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there was a possible
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for investigators.
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1989 comes from the
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“Connection”
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Texas A&M
The Battalion
FORECAST for WEDNESDAY:
Morning clouds giving way to a
mostly sunny, warm and humid
afternoon.
HIGH:86 LOW:63
J
Vol. 88 No. 136 USPS 045360 10 pages
College Station, Texas
Wednesday, April 19,1989
Wright ‘intends to fight’ committee charges
WASHINGTON (AP) — House Speaker
|iin Wright, opening his defense against a
itring of ethics committee charges, sought
Tuesday to rally Democratic colleagues and
[old them, “l intend to fight and I intend to
win."
He said that while he may have made
mistakes in judgment, “I have never done
anything to dishonor this institution and I
never will.”
In a half-hour speech to a private session
of the Democratic Caucus in the House
chamber, and later in press releases, Wright
chose to concentrate his defense on one is
sue: the charge that his wife, Betty, did no
substantial work for the $72,000 she re
ceived from a Fort Worth friend from 1980
to 1984.
But more troubling to many of his col
leagues were charges that Wright sought to
evade House limits on outside earned in
come through seven bulk sales of his book,
“Reflections of a Public Man,” most of them
made in lieu of accepting speaking fees
from interest groups.
Wright received a standing ovation at the
end of his caucus speech, which included an
admission that he had made some errors in
judgment and “may have made some mis
takes in my life,” participants said.
Wright’s lawyer, William C. Oldaker, was
consulting with the ethics committee to ar
range a speedy appearance for the speaker
before the committee to answer the formal
charges.
Following his speech, most Democratic
House members interviewed voiced tenta
tive support for Wright. Many said they
had not yet read the ethics committee’s vo
luminous report formally charging him
with 69 instances of rules violations, and
added that they were waiting to see whether
the panel takes all of those issues to a disci
plinary hearing.
But they acknowledged that growing po
litical heat from their home districts — and
what lawmakers hear when they go home
for the long Passover weekend — would
play a role in whether Wright remains as
speaker.
“The recess will have some role, because
every member is undoubtedly aware that if
we have to make difficult votes in defense
of the speaker, those will be used in 30-sec
ond Republican political ads against us” in
the next election, said Rep. Pat Williams, D-
Mont.
“The easy thing for Democrats to do is to
throw Jim Wright over the side and in
stantly install (House Majority Leader)
Tom Foley behind the wheel,” Williams
said. “It may be that the toughest political
vote of our lives will be the one to save
him.”
Prosecutor compares North
to Adolf Hitler, Joe Isuzu
WASHINGTON (AP) — Oliver
North was portrayed to his trial jury
Tuesday as a liar who couldn’t stop,
and as “the Joe Isuzu of govern
ment” who followed Hitler’s maxim
that “the victor will never be asked if
he told the truth.”
‘‘If Ollie North wanted to get it
done, he didn’t care if he broke the
law, ” said prosecutor John Keker in
final arguments at North’s trial.
But, in return, defense lawyer
Brendan Sullivan said anyone “who
links Colonel North to Adolf Hitler
isnot credible and should not be be
lieved.” He called the comparison
outrageous.
‘This man is not Adolf Hitler,”
Sullivan said, “and he doesn’t do
things like Adolf Hitler.”
The defense lawyer was scornful
of his opponents, saying everything
the government sees North as doing
“is through a dirty glass.”
Why shouldn’t North have
thrown papers away, he asked, when
they referred to the secret opera
tions of the government.
“In this case, the government is
off track and running wild, and you
should stop it,” Sullivan told the
jury.
North, the former National Secu
rity Council aide who was at the cen
ter of the Iran-Contra vortex, sat
stone-faced at the defense table as
prosecutor Keker methodically tried
to dismantle his American-hero
image.
“Telling the truth is something
you learned at your mother’s knee,”
Keker said. “Government by decep
tion is not a free government. Gov
ernment by deception is not a demo
cratic government. Government by
deception is not a government un
der the rule of law.”
After North’s lawyer Finishes his
closing argument Wednesday, there
will be rebuttal and then the trial —
now in its 12th week — will go to the
jury, which will then be Sequestered.
“I will be asking you to return a
verdict of guilty as to each of these
12 counts against Oliver North,”
Prosecutor Keker told the jury Tues
day.
He said, “The tragedy of Oliver
North is of a man who cared so
much for freedom in Nicaragua, but
forgot about the demands of free :
dom and democracy here at home.”
Civilians flee Beirut as troops
cease fire to allow evacuation
BEIRUT, Lebanon (AP) — Thousands of civilians
fled west Beirut Tuesday as Christian and Syrian gun
ners held their fire briefly to allow the evacuation of 70
severely wounded Moslems to a French hospital ship.
Hundreds of cars packed with suitcases, mattresses
and blankets sped down a seaside highway to south and
east Lebanon as the wounded were assembled outside
[he home of acting Prime Minister Salim Hoss.
Eight people were killed and 43 wounded overnight
as the city’s divided population huddled in bunkers and
bomb shelters for a third night. That raised the toll to
270 killed and 975 wounded since fighting erupted
March 8.
Pillars of flame from burning buildings lighted the
sky and the city was laden with smoke as Christian army
units and Syrian and Moslem gunners bombarded the
capital with rocket, artillery and tank fire.
France’s President Francois Mitterrand asked Presi
dent Bush, Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev and
other vv'orld leaders Tuesday to help end the fighting in
this former French colony, said Mitterrand spokesman
Hubert Vedrine.
Egypt’s Middle East News Agency reported a tele
phone conversation between Mitterrand and Egyptian
President Hosni Mubarak “crystallized the idea of mak
ing joint efforts at the international level to halt the
bloodshed.”
The Arab League Council called an emergency meet
ing for Friday on Lebanon, although it has failed to end
the fighting with three failed cease-fires.
The council comprises foreign ministers of the 22
member states which in 1976 granted Syria a mandate
to pacify Lebanon.
Damascus maintains 40,000 troops in Lebanon.
“I can’t take it any more,” said Farah Shatilla of west
Beirut. “We can live without bread, electricity and wa
ter. But hearing the screams of death and agony of our
neighbors, this I can’t take.”
Photo by Dean Saito
Sign of the times
Graffiti livens up this sign on the corner of heed the warnings and ventured into the con-
Parking Lot 60 near G. Rollie White Coliseum. struction area Tuesday. This sign is one of
This student, as many others, chose not to several warning of campus construction.
Police link most victims
in Mexico to drug trade
Soviet dissident says Gorbachev’s policy
of glasnost producing confusion, turmoil
By Melissa Naumann
REPORTER
Confusion is what has pre
vailed in the Soviet Union under
the new glasnost policy, the first
Soviet dissident allowed back in
Moscow since the beginning of
glasnost said Tuesday at a pro
gram sponsored by MSC Political
Forum.
Dr. Alexander Goldfarb said
the most obvious indicator of the
confusion during his last visit to
the Soviet Union was an interview
with a reporter from a popular
weekly Soviet magazine. After
Goldfarb candidly answered her
questions about why he left the
Soviet Union in 1975, she told
him the editor might choose not
to publish the article because his
reasons for leaving were political.
“She said it is true that
censorship was abolished,” Gold
farb said. “The problem is that all
of the press is still owned by the
government, and the editor-in-
chief was an employee of the gov
ernment.”
This type of paradox is rep
resentative of the turmoil the So
viet Union is experiencing, Gold
farb said.
“The Soviet Union recently has
ceased to become a monolithic
entity,” he said. “At the moment,
the Soviet Union is indeed an
eclectic entity.”
Goldfarb said one reason for
the confusion is the growing dis
satisfaction of the people on the
geographical fringes of the Soviet
Union. The unity of the Union of
Soviet Socialist Republics is being
threatened as these highly ethnic
Alexander Goldfarb
republics, such as Estonia and
Lithuania, strive to become more
independent, he said.
Another contributor to the tur
moil is an “ideological vacuum” in
the Soviet Union, he said. Ameri
cans may see themselves as lack
ing concrete political ideals, but
the Soviet situation is more ex
treme.
“(Soviet) people’s hearts and
minds are up for grabs by any in
fluence that will come in,” he
said.
One of the two major influ
ences is the Western culture,
Goldfarb said. As Western ideas
and products, such as Coca-Cola
and pantyhose, infiltrate the So
viet Union, some Soviets are be
coming more receptive to the
Western way of life, he said.
The conductors of the Western
influence are educated people,
including professionals and uni
versity employees, who haven’t
shared in the political power, he
said.
Goldfarb said the other influ
ence is the re-emergence of tradi
tional ideas that were destroyed
and suppressed by the Bolshevik
regime.
The people who support a re
turn to traditional ideas want a
return to rural life and are vio
lently xenophobic, rejecting ev
erything foreign, he said.
“They want to forcefully expel
non-Russian people,” Goldfarb
said. “They say we should become
Russia for Russians.”
The tension between the sup
porters of Western ideas and the
supporters of traditional ideas is
overwhelming, he said.
“The passion of this debate is
so high that you quite often hear
the words ‘civil war’ when you are
there,” he said.
He said another cause for con
fusion is President Mikhail Gor
bachev’s lack of consistency.
For example, in the Soviet
Union, Gorbachev speaks of a na
tional destiny like a nationalist
leader, Goldfarb said.
“(But) when he comes here (to
the United States), he is a West
ern-style socialist, like (French
President Francois) Mitterand,”
Goldfarb said. “From those who
have met him, you cannot get a
sense of what this man is up to.”
Goldfarb said Gorbachev has
gained a great deal of political
power, but to keep it, he must
deal with the growing dissatisfac
tion among the people. Shortages
in Moscow of necessities such as
meat, produce and shoes have
caused the public to trust him
less.
“I think his immediate political
roblem is that the people are un-
appy,” he said. “A major source
of frustration is meeting con
sumer demands.”
MATAMOROS, Mexico (AP) —
Most of the 15 bodies exhumed in a
rural area west of here during the
past week were those of drug traf
fickers and not random victims of an
occult-influenced drug ring’s human
sacrifices, a Mexican police official
said Tuesday.
Juan Benitez Ayala, commander
of the Federal Judicial Police in this
border city, also said the investiga
tion has shifted to Mexico City,
where officials believe several mur
ders are linked to the drug ring’s
“godfather,” 26-year-old Adolfo de
Jesus Constanzo.
Constanzo was among the 11 in
dicted by a federal grand jury in
McAllen Tuesday on drug charges.
Also among those indicted was a
woman who has been called the
“godmother” of the cult, four men
in custody in Mexico, a man arrested
in Houston on Monday and four
who remained at large late Tuesday.
They were indicted on charges of
conspiracy to import marijuana; im
porting marijuana; conspiracy to
possess with intent to distribute the
drug; and possession with intent to
distribute, authorities said.
Benitez refused to comment on
statements he made to reporters on
Monday, when he speculated that
Sara Aldrete Villarreal, 24, the cub’s
reported “godmother,” may have
been killed by Constanzo because
she knew too much about the orga
nization.
On the U.S. side of the border, of
ficials said they thought she was still
alive, even though Mexican officials
reported Finding some of her per
sonal effects in an apartment con
taining an apparent occult altar.
“It just might be a put-on,” said
Cameron County Sheriff Alex Perez
in Brownsville. “If they did find a
purse or found a passport, that may
have been just a trick by Sara and
Constanzo to (make it appear) she is
dead ... I think she is still alive.”
He said the investigation in Mat-
amoros has shown that most of the
13 bodies unearthed at the Santa El
ena Ranch 20 miles west of Matamo-
ros last week, and another two found
Sunday at a nearby cooperative farm
were drug smugglers.
“I have information about only
four people who were sacrificed and
the great majority were drug traf
fickers,” Benitez said.
Of the 15 victims, “some were tor
tured, some were only shot, and
there were the young people who
were sacrificed.”
University of Texas student Mark
Kilroy, 21, of Santa Fe, Texas, was
one of the four sacrificial victims not
involved in the drug business, Beni
tez said.
He did not say which others ap
peared to be sacrificed, but said at
least eight and possibly more of the
victims were either associates or ri
vals of the Constanzo group.
Officials have searched at least
three residences in Mexico City
linked to the group, Benitez said.
“There are a lot of murders in the
Colonia Roma (an area of Mexico
City) connected to Constanzo,” he
said.
A 20-year-old woman, Maria Te
resa Quintana, arrested in Mexico
City on Sunday in connection with
the case was “totally involved” in the
occult practices of some members of
the group, who sought magical pro
tection for the smuggling business.
Her brother, Martin Quintana, is
one oi three men for whom new fed
eral drug-related warrants were is
sued Monday in Brownsville.
Quintana, and the other named in
the new warrants, Malio Fabio, are
believed to have participated in the
occult faction of the Constanzo orga
nization.