Letters

Lawyers, Guns, and Martyrdom
While I thought that Scott Anderson's account of the Leonard Peltier case ("The Martyrdom of Leonard Peltier," July) was well written, it ignored highly significant evidence that makes persistent allegations of a government frame-up far more plausible than his piece would suggest. Long after Peltier's conviction, a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit unearthed an FBI teletype report that stated unequivocally that an AR-15 rifle attributed to Peltier could not possibly have been the murder weapon--a conclusion that completely contradicts the trial testimony of its author, an FBI firearms expert. There were three such weapons found at the scene of the fatal confrontation. Anderson also fails to mention that even one of the federal appeals courts that affirmed Peltier's convictions acknowledged the existence of FBI misconduct.

William M. Kunstler
New York, New York

Editor's note: Mr. Kunstler has served as an attorney on Leonard Peltier's defense team.

I strongly object to the way Anderson misused quotes from an interview I conducted with Dino Butler, another defendant in the murders, for News from Indian Country. Many of these quotes were presented out of context. Anderson excerpted material and gave it emotional connotation based on his own erroneous interpretive assumptions, presenting an inaccurate picture of the intent of Butler's statements. He assigned negatively charged emotion to statements that Butler did not make in anger or bitterness or with any malicious intent. I apologize to Butler and feel bad that his words were exploited to suggest that he would deliberately try to cause upheaval and confusion. I would like to clearly and emphatically state that in our interview, Butler in no way implied that Peltier is personally responsible for his wrongful imprisonment. He did not speak of In the Spirit of Crazy Horse author Peter Matthiessen with bitterness or anger and in fact expressed genuine compassion for Matthiessen as someone victimized by information about the existence and activities of the alleged Mr. X. To conclude the article by implying that Butler's interview will jeopardize Peltier's chance of release is grossly inaccurate and assumes there is no evidence in this case other than the existence or nonexistence of Mr. X. I strongly recommend that Outside readers not take Anderson's article as an accurate representation of Butler's statements; copies of the original interview may be obtained from News from Indian Country, Route 2, Box 2900A, Hayward, WI 54843; 715-634-5226.

E. K. Caldwell
Depoe Bay, Oregon

Scott Anderson replies: In suggesting that I "ignored highly significant evidence" pointing to a possible government frame-up of Peltier, Kunstler resurrects one of the most tired and discredited defense assertions in the case: that an FBI teletype "stated unequivocally" that Peltier's AR-15 could not have been the murder weapon. Kunstler is apparently referring to a teletype written on October 31, 1975, by Evan Hodge, an FBI ballistics expert in charge of trying to link the .223 bullet casings found on Jumping Bull with the AR-15 recovered in Kansas when a car driven by Tent City fugitives caught on fire. ".223 casings," Hodge wrote, "not identifiable with AR-15 rifle located in vehicle which exploded on Kansas Turnpike September 10, 1975."

It's an intriguing revelation, but one for which the FBI has a rather persuasive explanation. As Kunstler points out, there were three AR-15s at Jumping Bull that day: The first was used by one of the Tent City residents, who fired 115 .223 rounds, including the point-blank murder shots; the other two were used by BIA officers, who fired at least seven .223 rounds during the storming of the Jumping Bull compound later in the day. As of October 31, 1975, Hodge had tested only those seven casings and determined that they could not have been fired by the AR-15 recovered in Kansas. Subsequent tests on all the other .223 casings, including one from the trunk of slain FBI agent Jack Coler's car, found that they matched the Kansas AR-15--the only AR-15 in the possession of the Tent City residents and the gun that two eyewitnesses placed in Peltier's hands.

This, of course, is the FBI's explanation of events, but it has been upheld by the courts throughout Peltier's appeals. As the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals stated in 1984, "When all is said and done...a few simple but very important facts remain. The casing [from the trunk of Coler's car] introduced into evidence had in fact been extracted from the Wichita AR-15. This point was not disputed." It's odd that Kunstler is unaware that the defense conceded this point, since he was Peltier's lawyer in this appeal.

I'm sorry that E. K. Caldwell feels I gave an inaccurate representation of her interview with Dino Butler, but she is accusing me of things that are not on the page. Nowhere in the article, for example, do I suggest that Butler is deliberately trying to cause upheaval or confusion among Peltier's supporters. Quite aside from Caldwell's charge of inaccurate context, Butler's words speak for themselves, both on the issue of Mr. X--"Well, there is no Mr. X"--and on his view of Peter Matthiessen--"I lost a lot of respect for Peter Matthiessen as a writer and as a person I could trust." These are Butler's words, not mine, and I did not take them out of context, as anyone who obtains a copy of Caldwell's full interview will see.

Anderson's report is based on a tenuous chain of speculation and hearsay. Though he weaves a compelling tale, I'm skeptical of his eagerness to discredit Matthiessen and his work. Anderson questions the motives behind Matthiessen's decision to donate half of his royalties from In the Spirit of Crazy Horse to the Leonard Peltier Defense Committee, yet he neglects to mention that on past occasion Matthiessen has given away all his royalties simply because he feels morally obligated to share the financial reward with those about whom he writes. In the three years I've known Matthiessen, we've had our share of disagreements. But I've never questioned his personal integrity.

Laurel Berger
Sag Harbor, New York

Correction: In the August issue, we erroneously reported that the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance "threatened to booby-trap" the Eco Challenge Adventure Race course. We have since learned that this threat was made by individuals falsely representing themselves as SUWA members and that SUWA in fact had no connection whatsoever with the threat. We regret the error.