1765 Nine American colonies united to draw up a “Declaration
of Rights and Grievances” opposing the Stamp Act, which ordered colonists to pay yet
more taxes—without representation. Eventually all thirteen colonies adopted the
Declaration.
1864 21 Confederate soldiers based in Canada robbed
three banks in St. Albans, Vermont, killed a local man, then escaped back
across the border. Their goal, in addition to raising funds, was to convince
Union generals the northern border posed a significant threat and troops were needed there. A U.S. posse captured several raiders but Canadian authorities
ordered their release.
1921 Radical members of the Portuguese Army, Navy, and
National Republican Guard set up artillery in Lisbon and forced the government
of Portuguese Prime Minister António Granjo to step down. When President
António José de Almeida refused to allow the rebels to take over, Corporal Abel
Olímpio drove a "ghost van" through the streets of Lisbon looking for
National Republican Party politicians on a hit list and led the radicals in the
assassination of P.M. Granjo and several cabinet members. The perpetrators were
judged and condemned in court.
1943 Allied aircraft bombed and sank the cargo vessel Sinfra
at Crete, drowing 2,098 Italian prisoners of war crammed in the cargo hold.
1944 The "October Revolution" of Guatemala
started when a small group of army officers launched a coup against the
military junta of Juan Federico Ponce Vaides that was set up by U.S.-backed
dictator Jorge Ubico after he was forced to resign. Oppressed citizens across
the country joined the pro-democracy movement and replaced the junta with one
that promised free and open elections.
1960 Police arrested Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and 51
others after they refused to leave their seats at a segregated lunch counter in
an Atlanta department store. Judges dismissed charges against 16 of the
protesters at their first court appearance but Dr. King was held on a charge of
violating his probation and sentenced to six months’ hard labor. Presidential
candidate JFK helped secure Dr. King's release.
1970 "Killer Prophet" John Frazier,
convinced he was obeying the word of God, invaded the home of California
ophthalmologist Victor Ohta and bound Ohta, his wife, two sons and a secretary,
shot them all dead, threw their corpses in the swimming pool, then wrote a note
on Ohta's typewriter declaring the start of WWIII and left it on Ohta's Rolls
Royce. Deputies staked out Frazier's shack and arrested him October 23. Tried
and sentenced to death, he received a commutation to life imprisonment; he
hanged himself in his cell in 2009.
1973 U.S. President Nixon rejected an Appeals Court
decision that he turn over the Watergate tapes.
1976 U.S. President Gerald Ford signed the Copyright
Act of 1976, the first major revision of American copyright law since 1909. It extended
federal copyright protection to all works, both published and unpublished, once
they are fixed in a tangible form.
1977 French authorities found the body of kidnap
victim Hanns-Martin Schleyer in the trunk of an Audi 100 on the rue Charles
Péguy in Mulhouse. The Red Army Faction, a West German far-left militant
organization, kidnapped the industrialist and former SS officer in September
and demanded the release of four RAF members being held at Stammheim Prison in
Stuttgart. The German government refused to negotiate and even prevented Schleyer's
family from offering 15 million Deutschmarks as a ransom. After three of the
RAF fanatics were found dead in their cells October 18, the kidnappers shot and
killed Schleyer.
1982 Police arrested automaker John DeLorean on
charges of conspiracy to obtain and distribute 55 pounds of cocaine worth $24
million. He was acquitted two years later.
1984 Three agents of the Polish Security Service of
the Ministry of Internal Affairs kidnapped Roman Catholic priest Jerzy
Popiełuszko, chaplain of the Polish “Solidarity” trade union, on his way home
from a prayer service. His captors tortured and hog-tied him, then bound him
up, attached rocks to his body, and threw him over a dam to drown. The
intelligence agents were tried and convicted of the murder.
1986 Mozambique President Samora Machel, leader of the
Front for the Liberation of Mozambique (FRELIMO) who led the Mozambican people
in their fight for independence from Portugal, along with 33 others, died when
their aircraft crashed into the Lebombo Mountains in South Africa. Some
observers believe the apartheid regime of South Africa set up a false beacon to
lure the plane off-course.
1988 The British government imposed a broadcasting ban
on television and radio interviews with members of Sinn Féin and eleven Irish
republican and Ulster loyalist paramilitary groups.
1989 The Court of Appeal of England and Wales quashed
the convictions of the Guildford Four after they had spent 15 years in prison
for the pub bombings in 1974 Surrey that killed four soldiers and one civilian
and wounded 65 others. The Met forced false confessions out of Paul Hill, Gerry
Conlon, Paddy Armstrong, and Carole Richardson and they were wrongly convicted;
the Balcombe Street Gang of the Provisional Irish Republican Army later claimed
responsibility.
1989 The U.S. Senate rejected a proposed
constitutional amendment that would have banned the desecration of the American
flag, with 51 Senators voting in favor of the amendment and 48 voting in
opposition. Congress passed the Flag Protection Act nine days later, but in
June 1990 the Supreme Court ruled (United States v. Eichman) the Act violated
the right of free speech under the First Amendment.
1998 Rock music fan Mark Nieto filed a lawsuit against the
rock group Aerosmith for alleged hearing loss after he attended a “Nine Lives”
concert at the Concord Pavilion amphitheater in Concord, California, the year
before. Nieto claimed he was not made aware of possible hearing loss before the
show.
1998 Members of the Earth Liberation Front set fire to
several lifts and buildings at Vail Ski Resort in Colorado, claiming expansion
of the resort was causing irreparable harm to area wildlife. The eco-terrorists
caused $12 million in damages. Two members pleaded guilty, one suspect was
finally captured 20 years later, and another remains at large.
2004 Thai officials announced the State Peace and
Development Council ousted Myanmar prime minister Khin Nyunt and placed him
under house arrest on charges of corruption. He was released in 2012.
2005 A defiant Saddam Hussein pleaded innocent to charges of pre-meditated murder and torture and argued with the Iraqi Special Tribunal on the opening day of his trial in Baghdad. He was sentenced to death by hanging a year later.
