Walker, Marilyn - Interview master file
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Transcript
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Cameraman | Yeah, we're rolling. | 0:05 |
Interviewer | Okay good. Okay. | 0:06 |
(Marilyn clears throat) | 0:09 | |
Okay. Good morning. | 0:10 | |
- | Morning. | 0:12 |
Interviewer | We are very grateful to you | 0:13 |
for participating in the Witness to Guantanamo Project. | 0:15 | |
We invite you to speak of your experiences | 0:19 | |
and involvement with your son. | 0:22 | |
And you can tell us who your son is when we ask you. | 0:27 | |
And we were hoping to provide you an opportunity | 0:31 | |
to tell you a story in your own words. | 0:33 | |
We are creating an archive of stories so that people | 0:37 | |
in America and around the world will have a better | 0:40 | |
understanding of what you | 0:44 | |
and others have experienced and observed. | 0:46 | |
Future generations must know what happened. | 0:51 | |
Post 9/11, by telling you a story you're contributing | 0:54 | |
to history, and we appreciate your willingness | 0:57 | |
and courage to speak with us today. | 1:00 | |
If at any time during the interview, | 1:03 | |
you want to take a break just let us know. | 1:05 | |
Anything you say that you'd like us to remove, | 1:07 | |
just let us know and we'll remove it. | 1:09 | |
We'd like to begin with some basic background. | 1:12 | |
If you wouldn't mind telling us your name and where you live | 1:16 | |
and birth and age and a little bit about your education | 1:20 | |
that would be helpful and children. | 1:25 | |
- | Okay. | 1:27 |
My name is Marilyn Walker, I live in California. | 1:29 | |
My birthday is December 20th, 1950. | 1:34 | |
I'm 62. | 1:38 | |
I have three children. | 1:39 | |
Interviewer | And a little bit about your education? | 1:42 |
- | And I have a bachelor's in humanities. | 1:45 |
Interviewer | And you're working in California. | 1:50 |
- | I'm working in California. | 1:52 |
Interviewer | Maybe we can begin by telling us | 1:56 |
who your son is | 1:59 | |
and then a little bit about his early visits to Yemen, | 2:00 | |
perhaps just to give a little background | 2:07 | |
before we get into what happened on 9/11 or after. | 2:09 | |
- | Okay. | 2:14 |
My son is, can we back that up? | 2:15 | |
Can you repeat the question? | 2:19 | |
I've heard- | 2:20 | |
Interviewer | Yeah. If you can tell us who your son is | 2:21 |
and then the first time he went to visit Yemen, | 2:22 | |
I guess which (speaks faintly) | 2:26 | |
- | Okay. I can't remember what year that was. | 2:29 |
Does it matter? | 2:32 | |
Interviewer | You don't remember? No. | 2:32 |
You remember how old he was? | 2:33 | |
- | He was, | 2:35 |
let me think he was 17. | 2:41 | |
I believe he was 17. | 2:44 | |
Yeah, he was 17. | 2:48 | |
Interviewer | So maybe you say who your son is- | 2:52 |
- | Okay. All right. | 2:53 |
All right. My son is John Lindh and... | 2:55 | |
I'm sorry, this is terrible. | 3:01 | |
Interviewer | And when he. | 3:02 |
- | I may need more leading because- | 3:04 |
Interviewer | When he first went to Yemen, | 3:06 |
how did that happen Marilyn? | 3:07 | |
How did it happen that he went there? | 3:09 | |
- | John made the, he was looking to study Arabic, | 3:12 |
and he wanted to study Arabic in the most classical form. | 3:17 | |
And he decided upon Sana'a Yemen, because that is | 3:21 | |
the place where the language is still spoken that way. | 3:27 | |
And he found a school that would provide that education. | 3:32 | |
And I didn't know anything about the region at all. | 3:41 | |
I barely knew anything about Islam or, | 3:45 | |
you know, the study of another language. | 3:51 | |
And so I did some research myself. | 3:54 | |
And I'd actually talked to a couple people | 3:58 | |
who knew of this school and said that | 4:01 | |
it was an appropriate school | 4:03 | |
and that it would be a good learning experience. | 4:06 | |
And so he left, he went for, I believe | 4:09 | |
it might not have been quite a year. | 4:17 | |
And he studied in the school for a, | 4:19 | |
I don't even know if it was two months. | 4:22 | |
And he realized that it wasn't exactly | 4:24 | |
what he was looking for. | 4:27 | |
Cause he really wanted to be immersed in the culture. | 4:28 | |
And the school was there to provide Arabic training | 4:31 | |
for Westerners. | 4:39 | |
And John was a new convert | 4:41 | |
and he wanted to be with people that practice the religion. | 4:43 | |
And that wasn't the case at this school. | 4:51 | |
And he was a bit taken aback by that | 4:54 | |
cause that's not what he was... | 4:58 | |
He was very idealistic | 5:00 | |
and he was expecting a different environment. | 5:01 | |
And so by and by, he found another place to study. | 5:05 | |
And so he was there for less than a year and he came home. | 5:12 | |
Interviewer | Can I just back up? | 5:17 |
When did he convert? | 5:18 | |
- | He converted, I think he was 16 | 5:20 |
when he made his formal conversion. | 5:24 | |
Interviewer | And did you know about that in advance. | 5:27 |
- | Oh, no. | 5:29 |
No, I didn't know about it. | 5:30 | |
No, we got a phone call one evening just | 5:31 | |
as we were starting to have dinner. | 5:35 | |
And I answered the phone and it was a man's voice | 5:38 | |
and he was asking for John and I just, you know, | 5:42 | |
I was surprised. | 5:47 | |
I mean, you know, cause it was a voice | 5:48 | |
that was, it was not an English speaker. | 5:50 | |
And so after the phone call we asked him | 5:52 | |
what that was about and when he told us | 5:56 | |
that he had converted. | 5:58 | |
So... | 6:00 | |
Interviewer | How'd you feel about that? | 6:02 |
- | You know it's hard to think back that far. | 6:03 |
I think I was a little, | 6:07 | |
I wanna say shock that's too strong word, | 6:14 | |
but I wasn't expecting it. | 6:17 | |
And I didn't really know anything about Islam. | 6:23 | |
I knew it was one of the Abrahamic religions, | 6:26 | |
but I didn't know anything at the time. | 6:31 | |
And so I, after that, I kinda took his lead | 6:34 | |
to kind of educate myself a little bit about it. | 6:39 | |
And, but it was, you know, I had my learning curve. | 6:43 | |
Interviewer | Were you okay with his converting? | 6:48 |
- | You know... | 6:51 |
You know, I didn't, at the time, | 6:55 | |
I didn't really know anything about it, | 6:56 | |
I didn't know what that meant. | 6:57 | |
I didn't know anything about it. | 6:58 | |
I mean, myself, I wasn't practicing Catholic. | 6:59 | |
And I'd explored other religions myself. | 7:07 | |
And so it wasn't altogether out of the, | 7:11 | |
like, I may think some families that might've been | 7:17 | |
something that would have been, how can this be? | 7:18 | |
But because I had also been a bit of a spiritual explorer. | 7:22 | |
And John had been exposed to some of that, | 7:26 | |
like Buddhism and native American spirituality, | 7:28 | |
had kind of gone to ceremony with me. | 7:32 | |
And so, and as I met, you know, | 7:35 | |
people that he was going to the mosques with, | 7:41 | |
they were really these really nice, | 7:45 | |
seemed to be really nice sincere young men. | 7:48 | |
So... | 7:57 | |
Interviewer | Did you have a conversation with him | 8:00 |
about why he converted? | 8:01 | |
- | You know, I don't know that I did really have. | 8:07 |
I know that Frank did. | 8:12 | |
And I know that John, of my kids was the more, | 8:14 | |
there was something more spiritual about him, | 8:22 | |
because we would have conversations. | 8:24 | |
And more around the native American spirituality. | 8:26 | |
Cause that's what I was involved in. | 8:31 | |
So I knew that he was he was a believer, he believed in God. | 8:37 | |
And | 8:40 | |
he just didn't believe that, you know, | 8:45 | |
having been raised Catholic to some extent | 8:49 | |
that Jesus was God. | 8:51 | |
And I had my own feelings about that too. | 8:53 | |
So we kind of were on the same wavelength. | 8:57 | |
Interviewer | So you were okay with his searching | 9:02 |
by going to Yemen to learn the language and the culture. | 9:04 | |
- | You know, I wasn't that comfortable with it. | 9:08 |
First of all, because, you know, | 9:12 | |
I didn't feel like he'd had that much world experience here. | 9:17 | |
And to go that far and it was a long way. | 9:20 | |
I didn't know anything, that was halfway around the world. | 9:24 | |
And I know the media made it out to appear that, | 9:27 | |
you know, sure. | 9:31 | |
You know, where would you like to go? | 9:32 | |
And go. | 9:36 | |
But it wasn't like that for me. | 9:38 | |
I did a lot of research, I talked to people | 9:40 | |
and there was the one person I spoke with in particular, | 9:43 | |
she was from Ireland | 9:47 | |
and she had her own travel business. | 9:49 | |
And she would take people to Yemen, Saudi Arabia and Iran. | 9:53 | |
And she said, hands down, if she had to pick a place to live | 9:57 | |
on the planet tomorrow, it would be Sana'a Yemen. | 10:00 | |
She loved it. | 10:04 | |
She said, the people are wonderful. | 10:05 | |
They're kind. | 10:07 | |
And so she said, he'll be fine, he'll be fine. | 10:09 | |
So I also knew that kids do go abroad for study. | 10:16 | |
Sometimes they go while they're in high school. | 10:24 | |
Some private schools send their kids abroad in high school. | 10:26 | |
And I didn't think it would be forever, | 10:30 | |
but you know, when he did finally board that plane | 10:34 | |
and I watched it takeoff, I mean, I was just... | 10:39 | |
It was really hard. | 10:46 | |
It was really hard to see him go. | 10:46 | |
Because my preference would have been, | 10:50 | |
if there had been a school here for him to study, | 10:52 | |
that would have been the thing | 10:56 | |
that I would have wanted to do. | 10:59 | |
But at the time there wasn't. | 11:00 | |
Cause he also wanted to study about the religion. | 11:01 | |
And there didn't seem to be, to my knowledge, | 11:04 | |
but again, I didn't know anything. | 11:10 | |
I didn't really know anything. | 11:12 | |
And I realize, you know, | 11:13 | |
maybe some of the criticism was fair | 11:18 | |
that, I know I was naive. | 11:19 | |
I was naive, you know? | 11:22 | |
I'll admit I was naive. | 11:23 | |
And... | 11:28 | |
Interviewer | Could you have thought of saying to him, | 11:32 |
wait until you get older before you go? | 11:34 | |
- | We did talk about that. | 11:36 |
But he was headset, he had the ambition to do it, | 11:38 | |
and the interest and that's all, he was interested in. | 11:43 | |
He really wanted to learn the language. | 11:48 | |
And, you know, this was also a kid who had been, | 11:50 | |
he'd been schooled at home for a number of years | 11:53 | |
because of illness. | 11:57 | |
And for him to now want to step out | 11:59 | |
after being home for so long. | 12:01 | |
It's like he was so ready to say, | 12:03 | |
he was ready to explore. | 12:07 | |
So if I had to do it over again, | 12:12 | |
I would do things differently. | 12:16 | |
But that's what I did in the moment. | 12:18 | |
And I also didn't know who to, you know, | 12:23 | |
I didn't know who to turn to. | 12:26 | |
I didn't really know what questions to ask, | 12:28 | |
I didn't know what questions to ask or who to talk to. | 12:31 | |
I mean, I know that probably sounds | 12:33 | |
on some level unbelievable. | 12:38 | |
Like how could you not? | 12:40 | |
I thought I was, you know, and the people that I spoke with, | 12:43 | |
one was a professor at the school | 12:46 | |
I was attending at the time who was familiar with that area. | 12:48 | |
And the other was this woman who traveled there. | 12:52 | |
And outside of that- | 13:01 | |
Interviewer | Did you think of going yourself too? | 13:03 |
- | Well, that wasn't till later. | 13:06 |
Yeah, that wasn't till much later than I thought. | 13:09 | |
Because he came home. | 13:11 | |
You know, he came home after that visit, stayed home for, | 13:12 | |
I think it might've been eight months, | 13:15 | |
bu, you know, he was wanting to go back | 13:17 | |
because the longer he was away from the language, | 13:20 | |
cause here he was immersed in the language, | 13:23 | |
the longer he was away, the less fluent he was becoming. | 13:26 | |
And so he returned. | 13:31 | |
Interviewer | Did you have any thoughts | 13:35 |
about his returning | 13:36 | |
- | Reservations? I did. | 13:38 |
And yet his dad didn't see. | 13:41 | |
So there was like he- | 13:43 | |
Interviewer | His dad? | 13:46 |
- | His dad wanted, | |
he, thought he should go. | 13:47 | |
So... | 13:49 | |
Interviewer | What were your reservations the second time? | 13:57 |
The same as the first or were they different? | 13:58 | |
- | Well, just because... | 14:01 |
Well, mostly because he, | 14:08 | |
I don't even know if I want this part recorded. | 14:12 | |
Interviewer | We don't have to. | 14:16 |
- | Okay. | 14:18 |
- | You want me to tell you or? | 14:21 |
Interviewer | Yeah. | |
- | Okay, edit it. | 14:22 |
Because when he was there the first time, | 14:23 | |
because of the school he went to the first time the man... | 14:26 | |
This is off, is this off the record? | 14:34 | |
Interviewer | No. | 14:35 |
We won't, we won't- | 14:36 | |
- | You'll excerpt this? | 14:37 |
Interviewer | Yeah. We can take this out. | 14:38 |
- | All right, okay. | 14:39 |
Interviewer | Or we can leave it in, but never show it. | 14:41 |
It's up to you, you can decide later. | 14:43 | |
- | I'm maybe never show it. | 14:45 |
Cause there's a little bit of blackmail going on. | 14:49 | |
Interviewer | But why don't you tell us | 14:51 |
so that we can excerpt it all, you decide? | 14:52 | |
- | Okay. | 14:54 |
Yeah, because it could be troublesome. | 14:56 | |
Interviewer | Okay. | 14:58 |
- | Because John had, you know, I think his, he had, | 15:00 |
I don't know if committed to a certain time, like a year | 15:04 | |
or I forget what the length of time was, | 15:06 | |
but because John dropped out, | 15:09 | |
I don't think we paid tuition beyond that point. | 15:12 | |
And on the one hand, this man said he felt, | 15:16 | |
because I would talk to him, he would feel somewhat, | 15:19 | |
sound like he's felt responsible for John. | 15:21 | |
Meanwhile, his own daughter went to school in Germany. | 15:23 | |
And John said that there were a lot of people at this school | 15:26 | |
that were like, there were like, they were CIA? | 15:29 | |
You know, it was like, there were like a lot of people there | 15:32 | |
that that's why they're there learning the language. | 15:35 | |
And anyway, so the school that John went to... | 15:37 | |
I can't remember, there's something about papers. | 15:44 | |
This first school held onto his papers somehow. | 15:46 | |
So when it came time for John to leave | 15:51 | |
he had a hard time getting out of the country. | 15:53 | |
Had a hard time getting out of the country. | 15:56 | |
And I was on the phone with the State Department about it. | 15:59 | |
I was on the phone with the embassy, | 16:06 | |
which were totally not helpful. | 16:09 | |
But you know, I can remember having a conversation | 16:12 | |
with someone at the State Department saying, | 16:14 | |
well he should never have gone. | 16:16 | |
You know, don't that it's unsafe for Westerners, | 16:18 | |
you know, to be there it's like, | 16:21 | |
well, I never saw an advisory. | 16:23 | |
Nobody told me, you know? | 16:24 | |
And the school that he was studying in the second school | 16:27 | |
apparently it was on their list | 16:32 | |
of schools not to be involved with. | 16:34 | |
And so really I was fairly clueless | 16:37 | |
about these things until then. | 16:44 | |
And so John was told to, would go to the embassy, | 16:45 | |
he went to the embassy and they made him sit. | 16:52 | |
They knew exactly who he was. | 16:54 | |
They made him sit there for like hours. | 16:56 | |
And then when he'd come to the counter again, | 16:58 | |
they'd say, oh, your your mother has been, | 17:01 | |
I don't think I called the embassy, | 17:03 | |
I called the State Department and they must have. | 17:05 | |
Your mother's been calling. | 17:07 | |
It's like, I never called them. | 17:09 | |
You know, that's what happened there. | 17:12 | |
So he finally was able to leave the country | 17:15 | |
through the kindness of strangers. | 17:19 | |
I have to say, well, get out through a family that helped. | 17:21 | |
And he almost didn't get on the plane, | 17:23 | |
they almost didn't let them on the plane. | 17:25 | |
They thought he was from Turkey or something. | 17:27 | |
You know, it thought it was somebody- | 17:29 | |
Interviewer | Did he have his passport? | 17:30 |
- | I can't remember whether it was passport, | 17:32 |
or there was something, there was another, | 17:36 | |
there was something else that- | 17:38 | |
Interviewer | Another document he needs to exit. | 17:41 |
- | I think there was another that he needed to exit. | 17:42 |
Interviewer | So they had to pretend he's from Germany to- | 17:45 |
- | Oh, no he was able to leave, he able to... | 17:47 |
No but, they thought he was somebody else | 17:50 | |
and that he was lying. | 17:51 | |
That he was from Turkey or some other country. | 17:53 | |
Interviewer | Well, wasn't he apprehensive | 17:57 |
about returning to Yemen | 17:58 | |
if he had this issue just to get out? | 17:59 | |
- | I think the situation it's because of this particular man | 18:04 |
who was, it was kind of a blackmail. | 18:08 | |
He wasn't gonna give him the papers until he got money. | 18:11 | |
Interviewer | He's at the school. | 18:15 |
- | He's at that school. | 18:17 |
And I can't remember the name of the school. | 18:18 | |
But- | 18:22 | |
Interviewer | So when John went back, | 18:23 |
he didn't go to the same. | 18:24 | |
- | He didn't got to that cool. | 18:25 |
No, he went to another school. | 18:26 | |
Actually, he went to another, a third language school, | 18:29 | |
and then he... | 18:34 | |
I'm trying to remember, he left that school. | 18:37 | |
I think he went back to the second school | 18:42 | |
for a period of time. | 18:44 | |
And then he had to leave the country | 18:46 | |
because of visa reasons. | 18:48 | |
And that's at that point that he wanted to go to Pakistan. | 18:50 | |
Although he didn't tell me. | 18:53 | |
Interviewer | This is the second trip? | 18:55 |
- | This is the second trip. | 18:56 |
He didn't ask me if he could go. | 18:57 | |
He asked his father, and Frank gave him permission, | 19:02 | |
and sent him money to travel. | 19:08 | |
And the reason he didn't tell me was because | 19:12 | |
he thought it would upset me, which it would have well. | 19:15 | |
Interviewer | Why? | 19:19 |
- | Well, because we had, I thought an agreement | 19:20 |
for him to return home, you know, after a year. | 19:23 | |
Interviewer | The second time? | 19:26 |
- | The second time that he would come back | 19:27 |
at least once a year and he'd come back. | 19:29 | |
But he did not. | 19:32 | |
He traveled. | 19:33 | |
Interviewer | So you had no idea, Frank- | 19:36 |
- | I didn't know until after the fact, | 19:38 |
till after he'd already. | 19:39 | |
And it was so that they could, you know, | 19:41 | |
so that I wouldn't be upset. | 19:43 | |
Interviewer | So frankly he was going to Afghanistan. | 19:46 |
- | No, no, no, not Afghanistan. | 19:48 |
No he was going to Pakistan. | 19:49 | |
Interviewer | But you didn't? | 19:50 |
- | But I didn't know until after he was there. | 19:51 |
Interviewer | So when you contacted John, did, | 19:53 |
have you ever contacted- | 19:57 | |
- | Well, our contact was not as frequent as I would like, | 19:58 |
because the communication is not that great. | 20:04 | |
It wasn't in Yemen. | 20:08 | |
He had to use, well, at that time | 20:09 | |
he wasn't using internet cafes. | 20:13 | |
The first time it was phone. | 20:14 | |
We were using phone calls, | 20:15 | |
but sometimes the phone system wouldn't work, | 20:18 | |
or it was certain times he couldn't use it | 20:21 | |
or just wasn't available. | 20:23 | |
And I would always have to wait for him to call me. | 20:27 | |
I think I couldn't call him directly. | 20:29 | |
And then when he went the second time, it was more, | 20:32 | |
we were communicating by email, | 20:36 | |
but that was irregular as well | 20:38 | |
because he was depending on internet cafes. | 20:40 | |
And so, and he'd have to walk some distance to get there. | 20:43 | |
Interviewer | So Marilyn, just to clarify, | 20:50 |
why again was he going to Pakistan? | 20:52 | |
- | He was going to Pakistan because he wanted to study. | 20:54 |
Now, he wanted to study the Koran and he wanted to, | 20:57 | |
it's actually memorizing the Koran. | 21:03 | |
And the memorization is taught in the madrasa, | 21:06 | |
which is, you know, a school. | 21:10 | |
And he, I guess he looked at several schools | 21:13 | |
and he found a school that was in, | 21:17 | |
what was known as the Northwest frontier at the time. | 21:21 | |
I believe it's changed names. | 21:26 | |
And so he was, you know, with mostly children in the class | 21:28 | |
and he's the oldest, the oldest student, | 21:35 | |
and he was there to memorize the Koran. | 21:38 | |
- | And how did you find out he was there? | 21:42 |
- | I believe he eventually, he emailed me to let me know | 21:45 |
and said he was sorry that he hadn't told me before | 21:47 | |
and that he didn't want any, he didn't wanna upset me. | 21:51 | |
Well, I think, cause he knew, | 21:56 | |
you know, John knew how hard it was on me | 21:57 | |
just to be that far away. | 21:59 | |
I mean, we're a close family and it's just, | 22:00 | |
he knows how I worry, you know? | 22:06 | |
So I don't think he was doing it to like | 22:09 | |
antagonize or you know, I think he honestly believed | 22:17 | |
that it was something that he needed, | 22:23 | |
it was part of his education, | 22:27 | |
and part of his duty as a Muslim | 22:28 | |
to memorize the Koran, to the extent that he could. | 22:31 | |
And it's easier to learn a foreign language | 22:35 | |
and it's easier to learn anything the younger you are. | 22:40 | |
So that made sense to me. | 22:44 | |
And- | 22:48 | |
Interviewer | Well, how'd you feel when you heard | 22:49 |
he was in Pakistan? | 22:51 | |
- | That was concerning because I knew Pakistan was unstable. | 22:54 |
And... | 22:59 | |
That's all I knew. | 23:02 | |
You know and I was, I'd watched the news, | 23:06 | |
I'd go to find what Pakistani news I could find. | 23:08 | |
I did the same thing when he was in Yemen. | 23:15 | |
Try to see, stay on top of things as much as I could. | 23:17 | |
It was a concern, plus it's a landscape. | 23:22 | |
I know nothing about, nothing. | 23:26 | |
Geographically, I mean the culture, | 23:30 | |
I just don't know anything, didn't know anything. | 23:33 | |
And, | 23:36 | |
but I just had to trust that he'd be okay, | 23:40 | |
and that he would be with people would take care of him. | 23:43 | |
You know, my experience with the Yemeni people | 23:49 | |
was the day that he left the second time | 23:52 | |
and we were at the airport | 23:55 | |
and he's getting ready to go down the, | 23:57 | |
what do you call it security. | 24:05 | |
And we're saying goodbye, and all of us are there together, | 24:07 | |
and his sister is just like beside herself | 24:11 | |
trying to hold onto her brothers. | 24:13 | |
Didn't want him to go. | 24:15 | |
Didn't want him to go. | 24:16 | |
I didn't want him to go. | 24:17 | |
And often the distance a bit away from us was this, | 24:18 | |
several Yemeni families. | 24:25 | |
Actually one of them had come up to us | 24:27 | |
just before John departed, | 24:30 | |
because their family members were going back | 24:32 | |
on this flight as well. | 24:34 | |
And I don't know, maybe John might've known him | 24:36 | |
from one of the mosques, or maybe they just recognized | 24:39 | |
that he was Muslim. | 24:45 | |
Anyway, so these women are taking in | 24:46 | |
the scene of our farewell. | 24:50 | |
And after John left we turned to leave | 24:53 | |
and these women called us over. | 24:58 | |
Or maybe we just went over to talk to them. | 25:00 | |
And each one of the women, without saying a word to us | 25:03 | |
just took Naomi in their arms and just held her. | 25:07 | |
I was just so, I was so touched. | 25:12 | |
I just, I don't know that people in my own culture | 25:15 | |
would do that. | 25:18 | |
You know, we just take this child who was, | 25:19 | |
I can't remember how old she was. | 25:23 | |
She might've been 10 at the time, nine 10 years old | 25:24 | |
to comfort her. | 25:30 | |
And then they did the same thing with me. | 25:31 | |
And, you know, he said just trust trust in Allah, | 25:33 | |
he'll be fine. | 25:36 | |
And so that really touched my heart | 25:38 | |
and seemed to ease the sadness, you know, a bit. | 25:44 | |
But it was hard, | 25:51 | |
you know, it was hard letting him go at that time. | 25:52 | |
But anyway, that was my experience of Yemeni people. | 25:55 | |
And also remembering what that Irish woman had said | 25:58 | |
about the kindness of the Yemeni people. | 26:04 | |
It was true. | 26:07 | |
But I didn't know anything of Pakistan. | 26:08 | |
And so. | 26:12 | |
Interviewer | Did you think of going to Pakistan? | 26:16 |
- | Well, I did. | 26:18 |
And we talked about it and he said, well, mama | 26:19 | |
mama you'd have a hard time here because of, | 26:22 | |
I think, | 26:26 | |
what did he say? | 26:28 | |
I think probably because of probably a number of things, | 26:29 | |
but, bathrooms would be, would be different. | 26:33 | |
I'd have, it that'd be a challenge for me. | 26:37 | |
I don't know, I think I could probably dealt with it. | 26:39 | |
But that was his concern. | 26:42 | |
Plus I didn't know the language. | 26:44 | |
I didn't know anybody, you know. | 26:45 | |
So, but then I also didn't think that it was gonna be | 26:49 | |
for a very much longer time because we had an agreement. | 26:54 | |
I thought that he would come home in December, again, | 26:58 | |
he'd come home in December. | 27:00 | |
Which he did actually come home in December, | 27:02 | |
but not the way I thought he would. | 27:04 | |
And so... | 27:07 | |
Yeah, it wasn't, I didn't seriously think | 27:12 | |
of traveling there until I lost track of him. | 27:15 | |
Interviewer | So when you lost track of him | 27:19 |
what were you thinking and how did you lose track of him? | 27:20 | |
- | Well, you know, the last I heard from him was | 27:23 |
in April of 2001 and it was an email and he said | 27:26 | |
that something to the extent that he was gonna | 27:33 | |
be going up into the mountains, cause it was cooler. | 27:35 | |
It gets really hot in Bannu where he was living at the time. | 27:38 | |
And so, you know, I've been looking at a map and it's like, | 27:41 | |
okay, so that's like mountainous, | 27:45 | |
(coughing) | 27:48 | |
maybe it would be cooler, but that he wouldn't be able to, | 27:49 | |
he might not be able to communicate as often, | 27:54 | |
and cause it'd be more remote. | 27:58 | |
So I thought, okay, that was gonna be really hard. | 28:01 | |
It was hard enough because I tell you, | 28:06 | |
I never got into the computer as much as I did | 28:08 | |
during that period of time because I was on it all day. | 28:13 | |
hoping to get or checking it all day | 28:17 | |
hoping that that would be the day I get an email. | 28:19 | |
Interviewer | So as he disappeared, what we, | 28:26 |
then what was you thinking when you couldn't hear from him? | 28:29 | |
- | Well, I didn't know what happened. | 28:33 |
I mean, I had to keep telling myself that, you know, | 28:35 | |
that it must be because he's in such a remote area | 28:40 | |
that he just couldn't, and up what he is said | 28:44 | |
is he'd be able to that he would, it wasn't until, | 28:49 | |
it wasn't until, | 28:57 | |
as it got closer to August I was really, | 29:02 | |
well, actually it was before that July and August, | 29:05 | |
I was really, I was just beside myself. | 29:11 | |
I could hardly stand it. | 29:16 | |
I'd already dropped out of school. | 29:18 | |
I couldn't, I just couldn't keep up with my studies. | 29:19 | |
And I can remember, I mean, maybe we can maybe extra some | 29:23 | |
of this, but that summer I had been involved | 29:28 | |
with ceremony with the Lakota people and I had been | 29:35 | |
sun dancing and that was the second year at Sundance. | 29:39 | |
And that was the prayer I took in with me was | 29:43 | |
that my son would be safe, and where is he? | 29:48 | |
You know, I want him to come home. | 29:50 | |
So... | 29:53 | |
It was September 11th | 30:02 | |
that really tipped at all for me | 30:09 | |
where I was worried because, you know, | 30:13 | |
last I heard he was in the mountains of Pakistan | 30:18 | |
and president Bush was talking about, | 30:20 | |
going to Afghanistan, | 30:25 | |
which is right on the border of Pakistan. | 30:28 | |
And I was worried that he would, they were gonna go | 30:30 | |
into Pakistan and that they would be bombing. | 30:33 | |
And that somehow I didn't, you know, I didn't know, | 30:36 | |
did he fall off a cliff? | 30:38 | |
I don't know. | 30:40 | |
I had horrible scenarios going through my mind | 30:41 | |
at the time of what could have happened to him, | 30:46 | |
getting sick because I knew that, you know, | 30:48 | |
his system was, it was fragile. | 30:51 | |
It was fragile here, he wasn't completely, | 30:53 | |
the picture of health when he left. | 30:59 | |
And he'd had some issues with his health when he was there. | 31:02 | |
So I didn't know he could have gotten sick. | 31:04 | |
I didn't know anything. | 31:06 | |
So I'm trying to remember at what point this was, | 31:11 | |
what month this was. | 31:18 | |
It was either October or November. | 31:22 | |
I was listening to Democracy Now, | 31:25 | |
and there was a Muslim theologian as a guest | 31:27 | |
of Andy Goodman on that day. | 31:35 | |
And he was talking about his experience. | 31:37 | |
He was from South Africa originally | 31:40 | |
and he had part of his education included | 31:42 | |
studying in the madrasa in Pakistan. | 31:49 | |
And I thought, oh, my I've got to talk to this man | 31:53 | |
because I was thinking, I have, you know, | 31:58 | |
anyway I have to talk to this man. | 32:01 | |
So I right away contacted | 32:03 | |
the program and got an email. | 32:06 | |
I emailed him and he emailed me that day within like hours. | 32:13 | |
And we were on the phone and we were talking | 32:18 | |
and he wanted me to meet somebody | 32:21 | |
that he knew here in San Francisco. | 32:24 | |
Cause at the time I think he was in New York teaching. | 32:26 | |
And I did, I met that person, he said, anyway, this | 32:30 | |
theologian was saying that I think, | 32:37 | |
I can't remember whether I brought it, | 32:41 | |
I wanted to go to Pakistan, and he said that he would go, | 32:42 | |
he would go with me. | 32:46 | |
He would take me cause he knew the madrasas. | 32:47 | |
And this other person would go with me. | 32:50 | |
Interviewer | The other person was Muslim too. | 32:54 |
- | Yeah, he was Muslim as well. | 32:56 |
And, so that was my, you know, | 32:59 | |
I was already in my mind planning to go. | 33:03 | |
Interviewer | He didn't meet John, and he didn't know? | 33:07 |
- | Yeah, he didn't know John. | 33:08 |
He hadn't met John. | 33:09 | |
And at that time I still didn't know where John was. | 33:12 | |
you know? | 33:15 | |
So it would have been like looking | 33:16 | |
for a needle in a haystack. | 33:17 | |
But in addition to that, to back up a bit | 33:21 | |
I had met a young man who worked at a electronic store | 33:24 | |
near where I lived, and I'd go into buy a TV one day. | 33:34 | |
And this was like the year before, I was like, | 33:39 | |
so this would've been the fall of 2000 when I met him. | 33:44 | |
And he was from Pakistan and I don't even know how | 33:48 | |
he got into the conversation about it. | 33:52 | |
I don't even know how the conversation started, | 33:55 | |
but by and by, we made a connection | 33:57 | |
and he invited me to a dinner. | 34:00 | |
It was a gathering of people. | 34:05 | |
And so we became somewhat friends that way, you know? | 34:07 | |
And so when John went missing, | 34:16 | |
I had the address of his school where John was writing. | 34:21 | |
He had been writing to me from, when he would write. | 34:26 | |
And I wrote to the Mufti there. but I am writing in English. | 34:30 | |
So I asked this man, if he could translate it for me. | 34:37 | |
So he translated the letter for me into | 34:41 | |
whatever that language is. | 34:44 | |
I don't know if it would have been or Arabic, anyway, | 34:47 | |
he translated a letter for me. | 34:49 | |
And so I sent this letter and then I got a letter | 34:52 | |
in return from this Mufti saying that... | 34:59 | |
(phone ringing) | 35:04 | |
My phone, I forgot to turn my phone off. | 35:05 | |
Interviewer | We'll take a break then you'll turn it off. | 35:08 |
- | Yeah, I think. | 35:09 |
I received a letter back from the Mufti that said | 35:11 | |
in essence that, you know, John was had been a good student | 35:18 | |
and that essentially, pretty much what John had said | 35:24 | |
that he would and that he was fine. | 35:29 | |
Interviewer | John was still there | 35:32 |
at the time you got that letter back? | 35:34 | |
- | He was not, he was not at the school, right? | 35:37 |
He was not at the school. | 35:40 | |
So, but still was concerning | 35:42 | |
because he didn't really tell me anything. | 35:46 | |
Interviewer | He didn't tell me where John was? | 35:48 |
- | He didn't tell me where John was. | 35:49 |
Interviewer | And when was- | 35:52 |
- | But I'm not sure, you know. | 35:53 |
This would have been, when did I get that letter? | 35:54 | |
That letter... | 35:57 | |
I honestly don't remember whether that was, | 36:00 | |
I can't remember the timing July or August. | 36:04 | |
as far as linear dates and stuff, Frank is your guy, not me. | 36:07 | |
I just can't keep it straight. | 36:13 | |
I get to, that's just like me in general. | 36:15 | |
But with this whole thing, it's not linear for me. | 36:19 | |
And it's just like, it's all notion. | 36:24 | |
So it's all kind of... | 36:28 | |
Interviewer | So it was really comforting or not really, | 36:31 |
if didn't help? | 36:33 | |
- | It was not really, | 36:34 |
because he didn't give really give me any real information. | 36:36 | |
You know, I want to know where he was. | 36:38 | |
And so I, you know, I did, I called Frank spoke to Frank, | 36:41 | |
I think it was in August. | 36:49 | |
You know, I'm losing my, | 36:52 | |
I don't remember what it was, but anyway, | 36:54 | |
I remember talking to Frank and telling him, | 36:56 | |
I was really concerned about it. | 36:58 | |
It might've been, it was after getting that letter | 36:59 | |
because he had the letter. | 37:06 | |
I wanted to go to the mosques. | 37:08 | |
I knew the mosques that John had gone to. | 37:10 | |
And I've never been to a mosque, but I was, I wanted to go, | 37:12 | |
but I being a woman, I thought, | 37:15 | |
I guess from the little that I had already started to learn | 37:19 | |
that women don't go as often and that it might be easier | 37:22 | |
for Frank to talk to people. | 37:27 | |
And so he, it first wasn't as concerned, | 37:30 | |
I think it's a difference between dads and moms. | 37:35 | |
He just, he thought, everything's fine, he'll be fine. | 37:37 | |
And I'm, you know, I'm just worried work. | 37:42 | |
And, but he did agree to go to the mosques. | 37:45 | |
Well, if you don't go, I'll go. | 37:52 | |
So I said, he agreed to go. | 37:53 | |
And took the letter with him and showed it to them. | 37:56 | |
People at the mosques remembered him as this young | 37:58 | |
earnest convert who was just looking to learn about Islam. | 38:02 | |
And, but that didn't, you know, | 38:09 | |
move things forward in terms of figuring out where he was. | 38:14 | |
So | 38:18 | |
it was until, well, actually I guess | 38:23 | |
my plans for going to Pakistan would have really | 38:27 | |
started to really come to seriously, you know | 38:32 | |
looking at flights and things just about the time | 38:35 | |
that the story broke for John in November. | 38:38 | |
Well, actually it broke in December, | 38:43 | |
but I remember the story of the uprising. | 38:46 | |
And that was a story that- | 38:49 | |
- | At the fortress? | |
- | At the fortress, that it was here, | 38:53 |
well it should have been a bigger story than it was, | 38:56 | |
but it was it was a story one day that it wasn't any more. | 38:58 | |
So I had no idea that John would have been there. | 39:02 | |
So Yeah, the next day heard, was when his cousin Tom, | 39:12 | |
who is also Muslim, sent me an email with a link | 39:20 | |
to an, I think it was MSNBC. | 39:27 | |
It was a article. | 39:32 | |
It wasn't a TV thing, It was an article, | 39:35 | |
with a photograph and it was this little photograph. | 39:37 | |
And he said, do you think this could be John? | 39:40 | |
And so I looked at it and it's like, you know | 39:44 | |
I knew my kid. | 39:47 | |
Yes, it was my... | 39:49 | |
I was horrified. | 39:51 | |
And so I called Frank right away and he came over. | 39:53 | |
I think he was somewhat in disbelief. | 39:58 | |
I came and looked at the screen and he was on his way | 40:02 | |
to actually go pick up Naomi who was in a play that evening. | 40:07 | |
And... | 40:11 | |
So it's like what do I do? | 40:19 | |
So I called the FBI in San Francisco. | 40:22 | |
And cause I thought everybody would know this story already | 40:28 | |
you know, about this fortress. | 40:32 | |
And they would have some handle on it. | 40:34 | |
And I don't know anything, how government works I suppose | 40:36 | |
at that moment. | 40:41 | |
And so they weren't helpful. | 40:42 | |
And they said, you know, call the State Department. | 40:45 | |
So I did. | 40:48 | |
And... | 40:50 | |
So I called the State Department and it was a weekend. | 40:53 | |
It was a Sunday. | 40:55 | |
And, I believe it, no, maybe it was a Saturday. | 40:57 | |
I can't remember now it was a weekend. | 41:02 | |
It was a weekend because the operator took my message | 41:04 | |
and cause I was in a panic, you know. | 41:10 | |
Interviewer | What were you asking? | 41:15 |
- | I was, I knew about this story. | 41:16 |
I wanted to know how to, you know, | 41:18 | |
I wanted to find out about my son. | 41:21 | |
I wanted to tell them, this is my son. | 41:22 | |
Because at the moment in this photograph | 41:25 | |
nobody knew who he was. | 41:28 | |
It was just an image. | 41:30 | |
They hadn't talked him or anything at that point | 41:32 | |
I don't think it was just, it was one of the images | 41:34 | |
of where they were taking the prisoners out | 41:37 | |
of the fortress and they had their arms behind their back | 41:42 | |
tied at the elbow. | 41:47 | |
And John was like, looking back. | 41:48 | |
And so that's how I, you know. | 41:52 | |
And I mean I haven't seen my kid in two years, | 41:54 | |
and this I haven't heard from him in months | 41:58 | |
and this is what I see. | 42:01 | |
And so I wanted to know more. | 42:03 | |
I want to help, you know, let them know this is my kid. | 42:07 | |
So I think the operator didn't quite know what to do | 42:14 | |
with me, but she... | 42:19 | |
I'm trying to remember, I can't remember the sequence | 42:22 | |
whether she connected me finally with someone | 42:24 | |
who was obviously in a, had a party she was at, | 42:27 | |
whoever the person was on duty, that weekend was at a party. | 42:30 | |
And she was nonplussed that I was taking her away | 42:33 | |
from her party to ask this question. | 42:37 | |
And she was of no help at all. | 42:43 | |
That was my first contact with the State Department. | 42:46 | |
First conversation, if you wanna call it that | 42:49 | |
with the State Department | 42:52 | |
I never heard from them again ever, ever after that, | 42:55 | |
never heard from them. | 42:58 | |
They never communicated with me or Frank. | 42:59 | |
I'd given them all number and I didn't get in touch. | 43:06 | |
So I thought, okay, but I didn't get anywhere there. | 43:10 | |
Who else can I call? | 43:12 | |
I called MSNBC. | 43:14 | |
And again, I, you know, I was in a panic | 43:16 | |
and they must've thought this was some crazy woman calling. | 43:20 | |
And I said, no, I'm telling you, this is my son. | 43:23 | |
And so they took my information and they had the reporter | 43:27 | |
who broke the story, gave him my contact information. | 43:31 | |
And he called me early the next morning. | 43:38 | |
And that was my first lesson in | 43:41 | |
how not to talk to the press. | 43:46 | |
Because I thought we were just having a conversation | 43:50 | |
and that he was letting me know how my how my kid was | 43:53 | |
and that he was safe. | 43:56 | |
He was being taken care of. | 43:58 | |
That I didn't have to worry. | 44:01 | |
Interviewer | That's what he told you? | 44:02 |
- | They were probably gonna get them him out of the country. | 44:04 |
They were probably gonna take them eventually | 44:05 | |
to the Germany. | 44:07 | |
They thought that he either they were gonna take him up | 44:08 | |
to this other prison. | 44:10 | |
The name escapes me. | 44:14 | |
(indistinct) | 44:15 | |
How do you? | 44:18 | |
Interviewer | (indistinct) | 44:19 |
- | Something like that? | 44:20 |
And, but then- | 44:22 | |
Interviewer | Who was the reporter. | 44:24 |
Is it the man who interviewed John later on? | 44:28 | |
- | It was, no. | 44:31 |
It was a young reporter. | 44:32 | |
Interviewer | That's okay. | 44:39 |
- | It's Co, I wanna say Collins, something Collins. | 44:40 |
I can't remember what it is. | 44:45 | |
Interviewer | And he assured you- | 44:46 |
- | He assured me that John would be fine not to worry | 44:48 |
that he'd be fine. | 44:50 | |
And then he proceeds to ask me questions like, | 44:51 | |
so what religion are you and your husband or his dad, | 44:53 | |
and how was, all these questions that like, | 44:59 | |
I think we were talking, it was real early in the morning. | 45:01 | |
And you know, I'm just telling him things. | 45:04 | |
And then he's asking my address. | 45:08 | |
Little did I now. | 45:11 | |
And so within, I don't know, a couple hours maybe | 45:15 | |
if it was that, that the press descends upon my home, | 45:20 | |
which at the time was a duplex | 45:27 | |
and there were two sets of them. | 45:30 | |
They were all over the, you know, | 45:31 | |
they were in the parking lot. | 45:34 | |
They were coming to my door and, you know, | 45:35 | |
I opened it a little bit and thinking that's, | 45:39 | |
cause the phone was starting to call, | 45:42 | |
you know, I'm was getting phone calls. | 45:43 | |
And I told them I didn't wanna talk, you know? | 45:46 | |
And so I'd no sooner close the door | 45:50 | |
and I'd get a phone call from the same person | 45:53 | |
I just said I don't wanna talk. | 45:55 | |
So they were relentless. | 46:01 | |
And they also went to my neighbors, you know. | 46:03 | |
They're really heartless | 46:07 | |
Interviewer | (indistinct) another ways that John was- | 46:12 |
- | No. | 46:15 |
Interviewer | It was all from you? | 46:16 |
- | It was just me. | 46:18 |
At that point it was just me. | 46:20 | |
And so- | 46:24 | |
Interviewer | Had they gone to Frank too? | 46:30 |
- | I didn't give, I don't believe I gave his address, | 46:33 |
but by and by, they found and they found him | 46:39 | |
and they'd be all over the lawn. | 46:41 | |
But they they took up residence in the parking lot. | 46:45 | |
I mean, this is my home and it's not just mine. | 46:48 | |
I'm, you know, I rent and these are my neighbors | 46:50 | |
who were great. | 46:54 | |
I mean, we can cut this later, but I felt like I had, | 46:59 | |
I had my pit bull on one side, | 47:03 | |
my German shepherd on the other cause they were like women, | 47:05 | |
and they were like, don't mess with her. | 47:07 | |
You know, it's like go away. | 47:11 | |
They were really, they were really great | 47:14 | |
defending and protecting me. | 47:15 | |
Interviewer | Did you get any official confirmation | 47:24 |
from anybody? | 47:25 | |
- | No, I never heard from anybody. | 47:26 |
No, no, nobody, no. | 47:28 | |
It was just media. | 47:30 | |
And I also, I called | 47:32 | |
I called Democracy, did called Democracy | 47:37 | |
or did I called up KPF, I called KPFA | 47:39 | |
thinking that they would know somebody | 47:42 | |
that I could call to help. | 47:44 | |
And | 47:47 | |
they wanted to put me on the air right away. | 47:54 | |
I said, I don't wanna talk, I just want some help. | 47:55 | |
I thought you guys could help me. | 47:58 | |
And, I think they might've suggested | 48:01 | |
calling Human Rights Watch. | 48:05 | |
And this journalists I spoke with initially had said, | 48:07 | |
do you mind if, I guess one of his cohorts called me, | 48:13 | |
which he did, | 48:18 | |
and I didn't really wanna talk to anybody about it. | 48:20 | |
I just wanted some help. | 48:23 | |
I wanted to know how my kid was. | 48:24 | |
I didn't have a story. | 48:26 | |
I just wanted to get, I just wanted, | 48:29 | |
I just wanted to take care of my family. | 48:31 | |
And... | 48:36 | |
So I called, she actually suggested calling | 48:40 | |
Human Rights Watch as well. | 48:44 | |
So I called, I remember calling Human Rights Watch | 48:45 | |
and they were not, I can't remember what the conversation | 48:48 | |
was, but they were not helpful. | 48:52 | |
Maybe they didn't know the story at the time, | 48:54 | |
but they weren't, they didn't wanna do anything about it. | 48:55 | |
And amnesty international. | 48:59 | |
I think I call the ACLU. | 49:00 | |
Did I call the ACLU | 49:03 | |
I think I called the ACLU. | 49:05 | |
Well, this was international. | 49:07 | |
So they couldn't, they didn't have anything to do with it. | 49:08 | |
All right. | 49:13 | |
So anyway, so I felt like I, you know, | 49:14 | |
I bombed on all three accounts. | 49:15 | |
Meanwhile, you know, there's more media coming | 49:18 | |
and I just gathered up what I needed. | 49:20 | |
Naomi was at Frank's. | 49:24 | |
Gathered pillows, just what I could carry | 49:26 | |
and just fled and just ran, | 49:33 | |
you know, just drove as fast as I could. | 49:38 | |
And to Frank's got Naomi and I already had | 49:42 | |
another safe house. | 49:46 | |
I just wanted to get away. | 49:47 | |
So I stayed with friends and I was probably out of my house | 49:50 | |
for the better part of three weeks, | 49:56 | |
maybe a little bit longer. | 50:00 | |
My friends were really kind, you know, people that knew me. | 50:03 | |
Like in San Anselmo, at the time I was living in Fairfax. | 50:09 | |
And I didn't really know anybody there. | 50:14 | |
I mean, I had to live there. | 50:16 | |
I had one friend in town, besides my neighbors | 50:17 | |
I mean, I was friendly my neighbors. | 50:21 | |
But I really, I didn't feel as close to Fairfax | 50:24 | |
as I did to San Anselmo. | 50:28 | |
And I was, it was just, it was terrible time. | 50:30 | |
It was terrible time. | 50:35 | |
I felt like I would tell people I was living like, | 50:36 | |
I was living as a vampire because I'd only go out at night. | 50:40 | |
Because I knew if I went out at night, I wouldn't | 50:44 | |
I probably wouldn't run into people that I knew | 50:48 | |
because it was too hard. | 50:52 | |
I just start to cry. | 50:54 | |
Interviewer | Had the story broken by then. | 50:56 |
- | It had broken. | 50:57 |
Oh yeah, it was everywhere. | 50:58 | |
In fact, after I left, I think that very day | 50:59 | |
I have a friend who has had for years worked in TV and radio | 51:03 | |
and it had broken, and she came | 51:12 | |
and she helped court there in the parking lot | 51:15 | |
for a little bit just to get them out of there. | 51:18 | |
And, you know, would say things to them, like shame on you. | 51:21 | |
You know, this is a member, especially people | 51:27 | |
there were people that she knew, | 51:30 | |
some of these rich reporters. | 51:31 | |
This is someone from our community, you know? | 51:33 | |
And anyway, she was able to kind of like the pied piper | 51:36 | |
get them to go to another location, to do their questioning. | 51:42 | |
I just discovered it was just it was all about the story, | 51:49 | |
but it doesn't matter what the story is, | 51:53 | |
and it doesn't matter what the facts facts are | 51:55 | |
because the bottom line is they need a story | 51:59 | |
and they will make it up if they have to. | 52:02 | |
And I had that experience with someone who I, you know, | 52:05 | |
from New York times, so I had to call. | 52:11 | |
And after I read something on the front page | 52:13 | |
of the newspaper, that was not, I had never said that. | 52:16 | |
and those things weren't true. | 52:20 | |
And I mean, it wasn't harmful, | 52:22 | |
but it wasn't anything I'd said. | 52:25 | |
And, you know, I, when I called her and she said, | 52:29 | |
well, you weren't available for comment. | 52:35 | |
I said, no, I wasn't available for comments. | 52:38 | |
So what, you just make it out of, pull it out of the air? | 52:40 | |
And says, well, you weren't available for comment. | 52:44 | |
And then she goes on to say, well, they were stringers. | 52:46 | |
And I said, it has your name on it. | 52:50 | |
Well, that's how New York times does it. | 52:53 | |
It has your name on it. | 52:54 | |
And so I said I just wish for a moment | 52:57 | |
people would just stop and think about | 53:00 | |
what this does to someone and a family. | 53:03 | |
I'm just trying to gather my family around | 53:08 | |
and take care of my family while the knife is being, | 53:11 | |
you know, I'm feel like I'm being stabbed in the heart over | 53:16 | |
and being twisted, you know? | 53:19 | |
And this is what the media does. | 53:22 | |
I had no idea that it was that bad. | 53:26 | |
I mean, I've seen news broadcast | 53:28 | |
where they go to people's homes | 53:31 | |
and people don't wanna talk, and it's like, | 53:33 | |
but to be in the midst of it was, it was... | 53:35 | |
Interviewer | Were trying to find about John | 53:44 |
in the meantime? | 53:45 | |
- | It was so painful. | 53:46 |
Meanwhile, no contact from the State Department. | 53:48 | |
Not returning calls. | 53:52 | |
And... | 53:55 | |
No, I didn't know anything. | 53:58 | |
And in that, Frank had contacted as soon as the story broke. | 53:59 | |
He did contact Jim Brosnahan the attorney who eventually | 54:03 | |
did take the case. | 54:10 | |
But he didn't get anywhere with him either. | 54:14 | |
There was no contact. | 54:16 | |
They just wouldn't communicate. | 54:18 | |
No, we were getting the news about him, about John | 54:26 | |
like everybody else on the news, the CNN report. | 54:29 | |
Interviewer | Well, what did you think | 54:38 |
when they called him (indistinct) Taliban? | 54:39 | |
Which should I assume they did, what were you thinking? | 54:42 | |
- | Well, that was the media, I knew that was the media. | 54:45 |
Or they needed, they need some kind of moniker forum. | 54:49 | |
Because it was a way of, | 54:54 | |
what's the worst thing you can say at that time? | 54:58 | |
And it was a way of demonizing him | 55:02 | |
and it just fed into the whole | 55:04 | |
spin that was being spun at that time. | 55:10 | |
You know, it was just and, | 55:17 | |
and it ran daily all day long, all day long for weeks. | 55:18 | |
At least it seemed that way to me, it was constant. | 55:27 | |
And every talking head that had access to a microphone | 55:31 | |
had something to say, | 55:35 | |
whether they knew anything about the story or not. | 55:37 | |
Like, for instance, I made the mistake | 55:40 | |
in the first moments that morning, the first morning | 55:42 | |
of saying that I thought John had been brainwashed. | 55:47 | |
Well, I wasn't thinking necessarily in the context of say | 55:52 | |
Patty Hearst, | 56:04 | |
but there's somewhere along the line, perhaps | 56:10 | |
in people that he met. | 56:13 | |
He was being, he was hearing an ideology. | 56:15 | |
I don't know, he's young. | 56:23 | |
I know what my youth was like. | 56:25 | |
And especially during the '60s. | 56:27 | |
And so... | 56:30 | |
But just that word brainwash | 56:36 | |
I cannot tell you how many people, | 56:40 | |
I mean, these are people, I can't remember their names now, | 56:42 | |
but people that you could see often on the news | 56:45 | |
talking about brainwashing. | 56:48 | |
It's like are you kidding me? | 56:51 | |
You can't come up with anything, | 56:53 | |
because they didn't have anything. | 56:55 | |
They didn't know the story. | 56:57 | |
And it was just pretty much what they were getting | 57:00 | |
probably from, I don't know. | 57:03 | |
Did they have inside leads to the government? | 57:07 | |
You know, it seems to be they were their mouthpiece | 57:10 | |
at the time. | 57:12 | |
I can really, some of this is gonna have to be cut | 57:14 | |
cause I hold the media so responsible | 57:18 | |
for so much of what happened in those early days. | 57:22 | |
I mean, not just John story. | 57:27 | |
I mean, through all through the Iraq war, | 57:29 | |
I mean just all of that. | 57:31 | |
Interviewer | Well, when did you finally hear something | 57:38 |
hard about John where you do an actual statement | 57:41 | |
from the administration? | 57:45 | |
- | I believe... | 57:52 |
Let me think. | 58:00 | |
I remember early, it was in December. | 58:03 | |
So it was around Christmas time | 58:07 | |
when there was a Barbara Walters interview | 58:10 | |
with George Bush and his wife. | 58:12 | |
And I believe it was that with, I didn't see the interview, | 58:17 | |
but there was like the lead up to it. | 58:21 | |
And it had been something about, | 58:26 | |
he made some comment about John. | 58:33 | |
You know, like I don't know what we're gonna do | 58:39 | |
with this young man or poor young man | 58:40 | |
or something like that. | 58:45 | |
The only thing, you know, we'd hear things from, | 58:49 | |
and I can't remember the timeline, | 58:51 | |
people that were most outspoken | 58:54 | |
were Ashcroft, John Ashcroft | 58:59 | |
and Donald Rumsfeld. | 59:10 | |
Interviewer | But no one spoke to you? | 59:13 |
- | Nobody spoke to me directly or Frank | 59:15 |
or the attorneys as far as I know. | 59:17 | |
Interviewer | So, you hadn't heard first information | 59:20 |
from anybody? | 59:22 | |
- | No, we just knew, we didn't know anything. | 59:25 |
And we couldn't communicate with them. | 59:28 | |
In fact, Frank wrote a letter, | 59:30 | |
Frank contacted the Red Cross, | 59:36 | |
he knew to do that. | 59:37 | |
I didn't even know to do that. | 59:39 | |
And he wrote a letter to John | 59:45 | |
and I think originally they weren't able to, | 59:48 | |
I could be wrong about this, but I don't think | 59:52 | |
they were able to deliver the letter at first. | 59:53 | |
Interviewer | So you didn't even know what John was | 59:57 |
or did you? | 59:59 | |
- | No, we didn't know, no. | 1:00:01 |
No. In fact, no, we didn't know. | 1:00:03 | |
No. Like I said we were getting the news the same way | 1:00:15 | |
everybody else was at the time. | 1:00:22 | |
And so I didn't... | 1:00:24 | |
Interviewer | Well, what was the first contact with John? | 1:00:29 |
- | First contact was after they brought him back here | 1:00:33 |
which was, | 1:00:37 | |
I wanna say February. | 1:00:44 | |
And during that time before we'd had, | 1:00:50 | |
we did get a letter from him through the Red Cross | 1:00:55 | |
stating that he was okay. | 1:01:00 | |
Interviewer | Was the letter redacted? | 1:01:06 |
- | I don't think so. | 1:01:09 |
I don't think so. | 1:01:10 | |
And no, the first contact, real contact we had with John | 1:01:14 | |
was when he came back and, | 1:01:18 | |
at the courthouse | 1:01:25 | |
Interviewer | How was that? | 1:01:26 |
- | Well, it was through a screen | 1:01:29 |
and so we were able to put our hands up and touch. | 1:01:34 | |
And it was great, I mean, | 1:01:40 | |
we were grateful to see each other, you know, | 1:01:43 | |
but he didn't have his glasses. | 1:01:46 | |
John wears glasses. | 1:01:50 | |
He can't, doesn't see. | 1:01:52 | |
He can see to read, but he can't see distance. | 1:01:55 | |
So he didn't have his glasses. | 1:01:59 | |
So | 1:02:00 | |
we met, it was just for a brief time in this room | 1:02:05 | |
where there was a guard so you couldn't really | 1:02:07 | |
have conversation, but he was glad to see us. | 1:02:11 | |
And we were certainly | 1:02:16 | |
happy, grateful, those words don't even touch it to see him. | 1:02:21 | |
And then I guess the attorneys met with him after we did. | 1:02:30 | |
And I remember they said that his comment was, | 1:02:37 | |
"boy, am I glad to see you guys." | 1:02:40 | |
Or something like that. | 1:02:42 | |
"Where am I ever glad to see you." | 1:02:43 | |
But then in the courtroom, when they brought John out | 1:02:46 | |
I know the media made a big deal about his not | 1:02:50 | |
looking to his parents or something, looking over at us | 1:02:52 | |
like as if like, there's this chasm between family and son. | 1:02:57 | |
He can't see, not to mention it's a courtroom. | 1:03:02 | |
All eyes are on, you know, it's like... | 1:03:08 | |
Anyway. | 1:03:12 | |
So that was our visit. | 1:03:17 | |
I didn't see him again to actually talk to him at all until | 1:03:20 | |
we were able to see him at the Alexandria jail. | 1:03:28 | |
Interviewer | How much after that? | 1:03:33 |
- | I don't remember. | 1:03:48 |
Well, I know it wasn't in February. | 1:03:51 | |
Interviewer | So at least a month or so? | 1:03:54 |
- | It was at least a month. | 1:03:55 |
- | So during this time, what were you thinking about John | 1:03:57 |
and all the media that heard about him? | 1:04:01 | |
What the administration was saying? | 1:04:04 | |
- | Well, I was scared to death | 1:04:06 |
because there were some people that were calling | 1:04:08 | |
for the death penalty for him. | 1:04:10 | |
And | 1:04:14 | |
I was angry. | 1:04:26 | |
I was really angry. | 1:04:27 | |
I was scared. | 1:04:30 | |
And... | 1:04:34 | |
Because I knew this wasn't, | 1:04:38 | |
John wasn't the person that they were | 1:04:41 | |
characterizing him to be. | 1:04:45 | |
And I know people will say, well that's cause he's your kid. | 1:04:48 | |
You know, it's like, I know that's not who he is | 1:04:54 | |
and that's not who he is. | 1:04:58 | |
- | I don't know I really lost faith in the government | 1:05:16 |
and the system and people that I had up until that time had | 1:05:21 | |
respect for. | 1:05:28 | |
And I was shocked that this person in particular | 1:05:31 | |
would have been one of the people that would have | 1:05:37 | |
been calling for the death penalty for my son | 1:05:40 | |
without knowing he hadn't even had a hearing. | 1:05:43 | |
He was being tried in the court of public opinion. | 1:05:46 | |
And I believe she's an attorney. | 1:05:50 | |
And I was, you know, I was... | 1:05:55 | |
And the fact that she was a woman, | 1:06:04 | |
you know, I guess that was it. | 1:06:06 | |
And I probably, I mean, everybody knows it | 1:06:07 | |
because we've said it so many times. | 1:06:10 | |
So it's Hillary Clinton. | 1:06:11 | |
You know, I was just shocked that she of all people | 1:06:13 | |
would say that. | 1:06:17 | |
And she wasn't the only one, but here this was | 1:06:21 | |
they didn't even know the story. | 1:06:25 | |
You know, they were just buying into the story | 1:06:27 | |
that everybody else had been hearing from the media | 1:06:29 | |
that was a myth. | 1:06:33 | |
It was like this mythology that was being created. | 1:06:35 | |
And, you know, it undermined my faith in any | 1:06:41 | |
chance that he would get a fear trial, you know, anywhere. | 1:06:51 | |
And also because of the tenor of the the climate | 1:07:04 | |
that we were living in then. | 1:07:08 | |
The people were, you know, they were scared, | 1:07:11 | |
there was Islamophobia. | 1:07:14 | |
And... | 1:07:16 | |
Interviewer | Did you have a chance to talk to John | 1:07:27 |
in Alexandria? | 1:07:28 | |
- | We talked, you know, everything | 1:07:30 |
any conversation we have even at that time was record. | 1:07:33 | |
Everything was being recorded and listened to. | 1:07:38 | |
So it makes it hard to have a candid conversation. | 1:07:40 | |
But we would talk about things | 1:07:46 | |
to the extent that he could talk about his time there. | 1:07:51 | |
One of the things that... | 1:07:58 | |
You know, one of the... | 1:08:02 | |
One of the things he was charged with was, | 1:08:04 | |
and it's only because he admitted to it, | 1:08:07 | |
it's not like they found him with it, | 1:08:09 | |
but was that he was carrying a firearm and a grenade. | 1:08:12 | |
And that charge carry the additional 10 years. | 1:08:16 | |
And that came at the suggestion of a recommendation | 1:08:22 | |
I believe from Donald Rumsfeld. | 1:08:27 | |
And John and all of those prisoners were disarmed. | 1:08:32 | |
They'd been disarmed. | 1:08:37 | |
They didn't have any weapons when they went in | 1:08:39 | |
except for one, I think that had held onto something. | 1:08:41 | |
He threw a grenade. | 1:08:43 | |
I think that was before they went into the fortress. | 1:08:44 | |
But John, during that whole time had his hands | 1:08:48 | |
behind his back. | 1:08:52 | |
He didn't have any weapons. | 1:08:53 | |
His hands were behind his back for the whole time. | 1:08:55 | |
His hands were behind his back. | 1:08:57 | |
And so when he came out of the fortress, he had no weapons. | 1:08:59 | |
He admitted because it was standard issue | 1:09:06 | |
for the Taliban soldiers to be given. | 1:09:08 | |
So in one of our conversations, I said to John, | 1:09:13 | |
I said, I'm sorry, but I just cannot, | 1:09:17 | |
I can't envision you ever holding a gun, using a gun. | 1:09:20 | |
- | And he just smiled, he said, "I can't either." | 1:09:25 |
You know, cause he didn't, he didn't. | 1:09:28 | |
So... | 1:09:33 | |
Anyway, so he was charged with like 10 counts and | 1:09:46 | |
they were all dropped except for the the one | 1:09:59 | |
of giving aid to the Taliban. | 1:10:03 | |
But it was more of, he broke an economic sanction, | 1:10:07 | |
which I don't believe he knew that even existed at the time. | 1:10:10 | |
Because when people have asked, | 1:10:16 | |
well, did you ever have conversations about the Taliban? | 1:10:17 | |
No, I didn't. | 1:10:20 | |
Because I didn't think it was anything | 1:10:22 | |
we didn't have conversation about ever. | 1:10:24 | |
You know, it was the farthest thing from my mind. | 1:10:26 | |
And... | 1:10:30 | |
Interviewer | How do you feel about the plea bargain? | 1:10:38 |
Did you, were you in favor of it? | 1:10:40 | |
- | What choice do we have? | 1:10:43 |
We had no choice. | 1:10:44 | |
He had no choice. | 1:10:45 | |
He was looking at three life terms. | 1:10:45 | |
And at that point in time and where the hearings were held, | 1:10:51 | |
he didn't stand a chance of, you know, | 1:11:06 | |
having any kind of unbiased | 1:11:09 | |
joy, you know, at the ti... | 1:11:20 | |
People would've had to been living under a rock at the time | 1:11:22 | |
to not know that what they thought they knew the story was. | 1:11:25 | |
And I feel like on some level they want, | 1:11:31 | |
they they needed something. | 1:11:35 | |
The government needed something to say, | 1:11:36 | |
you know, look we're doing our job. | 1:11:39 | |
We've got this war on terror going | 1:11:43 | |
and hey, look we got one and you know, | 1:11:44 | |
and they got this 20 year old kid | 1:11:48 | |
who thought that he was doing what | 1:11:54 | |
his faith required of him, which was in his interpretation | 1:12:00 | |
that if you are able bodied and you're Muslim | 1:12:07 | |
and you see other Muslim Muslims being oppressed | 1:12:11 | |
it is your obligation to do something about it. | 1:12:16 | |
And | 1:12:21 | |
he was young. | 1:12:25 | |
I don't think he, he was young, idealistic. | 1:12:28 | |
And I remember when I was young, I thought I knew it all. | 1:12:33 | |
And you couldn't tell me any different. | 1:12:37 | |
I could listen to you and I'd weigh it, | 1:12:40 | |
but I knew best, you know until I had my own experience | 1:12:43 | |
and I learned, yeah, you know, mom was right or yeah. | 1:12:48 | |
You know, my father was right or | 1:12:53 | |
that story really was true. | 1:12:57 | |
And John was like that, it was, | 1:13:01 | |
I think even if he had heard stories about the Taliban | 1:13:07 | |
were maybe negative, | 1:13:11 | |
he would still want to find out himself. | 1:13:15 | |
He'd want to see, is that true? | 1:13:18 | |
Is that true? | 1:13:20 | |
And I believe the people that he met in Pakistan | 1:13:22 | |
were maybe not like they were in Afghanistan | 1:13:26 | |
or that wasn't his experience, | 1:13:29 | |
that he didn't see any of that. | 1:13:31 | |
And you know, around the time that John was found | 1:13:33 | |
I, it's interesting how life throws you these things, | 1:13:41 | |
a friend of mine was living with a family at the time, | 1:13:51 | |
sharing a house with a family whose daughter at the time | 1:13:56 | |
had a Pakistani boyfriend who lived in Pakistan. | 1:14:03 | |
She'd met him when she was, I think she'd gone to school | 1:14:07 | |
in Pakistan or something, or anyway, maybe they met here. | 1:14:10 | |
I think they met here at university | 1:14:14 | |
and then he was in Pakistan and she'd visited him there. | 1:14:15 | |
And she was telling me that, yeah, she said | 1:14:19 | |
Taliban are everywhere. | 1:14:22 | |
You go to the cafe they're sitting right next to you. | 1:14:23 | |
They're just like other people, you know, it's not like, | 1:14:25 | |
and she said, she was young too, like John, | 1:14:28 | |
I think she was about John's age. | 1:14:31 | |
She says, it's not like they describe them here. | 1:14:34 | |
You know, they're not, you wouldn't look at them | 1:14:37 | |
and think they're terrorists. | 1:14:39 | |
And, but, you know, had we had the opportunity | 1:14:43 | |
to have a conversation about the Taliban | 1:14:49 | |
I would have told them what my views were | 1:14:50 | |
which their treatment of women | 1:14:55 | |
and denying them education and, | 1:14:59 | |
which is not part of Islam. | 1:15:03 | |
It's just not, it's some aberration and they've cultural | 1:15:06 | |
or something that they've developed. | 1:15:10 | |
But anyway, back to John's reasons for going | 1:15:15 | |
at the time that John went, which was in August | 1:15:19 | |
so it was pre 9/11, | 1:15:25 | |
he went thinking he would just be there for a time, | 1:15:27 | |
and that he would be kind of doing his duty, | 1:15:32 | |
it'd be a few months maybe | 1:15:34 | |
and then come back to Bannu, and then eventually come home. | 1:15:36 | |
At the time he was hearing stories | 1:15:42 | |
that the Northern Alliance were, | 1:15:43 | |
they were raping women and young girls | 1:15:49 | |
and probably not just, | 1:15:54 | |
so he went about finding how he could get involved. | 1:15:59 | |
And I don't know how you do that, | 1:16:03 | |
and neither did he I'm sure, | 1:16:07 | |
but he probably talked to people that led him to one person, | 1:16:09 | |
they led them to somewhere and by and by he wound up | 1:16:12 | |
where he did. | 1:16:18 | |
But it was not to fight Americans | 1:16:19 | |
because the Americans weren't there at the time. | 1:16:22 | |
And at the time Northern Alliance weren't our allies either. | 1:16:24 | |
So, you know, | 1:16:30 | |
people have said he just was in the wrong place | 1:16:36 | |
at the wrong time of history. | 1:16:38 | |
Because if it had been, if nine 11 hadn't happened | 1:16:42 | |
he could have had a life. | 1:16:47 | |
Interviewer | Do you have a question? | 1:16:57 |
Do you have a question? | 1:16:59 | |
Woman | No (indistinct) | 1:17:00 |
Interviewer | Well, after the plea bargain, | 1:17:03 |
did you feel better? | 1:17:06 | |
At least you knew your son was in America, | 1:17:07 | |
and at least you knew where he was gonna be, | 1:17:10 | |
even though for life for 20 years, going forward? | 1:17:11 | |
How'd you feel I guess, after the plea bargain? | 1:17:15 | |
- | Well, the immediate reaction was reality sunk in. | 1:17:24 |
20 years is a long time. | 1:17:35 | |
(inhales deeply) | 1:17:42 | |
(exhales deeply) | ||
But there, you know, at least there was the hope that | 1:17:45 | |
if he had to serve the entire sentence that | 1:17:56 | |
he could have a life when it came out. | 1:18:01 | |
And we also hope that over time that perhaps | 1:18:08 | |
the government and the public would | 1:18:16 | |
pull back some and maybe review the situation | 1:18:23 | |
and the circumstances and be more reasonable. | 1:18:28 | |
And John's never asked for pardon, | 1:18:33 | |
John's honest, honest, honest, honest to a full. | 1:18:36 | |
If you can be honest to a full, | 1:18:40 | |
and he's never denied what he did. | 1:18:42 | |
So he wasn't asking for a pardon, | 1:18:51 | |
but he would ask for his sentence to be commuted. | 1:18:52 | |
And up until this time it's been denied. | 1:18:55 | |
But as time has gone on, and I don't see a lot of progress | 1:19:03 | |
really and, there's been some, but not enough | 1:19:09 | |
in our assessment of those early years. | 1:19:14 | |
And particularly of that time. | 1:19:19 | |
And especially in light of what continues to go on | 1:19:27 | |
in Afghanistan and Pakistan | 1:19:29 | |
that my concern now is that, you know, | 1:19:37 | |
what kind of life is he gonna have when he comes out? | 1:19:46 | |
Because, | 1:19:49 | |
I don't know how safe he's gonna be. | 1:19:56 | |
I mean, you want your kids to be safe at any age. | 1:19:58 | |
Anybody you love. | 1:20:03 | |
But | 1:20:07 | |
they've... | 1:20:12 | |
Again, they've created like this mythology about my son | 1:20:24 | |
as to who he is, what he's capable of. | 1:20:28 | |
And I just, it's my fear is that he will never be able | 1:20:34 | |
to have a life here where he can return to a community | 1:20:41 | |
whether it's California or anywhere else, | 1:20:48 | |
wherever they release him | 1:20:51 | |
that he would be able to find a job that people are gonna | 1:20:55 | |
welcome him with open arms. | 1:20:58 | |
I mean, I know that this is a difficult journey for any | 1:21:03 | |
prisoner in the world, not just here to have to | 1:21:11 | |
navigate those waters | 1:21:22 | |
But... | 1:21:30 | |
Interviewer | Why do you think that America won't | 1:21:35 |
accept him when he's released? | 1:21:38 | |
What makes you think that? | 1:21:40 | |
- | Because of, I mean | 1:21:41 |
to this day, people are so ignorant of Islam | 1:21:47 | |
and Islamophobia is alive and well. | 1:21:51 | |
And John is practicing Muslim and that's not gonna change. | 1:21:57 | |
And because they described him as a terrorist, | 1:22:12 | |
even though all the terrorism charges were dropped, | 1:22:14 | |
all of them, as soon as that, the prosecuting attorneys | 1:22:17 | |
left that courthouse that day, they came out and said | 1:22:21 | |
I can't remember exactly what the terms were, | 1:22:26 | |
I wish I had done more research, refresh my memory, | 1:22:29 | |
but to the, in so many words that they had | 1:22:34 | |
gotten won. | 1:22:41 | |
And they continue to do it over the years | 1:22:43 | |
whenever there would be another terrorism case | 1:22:47 | |
they would bring out John's name | 1:22:50 | |
and John's name would be right there in the article. | 1:22:52 | |
What the relevance was, I don't know, | 1:22:55 | |
but they would, they would sandwich him between, | 1:22:58 | |
you know, Moussaoui and Richard Reed | 1:23:02 | |
and just to prove that he's one of them. | 1:23:07 | |
And when we would ask her retractions they wouldn't. | 1:23:11 | |
So I think some people think that by | 1:23:20 | |
doing a plea bargain, that somehow | 1:23:27 | |
you're taking a plea bargain because you really are guilty. | 1:23:29 | |
And, but this is, you know, | 1:23:34 | |
this is an option you have. | 1:23:39 | |
And... | 1:23:42 | |
I feel like I'm flooding with emotion. | 1:23:59 | |
So I'm not thinking straight. | 1:24:05 | |
Interviewer | Well, how has it been visiting with John | 1:24:06 |
today or even over the years as? | 1:24:09 | |
- | Well, when he first was placed in the federal system, | 1:24:14 |
he was placed in California in Victorville, | 1:24:21 | |
and it was a medium security prison. | 1:24:25 | |
And he was in general population, which meant that he | 1:24:28 | |
among other things, he could have visits with his family. | 1:24:36 | |
Had a point system, so they had I think 40 points a month. | 1:24:41 | |
And Frank and I would split it up. | 1:24:46 | |
So I'd go one weekend and he'd go another. | 1:24:50 | |
And one or the other kids would go with us. | 1:24:53 | |
And | 1:24:57 | |
we would be in this large room with other families | 1:25:02 | |
and we'd sit across from each other and may be able to | 1:25:06 | |
have food together from the vending machines and- | 1:25:08 | |
Interviewer | Could you hug? | 1:25:14 |
- | Oh, yeah we could hug we could hug, all of them. | 1:25:15 |
(sobbing) | 1:25:23 | |
So... | 1:25:26 | |
(sighs) | 1:25:31 | |
But that changed in 2006. | 1:25:35 | |
And I'd gone for a visit with his brother, | 1:25:41 | |
his older brother. | 1:25:46 | |
And I believe it was October. | 1:25:49 | |
And that visit was through a monitor. | 1:25:54 | |
I hadn't seen him in a month. | 1:26:02 | |
I think it was October, I saw him was in November. | 1:26:05 | |
And that was on a monitor. | 1:26:10 | |
And he was in shackles the whole time talking | 1:26:13 | |
holding the phone. | 1:26:19 | |
We were in the room with the families | 1:26:24 | |
all the other families, but he was the only one | 1:26:26 | |
on monitor. | 1:26:35 | |
And so after that visit | 1:26:38 | |
Interviewer | You know why that happened? | 1:26:41 |
- | No. | 1:26:42 |
No. They didn't tell us. | 1:26:51 | |
You know, I may have to back that up a bit. | 1:27:01 | |
I can't remember if they had put him in the shoe | 1:27:04 | |
at that point, they might've put him in the SHU. | 1:27:06 | |
For no reason. | 1:27:10 | |
Or no reason evident. | 1:27:11 | |
And that might be why. | 1:27:13 | |
Because even when he'd been put in the SHU before for | 1:27:15 | |
no reason. | 1:27:21 | |
Or I, | 1:27:22 | |
I know he'd been chastised for having spoken Arabic | 1:27:25 | |
at one point, but I don't think he was put in the SHU | 1:27:28 | |
for that. | 1:27:30 | |
But I know that there was at least one time | 1:27:32 | |
and they would have put all political prisoners | 1:27:37 | |
in the system, in the country, in the SHU. | 1:27:39 | |
If there was like an orange alert or something. | 1:27:45 | |
Anyway. | 1:27:50 | |
Anyway, so we were, yeah, so we were in the room | 1:27:55 | |
with the families and the following month, | 1:27:57 | |
yeah, I probably have my dates mixed up, but nevermind. | 1:28:05 | |
The following month we learned that | 1:28:08 | |
he'd been moved moved out of Victorville together. | 1:28:11 | |
And for a while, we didn't know where he was. | 1:28:18 | |
Then we learned he was in Oklahoma, | 1:28:22 | |
which is kind of like a transfer station, | 1:28:24 | |
transfer central for federal system. | 1:28:28 | |
I don't know if it's just for that part of the country or, | 1:28:31 | |
but he was in Oklahoma for a period of time. | 1:28:33 | |
And I don't believe we could communicate at all | 1:28:36 | |
by mail or if there was no mail going back and forth. | 1:28:40 | |
And he was held, I think for an extended time | 1:28:46 | |
because of weather. | 1:28:51 | |
Because then they drove him I think, to Florence, Colorado, | 1:28:53 | |
the super max. | 1:28:59 | |
And he was there for. | 1:29:01 | |
I don't think he was there for a whole year. | 1:29:06 | |
He probably, he got there in February, I believe. | 1:29:09 | |
And I believe he left in October, something like that. | 1:29:12 | |
Where he was in isolation | 1:29:17 | |
and visitation wasn't as often, I don't remember. | 1:29:21 | |
you know how long we had. | 1:29:27 | |
I'd seen him over the course of two days. | 1:29:29 | |
So it was like a certain number of hours in each day. | 1:29:32 | |
And you know, it just, it was through glass | 1:29:37 | |
and a telephone. | 1:29:41 | |
No other visitors. | 1:29:43 | |
There could not be any other visitors, | 1:29:45 | |
it just had to be one-on-one as my understanding. | 1:29:46 | |
Or maybe that's just the way it worked out. | 1:29:50 | |
Interviewer | No other visitors meaning | 1:29:52 |
you couldn't bring your kid with you? | 1:29:53 | |
- | I could bring a kid, but I mean, it wasn't like, | 1:29:55 |
you know, like some situations | 1:29:56 | |
there might be other it might be other prisoners | 1:29:58 | |
and their families. | 1:30:01 | |
And... | 1:30:06 | |
That place was awful. | 1:30:12 | |
I can remember the why lobby, it was like this, | 1:30:15 | |
I mean, a federal as far as a prison, | 1:30:20 | |
I mean, I have had only been to the one, | 1:30:23 | |
the two before, well, the jail and the prison in California. | 1:30:25 | |
But this was rather new. | 1:30:29 | |
And it was in the round and it was like their showpiece. | 1:30:32 | |
And I can remember, I'm just telling you this, | 1:30:36 | |
we don't have to keep it, | 1:30:38 | |
but before you walk through the iron bars doors, | 1:30:39 | |
there are photographs, | 1:30:45 | |
there are photographs, black and white glossy photographs | 1:30:48 | |
big photographs, because this is like the gem | 1:30:51 | |
of the federal system. | 1:30:53 | |
And with like razor wire gleaming. | 1:30:56 | |
And it's the Alcatraz, they call it the Alcatraz | 1:31:00 | |
of the Rockies. | 1:31:05 | |
And so that's one wall. | 1:31:08 | |
And then on the other is like a box, what do you call it? | 1:31:11 | |
You know, one of those glass cabinets | 1:31:17 | |
where they have their watch cap. | 1:31:19 | |
And I don't know if there was a t-shirt or well, cap. | 1:31:24 | |
What did they call it? | 1:31:30 | |
Whatever it was, it's Alcatraz of the Rockies. | 1:31:33 | |
It's like, I remember saying to one of the people | 1:31:36 | |
that took me back once it's like, are you proud of that? | 1:31:39 | |
I mean, really, is that something we wanna hold up? | 1:31:44 | |
This, I mean... | 1:31:46 | |
Anyway. | 1:31:49 | |
Interviewer | How did John handle isolation | 1:31:51 |
for those- | 1:31:52 | |
- | He seemed to be okay with it. | 1:31:53 |
I think partly because he didn't have to deal | 1:31:55 | |
with a roommate. | 1:31:58 | |
He didn't have to deal with a cellmate. | 1:31:59 | |
And he also, you know, at Victorville, | 1:32:00 | |
I mean, I think he made, | 1:32:03 | |
I guess if you could call them, | 1:32:09 | |
he made, I guess some friends, it's not like... | 1:32:10 | |
John said he could never really fully feel | 1:32:12 | |
like he could trust anybody. | 1:32:14 | |
I think in prison that's probably a good thing | 1:32:15 | |
to have that mentality because you never know. | 1:32:21 | |
But you also, I think would wanna know | 1:32:25 | |
that somebody's got your back. | 1:32:26 | |
You know if something were to happen. | 1:32:28 | |
So I think he did have probably some people | 1:32:30 | |
there that he knew. | 1:32:33 | |
But he did always have to be looking over his shoulder. | 1:32:34 | |
Cause he, I think within the first couple of weeks | 1:32:38 | |
he was jumped by another inmate who was | 1:32:40 | |
part of a white supremacy group. | 1:32:46 | |
And for that, they both were put in the shoe | 1:32:50 | |
and eventually that other inmate was transferred somewhere. | 1:32:53 | |
But so, you know, it was not an ideal circumstance for sure. | 1:33:00 | |
So I think he was okay with that. | 1:33:07 | |
And he could focus on his studies, his reading. | 1:33:13 | |
So, but it was hard seeing him there because it was so cold. | 1:33:22 | |
I remember driving up to the check-in booth | 1:33:28 | |
before you drive, cause it's way in the back, | 1:33:34 | |
the shoes way in the back the super max, | 1:33:36 | |
and the guard saying, oh, I'm so glad | 1:33:40 | |
I don't work back there. | 1:33:45 | |
It's like, well, that's somebody who's free, you know? | 1:33:46 | |
And he doesn't even, this job to be a garden | 1:33:50 | |
doesn't wanna work there. | 1:33:53 | |
Because it's, I don't know if it's all underground, | 1:33:55 | |
but where I saw him as kind of like you go down. | 1:33:58 | |
Interviewer | Did John see the sunlight. | 1:34:04 |
- | I think he could see it like a narrow, | 1:34:06 |
you could see the windows were really narrow. | 1:34:08 | |
So, you know, really narrow. | 1:34:12 | |
And they don't, they didn't get much in the way | 1:34:14 | |
of exercise there either. | 1:34:16 | |
Anyway. | 1:34:20 | |
So he was there till, I believe... | 1:34:22 | |
Excuse me, I need to use a tissue. | 1:34:25 | |
Interviewer | Sure. | 1:34:27 |
Luke give a tissue. | 1:34:28 | |
- | I have one. | 1:34:30 |
Interviewer | Okay. | 1:34:31 |
- | Yeah. | 1:34:32 |
Do I need to turn this. | 1:34:32 | |
Interviewer | Understand the pain that you | 1:34:33 |
and the family have gone through. | 1:34:35 | |
and does he understand the way America has looked at him | 1:34:37 | |
how they perceive him. | 1:34:42 | |
- | I think I, he can only understand it | 1:34:45 |
to the extent that he's witnessed it I think. | 1:34:48 | |
In terms of his, you know | 1:34:57 | |
concerns about the family. | 1:35:01 | |
And | 1:35:04 | |
I think it upsets him to a great deal. | 1:35:11 | |
I mean, to the extent that a visit we had not too long ago, | 1:35:13 | |
it's been in the last year or so, | 1:35:17 | |
where our visit was curtailed. | 1:35:20 | |
I can't remember. | 1:35:27 | |
Did I tell you this on camera or off? | 1:35:28 | |
I already talked to this off camera. | 1:35:29 | |
That because of the phone system that they have in Indiana | 1:35:33 | |
it's just like an, you know, it's like a wall phone | 1:35:42 | |
it's all style wall phone, dial wall phone, | 1:35:44 | |
and it has a lever on the side for, to increase loudness. | 1:35:46 | |
And so you have it all the way up. | 1:35:52 | |
And there are times when I can barely hear him | 1:35:56 | |
or he can't hear me. | 1:36:00 | |
And you know, I've been he's been told to speak up, speak up | 1:36:02 | |
or the visit is gonna be canceled or they'll tell me | 1:36:05 | |
speak up, speak up or the visit gonna be canceled. | 1:36:07 | |
And we're both speaking, John's soft-spoken. | 1:36:10 | |
He just is. | 1:36:13 | |
I think I probably am, although in my head | 1:36:14 | |
it doesn't sound that way | 1:36:16 | |
But you know, I'm not loud. | 1:36:19 | |
And so I would speak as loud as I could, | 1:36:24 | |
but that still wouldn't be enough. | 1:36:27 | |
And on one of these visits, | 1:36:29 | |
the guard that was sitting outside of the room | 1:36:32 | |
where we were talking, | 1:36:36 | |
it has a glass, at the time though, | 1:36:37 | |
I'm not sure if it did have that glass they've changed it. | 1:36:42 | |
But anyway, the guard came in to say that, | 1:36:46 | |
ma'am, you're gonna need to speak up | 1:36:48 | |
or the visit's going to be, we will have to be curtailed. | 1:36:51 | |
Interviewer | Why did they want you to speak up? | 1:36:53 |
- | Because they couldn't hear me. | 1:36:55 |
Because the conversations are being recorded. | 1:36:57 | |
So the person listening to the conversation | 1:37:00 | |
couldn't hear us. | 1:37:02 | |
And over the years we've had it, Frank, | 1:37:05 | |
I mean, John and I have had this conversation about, | 1:37:07 | |
you know, well fix the phone. | 1:37:09 | |
I mean, what's it gonna take if you wanna hear us fix it. | 1:37:12 | |
And so... | 1:37:18 | |
So anyway, so I thought I was talking, | 1:37:23 | |
so then apparently I wasn't talking loud enough, again | 1:37:25 | |
and then counselor for the unit came and, | 1:37:27 | |
was yo know very nice | 1:37:32 | |
and said you're gonna need to speak up | 1:37:33 | |
or we're gonna have to cancel the visit. | 1:37:36 | |
And I said, I, is as loud as I'm talking, | 1:37:38 | |
I said, it's been this way for six years, | 1:37:43 | |
let's see what's it been six years. | 1:37:45 | |
It's been this way ever since he got here, it's the phone. | 1:37:47 | |
And he said, I understand, I understand. | 1:37:52 | |
And so then the same visit, he came back. | 1:37:54 | |
I believe he came back a second time and said | 1:38:03 | |
I can't remember, it was the first, | 1:38:08 | |
if it was that visit combined in, | 1:38:09 | |
my memory's a little shaky here, | 1:38:10 | |
but he came back and said, you know, | 1:38:14 | |
the visit is, something he said | 1:38:16 | |
that there would not be a visit the following day. | 1:38:20 | |
I had a visit scheduled the following day. | 1:38:22 | |
Cause he gets eight hours a month. | 1:38:24 | |
So I was seeing him for hours on one day on four hours | 1:38:26 | |
the next. | 1:38:28 | |
That they'd gotten word from Washington, | 1:38:30 | |
that they were gonna be, | 1:38:33 | |
I think he said then they were gonna be working | 1:38:37 | |
on the phones. | 1:38:39 | |
And so I said, you know, this isn't right. | 1:38:41 | |
And he said, well, you can stay a little bit longer. | 1:38:47 | |
We'll let you stay like an hour longer or something. | 1:38:53 | |
And we'll get you something from the vending machine. | 1:38:55 | |
It's like, I don't want anything for the vending machine. | 1:38:57 | |
I did stay a little while longer, as long as I could. | 1:38:59 | |
And I was just, I was angry. | 1:39:04 | |
Because this has been going on for years. | 1:39:10 | |
And so the unit counselor | 1:39:14 | |
and the man who listens to us were there to walk me back | 1:39:20 | |
out to the lobby. | 1:39:27 | |
So I go back to my car and after we left the building | 1:39:28 | |
they apologized for what had happened. | 1:39:33 | |
And the one said... | 1:39:36 | |
I think I might've said something like, | 1:39:45 | |
I find it hard to believe that you don't know who the, | 1:39:48 | |
that people in Washington don't know who's visiting. | 1:39:51 | |
Well, you know, we just found this out ourselves. | 1:39:55 | |
I think they got enough, | 1:39:58 | |
they've got an email or something that morning. | 1:39:58 | |
We don't know why, you know. | 1:40:01 | |
So the man who listens to us said, | 1:40:05 | |
well, it's not like he said, meaning John, | 1:40:09 | |
cause he's listening to the conversation. | 1:40:11 | |
It's not like he said, that it's some kind of conspiracy. | 1:40:13 | |
And I said to him, well, I said, well, I don't know that it, | 1:40:19 | |
whether it is or not, but if I was in his place, | 1:40:22 | |
I might think so because this just happened to his father | 1:40:26 | |
the month before, and his sister who were visiting. | 1:40:29 | |
And the visit was cut short by a day. | 1:40:32 | |
And the other thing is, you know, | 1:40:37 | |
I could have flown back if I could have gotten a flight | 1:40:44 | |
that day, but it was already late in the afternoon. | 1:40:46 | |
And I might've had to pay more. | 1:40:50 | |
It's expensive for me to fly. | 1:40:53 | |
And really wasn't worth it at that point. | 1:40:57 | |
So I stayed another night in the hotel. | 1:40:59 | |
If I'd known, it was only gonna be one night, | 1:41:04 | |
I only would have had to pay for one night | 1:41:06 | |
and just a flight for a couple of days. | 1:41:09 | |
Well, it still would've been the same price, but anyway. | 1:41:13 | |
I wouldn't have lost a day of work. | 1:41:17 | |
So | 1:41:19 | |
he said, well it's not just you, | 1:41:23 | |
it's happened to another family | 1:41:25 | |
or another couple of families. | 1:41:28 | |
Family that drove up from Texas to Indiana | 1:41:29 | |
and they get to visit once a year with a bunch of kids, | 1:41:32 | |
and their visit was cut short | 1:41:37 | |
which you know, it's just cruel. | 1:41:40 | |
I mean, hey, the visit is already through glass | 1:41:42 | |
and a telephone in which you can't hear very well. | 1:41:46 | |
It's being recorded, | 1:41:49 | |
so you can't really have a heart to heart conversation. | 1:41:50 | |
It's hard for me. | 1:41:55 | |
It's just hard for me knowing that somebody is like | 1:41:56 | |
listening to me or looking over my shoulder. | 1:41:58 | |
The door now it's cut out, | 1:42:01 | |
used to have like a little window, | 1:42:03 | |
now it's got a full glass window | 1:42:04 | |
with a guard sitting at a desk. | 1:42:06 | |
So he's watching us. | 1:42:08 | |
I get locked in. | 1:42:11 | |
John's locked in, I'm locked in. | 1:42:13 | |
It's like, where am I gonna go? | 1:42:16 | |
Interviewer | Is John shackled? | 1:42:20 |
- | He's shackled before he comes into the visiting room. | 1:42:22 |
And then before he leaves, they shackled him. | 1:42:26 | |
Interviewer | And so going back to that question, | 1:42:28 |
are you able to tell John how the family | 1:42:30 | |
has felt over the years? | 1:42:34 | |
Or do you not want to tell John? | 1:42:36 | |
- | We've talked about it? | 1:42:38 |
I mean, he knows. | 1:42:39 | |
He does. | 1:42:40 | |
So anyways, after this visit, he wrote a letter | 1:42:41 | |
to the warden in which he expressed his | 1:42:44 | |
displeasure with what happened, | 1:42:52 | |
and that he wanted his mother compensated for her expense. | 1:42:54 | |
And he was written up or whatever, you know, for- | 1:43:02 | |
Interviewer | For writing that letter? | 1:43:08 |
- | For having done that. | 1:43:09 |
And I told him, I said, well it's not like the government's | 1:43:12 | |
not gonna ever give you your money back. | 1:43:14 | |
They're not gonna do anything, | 1:43:14 | |
they're not gonna do that, John. | 1:43:16 | |
I appreciate the gesture, but, you know. | 1:43:17 | |
But it got him into some hot water. | 1:43:19 | |
And so I think he does feel it, you know? | 1:43:22 | |
I mean, I know he does. | 1:43:27 | |
I know he does. | 1:43:28 | |
It's not a matter of thinking, I know he does. | 1:43:30 | |
In terms of how the country feels about him, | 1:43:32 | |
I think he only to the extent that he can | 1:43:36 | |
from reading newspapers, magazine articles | 1:43:39 | |
because he doesn't really watch television. | 1:43:43 | |
And | 1:43:46 | |
I don't think can really know, unless you're watching, | 1:43:50 | |
you know, I don't think you can really, | 1:43:52 | |
unless you're watching TV and you get a sense of... | 1:43:55 | |
Or if, he has no idea, really, he has no idea. | 1:44:01 | |
He might think he does, he has no idea | 1:44:06 | |
what it was like those first those first months, | 1:44:08 | |
those first couple of years, he has... | 1:44:11 | |
He just can't- | 1:44:13 | |
Interviewer | What was like for you | 1:44:14 |
or what was like for him? | 1:44:15 | |
- | For all of it, I think. | 1:44:16 |
Yeah. I don't think so because he was isolated from it. | 1:44:19 | |
He wasn't watching TV, he was reading. | 1:44:22 | |
And.... | 1:44:26 | |
You know, I would have been in the same place | 1:44:31 | |
if I hadn't been watching TV, watching CNN. | 1:44:33 | |
I gave up reading newspapers cause it was all lies. | 1:44:38 | |
Interviewer | Again what you're saying Marilyn | 1:44:43 |
do you think he's afraid, that when he's released | 1:44:45 | |
he's in danger? | 1:44:48 | |
Is he aware of that? | 1:44:49 | |
- | I think he's aware of it. | 1:44:50 |
And I think, I think he's very aware of it. | 1:44:51 | |
Yeah. | 1:44:56 | |
And that he might choose to live somewhere else. | 1:44:58 | |
If another country will take him. | 1:45:00 | |
That's another one, we don't know. | 1:45:03 | |
I mean, there are countries who have denied any kind of | 1:45:06 | |
amnesty or, | 1:45:14 | |
what's the word I'm looking for? | 1:45:19 | |
Exile status, what is that? | 1:45:23 | |
You know, like a refuge for him. | 1:45:25 | |
I don't know, that is a big concern. | 1:45:32 | |
That's a big concern for all of us. | 1:45:34 | |
And where that might be. | 1:45:38 | |
You know. | 1:45:43 | |
Interviewer | How's his, how are his spirits today? | 1:45:48 |
- | Well, last I talked to him they were good. | 1:45:53 |
I mean, you know, it's a hard one to... | 1:45:57 | |
You know it's a hard question, | 1:46:01 | |
I mean, it's a hard question to answer because... | 1:46:02 | |
His spirits are good given where he is. | 1:46:05 | |
To me, he seems shut down to some extent. | 1:46:13 | |
I mean, he wouldn't be. | 1:46:16 | |
It's... | 1:46:18 | |
Interviewer | (indistinct) Has a question. | 1:46:22 |
Woman | I have one question about you and your world life. | 1:46:24 |
As you go through your day today now, | 1:46:28 | |
do you feel like you have a relative normal | 1:46:32 | |
or is this always on, is this something that's like, | 1:46:36 | |
is as it's always on your mind | 1:46:41 | |
and you can't get away from it? | 1:46:43 | |
(sighs) | 1:46:48 | |
- | Is my life normal? | 1:46:49 |
No, no it's not, my life's not normal. | 1:46:51 | |
No. | 1:46:55 | |
It's always there. | 1:46:56 | |
I'm able to work. | 1:46:58 | |
I've fortunately found a job where, I mean, | 1:47:00 | |
for a long time, | 1:47:05 | |
it really held me back. | 1:47:10 | |
I couldn't get a job. | 1:47:12 | |
I'd had a job, I was kept on, I left it. | 1:47:14 | |
And then I, it took me a while to finally get a job. | 1:47:23 | |
It was through a friend. | 1:47:25 | |
I worked there briefly because my boss was awful. | 1:47:28 | |
But each time I had to put myself out there again | 1:47:34 | |
it was hard because it's like | 1:47:37 | |
what if somebody recognizes me? | 1:47:38 | |
Cause I mean to this day I'll have people, | 1:47:40 | |
some people, I mean, it's not as often, | 1:47:42 | |
but people that will recognize me. | 1:47:44 | |
And usually people are very kind, they're very kind, | 1:47:45 | |
they're very supportive. | 1:47:48 | |
But I have had occasions, it was more early on | 1:47:50 | |
where people would like kind of just stare. | 1:47:54 | |
I had that happened on the airplane once, | 1:47:57 | |
this one man have just kept turning looking back at me. | 1:47:59 | |
It's like, it was so rude. | 1:48:02 | |
And, or, I took Naomi to get her hair cut | 1:48:06 | |
and there was somebody and he was just like, | 1:48:08 | |
he was just like stare at me. | 1:48:10 | |
And then someone actually that I knew, | 1:48:15 | |
I've known from school who had been a parent of, who I knew, | 1:48:18 | |
I mean, weren't close friends, but you know, | 1:48:22 | |
her daughter Naomi were friends and she just, | 1:48:26 | |
as if I didn't exist, she just walked right by me. | 1:48:29 | |
Right by me. | 1:48:33 | |
But you know, I had to learn that, | 1:48:36 | |
I just have had to let that kind of stuff go. | 1:48:39 | |
I don't have any control over people's opinions. | 1:48:42 | |
And yet I'd still in my mind, I do wonder | 1:48:45 | |
well, what would people think if they knew? | 1:48:49 | |
So that was a concern whenever I would go | 1:48:52 | |
to put a job application and be being careful. | 1:48:54 | |
When I went back to school, I got my bachelor's. | 1:48:57 | |
I finally got my bachelor's after many, many many years | 1:48:59 | |
in 2004. | 1:49:03 | |
And I went back because I wanted to honor my parents. | 1:49:04 | |
I was the first person in my family to have gone to college. | 1:49:09 | |
So I did that. | 1:49:12 | |
But the intention was to go into social work or teaching, | 1:49:13 | |
which, and would have been public school. | 1:49:17 | |
I wanted public school. | 1:49:19 | |
But both would have been public sector. | 1:49:22 | |
And I just thought if they knew | 1:49:25 | |
or if they had the inkling of who I was, | 1:49:28 | |
not that I'm anybody, but that my son is who he is? | 1:49:31 | |
That that would be enough to like, no, sorry, you know, | 1:49:35 | |
this isn't a good time or you're not the candidate. | 1:49:40 | |
So... | 1:49:44 | |
Or if I got a job as a teacher, | 1:49:47 | |
It would take maybe a parent saying something | 1:49:49 | |
or I don't know. | 1:49:52 | |
I could have been worrying for nothing, I don't know. | 1:49:54 | |
But I have a friend who was a teacher who said, | 1:49:58 | |
no you could be right about that. | 1:50:00 | |
So yeah, it did color in terms of my friends, | 1:50:04 | |
I have friends that I had before. | 1:50:12 | |
I've lost maybe a couple because of it. | 1:50:15 | |
And | 1:50:22 | |
I've made friends because of it through it, | 1:50:28 | |
or, you know, in spite of. | 1:50:32 | |
And, but in terms of like | 1:50:35 | |
a basic thing as to a relationship? | 1:50:38 | |
I can't do it. | 1:50:45 | |
(sobbing) | 1:51:02 | |
(crying) | 1:51:10 | |
I think it colors everything. | 1:51:16 | |
Because I would like so much to have someone in my life | 1:51:22 | |
that I could hold on to, and could hold me. | 1:51:28 | |
It's really hard to hug yourself. | 1:51:31 | |
And someone that would be there that would, | 1:51:35 | |
that would have the courage to take it on. | 1:51:40 | |
And you don't have a package deal. | 1:51:45 | |
Even though I don't have little kids at home, | 1:51:50 | |
you know, it's my family. | 1:51:53 | |
So... | 1:51:58 | |
Interviewer | Are you saying partners have | 1:52:03 |
moved away from you when they found out who you are? | 1:52:08 | |
- | No, I haven't had any partners. | 1:52:09 |
I haven't even put myself, | 1:52:11 | |
I haven't been able to put myself out there. | 1:52:13 | |
Interviewer | Are you afraid of what | 1:52:20 |
they're gonna have to live with? | 1:52:21 | |
- | Yeah. But they wouldn't wanna be that close, you know? | 1:52:23 |
Yeah. I mean, it's probably, it's irrational thinking. | 1:52:25 | |
I know that on some level it's irrational thinking | 1:52:28 | |
and more so, you know, years ago, maybe not so much now, | 1:52:33 | |
but... | 1:52:40 | |
Yeah, it's just what it is for me. | 1:52:47 | |
And yet, you know, where I work now | 1:52:54 | |
and I do work at this school and, | 1:52:57 | |
I don't know, I used to... | 1:53:03 | |
At first I thought I was anonymous. | 1:53:05 | |
And then apparently a couple of teachers figured out | 1:53:07 | |
who I was and then the word spread | 1:53:10 | |
and then someone else knew. | 1:53:13 | |
But I still thought that I was anonymous. | 1:53:15 | |
And I think I am to some extent, because | 1:53:17 | |
a couple of people that I, you know, | 1:53:21 | |
and I'm close, I wouldn't say I'm close to everybody, | 1:53:22 | |
but I love the people I work with. | 1:53:25 | |
I work at like a really wonderful place. | 1:53:27 | |
And I was told by one of these teachers | 1:53:30 | |
that you don't have to worry. | 1:53:32 | |
You don't have to worry about the people here. | 1:53:34 | |
But these people that I have become closer to didn't know, | 1:53:40 | |
and, but you know, my boss knows. | 1:53:44 | |
I mean, people, I felt like needed know | 1:53:48 | |
in case anything should come up, I wanted them to know. | 1:53:51 | |
But I don't know that something, | 1:53:53 | |
I think at least I've heard one family knows, | 1:53:55 | |
and that hasn't doesn't seem to have affected our contacts. | 1:54:01 | |
So... | 1:54:10 | |
I lost my train of thought. | 1:54:16 | |
Interviewer | You're very aware, | 1:54:17 |
I mean, obviously every relationship every friendship, | 1:54:19 | |
you're very aware of- | 1:54:23 | |
- | It's trust. | 1:54:25 |
You know, what it comes down to trust. | 1:54:26 | |
And that was that, that's what was broken by all this. | 1:54:28 | |
It's just trust. | 1:54:34 | |
I've always trusted in the the goodness of everybody | 1:54:38 | |
even when people have gone bad, but at their core, | 1:54:45 | |
they're good. | 1:54:48 | |
It's how we come in, we come in and good. | 1:54:49 | |
And at our core we're good. | 1:54:52 | |
And... | 1:54:54 | |
It's hard to trust, cause I feel like | 1:55:01 | |
there have been times since then, you know, | 1:55:03 | |
like with the media where I've misplaced my trust in people | 1:55:05 | |
and they've turned around and stabbed us in the back. | 1:55:09 | |
They have misrepresented themselves | 1:55:15 | |
and then they've gone on to misrepresent us. | 1:55:18 | |
Yeah. It's, that's where of the hardest things for me is | 1:55:26 | |
having lost. | 1:55:31 | |
Woman | Do you any bitterness towards Frank | 1:55:34 |
for letting him go? | 1:55:36 | |
- | Bitterness? Yeah, I do. | 1:55:37 |
But I know he loves him, you know? | 1:55:47 | |
Yeah, for, you know, having sent him the money to travel | 1:55:54 | |
and not tell me being left out of the loop. | 1:55:57 | |
Woman | And do you feel like your other children | 1:56:10 |
have been able to pick up the pieces and move on? | 1:56:11 | |
(Marilyn sighs) | 1:56:17 | |
Or (indistinct) | ||
something you need to hide in this world? | 1:56:19 | |
- | I believe. | 1:56:22 |
I believe it is for my oldest, especially. | 1:56:24 | |
Because he and John are closer in age | 1:56:33 | |
and I think he felt responsible in some way | 1:56:35 | |
that he wasn't able to prevent any of this happening. | 1:56:39 | |
That, I don't know, you know, how siblings are. | 1:56:46 | |
You can think that, you know, somehow you're responsible. | 1:56:51 | |
I don't know. | 1:56:57 | |
So I'd say it's been harder for him. | 1:57:00 | |
His sister is, | 1:57:04 | |
you know, was, had a different relationship with her brother | 1:57:10 | |
because there she was the baby, he's eight years older | 1:57:14 | |
and he would talk to her and read to her | 1:57:21 | |
when she was in utero. | 1:57:25 | |
I mean, they had relations, they were bonded before | 1:57:26 | |
Naomi was born and he kind of took her under his wing. | 1:57:28 | |
So when this all broke, I can remember | 1:57:40 | |
her school was really good about protecting her. | 1:57:44 | |
Cause the media would try to go there | 1:57:46 | |
of all things to interview a little girl. | 1:57:51 | |
And there might've been, there was a student or two | 1:57:57 | |
that would say things about him, and Naomi | 1:58:01 | |
stand up for her brother. | 1:58:04 | |
Nobody's gonna mess with her brother. | 1:58:07 | |
Mess with her over her brother. | 1:58:09 | |
But it's been hard, it's been really hard on her. | 1:58:14 | |
It's been really hard. | 1:58:16 | |
But I think she's been able to get on with her life. | 1:58:27 | |
And my son has gotten on with his life now. | 1:58:31 | |
But those, those early years were really really hard. | 1:58:33 | |
And then you know it's hard not seeing him. | 1:58:38 | |
She doesn't get to see him as often because of, | 1:58:40 | |
both of them, their lives, they're working. | 1:58:45 | |
I think it's hard for them seeing, you know, | 1:58:59 | |
what their parents have had to go through. | 1:59:02 | |
Woman | Any final thoughts you wanted to share or? | 1:59:16 |
- | I can't even think right now. | 1:59:35 |
Interviewer | Well, you're disappointed in our country. | 1:59:36 |
You kind of said that, but... | 1:59:38 | |
As you're talking, I'm thinking, you know, | 1:59:44 | |
that's one of the trust that you've had that are- | 1:59:49 | |
- | Oh, I'm disappointed. | 1:59:51 |
You know, and I often recall something my father said | 1:59:52 | |
when John went to Yemen the first time, | 1:59:59 | |
my father was not happy to hear about it. | 2:00:00 | |
He said, "You're never safe when you leave these shores." | 2:00:07 | |
And I really didn't know what he meant by that. | 2:00:12 | |
Cause I thought, well, he'd been in World War II. | 2:00:14 | |
He left, you know, he went to the Philippines and came back | 2:00:18 | |
and I knew lots of people that had traveled, | 2:00:23 | |
gone to school in Europe, traveled, | 2:00:27 | |
vagabond and around the world. | 2:00:31 | |
And they came back, everybody was fine, | 2:00:36 | |
but what I didn't realize | 2:00:38 | |
and I probably didn't think of it in this context | 2:00:40 | |
when he said it to me, | 2:00:42 | |
but that you're not safe from your own country. | 2:00:43 | |
If once you leave these shores, you're on your own. | 2:00:49 | |
And... | 2:00:53 | |
(sighs) | 2:00:58 | |
I could probably take a break. | 2:01:07 | |
Interviewer | Sure. | 2:01:08 |
- | If I may. | |
Interviewer | We can end it too or wind up- | 2:01:09 |
Woman | Yeah, I think. | 2:01:11 |
Interviewer | I think it's fine if- | 2:01:12 |
Woman | Yes. | 2:01:13 |
Interviewer | ...to end it. | 2:01:14 |
So is that okay with you? | 2:01:15 | |
- | Yeah. | 2:01:16 |
Interviewer | Johnny has to take 20 seconds | 2:01:17 |
of quiet time of that he just winds the camera just first. | 2:01:20 | |
- | Oh, with me sitting here. | 2:01:27 |
- | For room time, yeah you sit there. | 2:01:28 |
He doesn't need film on you, he just needs the room- | 2:01:30 | |
- | Oh okay. | 2:01:32 |
Cameraman | Begin room time. | 2:01:34 |
End room time. | 2:01:53 |
Item Info
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