Vol. 74/No. 48      December 20, 2010

Poindexter, 65, and we Langa (formerly David Rice), 61, were leaders of the Black Panther chapter in Omaha, Nebraska, in the 1960s and became targets of the Omaha police and the FBI under the U.S. government’s Cointelpro (Counterintelligence) programs. Both men have been imprisoned for 40 years, serving life sentences at the Nebraska State Penitentiary on frame-up charges of killing an Omaha policeman.

Poindexter and we Langa were active in protests demanding justice for the killings and harassment of Blacks by Omaha cops.

On Aug. 17, 1970, police were sent to a house in North Omaha after an anonymous caller told a 911 dispatcher that he could hear a woman screaming. A suitcase bomb exploded after the cops entered the house, killing one police officer and injuring seven others.

Within hours Omaha cops targeted the Black community; dozens were picked up and questioned. “Houses were searched, some without legal warrants,” according to Lucas Tyler, Omaha Black rights veteran.

At Poindexter’s and we Langa’s 1971 trial they were found guilty of the bombing on testimony by Duane Peak, a 15-year-old Black youth police said placed the 911 call. At a preliminary hearing Peak testified Poindexter and we Langa had nothing to do with the cop getting killed. After a brief recess, however, Peak returned to the witness stand and changed his entire story to accuse Poindexter and we Langa of the bombing.

Nan Graf, a retired college professor, has been an active supporter of Poindexter and we Langa since 1974. Graf had been asked by Nebraskans for Justice to collect documents and memos through the Freedom of Information Act pertaining to the systematic spying and harassment of African American activists in Nebraska by the cops and FBI.

Graf said, “In one memo dated October 10, 1970, six months before Poindexter’s and we Langa’s trial, the FBI said in writing that the tape of the 911 emergency tape should be withheld from the defense attorneys because it would be prejudicial to the prosecution’s case.”

Nebraskans for Justice has printed postcards of “Truth and Reconciliation” addressed to U.S. attorney general Eric Holder. Since September hundreds have been signed and mailed to his office.

Amnesty International has adopted the case and has called for the release of Poindexter and we Langa. The British Broadcasting Company produced a documentary, and actor Danny Glover has supported the fight.

For information on how to back the fight to free Poindexter and we Langa go to www.n2pp.info or contact Mary Dickinson at mdickin@lps.org.

Mary Dickinson is a Lincoln High School teacher and vice president of Nebraskans for Justice.
 
 
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