Download PDF of this full issue: v7n6.pdf (8.5 MB)

Police Murder Vet

By VVAW

RULING CLASS JUSTICE: $1 FINE

The verdict came in in early October: the cops were acquitted of the murder of a Chicano worker and Vietnam vet and were convicted of a misdemeanor charge of "negligent homicide." In a vicious endorsement of police murder and in utter contempt for the lives of the oppressed, the judge gave the cops a $1 fine and one year's probation.

On May 2, Joe Campos Torres had been arrested in a bar in Houston's East End. The six arresting officers beat him unmercifully. When they arrived at the city jail to book him for disorderly conduct, the cops on duty wouldn't accept him as a prisoner, saying that the arresting officers had to first take him to the country hospital for treatment.

Instead of the hospital, Torres wound up in a secluded area near Buffalo Bayou. The six pigs beat him again. Then one of the badge-bearing bastards, Terry Denso, said, "Let's see if the wetback can swim." The semi-conscious Torres was dumped into the water where he drowned.

There was tremendous outrage in Houston's Chicano community over Joe Torres' murder. Because of this, and with the eyewitness testimony of one of the cops who decided to break the police "code of silence," two of the murderers were brought to trial. Part of the local ruling class' efforts to vindicate the murders involved moving the trial from Houston to Huntsville, Texas, a small city 70 miles away where the main state penitentiary is located and employs 30% of the city's workforce. In addition, there are almost no Chicanos and few blacks living in Huntsville.

The outrageous verdict and sentence hit like a bombshell. People were furious. The reaction of the masses of people scared the hell out of the ruling class in Houston.

The struggle to bring the murderers of Joe Torres to justice has been the most significant battle against police brutality and the oppression of minorities to shake Houston in several years. The fury of the people at this and a series of equally barbaric police killings has been organized into powerful action. Shortly after the court rulings, and because they were met with strong, organized and angry demonstrations, the federal government was forced to come out with indictments against the killer cops for violating Joe Torres' "civil rights." It was an important, but by no means final, victory.

Even before the vicious killing of Torres, the Houston police had earned a reputation for brutality and murder. Last year, Milton Glover, a Black vet, was walking through his neighborhood when two policemen called him to their squad car. When Glover instinctively reached for the Bible he always carried in his pocket, the cops shot him dead. Earlier this year a cop emptied two clips of his .45 automatic into a derelict wino he claimed was attacking him with the children's scissors! In another incident within the last two years, a young Black man was chased to his home by 20-40 squad cars and two helicopters for exceeding the speed limit. There he was beaten by police in front of his parents, who were pushed around and called "niggers."

On the initiative of the Revolutionary Communist Party and the National United Workers Organization, a group was formed, People United to Fight Police Brutality, to provide an organized way for fighters from the Chicano community and other communities to take up the Joe Torres fight and overall police terror.

As the struggle against Torres' murderers exploded, the bosses of Houston tried every tactic they could come up with to dowse the fire. Groups of supposed "leaders" of the Chicano community were pushed to tell people to "calm it." When People United called for a march, even the local priests were used to tell their congregations which groups they should follow. But these tactics failed; People United combated them at each and every turn. And when the march happened, over 400 people turned out to show their anger.

The big response to calls for mass actions have made it clear that the people are not about to be intimidated or sit back and "have faith" that the courts will set everything straight.

The only reason the federal courts have stepped in is because of the hell raised by angry people in Houston. After so much bitter experience with the "wheels of justice" which crushed Joe Torres to death and vindicated his killers, the masses of people in Houston demanding real justice have not been side-tracked. Seven years ago, the last time the federal courts in Houston indicted a killer cop, he was acquitted after a year's delay. The ruling class and their police would like to repeat this, but their plans could well be upset by the people, organized and united!