NAVY ‘IMMORAL’ WITH PROTESTERS

[Guaili-Cayniabon]

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In the first week of June, the Congressional Hispanic Caucus of the U.S. Congress held hearings into allegations that Navy personnel abused many of the 180 protesters arrested in late April and early May while attempting to block Navy bombing exercises on the Puerto Rican island of Vieques. More than 1,500 protesters have been arrested on Vieques in the past several years.

Rep. Luis Gutiérrez (D-IL), several members of the Puerto Rican Senate and actor Edward James Olmos testified at the hearings, which were chaired by Rep. Robert Menéndez (D-NJ). Witnesses said they were strip-searched and deprived of water in the heat for long periods; some fell ill after being doused in pepper spray. The detainees were kept handcuffed and were not given life jackets when they were taken by barge to the main island of Puerto Rico; young women forced to kneel on the deck were harassed by officers who made obscene comments and gestures.

The prisoners were subjected to body searches at a processing center. “They made the most indecent, disgusting, immoral search of me, out in the street, in front of a cyclone fence with 20 Navy men watching,” Velda González, vice president of the Puerto Rican Senate, told New York Times columnist Bob Herbert. “This was in front of everybody. I’m an old woman. I’m a grandmother of 11 grandchildren.” Navy spokesperson Lt. Cory Barker told Herbert on June 13 that the Navy had no plans to investigate the alleged abuse.