June 19, 2008: The pre-trial hearing in Rapid City was set to start at 8:30 a.m. on Monday, October 6, 2008, followed by selection of the jury and continuation of the trial until it is completed with a break between the end of the day Friday, 10 October and 9 a.m. Tuesday, October 14th. If a third week is necessary, the trial will continue at 9 a.m. Tuesday, October 21st.
- From grahamdefense.org
On June 18, 2008, American and Canadian corporate media services published online reports that prosecution and defense lawyers are asking for John Graham’s trial to be delayed from September to October of 2008.
The corporate media continues to wrongly claim that “witnesses” at Arlo Looking Cloud’s 2004 trial said that he, John Graham and another American Indian Movement member drove Anna Mae Aquash to the location where her body was later found and that John Graham shot her. It should be made clear that no person testified at Looking Cloud’s trial to witnessing Graham kill Aquash. There was also no physical evidence presented that linked either Looking Cloud or Graham to the murder. The only testimony given was regarding what persons claimed Looking Cloud had told them or was regarding supposed sightings of him and Graham together with Aquash at various homes. One person who testified, former AIM member Darlene Ecoffey (then Nichols), admitted during the trial to being a paid police informant and later married one of the main police investigators of the case, self-proclaimed FBI academy graduate Robert Ecoffey (who also took part in the “Incident at Oglala” FBI-led assault on an AIM camp on June 26, 1975, at Pine Ridge).
Arlo Looking Cloud’s trial, February 2004 (grahamdefense.org)
Questions linger about John Graham handover
By Matthew Burrows
The Georgia Straight (Vancouver, Canada)
April 10, 2008
Family and supporters of John Graham are still furious over unanswered questions relating to his high-speed extradition to the U.S. last December.
“Why would they put this man in chains and take him across the border, full speed, without him being allowed to talk to lawyer or family?” Vancouver-based justice advocate Jennifer Wade asked in a phone conversation with the Straight.
The Yukon-born Southern Tutchone man is charged with first-degree murder in the execution-style killing of Nova Scotia Mi’kmaq and American Indian Movement member Anna Mae Pictou Aquash, whose body was found in 1976 on the Pine Ridge reservation in South Dakota. Graham has always maintained that he did not commit the crime.
On February 21, 2005, B.C. Supreme Court Justice Elizabeth Bennett ruled that Graham could be extradited to the U.S. to stand trial for the crime. On June 22, 2006, months after the Conservative party gained a minority in Parliament, then–justice minister Vic Toews signed off on the handover of Graham to U.S. authorities.
On June 26, 2007, the B.C. Court of Appeal dismissed Graham’s appeal. On December 6, 2007, the same day he was whisked to the border, Graham was denied leave to appeal his case to the Supreme Court of Canada. According to Wade, Graham was driven from the North Fraser Pretrial Centre in Port Coquitlam and turned over to U.S. authorities. He is currently being held in the Pennington County Jail in South Dakota.
Burnaby-Douglas NDP MP Bill Siksay wrote two letters to Justice Minister Rob Nicholson, dated December 6 and 11, 2007, demanding answers to questions surrounding the surrender.
“Given that he was extradited the same day as the Supreme Court decision was delivered, it is clear that both Canadian and U.S. authorities had already made the necessary arrangements to remove him,” Siksay wrote on December 11. “Why then was Mr. Graham’s legal counsel or his family not informed about the timing of the extradition?”
In a two-page letter to Siksay dated December 18, 2007, Janet Henchey, general counsel and associate director of the International Assistance Group in the federal Department of Justice, stated that it was “standard practice to remove persons sought for extradition pursuant to a valid surrender order as soon as practicable upon the release of the final decision on any outstanding appeals”.
According to Wade, Graham was denied basic rights. “They [prisoners] are allowed to talk to family or lawyer before going,” she said. “He was not allowed access to family or lawyer or friends of any kind. He asked repeatedly if he could phone his family to tell them he was leaving, and they said no.”
Wade has been advocating on Graham’s behalf since he was arrested in Vancouver in December 2003.
John Graham trial moved to September
By Heidi Bell Gease, rapid City Journal staff
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
The murder trial of John Graham has been rescheduled for Sept. 23 at the request of Graham’s attorney.
Graham, 52, of British Columbia was supposed to go on trial here June 17 in U.S. District Court for the fatal shooting of Anna Mae Pictou Aquash, a fellow American Indian Movement member who died on Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in December 1975.
Graham’s attorney, John Murphy, filed a motion Feb. 28 asking that the trial be delayed, saying he needed more time to prepare. According to the motion, the government had already provided Murphy with more than 4,200 documents and 112 audio tapes of witness interviews.
U.S. District Judge Lawrence Piersol, who will preside over Graham’s trial, has rescheduled the trial to Sept. 23. Graham has agreed to waive his right to a speedy trial.
Another man charged in Aquash’s death, Fritz Arlo Looking Cloud, was convicted of first-degree murder after a 2004 trial in Rapid City.
He was sentenced to life in prison.
John Graham’s attorney asks for later trial
Man charged in AIM activist’s death seeks to move trial to Sept. 15.
By Heidi Bell Gease, Rapid City Journal staff
Monday, March 03, 2008
The defense attorney for John Graham, the Canadian man charged with fatally shooting Anna Mae Aquash, has asked that Graham’s trial be postponed.
Graham, 52, is charged with murder in connection with the death of Aquash, a fellow American Indian Movement member who died in December 1975 on Pine Ridge Indian Reservation.
Graham, of British Columbia, is currently scheduled to stand trial June 17 in U.S. District Court in Rapid City.
In a motion filed Feb. 28, defense attorney John Murphy asked that Graham’s trial be moved to Sept. 15 or later in order to allow more time to prepare for trial.
According to the motion, the government has so far provided the defense with 4,263 documents, not including transcripts, as well as 112 audio tapes of witness interviews.
“Defense counsel has spent nearly 43 hours of time at the jail with Defendant Graham reviewing discovery documents, to date, we have only been able to get through the first 600 documents,” the motion states. “More time will be needed to review and sort through the voluminous discovery in this case in order to adequately prepare for trial.”
In the motion, Graham agreed to waive his right to a speedy trial.
No judge’s ruling had been filed as of Monday.
Another man charged in Aquash’s death, Fritz Arlo Looking Cloud, was tried and convicted of first-degree murder after a 2004 trial in Rapid City. He was sentenced to life in prison.
Contact Heidi Bell Gease at 394-8419 or heidi.bell[at]rapidcityjournal.com
Event to Honor Warrior and Elder Harriet Nahanee
NATIVE 2010 RESISTANCE!
Five females from the N2010R and also repping other groups/Nations traveled to Coast Salish Territory (colonial Victoria) on March 1st, 2008, for an event put on by the Camas Center to honor Pacheedaht Warrior and Elder Harriet Nahanee…
…A Nlaka’Pamux woman spoke about the mess that the development has made on her territory… This speaker also discussed in depth Tuchone Warrior John Graham, and his illegal extradition. This issue was talked about a lot throughout the evening by numerous people. It is a topic many people have interest in learning more about and organizing around. For more information see: http://www.grahamdefense.org/. The criminalization of dissent especially of Indigenous people resisting corporate invasion is being accelerated by the 2010 Olympics…
* Full story at: Spirit of Warrior Harriet Nahanee
…Free Leonard Peltier, Free John Graham, Free Aaron Patterson! Free Imam Jalil Al-Amin! No Uranium Mining in Sharbot Lake! No to Gallore Creek Mine! No Mine in kamloops! No mining in Guatemala! No Mining Mother Earth! Shut Down Sun Peaks and Revolstoke ski Resort!! No ski resort in Sutikalh (Melvin creek) Save the Headwaters! Boycott Shell! No Olympics on Native Land! We won’t stop until we win! Warriorz Unite!
Native Youth Movement Communications
Native 2010 Resistance
- From the report: “Warriors complete 20+ stop Tour against 2010 Olympics” with links to media at Infoshop News
Links to documents at grahamdefense.org:
Anarchist solidarity with indigenous warrior John Graham
By some Vancouver anarchists
January 19, 2008
Anarchists in Vancouver, Canada, have been standing in solidarity with indigenous warrior John Graham since his extradition hearings began here in 2004.
The FBI charges that Graham killed his comrade Anna Mae Pictou Aquash, his friend and fellow warrior in the American Indian Movement (AIM). Aquash’s body was found on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, South Dakota, in February of 1976.
Although Aquash was a well-known AIM leader and fugitive, Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agents and Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) police claimed they couldn’t identify her. Their pathologist claimed she died of exposure and removed her hands. The BIA prevented people from viewing her body and had her body buried without a death certificate or burial permit before her hands were sent to the FBI for identification. A second autopsy requested by her family and friends revealed that she had been shot.
In the 1970s, the FBI’s Counter-Intelligence Program (COINTELPRO) was targeting AIM and traditional Lakota people for destruction, in part because of high-profile actions such as the armed re-occupation of Wounded Knee at Pine Ridge. In the course of three years, an FBI-backed death squad, the Guardians Of the Oglala Nation (GOONS), which included many BIA cops, killed more than 60 AIM members and traditional Lakota people on the reservation. BIA Tribal Chief Dick Wilson, founder of the GOONS, signed over Lakota territory for exploitation by various energy corporations, including uranium-mining companies.
In the 1990s, law enforcement agent Robert Ecoffey began to fabricate a case that AIM leaders ordered Aquash killed because they believed that she was an FBI informant. This was based on the FBI’s attempt in the 1970s to spread rumours within AIM that Aquash was an informant and to shift suspicion for her murder from themselves to AIM after their failed attempt to cover-up her identity and true cause of death.
In the 1970s, Ecoffey was a member of the BIA police force at Pine Ridge and took part in the FBI-led assault on an AIM camp set up to protect a Lakota family from the GOONS. This event became known as the “Incident at Oglala” and led to the deaths of AIM warrior Joe Stuntz Killsright and two FBI agents. Ecoffey later testified as a government witness against AIM warrior Leonard Peltier at the 1977 frame-up trial over the killing of the two FBI agents.
We believe that the case against John Graham is an attempt to cover-up the deadly counter-insurgency campaign waged by government agencies at Pine Ridge in the 1970s. We also believe it is an attempt to cover-up Aquash and Graham’s history of resistance to the corporate theft and destruction of indigenous land, cutting-off today’s generation and future generations from an important point-of-reference. Both Aquash and Graham opposed uranium mining as being in total conflict with the traditional indigenous way of life. In the 1980s, Graham continued to fight against uranium mining in Native territories in Canada.
At different times, Anna Mae Pictou Aquash, Leonard Peltier and John Graham all said they were offered their freedom if they collaborated with the FBI against AIM leaders. They all refused. Myrtle Poor Bear said that FBI agents threatened her with photos of Aquash’s body, saying it would be worse with her if she didn’t sign false affidavits against Peltier to have him extradited from Vancouver. Peltier said he was offered his freedom in 1998 if he falsely pointed the finger at John Graham and AIM leaders for Aquash’s death. He refused. Graham has said US law enforcement agents visited him in the Yukon in the 1990s and threatened that he’d face a murder charge if he didn’t falsely point the finger at AIM leaders for Aquash’s murder. He refused.
John Graham is currently imprisoned at the Pennington County Jail in Rapid City, South Dakota, and his trial date has been set for June 17, 2008. He was arrested in Vancouver in December of 2003 and spent 40 days in prison until he was released under house arrest to face his extradition hearings. He was taken back to prison on June 26, 2007, just before the Supreme Court of British Columbia rejected his appeal. The Supreme Court of Canada rejected his final appeal on December 6, 2007, and he was extradited to South Dakota that same day. That night, the locks of the probation office he was forced to regularly check-in with were glued shut and “Free John Graham” was spray-painted on one of its walls. There is also an on-going graffiti campaign in Vancouver in solidarity with him.
Vancouver anarchists first learned about the case from the local Native Youth Movement, mutual friends and John Graham’s family. We further educated ourselves, got to know John himself and talked with him about his history. Anarchists in Vancouver (and at times anarchists from other parts of British Columbia) have attended his court dates, visited him in prison, put on informational events on the case, put up posters, produced leaflets and supported events held for John Graham by the Native Youth Movement or his daughters. We’ve also supported indigenous warriors who’ve publicly challenged speakers spreading disinformation around the case.
Indigenous resistance to colonization is one of our primary sources of inspiration in our own anarchist struggle against industrialism, capitalism and the State. By standing in solidarity with John Graham we are strengthening our own struggle for freedom.
For us, solidarity with John Graham also means continuing on with the struggle against development, against uranium mining, against the police, against all prisons everywhere. As Anna Mae Pictou Aquash herself said after she was arrested and threatened by the FBI in September of 1975, “Jails are not a solution to problems.”
- >
To write to John Graham at Pennington County Jail, address envelope as follows:
John Graham
307 St. Joseph Street
Rapid City, SD 57701
USA
- >
John Graham’s history of resistance (actions and activities he took part in):
Early 1970s -
- Beothuck patrol by the Native Alliance for Red Power, monitoring police harassment of
Natives in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside.
1974-
- Second Native Peoples’ Caravan to Ottawa and occupation of abandoned Carbide Mill (Native Peoples’ Embassy).
- Mohawk warriors armed re-occupation of Ganienkeh territory in New York State.
1975 –
- Security at Farmington, New Mexico, AIM convention related to racist murders of Navajos.
- Security and safe transportation for traditionalists at Pine Ridge, South Dakota, Lakota territory.
1980 –
- Caravan for Survival from Regina to uranium boomtown, La Ronge, Saskatchewan, to protest Key Lake uranium mine government board of inquiry.
1981 -
- Anna Mae Aquash Survival Camp near Pinehouse, Saskatchewan, on Key Lake road to stop the development of what became the world’s largest uranium mine (John was instrumental in the founding and naming of the camp).
1983-1984 -
- Red Peoples Long Walk from Victoria to Ottawa and Akwesasne for survival and against assimilation.
- European speaking tour against uranium mining.
Anna Mae Pictou Aquash’s history of resistance (actions and activities she took part in):
1969 –
- Aquash is arrested in Boston after jumping onto a group of police when they arrested a friend of hers who was assaulted at a bar.
1970 –
- Boston Indian Council and AIM demonstration against Mayflower II, Thanksgiving Day.
1972 –
- Trail of Broken Treaties leading to occupation of Bureau of Indian Affairs headquarters in Washington DC.
1973 –
- Armed liberation of Wounded Knee, Pine Ridge, Lakota territory
1974 -
- Training in Karate at AIM gym.
- Armed re-occupation of Anicinabe Park in Kenora, Ontario, by the Ojibway Warriors Society.
- Research, teaching and creating programs for the Red Schoolhouse, AIM Survival School in St. Paul, Minnesota.
- Re-organization of Los Angeles AIM chapter, fundraising and expulsion from office of then suspected FBI informant Douglass Durham (later confirmed).
1975 –
- Armed occupation of religious building in Gresham, Wisconsin, by Menominee Warrior Society.
- Farmington, New Mexico, AIM convention related to racist murders of Navajos.
- Security and health for traditionalists at Pine Ridge, South Dakota, Lakota territory.
- >
Websites:
http://www.grahamdefense.org
http://ourfreedom.wordpress.com
Recommended reading:
The Life and Death of Anna Mae Aquash by Johanna Brand
In the Spirit of Crazy Horse by Peter Matthiessen
Lakota Woman by Mary Crow Dog
Daughter of extradited man speaking up for her father
APTN National News Daytime
Wednesday, December 19th
APTN National News Primetime
Tuesday, December 18th
“Think about it. When has the United States government ever put so much energy and effort and money into finding the murderer of an Indian woman on a reservation?”
- John Graham, interview with Aboriginal Peoples Television Network, April 2007, re-aired Tuesday, December 18th, 2007, and Wednesday, December 19th, 2007
