A-Infos (en) [AFIB] Baltimore Black Panther Fights for Justice

[Tom Burghardt <tburghardt@igc.apc.org>]

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|| * -- ALERT   -- *  --  July 17, 1998  -- * --  ALERT  -- * ||
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                           U R G E N T
                            A L E R T 
                              _____
 
                    * PAN-AFRICAN NEWS WIRE *
                    E-mail: ac6123@wayne.edu
                        Weekly Dispatch IV
                    - Friday, 17 July, 1998 -
 
                              -----
_________________________________________________________________
 
          BALTIMORE BLACK PANTHER FIGHTS FOR JUSTICE
_________________________________________________________________
 
        By the Marshall Eddie Conway Support Committee
 
                              * * *
 
     News Release, 17 July, (PANW) -- Baltimore Black Panther
leader, Marshall Eddie Conway, has been unjustly imprisoned since
1970 for a crime he says he did not commit. 
 
     Conway states: "I am a political prisoner in the State of
Maryland. I did  not receive a fair trial because of the
political climate against the Black Panther Party in 1970. I have
now served over 28 years in the Maryland Prison System. In 1970,
as a member of the Black Panther Party, I was framed for the
murder of a Baltimore City Policeman, and the shooting of two
other city police. I am innocent. Over the past 28 years, a group
of supporters have been working for my release. We have struggled
through the court process, and not received justice. We have
progressed through the parole process. I have met all the
requirements necessary to receive parole, and then without
warning, they change the rules. We have now reached an impass
that can only be overcome with mass support.
 
     "Justice has been both a tool and a weapon in the Black
Community. During the 1970s, it was used as a weapon against
unity. I have and always will work for positive change in our
community. Because of this commitment, I have suffered the
injustice of the misuse of the justice system. Only the support
of positive people can correct this wrong".
 
EVOLUTION OF A REVOLUTIONARY
 
     It all started for Conway in 1966, in Germany, where he was
serving in the US Army. This year, he saw a play about Malcolm X.
"It got me wondering who this guy was, what he was all about",
Conway said. "Then his autobiography came out and I read it.
That's the point when I became political".
 
     Disillusioned with the Army, Conway returned to his home-
town of Baltimore, Maryland, in September of 1967, having
received an Honarable Discharge. He joined the Congress of Racial
Equality (CORE). Integrating the Sparrows Point Fire Department
was one of CORE's primary projects. (Sparrows Point is the home
of the giant Bethlem Steel Mill.) Conway estimates that about 70%
of the department was Ku Klux Klan sympathizers.
 
     According to Conway, "being one of the first Blacks in the
Fire Department, I had a real experience with organized racism.
It kind of pushed me to a more militant stand in order to just
maintain employment. That made me realize that it was time to do
something more serious".
 
     Seriousness for Conway came in the form of the Black Panther
Party (BPP). In April of 1969, Conway joined the Baltimore
Chapter of the BPP. According to former Baltimore Panther leader
Paul Coated, the "party grew because it hit a responsive chord in
the community, which was police brutality. "Eddie, myself and
other young Black Women and Men joined the Party seeking an
organizational vehicle to end the exploitation and degradation of
Black people. We were frustrated by the limited success of the
Civil Rights Movement and the government assassinations of
Malcolm X and Martin Luther King, Jr. We united to actively
change 'the system', by any means necessary".
 
FRAMED AND RAILROADED
 
     One year later, on April 24, 1970, two police officers were
shot in West Baltimore by three men walking by their police car.
One, Officer Sager, died. A few blocks away from the shooting,
another policeman, Officer Nolan, reported chasing and exchanging
shots with someone who eluded him.
 
     At the same time, the police caught two men several blocks
from where the officers were shot. Jack Johnson, Jr. and James
Powell (both later identified as members of the Black Panther
Party) were apprehended under the back porch of a house. Several
rounds of ammunition and a 38 caliber handgun were found lying on
the ground between the two men. The next morning, another gun was
allegedly found at the arrest site concealed under a sandbox. A
ballistic expert later testified that a 38 caliber bullet was
removed from the skull of Officer Sager. Powell and Johnson were
charged with first degree murder.
 
     Two days later, police came to the Main Post Office, where
Eddie Conway worked, and arrested him. They later charged him
with murder and attempted murder. At the time, the only evidence
against Conway was an identification given by Nolan, who stated
that he saw someone running into an alley- at night - and
exchanged shots with that person.
 
     A warrant had been issued for Conway's arrest, although
there was no direct physical evidence to link him with any of the
shootings that night. According to the testimony of the arresting
officer, the warrant for Conway was obtained based on information
provided by an informer for the Federal Bureau of Investigation
(FBI). According to prosecution attorney Peter Ward, "the
greatest difficulty in the State's case was that we didn't have
any direct evidence and we didn't have a direct eyewitness. There
were a lot of incriminating circumstances that we had to tie
together to form a total picture". (taken from the "City Paper",
February 15, 1990)
 
     The prosecution built its frame-up against Baltimore Panther
leader Eddie Conway in several ways. Jack Johnson, closely tied
to the shooting by evidence, was to receive immunity from
prosecution in return for implicating Conway in the crime. When
Johnson took the witness stand, he pleaded the fifth amendment.
Other means of case-building was using a "stacked deck"
identification in which Officer Nolan was shown two sets of
photos with Eddie Conway's picture - the only one common to both
sets.  The most disputed piece of evidence was the testimony of a
prisoner who was placed in Conway's cell for four days. This man,
Charles Reynolds, on his way to prison in Michigan, claimed that
Conway confessed to him, a confession providing the only
incriminating testimony other than that of the police officer.
Reynolds then asked for a favorable recommendation to the
Michgian Parole Board in exchange for his testimony.
 
     Without adequate legal defense, Marshall Eddie Conway was
railroaded into prison.  He was sentenced to life imprisonment
plus 30 years. Some 21 Panthers, former members, and close
community activists were either arrested or were fugitives at the
time of Eddie Conway's arrest.
 
THE COUNTER-INTELLIGENCE PROGRAM (COINTELPRO)
 
     During the 1960s, the FBI, under J. Edgar Hoover, carried
out the COINTELPRO (Counter-Intelligence Program) aimed at the
disruption of Black and political dissidents. Targeting the Black
Liberation Movement, it sought, "to prevent the rise of a Black
Messiah".  Hoover called the Panthers in 1969, "the biggest
threat to national security". BPP chapters were attacked from
coast to coast. Chicago Panthers Fred Hampton and Mark Clark were
murdered in a police raid in 1969. Geronimo Pratt served over 27
years for a murder in which he did not commit. Many other Black
and political organizations were targeted for disruption.
 
     Eddie Conway contends his was just one name on a long list
of COINTELPRO victims. For his part, Eddie has remained strong,
providing leadership in inmate councils and coordinating
meaningful programs for other inmates. He actively conducts legal
research to aid his and other's defense cases. The legal work
around Conway's case continues. Two committees, The Marshall
Eddie Conway Support Committee and Friends of Marshall Eddie
Conway, working closely with Eddie, have reached out broadly in
the community and on the campuses. On December 9, 1995, over 300
supporters turned out at Dunbar High School for an Eddie Conway
rally, featuring Acklyn Lynch, UMBC African-American Studies
chair and noted author, the Sankofa Dance Company of Baltimore,
and many others.
 
     During the last three years (1995-1998) of the campaign to
"Free Eddie Conway", the support committee has held seminars,
fundraisers, lectures and distributed tens of thousands of
leaflets and hundreds of information packages. The committee has
appeared on radio programs, launched petition drives, attended
political prisoner conferences and demonstrations. In addition,
the supporters of Eddie Conway has had the political prisoner's
plight covered by the newspapers as well as created a network of
activists in a number of states.
 
     Funds are needed to help the committee's work to win freedom
for Eddie Conway. Please send letters addressed to Maryland
Governor Parris Glendening - who has stated that he will deny
parole for practically all prisoners serving life sentences - and
to the Maryland Parole Board, supporting Eddie's petition for
parole to:
 
          THE MARSHALL EDDIE CONWAY SUPPORT COMMITTEE
                         P.O. Box 41144
                    Baltimore, MD 21203-6144
                       Tel: (410)-276-7221
        Web: http://www.erols.com/rucnshus/mecschom.html
 
                              * * *
 
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