This account is factual. The documents quoted here were really written and mailed by me, or written by others and received by me. If any forgery or falsification has occurred, I am not a party to it and am not responsible. Links within the text lead to scans of the actual documents.

I have not transferred this copyright to any person, nor have I contracted with any publisher for distribution of this article. While included in the "Right to Reproduce" policy indicated on the homepage, this article remains my intellectual property. Since it represents my true experience, I assume and accept full responsibility for it.

It should come as no surprise that government agencies routinely discourage, ignore, and speciously reject complaints of human rights violations in America. Coverup is, and some would say always has been, the norm. This writer can document a long history of such devious and sophistic trickery as is experienced by many a victim and many a whistleblower in this land, but that is not the primary subject that concerns us here.

The supposed remedy for government's stonewalling and coverup is public exposure by the media and the non-governmental organizations mandated to uncover such scandals and advocate for the helpless oppressed. Given the stated intentions and frequent good works of such organizations, one assumes a certain reliable level of integrity and disinterested compassion. It is hard to imagine the American Civil Liberties Union, Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, the Center for Constitutional Rights, or Pacifica Radio engaging in the same kinds of evasion employed by public agencies in suppression of human rights, but, sadly, that has been my experience.

America is a nation in denial, the dominant force in a world that daily closes its eyes to the hard realities of corruption, discrimination, and outrageously specious rationalization. There are things no major publication dares to print, no major broadcaster dares to discuss. Working largely through dummy "private" agencies, American law enforcement, military, and intelligence authorities violate human rights with absolute impunity, using 21st-Century technology to advance an inhuman, totalitarian agenda. Those who know won't speak. Those who speak are not heeded. Those who hear do not listen. Those who listen will not act.

I am a whistleblower. From 1975 until 1988, I worked as a Speech and Hearing Therapist for Manhattan Borough Developmental Services Office (currently known as Metro New York Developmental Disabilities Services Office), a facility for the mentally retarded operated by the State of New York. In 1975, I had no idea that what was then known as the Department of Mental Hygiene had been involved in classified contracts with US military and intelligence agencies, that it had caused the wrongful death in 1953 of one Harold Blauer, that it had participated in what US Judge Constance Baker Motley described in 1987 as a "20-year conspiracy" to conceal the fact that Mr. Blauer had died as a human guinea pig in an experiment to test hallucinogenic drugs as weapons of war (1).

In the 1980s, MBDSO at 75 Morton Street in New York's Greenwich Village became a hotbed of covert law enforcement and intelligence activity involving CIA, military intelligence, federal, state, county, and municipal law enforcement and corrections officials, dummy "private" agencies, and, apparently, the Republican National Committee. In alignment with Reagan Administration policies, these forces concerned themselves primarily with "fighting terrorism" and the "war on drugs." They defined "terrorism" loosely (2), bringing under its umbrella peaceful, humanitarian activists such as the Committee In Solidarity with the People of El Salvador (CISPES) and the Sanctuary movement, a group of religious persons who tried to prevent the involuntary return of refugees to El Salvador (a deadly policy clearly violative of International Law). Among Sanctuary's leaders was Jack Elder, who had been my fraternity brother at the Catholic University of America in the early 1960s (3). At the suggestion of Colonel Oliver North (of Contragate notoriety), Philip Mabry, a former CIA agent who headed a right-wing think-tank in Texas, wrote to the Director of the FBI naming individuals and organizations as Communist sympathizers. As a result, the FBI appears to have investigated a college classmate of mine, actress Susan Anspach, as well as Susan Sarandon, who attended Catholic University after we graduated but who had grown up in my home state of New Jersey (4). Few Americans then were aware of such Mc Carthyite witch-hunts, and still fewer, here and abroad, will acknowledge them now.

The power and influence of these law enforcement and intelligence agents became weapons in the hands of egregiously unscrupulous administrators. I heard them laugh about the tragedy and disgrace of others. I could almost hear the saliva dripping from their jowls as they gleefully spoke of arrests and strip-searches. I was sickened by their utter contempt for the law -- their strutting, swaggering, snickering arrogance. Through the administrative areas adjacent to my office roamed conscienceless monsters whose callous ruthlessness bordered on the demonic and who were able to get away with anything they chose to do. They planted evidence. They falsified crime reports at will and with impunity. They suborned perjury. They bribed and intimidated, harassed and terrorized. They may have killed. Claims of "national security" and "police business" assured universal cooperation and secrecy.

Obscenely intrusive, unbelievably extensive "lifestyle" investigations became a powerful administrative tool for staff reduction through intimidation -- blackmailing, blackballing, and blacklisting. When the "evaluators" could not unearth real evidence, they simply invented it. The concepts of due notice and due process occupied no place in their lexicon.

Manhattan Borough Developmental Services administrators, in their absolute contempt for the civil liberties of workers, including myself, involved themselves with corrupt law enforcement personnel like Sergeant Richard Pike and Officer Jeffrey Gilbert of the 106th Precinct in Queens, accused and later convicted of using electric stun-guns to torture a marijuana suspect (5). My employers made it clear that they found nothing wrong with such practices. For some of us, the dreaded "1984" arrived right on schedule (6).

Letters to my union, Public Employees Federation, AFL-CIO, produced only futile grievances that encountered delay, obfuscation, and arbitrary denial. Union representatives refused to appeal these to the highest possible level. Their lack of support likewise truncated the progress of several more grievances filed personally by myself, which, in the end, they joined the State in actively suppressing (7).

I then tried the American Civil Liberties Union of New Jersey, writing several letters to ACLU summer intern Mary James. I described a pattern of political repression starting in the late 1960s, when I first wrote letters to the editor against the war in Vietnam. I noted the intensified harassment consequent upon my participation in a 1982 demonstration sponsored by the Committee in Solidarity with the People of El Salvador (CISPES). I told of unconstitutional investigative techniques, break-ins of my home and car, secret, non-adversarial "evaluations," interception of mail, possible phone taps, suspected drugging and poisoning, electronic surveillance at the workplace and at home, and a campaign of ridicule and defamation among my neighbors [scan of my last letter to Ms. James].

On December 4, 1984, Daniel D. Schechter of ACLU of NJ wrote to me: "I believe that your action in retaining your union's services is proper and, I hope, effective. If, however, you are dissatisfied with their progress, I suggest that you retain private legal counsel of your own selection. Thank you for writing to us [scan]." In other words, get lost.

In 1985, I began writing to the New York State Special Prosecutor (8) and, later that year, filed a complaint with the Office for Civil Rights of the US Department of Health and Human Services, triggering a campaign of unimaginably vicious retaliation that continues to this day.

My July 22, 1985 correspondence with ACLU's New York office [scan] supplied copies of my letters to the Special Prosecutor, accusing the State of New York of maliciously and relentlessly utilizing the immense powers of government to harass targeted employees out of their jobs. It noted also the union's ineffectiveness and the State's obstruction of the grievance process. Experiencing already the disabling health problems -- probably maliciously-induced -- that have impeded me ever since, I wrote: "I simply do not know where to turn. I have fought well, but I can't fight alone any more. Please help me, or tell me who can."

A card arrived, postmarked July 26, acknowledging receipt of my request for assistance, telling me that it had been forwarded to the National Prison Project in Washington, DC and suggesting that I should henceforth contact that office directly [scan].

On August 1, 1985, however, Mr. Ed Martone of New Jersey ACLU wrote to me that my letter to New York ACLU had been redirected to his office [scan]. "As the incidents occurred in New York State, it is out of the jurisdiction of the ACLU of NJ," he advised, appending the further insult: "Additionally, there don't appear to be questions of constitutional law in your complaint which would warrant ACLU intervention." My August 2 response [scan] insistently reminded Mr. Martone that incidents had occurred in both states and that my complaint involved very clear constitutional issues. He never answered.

I consulted in October, 1985 with Sanford Oxfeld, Esq., whose father, Emil Oxfeld, was then President of ACLU of NJ. At work on October 16, someone spoke the name Oxfeld just outside my office. Nancy Iris Oxfeld and Barry Aisenstock, law partners, were paged several times on the public address system. In the office adjacent to mine, a male voice using the telephone complained that he couldn't handle something. "I'm up to my ears in ACLU work. Maybe we should have Mark handle it" (possibly a reference to law partner Mark Blunda, Esq.). In another call, he pleaded with someone else to take the case. "Somebody broke into his car," he said. In all of this, no-one saw fit to speak to me, the plaintiff. At five o'clock, however, the security guard at the reception desk nudged a companion, nodded in my direction, and said: "He brought his lawyer to work with him."

Sanford Oxfeld's letter to me dated that same day, October 16, 1985 [scan], told me, essentially, that he was too busy to take my case. He offered to refer me to Michael Shen, Esq. [scan]. Mr. Shen, the only private lawyer that ever expressed willingness to represent me, stopped returning my phone calls shortly after my employers learned his name [scan]. When I finally got in touch with him, he insulted me. I relieved him of responsibility [scan]. My former employers and their associates can "reach" just about anyone with their intimidative tactics and their slanderous cock-and-bull stories.

New York's Center for Constitutional Rights gained fame largely through the work of its most illustrious officer, the late William Kunstler. My letter to the Center on August 10, 1986 asked for help in finding legal counsel. I supplied some documentation and stated: "In brief, the State of New York is committing crimes against its own employees, involving itself in gross violations of Constitutionally-guaranteed rights and of federal, state, and municipal statutes, enjoying, in the process, the active cooperation of government at all levels, including law-enforcement and intelligence-gathering agencies."

Associate Legal Director Randolph Scott-McLaughlin responded on August 21 that, "due to understaffing and CCR's present financial situation, we are unable to provide legal representation to the many people who write to us." He suggested contacting New York ACLU [scan].

I wrote back to Mr. Scott-McLaughlin on August 23, informing him of the "royal run-around" that ACLU had inflicted on me the year before, stressing that the CIA was involved and that persons at my workplace were exerting influence to prevent me from obtaining legal counsel. He wrote on August 28, 1986: "Please be advised that I do not know of any lawyer in New Jersey that I can refer you to. Please contact the New Jersey Bar Association for a referral [scan]." In other words, get lost.

The program of defamation and intimidation intensified, with an increase in illegal break-ins, on-the-road harassment, and "set-ups" designed to provide falsified "evidence" to be used against me in secret, non-adversarial "evaluations" that would brand me as crazy or criminal. The New York State Special Prosecutor, Charles J. Hynes, would not acknowledge my letters or take any action. The US Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York, then headed by Rudolph Giuliani, likewise refused to take action.

On the afternoon of September 9, 1987, my dog Storm cried out from the area behind our backyard shed, near the fence separating our property from the neighbors' yard. By the time he reached the patio, we could see a gash in his chest that spurted blood when he exhaled. My wife brought him to the veterinarian's office, where his punctured lung proved fatal. Everyone, including my wife and the vet, described it as an accident. I saw the wound. It was no accident. Having conspired for months to "set up" my dog and me, persons associated with my employers had viciously stabbed him.

With this ghastly act of terrorism -- not the only such crime committed that autumn in Iselin, New Jersey (9) -- there commenced a horror that is difficult to describe and not likely to be believed. The terrible technology predicted in Gary Selden's October, 1981 Science Digest article "Machines That Read Minds" had, indeed, become a reality (10).

On October 24, 1990, President George H.W. Bush's White House spokesman Marlin Fitzwater discussed Republicans who had opposed the President's policies, threatening: "If they can sleep with their conscience, let them try." He cautioned that while they were free to "say whatever they want," penalties might ensue, "but we never discuss it in public." He suggested that they would "suffer in their private purgatories." Pressed for an explanation, he responded: "I can't tell you. If I told you, it wouldn't be a surprise (11)."

Mr. Fitzwater later denied that actual retribution would occur, but he never did explain what a "private purgatory" is or by what means President Bush's critics would be thrust into it. His listeners never learned how someone acting according to the dictates of conscience would then find his sleep disturbed by the very conscience he had obeyed. The President's own spokesman had obviously leveled a threat that day, but its precise nature remained a mystery.

Marlin Fitzwater's cryptic comments were no mystery to me, and the "surprise" of his "private purgatories" had long since worn off. You see, I had already spent more than three years in a "private purgatory." It consists of electromagnetic brain-invasion and mental torture. In addition to other forms of cruel, inhuman, degrading treatment, it involves the use of sophisticated electromagnetic devices that violate the privacy and dignity of a victim's mind and body, as well as "directed energy" broadcast techniques that force the victim to hear inhuman, repulsive professional mental torturers from whom he cannot escape (12). This virtual demonic possession is the hell on earth that I have known ever since my torturers softened me up by killing my dog in 1987. It is not a paranoid delusion. It is real.

On November 15, 1987, about three weeks before realizing the source of the "voices" that assailed me -- and not yet willing to mention them -- I wrote to the publishers of Mother Jones magazine, suggesting that the "corrupt obstruction of those societal mechanisms that are supposed to prevent and correct" rights violations might be of interest to one of MJ's investigative reporters. My letter was "Returned to sender. Forwarding order expired." I re-mailed it on December 23 to the correct address.

The result was a postcard dated January 12, 1988 from Jo Ann Cabello, Editorial Coordinator [scan]. Ms. Cabello wrote: "Thank you for thinking of Mother Jones and sending us your extensive documentation of your case. After careful review, I regret that there is little we can do to help at this time. We hope the other organizations you've contacted can be of more help and we wish you luck with your case." I surreptitiously sent Mother Jones several items in the following months enclosed in subscription-renewal envelopes, and followed up with a certified letter on June 4, 1988 disclosing the existence of brain-invasion technology, but there was never any response.

As a member of Amnesty International USA, I wrote a letter to the New York office on December 8, 1987, stressing that I was not asking for material assistance or advocacy, but only bearing witness: "My experience, however, sheds light on the extent to which Constitutional guarantees of human liberty may with impunity be circumvented in this nation, at this time. The documented failure, in my experience, of all those checks and safeguards that are supposed to prevent arrogant abuse of public power provides an evil omen that society ought not ignore."

My follow-up phone call on December 14 was switched from extension to extension. No one would confirm receipt of my letter. Staff were, by turns, impatient and patronizing. For months, no response was forthcoming. Finally, on April 18, 1988, I hand-delivered another copy, with accompanying materials, to the New York office. Then came Marika Brussel's response, dated April 14, 1988 [scan], which explained AIUSA's mandate and said: "Unfortunately, your situation does not fall within this mandate and therefore there is nothing Amnesty can do. You may wish to contact the American Psychological Association as they deal primarily with psychological abuse."

Note, please, the presumption of self-interest. Despite my best efforts at presenting the issue objectively, others all-too-frequently choose to perceive me as a pitiful supplicant, begging for mercy and assistance. I am, to be sure, the victim of a kind of torture few could begin to understand, in need of help and relief from suffering and indescribable indignity, but I am also a whistleblower. My letters consistently stress that my primary objective is to inform, to advise, to warn, to admonish. There is nothing wrong with begging for help under torture, but to presume that I have no other purpose is to add insult to injury.

Should society, moreover, become aware of the reality of round-the-clock "internal surveillance," such treatment will, indeed, be seen to constitute a form of imprisonment. What loss of liberty is greater than the lack of mental privacy? Something from which one cannot escape is a prison, is it not? Anyone enduring cruel, inhuman, degrading treatment from which no escape is possible must be considered a prisoner. Were Amnesty International to acknowledge this reality, there would be no excuse for refusing assistance to its victims. In any event, a callous response that says "That's not my department" to complaints of torture is, in my opinion, unjustifiable.

My career as a New York State employee ended in 1988. Having made me too sick to do my job, too sick and terrorized to get to work on time, my employers dismissed me on charges of insubordination and time abuse. Ms. Elizabeth Truly, Esq., appointed by Public Employees Federation to represent me in my disciplinary arbitration, insisted that I assume a defensive, penitent stance. When I resisted this, she withdrew from the case. As Ms. Truly had threatened, the union did not appoint another attorney. Ill for several months with simultaneous Epstein-Barr and Cytomegalovirus infections, I was shocked when my personal physician declared me fit for work just in time for the disciplinary arbitration, which I was still too sick to attend. The arbitrator and the State would not postpone the hearing, to which the union sent no representative at all. This illegal ex parte hearing on November 18, 1988 ended my career. The New York State Public Employment Relations Board dismissed my Improper Practice Charge (Case No. U-10571) without a hearing, then dismissed my appeal, also without a hearing.

Meanwhile, the US Department of Health and Human Services Office for Civil Rights, using every trick in the book to avoid confronting the issues, sold out most insultingly (13). On November 18, 1988, the same day as the arbitration hearing that cost me my job, OCR rendered its decision on my second complaint (Docket Number 02-86-3057), which had charged the State with retaliating against me for having filed the first complaint. The decision placed the blame on me, saying that my attitude toward my superiors was the problem. My appeal of this decision was denied.

Numerous attempts in the following year to obtain private legal counsel for an action against my oppressors produced only frustration. At least two New Jersey lawyers went out of their way to insult me.

On March 12, 1989, I wrote to the Christic Institute in Washington, DC [scan]. Shirley Coleman, Legal Assistant, responded on August 29: "The Christic Institute is presently committed to the case of Avirgan et al vs. Hull et al, commonly known as the Contragate case, which demands all of the Institute's litigation resources. The legal team at the Institute is very small and, at this point, we are accepting no other cases and unfortunately cannot accept yours (14)." She suggested that I try ACLU or Legal Services Corporation [scan].

Very well. I sent some documentation on September 20, 1989 to ACLU of New Jersey. Response No. 49789 from Staff Assistant Flavio L. Komuves, dated September 27, suggested using the Freedom of Information Act to obtain documents. No other issue was addressed [scan].

I could be wrong, but this struck me as an example of another frequent dodge. Communications, verbal and written, have implied that the victim, the whistleblower, is really a suspect or a fugitive -- that, if he knew what dirt his adversaries have on him, he would fold up his tent and disappear into the sunset. A number of individuals and agencies have attempted to put me on the defensive, including, and especially, the mental torture teams themselves. For the record, I have never been charged with or convicted of any crime in any state or nation, nor has any court pronounced me "mentally incompetent."

Ms. Coleman's other suggestion was Legal Services. I visited the New Brunswick, NJ office of Middlesex County Legal Services Corporation on October 6, 1989, leaving some documentation. Staff Attorney Paul V. Mullin wrote to me on November 1, stating that the "problem" was "not within our case priorities [scan]." I wrote again on January 23, 1990, asking in what way my case failed to fall within priorities. His response on February 13 stated that mine was considered a "fee generating case" in which the plaintiff seeks monetary compensation for damages, and that Legal Services Corporation could not accept such a case [scan]. Was this a valid excuse for failing to advocate on behalf of the victim of an ongoing crime, for refusing to help that victim obtain the equal protection of the law, for refusing to bring the facts to public attention? What nicely-crafted sophistry! Mr. Mullin must have done well in law school.

It doesn't end there. I paid a visit on March 12, 1990 to the Perth Amboy Legal Services office. Staff there would not deal with me, but put me on the phone to Paul Mullin in New Brunswick, who told me, this time, that Legal Services could not deal with civil rights matters!

Meanwhile, on October 6, 1989, I had finally followed the advice given me three years earlier by Mr. Scott-McLaughlin of the Center for Constitutional Rights, with discouraging but enlightening results. The Middlesex County Bar Association Lawyer Referral Service was located in the county courthouse in New Brunswick, in a small office radiating from the law library. A woman at the receptionist's desk told me that no lawyers were there, that attorneys were available only before 1:00 PM. She would not look at my papers or accept them for referral to others. She would not even take down my name, but instructed me to call before 1:00. As I paused outside the door for a moment shuffling papers, a male voice from the adjoining office asked her: "Do you work for the Republican National Committee?" Her answer was "Yes."

August 7, 1989 was the date of my first letter to Human Rights Watch. This organization, unlike Amnesty International, extends its mandate beyond abuse of prisoners. I called myself a torture victim and explained the "stream of consciousness machine." Nancy A. Beatty signed the postal receipt on August 16 [scan], but no response was ever forthcoming.

Human Rights Watch's Executive Director, Mr. Aryeh Neier, gave a speech sponsored by World Goodwill in New York City on August 31, 1989. I was, by then, totally disabled, although my physicians were refusing to document my disability on any grounds other than psychiatric. Summoning all my strength, I drove more than twenty miles to attend the address. Mr. Neier stressed that his organization seeks to "find out about human rights abuses in every conceivable way." He stated that contacts in various countries "point us in the direction of particular victims of abuses so that we can gather testimony from those persons, and from witnesses to abuses (15)." As he waited for the elevator after his speech, I approached him, handed him my August 7 letter and a small stack of documentation, and asked him to show these materials to someone in his organization.

Hearing nothing, I sent Human Rights Watch another letter on February 5, 1990. There was still no response. My phone call to their New York office on February 22 could not be completed. An announcement said "changed to an unlisted number." A human rights organization with an unlisted number?

Again summoning all my strength, I travelled to New York on May 31, 1990 to seek recognition and advocacy at the office of Americas Watch. As I entered, the receptionist told someone on the telephone that everyone was out of the office. A young man, nevertheless, appeared and spoke to me. He said that they did not take up individual complaints and advised me to see ACLU or the New York State Ombudsman. He would not accept fresh copies of my letters, nor did he offer any explanation for his organization's lack of response. I am convinced that he was a government agent. Leaving, dejected and infuriated, I turned at the door, faced the empty reception office, and whispered "God damn all of you!"

My December 5, 1990 letter reminded Mr. Aryeh Neier of his statements before the World Goodwill audience in August, assured him of my sanity, and noted Marlin Fitzwater's comments reported six weeks earlier. Referring to those who had hurt and humiliated me, I wrote: "Theirs is a diabolical, totalitarian agenda. Their disgraceful activities must be exposed to public view and punished with extreme severity. What has happened to me must never happen again, anywhere, to anyone. In the name of humanity, please let the truth be known."

Mr. Neier's response, dated December 17, 1990, stated: "I have received your letter of December 5 and its enclosures and do not see any way that we can assist you as the matter discussed in your letter is beyond our scope and competence. Best regards [scan]."

What, I wondered, was beyond their scope and competence? Political repression? Retaliation against a whistleblower? Illegal discrimination? Invasion of privacy? Defamation of character? Attempted malicious prosecution? Deprivation of legal counsel and the equal protection of the laws? State terrorism? Medical and scientific experimentation without free consent? Torture? What part couldn't they understand?

My letter of October 1, 1990 had told the Constitutional Litigation Clinic of Rutgers University: "The attached materials indicate a long ... history of criminal interference with my rights under state, federal, and international law. In six years of struggle, I have not been able to secure the arrest and prosecution of those responsible or obtain effective advocacy." Law student Dwayne Warren wrote to me on November 19, informing me that the Clinic was unable to provide representation "in the matter you presented [scan]." He added: "You should be aware that we have no authority to initiate criminal prosecutions nor any special influence with the authorities that do." Had anyone, I wonder, informed the Rutgers Inquiries Team and Mr. Warren that civil rights attorneys may seek mandamus relief to compel recalcitrant public officials to perform their duties, as well as injunctive relief, instructing individuals and agencies to cease unlawful activities?

My attempt on October 20, 1990 to contact journalist Tim Weiner at the Philadelphia Inquirer produced no acknowledgment or feedback. I doubt that he ever saw my letter. He may, by then, have started work at the New York Times.

The late Professor George Wald of Harvard University, eminent scientist and human rights activist, sent me a condescending hand-written response dated December 18, 1990 [scan]. Using the same word Aryeh Neier had used the day before, he wrote that my letter was far out of his "scope." He described it as "very well written, deeply disturbing, no doubt characterized as deeply disturbed, paranoid." He wrote: "You have to do it all in your Self. Your Self is all you have." His final advice was: "Stop writing to strangers."

WBAI-FM in New York may not have received my first letter, dated September 18, 1990. I had written the address incorrectly. I wrote again on February 1, 1991, having heard Bob Fass and Tuli Kupferberg on the night of January 26. In the course of their bantering, Mr. Kupferberg had asked jokingly: "You don't have one of those machines here that read people's thoughts, do you?" Mr. Fass responded "Yes" and cut immediately to music. My three-page letter was never answered.

On May 9, 1991, WBAI rebroadcast an interview originally heard several days earlier in which California-based researcher and broadcaster Dave Emory discussed the Intelligence Community's use of mind control. He reported that devices generating microwaves could "do a number of things to actually kill people, physically kill people. Their brains can be controlled; subconscious impulses and thoughts can be placed in their brain while they're asleep; their thoughts can actually be read, and auditory and visual hallucinations broadcast into the brain." I phoned the station to thank WBAI's staff for broadcasting the truth.

After my divorce in 1991, possessing money of my own for the first time since 1988, I decided to seek political asylum in Europe. I planned a visit to Washington, DC to follow up personally my letters to the Dutch and Danish embassies and to make one last attempt at securing effective advocacy in my native land. My letter of June 5, 1991 to the Washington office of Human Rights Watch announced my intention to visit that office later in the month. There, on June 20, I learned that all the Helsinki Watch personnel were on vacation until July 8 (Helsinki Watch was then the division that dealt with the USA). Again, however, a young man appeared, looked briefly at my documents, and told me with a straight face that the organization does not investigate or report abuses within the United States!

The same day, and again two days later, I visited the Christic Institute, following up a letter written on June 5 and presenting some documentation. The tiny, cluttered, run-down office and the decent staff person occupying it -- a far cry from Human Rights Watch's plush space and high-handed staff -- suggested sincerity, but no attempt was made to get in touch with me at the motel, or later at home.

My European ordeal is recounted in "Hard Realities"." Briefly, the Dutch authorities, not wishing to offend my government, coerced me into withdrawing my asylum request. At Amnesty International's Amsterdam office on September 3, 1991, two staff persons listened patiently, but ended up questioning my mental health and suggesting that I see a psychiatrist. They would not offer any sort of advocacy or assistance.

I headed north. The Danish government housed me in a refugee camp, but rejected my asylum request without legal representation or right of appeal. On December 19, 1991, Danish authorities returned me against my will to the United States, having charged me more than two thousand dollars for the privilege. According to the US Embassy in Copenhagen, they had falsely described me as "apparently deranged" and "hospitalized here," while conveniently neglecting to state that I had sought political asylum.

My new apartment in Elizabeth, New Jersey was well within the New York broadcast area. On June 15, 1992, WBAI-FM interviewed Kenneth Roth, then Deputy Director of Human Rights Watch. Explaining his organization's criticism of Haiti's Aristede Administration, he said: " ... a human rights group must be concerned first and foremost with its credibility. It must report violations by whoever commits them, be it a horrendous military regime or a democratically-elected leader like President Aristede."

I took the opportunity to send a certified letter to Helsinki Watch in Washington, reporting violations of my human rights by the United States, the Netherlands, and Denmark. There was no response. Letters to Oregon Public Broadcasting (producers of "European Journal"), Western Public Radio (producers of "The Privacy Project"), WCBS-Channel 2 in New York (regarding the program "Intruders"), and to the late Samori Marksman at WBAI likewise went unacknowledged.

I phoned in to Bob Fass's WBAI radio show on the night of June 27, 1992, relating my experience as a refugee. Under severe heckling from other callers, I revealed some of the corruption at my erstwhile workplace, and eventually, at the end, mentioned the "stream of consciousness" mind-reading machine. The program ended with the animalistic guffaws of my hecklers. This was the same radio station, remember, that had broadcast Dave Emory's revelations the year before. A letter to Santiago Nieves at WBAI on August 1 regarding Rudolph Giuliani's tenure as US Attorney produced no feedback (16).

My only positive contact during 1992 was with Myra Reynolds of the Citizens Commission on Human Rights in Los Angeles, which deals primarily with the abuse of mental patients. Ms. Reynolds, though compassionate and interested, was not moved to publicize my situation. I must nevertheless praise her for her sincerity and decency, rare qualities these days.

There followed another trip to Europe. This time, despite advance notice, no-one at Amsterdam's Amnesty International office would even talk to me. American agents played sadistic cat-and-mouse games with me and stole several items, including a briefcase containing papers I had intended to submit in support of my asylum application (I didn't get it back until after my interview with the Dutch Ministry of Justice). The Dutch, whose country and culture I idolized, just about destroyed my faith in humanity. They rejected my appeal, forcibly repatriated me, refused me re-entry into the Netherlands, and apparently conspired to confine me in a Belgian hospital under psychotropic medication, then imprison me as an illegal alien to coerce my "voluntary" return -- disheveled and penniless -- to the land of my torturers. Three days later, a much-resented "guest" in my former wife's home, I attempted suicide by swallowing a handful of her Xanax pills. The hospitalization that followed put the finishing flourishes on a long campaign of psychiatric discreditation that had begun in 1984. Doctors now feel free to call me a victim of Delusional Disorder, though they cannot explain exactly what delusions I entertain.

Whenever the media generate a bit of light and fresh air, an unseen hand, it seems, slams the window shut and draws the shade. On October 9, 1994, WBAI-FM's "Emanations" program featured an interview with Ms. Julianne McKinney of the Association of National Security Alumni's Electronic Surveillance Project. A former Army intelligence officer, she confirmed the existence of "directed energy" broadcast technology that can produce a "voices-in-the-head" phenomenon.

By the time comedian-activist Dick Gregory appeared on Bernard White's WBAI morning show on February 6, 1995, however, the atmosphere had changed. The outspoken Mr. Gregory started to mention that the government has "equipment" with which it is "messing with people's minds." Most uncharacteristically, however, he then exercised self-censorship, stating that he didn't want to "leave here discredited." A letter to Bernard White about this incident went unanswered. I listened in vain throughout 1995 and 1996 for more news of electromagnetic brain-invasion weaponry. I heard none.

On March 28, 1995, Professor Ann Fagan Ginger of Berkeley, California's Meicklejohn Civil Liberties Institute was interviewed on WBAI and gave listeners a New York phone number. I was pleasantly surprised when she returned my call, but she sounded a bit nervous and reticent. Professor Ginger made no offer of advocacy, but encouraged me to continue my efforts. Two letters written to her Berkeley, California address went unanswered.

None of my 15 letters to WBAI or Pacifica ever prompted any sort of response. The last, dated February 28, 1996, emphasized: "Everything I claim is real. I'm not paranoid; I'm damn annoyed." I wondered aloud how much oppression might not have happened had someone listened to me years before. "Justice delayed is justice denied. Truth delayed is truth rendered irrelevant. Please get in touch with me for further information." There was no response.

In 1997, I decided not to renew my subscription to WBAI. Why contribute to a station that will not answer my correspondence? There seems to be no point in even listening to a station so obviously controlled or intimidated by intelligence forces.

As of the spring of 1995, Dave Emory had a show broadcast on WFMU-FM in East Orange, New Jersey. It was his custom once a month to phone in his program live from California, responding to questions submitted by WFMU listeners. On May 16, I called in a question about mind-control and mind-reading technology. He responded positively, confirming the existence of devices that "measure the changes in the electromagnetic field around the human body which correspond with the activation or deactivation of certain neural pathways," thus detecting "sub-vocal thought" and interfacing these changes in the body's electromagnetic field with computer technology. He also reported that devices have existed for some time that can "implant thoughts in the brain of an experimental subject."

During the course of the show, Mr. Emory also discussed the Temple of Set, a sect founded by former Army intelligence colonel Michael Aquino, and he touched briefly on Project Monarch, which allegedly uses mind-control on young children to induce artificial multiple personalities for purposes of espionage and sexual exploitation. He remarked at one point that 21st-Century technology was in the hands of "people who thought Hitler and Mussolini were great." He said "It's very late in the day," warning that we may face "the total world triumph of absolute evil, forever."

That was the last time I ever heard Dave Emory speak live on WFMU's airwaves. Shortly thereafter, he took the summer off. When his program returned in the fall, it consisted only of pre-recorded material. I have to say, though, that the intrepid Mr. Emory has spoken more truth, more consistently and courageously, than any other broadcast personality I know. His interviews of such authorities as Nick Begich, Ph.D. have revealed significant truths, including cautious references to mind-reading technology.

My second appeal, in the summer of 1995, to Rutgers University's Constitutional Litigation Clinic produced a response from law student Regine Dupuy-McCalla informing me of the Inquiries Team's decision: "Unfortunately, our Clinic cannot handle the kind of matter you have described and will, therefore, be unable to represent you [scan]." Cannot handle? What does that mean?

My March 25, 1996 letter to the Center for Constitutional Rights in New York, written without reference to the previous correspondence of a decade before, produced no response, even though CCR has represented other victims of the government's campaign against CISPES.

A sympathetic rejection dated April 9, 1996 came from H.W. Cummins, Esq., representing the Task Force on Radiation and Human Rights in Takoma Park, Maryland. He suggested that I should talk to a lawyer in New Jersey. I couldn't resist writing him back on April 13, however, sending a ten-page chronology of my previous attempts since 1984 to obtain legal representation. My letter also revealed that while I was out to dinner on April 10, someone had broken into my Perth Amboy, New Jersey apartment and snipped the diamond tip off my phonograph stylus. A nice Freudian touch, don't you think?

I have quit the American Civil Liberties Union. ACLU of New Jersey ignored five letters from me between 1994 and 1997, including one on March 5, 1996 that said:

You can be forgiven for refusing to look compassionately upon my own personal ordeal, but how can you justify ignoring the vitally-important issues I have tried to bring to your attention? Electromagnetic mind-invasion technology has existed for at least nine years. How many persons have been victimized, without even knowing what was happening to them? ...

Do you really imagine that no-one will ever do these things to you or anyone you care about? Are you ready to see the minds and bodies of your loved ones invaded and abused by psychopathic fascist freaks? I have seen these monsters turn little girls into mind-control zombies, slave-prostitutes. Is there no voice other than my own to denounce these practices? Will no one help me expose these crimes?

My letter of February 20, 1997 to ACLU's Membership Director Denise G. Hantman supplied materials indicative of her organization's evasive insouciance since 1984. I wrote:

The well of hope and trust has run dry. I can no longer contribute to organizations that discriminate against me and refuse to challenge the vicious criminals I have sought to expose. The use of high-tech torture by America's intelligence and law-enforcement authorities in suppression of human rights is the most significant and portentous issue that confronts persons of good will. Nobody can afford to ignore it. Nobody is protected against it. It is now 1984-plus-thirteen. Big Brother is raping you, and nobody seems to care.

Ms. Hantman wrote this on February 26, 1997 [scan]:

We are in receipt of your February 20 letter informing us that you are dropping your membership due to your present financial limitation and clear disappointment in the ACLU of New Jersey for not assisting you with your human rights cause.

It appears that you perceive the ACLU as a public defender like Legal Services or Legal Aid, and it is not. The cases taken are generally landmark cases that set precedent so a larger number may benefit from the decision. Also, each ACLU affiliate is autonomous and decides the issues it will stress and which cases it will accept, independent of other affiliates and the National office. Therefore, the National ACLU does not intervene in these decisions.

Our Public Education Department sent you some literature last October, and we hope you found it informative. Unfortunately, we cannot be of more assistance.

Thank you for your past support of our work.

Compelled to respond, I wrote on February 28 that I was not a criminal suspect in need of a public defender -- that I had never been charged with or convicted of any criminal offense. I informed her that she was not the first to treat me like a "pitiful little miscreant with a personal `problem' or `cause' that is of no general significance or interest." Later in my letter, I stressed the issues once again:

How could you have read my United Nations "1503" communication without realizing that I do indeed present a "landmark case" that "sets precedent so a larger number may benefit from the decision?" This is not my human rights cause. It is the cause of human rights, period. Electromagnetic neurological invasion, assault, and somatic disruption effectively nullify the First, Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, Ninth, and Fourteenth Amendments. This country's absolute refusal to abide by its own laws and Constitution and to comply with the international human rights treaties, as demonstrated and documented in my personal experience, endangers the very future of human civilization.

You needn't respond unless you are prepared to acknowledge and discuss the issues.

There was, of course, no response.

Human Rights Watch ignored four letters after my return from Europe, the last of which, dated April 25, 1997, dealt solely with the discriminatory "safe country of origin" asylum policies lately adopted by European countries. Apparently, that issue is also a bit too controversial for the fainthearted folks at Helsinki Watch, who will not favor me with a reply. They don't respond to e-mails, either.

Amnesty International remains intransigent, refusing to consider my case even after having enlarged its mandate to include refugees. E-mails to Amnesty offices generally prompt no response, except for the Copenhagen and Amsterdam offices. Lisbet Birkedal's message of October 7, 1998 informed me: "If the case involves a complaint against the Danish authorities then the Danish Section is not just unable to act but prohibited from getting involved under the statutes of Amnesty International." I thanked her and continued my attempts at contacting AI's international secretariat in London, with no success to date.

Hard-hearted Amnesty in Amsterdam is another story entirely. Mr. Diederik de Bruijn of that office's Department of External Relations is so contemptuous as to make one wonder how he ever ended up in that line of work. On October 7, 1998, he sent me the following text with the title "Your e-mail messages:"

The Dutch section of Amnesty International received a lot of messages from you over a long time. Once, I sent you the answer that your case does not fall within the mandate of AI and that we are not in a position to help you. Don't you read your e-mail or do you have a bad memory? Would you please be so kind not to send any further messages to us? Your messages are neither read nor answered in the future. Please take notice of my answer.

I did not accede to Mr. De Bruijn's wishes. My response of the same date was firm, and I sent a copy to London:

Guess what! Amnesty International's mandate has changed! It now includes refugees and asylum-seekers. You may be interested to know that AI has even spoken out strongly against "safe country" asylum policies and such involuntary repatriations as your country inflicted upon me (see http://www.amnesty.org/ailib/intcam/refugee/report/index.html).

Amnesty International has also taken a strong position against rampant police brutality in my "safe" country, the United States of America, taking note of that which has occurred in New York City. As I may have informed you, I "blew the whistle" in 1985 on corrupt connections between my employers (a New York State agency) and members of the S.N.A.P. Team of New York's 106th police precinct, who had used electric stun-guns to torture marijuana suspects.

You are badly in need of education, Sir. I seriously wonder whether you work for Amnesty International at all.

I shall be sending copies of this message to AI's offices in London and the USA. It is my hope that they will reaffirm the right of any victim of such human rights CRIMES as discrimination on the basis of national origin and coerced repatriation to seek attention, advocacy, and assistance from their non-governmental organization.

I also intend to post the text of your message, with this reply, on JH Graf's Human Rights Forum at http://forums.delphi.com/m/main.asp?sigdir=jhgraf and elsewhere. I want others to know of your disgraceful attitude.

I am not a piece of garbage. I am a man, endowed with dignity and rights. Nobody has any excuse for discriminating against me. Shame on you, Sir, and on those whose inhuman crimes you seek to cover up. You can run from the truth, but I will not let you hide.

There was no response from any Amnesty International office.

More than ever, I have become a non-person -- shut out, anathematized. Aside from crafty, sophistic buck-passing or excuse-making letters, I get no recognition or cooperation whatever from any agency of government, any congressman or senator, any human rights organization, legal clinic, or United Nations agency (17). Those I try to contact, if they get my letters at all, are either intimidated or "complimented" -- that is, induced via slanderous cock-and-bull stories to cooperate with the conspirators and to hold me in contempt.

I am forced to live in ""Virtual America"," where personalities prevail over principles. The corruption I've discussed here benefits from a prevailing mindset of narrow loyalties and arbitrarily limited mandates. The Virtual America of my experience (Virtual Europe, too, I'm sorry to say) flounders in avoidance, excuse-making, exception-making, and loophole-finding. Instead of just doing the right thing, people -- especially public officials and human rights advocates -- will stay up nights searching for ways to rationalize doing the wrong thing or nothing at all. Blind to the issues, they focus on personal, individual distinctions. They inspect me and reject me.

Those who can acknowledge the issues at all suggest that it's somehow all my fault. My personality, my character, my sanity, my morality, my motivation, my credentials, my lifestyle -- these become the issue. They decide they don't like my writing style or the way I part my hair. They decide that I don't have enough academic credentials, haven't won any honors, have no standing, don't deserve any recognition. I'm the wrong race, the wrong sex, the wrong age, the wrong shape, the wrong nationality. I'm only one person: they concentrate on groups. Mine is a small tragedy: they only deal with big ones. My prison has no walls or bars, my torture leaves few scars, my murder is too slow to be noticed. Let's face it, I just don't qualify. I should apologize for being so selfish as to demand the equal protection of the law.

My own victimization thus becomes an argument against my message. Is there a law that says victims cannot be advocates, or are people simply looking for an excuse to continue wallowing in denial? Every person deserves respect.

Though I have as much right as anyone else to demand justice, this is not about me alone. It's about issues, principles. I am convinced that many have died because nobody would listen to me. Many are suffering, many are enslaved, many are degraded and exploited, many are hospitalized or imprisoned because nobody would pay attention to the issues I have tried to raise. The honor and credibility of nations (and of the United Nations) are at stake. I tell you frankly that if truth and justice do not prevail in this matter, civilization will fall, so grave are the horrors such corruption portends. The rule of law is paramount. Without it we are all doomed.

America is a nation in denial. My experience suggests that its institutions for promoting human rights and justice are undergoing progressive paralysis. Its institutions for exposing ugly truth are, in this instance -- and soon, I'm sure, in many others -- quite effectively gagged.

Take this message, America, from one who has not known peace of mind or privacy of thought in more than five thousand days. You have the right to remain silent. You also have the right not to remain silent. Preserve the one by exercising the other.