Posted on 02/24/2003 5:56:23 AM PST by vannrox
Edited on 04/13/2004 2:41:52 AM PDT by Jim Robinson. [history]
That's not what the article is about. The article, and my comments, deal only with the motion of the Indian tribes as stated, not secret or speculative motivations of other parties or agencies or courts. This article details the legal manuever of the tribes to prevent the study of these bones. Do they wish to suppress the truth? Are they afraid of what the studies may reveal? In don't know one way or the ohter, but I suspect the answer may be yes. But that's not what the article deals with.
Where did you get that information? It was the Army Corp of Engineers that covered it over. No bulldozer (Helicopter dumping bucket after bucket of dirt and gravel) No cottonwoods were planted (There are some existing Russian Olive trees surrounding the area.)
I live right across the river from where Kennewick Man was found. The Army Corp of Engineers has control of the area along the Columbia River. They had started the process of covering the site when our Congressman Doc Hastings put in a bill to halt the Corp from covering it over. The bill passed the house, passed the senate, but before it could be registered as having passed, The Army Corp of Engineers was ordered by the then Commander in Chief, Clinton, to continue covering it over.
An aerial view shows the area of Columbia Park where Kennewick Man was found in July 1996
The site where Kennewick Man was discovered in July 1996 is overgrown with vegetation in July 1998, four months after the Army Corps of Engineers covered the area with dirt and burlap and vegetation.
Dr. Doug Owsley, curator and division head for physical anthropology at the Smithsonian Institutions National Museum, along with seven other scientists, filed a lawsuit to prevent the government from turning the skeleton over to Indians and to seek research access to the remains. Available evidence suggests that Kennewick Man had no "cultural affiliation" with Indians, as NAGPRA requires. The closest thing to such an affiliation might have been the Indian arrowhead lodged painfully in this ancient mans hip bone.And from another source:The scientists lawsuit has impeded the Clinton-desired cover-up of Kennewick Man. It also opened the way for transfer of more than 350 bone pieces to the University of Washingtons Burke Museum in Seattle, where they remain under lock and keyor most do. Of a dozen femur bone pieces collected and recorded, as of January 1999, only two reportedly could still be accounted for. The rest have apparently been stolen in what Dr. Owsley called "a deliberate act of desecration."
Two years ago some private citizens filed a law suit against the government, seeking to stop the internment. Among the plaintiffs is Dr. Douglas Owsley, division head of physical anthropology for the Smithsonian Institution's Museum of Natural History.Clinton was particularly adept at using the undertaker to cover the crime. Remember that bit about those two kids in Mena and Bernie Malek?http://x34.deja.com/getdoc.xp?AN=438607284
Recall that the FBI issued public statements that the Branch Davidians had killed each other and set themselves on fire on April 19, 1993. Given that the Mt. Carmel Center was (allegedly) the scene of a mass murder/suicide, highest professional standards should have been used to recover the bodies. Procedures for recovering bodies in a crime scene are of utmost importance. The environment in which bodies are recovered is packed with evidence of the time, circumstances, and cause of death, essential in murder investigations.
http://www.Public Action.com/SkyWriter/WacoMuseum/death/page/d_hb.html
Dr. Owsley is trained in these methods. In fact the Smithsonian Institution's anthropology department has had a long standing relationship with the FBI for decades, ostensibly helping the FEB solve crimes and identify victims.
Dr. Owsley's colleague, Dr. Douglas Ubelaker (the curator of anthropology at the National Museum of Natural History at the Smithsonian), has written a popular book on the work of forensic anthropologists ("Bones, A Forensic Detectives Casebook," Edward Burlingame Books, 1992.) The dustjacket tells us Dr. Ubelaker is a top consultant to the FBI.
Says Ubelaker: "A smart detective knows how much may be learned from the environment in which a body has been found," (pg. 105).
Both Dr. Owsley and Dr. Ubelaker were sent to Waco to help the locals recover the bodies of the Branch Davidians from the ruins of Mt. Carmel.
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