Drummond Union: Govt Muffles Key Witness (Alabama coal company, death squad, Colombia)

[Judi Lynn]

Source: Forbes/Associated Press

Drummond Union: Govt Muffles Key Witness
By FRANK BAJAK 07.24.07, 2:02 PM ET

BOGOTA, Colombia - The union activists suing U.S. coal company Drummond Co. Inc. in Alabama in the 2001 murders of three labor leaders say deliberate foot-dragging by Colombian authorities is preventing the jury from hearing their star witness.

"The strategy of these people is to delay the process so the trial ends without this evidence being presented," said Francisco Ramirez, a union official working with the plaintiffs. "They're giving us the runaround."

Concerned by the delay, 12 Democrats in the U.S. Congress wrote Colombia's vice president last week asking him to intercede.

There is also worry over the safety of the witness, Rafael Garcia, who is in a maximum-security Bogota prison.

The Democrat who chairs a House subcommittee on international human rights, Rep. William Delahunt, wrote President Alvaro Uribe last month asking he guarantee protection for Garcia.



Read more: http://www.forbes.com/feeds/ap/2007/07/24/ap3946486.html

[Judi Lynn]

1. This witness has already put Colombian politicians behind bars.

Also, from the article:

"We have until the end of the week to hear something from the Colombian government, and I'm getting the distinct impression that they don't want this to happen," said Daniel Kovalik, an attorney for the United Steelworkers union.

Garcia's testimony against key Uribe allies has helped put several congressmen in jail and exposed alleged close ties between the murderous right-wing militias and Colombia's ruling elite.

~~~~~~~
The former technology chief of Colombia's domestic security agency has pleaded guilty to charges including money laundering and erasing the records of wanted drug traffickers. He claims to have engineered a massive vote fraud in 2002 that favored Uribe and congressional candidates also supported by the paramilitaries.

Garcia's former boss, Jorge Noguera, was a regional Uribe campaign boss that year and Uribe later named him chief of the DAS domestic security agency. Now in jail on criminal conspiracy charges, Noguera is the highest-ranking Uribe administration official to be embroiled in the so-called "para-politico scandal."
(snip)

If only they had the slightest chance of seeing justice done here. With _Bush's right-wing pResident Uribe involved, and an American corporation, it's so NOT LIKELY. What a shame. The loser is humanity itself.

[Judi Lynn]

4. Once DU'ers read enough of this pathetic event, no amount of spin

will dissaude them. All that's missing is the investment of time! More:

Steel Workers to Attack Drummond Coal Co. Role in Columbian Unionists' Murders
Wednesday, July 11, 2007

(Press Associates, Inc.)
By Mark Gruenberg

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. --The Steel Workers, aiding
their Colombian union brethren, will attack the role
of Alabama-based Drummond Coal Co., in murders of
three top union leaders at Drummond’s La Loma mine in
the South American nation.

~snip~
One link, the witnesses told the lawmakers, is that
Drummond knew about the killers’ plans, and did
nothing, even when the unionists asked for the same
protection--such as sleeping in the guarded barracks
at the mine--the company gives its Colombian on-site
managers.

“As became apparent shortly after the killings, the
Drummond Co. was well aware of the threats posed by
Right Wing paramilitaries in the region,” Kovalik
testified. Drummond denied the union leaders’
requests for protection, and instead said “they hoped
the (Colombian) government, and in particular the
agency known as the DAS”--a special security
service--“would be able to assist them with their
concerns."

Kovalik, quoting the DAS chief’s affidavit, said the
president of Drummond’s Colombian subsidiary “handed a
suitcase full of cash” to the leader of the
most-prominent paramilitary group, AUC, and “openly
stated the money was in exchange for murdering” the
first two union leaders at La Loma mine, Locarno and
Orcasita. AUC murdered all three.

“Drummond’s leaving the fate of its workers to the DAS
was tragically ironic, for in early 2006, the DAS
itself was collaborating with right-wing
paramilitaries to have trade unionists killed,”
Kovalik said. “Indeed, according to former DAS
intelligence officer Rafael Garcia, the DAS was
keeping and providing the paramilitaries with a list
of trade unionists it wanted them to kill.”
(snip/...)

http://www.ilcaonline.org/ht/display/ArticleDetails/i/50777

[Supersedeas]

7. death squads for laissez faire capitalism -- geaux Boooosh

[Judi Lynn]

2. U.S. Seeks Intel Officer's Testimony

U.S. Seeks Intel Officer's Testimony
Lawmakers query Colombian VP in suit against U.S. firm

Ludwig De Braeckeleer (ludwig)

Published 2007-07-22 02:41 (KST)

Drummond, an Alabama-based mining corporation, is fighting a lawsuit in a Birmingham federal court for crimes committed in Colombia. The company, which operates large facilities in La Loma, Colombia, is charged with hiring paramilitary gunmen in 2001 to kidnap, torture and murder three Colombian union leaders.

This week, 12 U.S. lawmakers sent a letter to Colombian Vice President Francisco Santos asking him to make a former intelligence officer available for testimony.

The former officer, Rafael Garcia, has previously claimed that he witnessed Augusto Jimenez, Drummond's top executive in Colombia, personally giving $200,000 in cash to the leader of an armed group as payment for the killings of Valmore Locarno Rodriquez and Victor Hugo Orcasita.

U.S. District Judge Karon Bowdre has ruled that the attorneys representing the families of the victims could present Garcia's testimony either by videoconferencing or by a sworn statement. "His testimony could be very damning to the coal company," Bowdre wrote.

According to the Pittsburgh-based United Steelworkers, which is suing on behalf of the families, Vice President Santos promised last May to make Garcia available for testimony. But so far, the Colombian government has failed to act on the promise. On Monday, the trial will enter its third week and is expected to last another two weeks.

"The civil trial has already begun, and we understand that if there is no response this week that the Colombian government will permit this deposition, Mr. Garcia's testimony will not be allowed for use by the court," the U.S. congressmen wrote in their letter.

The 12 lawmakers who signed the petition are Michael Michaud (Maine), Raul Grijalva (Ariz.), Jan Schakowsky and Phil Hare (Ill.), Dale Kildee (Mich.) Linda Sanchez and Brad Sherman (Calif.), Stephen Lynch and James McGovern (Mass.), Betty Sutton (Ohio), Lloyd Doggett (Texas) and Dave Loebsack (Iowa).

Without Garcia's testimony, there is little evidence directly linking Drummond officials to the right-wing militiamen that murdered the three union leaders.
(snip/...)

http://english.ohmynews.com/articleview/article_view.asp?no=373127&rel_no=1

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So if _Bush's friend, right-wing Alvaro Uribe's goverment can successfully withhold this direct witness's testimony, then the occassional visitor to D.U. will seem completely smug, as usual, in informing us, "I don't see any evidence."

There's a reason for that, as the rest of us all know.

[Bacchus39]

3. credible witness too, in a maximum security prison

n/t

[Judi Lynn]

5. It might benefit you to start recognizing the fact Democrats have ALWAYS been associated

with unions. You need to slow down and read a little about American history, and about the Democratic Party.

Scoffing at the case the United States SteelWorkers have brought against Drummond Coal on behalf of their own coworkers in Colombia tells Democrats more about you than you seem to grasp.

[Peace Patriot]

6. Bacchus39, you think Bush's pal Uribe is torturing Rafael Garcia to testify against

U.S. giant Drummond and Uribe's murderous thugs?

That's like saying Bush is torturing potential whistleblowers in Guantanamo Bay to force them to rat out, oh, say, Dick Cheney or Alberto Gonzales or Ahmed Chalabi.

Your comment. makes. no. sense.