And now:LISN <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
The Changing Story
MARTIN -- Bennett County
Sheriff Russ Waterbury was a
peripheral player in the
investigation of a brutal beating
here last week, but he handled
initial press inquiries into the tortuous beating of 22-year-old
Brad Young. FULL STORY
Argus Leader Local News
http://www.argusleader.com/news/Saturdayfeature.shtml
The changing story
By PETER HARRIMAN
Argus Leader Staff
published: 8/28/99
MARTIN -- Bennett County Sheriff Russ
Waterbury was a peripheral player in the investigation of a brutal
beating here last week, but he handled initial press inquiries into the
tortuous beating of 22-year-old Brad Young.
And his characterization of the incident as a hate crime brought
national media attention on this tiny town between the Pine Ridge and
Rosebud Indian reservations.
Waterbury was quoted by the Associated Press as saying Young had a rope
around his neck and was dragged behind a truck. Journalists -- including
representatives from this one -- leaped on the story that sounded
revoltingly similar to a case in Jasper, Texas, where a black man was
killed by whites who chained him to a truck and drug him down an asphalt
road.
NBC's "Today" show carried the story Wednesday morning. The Wall Street
Journal gave it Page 1 play on Friday.
Now Waterbury says he was misunderstood. Although he doesn't deny
characterizing the beating that left Young unrecognizable as a hate
crime, he says he didn't intend for it suggest racism was involved. What
he meant, Waterbury says, "is it would take somebody with a lot of hate
inside them to do that to another human being."
Waterbury was the source for the widely reported fact that the victim
had a rope around his neck when found last Saturday at an abandoned
house in
nearby Allen.
But Marlin Fineran, the carpenter who discovered Young when he noticed a
cloud of flies rise from his bloodied body in tall grass, says there was
no rope around the man's neck.
When confronted about that contradiction Thursday night, Waterbury
explained that he made the assumption a rope and a vehicle was used
while examining grotesque photographs of Young's injuries and talking to
a tribal investigator who handled the initial investigation.
"They said he was drug" with a rope, Waterbury said.
On Friday, however, Waterbury said he told reporters only that Young's
injuries made it appear he had been dragged. And he insisted that he
never said a vehicle was involved.
The affidavit attached to the federal criminal assault complaint against
Bryon Bissonette and Louis Means sheds some light on the manner and
extent to which Young was dragged around the abandoned house and yard.
It explains that he was kicked multiple times in the head, chest, legs
and arms, thrown into a crawl space, then dragged to another place and
kicked again.
Waterbury said photos of Young's ruined face taken last Saturday by his
deputy while Young lay unconscious in the Martin Hospital show what
appear
to be rope burns across Young's neck. It fit with an account of the
incident Waterbury received about 6 p.m. last Saturday from Oglala
Tribal Police Criminal Investigator Paul Forney, when Forney called to
ask Waterbury to pick up a Martin juvenile wanted in the case.
Waterbury says Forney told him then a vehicle was used in the assault.
But
Waterbury says he asked his deputy, whether Young's torso had abrasions,
and when deputy Brandon Arnold said no, Waterbury concluded that if
Young
was dragged it had to be by hand.
Forney declined to comment. He referred questions to Capt. Austin
Watkins of the Oglala Tribal Sioux police.
Watkins says his officers did not make any claims to Waterbury or anyone
else that Young had been dragged by a vehicle. He deferred further
comment
to William Grode, FBI special agent who investigates criminal cases on
the
Pine Ridge reservation and adjacent Oglala-owned land.
Grode acknowledged Friday that he, too, had heard rumors of Young being
dragged behind a vehicle, "but I don't know where that rumor started. On
Friday I had two rapes, a shooting, and this. Sunday I had two
stabbings, a murder, and another stabbing. It all runs together."
According to the affidavit, Young, Means, Bissonette and a minor were
driven to the abandoned house by Albert Salomon, who left them there
without transportation. The beating occurred after Salomon left,
investigators say. And as far as officials know, the only vehicle on the
property when the beating occurred was an abandoned Silverado pickup --
that did not have an engine.
While Young's mother is no investigator, she told the Associated Press
Friday that her son, who remains in a coma at a Rapid City hospital,
does have rope burns on his neck.
"He was dragged, but not by a vehicle," Carol Bucholz said. "It was by
hand. There was rope marks on his neck."
>From afar, Martin and Allen are thin, dark lines of trees and buildings
silhouetted on high ground against blue sky and rising from faded tan
and
green prairie. It is the only thing lofty about these Bennett County
towns.
>From the look of things, poverty is hot on the heels of just getting by
-- which passes for opulence here.
Two cultures share this place, uneasily at times. And tensions were
torqued when the two Oglala men and a juvenile were charged with beating
Young, who's white, nearly to death.
This media rumble began when Gordon, Neb. radio station KSDZ tipped off
the Associated Press that Young, 22, of Martin, had been dragged behind
a
vehicle by a rope around his neck. AP Bureau Chief Tena Haraldson says
her
reporter double checked the tip with Waterbury, combined it with the
work of a Rapid City television station and put it on the wire Tuesday
evening.
That incited a media frenzy.
Waterbury had a chance to shut it down even as late as 11 p.m. Tuesday
when this newspaper called to confirm the account reported by the AP.
But
rather than pointing out what he now says are errors, Waterbury let the
story stand.
Allegations Young was dragged by a vehicle "was basically supposition,"
acknowledged Allen Maltbie, public service director for KSDZ. He said a
reporter from the station interviewed "a relative of the victim. It was
his aunt, but I don't have her name.
"I believe it was a supposition on her part. Other than that, I'm not
entirely sure a vehicle was involved."
Haraldson says AP reporter Josh Kucera's first contact with the story
was
background notes from John Kant of KSDZ that he received about
mid-afternoon Tuesday. She says she believed the station got its
information about a vehicle being used in the assault not from a Young
relative, but from Waterbury.
Haraldson points out that it is not uncommon for the AP to re-report
stories that come from out of state. She notes that Kucera "is
meticulous to the point of being anal."
But Chris Hopkins, of KOTA-TV in Rapid City, confirmed Sheriff
Waterbury's
assertion that while he told reporters Young appeared to have been
dragged, he did not say anything about a vehicle.
"I specifically asked the sheriff, and he said there was no evidence of
a
vehicle," Hopkins says. He said the story broke for KOTA about noon
Tuesday, and it reported it on its early evening news. The AP
subsequently incorporated KOTA's reporting into its own stories, and
credited it with claims Young had been dragged by a vehicle.
"KOTA sent us their information. They had neck, rope, dragged,"
Harrelson
said. She acknowledges upset KOTA representatives contacted the AP
shortly
after.
"They said, 'You're crediting us with this, and we never said anything
about a truck, just dragged,' " Harrelson says.
What now appears to have happened to Young is this:
About 10 p.m. Friday in downtown Martin he climbed into a vehicle driven
by Albert Salomon and containing Byron Bissonette, Louis Means, and the
juvenile. That was unusual for Young, Waterbury says. He was a quiet
individual who spent most of time with his fiancee, Lisa Weidmann, and
their young son, Zachary, when Young wasn't working at his uncle's body
shop.
About 10:30 p.m. Young purchased beer at a Martin convenience store. The
transaction appears on the store's surveillance camera tape and
eventually
allowed Waterbury to identify Young.
Salomon drove the group to an unoccupied house about two miles outside
Allen, then left. Young and the other three were drinking, when,
according to the juvenile during Waterbury's questioning, Means walked
up beside Young and struck him on the side of the head. The blow
apparently knocked Young out, and when he hit the ground the three began
kicking him.
Waterbury said the juvenile told him "Louis did most of the kicking. He
was wearing steel-toed boots."
In the complaint against Bissonette and Means, Capt. Watkins reported
that
Means told him: "Byron Bissonette, himself and another person had beaten
Bradley Young, dragged him across a field, thrown him into a house crawl
space, dragged him out and then kicked him numerous times in the head.
They then left him in a field and departed."
Waterbury says when he told the juvenile the extent of Young's injuries
and asked why he was beaten, "he smirked and said, 'We must have messed
him up. I didn't think we did it that bad.' "
Fineran is the lead carpenter for the Oglala Housing Authority. He said
he had recently worked on an unoccupied house near Allen and boarded up
its doors and windows. Someone in Allen noticed a piece of plywood
missing and
phoned Fineran's brother, who passed along the message. About 9:15 a.m.
Saturday, Fineran went to check on the site.
Fineran says he discovered Young unconscious and covered with blood. He
says he checked for a pulse then raced back to Allen to notify tribal
police.
Young was transported by tribal ambulance to Martin Hospital, where he
was
registered as a John Doe, since his face was so badly swollen and
discolored he was unrecognizable.
Shortly later, deputy Arnold took photos of the injured man.
Young was flown to Rapid City about 3:45 p.m.
When Waterbury came on duty about 5 p.m., he saw the photos, and then
Forney called to ask him to take the juvenile into custody.
During questioning, the juvenile said Young had bought beer about 10:30
p.m. Friday. Waterbury retrieved the store's surveillance tape, saw the
transaction and recognized Young, whom he knew slightly.
He said he went to Young's house, and Weidmann was standing outside.
"I asked her 'Is Brad home?' and she became hysterical. She had just
filed a missing person's report. She asked if he was dead, if he'd been
in a car wreck.
"I said, 'There's a very good chance Brad is in Rapid City.' "
