Facing Hanrahan and Jail

On the walkway outside the Dirksen Federal Building, fifty picketers passed out handbills with the photo of the smiling police officers carrying Fred’s body from the apartment alongside a photo of the bloody mattress. The leaflets read, “Hanrahan: Wanted for Murder, Not for Mayor.”

Inside the packed courtroom everyone was waiting to see the public figure most identified with the raid. Hanrahan had lost the race for state’s attorney and another for Congress. He was now, in February 1977, a candidate for mayor in the Democratic primary running on his tough law- and-order stance.

Perry asked the jury if they had seen the protesters. Judy Norgle raised her hand and stuck up her nose disdainfully, acknowledging she saw them. She recoiled even further when Perry asked if it had affected her, but she insisted she “could be fair.” Perry warned the spectators not to display any handbills in court or they would be removed and gave orders to ban the picketing on the federal plaza, something he had no authority to do. “You may be causing very serious damage to the plaintiffs by your posters and picketing,” he warned, and threatened a mistrial.

I was pumped to cross-examine Hanrahan. My weariness from thirteen months of trial gave way to a rekindled excitement. Hanrahan was no doubt pumped too. The newspapers reported that his lawyers were seeking to restrain him and dampen his hair-trigger temper with sensitivity training in a mock trial.

The first day, we were like two wrestlers testing each other. Coghlan interrupted at every opportunity, even though I was only asking preliminary questions to elicit Hanrahan’s history and close connection to Marlin Johnson and the FBI. Perry excused the jury to hear arguments for most objections. The Daily News reporter described the court scene in the afternoon paper: “The jury paraded in and out of the courtroom like ducks in a row during arguments and objections. They have, one lawyer suggested, logged several miles between the jury box and the jury room.”

Hanrahan admitted he and local FBI head Marlin Johnson had talked over two hundred times about “wide-ranging” topics but never about COINTELPRO. Hanrahan had stated publicly that a major part of his job as state’s attorney was to “sell the police to the public … to maintain civilized safe society.”

“Our major problem is to overcome antipolice/antigovernment propaganda repeatedly and regularly and professionally issued by the Black Panther Party. It was as a result of that this incident developed,” he had told the federal grand jury, implying that the raid was a necessary response to Panther criticism of the police.

“I point to the .45 automatic used by Hampton in attacking the police,” Hanrahan had boldly asserted at his first December press conference.

I asked him who’d informed him that Hampton attacked the police with a .45, and his reply was vague—one of the police officers, he said, but he was unable to recall a name. He also could not offer how they had known it was Hampton. I asked him whether, in light of the lack of bullet holes or expended shells from Panther weapons, he still accepted the police accounts.

“I did and I do,” he said, with the same fury he had always displayed when his or their account was challenged.

Hanrahan continued to claim no responsibility for the misidentified photos given to the Tribune for their exclusive. He could “not recall” who told Bob Wiedrich, the Tribune reporter, that the nail heads in the kitchen door were bullet holes from Hampton’s firing or who misrepresented the bathroom door to be the bedroom door.

The next day, I asked Hanrahan for his evaluation of the investigation of his officers done by the Internal Investigation Division, the same one that IID chief Harry Ervanian termed a “whitewash” and the “worst I’ve ever seen.”

“Mr. Hanrahan, you do recognize, do you not, that the questioning of your officers was less thorough than the usual case at an IID investigation?” I asked.

Hanrahan sat up straight, squinted his eyes to show his indignation, and replied, “As of this time I certainly do not recognize that, nor do I believe that.” I started to impeach Hanrahan with his prior testimony. The defendants objected, and I had to read Hanrahan’s prior testimony with the jury excused. “A lot of things went wrong. Admittedly I am not pleased with the IID investigation. I asked, I insisted upon the IID investigation. I am not pleased with the way it was done. I am looking for efficiency, for an excellent product in this building, and I don’t want anything less than that.”

Perry: “That is what he said in court today.”

Volini: “Precisely.”

Haas: “Where are we? Are we in Alice in Wonderland? What the man has said today was that his only complaint with the IID investigation was the fact that the Panthers [the victims] didn’t come forward and make a complaint there. He has yet to—“

Perry: “Oh, counsel, he has not said a word about that today.”

Haas: “Judge we are not on the same … planet.

Flint had entered during the argument and was watching from the spectator section.

Coghlan: “May the record show that Mr. Taylor was seated in the spectators’ row, chortling and chuckling, while Mr. Haas was making his speech, and rose to address the court from the spectator section of the courtroom.”

Haas: “Let the record show that Mr. Coghlan … is trying to incite the court against us.”

Perry: “Shut up.”

Haas: “Obviously successful.”

Then came the unexpected.

Perry: “I am overruling the objection, I am going to let it be read and let the jury hear exactly what he said. It is the same thing he said today.”

Small victory—our sarcasm actually shamed the judge into letting us read Hanrahan’s former testimony as impeachment, but not without Perry’s belittling remark.

Despite the physical evidence, Hanrahan remained loyal to the police: “I still believe the truthfulness of what the police officers have told me.”

“You are going to put on a firearms identification expert to confirm your theories?” I asked.

Objection sustained.

“Are you aware of any report of physical evidence which supports your theory?”

Objection sustained.

“Wasn’t it because two persons had been killed in the apartment by police officers that it became difficult for you to continue to arouse the public to support the police?”

“No, it wasn’t the fact of those unfortunate killings. It was the tragedy of the orgy of the press and the distortion and the reckless printing of charges and statements by persons who had no knowledge of the facts.”

“Didn’t it occur to you that your actions stirred up peoples’ anger?”

Objection sustained.

I changed subjects. I asked Hanrahan if he had made a deal with Jerris Leonard to dismiss the Panther indictments in exchange for no indictment against himself and his officers. Hanrahan denied the deal, directly contradicting the FBI document that memorialized his agreement with Leonard. When I sought to probe him about the discrepancy, Coghlan and Volini objected and asked for a hearing.

After listening to Coghlan and Volini’s argument in chambers but not allowing Flint or me to respond, Perry came out and instructed the jury to disregard my last question to Hanrahan.

Haas: “Mr. Hanrahan, do you know how it was that Jerris Leonard knew on April 8th that the Grand Jury—“

Kanter: “Objection.”

The Court: “Now, Mr. Haas, Mr. Haas, wait a minute. You will not go into subject matter any further.”

Haas: “I didn’t even get to argue it. Well, Judge, the deal—“

The Court: “I said you may not go into it any further.”

Haas: “Judge, you can’t cover up the cover-up. That is part of our complaint, that they covered up, Judge.”

The Court: “Mr. Haas, you are now held in contempt of court for your last remark directed to the court, and I will prepare an order accordingly.”

Haas: “All right, Judge. I think all the people who have spoken the truth have always ended up in contempt, and the cover-up goes on and on.”

The Court: “I will now turn you over to the custody of the U.S. marshal for contempt, and hold you in custody until tomorrow morning at nine o’clock.”

Marshals grabbed me by each arm and escorted me from the courtroom by the side (prisoner) door and into the barred holding cell outside. As I exited, Flint yelled, “I’ll try to get you out on an appeal bond.”

A few minutes later, the U.S. marshals took me from the holding cell, down the prisoners’ elevator to the basement, and then by car to the underground receiving area of the Metropolitan Correctional Center. Moving from the courtroom to the MCC happened so quickly, I didn’t realize how angry I was until I arrived. I had decided in advance to question Hanrahan about the deal no matter what the judge tried to do to block it, but still I wasn’t expecting to go to jail for it.

The MCC is a modern, triangular-shaped, twenty-story, concrete building with vertical slits for windows, located two blocks from the courthouse. It housed mostly pretrial and presentence detainees in federal criminal cases. I was processed, fingerprinted, and my belongings were inventoried. I was allowed to keep my briefcase after it was searched. I donned a heavily starched orange jumpsuit and was assigned the top bunk bed in a dorm with a low ceiling. It was my first confinement.

What if I had to get out? I couldn’t. A tiny bit of the reality of a prison sentence set in, which I had only partially understood while negotiating plea agreements for my clients. I could do my twenty-four hours, but what about six months or a year? Did one ever overcome the trapped feeling when the cell door slammed shut?

Later in the afternoon, I was telling the other prisoners, “I’m a lawyer and I’m here because the judge didn’t like my questions.” Before any of my new roommates could respond, I heard a guard call my name. I was led from the day room to the attorney-client cubicle. Flint was there with a stack of papers. He didn’t look happy. Like the stock scene from the movies, I sat down with my lawyer to learn my fate.

“They denied the appeal bond.”

“What?” I said, incredulous.

Flint said the appellate judge who denied bond gave no reason; I contemplated a night in jail. I imagined a hellish work release whereby I was in court during the day and in the MCC at night. Flint assured me that we would resume the next day. He handed me my legal pad and a folder with my notes on Hanrahan’s cross-examination. Flint looked as glum as I felt when he left the interview room.

That night I lay on my bunk with my chin about six inches from the ceiling. This is not where cross-examination is supposed to end up, I thought. Exposing the deal was important enough to risk being here, but God knows what the jury thinks. I knew the press would be in court, ready to ask me questions. What could I say to the press to embarrass the judge? I spent more time scheming about what I would tell the reporters than preparing for the continued cross-examination of Hanrahan.

At 8:00 A.M. I was released and walked out of the MCC. Flint brought me my suit for a quick change at the office, and we went to court. Before the jury and judge entered, a Chicago Tribune reporter approached me. He asked what it was like to be in the MCC. I was ready: “Well, I can’t say much for the accommodations, but the company was more congenial than that of some persons in Judge Perry’s courtroom.” My sound bite made the paper, and I was pleased to get revenge, even if it sounds a bit sophomoric today.

Perry began court with the stern warning, “Now let me make one thing very clear, Mr. Haas. We are not going to have anymore Kunstler-inspired methods of trying this case.” I felt proud to be a compared to the famous Conspiracy Seven lawyer but also a little nervous. Kunstler had ended the Conspiracy trial sentenced to four years for contempt.

Despite the fact that I had spent a night in jail for mentioning it, the next day the deal between Hanrahan and Leonard was fair game. Hanrahan was allowed to give his fully prepped denial of there being any quid pro quo for his dropping charges. I was not allowed to use the deal document to impeach him, but at least the subject of the agreement was not out of bounds. After ten more days of questioning—or more accurately, two days of questioning and eight lengthy, long-worded, and self-serving days of objections and argument—Hanrahan stepped down. His lawyers were pleased that he hadn’t erupted, but they didn’t want to press their luck. They had no questions for him.