[Pnews] Fifty years ago, April 8, 1971: Omaha police detectives contradicted each other about dynamite during Ed Poindexter murder trial

[Prisoner News]

https://richardsonreports.wordpress.com/2021/04/09/fifty-years-ago-april-8-1971-omaha-police-detectives-contradicted-each-other-about-dynamite-during-ed-poindexter-murder-trial/
Fifty
years ago, April 8, 1971: Omaha police detectives contradicted each other
about dynamite during Ed Poindexter murder trialMichael Richardson - April
8, 2021
------------------------------

Omaha detective Jack Swanson’s testimony about discovery of dynamite was
contradicted by another detective in Edward Poindexter murder trial.
(credit: Nebraskans for Justice)

Fifty years ago, April 8,1971, Omaha detective Jack Swanson was called to
testify in the murder trial of Edward Poindexter and David Rice (later
Wopashitwe Mondo Eyen we Langa). The two men were leaders of the local
Black Panther affiliate group, the National Committee to Combat Fascism,
and accused of the bombing murder of Patrolman Larry Minard, killed at a
vacant house on the Near Northside on August 17, 1970.

Swanson, a sergeant in charge of the Intelligence Unit, was the police
liaison with Federal Bureau of Investigation which was directing
clandestine counterintelligence actions against the pair. Assistant
prosecutor Sam Cooper asked Swanson about dynamite he claimed he removed
from Mondo’s basement. Swanson said samples of the dynamite were taken by
Alcohol, Tobacco & Firearms Division agent Thomas Sledge after it was
transported to the detective bureau. Assistant Public Defender Thomas
Kenney asked Swanson to refresh his testimony about where he found the
dynamite in the basement.

“No, it wasn’t in a hole dug in a wall, it was just a place that didn’t go
all the way down to the floor but there was—like starting right here, there
was a place where you could store different things back there. When you
looked back in this space, you could see it.”

Swanson answered that he was the first one to find the dynamite then listed
others present. “As I recall, it may have been Sgt. Pfeffer or Agent Sledge
from the Alcohol, Firearms Division. I couldn’t tell you for sure. I
informed someone that I thought we had some dynamite in the basement. Well,
there were at least four or five other parties because we examined this
carefully before we moved it. We were looking for the possibility of a–that
there might have been wire or something. It wasn’t moved for at least ten
or fifteen minutes after we discovered it.”

Asked again who saw the dynamite before it was removed, Swanson tightened
his answer. “Well, Agent Curd was there and Sledge and Bob Pfeffer.”

Cooper questioned Robert Pfeffer next . When asked about dynamite, Pfeffer
quickly answered, “Sgt. Jack Swanson found the dynamite.”

Kenney asked Pfeffer when he first saw the dynamite. “When Sgt. Swanson
carried the box up from the basement of the Rice house.” Kenney then asked
if Pfeffer ever saw the dynamite in the basement. Pfeffer contradicted the
testimony of Jack Swanson, “No, I never went down.”

Pfeffer was asked to read a supplemental report he wrote on the search of
Mondo’s house where the dynamite “was in the basement hidden under a wooden
door.”

Poindexter and Mondo were convicted of murder, in part because of the
dynamite allegedly found in Mondo’s basement. Swanson was soon rewarded for
his testimony against the pair and promoted to lieutenant and eventually
served briefly as Chief of Police.

In 2007, in a post-trial hearing, Robert Pfeffer returned to the witness
stand. Pfeffer claimed he found dynamite in Mondo’s basement, not Jack
Swanson as he testified at trial. When confronted with his contradictory
testimony, Pfeffer became enraged and claimed he was misquoted by the court
reporter. Pfeffer also claimed he found three suitcases with wires sticking
out of them during the search of Mondo’s house and described dragging the
three suitcases with a rope through the handles. Pfeffer could not account
how no police report or other witness confirmed the three suitcases or why
they were not seized as evidence.

During the trial defense attorneys did not challenge the contradictory
testimony of Swanson and Pfeffer despite the obvious conclusion at least
one of them was lying. In 2007, when Pfeffer contradicted his own trial
testimony nothing was done; Poindexter was denied a new trial and Pfeffer
faced no perjury charges.

Mondo passed to the ancestors in March 2016 at the Nebraska State
Penitentiary. Poindexter remains imprisoned at the maximum-security prison
fifty years after the lies told about dynamite went unchallenged.
Poindexter, who continues to maintain his innocence, has a pending
commutation of sentence request with the Nebraska Board of Pardons but the
board, chaired by Governor Pete Ricketts, refuses to give him a hearing
date.

*This article is excerpted from *FRAMED: J. Edgar Hoover, COINTELPRO & the
Omaha Two story,* in print edition at *Amazon
<https://www.amazon.com/FRAMED-Edgar-Hoover-COINTELPRO-Omaha/dp/1985021994/ref=sr_1_43?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1530637788&sr=1-43&keywords=framed>*
and available in *ebook
<https://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=node%3D154606011&field-keywords=FRAMED%3A+J.+Edgar+Hoover%2C+COINTELPRO+%26+the+Omaha+Two+story>*.
Portions of the book may be read free online at NorthOmahaHistory.com
<https://northomahahistory.com/2017/07/07/framed-series-summary-by-michael-richardson/>*.
*The book is also available to patrons of the* Omaha Public Library
<https://omaha.bibliocommons.com/item/show/1919504060>*.*
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