I don't envy where they're going.
Posted on 03/14/2006 7:00:36 PM PST by Former Military Chick
SANTA ANA - After nearly eight years of investigation and trial preparation, the federal government opened its case Tuesday against the Aryan Brotherhood prison gang with a simple slide that read: "The Aryan Brotherhood: Blood in, Blood out."
The phrase - borrowed from the gang itself - sums up most of the allegations against members of the highly organized and violent white supremacist gang accused in 32 murders and attempted murders in one of the largest capital punishment cases ever filed in U.S. history. Sixteen of the 40 members arrested four years ago after a lengthy investigation could face the death penalty.
The first four defendants - reputed leaders of the gang - went on trial Tuesday in Santa Ana. Two face death; all have pleaded not guilty.
Attorney Dean Steward, who represents defendant Barry "The Baron" Mills, said last week: "The reality is, federal penitentiaries are violent and dangerous places and all of these guys - white guys - are a small minority and they're just trying to survive."
In his opening statement, Assistant U.S. Attorney Michael Emmick detailed the alleged crimes, including orchestrating a prison war against a black gang that resulted in at least two killings.
In another case, an Aryan Brotherhood member allegedly ordered a hit on an inmate who flicked a packet of sugar and spit milk at Edgar "The Snail" Hevle, another of the men on trial.
Emmick said the gang even went after its own when a member was ordered killed because he fell in love with a female gang associate he had been told to murder. Another was targeted because his wife on the outside refused to smuggle drugs into the prison for the gang, the prosecutor said.
"This case is fundamentally about power and control of the nation's prisons," Emmick said.
Later, he told jurors, "The Aryan Brotherhood is characterized, really, by its fearlessness with violence. The members will sometimes kill in full view of guards or others."
The case involves alleged gang activity at six federal prisons stretching from California to Illinois and four California state prisons. Emmick said testimony will come from many of the informants cultivated by authorities during their six-year investigation.
Many of the informants have dropped out of the gang and aided investigators since the 1997 war with a rival black gang that caused unrest and doubt among some Aryan Brotherhood members, Emmick said.
Some informants received as much as $8,000 in subsistence payments and were granted reduced sentences or immunity in exchange for their help, he said.
Like others in the Aryan Brotherhood, the men have long, violent criminal histories, have testified falsely in the past, and participated in crimes involved in the current case, Emmick said.
"They will not speak well, they will use offensive language," he told jurors. "We will present them, warts and all, and ask you to consider their testimony."
The four men now on trial are accused of orchestrating many of the crimes contained in a 140-page indictment. On Tuesday, they were dressed in starched shirts, used glasses and nodded politely to jurors and the judge. They were surrounded by federal marshals and chained to the floor with leg irons obscured from the jury by a high panel.
Mills, an alleged gang ringleader, is serving two life terms for murder after nearly decapitating an inmate in 1979. In the current trial, he faces a possible death sentence for allegedly orchestrating the 1997 killings of the two black inmates in Pennsylvania. He is accused of having a hand in all but one of the crimes listed in the indictment, Emmick said.
Another defendant, 58-year-old Tyler Davis "The Hulk" Bingham, could face the death penalty for the same alleged crimes. If acquitted, Bingham will be released in 2010 after completing his sentence on robbery and drug charges.
Also on trial are Hevle, 54, and Christopher Overton Gibson, 46. Hevle is eligible for release in five years and Gibson in 13 years.
If convicted of the new charges, both could face life in prison. Emmick spent more than an hour outlining the gang's history and culture, describing in detail how its members communicate despite being in solitary confinement for up to 23 hours a day.
He described elaborate conspiracies to kill out-of-favor members, with some of the hits taking as long as seven years to organize and carry out. He said members often communicated the orders of Mills and Bingham by hiding tiny messages, called kites, in mop handles, under rocks in exercise yards and in peanut halves glued back together.
Emmick said members spoke to each other through air vents or by emptying water from toilet bowls so pipes could carry sound.
In letters, members used invisible ink made with urine or lemon or grapefruit juice that reappears upon heating. They sometimes concealed handmade weapons, called shanks, by inserting them in their rectums, Emmick said.
The code used by gang members to communicate included phrases such as "in the hat," "having a green light on him" and "on sight" to refer to people targeted for murder, Emmick said.
"Some of these Aryan Brotherhood killings take a long time to develop and that's partly because when you're in prison you have a lot of time," he said.
update
It's an exercise in futility. You have a better chance of being hit by lightning that being executed by the California penal system.
I don't envy where they're going.
I'm sure Jessie, Sean and the gang will all be there to protest.
Maybe they could fall out of favor of the WAN and let the gang do Cali's work for them.
pls take me off ping list.
After they fry these sicko nazis, they need to go after the black gangs.
I don't think being in any state prison system is anything other than a horrific experience. No matter how bad you are, there are plenty of people there who are badder than you.
I'm sure the temptation to join a prison gang is overwhelming, for protection purposes if nothing else. For lifers, it probably gives some meaning to their existence.
Oops, you're right. Nevertheless, they have the 9th Circus to protect them.
Good point. The anti-capital punishment crowd out there, working hand in glove with the Aryan Brotherhood, has literally fostered the growth of the most aggressive brand of Islam in the prisons.
Actually that is a fair observation. Some will die faster with life than other's sitting through years of appeals.
The process needs serious reform.
In this case, they feel a jury will think to themselves that they are already are in prison .. blah blah ...
I say if you do the crime, you seek the right punishment let the jury do their thing ...
bump!
Come on you could Kill Jesus in Calif and not get the death penalty.
Sirhan Sirhan is up for parole by the way.
I hate to sound simplistic but the practical solution is Christianity and prison missions.
What the ?
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