The Buffalo Five
These are my recollections of the Buffalo five and not to be associated with first hand evidence because most of this is what I heard from others.
The story as I recall was that a group of Anti Vietnam war protesters in Buffalo conducted a raid on the offices of the draft board in the post office building in Buffalo New York. Although there were a larger number involved in the planning, there were seven who took part. Six went into the building and the 7th was in the getaway car.
The draft board raid was timed to coincide with a similar raid in Camden New Jersey. However, an informant in Camden had tipped the FBI about the raids and they showed up at the P.O. building after the six had gone into the draft board offices.
As I understand it, the getaway driver saw the FBI arrive but was not able to contact those in the building to alert them (no cell phones in those days). He (Kenny Moodie, I think) instead drove to the rendesvous to report and wait for a call to pick up any who might have gotten away.
Jim Goode (a.k.a. Jaime Bueno) one of the six inside saw the agents getting on an elevator to take then up to the floor of the Draft Board Offices and escaped by going down the stairs and after looking about unsuccessfully for the getaway car, ran off into the night. He was dresed in black clothes and like the others had his face and hands blackened so as to be less visible. However his escape route took him into the heart of the Black neighborhood on William Strteet. There he tried to borrow a dime (fancy ten cents for a phone call) to use a pay phone to get a pick up.
The other five were trapped by the FBI agents in the Draft board offices, arrested, jailed and eventually put on trial. I have tried to remember the five arrested and I think they were Chuck Darst and his girlfriend , Harry Davis, Jerimiah something and one other whose name escapes me. I think Jim Martin who stayed for a while in a cabin on Barren Hill road was the other.
We moved to Buffalo in June of 1970 and I started law school in September of that year. There I joined an organization called I think, Law Students Concerned. We took the role of unbiased, impartial observers of various anti-war demonstrations and protests in order we thought to be able to dispell rumours of protestors attacking police and vice versa.
In Washington while still working for the FBI investigating the antiwar movement, I had met Mike Daugherty, a former classmate at the minor seminary. He had gone to study with the Jesuits and there met Fr. Berrigan who was one of the first members of the "Catholic Left" to be involved with Draft Board Raids. Berrigan and others took draft records and publicly burned them to protest the US use of Napham in Vietnam and to "save those young men who might be drafted to fight and be killed in Vietnam"
I met Mike again in Buffalo and we renewed our friendship and he asked Cammie and me to join the anti war movement. When the trial of the, so called, Buffalo Five was about to get underway, we agreed to let those from out of town stay at our house during the trial.
Jim Goode and some others fixed the attic up as a bunk area for those staying. I could go on and on but that is the gist of it. Jim Goode and some others came up to CB after we were there and I remember that they used wood from an old falling down shack to make bunk beds for the three children.
I'm tired...of writing this. But there is much more. Did I ever tell you that I went to Camden New Jersey to testify at the trial of the Camden 28 as a defense witness concerning the FBI's methods of getting informants and how sometimes informants become agents provacateur as in the Camden and by extension the Buffalo Five cases.
The story as I recall was that a group of Anti Vietnam war protesters in Buffalo conducted a raid on the offices of the draft board in the post office building in Buffalo New York. Although there were a larger number involved in the planning, there were seven who took part. Six went into the building and the 7th was in the getaway car.
The draft board raid was timed to coincide with a similar raid in Camden New Jersey. However, an informant in Camden had tipped the FBI about the raids and they showed up at the P.O. building after the six had gone into the draft board offices.
As I understand it, the getaway driver saw the FBI arrive but was not able to contact those in the building to alert them (no cell phones in those days). He (Kenny Moodie, I think) instead drove to the rendesvous to report and wait for a call to pick up any who might have gotten away.
Jim Goode (a.k.a. Jaime Bueno) one of the six inside saw the agents getting on an elevator to take then up to the floor of the Draft Board Offices and escaped by going down the stairs and after looking about unsuccessfully for the getaway car, ran off into the night. He was dresed in black clothes and like the others had his face and hands blackened so as to be less visible. However his escape route took him into the heart of the Black neighborhood on William Strteet. There he tried to borrow a dime (fancy ten cents for a phone call) to use a pay phone to get a pick up.
The other five were trapped by the FBI agents in the Draft board offices, arrested, jailed and eventually put on trial. I have tried to remember the five arrested and I think they were Chuck Darst and his girlfriend , Harry Davis, Jerimiah something and one other whose name escapes me. I think Jim Martin who stayed for a while in a cabin on Barren Hill road was the other.
We moved to Buffalo in June of 1970 and I started law school in September of that year. There I joined an organization called I think, Law Students Concerned. We took the role of unbiased, impartial observers of various anti-war demonstrations and protests in order we thought to be able to dispell rumours of protestors attacking police and vice versa.
In Washington while still working for the FBI investigating the antiwar movement, I had met Mike Daugherty, a former classmate at the minor seminary. He had gone to study with the Jesuits and there met Fr. Berrigan who was one of the first members of the "Catholic Left" to be involved with Draft Board Raids. Berrigan and others took draft records and publicly burned them to protest the US use of Napham in Vietnam and to "save those young men who might be drafted to fight and be killed in Vietnam"
I met Mike again in Buffalo and we renewed our friendship and he asked Cammie and me to join the anti war movement. When the trial of the, so called, Buffalo Five was about to get underway, we agreed to let those from out of town stay at our house during the trial.
Jim Goode and some others fixed the attic up as a bunk area for those staying. I could go on and on but that is the gist of it. Jim Goode and some others came up to CB after we were there and I remember that they used wood from an old falling down shack to make bunk beds for the three children.
I'm tired...of writing this. But there is much more. Did I ever tell you that I went to Camden New Jersey to testify at the trial of the Camden 28 as a defense witness concerning the FBI's methods of getting informants and how sometimes informants become agents provacateur as in the Camden and by extension the Buffalo Five cases.
posted by Oldguy | 11:24 am
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