Hello comrades, friends and allies
After listening to the
pieces on ‘This American Life’ about Brandon Darby in which parts of my
life have been overturned. I had some thoughts.History and participating
in it is odd. Perceptions, truths and half truths swirl in a muck to
produce ‘the story’. There is always so much more to say.
This
story, the story of informants, activists and motvies, is complicated,
as are all of our lives. It is hard to get the whole picture from all
the voices, concerns and viewpoints, especially when one of those
voices–the government is holding their cards close and withholding
information. It will take years to sort it all out.
I don’t want
to give it much more brain space, but want to clarify clearly a couple
of things and ask some public questions, so please bear with me for a
moment.
1. Darby DID NOT co-found Common Ground. He and I went
in a boat to get our friend Robert King of the Angola 3 who we believed
was trapped in New Orleans. After that mission, Darby left New Orleans
for SIX WEEKS. Malik , Sharon and I co-founded the organization based
on our expericences and a plan I had drawn up on the first trip, which
Malik agree to. Darby was NOT an organizer and had NEVER organized
ANYTHING in his life. He had attended a few demonstrations. Period. He
wanted nothing to do with the idea when I proposed it. Malik, out of a
sense of loyalty to us in what we did defending against the white
militia, always bestowed it on him.
He didn’t have the
socio-political analysis to see the power vacuum the failing governments
had created by their negligence and indifference to historically
marginalized people. He saw and action adventure mission and charity,
and once it was done, so was he until the organization grew.
The
organization was well established in Algiers, Houma, and along the coast
as well as had been making excursions for relief into the wards from
the get go. We had already been working in the 9th, Lower 9th and 7th
wards, albeit on much more clandestine and smaller scale when he
returned. On the recent Democracy Now(Jan 09′) story on this case,
Malik gave him credit again, but regretted the statement and wanted to
withdraw it afterward, but it was live and recorded.
It also begs
the larger question what does co-founder mean? Besides ‘street cred’.
There were many wonderful, imaginative and hard working people who
coordinated and organized many projects at Common Ground. What about
those people, especially the early ones who built the first programs
within days and weeks?
Darby was brought in as the interim
director for almost three months, but under great internal politicking
by him and causing duress from coordinators on the ground at the time.
When he left the organization was in non-functioning on many levels.
But that is a longer story for later.
2. Darby was NOT an
anarchist. He actually never claimed to be for the longest time. He
disagreed with horizontal organizing and many of the underpinnings of
anarchism. He DID however absorb the language, when necessary for
interviews or speaking in public. He NEVER absorbed the practice during
the 6 years I have known him. He actually was more of a quasi
‘central-democratic’ Marxist. He thought anarchist wasted time, energy
and resources. “Myself and few excluded of course.” He would blurt in
the same breath. He aligned himself with what he thought the Black
Panther Party central committee would do–whether it was true or not.
He didn’t have a liberation or even an anti-oppression analysis, but
enough information to get by
within radical circles.
He is a self described ‘former christian fundamentalist’ which might explain is ‘all or nothing’, binary ‘beliefs’.
He
was the only ”’anarchist”’ I have ever known that wanted to
‘overthrow the government’. I debated and argued with him about the
impossibilities and reasons why that was a bad idea on so many levels,
but he took that message many places to the chagrin and dismay of many
radical circles.
3. On at least THREE different and unrelated
times Darby has stated that it was the FIRST time or reason he contact
the FBI. The first was in 2004 when he, according to what he told me and
my partner, went to visit the New Orleans office of the FBI to see
what they had on him. It sounded SOOOO paranoid. He explained the story
in great detail about his visit. The second time was in recent
interviews where he has stated he saw that Brad and David were going to
do something ‘harmful’ at the RNC in Minneapolis and he had to
intervene. And now he is saying that he had to visit the Feds when he
saw that Riad Hammad , his friend, was not in fact a school teacher in
Austin, but was involved in some other ‘nefarious’ activities. So which
is the truth? I know he met commander Bryson of NOPD in Oct/ or Nov. of
2005. He has stated in interviews that Bryson is the one who introduced
him to the Feds. Did he begin his work to spy on Common Ground and all
of us then? Where is the real Darby?
4. In the ‘T.A.L.’/NPR
story, they mention Darby going undercover to stop a Palestinian peace
activist named Riad Hammad from recruiting people for potentially
‘terroristic’ like activities. They don’t mention that Riad was found
dead at the bottom of a river here in Austin under very unusual
circumstances which the Feds ruled a suicide, but looked like was done
to him. (See:
http://www.austinchronicle.com/gyrobase/ReaderComments/?ContainerID=621848)
And that there is NO public evidence that anything that Darby is saying
is true. I don’t know myself, but Riad cannot defend himself against
the accusations.
They also don’t mention that when I went to
meet Darby at the Green Mews coffee shop in Austin during this time he
was often with Riad and some men he described in excited tones as ‘real
revolutionaries’ not activists. He could not wait to tell me, as if I
would be impressed. I told him , as always that he needed to watch out
for people he didn’t know, but what I didn’t know was working for the
Feds. Silly me. So he is bragging about this in a public place, did he
entrap Riad for the Feds like Brad and David? I have know idea, but I
know that Riad is dead either because he took his own life because he
thought someone was after him, or someone else took his life, because
they figured there was an informer in their midst. Either of those
scenarios are completely sad and scary, and not the world I want to
create or be a part of.
5. In Darby’s ‘revolutionary rhetoric’
over the years he tried to get numerous people, including myself, to do
the things the two men were eventually taken down for. I believe now he
tried to set me up in 2006 (after he, according to FBI documents began
informing and provoking) to firebomb a bookstore called Brave New Books
in Austin. I was NOT interested at all and thought it was stupid. I
tried to talk him out of it. The event never happened. He was allowed to
change his mind and move on. What if the Feds had raided him at the
time?
It was the kind of action mixed with his confused politics
that was a pattern with him. I was going to testify to this in David
McKay’s second trial. For years he advocated ‘blowing things up’ and
later using arson. I don’t know if he did, but he sure did try to get
other to do it. So was it revolutionary zeal or agent provocateur shit
straight out of the manual?
That is all I have to share now.
Thanks for taking the time to let me clear the air on this rainy day.
Two men are now in prison for a thought crime, one man is dead in
Austin and according to the bad governments documents from the McKay
trail he is still on the payroll working on other cases.
This is
not democracy, this is a farce with real consequences and real impacts
on so many lives. The pollution and fear mongering of the statehas gone
unchecked of years, and now a new generation of men and women are in
prison.
I still do not fear the government, but recognized the
dangerous and ludicrous levels they will go to to justify bureaucracy,
and budgets and departments and ‘security’. When did we it become ok
for anyone to turn in people for money and talk to the media like it was
a sporting match between two teams? (Scratching of head…)
More of this will be revealed as the future becomes the present.
Do not be afraid, do not stop trusting, and do not stop dreaming of better worlds.
Still humbly dreaming of collective liberation.
