Let the Fire Burn Page #8

- That's correct.

Stakeout police have just

taken position.

There must be movement

somewhere in the Osage,

and they're all scattering

between 62nd and Osage and 63rd.

They're running around like

something's going on around here.

These are live pictures.

They are looking for something there.

You can hear hollering. Where it was

coming from, Larry, I don't know.

When the fire got real heavy,

when we smelled all that smoke,

and we couldn't breathe,

then that's when we started

yelling that "kids coming out,"

and then they opened the garage door

and opened the cellar window.

What did you say?

What did you yell?

We were saying,

"We wanna come out!"

"We wanna come out?"

And what did the other children do?

Did they do the same thing?

Yeah.

- Were any of the children crying?

- Yeah. We all was.

- Why had you all gone to the back alley?

- To prevent the escape of MOVE members.

Well, what did you expect

to find in that alley,

the reason why you took

a machine gun back there?

I had no idea what to expect in the alley.

Do you solemnly swear

to tell the truth...

- and nothing but the truth so help you God?

- I do.

Your vantage point

was to the back of 6221.

- Is that correct?

- Yes.

All right.

Was there any time...

that you observed

either with your eyes or your ears...

people attempting

to come out of that house?

I heard a female scream,

"Don't shoot. We're coming out."

At that time officer Trudel

who was at the rear window.

Officer Trudel said,

"They're coming out."

if you look carefully,

by the way, if you can

take a look so I can point

to the monitor here,

right here is a line

of stakeout squad officers,

and they seem to be lined up at the

ready waiting for something to happen.

They seem to be waiting for something

to come out of that house.

You said that Rad

tried to take Tomaso out?

Mm-hmm.

He was on his knees, and he had

Tomaso around his stomach like that.

On his knees?

Was he crawling along the garage floor?

Rad was.

Now, when they did come out,

I see the smaller child come out,

and then an adult male

come out right behind them.

Yeah.

And he stood up and aimed a rifle up in the

direction of officer Bariana's position...

and fired, like,

four or five quick shots.

Did Conrad

have a rifle or a gun...

when he went out the garage door?

Mm-mmm.

What did he use

to open the bolt on the door?

A big monkey wrench.

A big monkey wrench?

Are you certain it was a rifle and not a

monkey wrench or something of that nature?

No, sir. When this-

I know a rifle, believe me.

And when this male

pointed this rifle up,

I- in other words, I could hear sound

and see muzzle flashes.

Now, you say that some shooting started.

Did you hear shooting?

It was a-

Like it was just going after-

Like it was going-Bullets were

going after each other. Like-

Bullets were going

one right after the other.

- Something like that?

- Yeah.

Sergeant Griffiths, could you

just by rapping on the table...

indicate the sound the best

you can recall of those shots?

It was not automatic fire,

if that's what you're asking.

Okay, could you just try and indicate

for me what it sounded like?

Did you ever fire your weapons after the

bomb was dropped, officer Mulvihill?

No, sir.

- Officer D'Ulisse?

- No, sir.

He had two officers taking him out,

and then they started shooting again,

and then they brought him back in,

and then they locked the thing back up.

Did you see the child

actually go back into the house?

I believe the child

went back into the house.

All right.

Do you have any idea why that person

may have gone back into the fire?

My own idea? What I think?

Yes.

I just think

they went back into that fire...

sort of to regroup.

Well,

just as a human being myself...

I'm just trying to imagine myself

in that situation...

and behind me

there's a raging inferno...

and in front of me there are people

who are saying "come on out."

I'm trying to imagine...

what would cause me

to turn back and run into the fire.

I don't think we said anything

other than come down to us.

Come on down

with your hands up-

the normal police jargon

for calling the suspects to come down.

Mm-hmm.

I'm just saying that I'm trying to

put myself in that person's skin.

Sir, I don't think you ever could.

These were MOVE members.

Well, you see,

I knew a lot of those people...

as individuals

and as human beings.

A lot of people know MOVE

from what they may have seen.

But I had a lot of dealings with them,

and I knew them to be more

than MOVE people.

I knew many of them by name,

as human beings.

It's probably

a rhetorical question.

I don't think you, from

the way you've

responded, I don't think

you can answer that.

No, sir.

And then

what happened to Tomaso?

Rhonda was going like this on his back.

- Rhonda had Tomaso?

- Mm-hmm.

And she was hitting him

on his back?

Was he crying then?

He had stopped crying?

Did you hear him cry anymore...

after she was trying to pat him

and hit him on his back?

Only one time.

- And then what happened?

- He stopped.

He stopped?

And then what happened?

I didn't hear nobody,

and I just ran out of there.

Oh, my goodness.

Well, Larry,

the flames are probably

now leaping, um,

uh, 10 stories high.

It just looked like something

was completely engulfed.

What you're seeing now-

You're telling me that the flames

are now leaping high?

I remember Ramona coming from the rear of

the MOVE yard over the fence and down.

She had started

to walk down, stopped.

And she would wave

with her hand like this.

And then I see Birdie.

The way I describe it, it looked like

he literally came through the fire.

There was a board on fire there,

and he hopped over that

and he started coming down.

What did you see

when you first ran out of the house?

I saw fire and stuff.

You saw fire?

Where did you see the fire?

The tree was on fire,

and the house was.

And the house was on fire?

How about on the ground?

Was anything on the

ground on fire?

The pieces of the tree

was falling down.

Pieces of fire from the tree

were falling down?

Did the adults tell you what to do

if you all got out of the house?

They told us to stay together.

Ramona's up top.

- She's on the walkway, the elevated walkway?

- That's right.

Birdie's in the driveway.

Now, as they're coming down,

Ramona's a little bit in the front.

But at one time

does Ramona stop...

and she goes over to the railing and

reached over and tried to pick Birdie up.

He got I believe one foot,

maybe two, I don't know,

on the bottom of the concrete wall

where the fence meets.

Okay?

And she either let go

or slipped or whatever.

But Birdie fell back.

He went back.

And I remember he didn't get a chance

to put his hands down to break his fall.

The impression I was left with-

He landed square on his head.

If you're watching somebody

or somebody falls...

and you hear a thud,

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