ustxtxb_obs_1967_06_09_50_00017-00000_000.pdf

tures, get that man,’ and pointed, and Ray Davis, an Englishman who was acof Ray Martin, the ‘public relations man said, ‘and take that camera off my face.’ ” tive in the California strike and was arof the UAW in Canada, and called him. Medrano, taking account of Allee’s later rested in the same episode in Mission, Martin, Madrano says, called Walter Reuexplanations that it was lights flashing says he saw the Ranger smash the camera ther and Roy Reuther. Roy Reuther, Mein his eyes that he objected to, noted that into Medrano’s face. drano understands, called the White this was broad daylight and he was usingFifteen-year-old Guillermo de la Cruz, House and Gov. John Connally’s office, “no flash, no nothing.” one of those arrested in Mission on this despite the hour. “I got special treatment in the jail,” same occasion, says in a statement in Medrano said. A jailer said to him, “I Spanish he told the Observer he handdidn’t know you were a personal friend wrote that a Ranger twisted his arm and of Lyndon Johnson,” Medrano said. “I got pushed him against a box and hit him breakfast in the office of the sheriff, and “very hard in the chest,” and that when coffee with cream and sugar,” Medrano de la Cruz told the Ranger he was just concluded. going to give a cigarette to his cousin, “he told me to shut up and kicked me very strong.” This happened, de la Cruz ALSO IN MISSION on May 26, said, outside the PJ’s office in Edinburg. the Rev. Krueger says in a statement he Ray Davis says he saw this, and that the has prepared in affidavit form, the RanRanger then turned on Medrano, who said gers were waving the train through town to him, “Look, you put me here. You want with flashlights, so he took pictures of me to go somewhere else, tell me, and I this. Allee, Krueger says, “very roughly will,” whereupon the Ranger turned away grabbed me by the neck of my shirt, pullfrom Medrano. In cell, de la Cruz says, he ing it tight, and the seat of my pants” began to spit blood. and arrested him. Mrs. Krueger took a Medrano wanted to make a phone call, picture of this and was thereupon arrestbut it was past midnight, he says, before ed, too, and her camera confiscated, he was permitted to do so. By then he Krueger says. had been deprived of all his papers, in The reporters were on the other side eluding phone numbers he had with him, of the moving train at this time, Krueger but, he says, he remembered the number says. His statement continues: Yorkers Organizer Talks Things Over I When he was arrested, Medrano continues, he was standing in the middle of the street, over the stripe in the middle of the road, and when he asked. what he was arrested for, he was told, “Trespassing on private property.” Pointing to the road stripe he asked, “Whose private property?” and was told, “Well, you’re obstructing traffic, come on.” Put in a Ranger car, he saw that Rangers were still struggling to get Kathy Baker’s picket sign from her, and he started taking motion pictures of this from inside the car. Medrano said that, seeing this, a Ranger opened the car door, pulled the camera back “and hit me here,” in the front of his face, “and then back again and hit me in the nose,” took the camera and left it in the front seat, “broke the strap of the other camera” wrenching it off Medrano’s neck, and left it on the front seat, too. Medrano said the license plate of the car was RKK-671. A. I think Governor Connally called Vera. Q. All right, what happened then? A. The second part of the struggle began. When the pickets came down on the Mexican side, we put them up on our side of the bridge. And that’s when the Texas Rangers moved in. We had Trophy Farm stopped completely, but then Captain Alice and his boys moved in. They arrested people indiscriminately, even people who were not in the picket line, and shoved people, and verbally intimidated as many as they could. Ultimately, as you know, they began beating people. The Rangers have been operating as if they can do literally anything they want. Q. What has the effect been? A. One thing is that it has run us out of money. They are making us post cash bonds. Five hundred dollars a head, one hundred dollars a head. Thousands of dollars have been tied up. And, we have very, very limited resources. Q. Is there a difference in law enforcement techniques in Texas and California? A. To pat it mildly. We got shoved ‘around some in California, but nothing like what is going on here. These guys do anything they want. Take the other night. I was sitting on the porch _here at about 11 o’clock at night with Bill Chandler, Eliseo Medina, and Eddie Frankel. Captain Allee and another Ranger stormed up, saying “Move! Move! Where’s Magdaleno Dimas?” When I said I don’t know, Allee, said, “Well, you tell that guy I’m going to get him. He’s gotten into some thing he’s not going to get out of. And that goes ‘for you, too, Chandler.” Allee had a riot gun and the other Ranger had one, too. Allee kept waving his with his hand, with the barrel pointed up to the ceiling. The other One had his gun in front of him, sort of at port arms. I got scared. Allee said that Dimas had been seen carrying a gun. I told him that was ridiculous. Dimas and one of the other men have been going out in the evening hunting birds. For food, for God’s sake. Now, I’ll tell you one thing that made me sick. Kathy [Kathy Baker, a union aide] came in a little after Allee had left and she was very shaken. She’d just come from where Dimas was and he was gone but there was blood all over the house. So, I went to the courthouse, and the first thing I see is the Judge, B.S. Lopez,* and I ask him, “What’s happened? Why did they have to beat him up?” And the Judge said he’d sent him to the hospital for his protection. Chandler and Moreno are in the sheriff’s office and I asked the judge to come with me into that office. Chandler says he and Moreno had gone to see Dimas to tell him the Rangers were pretty drunk and looking for him and that they thought the Rangers were dangerous. But they can’t find Dimas. Allee found him, though. And gave him the most brutal beating I’ve ever seen. Dimas is in the hospital now in very serious condition. He has a brain concussion and many other injuries. A justice of the peace. I told the judge that he knew we were doing everything according to law and why were they holding Chandler and Moreno? And this Ranger turns on me and says, “Don’t tell me how to run our business here,” and he bodily threw me out of the office with the judge standing right there looking on. So I said to the judge, “Why are they pushing me right in front of you?” And he said, “I don’t know, Padilla. They are having an investigation. I’ll have to wait and see the complaints.” And I said, “But Judge, they are taking over your court, right in front of you.” But all he did was sorta of shake his head and tell me that we would get justice. And that’s just about the way things are around here the Rangers do anything they want. Q. What are your plans from here on out? A. We are going to continue. The people won’t quit. I asked them at meetings, “Do you want to quit?” And they yell “No.” We are going to build a community organization, just as we did in Delano. The people have to organize themselves. There is no other way if you are serious about organizing farm workers. By talking to each other, by helping each other, by learning how to work together, they will teach each other why no one should scab next year at La Casita. Q. What is your objective? A. To organize the farm workers of America. Lune 9, 1967 17