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Each targeted Panther is part of it, including Conway and Fitzgerald. On August 22, 1989, Newton himself was killed on his home city Oakland streets.
Marshall "Eddie" Conway
Detailed information on him can be found at http://www.freeeddieconway.org, headlined "Partnership for Social Justice (PSJ): Free Marshall "Eddie" Conway & All Political Prisoners!"
After 40 years of injustice, Conway thanked his supporters for trying to free him through "petition drives, rallies, speaking engagements, fundraisers, government resolutions, and theater and arts projects."
A US Postal Service employee, Conway was arrested at work on April 26, 1970, the day after two Baltimore police officers were shot in their patrol car, one killed, the other wounded. An hour later, two BPP members were arrested, an alleged weapon involved in the shooting was recovered at the scene, and another officer said he saw a third man near where the arrests were made.
Eddie Conway was named after issuance of a warrant based on information supplied by an unidentified informant - the commonly used tactic against innocent activists, targeted for challenging federal or local institutionalized power.
The other men, Jackie Powell and Jack Johnson, were tried and convicted. Powell later died in prison. Johnson is still incarcerated.
The charges came at a time of "considerable media attention focused on (BPP's) Baltimore Chapter." Included was front-page coverage of this case, and "a mass arrest of Baltimore Panthers (for another) purported torture/murder of an informant who participated in local chapter activities."
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