WHY NO INDICTMENT FOR CONSPIRING TO MURDER CASTRO? [View all]

[Judi Lynn]

WHY NO INDICTMENT FOR CONSPIRING TO MURDER CASTRO?
by Jacob G. Hornberger
September 15, 2017

During the Church Committee hearings in the 1970s, Congress and the American people learned that the CIA, in partnership with the Mafia, conspired to assassinate Cuban leader Fidel Castro. Ever since then, the U.S. mainstream media has poked fun at the various ways the CIA and the Mafia intended to kill Castro — e.g., via an exploding cigar or an infected scuba suit. In the process, however, the media has failed to ask a deadly serious question: Why weren’t the CIA and the Mafia ever indicted for conspiring to assassinate Castro?

Under U.S. law, assassination is considered murder. Anyone who assassinates another person is indicted and prosecuted for murder. That’s why, for example, that the accused assassin of President Kennedy, Lee Harvey Oswald, was going to be indicted and prosecuted for murder. It’s why the assassins of former Chilean official Orlando Letelier, who killed Letelier on the streets of Washington, D.C., were indicted and prosecuted for murder. It’s why Mafia officials who have assassinated rivals or government officials have been indicted and prosecuted for murder.

Keep in mind also that we are talking about two separate crimes: murder and conspiracy to murder. The crime of murder involves the actual wrongful taking of another person’s life. A conspiracy to murder involves an agreement of two or more people to commit a murder. People can be convicted of conspiracy to murder even though they don’t actually commit the murder.

It’s not enough, however, in a conspiracy case for prosecutors to show only an agreement to murder. To secure a conviction, they must also prove that the conspirators committed what the law calls an “overt act” to advance the conspiracy. If two or more people simply agree to commit a murder but commit no overt act, then they cannot be convicted of conspiracy to murder.

More:
https://www.fff.org/2017/09/15/no-indictment-conspiring-murder-castro/

Editorials and other articles:
https://www.democraticunderground.com/1016193213