ustxtxb_obs_1971_11_19_50_00005-00000_000.pdf

Photo by Paul Levy . Left to right Dave Zeiger, Richard Chase, Bob Margarucci and Bob Faucher. friends did six shows in two days, Sept. 18 and 19, to jam-packed audiences. Meantime, more fun H & I was going on A week before the FTA show, the FHUF sponsored a picnic at Stillhouse Hollow Lake, a local recreation area. After the picnic, the participants set out for Fort Hood in a motorcade of about 30 cars. There were a couple of motorcyclists in the caravan and one of them was dinging around, crossing the center strip. A Nolanville policeman pulled him over and commenced to issue a warning citation. Other cars in the caravan turned back to see what was up. “Everything’s cool. He just wants to talk to us,” yelled one of the bikers. And everything was cool until a couple of Killeen police officers showed up at the scene, far outside their territory, and tried to haul the bikers off in their car. Murmurs, shouts and one of the Killeen officers pulled his gun. More Killeen police appeared on the scene and the onlookers were ordered to buzz off. The motorcade continued toward Killeen but found a roadblock outside the town where 28 people were arrested. GIs claim that some of those arrested at the roadblock were beaten; police deny it. Among those arrested were Captain Bob Gilchrist and wife Diane \(disorderly conduct, abusive language and interfering other Army men in Killeen, found himself subject to a form of double jeopardy, faced not only with civil charges but subject to military discipline as well. In his case, the military investigation, which lasted a week and a half, resulted in his release, but others have not been so lucky. If a soldier is arrested in Killeen, especially on charges stemming from anti-war activity, he is likely to find himself faced with military discipline back on post or a D.O. or B.C.D. \(Dishonorable Discharge or Bad Conduct THE STILLHOUSE Lake arrests and the tension of city authorities over the FTA show set the scene for the Veterans’ Day march. As per usual with Killeen peace marches, the FHUF, when planning their march, applied for a parade permit from the city. Permit denied. In a decision without precedent and which was not to set precedent, the city demanded money, specifically, $5,000 in cash, before it would grant a parade permit to the FHUF. Observer: Had you ever asked for money fro _m any group wanting to have a parade in Killeen before this time? Lindley: No. Obs: If groups such as the VFW or the American Legion apply for parade permits in the future, will they be asked to pay a fee? Lindley: I seriously doubt it. Obs: Why did you ask for a fee from this group? Lindley: Look, we didn’t keep cost records on the parade of this group in May, 1970, but we did for their parade in May, 1971. The May, ’71, parade cost us $2,800 in overtime pay for police. The Chamber of Commerce has parades here and their parades cost about $100; that’s a little inequitable; the taxpayers have to bear this, you know. Obs: The parades of this group in the past have been peaceful, have they not? Lindley: Yes, but we have to police them heavily because of the feelings, not only the feelings of the citizens, but the feelings of those from surrounding towns; these people get unhappy at these types of parades. We need police protection to keep from having incidents. Obs: With the onlookers? Lindley: Yes. The matter wound up in the court of . Austin’s U.S. District Judge Jack Roberts. Roberts denied the city’s request for an injunction to block the parade and he also denied the request of the FHUF’s lawyers for an injunction to stop the city from stopping the parade. Said Lindley of Roberts’ decision: “The court backed us up.” At one point during the proceedings, Roberts remarked, “It sounds to me like you all should get together and work it out.” Lindley apparently tried to do just that. Shortly before the parade was scheduled to start, Lindley called in Dave Zeiger and said the city would settle for $500 as a fee for a parade permit. Zeiger responded that he could not make such a decision alone, that Lindley would have to come down to the Strut and present his proposal to the GIs waiting there. Lindley refused. The troops at the Strut marched. CONFUSION, LEGAL and otherwise, still prevails over what happened next. The Killeen parade ordinance defines a parade as a parade “upon any street, alley, plaza or public thoroughfare.” The GIs had voted to march on the sidewalk, to obey traffic signals and to abstain from chanting obscene slogans. But word came from the city authorities that anyone carrying a sign or placard would be considered part of a parade. The GIs decided to not lay down their signs and off they marched. They had marched a big half-block when a line of Killeen police appeared at the first intersection en route and swung the march around, the corner, around the next corner and, lo, what should be standing there but the city clink. Whereat arrests, of a sort, began. The mayor says that those who would not leave when ordered to do so were arrested.’ The chief says that those carrying signs were arrested. And other citizens present report that the police grabbed whoever struck their fancy. Among those arrested were seven women, one of whom was quite pregnant, and onlooker ErneSt Hamilton, 43, eight and a half years in the Army. Hamilton took to complaining loudly that, the whole thing reminded him of Nazi Germany. There were 114 people arrested and there are two cells in the men’s section of the Killeen jail, each of them designed to hold eight people uncomfortably. The result was predictably grim and was exacerbated by some unkindly police guards. More than 50 men were crammed into each of the cells without room to sit or lie down, except in shifts of eight, for 36 hours. The flush toilets in the cells didn’t work; the stench was atrocious and the ventilation worse. It seems that almost every one of the 114 arrested has his or her own particular tale of horror to tell of those 36 hours. The men had difficulty November 19, 1971 5,