Speaker 1: From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
Speaker 1: riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or
Speaker 1: learn this stuff they don't want you to know. A
Speaker 1: production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2: Welcome back to the show. My name is Matt, my
Speaker 2: name is Nolan.
Speaker 3: They call me Ben. We are joined as always with
Speaker 3: our super producer Andrew Treforce Howard. Most importantly, you are you.
Speaker 3: You are here. That makes this the stuff they don't
Speaker 3: want you to know. In tonight's episode, we are exploring
Speaker 3: a story of crime, politics, and possibly conspiracy. Building off
Speaker 3: our earlier exploration into the American Indian Movement, we are
Speaker 3: focusing on a single individual, a man who, as we record,
Speaker 3: has been nearly half a century eight years imprisoned for
Speaker 3: crimes that he maintains he did not commit. Now, before
Speaker 3: we roll through this, guys, what's the most important thing
Speaker 3: people need to remember about our US versus the American
Speaker 3: Indian Movement episode?
Speaker 4: Oh jeez, how do you boil that down? I don't know.
Speaker 5: As far as I'm concerned, that reparations are due ward
Speaker 5: two and they still haven't been paid in many cases.
Speaker 2: Yeah, maybe just the formation of this country is the
Speaker 2: direct result of taking land from peoples that lived here
Speaker 2: before America was ever a thing, and it continues the country,
Speaker 2: the company America continues to I would say, disenfranchise and
Speaker 2: wrong peoples that they stole the land from initially agreed.
Speaker 3: The United States has always been an experiment and it
Speaker 3: is the result of a conspiracy. There is nothing inaccurate
Speaker 3: about that statement. This is the story of Leonard pell Tier.
Speaker 3: Here are the facts. We mentioned this in our previous episode,
Speaker 3: our exploration of the American Indian Movement. Leonard Helltier. You
Speaker 3: can hear it called that on sixty minutes. You can
Speaker 3: hear alternative pronunciations. Last name P. E. L t I
Speaker 3: E R. Born on September twelfth, nineteen forty four, in
Speaker 3: Grand Forks, North Dakota, and who he was part of
Speaker 3: a really big family.
Speaker 4: Unbelievably big.
Speaker 5: Indeed, he was the eleventh of thirteen children.
Speaker 4: At least it wasn't the middle child. That would have
Speaker 4: been rough with that many similss.
Speaker 3: Kind of he's like the end of the middle children,
Speaker 3: but he's not the last, and he's not the eldest.
Speaker 5: One could argue maybe not the worst position, because if
Speaker 5: you're eleventh or thirteenth, you haven't been totally forgotten by
Speaker 5: mom and dad yet.
Speaker 4: But you're also like kind of old news. So it's
Speaker 4: sort of a kind of the sweet spot maybe.
Speaker 3: But I don't know my ancestors who at some point
Speaker 3: started just naming the kids based on their birth order.
Speaker 3: I have for many years a great aunt nine.
Speaker 4: Nice.
Speaker 5: Wow, you know what, I think we should normalize naming
Speaker 5: children after prime numbers. I think that's a good idea.
Speaker 5: I like the way numbers sound.
Speaker 4: Six.
Speaker 5: There's a character named six, I believe, what was it,
Speaker 5: ozark AnyWho.
Speaker 4: I think there's a nice ring to it.
Speaker 5: But his parents divorced when he was four years old,
Speaker 5: and after this, he and another sibling sister unclear as
Speaker 5: to which number of sibling she was, were sent to
Speaker 5: the Turtle Mountain Indian Reservation of the Turtle Mountain Chippewa
Speaker 5: tribe near Belcourt, North Dakota, in order to live with
Speaker 5: their paternal grandparents.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and his father would later move back to his
Speaker 3: own parents area. The letter is the opposite of a
Speaker 3: quote unquote silverspoon kid. You know, like far too many
Speaker 3: children in the native community. He grew up amid rank
Speaker 3: poverty and active discrimination. And we mentioned this in our
Speaker 3: previous exploration, but we didn't get into the specifics. At
Speaker 3: the age of nine, he was sent to a boarding
Speaker 3: school that function to assimilate Native children, the Wapaton School
Speaker 3: in North Dakota, and he was, like so many innocent
Speaker 3: children there and in Canada and in Australia, if we're
Speaker 3: being honest, he was subjected to various forms of emotional
Speaker 3: and physical abuse. I would also say he was subjected
Speaker 3: to cultural abuse because he was being forced to erase
Speaker 3: his own and sel estual culture. And there's not really
Speaker 3: in English a word for that kind of brutality visited
Speaker 3: on people, So I would go with cultural abuse or
Speaker 3: cultural erasure.
Speaker 5: I rasure, Yeah, No, I mean it reminds me of like,
Speaker 5: you know, the Germans are so good with having words
Speaker 5: describe like kind of complex emotions or scenarios, like the
Speaker 5: word for Holocaust guilt, which I think I've talked about before.
Speaker 5: But no, but I think this concept deserves a word.
Speaker 5: But I think he did the next best thing, Ben,
Speaker 5: You're absolutely right, cultural erasure or abuse.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So, as a little little child he went through
Speaker 2: that whole scenario. Then he was sent to another one
Speaker 2: of these schools, right, this time in South Dakota the
Speaker 2: Flandreaux or f L A N d r. Eau Indian School,
Speaker 2: and then he ended up dropping out around the ninth
Speaker 2: grade and headed back to where his dad was in
Speaker 2: Turtle Mountain.
Speaker 3: And while he is at Turtle Mountain, he witnesses first
Speaker 3: hand the policy we're talking about earlier, the policy of termination.
Speaker 3: Termination at this point was not necessarily the media genocide
Speaker 3: practiced by the Nazi Party, but it did include siege mentality,
Speaker 3: withdrawing federal assistance, including food assistance, from Native Americans living
Speaker 3: on these reservations. It was at the very best, a
Speaker 3: ham fisted attempt to make people, you know, eat the
Speaker 3: apple pie right, drink the George Washington mead, assimilate and
Speaker 3: stop speaking their own languages.
Speaker 2: And this is in the late nineteen fifties, I believe,
Speaker 2: around the time when this is occurring.
Speaker 3: And history is far closer than it looks in the
Speaker 3: rear view mirror. It was at worst, very much like
Speaker 3: putting a community under siege, like the old medieval warfare
Speaker 3: style thing. You surround a castle and you try to
Speaker 3: starve it, and that's what they were doing. And for
Speaker 3: anyone who would ignore the various broken covenants of the
Speaker 3: US government and agree to assimilate. They were given promises
Speaker 3: of jobs and guaranteed housing in urban areas.
Speaker 4: Spoiler.
Speaker 5: I mean, you know, it seems like almost one of
Speaker 5: the cruelest cuts of the whole relationship between the United
Speaker 5: States government and Indigenous people is the continual stringing along,
Speaker 5: you know, the continual promises and the continual kind of
Speaker 5: moving of goalposts. It's just, I don't know, it's just
Speaker 5: a very difficult way to live without any kind of
Speaker 5: assurance that you are going to be made a whole
Speaker 5: or that you want to be taken care of.
Speaker 2: And just so I get those dates right really quick, guys,
Speaker 2: it is in the late nineteen fifties when this is
Speaker 2: when Leonard is experiencing this. But that was a policy
Speaker 2: either went from nineteen fifty three all I think to
Speaker 2: nineteen sixty eight.
Speaker 3: Yes, officially, I would argue. I would argue the BIA
Speaker 3: has continued very similar things. Well, as we'll discuss with cointelpro.
Speaker 2: That's the Bureau of Indian Affairs.
Speaker 4: That's the Eurea of Indian Affairs, right.
Speaker 5: So, with those promises of jobs and housing from the
Speaker 5: US government, folks arrived in many of these cities, and
Speaker 5: like we mentioned, were kind of left holding the bag.
Speaker 4: You know, we're not.
Speaker 5: Given the opportunities and assistance that they were promised. This
Speaker 5: is going to become an ongoing theme. So as a
Speaker 5: result of said broken promises, many of them became unhoused
Speaker 5: in the parts of the country where they had no
Speaker 5: support systems.
Speaker 3: Right, yes, and we're further victimized by again I use
Speaker 3: the word rank not loosely. It is unclean discrimination. You know,
Speaker 3: they were calling people engine I n jun and things
Speaker 3: like that. It was very bad and it was not
Speaker 3: what Uncle Sam promised them. And so in nineteen sixty five,
Speaker 3: Leonard relocates to Seattle, and you know, he got there
Speaker 3: way before Microsoft did, and he went because this is
Speaker 3: the historic homeland of the Nez Pierce. And while there,
Speaker 3: Leonard does several amazing things. He takes some odd jobs
Speaker 3: in construction, He works as a welder. He eventually becomes
Speaker 3: the part owner of an autobody shop. And here I
Speaker 3: would argue, no matter whatever, nine to five kind of
Speaker 3: job the guy has, he finds his true vocation, which
Speaker 3: is activism, which is supporting the community, and so he
Speaker 3: becomes evolved in different aspects of the Native American rights movement,
Speaker 3: and he he has this greater goal in mind. Right,
Speaker 3: organizations can be ephemeral, they can have ven diagrams, you know,
Speaker 3: not everybody affiliated with something like the United Indians of
Speaker 3: All Tribes, not everyone there as a member of the
Speaker 3: American Indian movement, but they are gathered toward common cause.
Speaker 3: And so here Leonard does really awesome stuff. He finds
Speaker 3: people who have been you know, promised jobs by the
Speaker 3: termination policy and then been robbed of those jobs. Or
Speaker 3: he finds people who have been caught up in the
Speaker 3: incarceration system and then let out just sort of counting
Speaker 3: the days before they get arrested again. And he helps them,
Speaker 3: and he says, come get a job with me, come
Speaker 3: live here at the autobody shop. We can help you out.
Speaker 3: And if someone has a car in need of repair
Speaker 3: and they can't afford it, he helps them out there too.
Speaker 2: Yeah, this is a really important thing here. Just when
Speaker 2: I'm thinking about it, I'm imagining all the people who
Speaker 2: read about or see, you know, on the news or
Speaker 2: something some kind of movement that's occurring, like this Native
Speaker 2: American rights movement. Right there are people who see it
Speaker 2: and then want to get involved. But then there are
Speaker 2: also people like Leonard, like his family, like all of
Speaker 2: the people that were living in these various reservations that
Speaker 2: in that land that was just taken again by the
Speaker 2: United States. To actually experience that, to go through that,
Speaker 2: to watch yourself, your family, your friends, not have any
Speaker 2: of the things like to be lied to, let's say,
Speaker 2: to your face, and then to go through all the
Speaker 2: hardships that that entails. Somebody who has been through that
Speaker 2: experience is ready to fully fight back against whatever system
Speaker 2: wronged them, whatever individuals, whatever group, whatever that thing is
Speaker 2: that both took from them and then wrong them. I
Speaker 2: just think that's a really important thing, Like, oh, yeah,
Speaker 2: that mean fire that would be in your mind. I
Speaker 2: don't think would get crushed out by anything.
Speaker 5: Yeah, And not to be like mega mega like America
Speaker 5: sucks or whatever, but it does feel like this is
Speaker 5: sort of typical behavior, this mo of like, whatever you've
Speaker 5: got going on isn't as important as what we've got
Speaker 5: going on, and what we want and what we need
Speaker 5: completely supersedes any of your concerns, and.
Speaker 4: We are going to quote unquote make it right. What
Speaker 4: we did.
Speaker 5: We acknowledge somewhat that we shouldn't have taken your land.
Speaker 5: Maybe don't even go so far as they shouldn't have,
Speaker 5: but we're going to give you something in return and
Speaker 5: then just not get it just completely, you know, leave
Speaker 5: people hanging after being the one that wronged them in
Speaker 5: the first place. Now you're the one who's supposed to
Speaker 5: mitigate that wronging. And I mean, it's it seems like
Speaker 5: a conflict of interest, is it to the largest possible degree?
Speaker 2: What?
Speaker 3: No way, But yes, you're absolutely right, and I agree
Speaker 3: with you. Know, there's much more to the story of
Speaker 3: the body Shop. Like we were saying earlier, it did
Speaker 3: become a halfway house for people who had been discharged
Speaker 3: from incarceration on a federal or local level or a
Speaker 3: state level from the Native community. Eventually, just like the
Speaker 3: original attempt to occupy Alcatraz shout out to Ridiculous History episodes,
Speaker 3: eventually the autobody Shop did have to shut down. Yet
Speaker 3: I would argue this showed Leonard the way, This showed
Speaker 3: him that change is possible. And during this time he
Speaker 3: also becomes intensely involved with land reclamation issues, with alcohol counseling,
Speaker 3: and with initiatives to preserve native land in Seattle during
Speaker 3: the time when real estate is booming. I like check
Speaker 3: out if you want to learn more about this bick
Speaker 3: out the takeover of Fort Lawton on March eighth, nineteen seventy.
Speaker 3: At this point we mentioned the earlier initiative. You can
Speaker 3: learn more about it and occupy ALCATRAZM ridiculous history. Leonard
Speaker 3: was part of the United Indians of All Tribes group
Speaker 3: that scaled the fences around Fort Lawton, and Fort Lawton
Speaker 3: is contiguous with the Greater Seattle area. The fort was
Speaker 3: going to be decommissioned. The local horse traders wanted it
Speaker 3: to be a park, like a local park, and they
Speaker 3: were not listening to peaceful means of negotiation from the
Speaker 3: native populations, so they got the fence jumped. And when
Speaker 3: these guys jumped the fence, they are confronted with flamethrowers
Speaker 3: and machine guns, and then they peacefully surrender and the
Speaker 3: law enforcement beats the snot out of them, arrest them,
Speaker 3: and then when they take them to their cells to
Speaker 3: this stockade, they beat the snot out of them again.
Speaker 3: Leonard eventually is released, but he refuses to leave the
Speaker 3: property until every other protester is also set free because
Speaker 3: they add no real charges to keep these people on.
Speaker 5: Well that's because well, I mean, just to give a
Speaker 5: little bit more detail maybe around what led to them
Speaker 5: believing that they were righteous in jumping the fence. The
Speaker 5: decommissioned fort was very similar to what had happened with Alcatraz,
Speaker 5: where it was no longer being used as a federal penitentiary.
Speaker 4: Or no longer being used.
Speaker 5: Therefore, there was a law in the books I believe,
Speaker 5: I can't remember the exact name that supposedly would grant
Speaker 5: Native people the ability to petition to have those lands
Speaker 5: returned to them for use as cultural centers or as
Speaker 5: heritage centers or what have you.
Speaker 3: And that's the Fort Laramie Treaty of eighteen sixty eight,
Speaker 3: which allows Native American populations to appropriate quote surplus federal land.
Speaker 4: There you go.
Speaker 5: So what they were doing was technically legal, and yet
Speaker 5: they were met with a show of force.
Speaker 2: It's so weird when we're thinking about the legality of
Speaker 2: everything we're going to be talking about this episode, it
Speaker 2: makes your headsp well, yeah, because it really is. It's
Speaker 2: an authority from a country that officially, on paper runs
Speaker 2: the land everybody is on except for these little places
Speaker 2: that they've granted to the original peoples that lived there,
Speaker 2: right where.
Speaker 3: The laws, those covenants yet exactly exactly.
Speaker 2: It's when you're thinking about what is against the law
Speaker 2: or not against the law, or okay for a group
Speaker 2: of protesters to do or not okay for them to do,
Speaker 2: it gets so muddied.
Speaker 5: Shifts depending on who's in charge and who it benefits.
Speaker 5: You know, I really, I mean, I would consider myself
Speaker 5: for the most part of law abiding citizen, but stuff
Speaker 5: like this really does kind of call into question the
Speaker 5: whole nature of what is legal and what is right
Speaker 5: now and the relationship between those things.
Speaker 3: And here we find common cause with every long time listener,
Speaker 3: every fellow conspiracy realist tuning in to stuff they don't
Speaker 3: want you to know. Ideologies may differ, but a promise
Speaker 3: broken is a promise broken. And if we exercise empathy,
Speaker 3: we can absolutely understand the objective track record of various
Speaker 3: treaties being proposed and then being broken, and then being
Speaker 3: proposed and then being broken, and then being proposed and
Speaker 3: proposed and then being broken and then being proposed and
Speaker 3: then being broken. I yield my time.
Speaker 2: It reminds me a lot of wartime reporting, and it
Speaker 2: depends so much on who's telling you the story right
Speaker 2: where you're gathering information from or if you hear a
Speaker 2: story about Leonard Peltier and any of these movements. Whoever's
Speaker 2: telling you the story specifically in that time period is
Speaker 2: going to shape a lot of how you view this,
Speaker 2: this thing, all of these events that we're talking about.
Speaker 2: So you just I mean, I know, we have to
Speaker 2: we talk about keeping that in mind at all times
Speaker 2: when we're exploring the world, right, but just in this
Speaker 2: case in particular, especially if you are listening to some
Speaker 2: of the things the FBI has said about Leonard and
Speaker 2: all of the various things that Leonard got up to,
Speaker 2: you're going to have a whole different picture.
Speaker 3: So it's nineteen seventy two and Leonard joins the American
Speaker 3: Indian Movement at the behest of a guy named Dennis Banks,
Speaker 3: and he joins this to further what he calls the
Speaker 3: resistance that he started when he was nine years old
Speaker 3: at that Indian school abusing those kids, and he participates
Speaker 3: in something called the Trail Broken Treaties March again, peaceful
Speaker 3: protest should be part of the American fabric. He gets
Speaker 3: jammed up. I'm gonna be honest with you. He spent
Speaker 3: most of the Occupy Alcatraz movement in a jail in Wisconsin,
Speaker 3: where he was charged with attempted murder related to another
Speaker 3: protest in Washington, DC. He claimed he had been set
Speaker 3: up by the police, and that claim turned out to
Speaker 3: be true. They were stitching them up. As we've mentioned earlier,
Speaker 3: it was co intelpro in full wingspan. He makes bail
Speaker 3: that wingspan references for you.
Speaker 2: Nolo before we find out, right before he gets acquitted
Speaker 2: all that stuff, the next thing happens.
Speaker 3: Right, Yeah, he makes bail in nineteen seventy three spring April,
Speaker 3: and he joins a protest in Milwaukee, and then he
Speaker 3: heads over to Wounded Knee with people he's met before
Speaker 3: and in the course of that protest movement.
Speaker 5: This is the site of the Battle of Wounded Kney.
Speaker 3: Yes, well, loosely, and he hopes to he and the
Speaker 3: group he's with hope to deliver supplies as the siege
Speaker 3: on Wounded Kney draws to a close. And they also
Speaker 3: at this point, just like in Occupy Alcatraz, they also
Speaker 3: know there are rival factions. There are a lot of
Speaker 3: cooks there are a lot of egos, right, so they
Speaker 3: want to calm that down and they want everyone to
Speaker 3: remember the larger mission. But by this time, by April
Speaker 3: of nineteen seventy three, the FEDS consider Leonard a fugitive
Speaker 3: and he is accused of unlawful flight to avoid that
Speaker 3: attempted murder charge. We'll give you the high level stuff
Speaker 3: here before we go to the atbreak. Leonard is eventually
Speaker 3: convicted of murdering two FBI agents. We will give you
Speaker 3: their names as we dive in. Aside from a brief
Speaker 3: escape in nineteen seventy nine, and he's convicted in nineteen
Speaker 3: seventy seven. He's been incarcerated ever since. Serious questions about
Speaker 3: the legality of the trial remain, and as we record
Speaker 3: this evening, he is alive. His supporters consider him the
Speaker 3: longest incarcerated political prisoner in United States history. So decades later,
Speaker 3: we are joining many people asking the question that has
Speaker 3: haunted thousands since Leonard's conviction. Is this man guilty of
Speaker 3: the crimes he was convicted for, or has the US
Speaker 3: government yet again in prison demand for crimes he did
Speaker 3: not commit.
Speaker 4: Let's take a.
Speaker 5: Quick break and hear a word from our sponsor and
Speaker 5: then get into the details.
Speaker 3: Here's where it gets crazy. It really like the crimes,
Speaker 3: whether or not he's guilty, it depends upon whom you ask. Officially,
Speaker 3: the US government at every single, again practicing level, considers
Speaker 3: Leonard a convicted murderer. But here's the thing. The guy
Speaker 3: has always maintained his innocence and numerous supporters, including people
Speaker 3: who were originally part of the prosecution on his case,
Speaker 3: they agree.
Speaker 5: Right, And to really understand the level of controversy surrounding
Speaker 5: this whole case, as well as the accusations of conspiracy,
Speaker 5: we have to first take a look at the events
Speaker 5: that led up to these alleged crimes. So we've talked
Speaker 5: about this a little bit before, but let's kind of
Speaker 5: get into some of the minutias with the timeline of
Speaker 5: the shootout and the murders that you mentioned, Ben. Back
Speaker 5: in the mid nineteen seventies, when Peltier and a handful
Speaker 5: of other AIM members went to the Pine Ridge Indian
Speaker 5: Reservation in South Dakota in the hopes of assisting the
Speaker 5: Oglala Lakota in helping to plan some community activities, things
Speaker 5: like religious ceremonies and programs that would help ensure their
Speaker 5: self sufficiency and also to help organize some teams that
Speaker 5: could offer them security, you know, because they frankly did
Speaker 5: not feel particularly safe from you know, the US government.
Speaker 5: I mean, I want to backtrek really quickly too. I
Speaker 5: mentioned the you mentioned Ben that he went to Wounded Knee,
Speaker 5: and I asked that was the site of the Battle
Speaker 5: of Wounded Kni. I just wanted to backtrack and say,
Speaker 5: it's a little bit more like a massacre at Wounded Kny.
Speaker 5: That is what it is referred to often as, because
Speaker 5: it was essentially just an absolute slaughter of Native people,
Speaker 5: you know, by US soldiers. So the notion of needing
Speaker 5: security to literally protect themselves from those that might do
Speaker 5: them harm from outside their community absolutely makes sense as
Speaker 5: precedent for it.
Speaker 3: Yes, agreed, and think about the panthers, you know, co
Speaker 3: intel again is flapping its wings and sold do dads.
Speaker 3: It is attempting to infiltrate right, and it is also,
Speaker 3: I would argue, under the auspice of that sith Lord Hoover,
Speaker 3: it is attempting to maybe generate conflict when conflict does
Speaker 3: not need to exist. On June twenty fifth, nineteen seventy five,
Speaker 3: two FBI special agents, Ronald Arthur Williams and Jack Ross Kohler.
Speaker 3: They question one of Leonard's associates, a guy named Norman Charles,
Speaker 3: and when they talk to him, you know, and they say, hey,
Speaker 3: tensions are high. There's a guy who has been accused
Speaker 3: of assaulting to local ranch workers. We think he may
Speaker 3: have stolen some cowboy boots. His name's Jimmy Eagle. Do
Speaker 3: you know Jimmy Eagle. We think he drives a red
Speaker 3: pickup truck, which will be important later. And so on
Speaker 3: the next day, on June twenty sixth, nineteen seventy five,
Speaker 3: these agents return to the Pine Bridge Reservation and they
Speaker 3: go to a place called Jumping Bull Ranch. They are
Speaker 3: searching for this guy, Jimmy Eagle. Sometime after eleven am,
Speaker 3: both agents who are by the way in plane clothing.
Speaker 3: They are in separate on marked cars. They start following
Speaker 3: something we mentioned previously, a Chevy suburban correll occupied by
Speaker 3: letter Norman Charles and a guy named Joe Stunts. The agents,
Speaker 3: at this point, very important to note, are not aware
Speaker 3: of Leonard's outstanding warrant. They're focused on finding this Jimmy
Speaker 3: Eagle guy and spoiler The FBI's official statement is they
Speaker 3: believe that Chevy suburban belonged to Jimmy Eagle. The FBI's
Speaker 3: official statement as.
Speaker 5: Of now right, and this leads to more murky stuff,
Speaker 5: the official story being that the Chevy made it to
Speaker 5: the Jumping Bull ranch, whose owners had allowed Aim to
Speaker 5: camp out there. The three men in the suburban stopped,
Speaker 5: got out of the vehicle and began to exchange gunfire
Speaker 5: with federal agents. Agent Williams radio local dispatch, claiming the
Speaker 5: vehicle's occupants were firing on them.
Speaker 3: Williams says, if reinforcements do not arrive, both he and
Speaker 3: Kohler will be killed. And we have to remember the
Speaker 3: context here. Tensions had already been quite high for quite time,
Speaker 3: and many residents at the ranch. They heard the gunfire,
Speaker 3: right they saw the unfamiliar cars, They returned that gunfire.
Speaker 3: As a result, these agents are outgunned. We mentioned this earlier.
Speaker 3: Another person working for the FBI, agent Gary Adams, responded
Speaker 3: to the call that Williams put out, which we previously
Speaker 3: mentioned in our American Indian Movement episode. But he and
Speaker 3: other officers working under the auspice of BIA, they encountered
Speaker 3: gunfire they were held back. They could not get to
Speaker 3: the scene on time. So Kohler and Williams are murdered.
Speaker 3: That is true. Those people died, and there are multiple suspects.
Speaker 3: There are also multiple firearms. However, someone has to go down.
Speaker 3: And a side note, the charges against Jimmy Eagle for
Speaker 3: the assault of those two local ranchers and the theft
Speaker 3: of those purported boots. Those charges are later dropped. Jimmy
Speaker 3: Eagle is a free man.
Speaker 2: That crazy. The whole reason for those agents to be
Speaker 2: on that land, in that area at that time, it
Speaker 2: just goes away. This is something to note here. According
Speaker 2: to official documents trial documents, the gunfire lasted around ten minutes,
Speaker 2: So like the firefight that happened, there are very few
Speaker 2: shots actually fired by these two agents. I think it
Speaker 2: was five in total that was fired by them. But
Speaker 2: then there were around one hundred and twenty five bullet
Speaker 2: holes in the vehicle or vehicles.
Speaker 3: And that's a handgun versus AR fifteen situation.
Speaker 2: And well there's also a shotgun that one of the
Speaker 2: officers used, and I think a rifle that the other
Speaker 2: officer used at least a few times a few shots. Yeah,
Speaker 2: But then the craziest thing, and I think that's an
Speaker 2: important here, is that, as you're saying, Ben, that the
Speaker 2: other officers finally make it to the scene right to
Speaker 2: discover the bodies, and what they find is two officers
Speaker 2: who've been shot multiple times in different places in their body,
Speaker 2: but each of them have at least one bullet to
Speaker 2: their head, which doesn't necessarily mean point blank execution style shot,
Speaker 2: but these are very specific bullets they're used, and one
Speaker 2: of the officers has two bullet holes.
Speaker 3: Right, which we're going to get into in a moment there.
Speaker 3: And the only reason I raise the point about the
Speaker 3: AR fifteen idea is because it does become part of
Speaker 3: the forensic investigation, the idea of automatic versus non automatic.
Speaker 3: So the firearms used by the FBI do not include
Speaker 3: automatic weapons. Tragic deaths, right, they are tragic. These guys
Speaker 3: are just trying to do their job, you know what
Speaker 3: I mean. They're not being purposeful dicks, right, They're following orders.
Speaker 3: Shout out to Hannah Errand and the banality of evil.
Speaker 3: There three men ultimately arrested in connection with the murder
Speaker 3: of these two FBI agents. The first two guys who
Speaker 3: are arrested before Leonard are Robert Robideaux and Darrell Butler
Speaker 3: or Dino the I n oh, And both of these
Speaker 3: guys are at the Jumping Bull ranch during the time
Speaker 3: of the shootout. And to the earlier point made ten
Speaker 3: minutes may sound brief, but that's actually pretty long for
Speaker 3: the fire fight.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah. It was described by media at the time
Speaker 2: as lasting for hours. So that's why that's want to
Speaker 2: make that ten minute thing, just put it out there.
Speaker 2: At least that's according to the FBI. The only lasted
Speaker 2: ten minutes and to testimony given during the trial.
Speaker 3: And ten minutes is on the outside of plug ability
Speaker 3: because it's not a video game. When you get tagged,
Speaker 3: you bleed, and.
Speaker 4: Ten minutes in bullet time feels like ours to me.
Speaker 2: I can't imagine well yeah, or a military situation where
Speaker 2: there's purposeful just firing to try and you know, make
Speaker 2: whoever you're firing against.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's correct. I agree with that. And Leonard believes
Speaker 3: he has no chance at a fair trial. Let's remember
Speaker 3: he already served time for crime that he says he
Speaker 3: never committed, and so he flees to Canada and goes
Speaker 3: over the northern border. He buys a station wagon and
Speaker 3: it's September ninth of the same year. Ammunition in the
Speaker 3: wagon exploded. According to again official reports, people discovered agent
Speaker 3: Kohler's rifle and three oh eight and they also found
Speaker 3: an AR fifteen in the remains of the vehicle. Over
Speaker 3: the years, as we mentioned, Leonard has provided multiple alibis,
Speaker 3: none of which persuaded juries were indeed the Pellet courts,
Speaker 3: we do know he acquired an RV, a recreational vehicle.
Speaker 3: He made his escape, He was stopped briefly by a
Speaker 3: state trooper out in Oregon, and there was an exchange
Speaker 3: of gunfire. Again, Leonard fled on foot, and according to
Speaker 3: the reports, Agent Kohler's handgun was found under the front
Speaker 3: seat of that RV, which does mean that there was
Speaker 3: some sort of physical presence during the firefight, But it
Speaker 3: does not mean he murdered those guys.
Speaker 2: Well, it doesn't. But what it does mean is that
Speaker 2: it looks really bad for Peltier right now, if you
Speaker 2: take into account these actions. Right, that's the second time
Speaker 2: that it's known of by whoever's investigating this case, that
Speaker 2: Peltier was stopped and shots were fired.
Speaker 6: Right.
Speaker 2: Whether or not shots were fired that first time, whether
Speaker 2: or not Peltier fired his AR fifteen that they're claiming
Speaker 2: at those two officers. Originally that's one thing, but in
Speaker 2: this case, it's being claimed, at least by law enforcement,
Speaker 2: that he's fired again, this time on a state trooper
Speaker 2: in Oregon and escaped and or ran. This second time,
Speaker 2: he's run from a firing against some kind of law
Speaker 2: enforcement officer.
Speaker 3: Further, he took a firearm.
Speaker 4: From that agent.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, yeah.
Speaker 4: But in this narrative, yes.
Speaker 2: You're if you're lining all this stuff up, and let's
Speaker 2: say you're an investigator hunting down whoever killed these FBI agents,
Speaker 2: this looks terrible for Peltier.
Speaker 3: And so it comes as no surprise that just before
Speaker 3: Christmas in nineteen seventy five, on December twenty second, Leonard
Speaker 3: Peltierra is named on the FBI ten Most Wanted List.
Speaker 3: Now cast your memory back, folks, if you grew up
Speaker 3: with shows like America's Most Wanted, you will realize that
Speaker 3: being on the ten most wanted list of the FBI,
Speaker 3: it does go a long way toward catching people. And
Speaker 3: you know, I'm not the biggest fan of copaganda. I'm
Speaker 3: on record on that I think all of us can agree,
Speaker 3: but often when people are on that wanted list, they
Speaker 3: deserve to be.
Speaker 2: There often, Right, I'm looking for the nineteen seventy five
Speaker 2: actual list of all the other people that he shared
Speaker 2: it with. Oh, this is what they put on his
Speaker 2: wanted for execution type murders of two US FBI agents
Speaker 2: related to the American Indian Movement.
Speaker 3: Yeah, they made sure to put the organization that log line.
Speaker 3: And he is arrested on February sixth, nineteen seventy six,
Speaker 3: in Hinton, Alberta by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. We
Speaker 3: know it's a funny name, but do take them seriously.
Speaker 3: He is extradited to the US in December of that year.
Speaker 3: Now a lot of US are hearing the timeline and saying,
Speaker 3: hold up. Guys arrested on February not extradited until December.
Speaker 3: Part of that is because there were already claims of
Speaker 3: a stitch up, and Canada itself, the government of Canada,
Speaker 3: later called into question the FBI's paperwork which ostensibly justified
Speaker 3: this extradition. Do we want to talk about extradition for
Speaker 3: a moment, Yeah?
Speaker 2: Please, Yeah, you can't just call a country and say, hey,
Speaker 2: we need this guy. It's not that simple, right.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it involves a negotiation and bargaining at that point.
Speaker 5: I mean, unless depending on the laws, but usually there's
Speaker 5: like some sort of exchange or at least there's an
Speaker 5: opportunity for one.
Speaker 3: Right, yeah, yeah, you nailed it. Even if even if
Speaker 3: you're talking about two countries that have standing extradition agreements
Speaker 3: that are bilateral, like let's talk directly and let's hunt
Speaker 3: bad guys together. Even in those cases like the Canada,
Speaker 3: keep it in like the Canadas or the United States,
Speaker 3: is they can deny a request if something doesn't add up.
Speaker 3: In Canada originally approved this extradition request based on documents
Speaker 3: submitted by the FBI, but not too much later or
Speaker 3: An Almond allma and T, Canada's solicitor general at the time.
Speaker 3: He stated the FBI's paperwork simply did not match up,
Speaker 3: and in particular, they were very concerned about witness statements.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, well, there was one one person you'll hear
Speaker 2: about a ton in the story at least early on
Speaker 2: in this kind of time period. Right here is Myrtle
Speaker 2: poor bear. This is somebody who lived around the area
Speaker 2: where all of this went down in Pine Ridge and
Speaker 2: at least, the affidavit that was put forward was that
Speaker 2: this person was Peltier's girlfriend or yeah, I think that's
Speaker 2: how they put it.
Speaker 3: That was the claim.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and knew all this information about him, and he
Speaker 2: had admitted all these things to her. That basically lined
Speaker 2: up exactly with the FBI's story of how things went down, but.
Speaker 3: Right right. But also side note, if you're looking for
Speaker 3: that name, it is poor Bear, two different words. Peltier
Speaker 3: and others in the Pine Ridge community seemed to unanimously
Speaker 3: agree that, no matter what happened during that shootout, Myrtle
Speaker 3: Poor Bear did not in fact know Leonard, and additionally,
Speaker 3: despite her affidavit, was not present during the shootout and
Speaker 3: the subsequent murders. This falsehood appears to be confirmed, as
Speaker 3: Poor Bear herself later admitted lying. And as we talk
Speaker 3: about so often these evenings, Myrtle Poor Bear claimed the
Speaker 3: FBI agents interrogating her coersed her into making these claims,
Speaker 3: and indeed she says they threatened her. In fact, later
Speaker 3: Poor Bear attempts to testify about the FBI intimidation at
Speaker 3: Leonard's trial. How whoever, the judge bars her testimony on
Speaker 3: the grounds of mental incompetence.
Speaker 2: This is disturbing, it's crazy, it's crazy town. You can
Speaker 2: hear her say these things on an episode of sixty
Speaker 2: Minutes titled The Last Sue Brave, and the last time
Speaker 2: I saw that it aired was like nineteen ninety two.
Speaker 2: You can find a clip of it on YouTube, though,
Speaker 2: Do check that out because you can just you can
Speaker 2: see her say it directly into the camera. This is
Speaker 2: what they did.
Speaker 3: And for the implications, it seems that our friends at
Speaker 3: the FBI had already decided Leonard would be their sacrificial goat,
Speaker 3: their culprit, their stone chair, and they were fine ignoring
Speaker 3: the mental issues documented on poor Bear's behalf so long
Speaker 3: as poor Bear played ball. But they were also fine
Speaker 3: assassinating her care character if her narrative did not tell
Speaker 3: the story that they wished her to tell. This is
Speaker 3: a very dangerous thing. It is unfortunately a common conspiracy
Speaker 3: and law enforcement.
Speaker 2: It is really creepy. It seems as though somebody high
Speaker 2: up enough said Peltier's our guy, and let's do what
Speaker 2: we got to do to get him behind bars. However, we, however, we.
Speaker 3: Do that, and perhaps more importantly, for a look at
Speaker 3: the internal culture and ideology the FBI. They said, two
Speaker 3: of our guys died, so anything that we can do
Speaker 3: to help catch the man we believe killed him is
Speaker 3: for the greater good. And if you find anything that
Speaker 3: counteracts or contradicts that narrative, then you should think a
Speaker 3: lot about your loyalty.
Speaker 5: Well, and the guy's a convenient I mean, he's a
Speaker 5: very inconvenient individual to have out in the world because
Speaker 5: he's an activist. He's doing all this stuff that our
Speaker 5: counter to the goals of the kind of statu quote.
Speaker 5: And I mean, I don't know, guys, We've all done
Speaker 5: a lot of stories and worked on podcasts and talked
Speaker 5: about here on this show and others cases where Patsy's
Speaker 5: are kind of you know, picked or identified, and you
Speaker 5: start to kind of get a sense of some of
Speaker 5: the criteria for that. And oftentimes it's like a win
Speaker 5: win where it's, oh, this guy gets to someone to
Speaker 5: pin this murder on and also get somebody out of
Speaker 5: the picture who you know would be a pain in
Speaker 5: our butts.
Speaker 2: Dude, I cannot recall who the individual was. It was
Speaker 2: interviewed on that sixty Minutes episode, but it was someone
Speaker 2: representing the FBI's position, and basically what he was saying was, look,
Speaker 2: the FBI didn't do anything wrong in this case, but
Speaker 2: if we did, if we did do something wrong, it
Speaker 2: wouldn't bother my conscience at all because we got the
Speaker 2: right guy.
Speaker 3: Essentially, sure, big Air quotes around right.
Speaker 2: Yes, well exactly, but again, in this guy's opinion, who
Speaker 2: was representing the Bureau at the time, the belief is
Speaker 2: already there. As you said, Ben, the belief comes first,
Speaker 2: and then we make the shoes fit.
Speaker 3: Not good science, no good law enforcement. So we know
Speaker 3: that Leonard Peltier fights the extradition charge, he is not successful.
Speaker 3: At the same time, the other two men additionally charged
Speaker 3: in these homicides, Robert Rubdeaux and Dino Butler, they are
Speaker 3: acquitted on the grounds of self defense. The jury says
Speaker 3: the forensic evidence proves these two guys could not have
Speaker 3: been the ones to fatally shoot those FBI agents, and
Speaker 3: the US government could supply no witnesses capable of proving
Speaker 3: those two men knew they were firing on FBI officers, right.
Speaker 2: And the reasoning for this whole thing it wasn't these
Speaker 2: two guys is because of the two head wounds from
Speaker 2: a two to two three tie bullet that were found
Speaker 2: in both agents that were killed that day, which they
Speaker 2: reasoned at least on paper and in the trial that
Speaker 2: was the weapon that Peltier owned.
Speaker 3: And as we'll see, Leonard Peltier's trial went quite differently.
Speaker 3: We're going to pause for a word from our sponsors
Speaker 3: and won't be right back. We've returned. So the two
Speaker 3: men of the original three who are accused and go
Speaker 3: to trial on these homicide charges, two thirds of them
Speaker 3: get acquitted. This is not the case for Leonard. The
Speaker 3: FBI claims they have not only forensic evidence, but they
Speaker 3: also have eye witnesses linking Leonard directly to the homicide
Speaker 3: of those special agents. In specific, the court claims the
Speaker 3: FBI agents are murdered with close up gunshots to the
Speaker 3: heads earlier point. One has one gunshot wound, another as too,
Speaker 3: And they're saying that according to the science, these men
Speaker 3: were murdered wild defenseless due to previous wounds sustained in
Speaker 3: that shootout.
Speaker 4: Coup de gras, right, Yeah, finishing them off execution.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it looks as though someone approached the vehicle and
Speaker 2: killed them afterwards. One of the officers had a bullet
Speaker 2: wound in his hand that appears to have then gone
Speaker 2: into his head, so as though you imagine.
Speaker 3: Something like he raised his hand to protect himself exactly. Yeah.
Speaker 3: And because of this, because of this evidence presented at
Speaker 3: the trial, Leonard is not able to submit what we
Speaker 3: would call self defense testimony. The idea then is clearly,
Speaker 3: these people, whomever they may be, whatever their providence was,
Speaker 3: whether or not you knew they were a they were
Speaker 3: not capable of defending themselves, and someone executed them. But
Speaker 3: this is the beginning the controversy. The controversy runs rampant,
Speaker 3: their accusations, numerous accusations of prosecutorial and governmental misconduct. Two
Speaker 3: witnesses in the initial trial that Leonard has to undergo,
Speaker 3: they recant their statements and they say the FBI threatened me,
Speaker 3: they coerced me into false testimony. Sound familiar, shout out myrtle.
Speaker 2: Yep MRTL by the way, like Myrtle beach.
Speaker 5: So what we do know is that at least one
Speaker 5: of the way that says was given an immunity deal.
Speaker 5: If they were to play nice and play along with
Speaker 5: this narrative, they would be saved from further prosecution. And
Speaker 5: speaking of you, know changing stories midstream. The FBI also
Speaker 5: changed their story, changing their previous statements during the course
Speaker 5: of the trial. We also know that agents Williams and
Speaker 5: Coher originally said that they were pursuing Jimmy Eagle.
Speaker 4: You'll recall the red pickup truck.
Speaker 5: He was accused of having beaten some people up and
Speaker 5: stolen some boots. I believe the FBI could affirm this
Speaker 5: on the day of the shootouts.
Speaker 3: And we only know that due to radio intercepts from
Speaker 3: the time. By the way, because to your point, Noel,
Speaker 3: all right, First off, Leonard did many things. He did
Speaker 3: not drive a red pickup truck, and authorities have been
Speaker 3: stopping red pickup trucks in general in the area for weeks.
Speaker 3: In fact, he had a Chevy Suburban, which we outlined earlier.
Speaker 3: Chevy Suburban. For anyone who doesn't know, it's a large suv,
Speaker 3: even if you're not a car person. It's difficult to
Speaker 3: confuse that with a pickup truck because its back half
Speaker 3: is covered, whereas a pickup truck has an open bed.
Speaker 2: Leonards, I would just say on that Chevy suburban, if
Speaker 2: you look at the actual images of it. The FBI
Speaker 2: has some images you can look at right now on
Speaker 2: FBI dot gov and you just search for Resmer's R E.
Speaker 2: S m U RS case and you can find it.
Speaker 2: And it is just for my own eyes and I
Speaker 2: didn't grow up. Then this is like, I don't know
Speaker 2: exactly what year make that is, but it is a
Speaker 2: nineteen sixties nineteen seventies looking suv, So it is it
Speaker 2: does look like a truck that has some kind of
Speaker 2: thing over the bed. That's all I would say, is
Speaker 2: it looks a little more just like a truck to
Speaker 2: me because it is that old model.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And maybe you can help me out with this.
Speaker 3: As a partially color blind entity, I according to the
Speaker 3: pictures and descriptions, I am under the impression this was
Speaker 3: not red. It was orange with a prom white rooftop.
Speaker 3: Is that correct?
Speaker 2: That's exactly right, very white right across the top, and
Speaker 2: it is a very red orange color, let's say.
Speaker 3: Got it? So the FBI to what you were saying earlier.
Speaker 3: In all, at the time of the trial, despite their
Speaker 3: earlier evidence, they claimed they had not been looking for
Speaker 3: a red pickup truck. They claimed they had been looking
Speaker 3: for a quote, orange and white van the entire time.
Speaker 4: Danta da da.
Speaker 3: N. We never lie, says Uncle Sam. It's the truth
Speaker 3: that changes.
Speaker 2: It is so crazy because it doesn't resemble a van
Speaker 2: at all, even a van from that time period.
Speaker 3: No, and there were really cool vans in the seventies. Now,
Speaker 3: we talked a bit about this just a few minutes ago.
Speaker 3: But we have to get into just the ballistics, right,
Speaker 3: the claim that prosecution had that there was an AR
Speaker 3: fifteen or AR fifteen style thing that fired the fatal shots.
Speaker 3: They never correct me if I'm wrong here. They never
Speaker 3: provide a cartridge casings for those close up shots. Does
Speaker 3: that mean someone took the casings had the wherewithal to
Speaker 3: do so?
Speaker 2: For over one hundred bullets fired, right, that's a little
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 3: They did find other casings of plenty.
Speaker 2: Yes, but if one of the prominent weapons that was
Speaker 2: firing those one hundred shots was an AR style two
Speaker 2: to two three like bullet bullets, then it is highly
Speaker 2: unlikely that it would just not be there. Although if
Speaker 2: someone walked up to the car to execute the officers,
Speaker 2: you can imagine those particular casings. If there's only three
Speaker 2: shots fired that we're talking about, those reasonably at least
Speaker 2: could be picked up right.
Speaker 3: Yeah, plausibly possibly, But in the heat of the moment,
Speaker 3: right at the conclusion of a very long firefight, with
Speaker 3: knowing that the FBI agents also expended case scenes, would
Speaker 3: you have would you have the presence of mind to
Speaker 3: pick your three?
Speaker 2: It depends on what's happening and why. Right, If this
Speaker 2: is like a full on execution or a targeted killing
Speaker 2: in some way, then maybe if this is in the
Speaker 2: heat of the moment a firefight breaks out, probably not
Speaker 2: like who in that moment with all that adournaline running
Speaker 2: is going to have that thought. This is what the
Speaker 2: FBI's website says, and it's talking specifically about the AR
Speaker 2: fifteen that Peltier owned. It says an examination by the
Speaker 2: FBI laboratory made a positive match with a two two
Speaker 2: three shell casing found in the trunk of Agent Kohler's car,
Speaker 2: So it's one of the vehicles that was fired upon
Speaker 2: and marks produced by the extractor of Peltier's AR fifteen.
Speaker 2: But listen to this, guys, no match could be made
Speaker 2: with the firing pin quote because it was too smooth.
Speaker 3: Right, right, right, And we also know that multiple independent
Speaker 3: witnesses have found there was no hard forensic evidence supporting
Speaker 3: the FBI's claims. Even here in twenty twenty four, there
Speaker 3: were different weapons present in the area during the shootout.
Speaker 3: There was also more than one AR fifteen style firearm
Speaker 3: in the area. And just to get in front of
Speaker 3: the emails here, an AR fifteen itself is not a
Speaker 3: fully automatic weapon. It's considered semi automatic. So for anybody
Speaker 3: who's seen maybe too many movies and you're thinking in
Speaker 3: AR fifteen could not do three discrete shots, it can.
Speaker 3: And I think that's a ghoulish but important thing to remember.
Speaker 3: We also know that the prosecutor wrapped up his case
Speaker 3: by saying, we proved that he being lettered, went down
Speaker 3: to the bodies and executed these two young men, and
Speaker 3: they were young, at point blank range. But later at
Speaker 3: the appellate hearing, the government attorney conceded the following, and Noel,
Speaker 3: could you do us the honors?
Speaker 4: Oh gosh, the dishonor.
Speaker 5: We had a murder. We had numerous shooters. We do
Speaker 5: not know who specifically fired what killing shots. We do
Speaker 5: not know quote unquote who shot the agents.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's the government saying it.
Speaker 2: It is the government saying, how do you walk that back?
Speaker 2: It's messed up, man, And for me, it's even further
Speaker 2: messed up to watch that sixty minutes episode and here
Speaker 2: Leonard say, yeah, I fired at those agents, he says,
Speaker 2: He says, yeah, I fired at those agents, but I
Speaker 2: did not kill them.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 2: But in your mind you think, well, somebody, at least
Speaker 2: on that side, somebody making that specific quote, would think, oh,
Speaker 2: well you you admit to firing at them. Well that's enough, yep,
Speaker 2: and it it's just awful.
Speaker 3: He's always been on record saying he participated in the firefight,
Speaker 3: and multiple other people have because again the context of
Speaker 3: this time, right, we know co intel pro let's get
Speaker 3: the all right, we got to say this. In two
Speaker 3: thousand and four, Foy Act goes through. There's another examination
Speaker 3: of the original FBI ballistics report and an impartial expert
Speaker 3: evaluates what was referred to earlier, that firing pin linked
Speaker 3: to the gun that must have everybody agrees probably was
Speaker 3: the same firearm, so the same firearm that executed FBI
Speaker 3: special agents Williams and Kohler. This impartial expert finds that
Speaker 3: cartridge cases from the scene of the crime, when recovered,
Speaker 3: did not come from the rifle that was tied to
Speaker 3: Leonard Peltier. There's just no way it could have happened
Speaker 3: exactly well.
Speaker 5: And also it's like, I mean, to a certain degree,
Speaker 5: when you're exchanging in fire with these agents, given the
Speaker 5: history and given everything we know about the government's relationship
Speaker 5: to these groups, it's like a.
Speaker 4: Form of self defense in a way.
Speaker 5: I mean, these people are coming for you, They're coming
Speaker 5: for what you have. It's like you are not being
Speaker 5: treated like a citizen, and.
Speaker 4: You are not.
Speaker 5: They are not your friends, they're not there to protect you.
Speaker 5: So I just I don't even hold it against him
Speaker 5: that he entered into a firefight because at a certain point,
Speaker 5: you are just protecting yourself.
Speaker 3: And he had no way of knowing who these people were.
Speaker 5: That's right, but even yeah, exactly, But I'm just saying,
Speaker 5: what to Matt's point earlier in the episode, just how
Speaker 5: this casts so much doubt on like what is legal,
Speaker 5: who is who are the good guys. It's just really hard,
Speaker 5: you know, to think of like the FBI in this case,
Speaker 5: as being out for anything other than just protecting this
Speaker 5: legacy that we've been describing.
Speaker 2: I think it gets murky when you're talking about good
Speaker 2: guys and bad guys anytime both sides are holding guns, right,
Speaker 2: oh oh.
Speaker 4: Boy, fog of war, I think they call it right.
Speaker 2: Well, yeah, And I want to bring something in here,
Speaker 2: just because we're in the timeline in the two thousands now,
Speaker 2: but in the I think it was in the nineties,
Speaker 2: there was this person that came forward and gave an interview.
Speaker 2: I think it was to Peter Matheson who called himself
Speaker 2: mister X. He gave an interview on camera where he
Speaker 2: covered his face, they altered his voice, and he gives
Speaker 2: a first person view of him killing these two FBI agents.
Speaker 2: He said, I approached the wounded agents. One of them
Speaker 2: brought up a pistol and fired it at me. I
Speaker 2: didn't give him a chance to fire again. I shot him.
Speaker 3: The other one and pulls up the hand.
Speaker 2: I immediately turned and put two bullets in the other
Speaker 2: agent because I didn't think I just shot the other agent.
Speaker 2: This is a person that was never verified. And then
Speaker 2: it came forward that this person appears to have been lying,
Speaker 2: and it was, at least according to the FBI, it
Speaker 2: was a lie.
Speaker 3: And if you want to learn more about the Foyer
Speaker 3: request that we're talking about, check out who is Leonard
Speaker 3: Peltier dot info. You can read the fullness there, and
Speaker 3: I appreciate the point also about the questionable witness testimony,
Speaker 3: which we see again. Whenever you hear somebody doing the
Speaker 3: part of voice with their facial pixelated, you have to wonder.
Speaker 4: That's it.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, no, for sure. Well and in the sixty
Speaker 2: minutes episode as well, just sorry, last piece on this.
Speaker 2: You can hear you hear the host ask Leonard, did
Speaker 2: you kill those agents? He says no. He says do
Speaker 2: you know who killed those agents? And Leonard's response is,
Speaker 2: I can't tell you. I'm not a rat, I'm not
Speaker 2: an informant. We believed in what we were fighting for.
Speaker 2: I lived it, I experienced it, I witnessed.
Speaker 3: It, which is very much an answer to a different question.
Speaker 3: And that is honestly a little bit of media training there,
Speaker 3: because you know, if you have ever been in media training,
Speaker 3: up to and including your favorite politicians, the rule of
Speaker 3: thumb is always answer the question you wish you were asked.
Speaker 5: It's a man who's also, more or less, as much
Speaker 5: as this could be possible, made peace with his fate,
Speaker 5: you know, like this, I am in prison. This is
Speaker 5: my contribution to the movement is not ratting some money
Speaker 5: out or not, you know what I mean, like taking
Speaker 5: one for the team more or less.
Speaker 3: I'm glad you mentioned that because maybe not in the
Speaker 3: same spirit. But we're going to end on a couple
Speaker 3: of things before we get to this. We have to
Speaker 3: note everything that you were taught as a US resident
Speaker 3: about the justice system. In theory teaches us and a
Speaker 3: person is innocent until proven guilty or wealthy at some
Speaker 3: point I walk down the street from that one. We're
Speaker 3: going to keep it at some point. Ideology and group
Speaker 3: think aside. We have to ask why this individual in
Speaker 3: specific was chosen as the evidence aside the murderer of
Speaker 3: two FBI special agents, Why did that happenqu bono, Who
Speaker 3: does it benefit? I think it's time we reintroduce our buddies,
Speaker 3: that counter and Tetelligence.
Speaker 4: Program co intel pro for short.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's such a terrible ACRES because they just capitalized
Speaker 3: the C and the O encounter and then the intel
Speaker 3: and intelligence.
Speaker 4: It's barely an acronym. It's kind of like a missmash rely.
Speaker 3: I mean, they could have called it under Jens Graham,
Speaker 3: but they went with co intel Pro.
Speaker 4: Yeah. Well, it's you know it. Well, this is what
Speaker 4: we've got.
Speaker 5: So co Intel pro is, of course the infamous street
Speaker 5: name for the counter intelligence program. As you said, Ben
Speaker 5: meant to their mission, should they choose to accept it,
Speaker 5: and they did, was to expose, disrupt, misdirect, discreditor, otherwise
Speaker 5: neutralize inconvenient individuals.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and which includes just people that they put on
Speaker 2: a official rabble Rouser index that was floated around every
Speaker 2: field office the FBI ran, which is just it just
Speaker 2: it's a list. They just got bigger and bigger and
Speaker 2: bigger of people who either talked to much or were
Speaker 2: a part of some group they didn't like, or were
Speaker 2: highly influential in bringing members into those groups.
Speaker 3: Or just vegans, just vegans, Pete Seeger, you know.
Speaker 5: Think think John Lennon, you know, I mean that level
Speaker 5: of outspoken, you know, public figure.
Speaker 3: Bob Dylan, notorious communist, you know, shadows of McCarthy, shout
Speaker 3: out to the red scare. And also I'm not joking
Speaker 3: about vegans. Some people got popped or observed, monitored, came
Speaker 3: to attention because of their dietary habits alone.
Speaker 2: Yeah, or Martin Luther King, notorious you know, aggressive person
Speaker 2: who just wanted he walked around the country and just
Speaker 2: talked about you need to shoot people, right, Oh no, no,
Speaker 2: he talked about what you need to come together and uh,
Speaker 2: you know, be kind and peaceful. But he was on
Speaker 2: that list, and it was he got targeted by this,
Speaker 2: by this whole system for a long time.
Speaker 3: I think it wasn't just his civil rights work. I
Speaker 3: think it was the extenuation of that into questioning the
Speaker 3: class system of a country that often purports itself to
Speaker 3: be a meritocracy. In past episodes as well as interview segments,
Speaker 3: we've explored what we call the mission creep of co
Speaker 3: Intel Pro and related subsidiary operations.
Speaker 2: I think it's because he questioned the Vietnam War.
Speaker 3: I think that's a huge part of it, and I
Speaker 3: think in doing so, doctor King also questioned the inherent
Speaker 3: and visible class system of the United States. Right. Oh yeah,
Speaker 3: he said there are more of us than there are
Speaker 3: of them.
Speaker 2: Oh what's he saying?
Speaker 3: Right? And this is where we go to the official
Speaker 3: ending of co Intel Pro April of nineteen seventy one.
Speaker 2: Finally we're past that.
Speaker 3: Right. We are on record as well here at stuff
Speaker 3: they don't want you to know, saying that the name
Speaker 3: may have changed, yet the methods exist. They simply evolved.
Speaker 3: You know, like, what's that? What's that? Merk squad? Blackwater?
Speaker 3: Wait a damn I wait, academy, academy.
Speaker 2: That dude's going around having weird meetings, you guys trying
Speaker 2: to convince, trying to trying to convince world leaders that hey,
Speaker 2: why don't you just let us handle it because you
Speaker 2: know we're not a part of your military or their
Speaker 2: military or that military.
Speaker 3: Right right? Yeah, well Wagner left a vacuum. Yeah, so
Speaker 3: shout out to mister prince.
Speaker 6: Uh dude, just think about go and tell pro right now,
Speaker 6: Like with those the requests that you could put into
Speaker 6: Verizon or Exfinity or any.
Speaker 3: Well, think about this too. Why aren't we democratizing the
Speaker 3: obsessive surveillance state? What happened to co intel? Amateur? You
Speaker 3: know what I mean? I want to hear Cointel open mic,
Speaker 3: co Intel, bro co Hotel, bro Co Hotel, am Why
Speaker 3: are we bringing this up now? It tells us a
Speaker 3: great deal about the context surrounding the FBI's behavior toward
Speaker 3: Aim and ultimately toward Leonard. In particular, FBI deployed all
Speaker 3: the co Intel practices against AM, one of the first
Speaker 3: being the wholesale, the wholesale hoovering of leadership not proud
Speaker 3: of it, yeah right, and incarcerating these leaders by hooker
Speaker 3: by crook. For grassroots organizations, this is also a death
Speaker 3: by a thousand cuts. You see big corporations doing this
Speaker 3: as well. Like if you want to fight a DuPont,
Speaker 3: if you want to fight you know, like other whistleblowers
Speaker 3: we've talked about in the past, a big oil, a
Speaker 3: big pharma, then their first move is to tie you
Speaker 3: up in court in a way that bleeds you dry.
Speaker 3: So then the fact that you're telling the truth doesn't
Speaker 3: matter because you don't have the money for the lawyers. Dang.
Speaker 5: That's not to mention a group called the Church Committee,
Speaker 5: which had intended to investigate aim as another dissident group
Speaker 5: targeted by the FBI. Witnesses have been investigated by congressional
Speaker 5: staff and called to give testimony, but one day after
Speaker 5: this firefight in question here, the Church Committee canceled those hearings.
Speaker 5: There was something coming, something wicked.
Speaker 3: Something in the wind. Yeah, and the Church Committee did
Speaker 3: a good job on other things, but you could argue
Speaker 3: they did to due diligence on the case of Leonard
Speaker 3: and the case of the American Indian Movement. The political
Speaker 3: cost perhaps got too high for them. As we're recording now,
Speaker 3: Leonard is alive. He is serving two consecutive life sentences.
Speaker 3: As of September of twenty twenty four, he turned eighty
Speaker 3: years old. As of last month, he is eighty years old,
Speaker 3: and he has spent the majority of his life in prison.
Speaker 3: And I suggest that our most important last word for
Speaker 3: this episode is not our own. I think we read
Speaker 3: an excerpt from the elder himself. You can find his
Speaker 3: full statement on his birthday over at places like MR Online,
Speaker 3: Letter M Letter, R Online. We hope you do check
Speaker 3: it out. This is a piece of a longer thing.
Speaker 3: But gentlemen, I suggest we round Robin and Matt. Do
Speaker 3: you want to start us off?
Speaker 2: Of course, so these are Leonard's words, My friends, I
Speaker 2: need you to fight for you. Police are beating children
Speaker 2: in the streets. The Parole Commission still illegally holds many
Speaker 2: of us long past our release dates. The Supreme Court
Speaker 2: has made it impossible for people to challenge wrongful convictions.
Speaker 2: And let's just put this in there. His first habeas
Speaker 2: corpus that he put forward was in nineteen eighty two,
Speaker 2: before I was born, and he's still fighting for this.
Speaker 5: Yeah, Indigenous people are still being forced from our land.
Speaker 4: We protect Mother Earth.
Speaker 5: They have stripped her bear and now want our resources.
Speaker 5: Our people go missing at a staggering rate, and no
Speaker 5: one blinks.
Speaker 3: And please read the full We're going to end with
Speaker 3: this excerpt. The elder continues. We are awaiting the Huru
Speaker 3: verdict to deta German whether free speech exists, a verdict
Speaker 3: that may well come down on my eightieth birthday, and
Speaker 3: I am still in prison. The Constitution reads, we the people.
Speaker 3: We must tell those in power we are the people.
Speaker 3: Sobering words. On July second, twenty twenty four, Leonard was
Speaker 3: again denied parole despite multiple activist groups seeking clemency. If
Speaker 3: you'd like to learn more about Leonard Peltier's ongoing case,
Speaker 3: check out podcasts like Wondery's Leonard Political Prisoner. Red Nation
Speaker 3: has a great interview with FBI agents who are close
Speaker 3: to the case. If you'd like to learn more about
Speaker 3: other controversial cases of people who may have been swallowed
Speaker 3: by a system, check out our friends at Wrongful Conviction
Speaker 3: and we talked about this a little. If you would
Speaker 3: like to write to Elder Leonard Peltier directly, his address
Speaker 3: is the following.
Speaker 5: Leonard Peltier p E L T I E R number
Speaker 5: eight nine six three seven DASH one three two USP
Speaker 5: Coleman one, US Penitentiary, pobox one zero three to three Coleman,
Speaker 5: Florida three three five two one.
Speaker 3: He can only receive letters, cards, postcards, no polaroid photos,
Speaker 3: and he can get money orders for commissary accounts. We
Speaker 3: do have it on good authority that he responds to
Speaker 3: all of his mail. Thank you so much for tuning in, folks. Again,
Speaker 3: we cannot over recommend the fantastic work that has been
Speaker 3: done by many justice organizations, law enforcement professionals, and countless
Speaker 3: others who, as individuals or as institutions continue to ask
Speaker 3: the hard questions about this case. So let us know
Speaker 3: your thoughts. We try to be easy to find online.
Speaker 5: You can find us the handle conspiracy Stuff where we
Speaker 5: exist on Facebook.
Speaker 4: We have our Facebook group.
Speaker 5: Here's when it gets crazy, join up chat with your
Speaker 5: fellow conspiracy realists there. You can let's find us that
Speaker 5: handle on x FKA, Twitter as well as YouTube, and
Speaker 5: we have a cavalcade of video delights awaiting you if
Speaker 5: you want to find us on Instagram and TikTok. However,
Speaker 5: we are conspiracy stuff show on those platforms.
Speaker 2: Oh yes, this is a really tough one for me. Guys.
Speaker 2: Nobody looks good in this, in that whole situation. But
Speaker 2: injustice is injustice, and we want to know what you
Speaker 2: think about it. Please give us a call. Our number
Speaker 2: is one eight three three std WYTK. When you call in,
Speaker 2: give yourself a cool nickname and let us know if
Speaker 2: we can use your name and message on the air.
Speaker 2: If you've got more to say than can fit in
Speaker 2: that voicemail, why not instead send us a good old
Speaker 2: fashioned email.
Speaker 3: We are the entities that read every piece of correspondence
Speaker 3: we receive, and no word worries. If you don't care
Speaker 3: for phones, no worries. If you don't care for sipping
Speaker 3: the social meds, We've got your back with this email.
Speaker 3: Be well aware, yet unafraid. Sometimes the void writes back.
Speaker 3: As a matter of fact, we're thinking about some of
Speaker 3: you right now. So stay tuned. Join us out here
Speaker 3: in the dark conspiracy at iHeartRadio dot com.
Speaker 2: Stuff they don't want you to know is a production
Speaker 2: of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app,
Speaker 2: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.