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Congressional Briefing for
Leonard Peltier
Washington D.C., May 17, 2000
Kevin McKiernan, Freelance Journalist, formerly
of NPR
Introduction: Kevin McKiernan, freelance journalist,
formerly of NPR, veteran journalist who corresponded for National
Public Radio's All Things Considered and the only journalist
who stayed at the Pine Ridge Reservation during the entire 71 days of
siege. He also continued to cover issues at the Pine Ridge during the
three-year Reign of Terror.
Kevin McKiernan: Good Afternoon. I am a journalist. I was
inside Wounded Knee during the 1973 71-day occupation... it was a
long time ago, but it seems like yesterday in many respects. In those
days, the Pine Ridge Reservation was a place of great violence with
little or no law enforcement. If you wanted as a reporter to gather
information about the American Indian Movement (AIM) or the Lakota
Traditional, there was a price to pay. I was one of a number of
journalists personally threatened and even assaulted physically by
vigilantes associated with Wilson's tribal government: my pickup
truck on one occasion was hit by a bullet and another time the breaks
on my car were cut.
At that time most of the traditional people on Pine Ridge believed
that the FBI targeted the AIM Indians -- as they were called -- and
overlooked crimes committed by Wilson and his followers. George
O'Clock, the special agent in charge of the Rapid City office, once
told me some years later, that the FBI got its SWAT team from Pine
Ridge -- that during this period from 1973 to 1976, the FBI used Pine
Ridge as a SWAT training ground for as many as 2,600 FBI agents.
That's a period of only three years and that's when most of the
abuses took place.
There is strong evidence of a relationship between the GOONs and the
FBI; US Federal Judge Fred Nichols once told me that the FBI and the
GOONs worked together because both were against the American Indian
Movement. In another interview, then Senator James Abourzek told me
the FBI chose sides in the Pine Ridge conflict, failed to investigate
an epidemic of Indian killings, and engaged in the selective
prosecution of AIM members.
In the 1970's I myself saw an illegal GOON roadblock on the Pine
Ridge Reservation and I filmed the armed vigilantes taking property
from AIM attorneys at gunpoint. At other times I saw the FBI pass
easily through these roadblocks making small talk with the armed men,
shaking hands, and then going on their way. And once I was with
federal agents in a government van which drove off the road, into a
ditch, and around such a GOON roadblock. No attempt was made to
confront or question the armed vigilantes.
In 1976 I investigated the murder of Byron DeSersa, an unarmed
resident who was ambushed and killed on a highway near the town of
Wanblee. The survivors of that incident said that several vehicles
associated with Wilson's GOONs had driven by their car and then
opened fire on the DeSersa car. The survivors in the car identified
the vehicles only less than an hour after the incident and gave the
license numbers to the FBI in Wanblee. Although the killers had
gathered to drink, celebrate, party, and discharge weapons in the
direction of houses owned by AIM sympathizers in Wanblee, FBI agents
in town refused to approach the house. Instead of making arrests,
they allowed the party to continue all weekend and permitted the
Wilson caravan the next day to leave town. Despite the many vehicles
involved, only one Wilson man was eventually charged, and he served
only two-to-three years on a reduced manslaughter charge.
I investigated other assaults as well, including the GOON
caravan that attacked AIM lawyers and destroyed an airplane they
had rented and flown to Pine Ridge. They had come there to gather
evidence in several legal cases... The GOONs sliced open the top of
one lawyer's car, beating the occupants and cutting a paralegal with
a knife. Wilson himself commannded that operation and later he told
me that he considered it a 'justifiable stomping". He was
indicted on a misdemeanor by the judge and then acquitted by an
all-white jury.
Years later I interviewed the commander of the GOON
squad Duane Brewer who was also involved in that attack. He was
well known on the reservation. In fact, he was a member of the tribal
police. On camera, he told me that the FBI had provided him with
intelligence on the activities of AIM members and that FBI agents had
supplied him with armor-piercing bullets to use against the American
Indian Movement. That is my statement.
Transcript from the Congressional Briefing for Leonard Peltier,
Washington D.C., May17, 2000
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