All The World Is A Stage 5

Excerpted from Steve Hendricks’ book The Unquiet Grave, pages 296 and 297:

Page 296:

The prosecution called for Nathan Merrick,and a broad faced man attired in the canvas formality of a rancher at church came to the stand.Merrick had been a criminal investigator for the BIA in February 1976 and was among those who went to Roger Amiotte’s ranch the day Aquash’s body was found. He testified uneventfully about a routine crime – scene investigation until the prosecution asked, “Mr.Merrick, did you have any idea what the cause of death was at the time?”

“At that time,”Merrick said, “looking at the body and the way the condition was,general consensus was that she was probably murdered or killed by someone. There was blood underneath of her head, the hair coming from the side of the ravine. And I just felt somebody threw her down in the ditch, down into the ravine.”

This was an astonishment, or should have been. For twenty eight years, the government had said that until the second autopsy none of it’s lawmen had seen any sign that Aquash had died violently-no hint of trauma to the body, save the decay of exposure.Yet not Merrick was saying that not only had he seen blood but the consensus of the many BIA officers,FBI agents, and deputy sheriffs on the scene was that the victim had been murdered.

Page 297:

Donald Dealing ,retired from twenty-six years in the FBI but still possessed of the trim anonymity that the Bureau favored in it’s agents, was called to the stand to discuss what he had seen at the crime scene.He too contradicted a claim cherished by the FBI.The Bureau had long held that he was the only agent who went to the crime scene on the afternoon the body was found.But he said there had been other agents. He did not say who and how many, and Tim Rensch did not ask, but after the trial other FBI officials also referred to “agents” at the scene ( also without saying who or how many).

Once a lie is told and then exposed the options available to address it are limited- they seem to be either an ongoing effort to sustain it, do as Clapper did when questioned about domestic spying in saying the answer given was the “least erroneous”,or admit it and come clean.

Of the three the last is seldom seen to be viable.

I believe both AIM and the feds have lied, continue to do so, and will proceed in like manner.

They are trapped in a web of their own making-the fear being that to admit a single one everything else becomes suspect- a hell of way to live.

The “truth” plays second fiddle to the agenda inspite of anything said to the contrary, whether it is AIM’s agenda or that of any agency.

Simple truths, like there were more than one agent present at the crime scene where Annie’s body was found- a fact based on statements given by agents.

Another simple truth that at least one of those present believed it was a murder scene and commented on the blood and clotted hair on her head- this prior to the second autopsy that confirmed she was executed.

I don’t know what others think of this but whatever perceived necessity existed to excise these facts from the discussion entirely escape me.

The thing about a lie is you can tell a hundred truths yet one lie will always raise suspicion and the question how many other lies have been told?

Regardless of who a person is, where their sentiments lay, it is the truth and only the truth that is of importance, and the speaking of it or the lack of doing so is what defines them.

In my opinion the vast majority on either side are deliberately undermining the ability to bring closure to the issues, both have a vested interest, and the survivors of victims as well as the nations are caught in the middle and being manipulated like puppets.

Loyalty is an admirable quality- but not if it’s foundations are constructed on lies. Not if the intent is to save someone’s ass or that of any agency or organization.

Both sides wait for such an admission,an opportunity to pounce and claim it a proof of their innocence- the primary reason neither side will, yet neither can profess any moral ascendency, and that ultimately places them all in the same egg basket.

One side betraying it’s own people, and the other an “oath” they took and a country.

Does this change the guilt of people like Peltier or Graham, Looking Cloud, or even Thelma Rios based upon her confession? Not a single  iota in my opinion-what it does is allow others to escape accountability, a crime in itself.

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