Delayed Justice

Thank you, thank you, thank you.  For your service, for the willingness and oftentimes the need to lay down your lives.  For the freedoms you have purchased with your blood.

Thank you.

A friend said he stopped by to read the blog and said I was writing as if I were depressed.  Well, not really.  Reflective, maybe and wondering, too, what’s next for all this.  But part of that wondering always happens after a long run of being really busy.  There are two projects that have required a great deal of time.  

The first is getting started on a film about Detroit’s Poet Laureate, Naomi Long Madgett.  Oh, she’s a wonder.  Only 86 and still working her art and working with a wonderful community of poets.  I’m here to tell you that Detroit is NOT dead.  The arts community is a vital part of what has been a leading city in the nation.  Of course there are problems in the Motor City, but they are as likely to be solved with art as with anything else.  That’s the thing: good or bad times, art can flourish.  So, we’re begun on what is likely to be a year-long project. The film is called Star by Star: The Poetry of Naomi Long Madgett.  I’ve been in Detroit for a several trips and we’ve been taping, taping, taping.  More interviews still to come with poets and critics.  And then lots of editing.

The second project is something I’m calling The Road to Andersonville.  Here’s a synopsis of the project:

During the American Civil War Union forces ran low on sharpshooters.  In Michigan the answer was to first change a law of prohibition and then to ask members of the Three Fires Tribes (Odawa [Ottawa), Bodewadmik [Potawatomi], Ojibway [Chippewa]) to enlist.  These were men who lived in peaceful coexistence with their neighbors (including the Whites) and who also had legendary woods and hunting skills.  There was, further, among them the tradition of a warrior society, the Ogitchedaw, whose members were required to see battle in war.  The Native Americans knew they were not likely to be well treated, they knew the intentions of the Whites as they effected displacements of other tribes (only one example of many is the Trail of Tears in 1838).  They knew their way of life was at risk; their accumulating losses of lands and culture were everywhere apparent.  Still, they responded with alacrity and in number: of 147 sharpshooters who came to be tested (by firing at and hitting a five-inch circle at 220 yards) 147 were welcomed into Company K, First Michigan Sharp Shooters.  Not one of the 147 was Ogitchedaw; not one had been in battle.

 These men saw hard service. Of the enlistees from the Elbridge Reservation (near Pentwater in Oceana Co.) 12 of the 25 were reported as casualties in the Battle of Spotsylvania.  As another example, there were 28 Ojibway from the Isabella reservation who enlisted in Company K.  Half of them (14) were either killed or wounded.  Two of them are buried in Arlington National Cemetery. A dozen Potawatomi also joined the ranks.  Some came from southwest Michigan to enlist in Company K.  Others came from Canada.  One fourth of them were either killed or wounded in battle.  One of the wounded was the son of a Potawatomi Chief.  He spent the last years of his life at the Grand Rapids Veterans Facility.

 Some of the Sharpshooters were captured.  Fifteen of their number were sent to a living hell: the prison camp at Andersonville.  (Of 45,000 prisoners, almost 13,000 died of starvation and/or disease [http://www.nps.gov/ande/index.htm].)  Of the 15 from Company K seven died and were buried there.  They have lain at Andersonville without receiving their ceremony.

 A handful of their descendants and others of the modern day Ogitchedaw (perhaps 12 in all) intend to honor their graves.  (For more on the Ogitchedaw, see http://www.sagchip.org/warrior_society/index.htm.)  These travelers plan to motor (at their own expense) from Michigan to Andersonville, GA, in May of 2010 to offer their prayers and pay homage and respect to their spirits. 

We will travel to Georgia and film as much as possible of the ceremonies at the  Andersonville National Historical Site and of activities that surround the event.  In addition, we will conduct a series of interviews with members of the Ogitchedaw, other members of the Three Fires Tribes who serve as historians, and outside researchers and historians, including Chris Czopek, the author of a forthcoming history of the Civil War Warriors, Seven Soldiers; The Story of Company K.  His groundbreaking research includes information about the lives and deaths (and burials) of all 147 men.  He knows the stories of recruitment, enlistment, training, service, the beginning of their becoming Ogitchedaw, discharge, and life after the Civil War (for those who survived).   The plan is to tell the story of the 147 Anishinabe who served in Company K through the seven who are buried at Andersonville and to put in context the meaning of their service.

So, that was the plan of work and we have just returned from Andersonville.  We saw all the graves…12,920 of them from the northern veterans (including the seven [or eight] of the Native Americans from Company K).  There is no question that we were standing on holy ground. There are many other veterans now buried there, too.  Our time there was most meaningful.  

So, now we have the film of what we needed to tell part of the story.  Next, raising funds to do the rest…all the interviews.  And editing. Oh, golly, always more editing.  Another summer’s and winter’s project.

And then there are murders still waiting to be told.  I added that  of Shannon Siders this week.  I hope soon to have a photograph of this young woman.  She was only 18 when she was murdered near Newaygo in 1989.  It’s way past time for this one to be solved and if only the right person would come forward….

Shannon Siders, 18, was out early in the morning July 18, 1989, with perhaps a half dozen friends in downtown Newaygo.  At some point she and some of her friends got into a car and took off.  When her father, Robert Siders, came home in the morning from his third-shift work at Pepsi in Grand Rapids, he said it didn’t appear that had she returned to the house again.  Shannon’s new puppy had not been let out, something he says she would have been sure to do.  But there was no sign of any struggle in the house, nor was anything missing other than his daughter, the clothes on her back, and her purse.  She sometimes went to stay with friends, and Bob Siders called around before filing a missing persons report.  The State Police responded and then turned it over to the Newaygo City Police.  Both agencies worked the case and turned up tips but no sign of Shannon.  In addition to their work, Bob printed up and distributed flyers in the area, along the west side of the state and into bordering states.

It wasn’t until that fall that a bow hunter happened upon her badly decomposed remains at a site some five miles distant, near a place called The Pit, a party spot for local teens.  Forensic results revealed a fractured skull, broken ribs and shoulder bones.  Pathologist Ronald Graeser, D.O., described the assault as sadistic and violent.  The death certificate lists July 18, 1989, as the date of her death.

Her father says that his daughter, like many other young people, had some struggles and was finding her way.  She had dropped out of school but was reconsidering pursuing her diploma.  When confronted with the need to either be in school or work she told him that she’d need a car in order to get a job.  “I told her that’s not the way it worked…she could get a job and THEN buy her own car.  She was a typical teen…and she was my daughter.”  Siders had raised Shannon as a single parent from the time she was four years old.  His assessment of her comes from their close association: “I believed she had the potential to be somebody.”

On October 23, 1994, Cindy Lesko went missing from her home in St. Claire Shores, Macomb County, MI.  Her body has never been found, but her husband, Albert Lesko III was tried and acquitted for Cindy’s murder in 2001.

Cindy filed domestic abuse reports against Albert in 1989 and 1992, but did not press charges against him at that time.  In 1994 she tipped authorities about six pounds of marijuana that Albert was hiding in the family home.  A short time later Albert severely beat Cindy, and was convicted of domestic abuse.  Cindy filed for a divorce, and retained temporary custody of their two children and the family home.

On the night of October 23, Albert was late in bringing the children home, and Cindy, who was speaking to a relative on the phone, said she was worried.  When Albert arrived with the kids later that night, a witness reported seeing a man and woman arguing on the front lawn of the Lesko house, and hearing the woman call for help, but authorities were not notified at that time.  It was the last time anyone saw or heard from Cindy.

MJVH

One of the joys of my work is that I have the opportunity to dive deep into projects.  That’s where I’ve been lately and that’s where I’m going again in short order.  And not all of it deals with only murder.  Can’t write about it at length just yet but I will in a few days.

Heck, no!  Don’t hold your breath.  But I promise: more, soon.