Chicago, IL—It was a very cold morning at 04:45 hours on 4 December 1969 when 14 Chicago cops assigned to the Cook County State’s Attorney’s office executed a search warrant on a filthy premises at 2337 West Monroe.The officers were looking for a large stockpile of weapons including three shotguns stolen from the Chicago Police Department, three highly illegal sawed-off shotguns and some 50,000 rounds of ammunition. That intelligence information was provided to police by a BPP associate who was cooperating.
Officers were rightly concerned they were being led into a deadly trap and took all necessary precautions to insure their own safety. This was a period before SWAT teams and police body armor were part of law enforcement resources.
The officers carried their service revolvers. In addition five carried 12 gauge Shotguns. Officer James Davis had a .30 caliber carbine and Officer Joe Gorman carried a .45 Thompson submachine gun also known, as the Chicago Typewriter.
Before the sun would rise, two men, Black Panther Party Chairman, Fred Hampton of Maywood and another BPP official from Peoria, Mark Clark were dead. Four other occupants of the large two-bedroom apartment were wounded
Hampton was a violent thug who was out on a appeal bond following a conviction and prison sentence for robbing an ice cream vendor in Maywood. Today the bail laws have changed and Hampton would have been kept safe behind bars where he belonged.
The Black Panther Party was founded in 1966 in Oakland, CA by several radical Communists including, Eldridge "Soul On Ice" Cleaver and Bobby “Burn Baby Burn” Seal.
There was a Illinois chapter that was violent, heavily armed and dedicated to the murder of policemen and the overthrow of our nation. The Panthers had various alliances with the Students for a Democratic Society and numerous street gangs such as the Black Stone Rangers and Vice Lords.
The common and redundant slogans of The BPP included, “Kill The Pigs” and that infamous Maoist quote, “Political power flows from the barrel of a gun”.
The BPP murders of numerous police officers nationwide along with their constant verbal and written terrorist threats made it abundantly clear that the BPP was at war with America.
The defense minister of the BPP was current U.S. Congressman, Bobby Rush. It was several months before the December raid that Rush and two other BBP members were arrested after a wild shootout that left six wounded in Robbins, IL. The future (and present) Congressman was found to be carrying a loaded .45 ACP semi-automatic pistol in a shoulder holster when arrested.
In the raid's aftermath police seized 19 Panther weapons that included an Ithaca 12 guage shotgun, marked, “Property of the Chicago Police Dept.” reported stolen earlier from a police vehicle and a sawed off shotgun banned by federal and state law. Also included, were several of what they describe today as “assault weapons”.
The radical element came out in full support defending the dead and wound panthers. Police arrested all seven BPP survivors on various charges including Armed Violence and various weapons charges.
The Cook County Coroner conducted post-mortem examination on Hampton and Clark. Later charges would surface along with a mistaken toxicology report that indicated Hampton had ingested sleeping pills and was asleep at the time of death. That was later thoroughly debunked as BPP race-baiting propaganda.
Aside from a Blue Ribbon Coroner’s investigation, a Chicago Police Internal Investigation there were no less than five unofficial parallel investigations groups including Renault Robinson and Howard Saffold’s Afro-American Patrolman’s Association.
There were two additional official investigations. One was the Federal Grand Jury investigation looking into possible civil rights violations against the BPP members. They declined to charge officers suggesting the 14 police officers were victimized by a political climate of “police persecution”. The Grand Jury also criticized the propaganda and fundraising done by the radicals to celebrate the heroic martyrdom of Hampton and Clark.
The next investigation was conducted by a private lawyer, Barnabas F. Sears who was appointed as a special prosecutor by Presiding Cook County Circuit Court Criminal Judge, Joseph A. Power. Sears was able to indict the 14 policemen along with the sitting States Attorney, Edward V. Hanrahan and Lt. John Meade for a multitude of offenses including Obstruction of Justice and Official misconduct. Mead was a lawyer as well as a Chicago cop.
The Panther related litigation lasted for decades. All criminal charges against the surviving BPP members and law enforcement officials were dropped in a bizarre simultaneous ending. Apparently the surviving Panthers, cops and prosecutors entered into an obvious quid pro-quo agreement.
University of Chicago celebrated with a screening of "The Murder of Fred Hampton", followed by a panel discussion with Jeff Haas, who signed his book, "The Assassination of Fred Hampton".
ReplyDeleteHere's a clip featuring my (I kid you not) Congressman, Bobby "Race Card" Rush who was the Panthers' deputy defense minister at the time.
Video
Fellow Panthers and fans of these hard corps Communist killers have posted loads of videos about this raid. The good news is two total scumbags are dead and will never carry out another threat against anyone.
ReplyDeleteI remember this very well.
ReplyDeleteEverytime I see Bobby(race card) Rush on TV I want to throw up. He is a disgusting piece of shit and only his own kind, black or white, would vote him into a congressional seat.
Ahh,the days when the police could send real patrolmen with M1 carbines,Thompsons and shotguns and take care of business.
ReplyDeletePeople should remember the blatant discrimination that Blacks faced in this country AND in Chicago back in those days, which helped spawn the creation of the BPP and other offshoots. It's very easy for the armchair 'night riders' to blast those folks, especially if you didn't grow up in those times.
ReplyDeleteLiving in Chicago back then was just as dangerous as living down South if you didn't "know your place" as a Black American. I'm not making excuses for the unnecessary violence caused by some of the leaders of those militant groups, but let's not forget that Black folks were far from equal in America.
Equality? Blacks were hardly equal! They were taken from a primitive civilization. Okay let’s ignore the reality that slave traders in Africa were themselves Black.
ReplyDeleteYour lame attempt to justify robbery, rape and murder on inequality reduces the entire Black race into a lower form and sub-human form of life.
God did not make anyone equal. Some are prettier, smarter, and more talented than others. Some civilizations are more advanced than others. Some earthlings were born on fertile soil with agreeable climates and some were not.
One thing for sure buying into the acts of the Black Panther Party philosophy as justification for hate, violence and thuggish behavior is in itself a proclamation that the race itself is deficient.
Are Blacks not capable to adapting to the more advanced civilization they were brought to? Is this more about Darwin’s Law? Anyone who accepts a racial excuse for murder, rape or robbery is the real racist.
A good Black Panther is a dead Black Panther.
@anonymous
ReplyDelete"Living in Chicago back then was just as dangerous as living down South if you didn't "know your place" as a Black American. I'm not making excuses...."
O yes you are. The fact is, no matter what had happened to blacks in another time and place, they came north in droves to make war on people who had never done them any harm, and that was wrong. No one who is not evil or stupid can fail to see this.
And you've got your social geography upside down and inside out. Thanks to King, the Kennedys and LBJ, blacks were given a free pass to come up and make the North as dangerous for whites as the South had been for blacks. I know this because not only did I grow up in those times, but my street was ground zero for every riot and disturbance of the era. I was one of the trusting white kids who believed the liberal line that "all the poor mistreated, misunderstood Negroes want is equality." Exactly. They wanted an equal opportunity to beat and brutalize whites.
It's very easy for the armchair 'night riders' to blast those folks, especially if you didn't grow up in those times.
ReplyDeleteDecember 05, 2009 11:35 PM
Oh believe me friend,we did blast some of those "folks" during that time.
Less than a month earlier, 2nd District Officer John Gilhooly and 3rd District Officer Frank Rappaport were killed at 58th and Calumet. The gunman Spurgeon Winter, a Panther member, was killed. A second gunman, also a BP, was wounded.
ReplyDeleteGilhooly and his partner, Michael Brady, were investigating a theft of a gun from an off-duty CC sheriff when they were ambushed from an abandoned apartment building. Gilhooly died when eh arrived at Billings Hospital. I think four other officers were wounded.
At the time, 2 and 3 were on the same zone. Rappaport responded to the 10-1 and was shot on King dr. when he found Winters under a porch. Officers Robert Tracey and Phillip Preost shot Winters.
A memorial Mass for the two slain officers was held on 13 NOV, to mark the 40th anniversary of their deaths. May they rest in peace.
"leftisthebest"