Above photo: From HandsOffUhuru.org.
Black community activists demand accountability from AG Merrick Garland.
Supporters of the “Uhuru 3” are accusing the FBI of engaging in a cover-up and violating the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). They are calling for pressure to be put on U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland to drop the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) baseless charges against African People’s Socialist Party (APSP) Chairman Omali Yeshitela and two leaders in the APSP’s white solidarity component, Penny Hess and Jesse Nevel.
It’s been over six months since attorneys filed Freedom of Information Act requests for information on FBI investigations of the “Uhuru 3”, who were indicted in April 2023 on fabricated charges that their combined 100+ years of published and spoken opinion advocating for black liberation makes them Russian agents. The indictments came nine months after a violent multi-city FBI raid on seven Uhuru homes and offices.
According to U.S. law, the FBI must respond to FOIA requests within 20 days of receipt. The FBI has failed to do so in response to requests by the Uhuru 3. They have denied the appeal for information of Jesse Nevel and refuse to respond at all to the request for information on Penny Hess. They are known to be holding more than 1,000 pages of information on Chairman Omali Yeshitela that they refuse to release and have said that it will take more than 5 years to turn over the information on FBI investigations of Yeshitela.
“We will do everything possible to find out what the FBI is hiding, documents that are vital in exposing the ongoing surveillance and attacks on the Party,” says Chimurenga Waller, spokesman for the Uhuru 3 Legal Defense Support Committee. “However, we know that the FBI has attacked African people and our organizations for many decades.
“They’ve done everything from harassment, slander, false imprisonment and assassinations like those of Black Panther Party members Fred Hampton and Mark Clark in Chicago on December 4, 1969. Today, instead of outright assassination, the DOJ is seeking to imprison 82-year-old Chairman Omali Yeshitela and Party solidarity forces Penny Hess and Jesse Nevel on charges that carry a maximum sentence of 15 years for each of them.
“This FBI tactic must be stopped. The Hands Off Uhuru counteroffensive is calling on everyone who believes that African people have a right to free speech and the right to organize for our freedom, to write letters to Attorney General Merrick Garland demanding that all charges be dropped against the Uhuru 3.”
Letters can be sent to:
Attorney General Merrick Garland
U.S. Department of Justice
950 Pennsylvania Avenue Northwest
Washington DC, 20535
For more information on the case and the campaign demanding “Drop the charges against the Uhuru 3”, visit handsoffuhuru.org or call 727-914-3617.