BY BILL KALMAN
DES MOINES, Iowa - A number of victory celebrations were held in several U.S. cities in mid-December marking the recent Iowa parole board decision to release Mark Curtis from prison.
Curtis, a former member of the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) union at the Monfort plant in Des Moines and a militant in the Socialist Workers Party, was framed up by the police on charges of rape and burglary in 1988.
After a more than seven-year fight, the international defense effort finally won Curtis's release effective December 7. He remains behind bars while his application to be paroled to Illinois, where his wife resides, is being processed.
People newly won to the Curtis case joined with longtime supporters to celebrate this victory in meetings in San Francisco; Washington D.C.; Houston; Birmingham, Alabama; Chicago; St. Paul, Minnesota; and Philadelphia.
In Des Moines, the Mark Curtis Defense Committee organized a successful meeting December 17 at the Best Western Starlight Village. One of the speakers, Juan Estrada Pérez, a vice president of UFCW Local 1149 in Perry, Iowa, told a television reporter why he was there. "It's important for workers around the world to unite. I hope this fight will not end until Mark Curtis is finally freed."
Don Barrell, a former Firestone striker and member of United Steelworkers of America Local 310, told the audience, "I always thought Mark was innocent. I'm also a rescue worker, and it did not seem like the physical evidence was there for conviction." Daniel Aguilar, a Nicaraguan worker at the Monfort plant here, and David Ochoa of the League of Mayan Indians and packing plant worker at the IBP plant in Perry, also spoke.
Messages were read from Roxanne Gould, a Native American activist involved in a struggle against police brutality in Sioux City, Iowa; Larry Ginter, a hog farmer from Rhodes, Iowa, who is active in the fight against large-scale hog confinement; Alfredo Alvarez, who was the chair of the Des Moines Human Rights Commission in 1988 when Curtis was arrested; and from Curtis himself.
"The defense committee really lived by the principle that an injury to one is an injury to all," Curtis said. "By continuing on this road... we can make this an inspiration for the fight to release Leonard Peltier, stop the execution of Mumia Abu-Jamal," and win freedom for others.
Through these meetings and other activities, $15,000 has been pledged to date for the defense committee's fund drive, and $11,000 has been collected. The drive, which ends January 1, aims to raise $25,000 to pay continuing legal and other costs associated with Curtis's impending release. Contributions or pledges should be sent to the Mark Curtis Defense Committee, Box 1048, Des Moines, IA, 50311.