[Freethe SF8] March 27 SF8 Hearing: More Courtroom security, More Stalling

[SF-8 case]

Today in a San Francisco courtroom with two to three times more 
security officers than 'normal,' members of the San Francisco 8 and 
their attorneys continued to press for the release of federal wiretap 
surveillance of the Black Panther Party offices. More written 
arguments are now to be filed by mid April with oral arguments 
scheduled for Friday, April 24th at 9 am.

Prosecutors are reluctant to make these documents public since they 
would undoubtedly tie the FBI's COINTELPRO program to this 
prosecution. COINTELPRO illegally targeted the Black Panther Party, 
its members and associates in precisely the time period covered by 
the prosecution's conspiracy allegations (1968-1973).

The increased courtroom security included the handcuffing and 
shackling of Herman Bell and Jalil Muntaqim. This issue had been 
argued and resolved twice before, resulting in a court ordered 
agreement with the San Francisco County Sheriff to allow the two 
jailed defendants full use of their hands in court and the dignity of 
not being fully restrained. Their attorneys refused to move forward 
unless directly ordered by the court, and eventually the defendants 
were freed of handcuffs for this pro forma hearing. This issue is 
likely to arise again before the next court hearing.

The next hearing will be Friday, April 24th at 9:00 am.
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://freedomarchives.org/pipermail/cdhrsupport_freedomarchives.org/attachments/20090327/27757594/attachment.html>