Anna Mae Aquash

(excerpt)From Wikipedia

[Anna Mae Aquash was born in a small Native village near Shubenacadie, Nova Scotia, Canada, March 27, 1945. Anna Mae was a Mi'kmaq warrior who became one of the most active and prominent womem members of the American Indian Movement (AIM) during the early 1970s. She was found murdered in 1976 on the Pine Ridge Reservation, about 10 miles from Wanblee, South Dakota, and became a martyr for indigenous human rights.]

Activism
In Bar Harbor, Maine, Aquash became involved in the Teaching and Research in Bicultural Education School Project (TRIBES), a program designed to teach young Indians about their history. She soon moved to Boston where she met members of the American Indian Movement (AIM) who were protesting against the Mayflower II celebration at Boston Harbor, boarding and seizing the ship on Thanksgiving Day of 1970. Anna Mae was active in creating the Boston Indian Council (now the North American Indian Center of Boston).

It was also at that time that she met her second husband, Nogeeshik Aquash, from Walpole Island, Canada. They traveled to Pine Ridge together in 1973 to join AIM in the siege of Wounded Knee, South Dakota, which is where they were married by Wallace Black Elk. A photo of their marriage can be found in the book Voices From Wounded Knee (1974).

She was also involved in the 1972 Trail of Broken Treaties march on Washington, D.C. and worked until her death for the Elders and People of Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, South Dakota. Although she was accused of "working for the Feds" during an AIM convention in Farmington, New Mexico the summer of 1975, many in AIM realized this was not true. On orders from above, AIM members Leonard Peltier, Dino Butler, and Robert Robideau confronted her at that convention and, according to Robideau, "...the three of us walked away satisfied she was not an agent. She later became a member of our group."

Often approached by members of the FBI's Counter-Intelligence Program (COINTELPRO) and asked to assist their efforts to destroy AIM (as was common in that era, i.e. Black Panthers, SDS, etc), Anna Mae always refused to cooperate. Still, FBI agents and collaborators spread rumors about her, and her death may have been a consequence of the paranoia instilled in many during that turbulent era by COINTELPRO.

Murder
On February 24, 1976, Aquash was found dead by the side of State Road 73 on the far northeast corner of the Pine Ridge Reservation, about 10 miles from Wanblee, South Dakota, close to Kadoka. Her body was found during an unusually warm spell in late February, 1976 by a rancher, Roger Amiotte. The first autopsy (reports are now public information) states: "it appears she had been dead for about 10 days." The Bureau of Indian Affairs' medical practitioner, W. O. Brown, missing the bullet wound on her skull, stated that "she had died of exposure." ("The Life and Death of Anna Mae Aquash by Johanna Brand.)

Subsequently, her hands were cut off and sent to the Federal Bureau of Investigation headquarters in Washington, D.C. for fingerprinting. Although federal agents were present who knew Anna Mae, she was not identified, and her body was buried as a Jane Doe.

On March 10, 1976, eight days after Anna Mae's burial, her body was exhumed as the result of separate requests made by her family and AIM supporters, and the FBI. A second autopsy was conducted the following day by an independent pathologist from Minneapolis, Dr. Garry Peterson. This autopsy revealed that she had been shot by a .32 caliber bullet in the back of the head, execution style.

Who killed Anna Mae?
On March 20, 2003 two men were indicted for the murder of Anna Mae Pictou Aquash: Fritz Arlo Looking Cloud, a homeless Lakota man, and John Graham (aka John Boy Patton), a Southern Tutchone Athabascan man from Whitehorse, Yukon, Canada. Although Theda Clark, Graham's adopted aunt, seems also to have been involved, she was not indicted.

On February 8, 2004 Arlo Looking Cloud was tried before a U.S. federal jury and five days later was found guilty. On April 23, 2004 he was given a mandatory sentence of life in prison. Although no physical evidence linking Looking Cloud to the crime was presented, a videotape was shown in which Looking Cloud admits to being at the scene of the murder but claims that he was unaware that Aquash was going to be killed. In that video, in which Looking Cloud is interviewed by Detective Abe Alonzo of the Denver Police Department and Robert Ecoffey, the Director of the Bureau of Indian Affairs Office of Law Enforcement Services, taped on March 27, 2003, he states that Graham was the triggerman. Looking Cloud is appealing his conviction.

John Graham is currently living in Vancouver, British Columbia. On June 22, 2006 his extradition to the United States to face charges on his alleged involvement in the murder was ordered by Canada's Minister of Justice, Vic Toews. Graham is appealing this order and is presently free on bail, with conditions.


CSI Vancouver: John Graham

By Lyn Highway
(excerpt)From Redwire Magazine
2005

In the case of Anna Mae Aquash, Brown initially cited her cause of death as 'exposure' from passing out drunk in the freezing cold. Even though she had an obvious bullet wound in her head. Doctors and nurses reported that they saw blood coming out of her head. He cut off both of her hands at the wrist and turned them over to an FBI agent and --among other autopsy procedures-- opened her skull and removed her brain, Her hands were sent to FBI headquarters in Washington DC for 'identifiaction.' This was despite the efforts of Gladys Bissonette (who knew Aquash) to view the body and identify it. Anna Mae was well known on the rez and could have been easily identified by simply looking at her face. This includes FBI agent David Price, who knew Aquash. Price had interrogated her on more than one occasion and just 6 months previously had recognized her from a distance at the Crow Dog's Paradise.

She was buried as a Jane Doe -without a burial certificate or burial permit. It wasn't until the day after she was buried that her hands were sent for finger print analysis. And then the FBI revealed her identity as Anna Mae Aquash. Aquash's family was told that she had died from drunkenness and exposure. They became suspicious because she did not drink. They demanded her body be exhumed and a second autopsy commenced.

The second coroner noticed a discoloured area near her temple, ran his hand over it and found an object x-rays revealed to be a bullet. W.O. Brown --even after examining her skull and brain, had somehow missed the bullet-hole wound and bullet. The bullet had been fired at point blank range from a .38 handgun into the back of her head. A weapon has never been found (In The Spirit Of Crazy Horse).

Anybody who watches CSI (a popular T.V. show about crime scene investigation) can immediately see many problems in the trail of evidence.

Her brain being removed, her body being buried and exhumed many times. Most obviously her hands being removed, and presumably preserved for transportation, would destroy any DNA material under her fingernails that would have resulted from scratching the killer during a struggle. But there doesn't seem to have been any struggle.

Why would a tested warrior, who had participated in many of AIM's armed actions, was comfortable using a gun, and also knew martial arts simply walk to her death and allow someone to shoot her in the back of the head?

There is a rumor circulating that that's exactly what happened: "she was taken by car to an isolated field; knelt down on her knees; asked to say a prayer for her daughters and was refused, than shot at point blank range in the back of the head; and her body kicked over an embankment, where it was found by a rancher walking his fence."

Where does this story come from? Or more importantly, what is the purpose of circulating this story? What this story does is attempt to plant a vivid image in our memories. And like many stories, it becomes true in our minds regardless of whether it has any basis in reality or not. It tugs at our emotions and leaves us vulnerable to believing false evidence.

The FBI, and sadly, Anna Mae's own daughters, one of whom is an RCMP officer, want us to believe that it was members of AIM who pulled the trigger. Specifically, they want us to believe that it was John Graham who killed Anna Mae. In their story, (and at this point it is objectively nothing but a fiction) Arlo Looking Cloud drove Graham and Aquash out to the isolated field, and sat in the car while Graham walked Anna Mae out of sight and shot her. Meanwhile, the facts build a different picture of the circumstances around Aquash's death. One that shows A.I.M. defenseless aginst the FBI's unrelenting and totally unscrupulous attacks.

Douglas Durham was the national head of security for AIM. It can be assumed he knew everything there was know about the organization, its members, their whereabouts and activities. It had been suspected that he was a spy for a few months before court documents proved that he was in fact a state agent and spy. Aquash was instrumental in the attempts to reveal him as an agent. He was allowed to leave the organization un-molested. He wasn't even given a beating for his treachery and deceit. FBI attempts to create suspision that Aquash was a spy were in vain: she continued to be one of the most trusted members of AIM.

Much of the accusations towards members of AIM are based on the leadership's character flaws, and not on actual evidence of murderous activity. Proponents of the AIM-killed-Anna-Mae-Aquash- theory revile the likes of Dennis Banks because he, and other AIM big-wigs, were not particularly wholesome characters. But being a womanizing, arrogant, self-inflated egoist is not a crime, nor by any extension does it make them murderers.

I will pose a scenario based on the actual MO (modus operandi, or method of acting) of the FBI and its COINTELPRO operations:

On Dec 4, 1969, Fred Hampton was the head of the Chicago Black Panthers. An informant provided the police with a map of Hampton's home. Hampton was drugged by an infiltrator. Heavily armed police raided his home, killing Hampton, one other and injuring many. Hampton was asleep when police riddled him with bullets in his own bed.

Perhaps Anna Mae was drugged, and that's how the killer managed to shoot her in the back of the head without a struggle. Perhaps she wasn't killed in the field near Wanblee at all. Perhaps she was drugged, or simply asleep, shot at one location and her body dumped in the field, near the fence where the killers knew she would eventually be found, but after a long enough time for any evidence to deteriorate.

Where is the evidence from the scene of the crime? I don't imagine, if any was gathered, that it would hold much integrity, considering the FBI report states that Aquash's body was found in September of 1976, when it was actually found in February, 1976. Wouldn't there have been blood, footprints, tire tracks, gun powder traces… Sure, crime scene technology wasn't as advanced in 1976 as it is today, but shouldn't there have been some shred of evidence pointing at someone? Even if there was, W.O. Brown made sure it would never be found. Drunken indian deaths were a common occurrence in South Dakota and merited little, if any attention from government authorities. Why, in this particular instance, did FBI agents attend to the scene? These specially trained agents surely could have found something? Or were they there precisely to ensure that nothing was found?

The FBI made it a point to brazenly leave the bodies of those it killed right out in the open and then use state apparatus to bold face lie about the circumstances of the deaths. This is a method of intimidation: "we'll kill you, and we'll get away with it, and there's nothing you can do about it." It leads to intensive fear and demoralization -its called terrorism. And Aquash was a target. At the time of her death she was on the run, and in hiding from a government who had pursued her and threatened to kill her.

But even pointing to the FBI as responsible for Aquash's death is speculation. Anna Mae could have been killed by anyone. Sure, its likely she was killed by the FBI, her murder fits their M.O. But really, it could have been anyone. Plenty of people had motives. Kamook Banks could have had a murderous jealously because Anna Mae had had a long term affair with Dennis Banks. Anna Mae's ex husband could have seen a convenience in her death because of their custody battle over their two daughters. A random psycho killer could have been passing through the area… All of these speculations are just as unfounded as the accusations against Graham and Looking Cloud.

***

Anna Mae Aquash's death fell into obscurity, like the 66 other deaths during the Reign of Terror on the Pine Ridge Rez. And was left in the unsolved mysteries category of hundreds, thousands and millions of native people who have died as a direct result of colonization for the past 500 years.

30 years later, the US government decides to rekindle the case of Anna Mae Aquash. And decry how much it cares about the plight of this brave Native activist. This despite Leonard Peltier's continued imprisonment. And documented evidence that he was framed by the FBI using false evidence and through manipulating court proceedings. Suddenly the US/Canadian governments care about one dead indian, despite the refusal of US authorities to answer to the demands for investigations of the over 65 other native people killed at Pine Ridge during the same period Anna Mae Aquash was killed.

Despite the US and Canadian police continuing to kill native people with not so much as a slap on the wrist from government or police authorities. And despite colonial Governments' continued, and heightened attacks on native peoples and the criminalization of our movements under new anti-terrorism legislation.

Arlo Looking Cloud:
Arlo Looking Cloud was tried for aiding and abetting the murder of Anna Mae Aquash. He pled not guilty. In February of 2004, he was convicted and sentenced to life. His lawyer was a complete quack and the only witness he called in Arlo's defense was David Price -the agent who Anna-Mae was running from. Looking Cloud had been an alcoholic living on the streets when he was arrested. FBI agents had visited him many times in previous years, plying him with drugs and alcohol. He confessed to being at the scene of Anna Mae's murder outside of Wanblee. This confession is the only item even vaguely resembling evidence in the case against Graham. His confession was made under heavy interrogation, and also while he was under the influence of drugs and alcohol. He recanted his confession and pled not guilty to the charges. He was convicted and sentenced to life.

Why would he confess if he didn't do it? There is well documented research on the questionable value of confessions, and the ease with which false confessions can be generated. People will tend to say anything to get out of the police station. A person may even come to believe, after a certain degree of interrogation and torment, that he/she is guilty -even if what he/she is admitting too is outlandishly untrue. He/she may even fabricate further evidence to implicate his/herself. For example, look at the Peltier case, where Myrtle PoorBear submitted an affidavit that she was Peltier's girlfriend, when in fact, it was revealed later that she didn't even know him.

The US government does not care about Anna Mae Pictou-Aquash. It does not care about A.I.M. or the problems in the movement. It doesn't care about Anna-Mae's daughters or her family. All it cares about it preserving and protecting itself, and crushing its enemies. Anna Mae Aquash was an enemy of the Colonial State, both the U.S. and Canada. She believed in and fought for the sovereignty of her people, and as a warrior was willing to sacrifice everything, including her own life for the liberation of indigenous people. To turn now to our enemies and ask them for justice and resolution is an insult to all of the warriors who gave their lives fighting the settler invaders.

The colonial governments are incapable of providing 'justice' for native people. This can be seen clearly in how they initially dealt with Aquash's death -with callous disregard for native life, with gross incompetence, and with transparent malice.

***

Prophecies around Wounded Knee believed that the ghost dancers would breathe new life into the indigenous resistance. In December of 1890, those ghost dancers who were shot down left a legacy that, in 1973, was revived by Lakota traditionals and A.I.M. warriors. And the indigenous resistance did take on a new life that exists today. Wounded Knee, and the uprisings at Oglala shape strong foundations for those of us continuing the fight against colonization.

What the US government is doing with the Graham/Looking Cloud case is a waft of poison to our memories. It pollutes the efforts of Anna Mae Aquash. Her participation in Wounded Knee, and in A.I.M., is part of our proud history of resistance. And the FBI and the US/Canadian governments are trying to take that away from us.

If we don't fight against Graham's extradition, and provide Arlo Looking Cloud with the same support as Leonard Peltier, or any prisoner of war, than we are losing yet another battle in the liberation of our people. And in the preservation of decolonized space in our own hearts and minds.