, we have at least one thing in common. We know a grave injustice has been done to Leonard Peltier.
The campaign concept is simple: (1) Send a message to AG Holder–We want justice… equal justice… and we want it NOW and (2) Put a face to the message.
The campaign has two components:
Action #1: Personal Response–Where you’ll provide a photographic image of yourself holding a campaign sign, as well as your name, address and e-mail address.
Action #2: Community Response–Where you’ll go out into your community and get others to participate in the campaign.
A box filled to the brim with campaign flyers, including all our faces, will be delivered to AG Holder’s office on or around February 6, 2010 - the 34th anniversary of Leonard Peltier’s arrest.
For details and instructions, see http://www.whoisleonardpeltier.info/.
We also ask that you contribute $1 to help us with expenses associated with the campaign. That’s right–ONE U.S. dollar! You can, of course, donate more if you wish. Checks and money orders should be made out to “LPDOC”. If you prefer, you may donate online at http://www.whoisleonardpeltier.info/.
Contrary to what some say, the Committee has limited resources and, like any other grassroots organization, struggles financially. Your dollars are needed to make this and other campaigns successful and so that more events–like those held in Boulder, Lewisburg, and Washington, DC, this year–can be planned and successfully implemented in the months ahead. Please give what you can.
Deadline
All photos should be received NO LATER THAN JANUARY 31, 2010 (but please don’t wait until then to send us your photo).
Again, for instructions, see www.whoisleonardpeltier.info. Download the campaign kit and review all of the materials provided. The campaign e-mail address is zoom@whoisleonardpeltier.info. Don’t hesitate to ask questions or request assistance.
Note to our local support group coordinators: Please let us know you’re on board with this new campaign by sending an e-mail to zoom@whoisleonardpeltier.info. We’ll work closely with you to help you succeed. To assist us with the planning of branch-specific special communications (which may be state, regional or international in scope) please provide your name and location in the body of your e-mail.
Thanks to all of you for the work you do. With your help, Leonard WILL see freedom soon.
Kari Ann Cowan, Assistant Coordinator
Leonard Peltier Defense Offense Committee
www.whoisleonardpeltier.info
The Tragedy of Leonard Peltier vs. the US
November 1, 2009
The Tragedy of Leonard Peltier vs. the US
The New York Review of Books
Volume 56, Number 18 · November 19, 2009
Circle for Clemency on 05 Nov in DC
October 29, 2009
Circle for Clemency
What: Peaceful demonstration in support of Leonard Peltier’s freedom
When: 05 November 2009; 6:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m.
Where: Washington, DC
President Obama will host his first annual White House Tribal Summit on 05 November 2009. The Nations will be given the opportunity to interact directly with the president and other top administration officials. All of the 564 federally recognized tribes are invited to send a representative. This is a prime opportunity to be seen and heard on the issue of Leonard Peltier’s wrongful conviction and imprisonment. Please plan to attend.
Peltier’s brothers, sisters, friends, and other supporters will gather in Lafayette Park on Pennsylvania Avenue (across from the White House) at 6:00 a.m. Bring signs and banners, wear Peltier T-Shirts, etc. From Lafayette Park, supporters will walk to the Department of the Interior, 1849 C Street, NW, where tribal leaders will assemble for their meeting with President Obama.
In support of this action, tribal members are asked to (1) urge your Tribal Chairpersons to speak to Obama on Mr. Peltier’s behalf - Free Peltier NOW; and (2) lobby your Tribal Councils to pass resolutions calling for freedom for Peltier, the release of all case-related documents still withheld by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and a congressional hearing on the government’s role in the turmoil on Pine Ridge Reservation during the 1970s.
Rob at (919) 596-2100 or clemencynow@gmail.com
Reconsider Columbus Day
October 10, 2009
Demand an Executive Review of the Peltier Case
October 2, 2009
On June 23, 1995, Amnesty International submitted a letter of concern about the Peltier case to then Attorney General Janet Reno. The world renowned human rights organization sought but failed to obtain an Executive Review of the case.
On August 21, 2009, upon hearing the news that Leonard Peltier had again been denied parole, Friends of Peltier renewed the call for an Executive Review of the Peltier case by the U.S. Department of Justice. We want justice… EQUAL justice… and we want it now.
This past April, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder announced that he had ordered the dismissal of the indictment against former Senator Ted Stevens on corruption charges. Stevens had been tried and found guilty, but hadn’t been sentenced; Holder’s action effectively vacated Stevens’ conviction. Holder was reportedly very angry that the prosecutors had withheld potentially exculpatory evidence from Stevens’ attorneys. After the prosecutors had been held in contempt of court for failing to turn over required documents, Holder replaced the entire trial team. Soon afterward, the Justice Department discovered a previously undocumented interview with the prosecution’s star witness. In the interview, the witness gave statements that directly contradicted his testimony at trial.
This statement made by Stevens’ attorneys is reminiscent of the Peltier case.
“This jury verdict was obtained unlawfully. The government disregarded the Constitution, the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure, and well-established case law … which require the government to reveal to the defense all evidence that demonstrates the innocence of the accused…The misconduct of government prosecutors, and one or more FBI agents, was stunning. Not only did the government fail to disclose evidence of innocence, but instead intentionally hid that evidence and created false evidence that they provided to the defense.”
What’s the saying? If it’s true, you’re not paranoid. And what is the truth? If it happened to Mr. Peltier, it can happen to anyone… even a U.S. Senator.
By nearly all accounts, Holder wanted to send a message that he would not tolerate any behavior he deemed to be prosecutorial misconduct. The following interview confirms those accounts. (We recommend that you watch this video in its entirety.)
On April 8, 2009, Attorney General Eric Holder sat down with Katie Couric (CBS) to discuss the direction he wants to take the DOJ. (Note: Holder, as he states in this interview, admires former Attorney General Elliot Richardson (deceased) and here’s why. In October 1973, after just five months as Attorney General, Elliot Richardson resigned rather than disobey President Nixon’s order to fire the top lawyer investigating the Watergate scandal, Special Prosecutor Archibald Cox. Richardson had promised Congress he would not interfere with the Special Prosecutor.)
Join with us in calling for an Executive Review of the Peltier case.
Write to the Attorney General and demand an Executive Review of the Peltier case because—how did he put it—oh, yes, because it is “the RIGHT thing to do”.
Also please sign the online petition.
PETITIONSeptember 12, 2009
Attorney General Eric Holder
U.S. Department of Justice
950 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20530-0001Dear Attorney General Holder:
Thank you for taking the necessary steps to investigate and vacate the conviction of Senator Ted Stevens because of misconduct by federal prosecutors. We the undersigned, in the interest of EQUAL justice, now ask that you undertake an Executive Review of COINTELPRO-era politically motivated cases, starting with the case of Leonard Peltier.
In 1975, the Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations with Respect to Intelligence Activities (also known as the Church Committee) investigated the counterintelligence activities of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) over a 25-year period. With regard to its COunter INTELligence PROgram, or COINTELPRO, operations, the Church Committee found the Bureau responsible for: violating and ignoring the law; exceeding its powers with regard to domestic intelligence activity; using excessively intrusive techniques against United States citizens; using covert action to disrupt and discredit domestic groups; abusing intelligence information for political purposes; and having inadequate controls, as well as no accountability. As you know, COINTELPRO was centrally directed and targeted a range of political dissidents and organizations. The stated goals of COINTELPRO were to “expose, disrupt, misdirect, discredit, or otherwise neutralize” those persons or organizations that the FBI found objectionable, i.e., a threat to the status quo. The Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., was one of the most notable of these COINTELPRO targets.
During the 1970s, the American Indian Movement (AIM) also was a target of the FBI. AIM activist Leonard Peltier was wrongfully convicted in 1977 in connection with the shooting deaths of two FBI agents and has served over 30 years in federal prison despite proof that he was convicted on the basis of fabricated and suppressed evidence, as well as coerced testimony.
The United States Courts of Appeal have repeatedly acknowledged investigative and prosecutorial misconduct in this case—evident from the time of Peltier’s extradition from Canada to his trial and subsequent sentencing.
Peltier also has been denied fair consideration for parole by unscrupulous, untruthful, and overzealous prosecutors who know parole authorities do not consult the court record and will therefore take on faith any false statements the prosecutors care to make.
On June 23, 1995, Amnesty International submitted a letter of concern about the Peltier case to then Attorney General Janet Reno. The world renowned human rights organization sought but failed to obtain an Executive Review of the case.
We agree with senior deputy director of Amnesty International-USA Curt Goering who, after the U.S. Parole Commission denied Peltier parole in August 2009, stated: “Given that the case against Peltier unraveled years ago, his continued imprisonment is only protracting a grave miscarriage of justice… When you consider the concerns that plague the case… it is unconscionable that Leonard Peltier should continue to suffer behind bars. It is high time for the U.S. government to… right the wrongs of the past.”
We call on you, Mr. Holder, to conduct an Executive Review of the Peltier case without delay, one that addresses:
–> FBI agents’ use of improper techniques or coercive tactics, as well as fabricated evidence;
–> FBI laboratory personnel’s use of poor scientific techniques, mishandling of evidence, provision of skewed or completely false testimony to support prosecution claims, or providing fabricated evidence; and
–> prosecutorial misconduct such as courtroom misconduct; mishandling of physical evidence (hiding, destroying, and/or tampering with evidence, case files or court records); failing to disclose exculpatory evidence; threatening, badgering, and/or tampering with witnesses; and using false or misleading evidence.
This review also should include examination of post-conviction actions on the part of FBI officials and agents, as well as prosecutors, to prevent fair consideration of Peltier’s applications for parole and Executive Clemency.
It is long past time to rectify an immense and evident injustice. The politically-motivated prosecution of Leonard Peltier is an abuse of power at least as troubling as that in Senator Stevens’ case.
Conduct an Executive Review of the Peltier case now. Only through such honorable action, which is wholly in your power, can we be sure that justice will, at last, be done.
September 12, 2009
Attorney General Eric Holder
U.S. Department of Justice
950 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20530-0001
Dear Attorney General Holder:
Thank you for taking the necessary steps to investigate and vacate the conviction of Senator Ted Stevens because of misconduct by federal prosecutors. We the undersigned, in the interest of EQUAL justice, now ask that you undertake an Executive Review of COINTELPRO-era politically motivated cases, starting with the case of Leonard Peltier.
In 1975, the Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations with Respect to Intelligence Activities (also known as the Church Committee) investigated the counterintelligence activities of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) over a 25-year period. With regard to its COunter INTELligence PROgram, or COINTELPRO, operations, the Church Committee found the Bureau responsible for: violating and ignoring the law; exceeding its powers with regard to domestic intelligence activity; using excessively intrusive techniques against United States citizens; using covert action to disrupt and discredit domestic groups; abusing intelligence information for political purposes; and having inadequate controls, as well as no accountability. As you know, COINTELPRO was centrally directed and targeted a range of political dissidents and organizations. The stated goals of COINTELPRO were to “expose, disrupt, misdirect, discredit, or otherwise neutralize” those persons or organizations that the FBI found objectionable, i.e., a threat to the status quo. The Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., was one of the most notable of these COINTELPRO targets.
During the 1970s, the American Indian Movement (AIM) also was a target of the FBI. AIM activist Leonard Peltier was wrongfully convicted in 1977 in connection with the shooting deaths of two FBI agents and has served over 30 years in federal prison despite proof that he was convicted on the basis of fabricated and suppressed evidence, as well as coerced testimony.
The United States Courts of Appeal have repeatedly acknowledged investigative and prosecutorial misconduct in this case—evident from the time of Peltier’s extradition from Canada to his trial and subsequent sentencing.
Peltier also has been denied fair consideration for parole by unscrupulous, untruthful, and overzealous prosecutors who know parole authorities do not consult the court record and will therefore take on faith any false statements the prosecutors care to make.
On June 23, 1995, Amnesty International submitted a letter of concern about the Peltier case to then Attorney General Janet Reno. The world renowned human rights organization sought but failed to obtain an Executive Review of the case.
We agree with senior deputy director of Amnesty International-USA Curt Goering who, after the U.S. Parole Commission denied Peltier parole in August 2009, stated: “Given that the case against Peltier unraveled years ago, his continued imprisonment is only protracting a grave miscarriage of justice… When you consider the concerns that plague the case… it is unconscionable that Leonard Peltier should continue to suffer behind bars. It is high time for the U.S. government to… right the wrongs of the past.”
We call on you, Mr. Holder, to conduct an Executive Review of the Peltier case without delay, one that addresses:
–> FBI agents’ use of improper techniques or coercive tactics, as well as fabricated evidence;
–> FBI laboratory personnel’s use of poor scientific techniques, mishandling of evidence, provision of skewed or completely false testimony to support prosecution claims, or providing fabricated evidence; and
–> prosecutorial misconduct such as courtroom misconduct; mishandling of physical evidence (hiding, destroying, and/or tampering with evidence, case files or court records); failing to disclose exculpatory evidence; threatening, badgering, and/or tampering with witnesses; and using false or misleading evidence.
This review also should include examination of post-conviction actions on the part of FBI officials and agents, as well as prosecutors, to prevent fair consideration of Peltier’s applications for parole and Executive Clemency.
It is long past time to rectify an immense and evident injustice. The politically-motivated prosecution of Leonard Peltier is an abuse of power at least as troubling as that in Senator Stevens’ case.
Conduct an Executive Review of the Peltier case now. Only through such honorable action, which is wholly in your power, can we be sure that justice will, at last, be done.
Friends of Peltier
Time to set him free… Because it’s the RIGHT thing to do.
www.FreePeltierNow.org
Watch the Interview with Ben Carnes on the Peltier Case
September 12, 2009
Peltier: I Am Barack Obama’s Political Prisoner Now
September 11, 2009
http://www.counterpunch.org/
September 11-13, 2009
If Only the Government Had Respected Its Own Laws…
I Am Barack Obama’s Political Prisoner Now
By LEONARD PELTIER
T he United States Department of Justice has once again made a mockery of its lofty and pretentious title.
After releasing an original and continuing disciple of death cult leader Charles Manson (sic - Lynette Squeaky Fromme) who attempted to shoot President Gerald Ford, an admitted Croatian terrorist, and another attempted assassin of President Ford under the mandatory 30-year parole law, the U.S. Parole Commission deemed that my release would “promote disrespect for the law.”
If only the federal government would have respected its own laws, not to mention the treaties that are, under the U.S. Constitution, the supreme law of the land, I would never have been convicted nor forced to spend more than half my life in captivity. Not to mention the fact that every law in this country was created without the consent of Native peoples and is applied unequally at our expense. If nothing else, my experience should raise serious questions about the FBI’s supposed jurisdiction in Indian Country.
The parole commission’s phrase was lifted from soon-to-be former U.S. Attorney Drew Wrigley, who apparently hopes to ride with the FBI cavalry into the office of North Dakota governor. In this Wrigley is following in the footsteps of William Janklow, who built his political career on his reputation as an Indian fighter, moving on up from tribal attorney (and alleged rapist of a Native minor) to state attorney general, South Dakota governor, and U.S. Congressman. Some might recall that Janklow claimed responsibility for dissuading President Clinton from pardoning me before he was convicted of manslaughter. Janklow’s historical predecessor, George Armstrong Custer, similarly hoped that a glorious massacre of the Sioux would propel him to the White House, and we all know what happened to him.
Unlike the barbarians that bay for my blood in the corridors of power, however, Native people are true humanitarians who pray for our enemies. Yet we must be realistic enough to organize for our own freedom and equality as nations. We constitute 5% of the population of North Dakota and 10% of South Dakota and we could utilize that influence to promote our own power on the reservations, where our focus should be. If we organized as a voting bloc, we could defeat the entire premise of the competition between the Dakotas as to which is the most racist. In the 1970s we were forced to take up arms to affirm our right to survival and self-defense, but today the war is one of ideas. We must now stand up to armed oppression and colonization with our bodies and our minds. International law is on our side.
Given the complexion of the three recent federal parolees, it might seem that my greatest crime was being Indian. But the truth is that my gravest offense is my innocence. In Iran, political prisoners are occasionally released if they confess to the ridiculous charges on which they are dragged into court, in order to discredit and intimidate them and other like-minded citizens. The FBI and its mouthpieces have suggested the same, as did the parole commission in 1993, when it ruled that my refusal to confess was grounds for denial of parole.
To claim innocence is to suggest that the government is wrong, if not guilty itself. The American judicial system is set up so that the defendant is not punished for the crime itself, but for refusing to accept whatever plea arrangement is offered and for daring to compel the judicial system to grant the accused the right to right to rebut the charges leveled by the state in an actual trial. Such insolence is punished invariably with prosecution requests for the steepest possible sentence, if not an upward departure from sentencing guidelines that are being gradually discarded, along with the possibility of parole.
As much as non-Natives might hate Indians, we are all in the same boat. To attempt to emulate this system in tribal government is pitiful, to say the least.
It was only this year, in the Troy Davis, case, that the U.S. Supreme Court recognized innocence as a legitimate legal defense. Like the witnesses that were coerced into testifying against me, those that testified against Davis renounced their statements, yet Davis was very nearly put to death. I might have been executed myself by now, had not the government of Canada required a waiver of the death penalty as a condition of extradition.
The old order is aptly represented by Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, who stated in his dissenting opinion in the Davis case, “This Court has never held that the Constitution forbids the execution of a convicted defendant who has had a full and fair trial but is later able to convince a habeas court that he is ‘actually’ innocent. Quite to the contrary, we have repeatedly left that question unresolved, while expressing considerable doubt that any claim based on alleged ‘actual innocence’ is constitutionally cognizable.”
The esteemed Senator from North Dakota, Byron Dorgan, who is now the chairman of the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs, used much the same reasoning in writing that “our legal system has found Leonard Peltier guilty of the crime for which he was charged. I have reviewed the material from the trial, and I believe the verdict was fair and just.”
It is a bizarre and incomprehensible statement to Natives, as well it should be, that innocence and guilt is a mere legal status, not necessarily rooted in material fact. It is a truism that all political prisoners were convicted of the crimes for which they were charged.
The truth is the government wants me to falsely confess in order to validate a rather sloppy frame-up operation, one whose exposure would open the door to an investigation of the United States’ role in training and equipping goon squads to suppress a grassroots movement on Pine Ridge against a puppet dictatorship.
In America, there can by definition be no political prisoners, only those duly judged guilty in a court of law. It is deemed too controversial to even publicly contemplate that the federal government might fabricate and suppress evidence to defeat those deemed political enemies. But it is a demonstrable fact at every stage of my case.
I am Barack Obama’s political prisoner now, and I hope and pray that he will adhere to the ideals that impelled him to run for president. But as Obama himself would acknowledge, if we are expecting him to solve our problems, we missed the point of his campaign. Only by organizing in our own communities and pressuring our supposed leaders can we bring about the changes that we all so desperately need. Please support the Leonard Peltier Defense Offense Committee in our effort to hold the United States government to its own words.
I thank you all who have stood by me all these years, but to name anyone would be to exclude many more. We must never lose hope in our struggle for freedom.
In the Spirit of Crazy Horse,
Leonard Peltier
Leonard Peltier #89637-132
USP-Lewisburg
US Penitentiary
PO Box 1000
Lewisburg, PA 17837
Online Birthday Wishes for Leonard Peltier
September 5, 2009
You can send birthday greetings to Leonard Peltier by signing the online birthday card. For more information: http://FreePeltierNow.blogspot.com/2009/09/online-birthday-wishes-for-leonard.html
A call to action for Leonard Peltier
August 31, 2009
As a result of Peltier’s recent parole denial, Ben Carnes, Choctaw Nation, and a Sun Dance Chief, states he will go to Washington, D.C. to stand and fast in front of the White House between September 5th – 12th, in hopes of securing a meeting with President Obama. Read more >>
