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May 25, 2007<br><br>
1970 murder retrial hearing resumes next week after contradictory police
testimony against Black Panther Ed Poindexter<br><br>
By Michael Richardson<br><br>
Ed Poindexter will once again be transported from his prison cell at the
Nebraska State Penitentiary to the Douglas County Courthouse to witness
another day of testimony in his effort to obtain a new trial for the 1970
murder of Omaha policeman Larry Minard.<br><br>
<br>
Minard was the victim of a homemade suitcase bomb designed to kill police
responding to an emergency call about a woman screaming in a vacant
house. Poindexter was the head of a Black Panther spin-off group
called the National Committee to Combat Fascism (NCCF) and engaged in a
war of words with police. Omaha was an emotionally-charged city
following the killing of 14 year-old Vivian Strong by police a year
earlier and Poindexter had emerged as one of the most vocal critics of
the shooting death.<br><br>
<br>
Although police arrested 15 year-old Duane Peak, who confessed to the
bombing, in a weeklong dragnet that rounded up dozens of people for
questioning and ended up with the arrests of 14 persons, the two men the
police were most interested in were Poindexter and David Rice.
Rice, NCCF Minister of Information, has since changed his name and is now
Wopashitwe Mondo Eyen we Langa.<br><br>
<br>
Convicted in 1971 for the bombing murder, the two NCCF leaders have been
in prison serving life sentences. Peak, who obtained a deal that
got him sentenced as a juvenile, testified against Poindexter and
Langa. Peak alleged the pair made the bomb he planted in the vacant
house. Peak also claimed he made the emergency call that lured
police into the deadly trap.<br><br>
<br>
Earlier this month vocal analyst Tom Owen testified that Peak did not
make the call after studying a copy of the emergency call. The
original tape was never used at trial and ended up missing.
However, a duplicate tape later surfaced as did a secret FBI memo warning
the tape would hurt the prosecution's case. When Owen played the
tape earlier this month, the voice that chilled the courtroom did not
sound like Peak's voice.<br><br>
<br>
The FBI was involved in the case soon after the explosion. An
illegal FBI operation called COINTELPRO was underway across the nation
targeted at the Black Panthers and other groups. FBI memos,
released under Freedom of Information requests, reveal a close
involvement in building the case against Poindexter and Langa.
COINTELPRO agents, the public would later learn, assisted local police in
obtaining convictions encouraging withholding of evidence, witness
manipulation, and other illegal activities.<br><br>
The two Omaha investigators most responsible for the arrest of Poindexter
and Langa are Jack Swanson and Robert Pheffer,<br><br>
<br>
Swanson, now deceased, made up a list of 39 members of the NCCF for the
police dragnet. Swanson was on hand when it was time to search
Langa's house for Duane Peak, then at large. At the trial Swanson
was the one who found dynamite in the basement and carried it upstairs to
a waiting car trunk. The car trunk is the first place an official
crime scene photograph pictures the dynamite. Swanson also gave a
curious BBC interview in the early 1990's where he said he felt he still
did the right thing in 1970 and that the arrest of Poindexter and Langa
ended the Black Panthers in Omaha.<br><br>
<br>
Pheffer, now retired, testified at the trial that he saw Swanson carry
the dynamite out of the basement. However, earlier this month
Pheffer contradicted his own trial testimony and claimed he found the
dynamite not Swanson. Pheffer, visibly agitated during cross
examination, not only changed his story but added to it with considerable
new information. Pheffer now claims he also found three suitcases
with wires in Langa's house. The suitcases now claimed to have been
found by Pheffer were never introduced at trial, never mentioned in any
police report at the time, and were not listed on a police inventory of
the house following the search.<br><br>
<br>
Peak's juvenile sentencing deal, the voice discrepancy on the emergency
tape and the conflicting dynamite testimony of detective Pheffer, in
combination with known COINTELPRO tactics, all raise serious questions
about the guilt of the convicted men who have steadfastly maintained
their innocence.<br><br>
<br>
After more testimony next week, Judge Russell Bowie will decide on
Poindexter's request for a new trial. Langa's conviction was
overturned by both a federal district court and appellate court.
However, the U.S. Supreme Court ordered the case returned to Nebraska
courts where the Nebraska Supreme Court said Langa's appeal time lapsed
while the case was in federal court.<br><br>
<br><br>
<br>
Authors Bio: Michael Richardson is a freelance writer based in Boston.
Richardson writes about politics, election law, human nutrition, ethics,
and music. In 2004 Richardson was Ralph Nader's national ballot access
coordinator.<br><br>
Richardson has written extensively on this case, and his past articles on
the case are available here:<br><br>
<a href="http://www.opednews.com/author/author3874.html">
http://www.opednews.com/author/author3874.html</a><br><br>
<br>
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