From taco!rock!concert!uvaarpa!caen!uwm.edu!ux1.cso.uiuc.edu!news.cso.uiuc.edu!ux4.cso.uiuc.edu!cburian Sun Mar 28 20:25:41 1993
Xref: taco alt.censorship:7486 alt.conspiracy:25602
Newsgroups: alt.censorship,alt.conspiracy
Path: taco!rock!concert!uvaarpa!caen!uwm.edu!ux1.cso.uiuc.edu!news.cso.uiuc.edu!ux4.cso.uiuc.edu!cburian
From: cburian@ux4.cso.uiuc.edu (Christopher J Burian)
Subject: Press censorship in Waco
Date: Sat, 27 Mar 1993 09:27:22 GMT
Message-ID:
Sender: usenet@news.cso.uiuc.edu (Net Noise owner)
Organization: University of Illinois at Urbana
Lines: 462
Linda Thompson is an attorney from Indianapolis.
===Forwarded from Fidonet===
* Original: FROM: Linda Thompson
* Original: TO: All
* Original: AREA: AEN NEWS
* Forwarded by Linda Thompson
* Forwarded Using QuickBBS 2.76 Ovr
* Forwarded at 02:06 on 26-Mar-93
Well, John Baird and I went down to Waco last Friday, March 19. We filed a
petition to allow David Koresh to have access to an
attorney or for an attorney to have access to David
Koresh, citing a lot of Supreme Court law that says a
person is in custody when they are no longer free to leave
the presence of police and that the person has a 5th
Amendment (Miranda v. Arizona) right to counsel when in
custody.
The Judge, Walter Smith, Jr., of the U.S. District Court,
Western District, Waco Division, would not read or hear
the motion on Friday or over the weekend and finally, at
close of business Monday, gave us an order that literally
had pages that were xeroxed from another order in it.
He had previously denied seven petitions filed on behalf of Koresh and 6
others by other attorneys -- using the SAME order.
We petitioned for an expedited appeal to the 5th Circuit
Court of Appeals in Louisiana and got turned down three
times by Thursday.
While we were there, we saw a lot of interesting things.
The ONLY news coming out of Waco comes from two places:
(1) Every day at 10:30, the FBI, by a guy named Ricks, holds a "press
conference" at the convention center. Whatever the FBI
wants told, that's what gets told and that's ALL that is
reported across the country, period.
(2) The only other source of "news" comes from reporters
who are living in RV's alongside one of the roads coming
out of the retreat area. If anyone leaves the area (i.e.,
the people who have left in the past few weeks), they are
paraded in open cars past this string of reporters by the
FBI on their way to the FBI command post center, so
reporters sometimes can take a picture of it. That's all.
HOWEVER, interestingly enough, CNN seems to be able to get in or at least
get film footage up close of the compound, though no one
else can.
Also, I know for a fact that CNN made at least two false
reports the week we were down there and the reports were
directly from the FBI itself.
===
Walter Smith, Jr., the judge who used the same order to
deny 8 different petitions on behalf of people inside the
retreat has also done the following:
(1) Allowed arraignments of people coming out of the compound to be held in
secret. At least one woman, Schroeder, was arraigned and
then held as a material witness. This means they didn't
have enough evidence on her to charge her with anything,
but they kept her in jail anyway. Everyone else coming
out of the compound is in jail as a "material witness",
too, and they aren't allowed to talk to anyone.
(2) Sealed the probable cause affidavits and search warrants that were
supposedly the ones the BATF was serving on day one. He is
very likely the same judge, or his magistrate, Green, who
signed the order. There are no other federal judges in
Waco and Green is the only magistrate (sort of a semi-
judge who is picked by and works for the judge).
===
The FBI took out the entire lawfirm of Thompson and Baird
for about 2 hours Saturday night, March 20th and the saga
goes like this:
Gary Hunt, who we now know to be a paid government informant but didn't know
at the time, John (Baird, my partner) and I decided to go
into the press area at Waco. We also had decided that
Hunt would cross the second road block inside the press
area. He would promptly be arrested and we would take
pictures of his arrest and challenge it on a First and
Fourth Amendment basis, along with violation of state law
and the 10th Amendment.
Our AEN press passes and driver's licenses were checked and passed at the
first road block. The guards there, mostly state police,
were pretty nice, friendly, etc. and even posed for
pictures. They trotted out the BATF "bomb dog", a golden
labrador retreiver that had a sign on his back that said
"ATF Agent." The dog was quite friendly, complacent, and
sleepy. I got a few pictures of all this. As I was taking
pictures, the State Police repeatedly said to the dog
(just kidding) "FBI agent, boy, sic 'em!!!" and laughed.
We went down into the press area, which was a major bore. There was
absolutely nothing going on except press RV's parked up and
down the road and a few cameras on tripods, taking
pictures of every car coming out of the retreat.
Interestingly, the government cars often had no tags.
We passed out three copies of a press release that
announced what we were doing to a couple of reporters.
One reporter who knew me walked up and said, "Oh so we
have legal counsel tonight." I told him, no, I was there
as a press member at that time and briefly mentioned AEN.
Gary, unbeknownst to us, had faxxed press releases BEFORE we went there, all
over the place. The reporter who spoke to me also trotted
over to the police and, kind of like the teacher's pet
suck-up at school, informed the police at the roadblock
that I was an attorney. Soon thereafter, lots more (6)
state troopers arrives.
Gary, however, decided he didn't want to be arrested
afterall, so we left. I would have done it but for the
pending petition in Federal Court.
Anyway, as we were leaving, back at the first roadblock 5
miles outside the retreat, the same nice friendly guards
had turned surly.
We were stopped and asked to show our press badges on the way out. They
snatched them from our hands. We were asked to show
driver's licenses and they took those, too. The officer
was overheard to say that he was going to "run these
through NCIC." We were told to stay in the car until the
FBI got there. So we did.
In the meantime, most of the police were hanging out at
various distances around the car, none too worried. A
real stoopid neanderthal-type BATF agent was nearby.
I had two rolls of film in my purse and another roll in a small instamatic-
type camera. I was looking for places to hide the film,
figuring what was coming. I noticed John looked a little
pale and looked out the window to see that the BATF agent
was pointing an MP5 with a flashlight on it right at us
(never at Gary, though). At first, I thought maybe it was
accidental because I saw it pointed at us, then he turned
it away a little, then he pointed it back at us, so I
thought maybe he was just too stupid to realize he was
moving it in our direction, then he stood and REALLY
pointed it at us, at which time I observantly remarked to
John, "Shit, he's pointing that machine gun at us!" to
which John astutely replied, "NO SHIT!!" (he'd been
watching it longer than I had).
Not being the brightest person in the world, I was absolutely astonished.
Fear didn't enter my mind (too stupid/astonished/whatever,
I guess), but I was FURIOUS. I wanted a picture for
evidence. So as he moved the gun again so it wasn't quite
pointed at my head, I snapped a picture.
As he ran around the car at me, I rolled up the window and locked the door.
He yelled in that if I took another picture, he'd break my camera.
The camera had an auto rewind on it and it was rewinding it's little wheels
off. He couldn't see what I was doing because it was too
dark inside the car and I got the film out and put it and
the other two rolls behind the glove box in the dash --
not IN the glove box, BEHIND it.
Shortly, the state policeman-in-charge came back and told
us to step out of the car and put our hands on the car.
They searched Gary and John . . . but NOT ME. Snort. Of
all the people likely to be carrying . . .well, nevermind.
So then we had to stand around in the 35 degree weather for
another half-hour or so, waiting on "The FBI" to arrive.
After we got out of the car, the police started shining flashlights in.
The short, dumpy neanderthal kgBATF agent went around to
the passenger door of the car and opened it. I repeatedly
stated that he did NOT have my permission to search the
car, LOUDLY. He picked up my purse off the floor and
dumped it in the seat and then he got Gary's camera from
the backseat and opened it and took the film out.
Gary called out to him repeatedly, "That's the wrong
camera, that's not the film." Ahem.
So then he found my camera and opened it and said, "Where's
the film." To which I replied that there wasn't any
(anyone could see that). So then he told Gary to quit
lying. hahaha. Told you he was stoopid.
So I asked the Texas state policeman bringing up my rear (we all had a
triage of our own personal police, front, back and side) if
he had sworn an oath to uphold the Constitution. He
crossed his arms and looked far away, and nodded
imperceptably. So then I asked him if he had ever READ it,
to which he didn't reply.
About two minutes later, as I put out a cigarette on the
ground, the state policeman pointed to it and said,
loudly, "YOU'RE LITTERING IN TEXAS!" (Oh, shit, big
trouble now, fer sure.) So I picked it up. I gave it to
Gary. I asked the nice policeman if his name was Ody or if
he'd ever been to Alice's Restaurant and wasn't that in
Texas?
So then the state-policeman-in-charge says the FBI has
arrived and tells us to pull the car off to the side of
the road by the big tent. All this time, we've been quite
a spectacle in the middle of the road. Remember, this is a
PRESS exit and plenty of press had passed by . . . and
stopped, and we now, thankfully, had lots of film rolling
in our direction.
The state-policeman-in-charge says, "They're going to
question you one at a time, who wants to go first?" So I
said I did.
Before we had embarked on this adventure, John and I had discussed whether
or not the night's planned events might bring the FBI out
of the woodwork, because we had not been able to serve a
copy of the legal papers on the head FBI agent (they were
avoiding us, but that's another story). So I had taken a
copy of the paperwork from the Court with me, just in case
we happened to actually run into an FBI agent. I took
that in with me for my "questioning."
The tent was off to the side of the roadblock. Inside, it was warm. There
were four metal chairs in a semi-circle, with an FBI agent
on each end of the semi-circle. I sat down in the middle.
A bunch of state policemen came in. The atmosphere was
clearly one of "We're the big boys and we're gonna show
you how it's done, fellas" (from the FBI side) and the
State Troopers were dead-pan but smirking as things
progressed.
First, the agents both stuck their ID badges RIGHT in my
face and said they were FBI (deep tone of voice, for
effect). Gee, was I ever intimidated (not).
So I asked Agent Callaghan (it said so on his ID) if he was
going to see Jeff Jamar, the officer in charge of FBI
operations, later in the day. He said he was, so I handed
him the envelope with the legal papers in it. He opened
it and looked at the court documents and said, "Where'd you
get this official seal?"
Duh.
So I patiently explained that the good clerks at the
federal district courts often seem compelled to stamp
legal pleadings with an official looking seal that they
apparently have on hand for whenever the mood hits them,
and that it seemed to happen most regularly whenever I
filed a LAWSUIT against somebody.
Duh.
So then Agent Caballo, who had been steadily writing down all the
information from my Avis rent-a-car paperwork, my AEN press
badge, and my driver's license, said, "How come your
driver's license number doesn't match the Avis car
paperwork?" I didn't have a clue, honestly. So I told him
to ask Avis, I didn't have a clue. So he said my Avis
paperwork was phoney.
So next, Callaghan says our press badges were phoney, too, to which I
replied they were not, that I was a member of a legitimate
electronic news service. So he wanted to know where I got
the badge and I said the same place CBS, NBC and every-
other-body gets theirs. To which he said, "Where?" And I
said, "That's your job, you find out."
So about that time, I figured it was time for Doc
Thompson's Constitutional Law Search and Seizure 101 short
course for these fellows.
I asked them if I was under arrest. Callaghan said, "No,
we just want to ask you some questions."
[If you are not free to leave, you are under arrest.
Edwards v. Arizona and Mendell v. U.S. and recently, U.S.
v. Nachtigal.]
I gave him a few pointers on this subject. He said, "We
aren't here to discuss the legalities of the situation."
To which I replied, "THAT's been rather obvious from the
beginning, hasn't it?"
Then I launched into a tirade about the BATF screwing it
up, the FBI coming in to cover it up, and there were
people like me who knew EXACTLY what was going on and that
whitebread America wasn't going to put up with this kind
of thing any longer and that every one of them would be
made to answer for these crimes. By this time, I was
shaking my finger in his face. I was almost old enough to
be his mother and he reacted as if I was, too.
He sort of ducked a little, looked pale and didn't say
anything. So I said, "If I'm not under arrest, then I'm
free to go. I need my property back." They gave it to me
and I left.
Next, Gary was going in and I went in with him. On the way in, one of the
troopers stopped me and said, "You wait in the car" and I
said, "No, I'm his ATTORNEY." They made me prove it, so I
showed them a few bar cards, like a poker hand, and said,
"Pick one." Then I went in with Gary. His interview was
MUCH shorter. Along the lines of "Is this your attorney?"
"Yes." "Where'd you get this ID?" "I'd advise you not to
answer that." "My attorney says not to answer." "Is he
under arrest?" "No." "No? Then he's free to leave." "This
passport picture looks phoney." "Fine, prove it, charge
him, or give it back and we're leaving." They gave it
back, we left.
John's interrogation was faster still. He was about twice
as tall as either of them (he's 6'4", 220). We went in,
sat down, they said, "Is this your attorney?" He said,
"When it's NECESSARY. Is it NECESSARY?" "Is he under
arrest? No? Then he's free to leave, right?" He got his
driver's license, we left.
Now that's not the end of it. The next day, at the press
conference, the FBI announced that we had been arrested
for having phoney press credentials.
This was a flat lie. We were never charged with anything
and the credentials were not phoney.
This whole thing had been done solely to discredit John and I because we
were representing David Koresh. And the FBI putting out
this false information was more propoganda, to get the
press to discredit us, just like they have Koresh. It
didn't work, except for one asshole TV reporter here in
Indianapolis and CNN. CNN apparently had news footage of
someone in a paddy-wagon (it most assuredly was NOT me or
John or any of us, there was no paddy wagon anywhere
around, either), along with the story.
So much for CNN's credibility in my book. And so much for
channel 59 here in Indianapolis, too.
===
After John and I were "detained for questioning", the next day, we got the
film developed and lo and behold, my picture of the kgBATF
agent pointing his MP5 machine gun at us, his finger
plainly on the trigger, the safety off, was good as gold.
We got it blown up to an 11" x 14" and we've been showing
it to all the news media who will film it, which is quite a
few so far. It shows up REALLY well on camera, too.
And I also tried to file criminal charges against him with
the local sheriff's office. The lower ranking officers
wanted to do it and said what happened was illegal, but
the report taking was assigned to a Lt. Larry Lynch who
refused to take a report and told me to see the DA
personally on Monday if I wanted to do that.
So we're filing a lawsuit instead for the illegal search and seizure.
===
The BATF and FBI each have their own command-headquarters
building, about three buildings apart from one another,
over on a small airstrip owned by:
CHRYSLER TECHNOLOGIES.
Chrysler technologies is a defense contractor and it led John to speculate
that perhaps the Chrysler buyout was even more of a sellout
than it appeared.
The FBI's building was surrounded by a chain link fence,
with one driveway into it, with a guard post and two-three
guards manning it at all times.
The guards at the guard post all looked like rent-a-cops or national guard.
The FBI set up was on the edge of the runway.
There's a big airplane hangar and sticking out of the door
of the hangar was the tail end of a camouflaged C5A
transport plane. We also saw two plain white, absolutely
no markings, small jets, along with two Move-Cargo (blue
star on the tail) jets (Move-cargo, I think, is supposed to
be a freight service, but it sure smells a lot like "Air
America". Oh well).
Back into the area a long ways (we couldn't get close) there was a very
pretentious, foreboding looking building, one story, with a
LOT of lights around the outside of it, that was probably
where they have been taking all the people that came out
of the Waco retreat for "questioning" before taking them
to jail.
We saw two BLACK helicopters on three different days, flying, landing, and
landed. They *do* reflect light funny and they show up on
a movie camera film as sort of a dull black-green, but
they most definitely are a flat black in person. There is
small red printing back on the tail section that I
couldn't read and on the top of the very front, there is a
very bright, almost flourescently bright, green patch with
a bit of white swirled in it. I haven't a clue what that
is or what it means or why it's there. One of the
helicopters was flying map-of-the-earth and practicing
strafing patterns when we saw it flying.
The kgBATF didn't rate the fancy digs. Their building is a
cement block one-story building up the road, no fence
around it. All they have is two kgBATF agents in their
private cars hanging out at the driveway coming in off the
road. We didn't even know they were guards and drove right
by them.
On Friday, there were no other vehicles other than POV's (privately owned
vehicles) or obviously military or fed unmarked cars. On
Saturday, though, there was a "US Department of the
Treasury" BOMB truck at the BATF headquarters and a large
firetruck at the FBI headquarters. We thought sure the
shit was going to hit the fan then but it didn't.
I got a few pictures of all of this, including the black helicopters.
===
John and I charged about $4000 on american express, due at the end of the
month in a lump sum. We also have thus far spent $500 in
court fees and another $400 in out of pocket expenses
(film, copying fees, using the computers at the printer,
developing pictures, and that doesn't include umpteen long
distance phone calls). We got back to the office in time
to learn our phone would be disconnected the next day if
we didn't pay that $471, too.
So, I hate to beg, but, we've decided we're in this for the
long haul and up to our eyeballs. We need money. Anyone
who can help:
American Justice Federation
3850 S. Emerson Ave., Suite E
Indianapolis, Indiana 46203
317-780-5204
Fax: 317-780-5209
--- QuickBBS 2.76 Ovr
* Origin: Gun Control = Criminals & Police vs. the Unarmed. (1:231/110)
===End Repost===
----------------- For PGP key, email -----------------------------------
| Chris Burian | To: pgp-public-keys@toxicwaste.mit.edu
----------------- Subject: MGET burian ---------------------------------
