I remember the Paul Lawrence story and Roz has it right, as I recall. One side-note is that the DA in Chittenden County (Burlington) was, I believe, Patrick Leahy, now Senator Leahy. Vermont has a tradition of civil liberties, though in some areas of the state it is stronger than in others. Putney and Brattleboro, where Roz and I were active, are liberal communities. When the FBI was looking for underground fugitives, they asked a "redneck" neighbor of a local commune to keep track of license plates parked by the commune. He essentially told them to fuck off. In elections last night, civil unions (gay marriage lie) was upheld; a transgendered man to woman ran for Congress on the Republican Party; and Bernie Sanders (who still publicly describes himself as a democratic socialist even though his politics are similar to progressive Dems) easily won re-election with over 70% of the vote. And a Progressive Party candidate, Anthony Pollina, running with full public financing under our new clean election law, won more than 10%. It would have been much higher had not civil unions become the defining issue. Many progressives joined Democrats in voting for the incumbent governor, Howard Dean, to stop a raving right-wing Republican bigot named Ruth Dwyer. Dwyer lost heavily and says she's through with politics and her movement is dead. Marty At 08:20 AM 11/6/2000 -0500, you wrote: > Here is a story, to the best of my memory (somewhat shorten) I would >like to share about a bad cop whose name is Paul Lawrence. Putney, >Vermont1970, various young people began complaining that they were busted >for drugs that had been planted and others complained that a police >officer named Paul Lawrence had beat them up and arrested them. >Many were convicted after police officer Paul Lawrence testified at trial >and some went to jail. > We ( the community) knew he was a bad cop. A group of us from New York >Newsreel moved to Vermont and stayed in the house of a Newsreel member. We >lived collectivly , did political work around a concept called Free Vermont , >and were part of a community farm that had gatherings every saturday and >sunday to work , share food and music, etc. It was called the Free Farm. > We made a film about the Putney Free Farm. I remember this well only >because I have a copy of the film and use it in my classes. One part of the >film shows young and old folks, hippies, bikers, rednecks, farm kids, etc >weeding the garden, cutting up vegies , cooking over a fire, big pots of >soup, playing drums, silk screening Fists with the words Free Vermont onto >shirts and jackets, passing out newsprint political booklets saying Hand book >of Fire arms and revolutionary ......, a shot of a vietnamese girl dancing >with a bomb on her shoulders, a photo of Bobby Seale. ect. In this film >there is a shot of a poster on a stick in the ground it says "WANTED" with >a picture of police officer Paul Lawrence. The writing under the photo says >"Beware of bad cop Paul Lawrence. He is known to plant drugs and beat people >up. etc. > Sometime later in the mid 70's, some of us had moved to Burlington, >Vermont. Young people hung out in City Hall Park during the summer . Some > were being arrested for drugs and claimed that they were innocent. Some >went to jail. The arresting police officer was Paul Lawrence. He had some >how moved and became a police officer in Burlington. > Sometime later, I met a chemist that worked for the State of Vermont. > He told me the story of what happened to Paul Lawrence . This chemist >worked in the Vermont State Labortory anaylising drugs that were >confiscated during arrests. He tested the drugs, wrote up a report, >passed it on to the police department, if the substance was an illegal drug, >the report would be used in the trial. If it was not illegal charges would >be dropped. He notice something strange. All the the cocaine arrests >by Paul Lawrence over a long period of time had exactly the same chemical >break down, cut with the same amount of substance, and matched eachother. >The chemist said, " I never saw this before and I knew something was wrong." >He reported it. > That summer, in City Hall Park, police officer Lawrence busted two >guys. These men a week earlier had picked me and a friend up hitchhiking > from Boston. ( In those days it was ok to hitch) >Paul Lawrence had arrested and planted Coke on the two guys . The >chemist, checked it out and it was the same coke from all of his other busts. > The only problem this time was that the two men from Boston who had given >us a ride were undercover narcotic agents . Paul Lawrence was arrested , >found guilty and served time in jail. Everyone he had ever arrested had >their records erased and/or released from prison, and pardoned. Later a book >and film were made about Paul Lawrence the bad cop. > >Gawd, this list gets me to relive my life and write stories that is one >reason I love it. my best, roz > >Michael Rossman wrote >>As for marijuana/psychedelic persecution, I am sure that it was the most >>widespread and frequently-exercised theme of the entire persecutory scheme. >>Whether it were more frequently accomplished through radicals' actual >>possession of banned substances, or through their planting by police and >>associates, is unclear to me. I heard plenty of tales of both sorts, and >>often >>had good reason to believe the latter kind, beyond my natural inclination >>(from sufficient evidence) to believe that many governmental agents had >>the >>opportunity, motive, immorality, and subcultural custom to plant such false >>evidences. (I trust that some readers' kneejerk reflex to scold me for >>"kneejerk" distrust of peace officers Marty Jezer * 22 Prospect Street * Brattleboro, Vermont 05301 * website: <http://www.sover.net/~mjez Subscribe to my Friday commentary (it's free), just send me your e-mail address by reply
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