US vs LEONARD PELTIER CLEMENCY,  WHAT HAPPENED?

Passing over Peltier/part 1 of 2:

Among the things Bill Clinton left behind are a broken promise and questions of a deal

  Inauguration Day in Washington, D.C., was overcast, cold and wet.

Tens of thousands of flag wavers, politicians and protesters were in town to demonstrate their feelings about America and its democracy. Law-enforcement officers were out en masse. Occasionally, protesters approached rain-soaked reporters to ask if there was "any word yet."

The answer was always, "No, not yet."

Leonard Peltier -- a man sentenced to two life terms in a Kansas prison in 1977 for the murder of two FBI agents, but whose case has been mired in controversy since it began -- had dared to hope that outgoing President Bill Clinton would grant him executive clemency.

But as the rain continued to pour down in Washington on Inauguration Day, Peltier's flickering hopes were dimmed and finally doused. Clinton granted 176 pardons that day, but never mentioned the man who has garnered widespread support from within and without Washington.
{Leonard's Pardon not Among those listed}

In the aftermath, several questions have arisen. Why was an insurgent team of Peltier advocates asked to draft a speech for Clinton if the president was not planning on granting clemency?

Could, as he claims, South Dakota Gov. Bill Janklow -- a conservative Republican from a state that Clinton's own commission on civil rights was critical of -- hold so much sway over Clinton as to keep Peltier behind bars?
{Daschle opposes freeing Peltier}

Did the unprecedented picketing of the White House by FBI agents affect Clinton's thinking on the Peltier case? And, as Peltier himself asks, was there a quid pro quo involving the American Indian Movement icon in Clinton's perjury and obstruction of justice investigation that stemmed from the Monica Lewinsky impeachment scandal? Did Clinton trade his own freedom for Peltier's?
{For Peltier supporters, Clinton's last day a 'day of shame'}

In the waning hours of the Clinton presidency, 176 pardons and commutations flew out of the Oval Office.
{Washington Post: Pardons & Commutations}

Dozens of them raised the eyebrows of even Clinton's closest allies, especially as Marc Rich -- the billionaire fugitive fuel executive who renounced his U.S. citizenship in exile to avoid criminal tax-evasion charges -- suddenly received a pardon after his ex-wife Denise Rich donated large sums of money to the Democratic Party and reportedly pledged $450,000 to the Clinton library.

Forty-six other cases raised similar suspicions, leaving U.S. Attorney Mary Jo White and a Manhattan grand jury to decide whether pay-offs had played any role in the pardon process.

The idea that a quid pro quo was a part of the pardon game caught the attention of Leonard Peltier's lawyers and supporters. The American Indian activist in 1977 received two consecutive life sentences for the point-blank shooting deaths of two FBI agents during a gun fight on Jumping Bull Ranch in Oglala, on the Pine Ridge reservation in South Dakota.

Peltier, who is serving his sentence in Leavenworth Penitentiary in Kansas, maintains his innocence to this day. He and his supporters claim he never received a fair trial. Peltier's supporters pointed out that unlike numerous pardons that were granted, Peltier's application for executive clemency went through all the appropriate Justice Department channels and had been pending throughout the Clinton presidency. The case has drawn the support of the 250 Indian tribes represented by the National Congress of American Indians, Amnesty International and renowned world leaders such as the Dalai Lama and South African Archbishop and Nobel laureate Desmond Tutu. Even one of the judges who heard Peltier's case at the U.S. Court of Appeals in St. Louis advocates clemency.

Advocates of clemency for Peltier had been encouraged since last November, when Clinton made his first public statement about the case in an unexpected call to New York radio station WBAI. In a 30-minute conversation with hosts Amy Goodman and Gonzalo Aburto, broadcast nationally on Nov. 12 by the Pacifica radio network on Goodman's syndicated show "Democracy Now!," Clinton promised he would give Peltier an answer one way or the other.
{Text of Amy Goodman's Interview with Bill Clinton}

While the hopes of Peltier's supporters ran high following Clinton's statement, FBI agents and a handful of their political allies in Washington, D.C., scrambled to prevent the president from letting loose the man they say is a cop killer.

In the end, Clinton didn't keep his promise to give Peltier an answer. He passed the file over to incoming President George W. Bush -- who some say is unlikely to ever consider it -- leaving several questions seething beneath the surface. Did Peltier's supporters know that a secret team was dispatched to Washington just days before Clinton left office, to argue the merits of the Peltier case with White House Deputy Counsel Bruce Lindsey and others?

Did his supporters know that the team, which included a lawyer, the author of a renowned book on Peltier and a top Hollywood film producer, were also asked to write a speech that Clinton could read explaining why he granted Peltier clemency?

Just how influential was South Dakota Gov. Bill Janklow, the man who takes credit for convincing Clinton in a mid-December Oval Office meeting to leave Peltier behind bars?
{URGENT PELTIER ACTION!..{additional info on janklow}

Why, on Dec. 15, did hundreds of FBI agents launch an "unprecedented" picket against clemency in front of the White House?

And why has Peltier spun a theory that may never be substantiated?

In the only in-depth interview with Peltier to be granted by Leavenworth Penitentiary to a newspaper since last October, Peltier told the Colorado Daily that he believes Clinton passed over his file in exchange for the deal that allowed the former president to put behind him a charge of perjury stemming from his testimony to Congress on the Monica Lewinsky scandal.

"He traded his freedom for mine," Peltier alleged.
 

Peltier and Pine Ridge

The history of Pine Ridge, where Peltier's troubles began, is steeped in the tragedy and bloodshed of past relations between the U.S. government and American Indians. For Indians and their supporters, Peltier has become a Nelson Mandela-like symbol of a centuries-long fight for cultural survival and civil rights.

It is the part of the country where, in 1876, Gen. George Custer, leading the U.S. Army's 7th Calvary, was defeated at the hands of Sitting Bull, who led Sioux and Cheyenne Indians. Some 14 years later, government troops closed in on Sitting Bull and killed him for resisting arrest on Standing Rock reservation. Many of his Sioux followers fled Standing Rock by horseback to Pine Ridge, but the 7th caught up with them. Between 150 and 370 Indian men, women and children were slaughtered at Wounded Knee. It's considered one of America's worst tragedies, made even more painful for American Indians, who readily point out that the soldiers of the 7th won 20 Congressional Medals of Honor for their actions while the descendants of the Sioux were left to live on reservations.
{ Petition to Rescind the Medals of Dis-Honor}

After the Wounded Knee slaughter, educators moved in to Americanize the Indians. Indian dress and beadwork were banned, rituals like the sweat lodge were forbidden, and the area's inhabitants were made to speak English. By the 1970s, a small village had grown out of the ashes of Wounded Knee. It was alive with the cultural resistance of the American Indian Movement.

Peltier was among those members of AIM who came to lend his hands to an Indian cultural revival and movement for social justice.

AIM was inspired by the civil-rights movement and energized by opposition to the Vietnam War, and in 1973 the movement took a stand against what it called tyranny on Pine Ridge. The reservation was the site of a 71-day standoff with the government that ended in a massive trial. Today, following the release of about one-third of some 9,000 classified federal documents from the era that show the government had conducted surveillance of Indians, trust is a rare commodity.

So it was on June 26, 1975, when two young FBI agents, Ron Williams and Jack Coler, were fatally shot after pursuing an alleged felon, who was said to have owned a red vehicle, onto Jumping Bull Ranch. Williams spotted a red vehicle matching the description and followed it onto the ranch, where he and Coler were ambushed.

Peltier and two others were charged with taking part in the slayings of Williams and Coler, though whether any of them fired the fatal shots was never proved.

AIM founder Darrell Butler and an AIM member, Robert Robideau, were indicted in U.S. District Court in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, as Peltier fled to Canada. He was nonetheless indicted on identical evidence in the two murders. And whereas Butler and Robideau were tried before a jury and acquitted, jurors stating that the defendants' actions appeared to be self-defense, a different fate awaited Peltier.

Peltier was captured in Canada and extradited back to the United States. A new case was built. One new factor was Pine Ridge resident Myrtle Poor Bear, alleged by the prosecution to be Peltier's girlfriend. Poor Bear, according to the prosecution, saw Peltier carry out the murder. The FBI obtained three affidavits from Poor Bear. In the first, Poor Bear claimed that Peltier told her he committed the murders. In the second, she claimed to be an eyewitness. A third was used to extradite Peltier from Canada. However, the defense took issue with Poor Bear's affidavits. Poor Bear had a known history of mental illness that prevented her from testifying in the trial. The defense argued that Peltier would have never been extradited had Poor Bear not signed the affidavit.
{Extradition based on false evidence, Peltier inquiry says}

In addition, Peltier faced evidence that wasn't presented against Butler and Robideau. Peltier also faced trial in a different venue in Fargo, N.D., where a former state attorney general, Judge Paul Benson, presided.

The FBI worked with U.S. Assistant Attorney Lynn Crooks to produce the single most controversial piece of evidence in the Peltier case -- a ballistics test that purportedly tied Peltier to the murder weapon.

After a car exploded on the Kansas Turnpike near Wichita, Kan., the FBI recovered a .223 shell casing like the one found in one of the dead agents' cars. The shell casing was matched to an AR-15 rifle which the FBI said was Peltier's.

During the trial, an FBI ballistics expert, Evan Hodge, testified that he was unable to perform a standard firing-pin test, which used shell casings found at the shooting site because the rifle was burned in the explosion. Instead, he conducted an extractor mark test -- which the defense said was less reliable -- and found the AR-15 matched.

During Peltier's lengthy appeal, 3,000 documents obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request came to light -- some showing that a firing pin test had been performed and there was no match.
{ballistics tests}
{RESMURS...from Appeal..lab report shows none of the .223 matched ANY AR-15}

In 1982, Peltier's lawyers argued for a new trial. In ordering an evidentiary hearing, judges expressed doubts over the credibility of Poor Bear's testimony and the ballistics evidence. Judges were concerned that the paperwork favorable to Peltier's case was unlawfully withheld from the defense.
{APPEALS CASES}

Yet no new trial was ordered.

By 1984, in another appeal hearing, it appeared that Crooks had backed off his theory that Peltier shot the agents. He argued that others could have been involved in the murders.

U.S. Appeals Judge Gerald Heaney reminded Crooks that he originally argued that Peltier had acted alone, prompting Judge Donald Ross to ask why Crooks didn't seem certain that Peltier was the killer.

Crooks replied, "But we can't prove who shot those agents." The appeals court in 1985 found that the prosecution withheld evidence that would have "cast a strong doubt on the government's case" and may have swayed the opinion of jurors.

But Heaney in 1986 did not order a new trial, even though he concluded: "There is a possibility that the jury would have acquitted Leonard Peltier had the records and data improperly withheld from the defense been available to him in order to better exploit and reinforce the inconsistencies casting strong doubts on the government's case."

In 1991, Heaney sent a letter to Congress stating he felt legally constrained not to grant a new trial and that the president might want to consider clemency for Peltier. In October of 2000, the judge affirmed to a senator that he still stood behind what he said, and added more.

"The FBI used improper tactics in securing Peltier's extradition from Canada and in otherwise investigating and trying the Peltier case," Heaney wrote. "At some point a healing process must begin. Favorable action by the President in the Leonard Peltier case would be an important step in this regard."

By August of 1993, 18 members of Congress, including a congressman who was a former FBI agent, asked for an independent investigation of the circumstances surrounding Peltier's arrest and trial. Though the letter did not talk about clemency, it sought to determine why the Justice Department had opposed a new trial for Peltier.

Also that year, former Attorney General Ramsey Clark recommended the president examine the merits of the government's case against Peltier.
 

Wounded relations

Though Clinton would never publicly address the Peltier case -- with the exception of his comments to WBAI -- he went to Pine Ridge in 1999, making him the first sitting U.S. president since Franklin Roosevelt to visit an Indian reservation. It was just a year after members of AIM had protested the President's Initiative on Race in Denver and several other cities, criticizing its failure to include a Native American on its advisory board.

Clinton, during his visit to Pine Ridge, acknowledged the problems faced by residents of the reservation, which still holds the dubious honor of being the most destitute place in the United States. It's where grinding poverty runs hand-in-hand with rampant alcoholism and the country's highest mortality rate.

"You have suffered from neglect, and you know that doesn't work," Clinton told a gathering on the reservation. "You have also suffered from the tyranny of patronizing, inadequately funded government programs, and you know that doesn't work. We have tried to have a more respectful, more proper relationship with the tribal governments of this country to promote more genuine independence, but also to give more genuine support."

The president once again neglected to mention one former symbolic Pine Ridge resident -- Peltier -- but the appearance nonetheless gave hope to Peltier's supporters. It was enough to lead members of the Leonard Peltier Defense Committee to hold a quiet month-long vigil in front of the White House in November 1999 as part of Native American Heritage Month.

"It was symbolic," said Gina Chiala of the LPDC. "Clinton had decreed it Native American Heritage Month, and we thought it was a good time to send a message, because clemencies are traditionally granted around Christmas." At sunrise every day from Nov. 1 to Thanksgiving, David Chief, a Lakota spiritual leader affiliated with Pine Ridge, led a service.

"It was cultural activities, spending the day in the park," Chiala said. "We wanted to send a quiet message to the president."

Though there was never any response from the president or his staff, Chiala said, there was one from the FBI.

"They took out a major ad in the Washington Post," she said. The FBI said in the ad that it sought to dispel some of the "inaccuracies" perpetuated by Peltier's supporters, including Amnesty International. The ad described Peltier as a cop killer, said the case against him had sound merits and told the president it was time to "move on."

According to Russell Means, a defendant in 1973's Wounded Knee trial and a long-time AIM leader, such advertisements are part of a failed public relations strategy by the FBI.

"They only make people more certain that Leonard is innocent," Means said. "It is an embarrassment to the FBI that these ads run."
 

The FBI and the Internet

On June 12, 2000, a parole hearing for Peltier at Leavenworth more than satisfied the FBI when a hearing examiner refused to look at the case for Peltier's release. From that point on, Peltier-related activities on both sides increased -- especially as the 25th anniversary of the firefight on Wounded Knee approached.

By June 26, the Minneapolis Division of the FBI had launched a Web site.

"We felt that it was time to honor the agents that were killed," said James "Chip" H. Burrus Jr., an assistant special agent in charge of the FBI's Minneapolis Division, which is responsible for South Dakota's nine reservations. "The focus, so much, has been on Mr. Peltier and what he did and how he is unjustly in prison -- not true."

Burrus calls the Web site, which includes photos of Williams and Coler's cars riddled with bullet holes, a response to demands for more information about Peltier's case.

"In June, there were a whole series of articles about what happened, and we put a bunch of stuff on our Web site," Burrus said. "We put up pictures; we put up as much as we possibly could without doing harm" to the survivors of the victims.

FBI agent Ed Woods was part of the effort, Burrus said. Woods set up a Web site -- www.noparolepeltier.com, which is central to the No Parole Peltier Association. The site won the 2000 Outstanding Site Award from the Law Enforcement Internet Directory.

The site, which Peltier's supporters say is rife with misinformation, challenges virtually every point and document available on the LPDC's site -- www.freepeltier.org.

"Much of the information on the (two Web sites) is emotional and judgmental," Chiala said. "The FBI is engaged in a campaign of misinformation. There are problems with police culture when they get so involved."

Burrus defended Woods, who maintains the Web site from his home, on his off-hours.

"He's very concerned about the issue, and he really serves as a kind of a clearing house of information for agents who are both retired and current who want to see and need ammo to be able to fight back with -- especially if they are debating at a university or if there's an editorial or something that appears," Burrus said. "What we try to do is, we try to straighten out a lot of the myths that have developed as a result of this case."

According to Peltier, the Web sites just drew more attention to his cause and the LPDC's site.

"It actually helped me, because a lot of people began doing their own independent investigation and getting more facts," Peltier said. "We seemed to get a lot more support from their actions."
 

The value of keeping it under the radar

In June of 2000, Margaret Colgate Love, a former pardon attorney highly familiar with Peltier's clemency file, published an article titled "Of Pardons, Politics, and Collar Buttons: Reflections on the President's Duty to be Merciful," in the Fordham Urban Law Journal. Love, who is now a private-practice lawyer, served as a Justice Department pardon attorney from 1990-1997.

In her article, she argued that presidents have an official obligation to forgive -- that forgiveness is a safety valve that preserves national integrity. She pointed to Constitution framers like Alexander Hamilton, who in his Federalist Papers said the pardon power could be both "mercy-dispensing and policy-shaping."

Pardons, she said, can be especially useful when a law appears to have had harsh or unjust consequence as well as in times of political upheaval.

She pointed out that until just 20 years ago, pardons, like the one President Gerald Ford offered to Richard Nixon, followed a specific pattern meant to preserve the status quo while healing divisions. But around the time when Ronald Reagan became president, pressures to get tough on crime made it more difficult for presidents to be merciful, Love argued.

According to Love, politicians since Reagan have felt compelled to show that they can be strict -- especially Democrats. Clinton was no exception, Love said.

In January, she published an op-ed in the Washington Post, blasting Clinton for caving in to political expediencies rather than providing merciful leadership.

But one of the most important points Love made about the pardon process focused on its behind-closed-doors secrecy. Love was critical of the press for "trying" pardons and clemencies in the court of public opinion.

She told the Colorado Daily that it hurt Peltier's chances. "It is never helpful to have pardon business put on the street before the president makes a decision," Love said. "I don't know who did that, but I think it was a shame to do that. I don't know if it was Mr. Peltier's supporters, who have not shown themselves to be terribly effective."

But in fact, Peltier's supporters were in the beginning working covertly and quietly, despite a massive base of support that is estimated to be millions of people.

Hollywood actor Peter Coyote, a long-time Peltier supporter, said he learned that it was better to keep the push for clemency quiet. It was the best way, he said, to get Peltier out of prison.

"I represented a wing of people under advice from Washington," Coyote said. "I was in the White House. I got a lot of good advice from people who basically said, 'Once this is on the president's desk, just let it drop below the radar.'

"The only audience for a clemency hearing is the president and three or four of his top advisors. Those are the only people who are instrumental. If you mount a big public campaign, you just bring it up on the radar and you mount resistance."

Coyote, who has known Peltier for decades, said he worked sources in the White House, the Justice Department and Democratic Party for several years. He made the contacts after he was asked to appear at the 1996 Democratic National Convention.

"The deal is that if you have a celebrity on the floor, you attract media attention," Coyote said. "I knew the quid pro quo. I said, 'All right, I'll do that. But I want access to somebody deputy level in the Justice Department to talk about Leonard.'"

Sources in the Justice Department, Coyote said, became sympathetic to Peltier's case after reviewing it. He said he met with John Dwyer, deputy associate attorney general.

"He said, 'Mr. Coyote, I'm embarrassed to tell you that when I first spoke to you, I thought you were some kind of wild-eyed radical,'" Coyote recalled from the meeting. "'I'm embarrassed to tell you that everything that you told me was true, and all that I can really tell you is that there are some extremely powerful people in Washington who do not want Leonard Peltier out of jail.'"

Coyote wasn't the only one making overtures. Others who exerted influence on the president included music mogul David Geffen.

Peltier said he appreciated the support.

"Geffen came out a little after my book was released," Peltier said, referring to his 1997 title "Prison Writings -- My Life Is My Sundance." "It was about that time. I know I received a message and they had read the book. They were aware of my case."

Peltier said he was made aware of a dinner meeting during which Geffen urged Clinton to support releasing him from Leavenworth.

"I know 'My Life is My Sundance' was brought to him at a dinner that they had," Peltier said. "It was brought to his attention that they had supported him in both campaigns ... and that they continue to support him, and that they never asked for anything in return -- but they were asking for this one thing."

And Geffen had influence. According to Federal Election Commission documents, Geffen in 2000 gave $240,000 to various branches of the Democratic Party and to Democratic candidates.
 

Clinton makes clemency battle public

Whether Hollywood influenced Clinton at all remained unclear. But the FBI feared that people like Geffen had somehow gotten to the president, especially after he said he'd make a decision -- one way or the other -- on the Peltier case.

When Clinton appeared on Pacifica's "Democracy Now!" on Nov. 7 -- Election Day -- the process suddenly went public and frenetic.
{Text of Amy Goodman's Interview with Bill Clinton}

"I don't have a position I can announce yet," Clinton told WBAI's Goodman. "... I believe there is a new application for him in there. And when I have time, after the election is over, I'm going to review all the remaining executive clemency applications. And, you know, see what the merits dictate. I will try to do what I think the right thing to do is, based on the evidence.

"And I have never had the time actually to sit down myself and review that case. I know it's very important to a lot of people, maybe on both sides of the issue. And I think I owe it to them to give it an honest look-see. So part of my responsibilities in the last 10 weeks of office after the election will be to review the requests for pardons and executive clemencies, and give them a fair hearing. And I pledge to do that."

Goodman asked: "And you will give an answer in his case?" "Oh, yeah, I'll decide one way or the other," Clinton replied.

Soon, Peltier's millions of supporters and hundreds of FBI agents set into motion what became arguably one of the most bizarre bids for clemency the country has ever seen.

On Dec. 10, International Human Rights Day, Peltier's supporters gathered at the United Nations in New York City to once again urge his freedom.

"By the observations of experienced organizers in New York City, it was a tremendous turnout for one of the most diverse rallies yet," said Dennis Moynihan of the LPDC, a carpenter who has extensive experience as a political organizer. Moynihan estimated that up to 3,000 demonstrators convened from every corner of North America. Indians came from Ontario, New England, Arizona, New Mexico and Pine Ridge, he said.
 {the peltier rally in new york}

Meanwhile, in South Hampton on Long Island, Means raised $16,000 for Peltier at an art gallery.

"Many of Leonard's supporters were there," Means said. "Writers, producers, authors, artists -- it was typical."

The FBI was also revving its engines.

According to Burrus, the interview with Goodman had prompted the FBI to step up its campaign against Peltier.

"President Clinton gave an interview with Pacifica radio that really ratcheted it up for us," Burrus said. "We were not aware that Mr. Peltier was under consideration. As a victim, as a recognized victim of Mr. Peltier, normally the FBI would be notified of this and so forth.

"Of course, Mr. Clinton comes on Pacifica radio and conducts his interview, and I think it's at that point where a lot of our agents began to say, 'Wait a minute here. What's going on? Our voices need to be heard.'

"So our office, as we always have, offered our side of the case. Since we were the office that had jurisdiction over the case and we were the office that provided the FBI agents who prosecuted the case -- we have the files and so forth -- we took the lead on that."

FBI Director Louis Freeh also delivered letters to Clinton, Rep. Henry Hyde, R-Ill., and Attorney General Janet Reno. "Please do not let this happen," Freeh wrote.
{Letter from Hyde and 21 Member of US Re: Peltier Clemency}

He called the case crucial to the FBI and said the Peltier conviction was just.

"Mr. President, there is no issue more deeply felt within the FBI or more widely shared within the law enforcement community than the belief that this attack by Peltier was nothing less than a complete affront to our cherished system of government under the rule of law," Freeh wrote. He added, "The premeditated execution of two young FBI Agents is the most vile disrespect for all that we cherish under our law and our God and for which moderation can only signal disrespect."

Freeh wrote that the families of Williams and Coler also stood against clemency and added that the FBI was unanimous in its opposition to clemency for Peltier.

"There is no dissent within our agency on this point," Freeh stated.

To Reno, Freeh sent a lengthy description of the case, stating that denying Peltier clemency was a "matter of extreme urgency to the FBI" and expressed concern that recent media coverage made it appear certain that Clinton would "review and decide" the issue in favor of Peltier.

On Capitol Hill, Rep. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., introduced a resolution in Congress that urged the president not to grant clemency, which he argued could only signal "disrespect."

The resolution never advanced. Meanwhile Hyde, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, circulated memos to other congressmen opposing clemency. Freeh's letter was attached.
 

Freeh's operating procedure

According to sources, this enraged Rep. John Conyers Jr. of Michigan, the ranking Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, who thought Hyde was abusing his position as chairman. Conyers had long supported Peltier, signing onto the 1993 letter.

In late December, Conyers and 17 other members of Congress sent Clinton another letter in support of Peltier.

"There were a number of representatives who responded to pressure from the FBI, but it's hard to quantify that," said Keenan Keller, an aide to Conyers. "Some just didn't want to take a position, given the controversy."

Keller added that many representatives had difficulty taking a stand on the issue because they were unfamiliar with the complexities of case.

"The controversy around Mr. Peltier is so historical, not enough members were really keyed into it," Keller said. The Democratic caucus from California was keyed into it, however. Its delegates brought resolutions supporting clemency to the Democratic National Convention in Los Angeles in August.

"That was one thing that the defense committee hoped to promote," Moynihan said. "This isn't a fringe issue. This is a mainstream issue. Much of the Democratic Party is not in touch with its mainstream constituents."

Several Democrats had strong feelings about the merits of the Peltier case and reservations about leaving him in prison any longer, given the historical rift between the government and Native Americans.

Rep. Eni Faleomavaega, D-American Samoa, who signed onto the letter, said he considered the case against Peltier to be circumstantial.

"It raises a very reasonable doubt," Faleomavaega said.

Faleomavaega said he was concerned over the ballistics test that connected Peltier to the gun used to shoot the agents, and added that he thought Peltier was framed.

"They wanted their pound of flesh," Faleomavaega said of the FBI. "I think this whole effort is that the FBI just wants to cover up another embarrassment."

He pointed to Robert Philip Hanssen, the FBI agent arrested for leaking secrets to the Russians for 15 years.

"They couldn't even find this mole in our security system that has been giving secrets and information to the Russians for how many years now?" Faleomavaega said. "That's called an embarrassment. I think the Peltier case is another case of embarrassment.

"I hate to say it: I think this man has been framed, and I do believe what he said to everybody -- that he did not shoot those agents."

Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., a member of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, did not sign onto the Members of Congress letter. However, he wrote to Clinton directly.

"I wrote to say that I felt he should get commutation," Frank said. "I had been asked before to join the letter for pardon. I said I really couldn't do that because I wasn't in a position to re-decide whether he was innocent or guilty, but I did think that now that he'd been sentenced for a while -- that in the interest of healing some angry feelings with some of the Native Americans and given that he's already served a very significant sentence -- that it made sense to release him."

A former Congressman and ex-FBI agent, Don Edwards, also urged clemency.
{Letter from Congressman Don Edwards, Former FBI Agent PDF Format}

On Dec. 14, he wrote to Clinton: "Granting clemency to Mr. Peltier should not be viewed as expressing any disrespect for the current agents or leadership of the FBI, nor would it represent any condoning of the killings that took place on Pine Ridge. Instead, clemency for Mr. Peltier would recognize past wrongdoing and the undermining of the government's case since the trial. Finally, it would serve as a crucial step in the reconciliation and healing between the U.S. Government and Native Americans on the Pine Ridge Reservation and throughout the country."

Pressure to free Peltier came especially from the international political community. Mary Robinson, the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, reminded Clinton in a letter dated Dec. 22 that Peltier's case has drawn the support of a "remarkably broad range of observers and institutions," including the European Union and indigenous people from around the world, including the U.N.'s Working Group on Indigenous Populations.

Meanwhile, South Dakota politicians took a stand and became perhaps Peltier's most vocal opponents. Sen. Tom Daschle, the Democratic Senate minority leader, said Peltier should not be walking around as a free man. He came out against clemency at the eleventh hour. He has refused numerous requests for an interview with the Colorado Daily, but told Clinton how he felt after being asked by the president for his views on the issue, according to an article in the Jan. 12 Sioux Falls Argus Leader.

"I'm opposed to a pardon of Leonard Peltier and have always been opposed," Daschle told the Leader. "That is what I shared with (Clinton)."

Daschle added: "I believe the law enforcement agencies, and those involved in law enforcement, and the accounts they provided about what happened and how it happened. I believe that it is a matter well documented."

Prior to that, South Dakota Republican Gov. Bill Janklow met with Clinton to urge that Peltier not be released. The Los Angeles Times reported on Dec. 21 that Janklow had somehow convinced Clinton that Peltier did not deserve clemency.
{URGENT PELTIER ACTION!..{additional info on janklow}

"He was seen as a credible, important point of view," the Times quoted a "White House official" as saying. "He made a very convincing case in a way that Freeh never could."

Reprinted under the Fair Use doctrine of international copyright law.

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PART 2 OF 2

Current and Past Supporters of Clemency for Leonard Peltier
Click here for complete listing in PDF format
{translated for the PDF challenged here}
Letter from Congressman Don Edwards, Former FBI Agent
PDF Format
Letter from NCAI
PDF Format
Letter signed by World Renowned Human Rights Leaders
PDF format
{translated for the PDF challenged here}
Go to More Support Statements