Banner Graphic, Volume 22, Number 221, Greencastle, Putnam County, 20 May 1992 — Page 2
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THE BANNERGRAPHIC May 20,1992
Tracy made a hostage over $lO BOSTON (AP) Former hostage Edward Tracy, who has been in psychological care since his release last year, says he was kidnapped in a business dispute. Tracy, 62, who held many jobs, including encyclopedia salesman, before his October 1986 kidnapping, said Tuesday he was abducted after an argument over $lO with a Beirut book distributor. “RELATIVES OF the same man came the next day and made me a hostage,” he said. He also said the hostage takers were members of a Beirut motorcycle gang he once belonged to called the Risk Takers. His remarks came in his first public appearance since he was hospitalized Aug. 14 at Boston Veterans Administration Medical Center, three days after his Shiite Muslim captors freed him. He joked and seemed clearheaded for most of the hourlong news conference. IN DESCRIBING his ordeal, Tracy said he was released from his chains only three times a day, to use the toilet or take a bath. He said that he was fed well and wasn’t beaten, but that his captors once threatened to maim him with a pair of pliers unless he gave them names of American spies.
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Federal study suggests pattern of police abuse
WASHINGTON (AP) The head of the House civil rights subcommittee says a Justice Department study of police brutality shows the need for legislation empowering federal authorities to sue local departments to stop widespread abuse. Rep. Don Edwards, D-Calif., said the study undertaken after Rodney King’s videotaped beating by Los Angeles police officers suggests that some departments have policies that lead to brutal treatment of suspects. “THE REPORT suggests there are patterns of police misconduct,” Edwards said in a statement disputing the Justice Department’s contention that no conclusions could be drawn from the data. He made the study public Tuesday. “The report supports our conclusion that in some departments and sheriff’s offices there appear to be repeated abuses which could be addressed” by court injunctions, said Edwards, who backs legislation authorizing the department to seek such relief. The study showed that New Orleans police led the nation with an average of 35 complaints a year during the 1984-90 period. There was an average of one complaint for every 38 officers each year or one for every 305 arrests. THE LOS ANGELES Police Department, now the focus of a federal civil rights investigation into the March 1991 King beating, ranked 11th with an average of 14 complaints a year, or one for every 15,393 arrests. The Los Angeles County Sherif-
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REP. DON EDWARDS Disputes Justice Dept.
f’s Office ranked second with an average of 34 complaints a year, or one complaint for every 519 arrests, according to data compiled from files of the Justice Department’s civil rights division. The Jefferson Parish, La., sheriff’s office, which serves suburban New Orleans, ranked third with an average of 23 complaints one for every 782 arrests. SAN ANTONIO police averaged 21 complaints a year to rank fourth in the study. There was a brutality complaint for every 2,126 arrests made by officers in the Texas city. The report involves only complaints filed with the Justice Department and not those lodged with local authorities. Crime legislation currently stalled in the Senate would require the department to collect figures on police brutality. The Bush administration opposes the measure, which also empowers Justice to sue state and local police agencies if it finds “a pattern and practice” of police abuse. THE DEPARTMENT is investigating whether four police officers who were acquitted of state charges in the King beating or any of the other 15 officers who witnessed the incident can be charged with federal civil rights violations. The Justice report showed a wide range in the rate of complaints. The Prince George’s County, Md., police had one complaint for
Trade deficit rises to $5.82 billion in May
WASHINGTON (AP) America’s trade deficit soared to $5.82 billion in March as imports jumped to an 18-month high, the government said today. The Commerce Department said the March imbalance was 77 percent larger than a revised February trade gap of $3.29 billion that had been the best showing in nearly nine years. WHILE EXPORTS hit a record in February, they fell back 1.8 percent to $36.98 billion in March while imports surged to $42.79 billion, their highest level since November 1990. The trade deficit is the difference between imports and exports. The Bush administration is
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every 31 officers in an average year. By contrast, there was one complaint for every 1,898 police officers in New York City in an average year. NEW YORK CITY police had one brutality complaint for every 53,407 arrests they made. “This disparity could indicate that there are a large number of agencies that are operating in an exemplary fashion, or it may be further evidence ... that many citizens fail to report incidents of abuse to federal authorities,” the study said. But Edwards said the study showed that some police agencies with a disproportionate number of complaints “deserve a closer look.” ‘THERE MAY be legitimate explanations for the disparities in some cases, but they seem to be policy-based in others,” he said. The Justice Department study acknowledged that particular policies pursued by local police could lead to more brutality complaints. The vigorous anti-drug campaign begun by a newly elected sheriff in Shelby County, Tenn., may have contributed to the jump from one complaint in 1985 to 29 in 1990, the study said. THREE DEPUTIES were prosecuted for brutality in 1990 and since then the number of complaints about the Memphis-area department have dropped, the study said. The Shelby County Sheriff’s Department ranked 19th overall with an average of nine complaints annually. Justice Department officials refused to release the report, which Edwards distributed Tuesday after it was obtained by his House Judiciary civil rights subcommittee. THE RANKINGS were based on a review of 15,000 complaints received by the Justice Department during the 1984-90 period. The study, focusing on 187 agencies that accounted for 49 percent of the complaints, was ordered last year by then-Attomey General Dick Thornburgh after the King beating. The complaints covered about fewer than 4,400 of the nation’s 16,000 state and local police, sheriff’s and corrections departments.
counting on continued trade improvements this year to boost the economy during an election year. But private economists said the March trade deterioration is likely to serve as a warning of more bad news to come. Many of them are predicting the country’s trade deficit, which has been on a downward path since 1988, could begin rising again as weakness in Canada, Europe and Japan cuts into U.S. export sales at the same time that Americans’ demand for imports rises. SO FAR THIS year, the trade deficit is running at an annual rate of S6O billion, which would represent a slight improvement from last year’s $65.4 billion imbalance.
Crime & Punishment
Texas executes inmate convicted of rape, murder
HUNTSVILLE, Texas (AP) A migrant worker who was sentenced to death by a jury that took just seven minutes to decide his fate was executed by injection early today for raping and murdering a 15-year-old girl in 1984. Jesus Romero, 27, went to his death after the U.S. Supreme rejected two late-hour appeals, the final one in a 6-3 vote. He had no final statement. ROMERO BECAME the 49th person executed in Texas since the Supreme Court in 1976 let states resume capital punishment. The total is by far the nation’s highest. According to testimony, Romero and some companions were drinking beer and taking drugs the night Olga Perales was killed near San Benito in 1984. Miss Perales was raped repeatedly, stabbed in the chest
Virginia man prepares for execution on Thursday
JARRATT, Va. (AP) Roger Keith Coleman went on the talk show circuit to proclaim his innocence as his execution tonight for the rape and murder of his sister-in-law drew closer. A request for a stay of execution was before the full 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals today. IN AN INTERVIEW Tuesday on NBC’s “Today,” Coleman said, “Time is running out. I have to be prepared for what could happen tomorrow night at 11.” He also was interviewed from his prison cell on the syndicated “Donahue” show, along with his girlfriend and mother. In a separate interview at the Greensville Correctional Center in Jarratt, Coleman said he hoped that if he is executed, his death will turn the nation against capital punishment.
The trade report was the second piece of bad economic news this week. On Tuesday, the government reported that construction on new homes and apartments plunged by 17 percent in April, the biggest nose dive in eight years. So far, the bad economic news has not put a dent on the euphoria on Wall Street as the Dow Jones industrial average climbed to another record close on Tuesday. Investors bid up stock prices on a belief that the weak economy will force the Federal Reserve to cut interest rates again. THE $5.82 BILLION March trade deficit was the worst since an October imbalance of $5.87 billion. The $679 million drop in exports
and stomach and beaten in the head with a pipe. Romero was seen giggling as witnesses at his 1985 trial recounted the slaying. The jury decided almost immediately on the death penalty. HIS ATTORNEYS had argued that he had psychological problems and that his lawyer at his trial was incompetent. On Tuesday, a federal judge granted him a reprieve, but a federal appeals court quickly lifted it. Two of Romero’s co-defen-dants were also convicted of murder. One was sentenced to death; the other received a life term. Another man received 20 years for sexual assault At the time of his arrest, Romero had been out on bail for three weeks after serving a few months of a 10-year sentence for aggravated sexual assault on the daughter of a police officer.
“I DON’T WANT my death to be meaningless,” Coleman said. “Eventually I will be proven innocent.” He said he had little hope of winning a reprieve, but added, “You can’t give up totally. There are a lot of people that care for me and support me and I’m drawing strength from that.” The 33-year-old former coal miner was sentenced to die for the rape and murder of his sister-in-law, Wanda McCoy, at her home in the southwestern Virginia town of Grundy. He insists he is innocent The defense has contended it has statements from people who say a neighbor of the victim bragged about committing the crime. But the neighbor has denied any involvement and prosecutors have ruled him out as a suspect.
reflected scattered declines in a number of industries. Sales of aircraft and parts, which had been surging, suffered a setback of s4l million while sales of computers and related products such as semiconductor chips dropped $236 million. The $l.B billion increase in imports, which pushed them up by 4.5 percent from their February level, reflected a 6.1 percent jump in auto imports which rose to $7.54 billion. AMERICA’S foreign oil bill rose 8 percent to $3.38 billion in March as the volume increased 3.3 percent to 5.49 million barrels a day while the price per barrel was up 4 cents to $14.46. As usual, the country’s largest deficit was with Japan, an imbalance of $3.99 billion that accounted for almost 70 percent of the overall imbalance. The Bush administration, trying to keep trade from becoming an election issue, has stepped up its efforts recently to narrow the deficit with Japan. ON TUESDAY, the Commerce Department announced that Japanese automakers were unfairly “dumping” minivans into the American market by selling their vehicles for as much as 12.5 percent below fair market value. Even with a tougher stance by the administration, many private economists are forecasting that this year’s trade deficit will widen to around $75 billion.
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