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February
19, 2002
John Chuckman
The
Devil and Georgie Bush
Prudence
Crowther
Did
Someone Say "Chador"?
Ramzi
Kysia
Caught
in the Iraq DMZ
February
18, 2002
Ron Jacobs
The
US and Iran
George
Lewandowski
Empire
in Declline
Lenni
Brenner
Life
and Death of a Folk Hero
February
17, 2002
Robert
Fisk
Lost
in a Pit of Desperation
February
16, 2002
Phillip
Cryan
Colombia
in War Time
February
15, 2002
C.G. Estabrook
From
New York to Porto Alegre
Robert
O'Brien
The
View from Porto Alegre
Mokhiber/Weissman
Resisting
the Assassins
February
14, 2002
Levy and
Easton
Ante
Pavelic
Real Butcher of the Balkans
Joan Claybrook
Dear
Jeb Bush,
About You and Enron
John Chuckman
Time
for a Woman Prez
Alexander
Cockburn
Banning
the Koran
February
13, 2002
Sen. Russ
Feingold
War
Powers and
the War on Terror
Tom Turnipseed
Bush's
Folly
George
Monbiot
American
Imperialism
February
12, 2002
Uri Avnery
The
Great Game:
Oil, Sharon and Iran
Tommy
Ates
Black
Land Loss
February
11, 2002
Walt Brasch
The
Synergizing of America
John Troyer
Enron's
Deep Throat?
February
9, 2002
John Blair
Criticize
Cheney, Go to Jail
February
8, 2002
CounterPunch
Wire
Ashcroft
the Bigot
Molly
Secours
Racism
and Real Estate
Wole Akande
World
Economic Forum:
The Aftermath
Cockburn/St.
Clair
Dita
Sari Tells Reebok
to "Shove It"
February
7, 2002
Patrick
Cockburn
Taliban's
War on Chess
John Chuckman
Howdee,
Dick!
Tariq
Ali
Mullahs
and Heretics
February
6, 2002
Amira
Hass
On
the Edge of the
Non-Violent Demonstrations
Vivian
Berger
Sentenced
to Rape
Vladimir Georgiyev
Russian Intelligence:
War on Iraq Begins in Sept.
Tom Turnipseed
"Axis
of Evil" a Cover for Corporate Corruption?
David
Vest
The
Enron Creature
February
5, 2002
Norman
Madarasz
Dispatch
from Pôrto Alegre
Tom Malinowski
What
to do with
Our "Detainees"?
Dita Sari
Why
I Rejected the
Reebok Human Rights Award
A Photographic Journal of Life
in an Afghan Refugee Camp
By Judith Mann
Resources:
100s of Links
About 9/11
CounterPunch:
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Coverage of 9/11 and Its Aftermath
Five
Days That
Shook The World:
Seattle and Beyond
By Alexander
Cockburn
and Jeffrey St. Clair
Photos by Allan Sekula
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War Diary
CIA's Assassination Plan a History of
Torture in US Prisons
bin Laden and Bush
Business Connections
Aisha Ikramuddin on the Hidden Hype
of US Food Bombs
Peter Linebaugh on
Pakistan
Christopher Hitchens' Love for Mrs. Thatcher
Jiang Zemin Tells Bush:
Nuke 'Em
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CounterPunch
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How the CIA's Backing of the Mujahideen Created the World's Most
Robust Heroin Market and Helped to Finance the Rise of the Taliban
and Osama bin Laden
Whiteout:
CIA, Drugs & the
Press
by Alexander
Cockburn
and Jeffrey St. Clair
The New Crusade:
America's War on Terrorism
By Rahul Mahajan
The Memphis Blues Again:
Six Decades of Memphis Music Photographs
Photos by Ernest Withers
Text by Daniel Wolff
The New Intifada:
Resisting Israel's Apartheid
Edited by Roane Carey
A Pocket Guide to
Environmental Bad Guys
by James Ridgeway
and Jeffrey St. Clair
The
Phoenix Program
by Douglas Valentine
Al Gore:
A User's Manual
by Cockburn
and St. Clair
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Reviews of Gore:
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February 19,
2002
A Prison Guard Who Has Never Owned
Up to His Crimes
By Kay Lee
I am so frustrated by numerous identically fruitless
attempts to stop prison guard violence, especially in Florida,
but of course I, like many others, will continue to seek justice.
A federal case should be made out of
the latest travesty. The recent acquittal of Timothy "Big
Red" Thornton and two other guards involved in the killing
of Prisoner of Florida, Frank Valdes, has angered a lot of people
across the nation.
Frank Valdes was pulled from his cell
at the Florida State Prison at Starke in July 1999 dead, with
22 broken ribs and fractures of his sternum, vertebrae, nose
and jaw, along with numerous internal injuries. There were boot
prints on his face, neck, abdomen and back. Nine guards were
originally charged in the crime. At first they claimed Valdes
"did it to himself", but by the time they reached court
over two years later, they had turned themselves into humanitarians
who "might have broken his ribs trying to revive him".
This was a case that should have been
easy to win--and might have been won--if the trial had been moved
completely out of the North Florida area (aka "Redneck Riviera")
with its proliferation of small prison towns.
The finding of innocence was supposedly
based on the premise that, since nine officers were involved,
the court had to determine the one 'killing blow' and who struck
it--or all would go free. How in the world are we to ever know
which was 'the killing blow' and who delivered it? Does the
medical examiner know? Do the guards even know? Of course not,
but somehow this detail becomes our impediment to justice.
How can a jury containing a guard deciding
a case against prison guards be considered impartial?
Why was the testimony of the remorseful
prison guard not heard by the jury?
Why did Thornton's high-priced attorney
(whom the Guard's Union hired) feel it necessary to use the popular
guard catch-phrase, most cunningly disguised in a symbolic gesture
that spoke louder than words, "All Inmates Are Liars"?
I'll tell you why: Because that's all
guards have ever needed to say to clear themselves of their own
perjuries and other 'improprieties' in Florida.
The presiding judge addressed both the
court and the jury prior to closing arguments and acknowledged
that he realized that just about everyone present was either
related to, was friends with, or saw each other at the local
stores. Did he honestly believe that conversations regarding
the trial never took place up to this point or even before the
jury was selected?
Once the trial was staged in the guard's
back yard, acquittals were predictable.
I have letters from a number of prisoners
who speak of the horrors the Florida State Prison system's errant
guards, including Thornton and Griffis, were inflicting even
before the Valdes killing.
Here's a little backgrounder on "Big
Red" Thornton, one of the guards present at the murder,
but somehow deemed legally innocent by Florida justice. It shows
the kind of people the DOC employees and protects. [Prison
captain twice arrested on the outside.]
"During his 14 years as a corrections
officer, Thornton's use of force to restrain inmates more than
30 times was always deemed justified. His personnel file shows
the 6-foot, 230-pound guard has never faced disciplinary action.
But while working as a bouncer at Bobby's
Hideaway in Waldo in 1996, Thornton was arrested on a charge
of aggravated battery. Alachua County sheriff's deputies said
he tried to break up an argument between his brother and 24-year-old
Scott Petty. He allegedly took Petty outside and kept hitting
him.
Petty received two broken ribs, a fractured
eye socket and a broken nose. The charge was dropped when Petty
decided not to press the matter.
In 1986, a year after Thornton became
a prison guard, Starke police charged him with burglary and battery.
They said he and a companion broke into a Starke motel and assaulted
another man. Thornton pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor battery
charge and the burglary charged was dropped."
Now Thornton and another three of the
involved guards (one from an earlier trial) are free men--because
no one in a position of power in Florida cared enough to win
this case. Families and prisoners and advocates are greatly
and rightly worried about the clear and foreboding message this
court sent to the prisoners and guards in Florida: If you want
to kill, just make sure you are wearing a DOC uniform and your
prey is a prisoner!
Unfortunately, I guess no one has thought
of filing federal conspiracy and murder charges against the guards.
Because of dual jurisdiction, from what I understand, federal
law can apply (like with Terry Nichols) and 18 USC which makes
murder associated with torture a federal crime, This was torture
by any standard, and NO DOUBLE JEOPARDY attaches. Under federal
law, these guards can be tried away from a kangaroo court of
relatives, supporters and friends.
The threats and abuses continue in the
prisons throughout Florida, only now guards invoke the name 'Valdes'
as a mutually understood threat to frightened prisoners. Ever
since the Valdes murder, guards all over Florida have been using
his death to threaten prisoners with the same fate.
The lives of other prisoners are at great
risk: look for more prisoners kicking themselves in the face
with their own boots, breaking 22 ribs by themselves or 'committing
suicide' in a variety of unlikely ways.
All I can say is, SEND IN THE FEDS!
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