San Francisco Police Department Park Station bombing
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| San Francisco Police Department Park Station bombing | |
|---|---|
Brian V. McDonnell, a sergeant
with the San Francisco Police Department who received fatal shrapnel wounds | |
| Location | Golden Gate Park Police Station, 1899 Waller Street, SF |
| Date | February 16, 1970 |
| Weapons | A pipe bomb packed with heavy staples |
| Deaths | 1 |
Non-fatal injuries
| 1 seriously: Robert Fogarty, 8 others |
The San Francisco Police Department Park Station bombing occurred on February 16, 1970, when a pipe bomb filled with shrapnel detonated on the ledge of a window at the San Francisco Police Department's Golden Gate Park station. [1]Brian V. McDonnell, a police sergeant, was fatally wounded in its blast.[2] Robert Fogarty, another police officer, was severely wounded in his face and legs and was partially blinded.[3] In addition, eight other police officers were wounded.[1]
According to the San Francisco Chronicle, "Investigators in the early '70s said the bombing likely was the work of theWeather Underground, and not the Black Liberation Army"[1]
An investigation was reopened in 1999. A San Francisco grand jury looked into the incident, but no indictments followed.[1][4]
In early 2009 conservative advocacy group America's Survival Inc. advocated for a murder charge against Bill Ayers of the Weather Underground. In connection with a press release, the group released a letter from the San Francisco Police Officers Association endorsing an earlier allegation by Larry Grathwohl, a former FBI informant within the Weather Underground, that "there are 'irrefutable and compelling reasons' that establish that Ayers and his wife, Bernadine Dohrn, are responsible for the bombing." [5] [6]
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Leaders of San Francisco's police officers union have accused Weather Underground co-founder Bill Ayers and his wife, Bernardine Dohrn, of taking part in the 1970 bombing of a city police station that killed a sergeant.
The union leveled the charge in a letter to a conservative organization lobbying for arrests in the case, but said it had not been in contact with investigators and had no new evidence related to the bombing, which killed Sgt.Brian McDonnell.
Instead, the union cited information from a former Bay Area resident, Larry Grathwohl, who is working with the conservative group, America's Survival Inc. of Maryland. Grathwohl asserts that he infiltrated the Weather Underground as an FBI informant and heard Ayers confess to a role in the bombing.
Ayers has denied any involvement in the bombing and, in January, called Grathwohl a "paid dishonest person" in an interview with The Chronicle.
The union's accusation surprised some authorities. According to a source familiar with the probe, who spoke on condition of anonymity, investigators have found no evidence that links the Weather Underground to the bombing.
America's Survival is planning to hold a press conference today at the National Press Clubin Washington to discuss the case and the union's letter.
"There are irrefutable and compelling reasons to believe that Bill Ayers and his wife Bernardine Dohrn ... are largely responsible for the bombing of Park Police Station," the letter says.
The letter, dated Feb. 24, is signed by union President Gary Delagnes, Vice President Kevin Martin, Secretary Tony Montoya, Treasurer Martin Halloran and Sergeant at Arms Christopher Breen.
Ayers, an education professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago, did not return a call Wednesday. Dohrn, a law professor at Northwestern University, was out of the country.
Martin said he wrote the letter after he was contacted a few weeks ago by Cliff Kincaid, the nonprofit group's president. Martin said he trusted Grathwohl, a Cincinnati resident who once lived in Castro Valley.
"It's coming directly from a person who had close, confidential conversations with Ayers and members of the Weather Underground," Martin said. "We have no reason to doubt his assertions."
Martin said the union wanted to "bring this case to attention, especially because Bill Ayers has been on a speaking tour. His actions have elicited this type of response."
The attack happened Feb. 16, 1970, when a bomb placed on a window ledge of Park Station at Waller Street and Kezar Drive killed McDonnell and injured eight other officers. The case got attention two years ago when prosecutors charged a group of alleged former Black Liberation Army members in the 1971 shooting at the Ingleside Station that killed Sgt. John Young.
A grand jury that investigated the Ingleside case in 2005 also looked at the Park Station bombing, but the results of the probe were not released. No one has ever been charged with McDonnell's death.
Grathwohl said Wednesday that he infiltrated the Weather Underground in late 1969, first at the urging of Cincinnati police and then at the direction of the FBI.
He said that in early 1970, Ayers visited him and other operatives in Buffalo, N.Y., and said Dohrn had been forced to plant the bomb at Park Station because others weren't active enough in committing violence. Ayers also knew the composition of the bomb and where it had been set, Grathwohl said.