[News] Puerto Rico: Independence Activists Suspect 'Dirty Tricks' As Police Department Crumbles

[Anti-Imperialist News]

Puerto Rico: Independence Activists Suspect Dirty 
Tricks As Police Department Is Shaken

By Juan Antonio Ocasio Rivera
<mailto:joboriken at aol.com>joboriken at aol.com

September 20, 2007

National print media in Puerto Rico are reporting 
on major issues of civil liberties, corruption, 
and alleged FBI “dirty tricks” on the lead up to 
the 2nd anniversary of the FBI killing of a major 
independence leader on the island.

<http://www.economist.com/people/displayStory.cfm?story_id=4455267>
[]

Filiberto Ojeda Rios, 72, leader of Puerto Rico's underground revolutionary
movement and killed by the FBI September 23, 2005

The weekly Claridad, daily El Nuevo Día, and 
other news outlets have been consistently 
reporting on the intervention of federal 
authorities in cases of police corruption, 
corruption in government and political parties, 
and on the growing harassment of independence 
activists on the island, the latter presumably by 
the intelligence agencies such as the FBI.

BACKGROUND

Video shows police shooting><br> Miguel Cáceres Cruz

Video shows Officer Javier Pagan shooting Miguel 
Caceres while the victim was lying on the 
sidewalk face down; scores of people witnessed the murder

After months of highly charged activity on the 
part of progressive activists condemning police 
brutality and fabrication of cases by crooked 
cops, a single police shooting broke the story of 
widespread police abuse across the 
island.  Miguel Caceres, 43, was returning from a 
family party when confronted by an officer whom 
Caceres asked not to block traffic with the squad 
car as he drove through an intersection.  Officer 
Javier Pagan Cruz, enraged at this perceived 
insubordination, charged at Caceres and attempted 
to subdue him.  As Caceres backed away and 
questioned this intervention, the officer 
attacked him with punches and kicks and a 
struggle ensued which ended with Caceres 
motionless on the ground, the officer mistakenly 
shooting himself in the thigh and then emptying 
his gun at point blank range into the unconscious 
Caceres, killing him.  The incident was captured on a witness’ cell phone.

Coupled with ongoing community rights struggles 
condemning police misconduct, this event (and its 
footage) exploded all over news outlets across 
the country (including YouTube) as more and more 
cases were exposed and investigated.

The cases of police misconduct and fabrication of 
cases (including the planting of evidence such as 
drugs and guns) were reported mainly in the 
western area of the island, under the command of 
the Mayaguez drug division.  These issues had 
been condemned in the press by residents of the 
Candelaria housing projects and activists from La 
Nueva Escuela and Puerto Rican Independence 
Movement 
(<http://nylatinojournal.com/home/puerto_rico_x/essay/police_stories_of_candelaria_and_new_york_city.html>http://nylatinojournal.com/home/puerto_rico_x/essay/police_stories_of_candelaria_and_new_york_city.html). 
Dozens of officers have now been either arrested 
or transferred and the division has been 
replenished with officers from other areas with 
no prior records of civilian complaints.

Prior to this event, federal authorities 
announced ongoing investigations into possible 
campaign finance improprieties by the incumbent 
pro-Commonwealth Popular Democratic Party and 
current governor Anibal Acevedo Vila.  Previous 
investigations were also conducted against the 
statehood-advocating New Progressive Party and 
its president, former governor Pedro Rossello Gonzalez.

What is of most concern however, is the emerging 
pattern of activity reminiscent of the “dirty 
tricks” campaign conducted by the FBI during the 
1960s and 1970s against progressive movements in the US and Puerto Rico.

Since the FBI killing of independence leader 
Filiberto Ojeda Rios in 2005, that movement’s 
many vocal activists have been subject to an 
ongoing campaign of surveillance, harassment, and 
raids.  Several months after Ojeda Rios was shot 
by FBI commandos and left to bleed to death, 
agents raided the homes of several activists, 
looking for information implicating them in the 
involvement in Puerto Rico’s armed revolutionary 
underground movement.  In the process, agents 
attacked local journalists covering the raid, 
purposely spraying mace into the eyes of those covering the story.

Since then, scores of activists have been and are 
being followed by land and air.  Cars trailing 
their every move are now reported as a regular 
occurrence by some.  Even helicopters have 
reportedly been used for surveillance 
purposes.  Others have been pulled over by agents 
on the road or visited at their places of work 
simply to be given some kind of ominous message 
to spread to the movement at large (i.e., “If 
anything happens, we’ll come after you” or “if 
anything happens this weekend [9/23/06], we will 
mop up all independence activists in Puerto Rico 
and in the mainland”).  Some have discovered 
and/or suspect their phone lines being tapped and 
monitored and most activists now openly assume 
that large-scale surveillance is taking place.

FBI manipula declara...

Members of La Nueva Escuela and their lawyers 
hold a press conference condemning FBI harassment 
(<http://pr.indymedia.org/news/2007/08/24914.php>http://pr.indymedia.org/news/2007/08/24914.php)

Recent events point to a more ominous development 
in the government’s counter-intelligence 
program.  La Nueva Escuela Treasurer and local 
marine biologist Roberto Viqueira was stopped by 
local police and had his person and car searched 
by FBI agents allegedly looking for evidence of 
bomb-making materials.  Activists denounced that 
the FBI was fabricating allegations in order to 
have judges approve search warrants and conducted 
an illegal search and seizure.  Viqueira’s 
personal agenda and cell phone were confiscated by agents.

Two weeks ago, Rafael Cancel Miranda, one of the 
four Nationalists who served 25 years in federal 
prison for pro-independence attack in Congress in 
1954 before receiving an unconditional pardon by 
President Carter, received an anonymous death 
threat on his cell phone.  Cancel Miranda is 
considered a national hero in Puerto Rico and is 
received with standing ovations, hugs, and kisses 
around the world, but most especially by his compatriots on the island.

Ten days later, the co-president of the National 
Hostosian Independence Movement, one of the 
largest independence-supporting organizations on 
the island, reported that he suffered a home 
invasion with disturbing detail.  Hector Pesquera 
reported that armed masked men broke into his 
home at 3:00am, subdued him and his family, and 
robbed them only of computers, laptops, cameras, 
cell phones, ipods, pen drives, pictures, and his 
van.  No other personal objects of value were 
taken and Pesquera denounced that police were 
slow to respond and shrugged off his suggestion 
that they use his license plate number to track 
down the van.  He reminded his fellow citizens 
that the police worked in collusion with hired 
guns in previous decades to attack independence movement leaders.

At around the same time, a well known member of 
the national Bar Association reported that his 
office was broken into two nights in a row – both 
times thieves walked off with computer 
equipment.   Evoking images of the dirty tricks 
of the Watergate era, the thieves stole his 
server and secretary’s computer and then returned 
to steal his computer.  Carlos Mondriguez, a 
former official of the Puerto Rican Independence 
Party and currently working on historical 
projects for the movement that are now lost, 
recalled being watched and harassed decades ago 
and hoped that such practices were over, but 
commented that these occurrences are forcing 
people to think that the movement cannot discount 
that something more sinister is not at hand.

ANALYSIS

During the tumultuous 1960s and 1970s, Puerto 
Rico witnessed a rash of bombings directed at 
independence leaders and organizations.  (Indeed, 
Puerto Rican revolutionary organizations were 
conducting their own armed campaign designed to 
push the US out of the island.)  Declassified 
documents and other now-public sources prove that 
massive surveillance took place, with the 
collection of dossiers on hundreds of thousands 
of people on the island.  Simple association with 
the independence movement was enough for a file 
to be opened on an individual.  Right-wing 
extremists with ties to anti-Castro Cuban exiles 
in Miami were contracted to attack movement 
leaders, resulting in deaths of prominent 
activists and bombings of pro-independence 
rallies and even newspaper outlets published by 
movement organizers.  People were watched and 
followed and visited at work.  Neighbors were 
interviewed and employers urged to fire 
employees.  Activists were stopped and searched 
regularly.  Their homes were broken into 
regularly, discreetly at times but also many 
times done so that it was obvious belongings were 
searched.  The gubernatorial candidate from the 
now-defunct Puerto Rican Socialist Party, Juan 
Mari Bras, lost his son to a shooting under 
circumstances which still remain unclear, leading 
most to believe it was organized and carried out 
covertly by US intelligence 
services.  Declassified documents show that FBI 
agents celebrated Mari Bras’ heart attack in the 
mid-1970s and took credit for the stress that caused it.

(See 
<http://www.icdc.com/~paulwolf/cointelpro/pr.htm>http://www.icdc.com/~paulwolf/cointelpro/pr.htm 
for more information on COINTELPRO & Puerto Rico's independence movement.

See 
<http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,915760,00.html>http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,915760,00.html 
for brief examples of the FBI's dirty tricks campaign)

The past has a torrid history of dirty tricks and 
if current incidents are any measure, those dirty 
tricks are emerging once again in an effort to, 
as J. Edgar Hoover put it, neutralize and disrupt 
the activities of the Puerto Rican independence 
movement.  The interesting thing is that the 
police force at that time was also buckling under 
the weight of its own corruption.

Today, as the police force once again 
disintegrates under the weight of its own 
corruption, federal intelligence agencies try to 
move into the position of savior – the good cop 
looking out for the interests of the people 
abused by local police or local politicians – 
while simultaneously emerging from the shadows to 
play their traditional role of suppressor of 
independence activists (who have actually been 
the only ones condemning police abuse and 
political corruption for years).  They are 
usurping the increasingly prestigious role these 
organizations have been playing with respect to 
the agitation against abuse and for human 
rights.  They do this with purpose, for they 
clearly fear that the movement is moving 
successfully towards winning over the masses with 
its message of dignity, respect for human rights, 
environmental justice, political transparency, 
and consequently, political self determination 
via independence.  They witness the developing 
strength in the resurgence of the movement and 
now seek to quell that strength and growth.  It 
is too late.  This FBI response and strategy will 
not weaken the freedom movement nor can they 
replace the freedom movement with themselves in 
their phony role as protector of the rule of 
law.  They will only engender deeper resistance 
(both to them and to the colonial system) and 
radicalize the movement, expediting the liberation process itself.

There are some interesting cues from which to 
view this resurgence of FBI political 
repression.  In the two years since their murder 
to Ojeda Rios, agents willfully harassed 
activists in the days leading up to September 
23rd – both the date of Ojeda’s assassination at 
their hands and also an important historical date 
for the independence movement.  1868 activists 
rebelled against the rule of Spain; this uprising 
is commemorated yearly by the liberation 
movement.  The FBI seems to be concerned that 
this date will produce some kind of violent 
activity but also seems to be attempting to 
provoke it.  They are again harassing activists 
in the lead up to September 23rd.

The FBI investigation into who supported Ojeda 
Rios during his 15 years of clandestinity and 
into the Macheteros organization is an ongoing 
investigation since September 23, 2005.  This 
means they are attempting to link local activists to both issues.

The movement has finally begun heeding Ojeda’s 
call for unification.  The independence movement 
has been notorious for its divisive nature and 
fractured front.  This year, all independence 
supporting organizations have joined forces to 
commemorate the 1868 uprising as well as Ojeda 
Rios himself.  Such an effort was undertaken in 
the late 1960s and was met with the severe FBI 
repression mentioned previously.  Within the 
context of such an important unitary event, the 
possible unification of independence-supporting 
organizations (even symbolically and temporary), 
it may be seen right now as a dangerous step 
taken for the Federal Bureau of 
Investigation.  When this history and these 
dynamics are placed within the backdrop of a 
society increasingly involved in community 
grassroots struggles that are increasingly 
agitating and increasingly successful, the 
development of a grand progressive front openly 
resisting a North American presence in Puerto 
Rico may seem terrifying to the colonially minded 
FBI.  These grassroots organizations are 
successfully highlighting, condemning, and 
drawing national attention to the issues of 
police brutality, human rights, worker’s rights, 
union organizing, environmental issues, eminent 
domain, and the preservation of national landmarks.


RECOMMENDATIONS


Such repression only engenders radicalization, 
and, as many activists from the 60s and 70s 
report, clandestinity, and the development of 
armed struggle as a defensive response.  This is 
why some are saying that this is the FBI’s way of 
provoking an action by the underground – and 
quickly and violently “mopping them up”.

In light of more and more information revealing 
the tactics of the feds in obtaining information, 
in collusion with the major telecommunication 
companies that offer wireless cell phone services 
coupled with these very focused interventions, it 
is imperative that the movement (and all 
organized progressive movements) restructure its 
defensive capabilities – in spite of the almost 
naïve sense that these things could not be possibly happening to ‘us’.


This may include the healthy scrutinizing of new 
recruits, limits on the dissemination of internal 
organizational information and communications, 
implementing security protocols during meetings 
to protect against electronic eavesdropping, 
reducing the open sharing of sensitive 
information over the internet and email, ensuring 
that computers are as protected as possible 
against Trojan horses and other malware, being 
conscious that text messages and phone 
conversations are easily being monitored – all of 
these things should be made priorities for 
activists currently organizing events that come 
close to touching on the question of Puerto 
Rico’s independence.  To avoid these realities is 
to allow disruption, discord, infighting, and 
destruction to be sown by the enemy.

CLOSING


The historical and evolutionary march towards 
emancipation is a process that cannot be 
stopped.  It cannot be surrendered and cannot be 
completely wiped away from the minds of the 
colonized even through the sophisticated means 
utilized by the United States Empire in Puerto 
Rico.  It is the fault line for which the 
imperial power is unprepared to 
face.  Anti-colonial sentiment within a colonial 
people is as natural as those phenomena and when 
it unleashes its fury, the freedom that will 
result will be just as inevitable as the winds 
and floods and destruction caused by those 
massive formations of mother earth.  The 
difference will be that freedom will mean the 
rebirth of our nation, guided and developed and 
protected by ourselves, without the abuse and 
interference of the invaders who do not have our interests at heart.

In the interim, we must take heed to the 
developing warning signs that our movement is 
once again under consistent and organized and 
sophisticated attack and must develop those 
necessary means to mitigate the effects of those 
attacks.  While we must not fall into the trap of 
expending too much energy on defense and not 
enough on offense (organizing the people), the 
national liberation movement in Puerto Rico and 
in the Diaspora is now faced with this reality 
and must adapt itself to meet any and all 
challenges.  We must also not fall into the trap 
of focusing too much energy on individual or 
organizational differences, as these will surely 
be exploited by the US intelligence 
community.  As we come upon another celebration 
of the birth of our freedom movement and mourn 
the loss of our most revolutionary comrade on 
September 23rd, we must also continue to forge 
the unity that he called for and that the 
Americans fear and must continue to be vigilant 
against the abuses that the colonial police 
internalize and act out against our people.

As our national hero Rafael Cancel Miranda often 
says, although we would rather receive hugs and 
throw flowers, we must also be prepared to do 
more in order to achieve that most noble dream 
enshrined in our most natural right – freedom.



Freedom Archives
522 Valencia Street
San Francisco, CA 94110

415 863-9977

www.Freedomarchives.org  
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