Remember COINTELPRO?
Miami arrests seen as racist entrapment
By
Larry Hales
Published Jun 29, 2006 12:48 AM
What is behind the FBI arrest of seven Black men
on June 22 in this election year, barely a year after thousands of Black and
poor white residents were left to die in New Orleans in the aftermath of
Hurricane Katrina?
Five of the men arrested in Miami are African-American,
and two are Haitian. Lyglenson Lemorin was arrested in Atlanta, where he had
moved. The men, who range in age from early 20s to early 30s, are charged with
conspiracy.
Patrick Abraham, one of the Haitian men, had already been in
the custody of immigration officials since May for staying in the United States
past his visa date. Stanley Grant Phanor was in custody for weapons charges. The
other men are Narseal Batiste, Naudimar Herrera, Burson Augustin and Rotschild
Augustine. The men had tried to start a construction company.
According to
the federal grand jury indictment, Batiste recruited the group to set up an
“Islamic Army” to wage a “jihad” in the United States
and then contacted an FBI agent, who was posing as a member of Al Qaeda. Batiste
allegedly gave the agent a list of necessary equipment and asked for
$50,000.
However, although several buildings are said to have been
searched, no evidence was found, other than a reported list and several photos
of Miami buildings that the men supposedly gave to the government-paid informant
who helped set the trap. The men were not found to have any of the materials
they were said to have requested. The claims that they had sworn allegiance to
Al Qaeda are farfetched as well. The only person who ever claimed to have any
contact with Al Qaeda was the undercover agent.
At a June 23 news
conference, FBI Deputy Director John Pistole stated that the defendants’
“conspiracy” was “more aspirational than
operational.”
Yet on the day of the arrests, the capitalist media
ran the story far and wide. The next day, pictures of the men were front page,
with sensational captions. One would think that Osama Bin Ladin, Al Zarqawi and
Jack the Ripper had all been caught together.
The treatment of these men
and this case exposes racism, not only in the media, and not only in Florida,
but in the United States.
The case highlights how severely reactionary the
ruling class’s government has grown.
‘No weapons, no
explosives’
Howard Simon, director of the American Civil
Liberties Union’s Florida branch, said: “We’re as puzzled as
everyone else. There’s no weapons, no explosives, but this major
announcement.”
Attorney General Alberto Gonzales admitted that the
men had no means or money to commit any act. Yet, he said, “We took action
when we did because we believe we have an obligation to prevent America from
another attack here.”
Rotschild Augustine’s lawyer Nathan
Clarke said, “This thing took place over eight months, according to the
indictment, and at the end of the indictment it says that this thing became
disorganized and nobody had ever done anything or did
anything.”
Albert Levin, the court-appointed attorney for Patrick
Abraham, said that it is a clear case of entrapment. Most of the talking was
done by the paid informant. The defendants mostly listened.
No one in the
neighborhood felt the men were any threat. A man named Bro ther Corey, an
associate of the other men, said that the group the men allegedly belong
to—Seas of David—mixes Islamic and Christian beliefs.
Family
members and residents of Liberty City, location of the warehouse where the men
live and work, said the men were quiet and well mannered. Marlene Phanor,
Stanley Phanor’s sister, said, “All they was doing, was trying to
do, was clean up the community.”
Liberty City is a poor
working-class neighborhood where almost half of Miami-Dade County’s over
500,000-strong Black population lives. It is one of the poorest areas in the
country, in a city with a 30-percent poverty rate.
It is also where a
rebellion sprang up in 1980. In 1979, cops were charged with beating to death a
Black motorcyclist, Arthur McDuffie. The cops were acquitted by an all-white
jury. One of the cops involved testified that McDuffie crashed his bike, and
when the cops reached him he was okay. But one of the cops took off
McDuffie’s helmet and beat him to death, then put the helmet back on his
head and said that he received the injuries in the accident. The coroner’s
report contradicted the cops’ original story, but, even with one of the
cops testifying as to the real events, the jury still acquitted.
Residents
in the area rebelled.
U.S. funds real terrorism
The case of
the seven men is indeed one of entrapment. It shows how far authorities are
willing to go to demoralize communities of color and activists. This is
reminiscent of the FBI counter-intelligence program known as COINTELPRO, which
was used in the 1960s and 70s to break up the Black Panthers and other militant
Black organizations, the Amer ican Indian Movement, and Chicano organizations,
and also to spy on a few socialist parties.
However, the difference is
that today the movement is not at the same point as during COINTELPRO. But the
message is clear. The ruling class is becoming more reactionary, and is trying
to prevent a militant movement in the streets, especially one arising from the
most oppressed.
There are terrorists in Miami-Dade—but it’s
not these men. The real terrorists have waged a war against the revolutionary
government of Cuba for nearly 50 years. They have been funded and trained by the
CIA and they operate in the light, not bothering with any sort of
shroud.
These terrorists have launched hundreds of attacks against the
Cuban people, attacks that have led to many deaths and injuries. One of their
ilk, a man reportedly responsible for blowing up a jetliner and killing 80
people, is being held on immigration violation charges, but the United States
refuses to extradite him to Venezuela, where he escaped prison. This man is Luis
Posada Carriles.
Posada Carriles and the other terrorists in Miami wage
their war of terror in cooperation with a government that openly plans for the
takeover of the Cuban government after Fidel Castro dies. So terrorists in the
U.S. government’s employ are okay, as long as the terror is in the ruling
class’s interest.
The case of the seven men begs the question: What
would five Black men and two Haitian men have against the United States, since
Alberto Gonzales announced that the men “view their home country as the
enemy”? If one took Florida itself—from the decimation of Native
peoples and slavery, to the Rosewood massacre and Jim Crow, and flash forward to
the 2000 elections when Black votes were suppressed, to the killing of Martin
Lee Anderson—there is plenty to despise.
The ruling class has the
idea to squelch the desires of working people, poor people and the oppressed,
and so the movement must see this case for what it is: a threat to organizations
of people of color and activists and revolutionary organizations demanding real,
deep change.
Articles copyright 1995-2012 Workers World.
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