("Quid coniuratio est?")
[CN Editor -- I cannot vouch for the accuracy of all of the following. It may or may not be true, I just don't know. However I consider Skolnick to be an honest and careful investigator.]
[The following is a transcript of a recorded phone message put out by a group in Chicago called "Citizens' Committee to Clean Up the Courts [CCCC]." (312) 731-1100 and (312) 731-1505.]
Hi! Sherman Skolnick, Citizens' Committee to Clean Up the Courts, 9800 South Oglesby.
What happens to judges who are independent-minded and defy the establishment? Well sometimes they are simply murdered!
Some examples:
In 1969, James Earl Ray (real name, Ryan) was pressured by his lawyers to plead guilty to killing Dr. Martin Luther King, jr. Ray's lawyers have promised him a lot of things, including large sums of money through the sale of a book. Later, Ray wrote to Memphis judge Preston Battle and requested permission to withdraw his guilty plea and stand trial, which would have opened up the whole conspiracy, including the mystery man, Raoul.
Under Tennessee law, it would have been only Judge Battle, as the sentencing judge, who would grant such a review. As he was considering the case, Judge Battle was found dead, laying over Ray's petition! Supposedly, "heart failure"! (We call that a "CIA heart attack".)
Ray spent years winding around the courts, trying to get a trial! Finally, in 1976, a three-judge federal appeals court panel was hearing the case. During the oral argument, federal appellate judge William E. Miller said he was in favor of forcing state authorities to re-open the Ray case. As he was later working on the decision, Judge Miller died -- supposedly a "heart attack". Then the other two judges issued a written opinion of the court rejecting Ray's appeal! They said Judge Miller, by then dead, had agreed with them before he died; we have only their word for it.
We believe both Judge Battle and Judge Miller were murdered at crucial points in the Ray case.
The Patty Hearst case went up for grabs because the trial judge, Oliver J. Carter, died of an alleged "heart attack" just before passing final sentence. Kept out of the trial was documentation showing the involvement of the CIA with the so-called "Symbionese Liberation Army", interwoven in the case. Instrumental in the cover-up were stories of Chicago Tribune reporter Ron Cosio(sp?), linked to the federal spy network.
Then there are some more recent examples of how judges were silenced.
Federal district judge Robert Aguilar of San Jose, California, is about the only Hispanic federal judge in the nation. In a case involving brutality against minorities, he ruled that the FBI and the Immigration Service are the American gestapo and act like the Nazis. When we heard his outspoken decision, we said to ourselves, "Oh-oh. They're gonna shut him up by frame-up or political assassination!" Sure enough, shortly after, he was indicted on a series of frame-ups. He apparently is on the way to jail.
Nevada federal district judge Harry Claybourne(sp?) publicly pronounced that the Justice Department's strike force there operates like the gangsters and you can't tell one from the other. Claybourne was removed from the bench by a federal frame- up and a rigged impeachment in Congress.
Federal district judge Al C. Hastings of Florida, a black, was a strong voice for Constitutional rights and vigorously opposed the FBI -- the American gestapo. He was one of the few black federal judges. Through a slanted Congress and the whores of the press, Judge Hastings was removed by impeachment by the Senate.
In Chicago, most of the federal judges here are multi, multi- millionaires -- bankers and speculators.
[Addendum:] Through heroic efforts, Judge Aguilar was able to beat the rap. [CN -- see above, re: Judge Aguilar]
And what can you do? Well, call up your favorite news-fakers, whether in broadcasting or in the print media and tell them to stop kidding us about the death of judges and about the murder of reporters. [CN -- e.g. write to realitycheck@cbsnews.com]
In Chicago, see us on cable tv, channel 21, 9 pm [cst] most Monday evenings.
Play it again: "Chicago as the Center of the Corrupt World". (312) 731-1505.
New message Saturday; we change it several times a week.
Donations appreciated. Citizen's Committee to Clean Up the Courts, 9800 South Oglesby, Chicago, [Illinois] 60617. For the latest on courts, banks, espionage agencies, political assassinations, and the news media. On 24 hours a day.
I encourage distribution of "Conspiracy Nation."
Coming to you from Illinois -- "The Land of Skolnick"