To All:
I first blew the whistle on the Monsters of Morton Street in June of 1984. An eight-month undercover investigation by New York State police and private investigators had culminated on June 6 in a police raid on my workplace in which 35 employees were arrested and suspended. Although, in the long run, the charges of client mistreatment and substance abuse did not result in a single conviction, the high-profile raid was obviously intended to intimidate all employees. One does not expect to see police officers wandering around one's workplace with their guns drawn. I was so distressed that I could make no effective contribution at a client case conference I attended that day. I complained bitterly about what I may have called "Gestapo tactics."
A few days after the raid, which I call the "D-Day Massacre" (pronounced Mass-a-cree as in Arlo Guthrie's Alice's Restaurant), my union, Public Employees Federation, called a meeting, chaired by PEF Council Leader Robert Jackson. At the meeting, I told those assembled that I had heard investigative activities in the area of the Education and Training office that seemed not to have been part of the official operation. These, I said, involved illegal violation of civil rights and privacy, including the break-in of my car, whose trunk lock somebody had mutilated with a burglary tool. After the meeting, psychologist Michael De Respinis told me that it was no surprise, since Director of Education Rocco Menta had CIA connections.
I wrote to Mr. Jackson, who eventually told me that he considered legal action by the union a bit premature. Shortly after, his chair was filled by Mark Berberian, who sometimes made a show of support, but ended up betraying my interests most egregiously.
Mr. Robert Jackson has since made a name for himself as a prominent social and political activist. Last year, he was elected to the New York City Council.
On January 13, 2003, I wrote an e-mail, which I named "Old Times, Current Times," to Mr. Jackson at jackson@council.nyc.ny.us. Here is its text:
Dear Mr. Jackson:
First of all, congratulations on your success as an activist and as a New York City Councilman.
You may or may not remember me. We talked and corresponded in 1984, when you were a Council Leader for the Public Employees Federation. The initial paragraph of my letter to you dated July 8, 1984 read as follows:
"I am employed as a Speech and Hearing Therapist at Manhattan Developmental Center. During the P.E.F. meeting held at 75 Morton Street shortly after the `D-day massacre,' as you may recall, I asked a question regarding the scope of the State's investigative and police activities with regard to persons and situations at M.D.C., inasmuch as my work location within the building, to which I had been reassigned against my will in November, had placed me in a position where I had overheard certain individuals apparently planning and participating in activities of an investigative and possibly prosecutorial nature. Since then, these activities have apparently continued. Because of what I have heard over the past six months, I am convinced that the Administration of Manhattan Developmental Center has been using the immense resources of the City, State, and Federal governments in order to intimidate and remove from the payroll employees who, like myself, are regarded as undesirable or expendable for a variety of reasons not necessarily involving criminality. The tactics involved have included constant, unremitting surveillance, by personal and electronic means, at the workplace, while travelling, and even at home. Additionally, illegal entry and search, deliberate sabotage of a private car (mine) in such a way as to provoke accidents, possible interception, examination, and confiscation of private mail, and possible tapping of a private telephone (mine) are likewise characteristics of a thoroughly reprehensible campaign aimed apparently at achieving staff reduction by destroying the health, reputations, human dignity, and future financial security of those who are unfortunate enough not to have friends in high places. In my case, the humiliating but legally inconsequential `dirt' unearthed by these sordid activities has been carefully and methodically communicated to co-workers, neighbors, associates, officials, and possibly even long-lost relatives that I have yet even to meet. The ability of the persons involved in these efforts to `reach out and touch' those from whom I might seek cooperation, help, or friendship suggests an immense degree of power and `clout,' such as might be exhibited by an agency of the Federal Government."
Pardon the long sentences and my failure to divide the text into effective paragraphs. My writing has improved since then.
The abuses I reported then have continued to this day, twelve years after the State deprived me of my livelihood without due process (see the second half of "Here's How It All Came About" http://www.angelfire.com/nj/jhgraf/hereshow.html on my web site).
In a desperate attempt to escape the persecution and mental torture inflicted by persons and agencies associated with the Monsters of Morton Street, I tried three times (1991-3) to obtain political asylum in European countries and was thrice returned to these shores against my will. My UN complaints against these European nations lie unacknowledged and unprocessed. The corruption -- the obscene abuse of governmental power -- is global, and it has hurt many, many others as well as me.
This communication has two purposes. I am writing to ask for whatever truth you can tell me about the secret, non-adversarial "evaluations" whose slanderous allegations have seriously damaged my life. Who conducted them? Who participated in them? What decision or legislation authorized them? How can I obtain access to the records?
My second purpose is to ask you, now that I am nearly 61 years old, disabled, impoverished, and anathematized, to exert whatever influence you can to break the log-jam. The truth must be told. Justice must at last be done. Please follow the link below my signature. My full address and phone number are on that page.
Sincerely,
James Henry Graf
Please Make the UN Do Its Job!
http://www.angelfire.com/nj/jhgraf/makeun.html
So far, I have received no response. My effort has resulted only in viciously intensified attacks on my person and computer by "Marlin Fitzwater's Private Purgatories."
James Henry Graf
