Wounded Knee 122 Years Later

[Peter Lemkin]

Silence, they say, is the voice of complicity.
But silence is impossible.
Silence screams.
Silence is a message,
just as doing nothing is an act.
Let who you are ring out & resonate
in every word & every deed.
Yes, become who you are.
There's no sidestepping your own being
or your own responsibility.
What you do is who you are.
You are your own comeuppance.
You become your own message.
You are the message.

In the Spirit of Crazy Horse

- Leonard Peltier

AMY GOODMAN: On Saturday, after the Leonard Peltier concert at the Beacon Theatre, I had a chance to speak directly with Leonard Peltier, when he called into a news conference that was organized by Native elders, his lawyers and Pete Seeger. I conducted the interview in the front row of the press conference by telephone as he spoke to me from the U.S. Penitentiary at Coleman, Florida. Peltier was sentenced to prison in 1977. He's now 68 years old.

AMY GOODMAN: Leonard, this is Amy Goodman from Democracy Now! I was

LEONARD PELTIER: Oh, hi, Amy. How are you?

AMY GOODMAN: Hi. I'm good. I was wondering if you have a message for President Obama?

LEONARD PELTIER: Concerning what?

AMY GOODMAN: Your situation or the situation in the world or your own situation.

LEONARD PELTIER: Stop all the wars. Stop all the wars. Or what? What kind of message are you talking about?

AMY GOODMAN: You can share several messages.

LEONARD PELTIER: OK. Well, I just hope he can, you know, stop the wars that are going on in this world, and stop gettingkilling all those people getting killed, and, you know, give the Black Hills back to my people, and turn me loose.

AMY GOODMAN: Can you share with people at the news conference and with President Obama your case for why you should beyour sentence should be commuted, why you want clemency?

LEONARD PELTIER: Well, I never got a fair trial, for one. You know, my case has been throttled from the moment they had grand jury hearings. They had somebody on the grand jury hearing, at the hearing testifying against me I've never met in my life. And from the extradition from Canada, they violated international laws. And then at the trial, they had admitted racistsat the trial, they had admitted racists on the jury. They wouldn't allow me to put up a defense, and manufactured evidence, manufactured witnesses, tortured witnesses. You know, the list isjust goes on. So I think I'm a very good candidate forafter 37 years, for clemency or house arrest, at least.

AMY GOODMAN: What would house arrest mean? And can you describe your conditions in the prison in Florida where you are right now?

LEONARD PELTIER: Well, I'm in a United States penitentiary witha supermax penitentiary. And it's like all the rest of the penitentiaries. And house arrest would be that I'd be home onI'd be home on house arrest. I'd probably have to wear an anklet, a bracelet on my ankle, but that would be a lot better than this. At least I could get some medical treatment then. You know, I got real bad prostate right now, and it's just getting worse and worse. It ain't getting any better. It isn't healing itself, so, you know, it just continues to grow worse.

AMY GOODMAN: You were convicted of aiding and abetting the killing of these two FBI agents. What is your response to that?

LEONARD PELTIER: Well, originally I was convicted of first-degree murder, but after their case fell apart, they confirmed the conviction on the most critical evidence against me, the murder weapon. Then we filed a Freedom of Information Act and found two documents where they had done scientific tests from their firearms laboratory, and it came out negative. So this was a pieceanother piece of manufactured evidence, besides Myrtle Poor Bear, the witnesses and stuff like that. But, so then there case fell apart.

And then, in '92in 1985, when the federal 8th Circuit Court of Appeals judge, Judge Heaney, asked the prosecutors just what was Mr. Peltier convicted of, because we cannot find no evidence of first-degree murder in the record, the prosecutor, Lynn Crooks, stated that the government doesn't know who killed the agents, nor does he know what participation Leonard Peltier may have had in it. So, in 1992, I filed an appeal, again asking, "What am Iwhat was I in prison for if the government doesn't know what I'm in here for?" So they changed it to aiding and abetting, which is illegal, because I was never indicted for it, I was never prosecuted for it, and it takes a whole different defense in your trial. So I don't know what the hell I'm in here for.

AMY GOODMAN: How is your health? And can you describe the conditions at Coleman?

LEONARD PELTIER: Well, it's a United States penitentiary, you know, and they're getting worse and worse every year. They're notthey're not like they were 20, 30 years ago.

And I have awell, I have a bad prostate. I mean, you know, the doctor said that one side isone side looks healthy, and the other side is not healthy, of my prostate, when they gave me that scope test over a year ago. But so far it hasn't shown any cancer. I mean, you know, that's prettythis is one of the biggest killers of men. So, all they give me is a pill for it.

AMY GOODMAN: And diabetes?

LEONARD PELTIER: Well, I gotwell, yeah, I got all the other stuff, toodiabetes, high blood pressure, had a mild heart attack, had a mild stroke at one time. I mean, I'm falling apart.

AMY GOODMAN: Do you have any hope that you will be freed?

LEONARD PELTIER: Well, you know, according to the laws, they have the 30-year mandatory release law. After 30 years, I was supposed to be released. Of course, that went by. Come February, I'll have 37. But also, when I was sentenced to prison, a life sentence was seven years. I did not get life without parole; I got a life sentence. So I've done actually about five, six life sentences now. And, you know, that's reallyyou know, they're in violation of their own laws again, just on that. So, and I don't know. I'm fighting. I'm fighting for it. I'm going to try to get out.

AMY GOODMAN: What is your

LEONARD PELTIER: Can't predict that. So farso far, it ain't looking very good, I'll tell you that much.

AMY GOODMAN: What is your response to the FBI that campaigns against your release?

LEONARD PELTIER: Oh, they're fullthey're full of crap. You know, they're the ones that should be investigated for all the murders they committed on Pine Ridge. They supported that, those killings. They financed it. They gave intelligence and armor-piercing ammunition and sophisticated weaponry. This was all donethis was all stated by Duane Brewer, who was one of the leaders of the GOON squads on the reservation. So, I mean, they're the ones who should be investigated, which, by the way, someI might add now, some of the Indians and one state senatorstate senators in South Dakota are now calling for an investigation on that. They are going to put it together. And the son of Tim Johnson, who is an attorney in one of thein the attorney general's office in South DakotaTim Johnson is a congressman over there. His son is going to lead that investigation.

AMY GOODMAN: And what's the significance of that?

LEONARD PELTIER: Well, to put the murderers in jail. I mean, that's the way I look at it. I mean

AMY GOODMAN: For people who don't know about your case, especially young people, how would you like to be described? How would you, Leonard Peltier, like to be known to them?

LEONARD PELTIER: Well, just somebody that stood up for his people's rights and who tried to stop the Termination Act and all the other crimes committed against my people. That's the only reason I'm here. They ain't got methey ain't proved nothing about me. They ain't proved I did anything, let alone kill somebody.

AMY GOODMAN: What would you do if you were free?

LEONARD PELTIER: Well, I'd probably go home on house arrest. I mean, that's the only thing I can expect, because I don't think Obama is going to givehe's going to do what Bill Clinton did, and he ain't going to give no clemencies until his last year. He's just not going toit's not going to happen. I really don't believe it. So, I'm trying towe're trying toGeorge Bush signed the Second Chance Act, which is house arrest, and so we're trying to push that, so I can get over there, at least to maybe get someif I do get the house arrest, I can at least get some medical treatment, you know, because they're not givingthey're not giving it to me. They're justyou know, they're not going to give it to me. That's all there is to it. And, well, if I did, I'd go home to North Dakota. I got about 10 seconds left. That buzzer just give me aboutwell, about a minute, I think, I got left. But anyway

AMY GOODMAN: What gives youwhat gives you hope, Leonard?

LEONARD PELTIER: Huh?

AMY GOODMAN: What gives you hope?

LEONARD PELTIER: People like you and all the other supporters out there and people that are behind me, my people. That's the only hope I got.

AMY GOODMAN: And the meaning of Harry Belafonte and Pete Seeger and about a thousand other people who came out last night to this event in your honor?

LEONARD PELTIER: I got to say this. I got to say this really quick. I've got 10 seconds. Thank you all very, very much. And I'm sorry I can'tmy time is up. I've got to get off this phone.

PELTIER SUPPORTERS: We love you, Leonard. Love you, Leonard. Stay strong.

AMY GOODMAN: That was Leonard Peltier. I was speaking with him at a news conference on Saturday on the telephone. He washe is in prison at the U.S. Penitentiary at Coleman in Florida. He's been in prison for 37 years, is now asking President Obama for clemency. On Friday, a major concert was held here in New York calling for his release. Peltier is one of America's most well-known and longest-incarcerated prisoners. Go to our website at democracynow.org to see him reading his own poetry and to see Peter Coyote describing his case
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AMY GOODMAN: Our guest for the rest of the hour, Peter Coyote, politically engaged actor and writer, ordained Zen Buddhist priest, longtime friend of imprisoned Native American leader Leonard Peltier. He is the well-known voice of so many of Ken Burns' documentary series, most recently Dust Bowl, and before that, Prohibition, coming up, The Roosevelts, now here to talk about Leonard Peltier, because a major concert is being held in Peltier's honor Friday night to bring attention to the Native American leader's case, in prison now in Florida, but overall in prison for more than 37 years. If he served out his termhe was convicted for killing two FBI agents on the Pine Ridge Reservation in 1975. If he served out his term, he would be out when he was 95 years old.

Peter Coyote, why did you get involved with this case? Can you tell us the story of Leonard Peltier?

PETER COYOTE: Sure. I'll put that in a nutshell. I do want to say, he was not convicted for killing the agents. He was convicted of aiding and abetting, and even the government has admitted they have no idea whether he killed the agents or not.

So, I met Leonard long before he went to jail. I was involved in some Native issues before Wounded Knee. And a young friend of mine who was in charge of the spiritual elders came through, and they needed to buy some weapons for Wounded Knee, to defend. And I used to be a marksman; I know a lot about guns. I went to do that.

AMY GOODMAN: And they were allowed to have guns on the reservation.

PETER COYOTE: Oh, yeah. Yeah. So, traveling with them was this guy known as Alex, this big guy. We ran around for a couple of weeks, getting together some guns and ammunition and stuff like that. And several years later, I read an article in Akwesasne Notes about Leonard Peltier. I had no idea it was the same person. But I routinely send commissary money to people in jail that I know or that I'm impressed by, so they can buy some candy and cigarettes and stuff. I get this long letter back, "Hey, I knew this guy Coyote. He used to have a blue-eyed coyote dog and had this truck, and we did this and that. You knew me as Alex." So, I got goosebumps, and I thought, "I've got to get on board."

So here's the case in a nutshell. 1973, the highest per capita murder rate in the United States was the Sioux Indian reservation. Over 70 democracy activists were murdered by the chief of tribal police, Dick Wilson, who called his police force the "GOON Squad." The traditional women

AMY GOODMAN: That's GOON, Goons

PETER COYOTE: Yeah, Guardians of Oglala Nation. But they were, you know, being sadistic puns.

So the traditional women requested the American Indian Movement warriors to come in, and a cadre of men and women came in and set up a camp on the Jumping Bull Ranch. It was in this climate of murder and intimidation that an unmarked car drove onto the reservation one day. Two guys get out, and they get long guns out of the back. In retrospect, it turns out they were FBI agents, and they claimed they were following a kid who had stolen some cowboy boots onto the reservationhardly a federal crime. They had 50 tribal police just off the Jumping Bull Ranch. And what most people suspect is that it was a diversion, because the tribal police chief, Dick Wilson, was in Washington illegally signing away the uranium mining rights of the tribe.

So, a gunfight got started. No one knows how it got started. The tribal police fled. The FBI men were surrounded, they were wounded, and they were then executed. When they searched the bodies and they found out that they were FBI men, they were terrified, and the leadership knew what was coming, and they fled. And, in fact, the reservation was taken over by government forces. They fired 100,000 rounds of ammunition. They stripped Native elders naked. They broke down houses. They arrested three people for the crime, and they were acquitted by an all-white jury in South Dakota. And the government went crazy. So they got together, and they stitched up all the loopholes in the case. And they did it by fabricating chains of evidence, by suborning witnesses, by filing false affidavits. And they went, and they got Leonard. And when Leonard's trial was appealed, there was

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: So he was not part of the first three originally accused.

PETER COYOTE: Not at all. He was not part of the three at all. They went after him. The Canadian government is still suing the United States for filing false affidavits, which were responsible for his extradition. So they brought him down. They tried him. They made it look like an iron, bullet-proof case against him, and they imprisoned him.

At his appeal, the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals, a fellow named Judge Heaney wrote this list of 10 egregious errors in the trial, but said, "My hands are tied. I have to find him guilty." But he personally wrote to President Clinton asking for clemency for Leonard and said the FBI was culpable in this case, said

AMY GOODMAN: The judge in the case.

PETER COYOTE: The judge, Judge Heaney, did that. So, my argument is, since I was not there, I didn't witness itI was told by people who were there that Leonard was minding the children. The man who actually executed the agents has admitted it. He spoke to author Peter Matthiessen. He was masked. He said, "We were at war. I don't see why I should turn myself in. But I executed these people. This is what happened." So, my argument is, since I wasn't there, since I can't personally certify that Leonard Peltier didn't do this, I'm arguing that no American deserves a trial like this, that when the governmentwhen the federal prosecutor, whose name was Crook, stood up several years ago and said the government has no idea who committed the murders, Leonard Peltier should have been released.

In 1996, the Democratic Party asked me to be a delegate. And I said, "Well, I'll do that if you'll give me an introduction to a deputy level or above in the Justice Department." So I went to the convention, and they like celebrities because they get the cameras. And so they introduced me to a deputy level, and I briefed him on the case. And he said, "I'll have to get back to you." And he called me two days later, and he said, "Mr. Coyote, I'm embarrassed to tell you this. When you spoke to me, I thought you were a wild-eyed radical. I'm embarrassed to tell you that everything you said is true, and all I'm at liberty to say to you is that there are some very powerful people who don't want Leonard Peltier out of jail." And I said, "Would their initials be W.W.?" meaning William Webster, head of the FBI? And he said, "Well, you said that."

So, I think he has been held vindictively as the scapegoat for the deaths of two agentsthat's terrible, it's unfortunate. What were they doing on the reservation, driving into an armed camp? They were obviously preparing to spring a trap. These are high-stakes games. Leonard's aunt was run over and left dead on the side of the road. That's how he came there. Leonard was an urban Indian from Seattle. He's the guy that would fix everybody's car for nothing and make sure that people had something to eat. He's hardly a firebrand. And he's become the Nelson Mandela of the Native movement through his courage and growth and incarceration. And I'm one of the people who has known him since before he went to jail. So, I marvel at this change and deepening.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And you said that in prior attempts to try to get clemency for him, that actually the movement has not really understood the enormous influence that the FBI has in Washington in terms of every time that the movement sparks up and there's huge protest and outcry, the FBI goes around to congressional offices and to the White House advocating to keep him in jail.

PETER COYOTE: I can tell you this personally. I don't want toI don't want to make dissension among the left, people I respect, but I was involved in the clemency petition to Clinton, helped brief the people. We sent a producer in, who convinced the president's lawyer, who said, "You've convinced me. Now you have to write the speech for Clinton."

AMY GOODMAN: The president's lawyer was?

PETER COYOTE: SilverBrucesorry, Uncle Dribble is losing his frontal lobes. Anyway, but he got it. We laid out all the evidence. I was not in the room. Someone else went in, a big money guy. And so, I called the Leonard Peltier Defense Council, which is being run by a woman, very active and able organizer, whose husband had been murdered, and I said, "Listen, this is an appeal to an audience of one. Do not go for public opinion. Let's go in under the radar. Let's not notify the FBI." I can't really blame her for not trusting me, for, you know, theireverything they've gained has come from social action. And here's this Jew with an animal name saying, "Trust me, I'll make it alright."

So, I went to Congress. And they were out in the streets with their signs, and literally every congressional office I went into, as I was going in, the FBI was leaving with pictures of the dead agents that they had been showing on the congressmen. I could do nothing. And what I was toldand this is apocryphalbut I was told that it was Tom Daschle who went to Clinton, who was in a very tough race for his re-election, and he said

AMY GOODMAN: In South Dakota.

PETER COYOTE: Yeah. "If you free Leonard Peltier, you'll have a Republican senator in South Dakota." So that's the scuttlebutt that we got.

AMY GOODMAN: I want to turn to Lynn Crooks, an assistant U.S. attorney who helped put Leonard Peltier in prison. He was

PETER COYOTE: Who was the one that said, "We don't know if he did it or not."

AMY GOODMAN: He was interviewed by Tony Jones of Australian Broadcasting.

LYNN CROOKS: The trial was a long, hard trial, about five weeks. When we got all through with it, we wound up with no eyewitnesses. There were no direct testimony to "I saw Leonard Peltier finish off the agents." We had basically tried it on a kind of a combined hybrid theory. Our main theory, obviously, was that Leonard Peltier had gone down and personally executed both agents. I mean, there's no question that that was our main theory. But we hadn't proved that, and we knew we hadn't prove it. And so, we argued it to the jury quite simply as, "Ladies and gentlemen, this is what we think he did, but we know we didn't prove that, but, you know, we think we've convinced you that he did."

TONY JONES: You told the appeal judges in 1986, "We can't prove who shot those agents."

LYNN CROOKS: Well, again, you're talking semantics.

TONY JONES: No, what I'm talking about is a contradiction between two statements.

LYNN CROOKS: If you're talkingif you're talking about, did we have an eyewitness, did we prove by irrefutable evidence that he was the person that squeezed the trigger, we had never claimed that we had proved it in that sense.

TONY JONES: But that's what you told the jury. And if I can quote from your closing argument, "We proved that he went down to the bodies and executed these two young men at point-blank range."

LYNN CROOKS: Were they allowed to put the FBI on trial as they did in Cedar Rapids? No. But they were not allowed to essentially put the FBI on trial to imply that the FBI had hired Christopher Columbus to come over and harass the Indians.

AMY GOODMAN: That was Lynn Crooks, assistant U.S. attorney, who helped put Leonard Peltier in prison. Peter Coyote, if could you respond to what he said and then talk about what you're doing this week?

PETER COYOTE: Sure. Well, as I mentionedthis Australian reporter did a better job than I did of having the testimony to the jury and then the testimony to the judge. So, this is a man who's spent 37 years for a crime that not even the government can assert that he committed. It's telling that we had originally planned this benefitJackson Browne, myself, Harry Belafonte, Pete Seeger, a host of othersat the Beacon Theatre Friday night at 7:30, and there was going to be a benefit to try to raise money to get Leonard's lawyers re-energized, because they burn out. They've worked for 37 yearsappeals, families shattered. I mean, it's terrible. And Leonard stopped the benefit. He said, "After Sandy, I do not want to ask people in New York and New Jersey to give anything. Just bring my case to their attention. Let's give it a public look again, as we go after clemency." So that's what we're doing. We're just once again into the breach, refreshing the public's knowledge of this man, who is like Geronimo Pratt. You know, Geronimo Pratt only did 28 years, and Leonard has

AMY GOODMAN: Until his case was overturned.

PETER COYOTE: Yes, right, exactly. So, you know, I've been doing this a long time. And Leonard hasn't given up hope. I haven't given up hope. But I go home every night. Leonard is in jail. He's got diabetes. His health is bad. They didn't let him out for the death of his mother. They didn't let him out for the death of his father. They didn't let him out for the deaths of aunts and uncles. He survived two attempts on his life in prison. His jaw was wired shut for over a year, while he waited just, you know, basic medical treatment. And I'm embarrassed to be the citizen of a country that would treat any one man this way on the basis of such a jury-rigged trial.

AMY GOODMAN: Peter Coyote, we want to end with the words of Leonard Peltier himself, with another of his poems.

LEONARD PELTIER: "I Am Everyone."

I am everyone
who ever died
without a voice
or a prayer
or a hope
or a chance...
everyone who ever suffered
for being an Indian,
for being human,
for being indigenous,
for being free,
for being Other,
for being committed....

I am every one of them.
Every single one.
Yes.
Even you.

I am everyone.

AMY GOODMAN: Leonard Peltier, reading his own poetry, recorded by Claus Biegert, the German journalist. Peter Coyote, you have 10 seconds. You have spoken to Leonard in jail.

PETER COYOTE: My last letter from Leonard was several months ago, and he just said very plaintively, "Brother, please don't let me die in prison."