Conspiracy Nation -- Vol. 2 Num. 91

("Quid coniuratio est?")


[CN -- The following does not necessarily reflect the views of Conspiracy Nation. It merely reports what was said elsewhere.]

SHERMAN SKOLNICK INTERVIEW -- THE JOLIET CONNECTION

Sherman Skolnick was interviewed on Radio Free America (Shortwave, 5.065 MHz, mon-fri, 9 pm cst) on October 20, 1994. Mr. Skolnick is a veteran investigative reporter from Chicago and founder of the "Citizens' Committee to Clean Up the Courts" in that city. Following is my transcription of that interview. Host/Interviewer is Tom Valentine.

+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +

[...continued...]

TOM VALENTINE:
O.K. That sounds a lot like that BCCI fire that we talked about once before.

SHERMAN SKOLNICK:
Yes, that's right. That's about the size of it.

Now as to what was involved here: very substantial citizens from areas south of Chicago contacted the topmost officials of the DEA, the Drug Enforcement Administration, and complained about the strange goings-on past Moose Island. And what they got... And they complained to Anton R. Valukis himself! And what they got in return, instead of any remedy, were serious threats of bodily harm against themselves and their family. These are not dopers or ex-convicts that were complaining, these were fine, upstanding citizens. And they got no remedy. In fact they got threats.

Now we have been, ourselves, investigating the situation for four years. And when we became aware that the Treasury [Department] unit, who were bitter and disgruntled at being, uh, attempts to stop them...

VALENTINE
Yeah, that's called the "stand down". They're told that they have to stand down.
SKOLNICK
Well, their way of "standing down" was to deliver a truckload of their original documents, in their own handwriting, to [an] independent investigating group. We made a summary of those records, and, as I said, we confronted the head of the "task force".

By the way, the head of the "task force" that we confronted on March... On October 6, '94, previously was a White House aide in the Bush administration and a close crony of George Herbert Walker Bush.

Law enforcement people, and others, that are aware of what's involved here, believe that Bush himself is involved. As to who we directly know is involved, it's the former Governor here, Jim Thompson (he was the Governor of Illinois for 14 years), two of his cronies who were the chief federal prosecutors -- Dan K. Webb, from '81 to '85; and from '86 to '90 was Anton R. Valukis. Also, Fred Foreman(sp?), who was the chief federal prosecutor in this district, covered it up. And, as I said, at the meeting October 6th was the secretary to the current chief federal prosecutor, who is Jim Burns(sp?). I mean, we met in this office in the federal building here, and as I said -- after 35 minutes, the chief of the "task force", Mark Prosperi, got up [and] told me he's not interested. I summarized all that I've just summarized for your listeners. I offered witnesses and documentation. He said he's not interested, and in so many words, went out the door telling me I should mind my own business! Well I head up, for more than 30 years, a public interest citizens group. And we have exposed a great deal of corruption -- not from a political standpoint; that is, not to favor one political party over the other, but in the public interest. And we do it on our cable show, and we've done it on your show in the past, as you know, Tom.

VALENTINE
That's right.
SKOLNICK
I should have felt insulted on behalf of the public, that he felt that it was not our business to be stickin', to be goin' into this stuff! This is, this dope traffic that I'm describing -- with "China White" coming in, south of Chicago -- is, for all we know, a bigger operation than what was coming in to the Mena, Arkansas airport. And now, the Wall Street Journal (as I mentioned) belatedly calls it "The Mena Cover-up". (That was October 18th, the big story in the Wall Street Journal.)

I challenge the DEA, or the ATF (that supposedly investigated the burning down of the building), or the U.S. attorney, or the Justice Department, to finally, once and for all, do something.

VALENTINE
All right. My guest is Sherman Skolnick. If you'd like to call in, if you'd like to chime in with something, 1-800-878-8255. We will take your call. You can talk to Sherman.

I'm Tom Valentine. This is Radio Free America.

[...commercial break...]

All right, we are back live on Radio Free America. We're chatting with Sherman Skolnick. He's uncovered an investigation, a long-term investigation, that's been going on up in [the] Chicago area, near Joliet.

And as you've been hearing, we've got John in Syracuse, New York. You're on with Sherman. Come ahead, John.

JOHN
Yes, hi. I used to be stationed, Tom (I never told you this; I've told you some of the places) -- but I used to be stationed in Glenview, Illinois.
VALENTINE
O.K. At the naval air station there. Yeah.
JOHN
...naval air station, which has recently been shut down. It's been sold back to the city of Glenview. Everything's been moved out of that area, and all the airplanes have been transferred out to the east coast. Just as I was retiring, I had moved some of the airplanes out of that area.

But I had a question for your guest that, on all of the stuff that's gone on in this investigation, how has it been that these agencies aren't talking to each other in this investigation?

SKOLNICK
I can give a simplistic answer. Because of the Whitewater affair, there is a horrendous fight between the Treasury and the Justice Department. The Treasury [Department] wants to come out with investigative records showing that the Clinton White House is highly corrupt, going back to the time that Clinton was Governor and covered up the Mena, Arkansas thing. The Justice Department, under Janet Reno, wants to continue the cover-up because of the complications of the strange death of Vincent Foster.
VALENTINE
Now this is the, this is the Treasury Department bureaucrats. Not necessarily Lloyd Bentsen [Secretary of the Treasury].
SKOLNICK
Right.

Bentsen himself was involved in the CIA and the S&L scandal, according to Pete Brewton's book, The Mafia, the CIA, and George Bush.

VALENTINE
Yes.
SKOLNICK
So we've got a Secretary of the Treasury that's far less than an angel. I've never accused him of being honest, let's put it that way.

But the point here is that the Treasury [Department], at least the unit -- tried. And they've gone to substantial risk, to allow their office to be cleaned out; put onto a truck all their notebooks and performance files and delivered into the hands of private citizens that are making this public. I mean...

VALENTINE
This has happened, this has happened to you before, Sherman. Uh, go ahead, John. Is there something else you want to get in on?
JOHN
Well, yeah. There was one more thing.

Sarah McLendon(sp?) the other day, Tom, in a news conference, asked Bill Clinton when Mena, Arkansas went down and there was drugs bein' smuggled in there, why didn't the state of Arkansas, when he was a Governor, hold an investigation of what was goin' on there. He blew it off, he blew off the question, and said to her, back to her, "Oh, the federal boys were in here doin' all this. And I didn't get involved. All I did was some background checks." And he left it at that. But he said that he knew that there was something going on at the Mena airport. You know, Mr. Skolnick, some of this ties together. And I think some of this stuff has to be tied in, before we can ever press forward on it.

SKOLNICK
Sarah McLendon's question to Clinton was not picked up by any of the major press that was at the press conference. The first mention of it was, just briefly, in this story "Mena Cover-up" in the Wall Street Journal, October 18th. But the Washington Post, the New York Times, and all the major papers, pretended that there was no such question put to Clinton -- which was very revealing. Some people feel that Clinton, as Governor, ordered the State Police to look the other way, regarding the dope coming in there.

Now the question is, is it the Clinton White House and the Clinton Justice Department ordering various people to look the other way now that the dope transit point has been switched from the Mena, Arkansas area and is just south of Chicago, in Joliet? I mean, there's a vast cover-up in the works! And as I said, very substantial citizens have complained to the DEA and the Justice Department. And instead of any remedy, they got threats of death and so on!

So there's a vast cover-up in the works. And one of those that was involved in the overall thing was this John E. Gearham.

[...to be continued...]


I encourage distribution of "Conspiracy Nation."


If you would like "Conspiracy Nation" sent to your e-mail address, send a message in the form "subscribe conspire My Name" to listproc@prairienet.org -- To cancel, send a message in the form "unsubscribe conspire" to listproc@prairienet.org
Aperi os tuum muto, et causis omnium filiorum qui pertranseunt. Aperi os tuum, decerne quod justum est, et judica inopem et pauperem. -- Liber Proverbiorum XXXI: 8-9

Brian Francis Redman bigxc@prairienet.org "The Big C"

"Justice" = "Just us" = "History is written by the assassins."