[News] FBI Assassinates Puerto Rican Independence Leader Filiberto Ojeda Rios

[Anti-Imperialist News]

Monday, September 26th, 2005
FBI Shoots Dead Puerto Rican Nationalist Leader Filiberto Ojeda Rios

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=05/09/26/1434229

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For the past four decades Filiberto Ojeda Rios had been a leading figure in 
the fight for Puerto Rican independence and against U.S. colonial rule. He 
was wanted by the FBI for his role in a 1983 bank heist. [includes rush 
transcript]

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Longtime Puerto Rican nationalist leader Filiberto Ojeda Rios has been 
killed by the FBI. The shooting occurred Friday after FBI agents surrounded 
a house where he was staying. According to an autopsy, Rios bleed to death 
after being hit with a single bullet. Officials didn't enter his home until 
Saturday, many hours after he was shot.

The FBI claimed the 72-year-old Ojeda Rios fired first but independence 
activists accused the FBI of assassinating him.

For the past four decades Ojeda Rios had been a leading figure in the fight 
for Puerto Rican independence and against U.S. colonial rule.

In 1967 he founded and led the Armed Revolutionary Independence Movement. 
He was later a key organizer with the FALN, the Armed Forces of National 
Liberation and then the Boricua Popular Army, also known as the Los 
Macheteros.

The FBI considered Ojeda Rios a wanted fugitive because of his ties to a $7 
million bank robbery in 1983 in Connecticut. He had been living underground 
for 15 years.

On Friday night, 500 supporters of independence protested the shooting by 
blocking one of the main roads in San Juan. Here in New York, a protest is 
scheduled for today at 5 p.m. at 26 Federal Plaza.

Earlier this morning I spoke with political analyst and radio host 
Juan-Manuel Garcia-Passalacqua in Puerto Rico and asked him to lay out what 
happened.

Juan-Manuel Garcia-Passalacqua, Puerto Rican political analyst and radio host.

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AMY GOODMAN: Earlier this morning, I spoke with political analyst and radio 
host, Juan-Manuel Garcia-Passalacqua, in Puerto Rico and asked him to lay 
out what happened.

JUAN-MANUEL GARCIA-PASSALACQUA: What happened, and again it's in all the 
newspapers, because the widow survived, and she has told the story. What 
happened was that the special team of the Federal Bureau of Investigations 
entered Filiberto Ojeda's home in a rural barrio in the town of Hormigueros 
by crashing the gate and shooting one hundred times against the house. 
Filiberto then put on his fatigues and his boots and responded the fire 
with ten shots. And the number of -- the number of spent cartridges shows 
that he was shooting ten times, and the F.B.I. was shooting a hundred times.

After that, again, none of the hundred shots caught him, but a sharpshooter 
that was located on a high ground, maybe in a helicopter, shot him with a 
single bullet through again his neck or his -- place near the face. And he 
fell, and then for 12 solid hours, the F.B.I. refused to enter or let 
anyone enter the house waiting for Filiberto Ojeda Rios to bleed to death, 
which is exactly what the coroner certified this morning that Filiberto 
Ojeda Rios died of a single wound brought because of bleeding caused by 
that wound that lasted for hours without any medical or any other help. So, 
once again, it is clear this was a political assassination.

AMY GOODMAN: Can you talk about the significance of Filiberto Ojeda Rios?

JUAN-MANUEL GARCIA-PASSALACQUA: Yes, Filiberto Ojeda Rios was a young 
trumpet player in Chicago when he was involved in the efforts of the 
revolutionary Cuba intelligence in that city to promote independent 
sentiment in that city, and after that, he came back to Puerto Rico and 
founded what was known as the Ejercito Popular Boricua Macheteros, the 
clandestine sector of the nationalist movement in Puerto Rico that was 
responsible, as you know, for several successful attacks, including the 
blowing up of several airplanes in the military base in San Juan for $45 
million, and later for the assault of a truck, a brinks truck in Hartford, 
Connecticut, also successful, again, in the course of independence.
He was tried for those events in a federal court in Puerto Rico, and he was 
absolved unanimously by a Puerto Rican jury. I had the chance of 
interviewing him on television that day, and we remained friends from that 
day on. And he obviously was very proud of the fact that the Puerto Rican 
jury had absolved him of all crimes and had decided -- and this is the 
official decision of the jury -- that he had acted in legitimate defense 
against the forces of the United States. Then he went into clandestine 
activity again by taking off his -- how would you call that thing that they 
put on your feet -- whatever -- the electric -- whatever.

AMY GOODMAN: The bracelet.

JUAN-MANUEL GARCIA-PASSALACQUA: The bracelet, exactly. And he went into the 
mountains and lived there in the mountains in the town of Hormigueros. He 
built a house there, changed his physical appearance, shaved his beard -- 
that was his trademark -- and became Don Luis, the gardener of roses. And 
that's how his neighbors knew him for many years. But again, on the day of 
the celebration or commemoration of the Grito de Lares, the Puerto Rican 
revolution against Spain in 1868, he was attacked by a group of at least 25 
Federal Bureau of Investigation officials that, again, broke the gate of 
his home, shot one hundred times against him. He had a chance of responding 
that fire only ten times, and then the fatal shot by a sharpshooter in high 
ground took his weapon from his hands and fell.
After that, for 12 or 15 solid hours, he was left there to bleed. The blood 
from his body seeped out of the house under the door and through the little 
place in front of the house and could be seen by everybody. Everybody 
watching could have known that he was bleeding to death, but the Federal 
Bureau of Investigations repeatedly [inaudible] his doctors or his 
attorneys that were there as he bled to death. And that is the story. 
That's how Filiberto Ojeda Rios has gone into immortality in the history of 
Puerto Rico.

AMY GOODMAN: And his wife?

JUAN-MANUEL GARCIA-PASSALACQUA: His wife is now freed. She will hold a 
press conference in a couple of hours here in Puerto Rico. And the press 
today advances what she will say. She will say that she is the only living 
witness and that the F.B.I. officers entered her home shooting one hundred 
times, that Filiberto Ojeda Rios defended himself, and he was shot and 
fell, and he shouted to her, "Leave now! Save your life and keep fighting!" 
And that is what she will testify in a couple of hours in a press 
conference at the [inaudible].

AMY GOODMAN: Radio host Juan-Manuel Garcia-Passalacqua, speaking from 
Puerto Rico on the assassination of Filiberto Ojeda Rios


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