Kathy E <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
A former FBI agent testified on Tuesday that the agency did everything
in its power to achieve a peaceful solution to the 81-day standoff with
so-called Freemen in eastern Montana.
"We didn't want to take a posture that would provoke the situation,"
said Thomas Canady, the first witness to testify in the trial of six men
involved in the 1996 incident.
Canady testified that more than 100 guns were found in the compound
after the Freemen surrendered. But he spent most of his several hours on
the stand explaining the thousands of dollars worth of equipment the FBI
supplied the Freemen through undercover agents.
The six are charged with helping nine federal fugitives avoid arrest
during the standoff that ended June 13, 1996. They are also accused of
helping the fugitives write false liens and financial documents.
Canady said the agency gave the Freemen photocopiers, radios, and
computers, and one of the things they did with the equipment was make
fraudulent bank documents.
During cross-examination, defense attorney David Duke asked whether the
FBI had inadvertently given the Freemen credibility by providing
equipment that enabled them to produce the phony documents.
Canady said the idea was to give credibility only to the agents who were
trying to infiltrate the organization.
Canady also said that before he retired he investigated the financial
schemes of Freemen leader Leroy Schweitzer, and Schweitzer retaliated by
filing a $100 million lien against him.
Only two defendants in court
Only two of the defendants were in court Tuesday, while the other four
watched on television from their jail cells. The four had to be
physically restrained and carried from the courtroom Monday after
shouting and cursing and throwing furniture.
The two who were in court -- Elwin Ward, 57, and Edwin Clark, 47 -- sat
at the defense table, but refused to participate in the trial or to help
their court-appointed attorneys.
They also remained seated when Judge John C. Coughenour entered and left
the courtroom, a bit of contempt Coughenour ignored.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Jim Seykora said the trial was not about the
Freemen's political beliefs, but about their criminal actions, which he
called "outrageous, dangerous and illegal."
Seykora said in his opening statement: "The evidence will make it clear
they were ready, willing and able to shoot FBI agents and other law
enforcement officers to prevent them from arresting their friends."
Despite their uncooperative clients, lawyers for all six defendants
attempted to argue that the men were simple followers who had latched on
to the wrong idea.
Attorney Joseph Massman said his client Steven Hance, 48, was "a
dreamer, a wishful thinker, misfit, a wannabe, a johnny-come-lately..."
but was not acting with "knowledge, intent or purpose" when he helped
defend a ranch against the FBI.
Massman said the six defendants, like most other members of the group,
were "desperate, distraught people who turned to a false leader, Mr.
Leroy Schweitzer."
And Lisa Swanson, who is representing Hance's 25-year-old son James E.
Hance, said her client, too, was simply a follower who was "dragged
along" by Schweitzer.
"No one got hurt," Swanson said outside the courthouse Tuesday. "They
are trying to paint them as black and evil, but my client was not."
'It's very fortunate...no one got hurt'
The Hances, along with another son, John, 21, all of Charlotte, North
Carolina, and Jon Barry Nelson, 42, of Marion, Kansas, were the ones
ejected from the courtroom. The judge and lawyers have agreed to
instruct the jury not to consider the absence of the four when reaching
a verdict.
Clark, an original owner of the group's foreclosed farm compound, is
also charged with attempted bank fraud for trying to deposit a $100
million Freeman check in the Garfield County Bank in nearby Jordan
and writing checks on the account to pay real estate loans.
Two dozen people are charged in connection with the Freemen's
two-year operation from their isolated compound. The FBI says 800
people from around the country took lessons at the rural stronghold in
how to issue worthless liens and "warrants" the Freemen claim are legal
tender.
The group's leaders are scheduled for trial in May on charges including
bank fraud and threatening to kidnap and kill a federal judge.
"It's very fortunate that no one got hurt during those 81 days," says
U.S. attorney Sherri Matteucci. "But that's really thanks to law
enforcement, and not because of any intention not to act by the
defendants."
--
Kathy E
"I can only please one person a day, today is NOT your day, and tomorrow
isn't looking too good for you either"
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