Today's Stories

April 21, 2009

Andrea Peacock
Histrionics and Legalism in Missoula

April 17-20, 2009

Alexander Cockburn
Thin Ice From Here to the Horizon

Saul Landau
Infiltrating Alpha 66: a Conversation with Gerardo Hernandez, Leader of the Cuba Five

Franklin Lamb
Persia Rising

Ralph Nader
The Greedsters Are Back!

Fred Gardner
Obama's Chimerical Marijuana Policy: a Guide for the Perplexed

Dean Baker
A Win-Win Solution: Tax the Rich!

Rannie Amiri
The Curious Case of Benjamin Netanyahu

George Wuerthner
The War on Predators

Dave Lindorff
No Amnesty for Torturers

David Swanson
Personal Torture Laws

Jim Goodman
The Control of Food

Kathy Sanborn
Economic Fallout Hits Families Hard

Don Monkerud
Economic Recovery for Whom?

Manuel Garcia, Jr.
The People's Money

David Michael Green
Home of the Barricaded, Land of the 'Fraid

Nelson P Valdés
The OAS Charter, Cuba and the United States

Manuel Gomez
From the Bay of Pigs to Trinadad and Tobago

Dr. Susan Block
On Sex Addiction: the Deadliest Sin?

Ramzy Baroud
Non-Violence in Palestine?

Christopher Brauchli
Banning Barbie

Stephen Martin
Statelessness: the Final Frontier

Ron Jacobs
Tearing the Whole Building Down: the Dead in Greensboro

David Yearsley
Monkey Music

Lorenzo Wolff
A Song for the End of the World

Poets' Basement
Moser, McTeer and Buknatski

Website of the Weekend
New England Journal of Medicine Report on Civilian Deaths in Iraq

April 16, 2009

Mike Whitney
A Bulletin From the Captain of the Titantic

Russell Mokhiber
The Top 10 Enemies of Single-Payer

Ronald Teska
From Iraq to Appalachia

Gareth Porter
Predator Blowback

Paul Fitzgerald /
Elizabeth Gould
Thinking Like an Afghan

Benjamin Dangl
Latin America Changes

Kevin Pina
Haiti: Obama's First Foreign Policy Disaster?

Robert Bryce
Another Ethanol Producer Goes Bust

George Wuerthner
See the Forest: the Value of Dead Trees

Paul Garon, David Roediger and Kate Khatib The Surreal Life of Franklin Rosemont

Website of the Day
Socialism and the Facebook Generation

April 15, 2009

Kathleen and Bill Christison
Solving Palestine While Israel Destroys It

Ray McGovern
W, the Torture Decider

Robert Sandels
Is There a Latin American Policy?

Heather Williams /
Paul Baker
Carbon Cap and Trade: How Wall Street will Game the Regs and Trash the Planet

Jack Willoughby
The Lessons of the S & L Crisis

David Swanson
Habeas at Bagram?

Paul Craig Roberts
94 Years of Serfdom

Sara Mann
Norman Rockwell and the Perils of Nostalgia

Kenneth Couesbouc
John Maynard's Martingale: How Keynes Got Rich

Binoy Kampmark
Tax Haven Hypocrisies

Kekuni Blaisdell, Lynette Hi'llani Cruz, George Kahumoku Flores, et al.: An Urgent Letter to Obama on the Rights of Native Hawaiians

Website of the Day
Taxa: the Paintings of Isabella Kirkland

April 14, 2009

Conn Hallinan
The Afghan Rubik's Cube

Mike Whitney
Why is Goldman Sachs So Scared of Mike Morgan?

Peter Morici
Taxing Grandma to Subsidize Goldman Sachs

Greg Moses
Economic Curveballs: the Laffer Posse

Fidel Castro
Obama's Cuba Policy: Not a Word About the Blockade

Robert Weissman
No Blank Check for the IMF

Rebecca Macaux /
Philip Primeau
Somali Piracy and American Foreign Policy

Carmelo Ruiz-Marrero
The Dubious Revoution: Biofuels, the Next Generation

Dave Lindorff
Snatch-and-Jail Justice: the Ugly War on Immigrants

Walter Brasch
The Resurrection of Intolerance

Benjamin Day
Why Has the Press Failed Us in Reporting on Health Care Reform?

Website of the Day
The Appraisal Bubble

April 13, 2009

Patrick Cockburn
Iraqi Militia Fear Reprisals After US Exit

Uri Avnery
Our Dissonance

Jeremy Scahill
A Test Case for Habeas Corpus: Will Obama Prosecute the Somali Pirate in a US Court?

Martha Rosenberg
Suicide Syndrome: Are VA Protocols Behind Iraq Vet Suicides?

Karl Grossman
A Radioactive Extension for Aging Nuclear Plants

Nadia Hijab
Still Waiting: Obama and American Muslims

Sam Smith
America's Cultural Bear Market

James McEnteer
Peru's Shining Example

Sean McMahon
Globalizing Politicide: Israel's Strikes on Sudan

Namihei Odaira
Makota's "Campaign Against Poverty"

John V. Walsh
Bossnapping

Website of the Day
Declining IRS Audits for Big Financial Houses

April 10 / 12, 2009

Alexander Cockburn
Resurrection and Revenge

Chris Floyd
Hope Abandoned: Obama Protects CIA Torture Memos

Mike Whitney
"Liquidate the Banks; Fire the Executives!" Warren's Devastating Report to Congress

Saul Landau
How the Media Bought the Surge

M. Reza Pirbhai
Obama's Afghanistan Plan and India-Pakistan Relations

Franklin Spinney
The Art of the Scam: Wall Street and the Pentagon

Rannie Amiri
Iran's Elections: Why Arab Leaders Want Ahmadinejad to Win

William Blum
The Ideology of Barack Obama

Matt Vidal
Why Card Check Would Help the Economy

Jeff Howison
Death of the Square Deal

Jeff Leys
Resisting the Af-Pak War: the Creech Air Base Arrests

Dave Lindorff
America's Imperial Wars: Why We Need to See the Horrors

Ramzy Baroud
Israel Investigated: But Will It Repent?

Missy Beattie
The Grateful Dead, Wounded and Displaced

Fred Gardner
Fakes Left, Goes Right: Obama's Crossover Dribble on Marijuana Policy

Harvey Wasserman Another $50 Billion for Rust Bucket Nukes?

Suzan Mazur
A Revolution in Biology: an Interview with Nobel Laureate Paul Nurse

Bernard Umbrecht
German Capitalists Take Fire

David Macaray
A Word Clooney, Hanks and Baldwin Should Learn: Solidarity

Janet Kauffman
How to Starve (or Feed) a River

Ron Jacobs
Daring to Struggle, Failing to Win

Norman Solomon
Getting a Death Grip on Memory

Michael Winship
Let the Railsplitter Awake!

Richard Rhames
Empire, Ennui and Extra Cheese

Wanda Fucha
Brother, Can You Spare a Million Bucks?

David Yearsley
My Journey to the Heart of Rahman

Lorenzo Wolff
Getting Beyond the Black-and-White: Jason Isbell's Challenging New Album

Ben Sonnenberg
Rossellini's Louis XIV: "Neither the Sun Nor Death Can be Gazed Upon Fixedly"

Jeffrey St. Clair
Savage Incongruities: the Photographic Life of Lee Miller

Poets' Basement
Corseri and Corzett

Website of the Weekend
The Palestine Chronicle Needs Your Help!

April 9, 2009

Mike Whitney
The Decade of Darkness

Patrick Cockburn
What It Would Take to Mend Fences with Islam

Stephen Soldz
Caught on Tape: Diagnostic Abuse of Veterans

P. Sainath
The Rise of the Shoe-cide Bomber

Ellen Cantarow
Israel's Master Plan for Transfer

Gareth Porter /
Jim Lobe
Obama and Israel's Threat to Strike Iran

Jeremy Scahill
How Many Democrats Will Stand Up Against Obama's Bloated Military Budget?

Jerry Kroth
Saving GM From Bankruptcy--With the Stroke of a Pen

Binoy Kampmark
Fujimori Convicted: A Measure of Justice in Latin America

Fidel Castro
My Meeting with the Black Caucus

Website of the Day
Bird Song Radio

April 8, 2009

John Prados
The Af-Pak Paradox

Bill Moyers /
Michael Winship
Changing the Rules of the Blame Game

Winslow T. Wheeler
The Tooth Fairy and the Defense Budget

Russell Mokhiber
PBS Lashes Back

Kathy Sanborn
Depression Fury

Rev. William E. Alberts
If the Shoe Fits: Bush and Al-Zaidi

James McEnteer Rashomon and the Binghamton Shooter: the Rush to Interpret Jiverly Wong's "Statement"

Nadia Hijab
Olmert's Nightmare

Adam Turl
Card Check on the Ropes

Kevin Zeese
Escaping the Drug War Quagmire

Website of the Day
Walk Score Your Neighborhood

April 7, 2009

David Price
Counterinsurgency's Free Ride

Uri Avnery
Who's the Boss?

Chris Floyd
Talking Peace in Prague, Dropping Bombs in Pakistan

Winslow T. Wheeler Defense Cuts: Gates and the System

Marjorie Cohn
Prosecuting the Bush Torture Team: Spain Leads the Way

Dean Baker
Hands Off Social Security

Diana Johnstone
NATO, Strasbourg and the Black Block

Dave Lindorff
Politicizing Accounting

Martha Rosenberg
Life on HBO's Factory Hog Farm

Evelyn Pringle
Motherhood and the Psycho-Pharmaceutical Complex

Website of the Day
Gaza: Closed Zone

April 6, 2009

Michael Hudson
The IMF Rules the World

Andy Worthington Bagram: Guantánamo's Dark Mirror

Ray McGovern
Profiles in Cowardice: Eric Holder and Colin Powell

Deepak Tripathi
The Pakistan Enigma

Mike Whitney
Bernanke's Financial Rescue Plan: a Glide-Path to Destitution

Norman Solomon
Meet the New Escalators: the Democrats and the Afghan War

Jonathan Cook
Israel Railways Accused of Racism in Firing of Arab Workers

Judith Bello
Justice for the Developmentally Disabled

Deena Metzger Blackwater in Liberia

Dr. M. Kamiar
"There's No 'Eye' in Iran:" Obama's Pronunciation Problem

Website of the Day
Prison Talk

April 3-5, 2009

Alexander Cockburn
From Twin Towers to Twin Camelots

Kathy Kelly /
Brian Terrall
Getting a Closer Look at the Killer Drones

Sue Sturgis
Fooling with Disaster? Startling Revelations About Three Mile Island Raise New Doubts Over Nuclear Plant Safety

Peter Morici
Girding for a Depression

Kathy Sanborn
Homeless in Tent City, USA

Andy Worthington
Britain's Guantánamo: Fact or Fiction?

Rob Larson
Subprime Supreme Court: The Roberts Court Has Become a Powerful New Tool for Business

Saul Landau
Biden and Nixon: a Tale of Two Latin American Experiences

Steve Early
An Evening with Andy Stern

John Goekler
Was Gaza Israel's Waterloo?

Rannie Amiri
Arab League Reconciliation Summit a Bust

Dave Lindorff
Hooray for Juries! A Courtroom Victory for Ward Churchill and Academic Free Speech

Lee Ballinger
Sound Garden: Tom Morello at the Grammy Museum

Ron Jacobs
Artifacts for Survival

David Macaray
AIG Plays the Sympathy Card

John Wight
G20: Capital's New World Symphony

Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor
Race in the Obama Era

Mychal Bell
Surviving Jena Six

Missy Beattie
Hoop Hopes, War and Peace

Reza Fiyouzat
The Iran/US Rapproachment Dance

Michael Boldin
The War on Drugs is a War on You

Christopher Brauchli
The Pope's Batting 50-50

Charles R. Larson
Too Much Stuff

Susie Day
Bernie Breakout Shocker!!

Stephen Martin
Gordon Brown's Chicken Run at the G20

Kim Nicolini
"Last House on the Left:" Vigilantes of the Bourgeoisie

David Yearsley
Homage to Moog and Mallards

Phyllis Pollack
An Interview with Legendary Rock Producer Chris Kimsey on Working with the Stones, Ronnie Wood, Jimmy Cliff, Peter Tosh and Saint Jude

Poets' Basement
Foley, Valentine and Kozak

Website of the Day
The Corner Store

April 2, 2009

Robert Weissman
What If Obama Had Treated Detroit Like Wall Street?

Eric Toussaint /
Damien Millet
A G20 Meeting for Naught

George Bisharat
Israel's Impunity Must End

Russell Mokhiber
Something is Rotten at PBS

Franklin Lamb
Has Washington Lost Lebanon?

Gareth Porter
Settling Scores in Iraq: Maliki Draws US Troops into Crackdown on Sunni Rivals

David Macaray
Obama and the Ruling Class: "Only the Little People Pay Taxes"

Chris Genovali
B.C.'s Bloody Grizzly Hunt

Sam Smith
The Politics of Adulation

Suzan Mazur
Is Neo-Darwinism Dead?

Website of the Day
Fighting for Change in St. Louis

April 1, 2009

Chris Floyd
Surging Further Into the Afghan Abyss

Stanley Heller
Israeli War Crimes: Thank God, It Was Only Rumors

Mark Brenner, Mischa Gaus and Jane Slaughter Obama's Perilous Plan for Detroit: Restructure the Big 3, But Not With Bankruptcy

Jonathan Cook
The Slow Demise of Ehud Olmert

Eric Walberg
EU in Tatters: Only the Protesters Have Any Vision

Richard Morse
Why Haiti Can't Forget Its Past

Don Fitz
Guess Who Came to Dinner with a Match? Green Mayoral Candidate's Van Firebombed in St. Louis

Laray Polk
Texas and Evolution

Belén Fernández
12 Años de Soledad?

Harvey Wasserman
Cracking the Media Silence on Three Mile Island

Website of the Day
Pentagon Fraud Investigations Fell, While Contracts Soared

March 31, 2009

Uri Avnery
The Deception Tango

Peter Lee
Ghosts in the Machine: the World's Hottest Cyberwar Battlefield

Nicholas Dearden
A New Global Debt Crisis

Dave Lindorff
The Obama Betrayal

Joanne Mariner
"We'll Make You See Death"

Ron Jacobs
Obama's Pakistan Gambit

Wiliam S. Lind
Another Lost War

David Michael Green
Who Says the GOP Doesn't Have a Plan?

Benjamin Dangl
Beyond Elections in the Americas

Johnny Barber
Meditation in Orange

Dedrick Muhammad
Economic Inequality: the Foundation of the Racial Divide

Website of the Day
How the Obama Dems Took Over the Peace Movement

March 30, 2009

Michael Hudson
Financing the Empire: Do US Face G20 Mutiny?

Patrick Cockburn
What Next in Afghanistan?

Henry A. Giroux
Hard Lessons

Mike Whitney
Where's Eliot Spitzer Now That We Need Him?

Ralph Nader
Where's All the Money Coming From?

Paul Craig Roberts
Obama's War on the (Upper) Middle Class

Jeremy Scahill
The Logistical Nightmare in Iraq

Robert Bryce
The Cellulosic Ethanol Delusion

Jonathan Cook
Remembering Land Day in Palestine

Ray McGovern
Obama Bombs

Website of the Day
Hersh: Syria Calling

April 20, 2009

Will Libby's Dead Get Justice?

Defense Histrionics and Legalisms in Missoula

By ANDREA PEACOCK

Missoula.

Getting on the witness stand to be cross-examined by New York attorney David Bernick looks an awful lot like stepping into a boxing ring with Mike Tyson. Bernick is skilled and brutal; in the last seven weeks I’ve listened to him take apart some of the most articulate, intelligent people I’ve ever met. Last week in Missoula, Montana, he turned his sights on a mild-mannered EPA investigator named Bert Marsden.

The ring in this case is Judge Donald Molloy’s federal courtroom where the W.R. Grace corporation and five of its former managers face criminal charges for environmental crimes against the U.S. government and people of Libby, Montana: namely, that Grace and these men knowingly exposed generations of a small Montana town to lethal doses of a particularly virulent form of asbestos from its vermiculite mine there, violating the Clean Air Act in a conspiracy to defraud the federal government, and obstructing the subsequent investigation. More than 270 people from Libby lie in their graves due to asbestos from the mine, and another 1,800 (from a community of about 12,000) walk around with the death sentence of an asbestos-related diagnosis.

Halfway into the trial, the prosecutors are on the ropes. They began the process hamstrung by statutes of limitations, and by week seven found themselves forced to jettison witnesses and defend themselves against accusations of misconduct.

The government attorneys have been off-balance from the start, when the unfortunate timing of an appellate court ruling compelled them to put on their grand finale—the sorrowful tale of the Parker family who bought from Grace contaminated land for their nursery business—just as the case had barely begun.

Prosecutors Kris McLean and Kevin Cassidy stumbled through the first weeks of the trial at a stuttering pace, continually interrupted by defense lawyers who always seemed to have some objection to evidence, to questions, to the entire proceeding. Too often, the feds had no answer. They just couldn’t seem to get their rhythm on.

Bernick emotes outrage for the injustice done to his client week in, week out. So confident in his objections, he occasionally has to be reminded by the judge to wait for a ruling before continuing. As the trial progressed from weeks to months, Bernick lost none of his fervor, and he doesn’t save it up for the jury. Even with the panel out of the room, Bernick will burst into histrionics at some unfairness inflicted on the Grace company.

(“They don’t have conspiracy, they don’t have the science, the obstruction case is gotchas!” he shouted the other day.)

 Then, when one somewhat unsavory witness appeared to perjure himself, attorneys McLean, Cassidy and agent Marsden were accused of orchestrating the mess. While Judge Molloy read the incident as the witness attempting to “hijack” the government’s case, the defense gave no quarter alleging all kinds of outrageous acts on the part of the frazzled prosecutors.

It happened like this:

Robert Locke is a former Grace vice president, a Harvard business school grad who suffers from disabling depression, anxiety and attention deficit disorder. His career with Grace is noteworthy in large part for a memo he wrote in 1980, laying out the company’s options for dealing with an impending federal investigation of Libby’s vermiculite and its toxicity. “Obstruct and block,” Locke wrote. “Be slow, review things extensively and contribute to delay.”

From the prosecution’s point of view, Locke was perfectly positioned to help their case: he spent 25 years with Grace mostly in the Construction Products Division that ran the Libby mine. He also had an axe to grind, a discrimination lawsuit pending against Grace, and so proved receptive to the government’s overtures. As Bernick put it, the man was directly out of “central casting,” an ideal witness who could be the “voice of the documents” the jury would be considering. And for four days of direct and cross-examination, he delivered. Locke kept meticulous notes going back decades, could recall vividly the details of Grace’s decision-making process. He nearly single-handedly made the government’s conspiracy case.

But on day three, Locke said something that set in motion a series of events that may yet turn the largest criminal environmental case in U.S. history into an embarrassment that will haunt the government’s lawyers for the rest of their careers.

Locke testified that during a meeting about the sale of the former Grace screening plant to the Parker family for their nursery business, he voiced concerns about the deal. Defendant and former senior vice president Robert Bettacchi waved off Locke’s unease in a particularly callous manner.

Locke: I was told that we were—someone was going to buy the site of the former screening plant and the tunnel and grow mushrooms there or flowers or something or other. … I had real bad vibes about the site… I just said that it was a real bad idea to do that, we ought to just put loam over it and plant grass and keep people the hell out of it.

McLean: Did you say those things to Mr. Bettacchi?

Locke: Not those exact words, I imagine, but that’s what I said. I just thought it was a bad idea.

McLean: Did he make any response to your point?

Locke: Yeah, and that’s the only reason I remember that. He said caveat emptor.

McLean: What did that mean to you?

Locke: Well, it’s Latin and it means buyer beware…

When it came his turn to question Locke, Bettacchi’s attorney Tom Frongillo accused him of telling “an outright lie.” Indeed a transcript of his sworn testimony from a 2004 interview with government agents reveals Locke saying he had not been part of the talks regarding the sale of the screening plant to Mel and Lerah Parker. Taken as such, it appeared Locke had made the statement up right there on the witness stand.

But the 2004 transcript continues with Locke saying he had been at many meetings where the sale of Libby property was discussed. In later interviews, Locke told prosecutors that was the context in which he had aired his concerns to Bettacchi and been given the now infamous line.

Here, things get complicated. Locke had been offered immunity from prosecution in exchange for his cooperation, but turned down the deal; defense lawyers assert this decision was made with a wink and a nod from the government, that they had no intention of going after Locke but wanted him to look neutral, independent and vulnerable to the jurors. Furthermore, it turns out EPA investigator Bert Marsden failed to turn over all his email correspondence with Locke—notes showing Locke had a clear bias against Grace and Bettacchi in particular. Locke was therefore anything but the independent or vulnerable man presented to the jury, Bernick reasons.

“His message to the jury was unmistakable: He was his own man, by saying he was willing to experience the threat of prosecution,” Bernick said. “That was a false impression, right? Designed to mislead the jury.”

Over spring break, the defense attorneys filed motions to compel discovery of any remaining documents in the prosecution’s files that they were entitled to; they moved to strike Locke’s testimony in its entirety; and they accused the U.S. attorneys of working with Locke to cook up the whole exchange. That was the stage set for last Friday’s hearing. With the jury dismissed for the weekend, Bernick was given free reign with agent Marsden.

From the start, Bernick endeavored to pressure Marsden into saying that Locke was an integral part of the prosecution team—not a mere witness. He spent four hours picking apart emails spanning more than four years of communication between the two men, asking about books that Marsden had recommended to Locke, a meal they shared, and Locke’s apparent need to help out way beyond the scope of a normal witness.

“Mr. Locke got all these things he wanted,” Bernick insisted. “His own special (immunity) letter, special treatment, special input. Special, special, special! He had a special relationship with prosecution.”

Bernick never once let up on this theme—because the implication was the jury could not judge Locke’s veracity as a witness without knowing this context—but Marsden steadfastly refused to bend: Locke was unique, he was mostly cooperative, but he was not part of the team.

This was no small feat. Bernick is relaxed on the court’s stage, blessed with infinite patience. And he knows his targets are largely uncomfortable in the same setting. He wears them down, wears them out til they seem ready to agree with practically anything he says just to get out of there.

“This isn’t going to get any easier, Mr. Marsden,” Bernick said three hours into the interrogation, when presenting the agent with a yes or no question intended once again to confirm the “specialness” of his relationship with Locke. “No one’s going to help you... Just answer the question.” The judge mercifully broke for lunch soon after.

In the end, the defense provided no actual evidence of collusion between the prosecution and its purportedly tarnished witness, only their own insistence that such exists. And a strict reading of both Locke’s testimony, and attorney McLean and agent Marsden’s notes support their version of his story: that Locke spoke of Bettacchi’s comment more than a month before the trial began (and that a note of this comment was provided to the defense a week before Locke took the stand).

After working to establish a “hand in glove” working relationship between Locke and the prosecution, Bernick went on to accuse the government’s lawyers of doing the opposite with its other witnesses: purposely hiding documents from them in order to manipulate their testimony.

Most troubling to Judge Molloy, however, was what Marsden termed an “oversight”: the government’s repeated failure to produce all documents the defendants were entitled to in order to properly cross-examine witnesses. These materials are commonly referred to as “Brady” documents (from the 1963 case, Brady v. Maryland) and apply to any papers that may be either exculpatory or used for impeachment purposes—that is, to cast doubt on the testimony of a given witness. It’s no small matter, but a constitutional right born of the due process clause of the 14th Amendment.

The U.S. Attorney’s office was wise to bring in a fresh lawyer to argue the government’s side, and after Bernick grilled Marsden for four plus hours, Timothy Cavan of Billings, Montana, calmly let Marsden explain himself.

Marsden was profoundly sorry he hadn’t turned over his emails. He is not a lawyer, and misunderstood his responsibilities under Brady. He said he discouraged Locke from investigating aspects of the case on his own. Marden’s job is to keep witnesses engaged, and that’s what his contact with Locke was designed to do. They never socialized. They once shared a working lunch.

Afterwards, the defense attorneys stood one by one urging Judge Molloy to find the case so rife with misconduct, he should strike Locke’s testimony, and ultimately direct a verdict of acquittal.

“The misconduct problems associated with the prosecution’s case are not isolated, they are pervasive. Not just the testimony of Mr. Locke, though even it were, he is such a central witness… the ramifications require a significant remedy,” Bernick said. “I know it’s affected every single one of the witnesses I’ve referred to. That can’t happen accidentally. That’s the way the entire prosecution team has conducted business. It’s canned from beginning to end.”

Three of the six defense lawyers who spoke urged Molloy to consider the human toll of this case. They weren’t referring to people in Libby, however, but to the stress placed on their clients’ lives.

Norita Skramstad had by this point left the courtroom. She told me over lunch she had intended to take up “smoking, drinking and chasing men” in her golden years, but instead was on her way home Friday afternoon to take care of her dying son. This just two years after losing her husband, Les, to Grace’s asbestos. She had said earlier in the day, laughing, that it was good Les was not here to see this debacle or she’d be bailing him out of jail. Norita could tell these people a thing or two about the human toll of this case.

While Molloy appeared receptive to at least part of the defense’s grievances, specifically with regards to document retrieval and witness manipulation, U.S. attorney Cavan refused to give up the fight. 

“Everybody involved in this case has a thousand balls in the air. When you have a case of this magnitude, this length, this many witnesses, you’re going to have mistakes,” he said, adding that it was the jury’s responsibility to determine Locke’s truthfulness, and no one else’s. “The question is when they occur, can you cure them? And fortunately in this case you can. They’ve had the information for several days now. [Locke’s] still an active witness, put him back on the stand, have at him.

“I suspect they don’t want to cure this, but it’s there.”

Judge Molloy has scheduled further discussion of these matters for April 27. The defense expects to move for a judgment of acquittal by the end of this week. By that time, the prosecution should have called its final witnesses and rested its case.

Andrea Peacock is the author of Libby, Montana: Asbestos and the Deadly Silence of an American Corporation (Johnson Books, 2003). She lives south of Livingston, Montana, and can be reached at apeacock@wispwest.net

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