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As protests continue across the country over the police killing of Michael Brown, new questions are being raised about the grand jury that failed to indict Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson for shooting Brown. Many questions center on a woman identified in the grand jury documents simply as "Witness 40." She told the grand jury that Brown charged at Wilson "like a football player." Earlier this week, the website TheSmokingGun.com identified Witness 40 as Sandra McElroy. The website described her as a "bipolar Missouri woman with a criminal past who has a history of making racist remarks and once insinuated herself into another high-profile St. Louis criminal case with claims that police eventually dismissed as a 'complete fabrication.'" It now appears McElroy may have lied about witnessing the shooting, which occurred 30 miles from her home. On Tuesday, Rev. Al Sharpton said the report about Witness 40 gave new hope to the Brown family. He told the New York Daily News it shows the grand jury was "not a fair process." We speak about the case with TheSmokingGun.com editor William Bastone. He is the lead author of the article exposing the identity of Witness 40.
TRANSCRIPT
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: As protests continue across the country over the police killing of Michael Brown, new questions are being raised about the grand jury that failed to indict Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson for shooting Brown. Many questions center on a woman identified in the grand jury documents simply as "Witness 40." She told the grand jury that Brown charged at Wilson, quote, "like a football player." Her testimony largely supported Wilson’s versions of events and has been cited repeatedly on Fox News.
SEAN HANNITY: And then, quote, "He looked like a football player with his head down charging at Officer Wilson," charged at him, quote—and I’m reading—"like a football player with his head down charging." ... That Michael Brown, you know, was charging like a football player, full force, on Officer Wilson. ... One witness described it as charging at Officer Wilson like a football player with his head down. ... Don’t charge him, to quote one of the eyewitnesses, like a football player with your head down.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Earlier this week, "The Smoking Gun" website identified Witness 40 as Sandra McElroy. The website described her as a, quote, "bipolar Missouri woman with a criminal past who has a history of making racist remarks and once insinuated herself into another high-profile St. Louis criminal case with claims that police eventually dismissed as a 'complete fabrication.'"
AMY GOODMAN: It now appears that Sandra McElroy may have lied about witnessing the shooting, which occurred 30 miles from her home. She gave conflicting accounts to prosecutors about why she was near the Canfield Green Apartments in Ferguson at the shooting. She first said she wanted to "pop in" on a friend she hadn’t seen in 26 years. Later she read from a notebook in which she claimed to have been visiting the neighborhood to conduct personal research to help her understand black people.
It has also come to light that she had a history of posting racist comments online and helped raise money for Wilson and other Ferguson police officers. On Tuesday, the Reverend Al Sharpton said the report about Witness 40 gave new hope to the Brown family. He told the New York Daily News it shows the grand jury was, quote, "not a fair process."
Joining us now is William Bastone, editor of "The Smoking Gun." He co-authored the piece exposing the identity of Witness 40.
Tell us more about her. And how did you find out who she was?
WILLIAM BASTONE: Well, what we did is we looked at two volumes of her grand jury testimony, which is heavily redacted, but we zeroed in on the portions that gave a little bit of biographical detail about her—excuse me. And we used that information—you know, everything from the fact that she was adopted, divorced, had a couple of felony convictions and some other stuff—and then we basically went online and looked at some—a Facebook page that we believed she was associated with. And I’ll spare you all the details, but by a process of elimination, we zeroed in on her, figured out—got her name, and then we went and checked on Sandra McElroy’s background, and it basically dovetailed exactly with Witness 40—everything.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Now, in her testimony, she had admitted that she had been convicted of—
WILLIAM BASTONE: Check fraud.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: —check fraud, right?
WILLIAM BASTONE: Two felony counts of check fraud in 2007, had received three years of probation, a suspended sentence. And so, you know, then we reached out to a couple other people who had had interactions with her, and it made us convinced it was the same woman.
AMY GOODMAN: So, how was she presented to the grand jury? What did the police know? What did the district attorney know? And explain exactly what she said.
WILLIAM BASTONE: Well, she initially—she was not found by law enforcement. She approached law enforcement more than a month after the incident. She approached the St. Louis County police, gave an account of what occurred. Five weeks later, she met with the FBI and two Justice Department prosecutors, and then a day after that, they put her in the grand jury for the first time. So, she comes up with this story, that she sat on for a month, and tells the cops this story, and then five weeks pass before she basically goes into the grand jury.
And the thing that is incredibly puzzling is that I don’t think that anyone attempted to determine whether what she told them was true or not, because as we point out—I don’t know if we point out in the story, but our interest in investigating her began and our—found out who she was and everything about her, it took us two days to do that. We don’t have subpoena power. We can’t get her phone records. It took us, two reporters, three days to find her. And the cops had five weeks to find out. First, the story, on its face, was wholly unbelievable. And there were just simple investigative tasks that the cops could have done that could have disproven her. So, what they did, who knows what they did? But what the effect is, is, as I think we point out in our story, is that they basically allowed her story now to get baked into the narrative of the grand jury.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Well, interestingly, her claim—her initial claim, because she changed the story, right? Her initial claim was, because she was a white woman in a largely black neighborhood, that when she was asked why she was there, was that she was trying to find a former high school friend that she hadn’t seen in over 20 years, and got lost, couldn’t find the address and got out of her car to ask for instructions. So—
WILLIAM BASTONE: And then, amazingly, this cataclysmic event happens right in front of her. What luck!
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: So, you would think the police would at least say, "Well, let’s see in the surveillance footage if—or the video footage, if her car is anywhere in the vicinity."
WILLIAM BASTONE: Right. Well, they actually eventually did that. When she was—when she was questioned by the FBI and the two Justice Department prosecutors, they basically said to her, "You know that there are surveillance cameras in the area, and no one picked your car up. How could that be?" And she had no explanation. And they asked her, "Well, how did you get there?" And she described her path of getting there. And then they said, "Well, after it occurred, how did you leave?" And she gave an explanation that was impossible based on the way the roads were. There was—it was very clear that she looked at a map of the area, and she—looking at a map, or if you go online, MapQuest or Google Maps, it appears as if there is a pathway out of the area, and that’s the way she took. But that thing has been closed for like two or three years, and if you had physically been there, you would have known there was only one way out.
So, the story fell apart. And they kind of picked the story apart. But, you know, what you don’t really know is there are 12 grand jurors in there, and you don’t really know if anyone bought part of her story or that figured into their final decision, which is really kind of the scary part of it. It’s like—it’s like a person comes up with an insane story, approaches the cops with it, and usually the way it works is, like, "OK, thank you for coming in. We’ll be in contact with you," and then they’re never heard from again.
AMY GOODMAN: So, your article notes that Sandra McElroy appeared at the Ferguson grand jury November 3rd with a spiral notebook purportedly containing her handwritten journal entries from August. The opening entry in her journal on the day Brown died declared, quote, "Well Im gonna take my random drive to Florisant. Need to understand the Black race better so I stop calling Blacks Niggers and Start calling them People." That was her quote. I never use that word, except this is so significant right now because she used that word. What did Bob McCulloch understand about who she was?
WILLIAM BASTONE: Well, yes, it was at the end—it was in the waning moments of her first appearance in the grand jury, on October 23rd. I mean, she was virtually out the door, when she says, as a matter of fact, "Oh, you know, I wrote all this stuff down in my journal after it happened." And they were—"Would you like to see it?" And they were like, "Sure," you know, and that meant she was coming back.
So, 10 days passes, and she appears with this one volume that is her—it’s a notebook, her August notebook, and everything that precedes August 9th are like one-line entries. You know, I wrote in the piece, you know, they probably should have checked to see if the ink was wet on the notebook, because there’s no doubt what she did is—it was created after the fact to buttress this harebrained story that she told.
And, you know, it just seems like if—you know, we point out in the story, like, we went back and looked—you know, we knew what her Facebook handles were, and we knew what her YouTube account was and her Twitter account was. And she—you know, after the shooting, even after her grand jury testimony, she was saying these incendiary things online. And it just—
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Well, that’s the other—could you talk about that, what you found out from her social media accounts in terms of her biases and also her support of Darren Wilson and police officers, in general?
AMY GOODMAN: And if you talked to her?
WILLIAM BASTONE: Yeah, I’ll tell—yeah, I’ll explain that, as well. Yeah, we looked. You know, she is a very active commenter on Mike Brown. And she has a couple of Facebook accounts that we’ve linked to her, and she’s acknowledged after the fact they’re hers. And she was constantly commenting about the case, supportive of Officer Wilson. And she would do things like she would—most of what she would do is she would be in the comment sections on television stations or print publications. You know, there’s a story, and then there’s the comments underneath, and she’d hop in there. And she’d do things like, one afternoon, commenting on some news story about Ferguson, she just posts a graphic, that floats around in these kind of right-wing circles, and it’s a photograph of Michael Brown lying dead in the street, and it’s captioned something along the lines of "Stop asking for justice for Michael Brown. He got his justice," you know, and it’s a photo of him dead in the street. And she constantly was doing stuff like that, and "Pray for Officer Wilson."
And, you know, when she was in the grand jury, she basically denied that she was like a stooge for Officer Wilson—she was just there to tell the truth. You know, and she was involved in a Facebook page that she started 10 days after the shooting that purportedly was there to support law enforcement officers and first responders in Ferguson, and had nothing to do with Officer Wilson. They were raising money in a kind of a crowd-sourced fashion. And in the end, they donated all the money to the Officer Wilson trust fund. So, you know, I mean, this was all easily obtainable.
AMY GOODMAN: Could she be charged with perjury?
WILLIAM BASTONE: Well, she should be charged with perjury. She lied to the cops. That’s making false statements. The first time, September 11th, when they—when she sat down and she spoke with the FBI and the Department of Justice, she lied to them. The first time they put her in the state grand jury, she lied. The second time, she admitted she lied the first time and then lied again. So, she’s got—yeah, she should.
You know, and it’s one of these things where, yes, she has said that she suffers—she’s been diagnosed as being bipolar and that she has bouts of mania. But, you know, you—she insinuated herself into a case of national importance and spun out a story that was totally untrue. And do you walk away from that without some sort of—you know, the government just saying, "Oh, that’s fine. Next time something like this happens, if you’re a lunatic and you want to come forward and create a story that’s going to back up the cops, come on in. We’re happy to have you"?
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: But the bigger—that’s the bigger question, in my mind. It’s not what she did, but what prosecutors did, because either—
WILLIAM BASTONE: It’s mystifying.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: —they were totally inept in one of—as you say, one of the biggest cases in recent times, of national attention, or they knew or suspected that she was lying and didn’t care, which was even worse.
WILLIAM BASTONE: Well, you know what? If you’re a prosecutor and you know that someone’s going to come in into a grand jury and lie, you can’t really allow them to do that. That’s called creating a perjury trap.
AMY GOODMAN: Can a new grand jury be convened, based on this?
WILLIAM BASTONE: I don’t know. I mean, I think that’s probably a fairly tough thing to do.
AMY GOODMAN: And you spoke to her?
WILLIAM BASTONE: Yes. I mean, she would not talk to us before the story came out. We published the story on Monday morning. Yesterday, I corresponded with her, in which she admitted that, yes, in fact, she was Witness 40, and she expressed concerns for the safety of her three minor children, and she’s trying to erase her social media presence. And then I had a—she wanted to have a conversation off the record, which we had a lengthy conversation off the record. And hopefully we’ll maybe try to see if she’ll want to move some of that on the record.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Well, and, of course, Witness 40 was—the importance of her testimony was that she, and there’s at least another witness, as I recall, Witness 10, who were the ones who said that Brown charged at police officer Wilson. And so, obviously, if her testimony is impugned, then the issue becomes: What about this other witness? And I want to turn to MSNBC’s Lawrence O’Donnell. Late last month, he dissected the credibility of that other witness, Witness 10.
LAWRENCE O’DONNELL: Witness number 10 was working in the neighborhood, and he begins his story to the police with: "I seen the two young guys walkin’ down the street on the same sidewalk that I was on." Six weeks later, witness number 10 testified to the grand jury and changed his story about where Michael Brown was walking. He said under oath to the grand jury, "I seen Mike Brown and his friend walking down the street closer to the curb, not on the sidewalk." That is the kind of thing the district attorney was complaining about last night—witnesses changing their stories to fit the publicly known facts.
Here is why witness number 10 was the most important witness to appear in Darren Wilson’s defense. This is what he described Michael Brown doing when Officer Wilson got out of the car and chased him: "[Michael Brown] stopped. He did turn. He did some sort of body gesture. I’m not sure what it was, but I know it was a body gesture. And I could say for sure he never put his hands up after he did his body gesture. He ran towards the officer full charge." So there’s witness number 10 saying the magic words: He never put his hands up, and he ran towards the officer full charge.
In the grand jury, when the prosecutor asked witness number 10 to describe what he called a "body gesture," he said, "I can’t say for sure what sort of body gesture. I cannot fully recall. All I know is it was not in a surrendering motion of I’m surrendering, putting my hands up or anything. I’m not sure if it was like a shoulder shrug or him pulling his pants up. I’m not sure." So, there’s the district attorney’s favorite witness, the only one he quoted last night, saying, "I cannot fully recall. ... I’m not sure. ... I’m not sure," within the body of an answer in which the only thing he’s absolutely sure of is that Michael Brown did not do a surrendering motion. In a real courtroom, when a witness begins his answer with "I can’t say for sure," and then in the body of his answer he says, "I cannot recall fully," and then says, "I am not sure," twice within that same answer, that witness observation does not survive cross-examination. But there was no cross-examination in the grand jury room.
AMY GOODMAN: That was Lawrence O’Donnell on his show on MSNBC, Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell. And he went on from there. His final point about [witness] number 10 is that when he was asked by the police how far away he was, he said about a hundred yards—a football field away. When he goes into the grand jury, he says something like 50 yards—he cuts it in half—or 50 to 75 yards. Can he see? Does he wear glasses? None of those questions, because this isn’t a trial. This is a grand jury. Juan?
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Yeah, well, in light of this, Bill, your sense of—because obviously there’s still a federal investigation going on, and this kind of a dissecting of these witnesses and the testimony, that led the grand jury to decide there was no reason to indict, will certainly catch the attention, hopefully, of the federal investigators.
WILLIAM BASTONE: Yeah, I would think that—I have hopes that the investigation that they would do would be a lot more thorough than the local law enforcement agencies have proven to be capable of undertaking. I would assume that there—if someone says they were there, there’s going to be a good attempt of trying to figure out, in fact, whether they were there. Did they have their cellphone? Did it ping off of a cellphone tower? You know, anything. Is their car on any of the surveillance video outside some of these buildings? I mean, the Witness 40, McElroy, you know, conveniently, when she took this 30-mile drive up there, she left her cellphone at home. You know, I mean, there’s so simple ways to just go get her—go get her cellphone bills. You know, there’s like a six- or seven-hour time. If she placed one—she doesn’t have a landline. If she placed one phone call off of her cellphone, you’d pick it up off of—it’d ping off of a tower, and you’ll know she was nowhere near Ferguson at the time. You know, and the other thing is that when she testified the first time in the grand jury, it was one day after the St. Louis Post-Dispatch published a lengthy story that detailed exactly what Darren Wilson told police about his version of events. And if you look at that story and you look at her testimony, you wouldn’t be able to tell the two apart. So you get a good idea where she came up with all the facts.
AMY GOODMAN: Well, William Bastone, we thank you so much for your reporting. Of course, we’ll continue to follow this. And what does this mean for a grand jury? Could there be another grand jury? What does this mean for the prosecutor, for Bob McCulloch? William Bastone is editor of "The Smoking Gun" and lead author of the new article, "'Witness 40': Exposing a Fraud in Ferguson." We’ll link to it at democracynow.org.
When we come back, what’s happened to James Risen, the Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist for The New York Times? What is the Justice Department now offering him? Does he still face years in prison for refusing to reveal a source? Stay with us.
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We begin today’s show in Pakistan, where people in the northwestern city of Peshawar are burying their dead after a Taliban attack at a school killed at least 145 people — including 132 children — in the Taliban’s deadliest attack to date. According to the Pakistani army, Tuesday’s attack was carried out by seven Taliban attackers against the Army Public School, which both military and civilian girls and boys attend. Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has declared three days of mourning and convened a meeting of all parliamentary parties in Peshawar to discuss the response to the attack. The army has reportedly launched attacks at militants in the region. The Taliban said they targeted the children of military families in retaliation for Pakistan’s anti-Taliban campaign in North Waziristan. We speak to British-Pakistani political commentator Tariq Ali and Asad Hashim, Al Jazeera English web correspondent in Pakistan.
TRANSCRIPT
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: We begin today’s show in Pakistan, where people in the northwestern city of Peshawar are burying their dead after a Taliban attack at a school killed at least 145 people, including 132 children, in the Taliban’s deadliest attack to date. According to the Pakistani army, Tuesday’s attack was carried out by seven Taliban attackers against the Army Public School, which both military and civilian girls and boys attend. One of the surviving students described the scene of the attack .
SURVIVING STUDENT: [translated] As soon as the firing started, our teacher made us sit in a corner and told us to lower our heads. After around an hour, when the firing subsided a little, Army personnel came and rescued us. When we came out, we saw in the corridors our friends who had been shot three or four times, some dead and some injured. Their blood had spilled all over the place.
AMY GOODMAN: Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has declared three days of mourning and convened a meeting of all parliamentary parties in Peshawar to discuss the response to the attack. The army has reportedly launched attacks at militants in the region. The Taliban said they targeted the children of military families in retaliation for Pakistan’s anti-Taliban campaign in North Waziristan. Since June, at the urging of the United States, Pakistan has waged a massive offensive in the region, which coincided with the resumption of U.S. drone strikes.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Pakistani Taliban spokesman Mohammad Khurasani said the militants had been forced to launch the attack in response to army attacks. In a statement, Khurasani said, quote, "We targeted the school because the army targets our families. We want them to feel our pain." Pakistani education activist and Nobel Peace Prize activist Malala Yousafzai said she was heartbroken by the attack.
MALALA YOUSAFZAI: My family and I are heartbroken after hearing the news that more than a hundred innocent children and teachers have lost their lives in this recent attack on a school in Peshawar. And we stand with all those families and all those children who are injured right now and who are suffering through this big trauma. And now it is time that we unite. And I call upon the international community, leaders in Pakistan, all political parties and everyone, that we should stand up together and fight against terrorism, and we should make sure that every child gets safe and quality education.
AMY GOODMAN: That’s Malala Yousafzai speaking in Birmingham Tuesday. Earlier this month, she was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, the youngest ever. In 2012, she was shot in the head by a Taliban gunman who boarded her school bus. She survived and continues to campaign for the right of girls to go to school.
For more on the attacks, we’re joined by Tariq Ali, a British-Pakistani political commentator, historian, activist, filmmaker. He is the editor of the New Left Review.
Tariq, welcome to Democracy Now! Can you just respond to this horrific attack with 132 schoolchildren dead, 145 altogether including teachers?
TARIQ ALI: Amy, two things need to be said about this straightaway. This has very little to do with religion. What we are witnessing in Pakistan now is a form of a power struggle going on between militants aligned with the umbrella of pro-Taliban groups known as the Pakistani Taliban Movement, which isn’t a single movement, a struggle between them and the Pakistani—or segments of the Pakistani state to determine who controls the country. And the fact that over the last decade or so the authorities of the state—the military and the political parties, especially those parties sympathetic to the Taliban—have been incapable of or have refused to do anything about it, we now see the results and the impact of that. And that’s the first point.
The second is that we shouldn’t forget for a moment that one reason these Taliban groups have not been dealt with is because sections of the state still feel—even after this atrocity, by the way—that they can’t completely get rid of them because they are linked to the fight in Afghanistan, and the notion of the Pakistani military high commanders being that we need Afghanistan to give ourselves strategic depth—always a nonsensical notion, but it’s now exacting a very heavy price in Pakistan itself. And at the time when the United States went into Afghanistan, I remember writing in The Guardian that one consequence of this massive presence of Western military troops is going to be the destabilization and the advancement of terror inside Pakistan itself.
So, it’s a horrific attack. It can’t be justified. What the Taliban are saying is, of course, true, that they are bombed, that their kids die, and no one says a word. That’s absolutely true. But you cannot justify one crime by committing another.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And, Tariq, what about this continuing assault on North Waziristan by the Pakistani government, especially as the foreign troops, U.S. troops, in Afghanistan wind down and leave the country?
TARIQ ALI: Well, I think that this is the million-dollar question. Are they going to leave the country? Are they going to take their military bases with them? The latest from there, Juan, is that their military bases are going to stay with a very limited number of troops. But the Afghan Taliban has emerged as the winner in this conflict, and there’s absolutely no doubt in my mind that they are in touch with elements of the Pakistani military apparatus to discuss what to do now. I mean, they’ve been close for a long, long time, and so they will be discussing that, which is why the thing becomes much more complex, because I don’t think the Pakistani military has given up ever on the notion of taking Afghanistan back once the West leaves. And the fact that the Taliban in Afghanistan, with new supporters, has managed to hold the West at bay and defeated them, effectively, politically, if not militarily, is a sign that the Pakistani military has not given up.
AMY GOODMAN: We are also joined, in addition to Tariq Ali, by Asad Hashim, Al Jazeera English correspondent in Islamabad, in Pakistan. Welcome to Democracy Now!, Asad. Talk about the latest there and the response within Pakistan. Asad, can you hear us?
ASAD HASHIM: Yes, I can hear you now. Sorry, you just disappeared for a moment.
AMY GOODMAN: Ah, OK.
ASAD HASHIM: Sorry, I missed your question.
AMY GOODMAN: If you can talk about the latest in Pakistan right now and the response to this horrific massacre?
ASAD HASHIM: Well, the public response has been, as you can imagine, one of shock and outrage and horror. As Mr. Ali said, I mean, this was just something that was completely unprecedented, in a way. I mean, the Taliban has been, and their allies have been, carrying out attacks against civilian targets in Pakistan for many years now, but we’ve very rarely seen something on this scale. And it’s not just about the scale, I think; it’s also about the fact that it was children who were killed in execution-style killings, really, at the school. They lined them up in the auditorium in rows and face down, and then were shooting them in the head. And that really has brought about a visceral response from Pakistanis. So, today, really, the day was spent in sort of like numb horror, I think. Even now, most people who are in offices or in shops—a lot of shops were closed today, even though there was not necessarily a strike called of any kind and this wasn’t being enforced. People literally just did not want to work.
On the political front, there was the multi-party conference, the all-party conference, which you spoke about earlier and alluded to. That ended a little while ago, but it not really ended up with anything concrete. I mean, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, really, held a press conference with all of the leaders beside him, which was a show of unity, but they didn’t say anything concrete. They essentially just said, "We will come up with a plan in the next week that will be a united plan to resolve the issue of extremism," which is a really nothing statement, to be honest.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Asad, I wanted to ask you, the—could you talk a little bit more about the [TTP], the group that’s claimed responsibility for the attack, and its relationship to other insurgent groups? Because there are reports that the Taliban in Afghanistan have condemned this attack.
ASAD HASHIM: Yes, yes. So, the Taliban in Afghanistan do appear to have condemned the attack, and that’s interesting in and of itself, because the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan owes its allegiance to the Afghan Taliban and to Mullah Omar and, through them, to al-Qaeda. And this is very interesting because the TTP has actually suffered in recent months from a number of divisions and factions that have formed within it due to internal leadership issues, but also due to the issue of certain commanders pledging allegiance to the Islamic State, which obviously is a competitor in the global terrorism game, I suppose, to al-Qaeda. And so, you had the TTP actually suffering for its allegiance to the Afghan Taliban, and to have the Afghan Taliban now condemn this attack is very significant for them.
The TTP itself is a group that was formed—it’s an umbrella organization of terrorist groups that were formed in 2007 under Baitullah Mehsud. In the last year or so, we’ve seen it considerably weakened. As I said, there were leadership issues when they elected their new leader, which is Mullah Fazlullah. Now, he’s not from the tribal areas, which is where the group mainly operates and is from and where it draws its strength from. He’s from an area called Swat, where he conducted a very successful campaign against the Pakistani state. And I guess on the back of that, he was given the leadership role. But he’s—in the time that he’s been in office, since November last year, he has seen the TTP really sick several times. He’s had several—he’s had to fire several commanders who were not willing to follow him. So we’ve seen the TTP weaken to a degree.
The other reason why I would say we’ve seen the TTP weaken is because, since Zarb-e-Azb, since the military operation began on June 15th in North Waziristan, which you were referring to earlier, we were already expecting a large number of blowback attacks in urban areas, as we have seen after similar operations in the past. And this time, we really have seen very limited attacks of that kind. There was the attack in the Wagah border post that took place last month where about 60 civilians were killed. That was the first really large-scale attack. And this one is—as I said, it’s unprecedented in its scale—141 people killed, 143 now, I believe, with the death toll rising as people succumb to their injuries. This is the worst terrorist attack in Pakistan’s recent history.
AMY GOODMAN: Tariq Ali, in 2012, one of Pakistan’s leading English daily newspapers revealed a large majority of high-profile terrorism cases has resulted in acquittals in the country’s largest province. The piece appeared in The Express Tribune and was headlined "High-profile cases in Punjab: 63% terror suspects acquitted." Could you explain how the Pakistani state, and in particular the judiciary, have dealt with the rising number of militant attacks in the country?
TARIQ ALI: Amy, this is absolutely true, what The Express Tribune reported. And I would add to it that the fact that his own bodyguard killed the late governor of the Punjab, Salmaan Taseer, and were—and the guy is still awaiting punishment, and the fact that many lawyers in the court came to welcome the assassin of the governor is an indication of how deep the rot has gone. Now, a number of senior magistrates and judges in charge of the terrorism courts are basically scared. A, witnesses who come before them are threatened, so they withdraw their testimony. That leaves them with no legal basis on which to punish or sentence the perpetrators, and they have to release them. But I think a very large number of judges in these courts are scared. They’re scared that if they do their duty, they’ll be shot dead. And the inability of the state to protect them is something which a number of people have remarked on.
If I could just add one thing to what your man in Islamabad was saying, that it’s not the first time that the Afghan Taliban have attacked their Pakistani so-called supporters. They did so some years ago when there were other atrocities carried out. And the basic difference between the two groups is that the Afghan Taliban feel that the main target should be NATO and the West, and not the Pakistani state, on which, after all, they have relied for a long time.
AMY GOODMAN: Well, we’re going to leave it there. I want to thank you both for being with us. Of course, we’ll continue to cover this horrific story, this massacre that has taken place in Peshawar, 132 schoolchildren killed. Tariq Ali is a British-Pakistani political commentator, historian, filmmaker, novelist, editor of the New Left Review. And thanks so much to Asad Hashim, Al Jazeera English web correspondent in Pakistan, based in the capital, Islamabad. He recently co-authored two pieces for Al Jazeera, one headlined "Breaking Down the Tehreek-e-Taliban [Pakistan]" and the other titled "Children massacred in Pakistan school attack."
This is Democracy Now! When we come back, we go to Missouri to witness number 40. Who was she? Stay with us.
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In one of the most significant press freedom cases in decades, the United States government has confirmed that it will seek limited testimony from New York Times reporter James Risen. On Tuesday, Risen was ordered to participate in a hearing early next month in advance of the trial of a former CIA officer who is charged with revealing classified information. However, Risen has vowed not to testify at the trial of Jeffrey Sterling, who is accused of giving him classified information that revealed a botched CIA plot to disrupt Iran’s nuclear program. If he refuses, Risen could face jail time. Prosecutors say they will not ask Risen if Sterling was his source, but it is unclear what else he will be asked. We speak to Marcy Wheeler, investigative blogger who runs EmptyWheel.net and writes for ExposeFacts.org.
TRANSCRIPT
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: In one of the most significant press freedom cases in decades, the United States government has confirmed that it will seek limited testimony from New York Times reporter James Risen. On Tuesday, Risen was ordered to participate in a hearing early next month in advance of the trial of a former CIA officer who is charged with revealing classified information. However, Risen has vowed not to testify at the trial of Jeffrey Sterling, who is accused of giving him classified information that revealed a botched CIA plot to disrupt Iran’s nuclear program. If he refuses, Risen could face jail time. Speaking on Democracy Now! earlier this year, Risen emphasized the importance of a free and unhindered press.
JAMES RISEN: Without aggressive investigative reporting, we can’t really have a democracy, because the only real oversight for the government is an independent and aggressive press. And I think that’s what the government really fears more than anything else, is an aggressive investigative reporting in which we shine a light on what’s going on inside the government. And we can’t do that without maintaining the confidentiality of sources.
AMY GOODMAN: For more, we go to Grand Rapids, Michigan, where we’re joined by Marcy Wheeler, investigative blogger who runs EmptyWheel.net, writes for ExposeFacts.org.
Marcy, welcome back to Democracy Now! Talk about the significance of what the Justice Department put forward to James Risen yesterday.
MARCY WHEELER: Well, they claim it was a limited request for testimony. They’re asking him to confirm that he wrote the chapter of the book in question, as well as two earlier articles, one which they claim and one in which he explicitly refers to Jeffrey Sterling as a source. So, they’re going to ask to lay out that he did write these articles. They’re going to ask him to say that his source or sources for the chapter in question, he has a confidentiality agreement with. And then they’re also going to—I mean, they’re basically not going to ask him who his sources are, but they are going to get him on the stand. And my—I think what that then does is give the defense the opportunity to be the bad guys, because they have every incentive to try and demonstrate that Risen has more than one source for this story.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: So, your sense is that they would then hope that the defense would then begin to question Risen and put him on the spot?
MARCY WHEELER: Right. I mean, the last line of the filing they submitted yesterday basically said, "Well, this is what we’re going to do, but we can’t control what the defense does, and they have a Sixth Amendment right to actually, you know, confront their accusers." And Jeffrey Sterling’s lawyers have already started saying, "Look, you know, we have all of these documents from Risen from this period, which aren’t even necessarily related to this story, but things like FedEx receipts, and we might want to ask him about that."
And one of the—I mean, one of the underlying things that has developed in this case recently is that we now know that four of the other people who were cleared into this compartment for the Merlin story, for the botched nuclear weapons story, they have, according to the CIA, mishandled classified information in the past. And one of those people is the guy who was Sterling’s supervisor at the time, who would be one of the key witnesses against Sterling. And so, I can certainly understand—he’s facing prison time himself—why he would want to at least raise some doubts or raise some questions about how many sources Risen has.
And frankly, I mean, a reporter of James Risen’s caliber doesn’t rely on a single source for a story. And that would then still put Risen in the position of having to reveal details about his reporting, possibly the number of his sources, or what have you, that would get to the same questions the DOJ was getting to and would have the same effect of putting him at risk for contempt of court.
AMY GOODMAN: So that means he still faces years in prison.
MARCY WHEELER: Yeah, I mean, I think that he still could be jailed, because, frankly, in this case, the judge in the case, Leona Brinkema, was sort of saying, "I think the government needs to decide whether they want to take this or not, if they can’t rely on Risen." She doesn’t have that choice with the defense. I mean, the defense has the right to mount a defense, and the most obvious way for Sterling to do so is to say, "Look, you know, all these other people were cleared into this. They have been confirmed to have brought documents home from work, and therefore there’s no reason why you should assume"—to the jury—"that I am Risen’s only or even his source at all." And that would rely on digging up details about Risen’s reporting. I mean, I don’t know that’s what the defense wants to do, but that just seems like the obvious thing, and the government is very clear that at this point they have a limited request for Risen, but they can’t control what the defense would do.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And the general implications of this, given the fact that you have a person like James Risen, so well known as a major journalist in the country, having to battle this way, for other journalists, who—the impact, the chilling effect that this has on them?
MARCY WHEELER: Well, absolutely. I mean, remember that Risen was—Risen’s sources were being investigated not just for this story during this entire period, but also for the warrantless wiretap story. And there’s at least the appearance that this limited case was DOJ’s effort to go after Risen directly. And one of the details that has come out in this case is, as I said, the amount of documentation about Risen’s reporting that DOJ already has in hand. And, you know, A, it’s chilling, because it makes it very clear things like phone records, FedEx records, travel records, DOJ is getting that, or at least got that in the case of one of the top investigative journalists in the country. And then, moreover, that they would keep going with this—I mean, this story was years—we’re going back to 2000, right? This is an old story. It’s not a risk to national security anymore, yet DOJ persists and persists in pursuing Risen on the stand. And that just seems like a witch hunt.
AMY GOODMAN: And then the Obama administration may try to force another reporter to testify. Preet Bharara has asked Attorney General Eric Holder to approve a subpoena for 60 Minutes producer [Richard] Bonin over his interactions with an al-Qaeda press office during a period of time?
MARCY WHEELER: Right. And again, I mean, Eric Holder would like to appear as if he doesn’t want to rely on journalists as sources, but time and time again, you know, they at least consider it, even while the government—you know, we keep getting more and more evidence about the government leaking their own information, yet journalists keep getting targeted by DOJ.
AMY GOODMAN: Marcy Wheeler, thanks so much for being with us, investigative blogger who runs EmptyWheel.net and writes for ExposeFacts.org, speaking to us from Michigan.
And this breaking news: ABC is reporting American Alan Gross, who’s been held in prison in Cuba for five years, has been freed and is on his way to the U.S.
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Human Rights Group Files Criminal Complaint over Bush Torture Program
A human rights group in Berlin, Germany, has filed a criminal complaint against the architects of the George W. Bush administration’s torture program. The European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights has accused former Bush administration officials, including CIA Director George Tenet and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, of war crimes, and called for an immediate investigation by a German prosecutor. The move follows the release of a Senate report on CIA torture which includes the case of a German citizen, Khalid El-Masri, who was captured by CIA agents in 2004 due to mistaken identity and tortured at a secret prison in Afghanistan. So far no one involved in the CIA torture program has been charged with a crime except the whistleblower John Kiriakou, who exposed it. In a statement today, Wolfgang Kaleck, general secretary of the group which filed the complaint, said, "By investigating members of the Bush administration, Germany can help to ensure that those responsible for abduction, abuse and illegal detention do not go unpunished."
Death Toll from Taliban Attack on Pakistani School Hits 145
The death toll from a Taliban attack on a school in Peshawar, Pakistan, has risen to 145, making it the deadliest single attack in the group’s history. Over an eight-hour period, a group of Taliban gunmen killed 132 schoolchildren, 10 staff and three soldiers. The Taliban has said it carried out the killings in retaliation for Pakistani military attacks on Taliban families in North Waziristan. Secretary of State John Kerry condemned the school massacre.
John Kerry: "The images are absolutely gut-wrenching—young children carried away in ambulances, a teacher burned alive in front of the students, a house of learning turned into a house of unspeakable horror. And Prime Minister (Nawaz) Sharif said, 'These are my children, and it is my loss.' Well, this morning, wherever you live, wherever you are, those are our children, and this is the world’s loss."
We’ll have more on the attack after headlines.
Afghanistan: U.S. Drone Kills 11, Including Taliban
As the school massacre was underway in Pakistan, a U.S. drone strike killed 11 people in eastern Afghanistan. A local official said the dead were militants, including four members of the Pakistani Taliban.
U.S. Orders Reporter James Risen to Testify in Leak Case
The Obama administration has confirmed that it will seek limited testimony from New York Times investigative reporter James Risen in one of the most significant press freedom cases in decades. On Tuesday, Risen was ordered to participate in a hearing early next month in advance of the trial of former CIA officer Jeffrey Sterling. Sterling is accused of giving Risen classified information that revealed a botched CIA plot to disrupt Iran’s nuclear program. If Risen refuses to testify, he could be jailed. We’ll have more on the case later in the broadcast.
Los Angeles: Hundreds of Attorneys Stage Die-in Against Police Impunity
Hundreds of attorneys have joined the nationwide protests over unpunished police killings of African Americans. The attorneys, many of them in business attire, staged a die-in outside a Los Angeles courthouse, lying on the ground in the rain for four-and-a-half minutes — one minute for each hour that Michael Brown’s body lay in the street after he was shot dead. Attorney Carmina Ocampo said lawyers have a particular obligation to speak out about the failure to indict officers who killed Michael Brown and Eric Garner.
Carmina Ocampo: "Lawyers have felt anger and grief about what’s been happening, and as legal actors, we feel particular responsibility to call out and condemn the injustices in the criminal system and the racism. So, as people who are sworn to uphold the law — we study the law, we enforce the law, we take oaths to uphold the law — we want to speak out against these practices in the criminal system that are racist and result in the failure to indict police who kill unarmed people."
In New York City, lawyers plan to stage a die-in at the Brooklyn Criminal Courthouse today, marking five months since the police killing of Garner.
Ohio: Family of John Crawford Sues Wal-Mart, Police over Killing
In Ohio, the family of John Crawford, a 22-year-old African American shot dead by police as he held an unloaded BB gun inside a Wal-Mart, have filed a federal lawsuit against the retailer and the police department. The lawsuit accuses Wal-Mart of negligently leaving the gun unpackaged on a shelf and faults police for shooting Crawford within a second of their initial contact. Surveillance footage shows Crawford was on the phone with the gun swinging loosely toward the ground. But a grand jury found the shooting was justified.
Video: Police Interrogated, Threatened to Jail John Crawford’s Girlfriend After Killing
Video published by The Guardian shows that after the shooting of John Crawford in Ohio, police aggressively questioned Crawford’s girlfriend, who was in the store with him. As Tasha Thomas sobbed, police accused her of lying and threatened to jail her.
Police officer: "I want to be very clear, OK? That man had a weapon at some point, I understand, OK? That man produced that weapon. That man had the weapon when you picked him up. He had it in your car or something. You understand that we’re investigating a serious incident, you lied to me, and you might be on your way to jail."
Police questioned Thomas for more than an hour and a half before telling her that her boyfriend was dead.
Jeb Bush to "Actively Explore" 2016 Presidential Bid
Former Florida Republican Governor Jeb Bush has announced he will "actively explore" a run for president in 2016. Jeb Bush is the brother of former President George W. Bush and the son of former President George H. W. Bush. In 2000, as governor of Florida, his administration wrongfully purged at least 12,000 eligible voters from the rolls. His brother was ultimately declared the winner of the state, and the presidential race, by the U.S. Supreme Court, with a margin of about 500 votes. Jeb Bush has expressed skepticism about human-caused climate change and once said during a failed bid for governor in 1994 that women on welfare "should be able to get their life together and find a husband." In a departure from right-wing Republicans, he has supported comprehensive immigration reform.
Obama Backs New Sanctions on Russia as Ruble Plunges
President Obama has vowed to sign a new round of sanctions against Russia over its role in Ukraine. The move comes as Russia’s currency, the ruble, has plunged. Jason Furman, chair of the White House Council of Economic Advisers, said U.S. sanctions are having an impact.
Jason Furman: "I mean, if I was chairman of President Putin’s Council of Economic Advisers, I would be extremely concerned. They are between a rock and a hard place in economic policy. The combination of our sanctions, the uncertainty they’ve created for themselves with their international actions and the falling price of oil has put their economy on the brink of crisis."
Palestinians Seek U.N. Resolution Against Israeli Occupation; Man Killed in West Bank
Thousands of people gathered in the occupied West Bank for the funeral of a Palestinian man shot dead by Israeli soldiers during a raid on the Qalandiya refugee camp. The Israeli military says the man threw an explosive device, but witnesses told Reuters he was watching from the roof of his home. The shooting comes as Palestinians plan to submit a draft resolution to the U.N. Security Council today calling for Israel to end its 47-year occupation. The United States is expected to veto the measure.
Haiti: Protesters Call for President to Resign over Delayed Elections
In Haiti, mass protests are continuing over delayed local and legislative elections which were due to take place in 2011. The protests forced Haitian Prime Minister Laurent Lamothe to announce his resignation over the weekend. Protesters are now calling for President Michel Martelly to resign, as well.
Top Cuban Musician Tells USAID to "Go to Hell" for Botched Rapper Program
One of the leading musicians in Cuba has told the U.S. Agency for International Development to "go to hell" for ensnaring his son and other hip-hop artists in a botched plot to foment anti-government unrest. Silvio Rodríguez made the comments on his blog following revelations by the Associated Press that USAID tried to recruit Cuban rappers under the guise of civic causes like HIV prevention. As part of the program, USAID hired Creative Associates International, a firm that also played a key role in the "Cuban Twitter" program — a fake social media program launched in another bid to undermine the Cuban government. In the hip-hop case, Creative Associates was directed to recruit young rap artists looking to make "social change." But the program ended up endangering some of the artists, spiking their careers and forcing some, like Rodríguez’s son, to move to Florida.
Vatican Praises U.S. Nuns After Years-Long Investigation
The Vatican has praised the role of nuns in the United States following a controversial years-long probe into their adherence to Catholic doctrine. The report marks a shift in tone from a 2012 Vatican reprimand which resulted in an all-male takeover of the largest group of U.S. nuns. The nuns were accused of promoting "radical feminist" ideas and challenging teachings on homosexuality and the all-male priesthood. At a news conference Tuesday, Sister Sharon Holland, president of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious, praised the latest Vatican findings.
Sister Sharon Holland: "As the report itself acknowledges, the visitation was met by some religious with apprehension and suspicion. The expressed purpose — to look into the quality of life of religious women in the United States — was troubling. Some congregations reported that their elder sisters felt that their whole lives had been judged and found wanting. Despite the apprehension, however, today we are looking at an affirmative and realistic report which we know is based on the study of written responses and on countless hours of attentive listening."
In a statement, the Nun Justice Project called the investigation into Catholic women "both demeaning and a huge waste of time and energy."
Church of England Appoints 1st Woman Bishop
The Vatican report on U.S. nuns came as another denomination, the Church of England, appointed its first-ever woman bishop. Rev. Libby Lane will serve as the bishop of Stockport in northern England.
Brain Injury Program for Soldiers to Treat Pro Football Players
A leading brain injury program designed to treat veterans of war has expanded its mission to include professional football players. The Eisenhower Center in Ann Arbor, Michigan, has announced it will become the primary facility for treating National Football League players who suffer brain injuries. The NFL estimates nearly a third of its players will develop crippling brain conditions, including Alzheimer’s.
41 Arrested in Blockade Against Gas Storage at Seneca Lake in New York
In upstate New York, 41 people have been arrested for blocking the gates of a gas storage facility as part of a campaign against the Texas-based company Crestwood Midstream. The group, We Are Seneca Lake, has seen more than 130 arrests in a series of actions against the company’s plans to expand methane gas storage at a lake which provides drinking water to 100,000 people. Biologist and activist Sandra Steingraber said Tuesday’s action was led by teachers.
Sandra Steingraber: "Today we had 40 people blockading this gate, among them many teachers. We had special education teachers. We had elementary school art teachers. We had my son’s fifth grade science teacher. We had my daughter’s high school English teacher. My husband, the art teacher, was among them. We had professors who teach constitutional law. I’ve never been so proud of educators. This is the kind of education that the whole world needs right now."
Report: 220 Journalists Imprisoned Worldwide
A new report finds the number of imprisoned journalists has increased, with 220 currently held around the world. The Committee to Protect Journalists says the total is the second highest since its tally began in 1990. China and Iran are together holding one-third of all jailed journalists.
Jailed U.S. Journalist Barrett Brown Has Sentencing Postponed
In the United States, the jailed journalist and activist Barrett Brown has had his sentencing postponed until January 22 following a hearing Tuesday. Brown faces up to eight-and-a-half years in prison on charges related to the hacking of the private intelligence firm Stratfor, which exposed how the firm spied on activists on behalf of corporations. Brown originally faced 100 years in prison before pleading guilty to lesser charges.
Chelsea Manning Turns 27, Gets Birthday Message from Edward Snowden
U.S. Army whistleblower Chelsea Manning turns 27 years old in prison today. Manning is serving a 35-year sentence for giving secret documents on the Iraq War and other U.S. policies to WikiLeaks. Among those who have sent her birthday messages is NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden, who wrote, "I thank you now and forever for your extraordinary act of service ... You have inspired an angry public to demand a government that is accountable for its perpetration of torture and other war crimes."
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