(Four-part series in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette by Tony Norman covering the Free Getu Coalition's campaign to defend Getu Tewolde)
Misplaced vigilance greets a stranger to our city
Friday, April 26, 2002
Getu Berhanu Tewolde never intended to take advantage of Pittsburgh's hospitality suites at the Allegheny County Jail. When he boarded a cross-country bus in Washington, D.C., for Denver, the Ethiopian immigrant didn't even know Pittsburgh was one of the stops along the way.
As fate would have it, what was supposed to be a 12-minute layover at the Greyhound station Downtown on the morning of Feb. 1 became a six-week stay in the psychiatric ward of the county jail.
Held without benefit of either psychiatric examination or legal representation until the final week of his internment, Getu -- who has never read Kafka -- became the embodiment of the author's fictional character in "The Trial." Like Kafka's Joseph K., Getu was accused of terrible things in the vaguest way possible.
When Getu was released on bail on March 16, it was because of the activism of the Free Getu Coalition, a local group that had organized on his behalf.
The image of the 35-year-old, sporting a newly minted black eye, his wrists bound behind his back, made an indelible impression on those who watched the 10 o'clock news on Fox that night as he was unceremoniously escorted to a waiting paddy wagon.
For those who assumed that Getu was obviously guilty of something that imperiled the nation, or else he wouldn't have been forced to do the "perp" walk on Fox 53, it was confirmation of the value of stepped-up vigilance against terrorism in the wake of Sept. 11.
For others, the expression of helpless puzzlement on Getu's face was proof that Pittsburgh -- like much of America -- was in danger of becoming a place where an unwary soul with an alien name can land in jail by simply not fitting the local profile of what constitutes an "acceptable" stranger.
Getu, like Kafka's Joseph K., was about to find out what happens when civil liberties are jettisoned in favor of shifting definitions of guilt and innocence when the state deems it expedient.
"I didn't expect this from a big, civilized place like USA," Getu said in broken English when I interviewed him a few weeks ago. "Being called a terrorist doesn't fill me with confidence," he added wryly. It was a sign that six weeks of confinement hadn't deprived him of a sense of his situation's innate absurdity.
The refugee camps of Yemen where he spent nearly a decade before immigrating to America are more humane than a modern prison cell in the heart of Pittsburgh, Getu insisted.
He was so relieved to be released from 24-hour lock-down in a 5-by-4 mental health pod where he was fed anti-psychotic pills and mood-altering drugs all day, he said he felt like hugging even his jailers.
Freedom tasted so good to him that he said his heart was big enough to accommodate the evil he believes was done to him by police and Greyhound officials on Feb. 1, when he was accused of making "terroristic" threats at the bus station.
Getu's sojourn into Pittsburgh's criminal justice system began when he reboarded his bus after its layover. Due to the narrowness of the center aisle, Getu inadvertently brushed against a female passenger who happened to be the bus station's night manager.
"The lady right away complained something which I didn't understand and retreated [from] the bus," Getu said. Moments later, an agitated driver ordered Getu off the bus, a request he complied with immediately.
Back in the terminal, Getu was surrounded by several of the woman's angry colleagues. The only thing he understood for sure in all the shouting was that they believed he was a criminal of some sort. Minutes later, a man approached the group and ordered Getu to sit in a terminal chair. This time he refused.
"I was upset because I wasn't guilty of anything," he said. The man, later identified as a Pittsburgh police officer, moved quickly to disarm Getu of the pen he was holding. At 125 pounds, Getu struggled to keep his pen and his dignity, but was no match for an officer who had yet to identify himself. How he got his black eye and into a heap of trouble that landed him in a mental ward will be explored over the next several columns.
What put Getu in jail: his own zeal or over-reaction?
Tuesday, April 30, 2002
Part two of a series
On the morning of Feb. 1, Getu Berhanu Tewolde reboarded a Greyhound bus after a 12-minute layover at the Downtown station. He was eager to resume his journey to Denver, the city he had called home before moving to D.C. three months earlier.
The Ethiopian immigrant wanted to surprise his uncle, who didn't know he was crossing the continent for an impromptu visit. Getu's plan was to reclaim the clothes he'd left behind when he moved.
Traveling without a suitcase, Getu hadn't been in Pittsburgh long enough for the town to make an impression, good or bad. He'd been in the Greyhound terminal once before during a layover from Denver to D.C. last fall. Twelve minutes wasn't enough time to get the feel of a town, so he stretched his legs and wandered the terminal.
Later, an off-duty police officer would recall seeing Getu "talking to himself" that morning, though he didn't consider it particularly remarkable. Bus stations are usually full of eccentrics. He decided there was nothing threatening about Getu.
For his part, Getu recalls talking to a few people at the station. And there are indications that the 35-year-old's religious fervor manifested itself during his stroll through the terminal.
Later, Getu told one of his friends he had spoken generally about religion with some folks and that he'd even had a brief conversation with a police officer about atheism and God. He doesn't recall muttering to himself, though. Other than heightened religious feelings that morning, Getu doesn't believe there was anything unusual or obnoxious about his behavior.
No one, including those who mistook him for a terrorist on the Greyhound bus, has accused him of proselytizing or shouting his faith at passers-by. With only pita bread in a plastic bag for his trip, Getu had no Bible to thump even if he'd wanted to.
"I read the Bible, but I didn't take it [with me] that day," he said.
When Getu reboarded the bus, he struck up a conversation with another passenger sitting two or three rows behind him. They discussed spiritual matters, a topic Getu relishes. "I asked if anyone on the bus had a Bible," Getu recalls. "It was no problem and no one was upset. Nothing happened."
This was before Getu bumped into the Greyhound station's night manager, a woman named Angela Street who was on the bus that evening. Accounts vary as to what happened next, though everyone agrees it had terrible repercussions for civil liberties in general and Getu in particular.
Getu insists he merely brushed past the woman while trying to get to his seat down the bus' narrow aisle. Street told police Getu "pushed" her several times, a complaint that brought a Pittsburgh police officer to the scene. The bus driver ordered Getu off the bus after she complained.
Eight passengers wrote letters stating that Getu allegedly said things ranging from "I'm Jesus" and "the Lord of Lords asked me [to choose] life or death" to "You are all blessed, but wait until tomorrow" and "Americans are going to die."
These statements and several like them make up the bulk of the "terroristic threats" Getu is alleged to have made that morning. Getu insists he merely asked for a Bible and that there was no ruckus until he was back in the terminal. Once there, he says he was surrounded by Street's angry colleagues. The police believe some angry passengers were part of the crowd that surrounded him.
What happened next was either a full-blown "scuffle" with the arresting officer or a case of a foreign traveler being assaulted by an "unidentified man" while holding onto a pen that the man, who turned out to be a policeman, mistook for a knife.
It was during this scuffle that the officer, Bryan Sellers, subdued Getu and blackened his eye. Because Sellers had been dispatched directly from the Hill District Station, he was in full uniform. Getu recalls it differently.
Weeks later, Angela Street would fail to show at Getu's preliminary hearing to tell her side of events that landed a God-intoxicated Ethiopian in the psychiatric ward of Allegheny County Jail for six weeks. We'll explore Getu's encounter with the police and his journey through the system in the next column.
Caught in a vortex of fear, Getu still has hope
Friday, May 03, 2002
Part three of four parts
From the moment he reboarded his bus at the Greyhound station Downtown on Feb. 1, Getu Berhanu Tewolde was caught in a vortex of misunderstanding and worst-case scenarios.
For bumping into a Greyhound employee while navigating the narrow aisle of a Denver-bound bus, Getu, an Ethiopian immigrant, was ordered off the bus and back into the terminal.
Angela Street, the Greyhound station's night manager, said Getu pushed her "several times" on the bus. Getu insists that other than squeezing past the woman in the aisle on the way to his seat, he never touched her.
The first circle of the vortex that would eventually engulf Getu appeared when Street called the cops. The second circle was the group of angry bus station employees who surrounded him at the terminal. The vortex got stronger when Pittsburgh police Officer Bryan Sellers arrived.
Finding Getu surrounded by Street's angry co-workers, Sellers ordered him to sit down in a terminal chair. Getu refused. He didn't acknowledge the officer's authority apparently because his uniform wasn't as familiar to him as those he'd encountered in Washington, D.C.
The next circle was the one that got Getu charged with aggravated assault and resisting arrest. Frightened by the hostility of the strangers surrounding him, Getu made a gesture with a pen the agitated crowd mistook for a knife.
The circle of bruises under Getu's eyes came courtesy of an officer who believed he was disarming a knife-wielding zealot who'd reportedly made "terroristic threats" on the bus before "assaulting" a female employee.
Once handcuffed, Getu Tewolde was taken to the Zone 2 police station in the Hill District where he was interviewed by the FBI anti-terrorism task force. To its credit, it took the FBI 15 minutes to determine Getu wasn't a member of al-Qaida. There would be no federal charges filed against him.
Meanwhile, the Pittsburgh police confirmed that Getu was who he claimed to be. His status as a legal immigrant, his INS card and driver's license all checked out. Even his car was parked at the apartment complex in Washington, where he said it would be.
The Greyhound terminal was evacuated shortly after Getu was arrested, but a thorough search by police and bomb-sniffing dogs failed to turn up anything more dangerous than the usual bus station grime.
Still, no one in a position to cut Getu loose felt sufficiently embarrassed about hauling an immigrant with only a rudimentary command of English before authorities without benefit of legal representation or advice.
Consequently, the vortex of fear only got tighter. He was cleared by the FBI, but Getu was charged with making terroristic threats, risking a catastrophe, aggravated assault and resisting arrest. Statements he reportedly made about God, Jesus and America at the bus station were deemed sufficiently "dangerous" to have his bond set at $10,000. It might as well have been a million.
After a few days in a cell, Getu was moved to a mental-health pod at the Allegheny County Jail. He was fed eight anti-psychotic, mood-stabilizing pills a day, but never examined by a psychiatrist. He met his public defender for the first time at his hearing 10 days after he was arrested.
A month later on March 11, the ACLU and the Free Getu Coalition arranged for him to meet with a lawyer and have a full psychiatric exam before his hearing in four days. Getu was cleared by the jail's Behavior Clinic two days later. On March 15, the Free Getu Coalition paid the relieved immigrant's $525 bail, but his misadventures in Pittsburgh aren't over yet.
The charge he assaulted Angela Street disappeared, but Getu still faces trial for all the other charges. On May 20, he'll find out his trial date. Though the vortex of fear continues to tighten, Getu is no longer alone. The final installment on Tuesday will explore the source of the immigrant's hope.
If justice is finally done, Getu will leave Pittsburgh -- quickly
Tuesday, May 07, 2002
Part four of four
Getu Berhanu Tewolde is a handsome man. He bears little resemblance to the news footage of the puffy-eyed wretch carted off to the mental ward of the Allegheny County Jail three months ago for making "terroristic threats" and resisting arrest at the Greyhound station Downtown.
Getu's face no longer contains telltale signs of his arrest on Feb. 1. The bruised cheeks and swollen eyes that appall visitors to the Free Getu Coalition! Web site -- www.freegetu.org --have healed. The fear and confusion on his face have also receded, replaced by something resembling a peaceful wariness.
The Ethiopian immigrant's demeanor is friendly, but slightly formal. During several interviews at a coffee shop in Squirrel Hill, he is too focused to order anything. When he listens, he leans forward to concentrate with his whole being. When he speaks, he does so with the earnestness of someone for whom English is a second or third language.
During his six weeks at the Allegheny County Jail, Getu saw Pittsburgh at its worst -- suspicious, paranoid of strangers, legalistic and contemptuous of the civil liberties of immigrants. Fortunately, it wasn't the only face of Pittsburgh he was exposed to.
When word spread through Pittsburgh's peace activist community that an immigrant was in Allegheny County Jail without benefit of legal or psychiatric counsel, Getu was inundated with heartfelt expressions of good will and offers of help.
Groups as disparate as Zi-Activism, the Thomas Merton Center, the Anti-Discrimination Committee of the Islamic Center of Pittsburgh, Amnesty International and the American Civil Liberties Union worked to arrange something approximating a legitimate day in court for Getu.
At Getu's second hearing on March 15, the coalition's efforts paid off. Getu's bail was secured for $525 and he was released that afternoon. The allegation that initiated the arrest -- an assault charge for "pushing" a Downtown bus station night manager -- was dropped.
The charge of risking a catastrophe at the Greyhound station was initially dropped as well, but the district attorney's office had it reinstated. It continues to stand along with charges that Getu made terroristic threats, resisted arrest and assaulted a police officer. On May 20, Getu will find out what day he'll go on trial this summer.
Asked if he planned to stay in Pittsburgh after his trial, assuming a judge is wise enough to cut him loose after all he's been through, Getu smiles and says as politely as he can that he will be on the first bus back to Washington, D.C., if he is found "not guilty" or -- better yet -- if all the charges are thrown out.
Still, he insists that he likes Pittsburgh. On good days, the city reminds Getu of places in Europe he's fond of, but he's understandably nervous here because hypersensitivity and miscommunication got him thrown in jail.
Getu's treatment in jail convinced him that the system's tolerance of procedural irregularity in his case makes Pittsburgh an unlikely place to hang his hat. Asked if the lack of Ethiopian restaurants in this town was part of the problem, he laughed.
"I felt a little depressed while I was in jail," he said with characteristic understatement. "I have doubts about how they run the police department and the jail. It makes me worried."
Getu has made good friends in Pittsburgh during his unplanned sabbatical here. Many, like Saleh Waziruddin, the co-founder of Zi-Activism and the primary organizer of the Free Getu Coalition, will probably be his friend for life.
"When I visited Getu in prison, there were other people visiting people in the mental health ward," Waziruddin said. "It was as if it wasn't necessary to ask whether people were really crazy or not before they were placed there."
Waziruddin shuttles Getu to speaking events and interviews, prompting his friend to clarify his statements in rare instances when Getu can't get his thoughts across.
"They've been a lot of help since I came out," Getu said referring to Waziruddin and other members of the coalition named in his honor. "Everyone is working for humanity. Because of them, I have more confidence about my case."
Asked how he felt when we ended the interview, Getu said, "I hope they drop the [charges]." It was an honest answer to a question he wants desperately to put behind him.
