[Freethe SF8] SF Bay Guardian - The trial of the San Francisco 8

[SF-8 case]

<http://www.sfbg.com/blogs/politics/2009/05/the_trial_of_the_san_francisco.html>The 
trial of the San Francisco 8

http://www.sfbg.com/blogs/politics/2009/05/the_trial_of_the_san_francisco.html#more

By Ben Terrall

On Monday, June 8, the seven former Black 
Panthers known as the San Francisco 8 will face a 
preliminary hearing in Superior Court. The 
defendants are charged in the 1971 death of a 
local police officer; the charges were initially 
brought back in 1975, and dismissed when a judge 
ruled that the 
<http://www.freethesf8.org/>central evidence in 
the case was obtained through torture.

In fact, the FBI COINTELPRO-era case has a 
chilling resemblance to stories of torture at 
Guantanamo Bay: the statements were obtained 
after several of the suspects were subject to 
sleep deprivation, wet blankets used for asphyxiation, and beatings.

Now, although the San Francisco district attorney 
refused to file charges, Attorney General Jerry 
Brown has brought the case back. In 2007, he 
charged eight men – all of them now in their 60s, 
70s and 80s – with murder. One defendant has been dropped from the case.

The remaining defendants are Herman Bell, Ray 
Boudreaux, Richard Brown, Henry (Hank)Jones, 
Jalil Muntaqim (Anthony Bottom), Harold Taylor and Francisco Torres.

The case has attracted international attention, 
and 
<http://www.freethesf8.org/international_call_SF8.html>Nobel 
Prize winners including Desmond Tutu have called on Brown to drop the charges.


Locally, it’s led to a fascinating battle within 
the San Francisco Labor Council.


On Feb. 9, the council 
<http://www.freethesf8.org/SF_Labor_resolution.html>passed 
a resolution calling for the dismissal of all charges.

Then Gary Delagnes, the SF Police Officers 
Association President, launched an attack on the 
resolution and tried to get the council to repeal it.

But on April 13, in a victory for the activists and their backers, the
Delegates Assembly of the SF Labor Council voted 
against a motion to rescind or repeal the SF 8 
resolution. The 45 to 40 vote upheld the resolution.

Letter Carriers local 214 delegate Dave Welsh 
saluted the Labor Council’s decision, writing 
that progressive activists would “savor this small but significant victory.”

In a statement issued after the April 13 vote, 
the Free the SF 8 Committee argued, “This vote is 
a tribute to the solidarity of the progressive 
labor movement in San Francisco and its 
willingness to value political principles and 
refuse to endorse a 37-year old prosecution based 
on statements made under police torture. We thank 
all the delegates and the rank and file members 
of the Bay Area unions that voted and signed 
statements of solidarity calling for the dropping 
of charges against the San Francisco 8!”

Delagnes’s opposition to the resolution cited old 
allegations from the complaint against the SF 8. 
Supporters of the SF 8 note that the prosecution 
claims to have a murder weapon but says it is now 
missing.” Further, the prosecution admitted in 
2008 that DNA taken from the defendants in June, 
2006 did not match DNA from the crime scene, and 
fingerprints alleged to match one of the 
defendants apparently don’t match at all.

Activists also point to the millions of dollars 
the case will cost the State of California in the 
midst of a budget crisis and massive layoffs of workers.

Black Panther Party members were targeted 
<http://www.icdc.com/%7Epaulwolf/cointelpro/churchfinalreportIIIc.htm>through 
the FBI’s COINTELPRO program for assassination, 
false imprisonment, and ongoing police harassment.


The FBI’s San Francisco Field Office generated 
thousands of pages documenting illegal electronic 
surveillance of Panthers in the Bay Area. The 
information was used to create divisions within 
the Party, frame its members for crimes they 
didn’t commit, and disrupt many of the BPP’s 
service programs, including breakfast programs 
for children, health clinics, schools and child care centers.

Richard Brown, one of the 8, told us that the 
Black Panthers were about “serving the people
 
and I continued to serve the people as an 
individual by working with community-based 
organizations.” Now a community court arbitrator 
at the Ella Hill Hutch Center who works to push 
alternatives to violence among black and brown 
youth, Brown has over 30 years experience working 
in support of affirmative action.

He told us, “I’ve always been an advocate, and 
have worked with all kinds of people to see that 
women and minorities got what they deserved.” He 
also has years of experience with the 
African-American Community Police Relations 
Board, which works to improve neighborhood interactions with the SFPD.

Brown said that the Labor Council’s decision was 
“wonderful 
 we [the 8] owe them a great deal of 
gratitude. We asked for support and we got 
justice. They were wonderful, they came through.” 
Brown said he hoped that the debate about the 
resolution would not lead to future division on 
the council, because the SFLC’s history “of 
social justice and moral stands” needs to continue.


At posting time, the SF Police Officers 
Association President had not responded to Bay 
Guardian requests for a comment on the labor council’s vote.

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By Tim Redmond: May 04, 2009 03:58 PM


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