Forty-six years ago today, on December 13, 1974, a 45-year-old bookkeeper named Betty Van Patter was nursing a drink and crying softly after work at a bar on University Avenue called the Berkeley Square.
She had been fired from her job at the Black Panther Party by Elaine Brown, who headed up the party while co-founder Huey Newton was in exile in Cuba. Van Patter, an idealistic white supporter of the party, had witnessed irregularities and misuse of cash by party members and had warned Brown that they were illegal and if not stopped could bring unwanted attention from law enforcement authorities.
While she was at the bar, a man walked in and handed Van Patter a note. She got up and followed him out of the door.
Later that night, she was spotted at Jimmy's Lamp Post, another bar on Telegraph Avenue nearby in Oakland. The Lamp Post, owned by a cousin of Newton's named Jimmy Ward, was the site of many of the illegal cash transactions Van Patter had warned Brown about.
Meanwhile, back at the Berkeley Square, one of Betty's friends arrived to find her missing. He then placed a telephone call to the Lamp Post and asked if she was there.
"That party has left," he was told.
That night was the last time her friends saw or heard from Betty Van Patter. Her badly beaten body was found floating in San Francisco Bay over a month later, on January 17, 1975.
During the decades since Betty's murder, the Berkeley Police, the Alameda District Attorney, and a number of private investigators and journalists have tried to solve the case of her murder. I am one of those journalists.
To date, we have all failed.
The known evidence strongly suggests that the Panthers were responsible for her death. She was allegedly held in a secret chamber attached to the Lamp Post, where she was reportedly raped and tortured for an unknown amount of time before she was killed by a massive blow to the head. Her body was then dumped into the Bay.
In the years since this happened, some evidence has been produced as to who killed her, who ordered it and why. But no charges have ever been brought against anyone and those responsible remain free. Accordingly, this holiday season will be the forty-sixth straight that Betty Van Patter's children endure knowing that justice in their mother's case has yet to be served.
A few years after she died, Betty's warning to Brown came true. Authorities effectively shut the party down for illegal misuse of government funds.
***
The Black Panther Party was an historic attempt by a group of young black people to aggressively fight back against racism; its leaders established a number remarkable programs to monitor police arrests of black men, a free school and a free breakfast program for poor children.
The party, unlike other "black power" organizations, welcomed white support and forged alliances with Latino groups and gay organizations. It also developed a strong cadre of women leaders, like Elaine Brown, who helped the party gain international prominence.
At the same time, the party's leaders acted like a gang of street thugs, shaking down local merchants with protection money, and running drug and prostitution rings out of various locations, including the Lamp Post.
The visionary programs and the criminality co-existed side by side.
The party was identified by J. Edgar Hoover, the long-time head of the FBI, as a severe national security threat; he and other elements of the federal government waged an illegal campaign known as Cointelpro to infiltrate, disrupt, and destroy the Panthers. State and local law enforcement forces cooperated with the FBI in this effort, which at one point resulted in the brutal killing of Panther leader Fred Hampton and a colleague in Chicago.
The Panthers also waged a terror campaign of their own, murdering party members they suspected of being agents or informers, as well as innocent members of the community whose only crime was being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Huey Newton was at the center of all that was good and all that was terrible about the Black Panther Party.
One of Huey's major white supporters was David Horowitz, a Berkeley radical, who got Betty Van Patter her job with the organization. He knew her from Ramparts magazine, the left-wing voice of the movement to upend racism and imperialism during the 1960s, where he was an editor.
In the aftermath of Betty's murder, Horowitz underwent a very public transformation from the left to the right, where he emerged as one of the fiercest critics of the left in this country. He wrote books and articles and delivered lectures that shredded the idealistic vision of those seeking progressive social change by comparing them to Stalin's murderous rampage in the Soviet Union and Mao's reign of terror in China.
As Horowitz used his considerable intellectual ability and historical knowledge to carry on his anti-left crusade, he repeatedly cited his guilt over Betty's death as the catalyst that propelled him on this journey.
For my part, I never met Betty, but her daughter, Tamara Baltar, was a principle member of our group that founded SunDance magazine and the Center for Investigative Reporting (CIR), and she also helped Mother Jones magazine get off the ground.
Lowell Bergman and I co-authored a major piece in Rolling Stone magazine about the FBI's massive Cointelpro war to destroy the Panthers in 1976. In the process of doing that and related articles, we interviewed Newton, Brown, Eldridge Cleaver and many other Panthers and their most prominent supporters, including Hollywood celebrities, left-wing lawyers and Berkeley intellectuals.
While we were doing the Rolling Stone article, Bergman and I became aware of the dirty underbelly of the Panther organization, and later at CIR, we coordinated the breakthrough investigation that led to an explosive article by reporters Kate Coleman and Paul Avery called "The Party's Over," in New Times magazine in 1978.
That article, more than any other, pierced the facade of the Panthers and disclosed some of the awful misdeeds carried out by Newton and his followers, including the murder of Van Patter.
That her case has never been prosecuted or solved is a deep stain on the legacy of the 1960s.
But the statute of limitations never runs out on murder, and neither does the memory of an old investigative reporter.
So if you or someone you know has any evidence, however minor, that could help solve this case, please contact me.
***
Today's news headlines:
* She Stalked Her Daughter’s Killers Across Mexico, One by One -- Armed with a handgun, a fake ID card and disguises, Miriam Rodríguez was a one-woman detective squad, defying a system where criminal impunity often prevails. (NYT)
* The Vaccines Are Coming. A Divided and Distrustful America Awaits. -- A vast majority of people will need to be vaccinated to create a decisive decline in infections. Health officials are scrambling to make that happen. (NYT)
* Cargo carriers are poised to begin deliveries of the coronavirus vaccine (WashPo)
* Vaccination Sites Will Be Equipped to Handle Allergic Reactions, FDA Says (WSJ)
*UN chief urges leaders of every country to declare 'climate emergency' (Reuters)
* Stuck in Lodi Again -- In San Joaquin County, part of California’s vast Central Valley that produces most of the country’s fruits and vegetables, the coronavirus is spreading like a weed and the hospitals are running out of beds for the sickest patients. The virus has found a foothold in Lodi, a city of 68,000 on the county’s northern rim. The birthplace of A&W Root Beer, Lodi is surrounded by vineyards that rely on Latino farmworkers. (AP)
* Manhattan D.A. Intensifies Investigation of Trump -- Prosecutors have recently interviewed employees of President Trump’s lender and insurance brokerage, in the latest indication that he still faces the potential threat of criminal charges once he leaves office. (NYT)
* U.S. Clears For Release Longtime Guantánamo Inmate Never Charged With A Crime (NPR)
* Sidney Powell’s secret ‘military intelligence expert’ never worked in military intelligence (WashPo)
*
Trump lashes out at Supreme Court, Barr as efforts to overturn election fizzle
(Reuters)
* As leaders set fresh climate goals, Biden pledges US support (AP)
* After Nagorno-Karabakh War, Trauma, Tragedy and Devastation -- For Armenians uprooted from their homes, and for Azerbaijanis returning to uninhabitable towns, “It’s going to be very hard to forgive.” (NYT)
* Seven senators are at least 80 years old. Is it time for them to exit? (WashPo)
* Biden to prioritize trade ties with China (NHK)
* The Geminids, the most prolific meteor shower of the year, peaks this weekend (WashPo)
* Argentina Moves Toward Legal Abortion Amid Push for Women’s Rights -- President Alberto Fernández has made the rights of women and of gay and transgender people central to his government, even through a recession and a pandemic. (NYT)
* DHS holds holiday party, with revelers posing for photos unmasked (WashPo)
* 51 Years Later, Coded Message Attributed to Zodiac Killer Has Been Solved, F.B.I. Says (NYT)
* First major black star in country music dies from covid-19 complications: Charley Pride | 1934-2020 (WashPo)
* Scientists Warn Florida Will Be Under 6 Feet Of Snakes By 2021 (The Onion)
***
And think of a church with nobody praying
Have you ever looked up at a sky with no blue
Then you've seen a picture of me without you
Or stood by a river where nothing was flowing
If you've seen a red rose unkissed by the dew
Then you've seen a picture of me without you
Or a quiet Sunday morning with no church bells ringing
If you've watched as the heart of a child breaks in two
Then you've seen a picture of me without you
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