[Ppnews] Former Black Panther Faces Parole Hearing After 38 Years! - Chip Fitzgerald

[Political Prisoner News]

For Immediate Release

Committee to Free Chip Fitzgerald

Contact: Emani Bey or Jenn Laskin

831-238-9250

<mailto:freechipfitzgerald at yahoo.com/www.freechip.org>freechipfitzgerald at yahoo.com/www.freechip.org


Former Black Panther Faces Parole Hearing After 38 Years!


(Imperial, California, June 12, 2008)

On July 2, 2008, the possibility of freedom awaits Romaine "Chip" 
Fitzgerald, who has been in prison over 38 years.  This is the date 
of his upcoming parole hearing.  Chip's case epitomizes the 
culmination of the dirty tricks and tactics the U.S. government 
employed in its effort to destroy the Black Panther Party, of which 
he was a member when he was arrested.

             It is well-documented that, in the late 1960s, the FBI 
and other policing agencies of the government developed and carried 
out a concerted plan to neutralize or wipe out the Black Panther 
Party, after FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover issued his infamous 
declaration that the Party was the "greatest threat" to the nation's 
security.  As a result of the FBI's brutal campaign, many Party 
leaders were assassinated, falsely imprisoned, imprisoned under 
extraordinary sentences, slandered and demonized, as Party offices 
were assaulted and Party programs were undermined.  On January 17, 
1969, the Party's Southern California Chapter, of which Chip was a 
member, suffered the loss of its main leaders, Alprentice "Bunchy" 
Carter and John Huggins, at the hands of FBI-sponsored 
assassins.  Prior to that, in August of 1968, Los Angeles police 
gunned down Panthers Tommy Lewis, Steve Bartholomew and Robert 
Lawrence in a single incident.

             In September 1969, Chip himself was involved in a 
shootout with Los Angeles police, and sustained a gunshot wound to 
the head.  He survived this attack, only to be arrested later and 
charged with assault on police and the murder of a security 
guard.  He was convicted and sentenced to death, which was commuted 
to life.  That year, 1969, ended with the Chicago police 
assassinations of Black Panther leaders Fred Hampton and Mark Clark 
and a nearly six-hour raid by the LAPD's newly-formed SWAT Team on 
the Party's Los Angeles offices.

             Today, Chip is the longest held Black Panther Party 
political prisoner in the United States, now housed at Centinela 
State Prison, near the California-Mexico border.  His upcoming parole 
hearing is one of the most anticipated dates for many community 
leaders, students, and supporters around the world, all waiting to 
see if the California Board of Parole Hearings will employ justice in 
this hearing, particularly in consideration of the era and climate of 
Chip's arrest, conviction and sentencing in late 1969.

             The Committee to Free Chip Fitzgerald has been formed to 
advocate to the Board for Chip's parole, encouraging people to sign 
its online petition at <http://www.freechip.org/>www.freechip.org to 
urge the Board to release Chip back into his community as he has 
served more time than his sentence prescribed, and the State has no 
further interest in his continued incarceration.  A public tribute to 
Chip is slated for June 28, 2008, in Los Angeles, at noon at 
filmmaker Ben Caldwell's Kaos Network, 4343 Leimert Boulevard, where 
support messages from elected officials like Rep. Maxine Waters will 
be read, and labor leaders like Tryone Freeman, SEIU Local 6434 
president, will speak, along with former Black Panthers, including 
Elaine Brown and David Hilliard, in a program hosted by Dominique 
DiPrima of Stevie Wonder's radio station KJLH.




Freedom Archives
522 Valencia Street
San Francisco, CA 94110

415 863-9977

www.Freedomarchives.org  
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://freedomarchives.org/pipermail/ppnews_freedomarchives.org/attachments/20080612/e97816bf/attachment.htm>