Irish Republican granted political asylum in S.F

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Jimmy Smyth: Sean McGowan's victory could help his case for asylum.

SOCIALISTACTION DECEMBER 1992 7 may now think he has the "luck of the Irish," but because of a recent decision by the San Francisco Immigration Court granting him political asylum, some of it may rub off on the cases of other Irish Republicans that British authorities want to get their hands on.

McGowan's victory is the first time that a U.S. court has granted asylum to an Irishman because he faced death threats in British-occupied Northern Ireland.

The court's decision to vacate a deportation order against McGowan could have a direct influence on the cases of Jimmy Smyth and Kevin Artt, two escapees from Northern Ireland's notorious Long Kesh concentration camp in 1983.

Both Smyth and Art were arrested by the FBI in June 1992—Smyth in San Francisco and Artt in San Diego-and charged with making false statements to gain a passport. British authorities have made it clear that they want both men extradited back to Northern Ireland.

McGowan's case is a precedent because he has a prison record in Norther Ireland. As a member of the Official IRA, McGowan was convicted of armed robbery, possession of firearms and membership in the Official IRA and served almost eight years in Crumlin Road Jail and Long Kesh.

When he was arrested, McGowan was beaten and tortured by the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC). He filed brutality charges and, in return for dropping those charges, was sentenced to five years in prison instead of the 20 years he could have gotten.

Shortly after he was released in May 1983, however, the Ulster Volunteer Force, an outlawed paramilitary death squad, immediately began to threaten him.

McGowan told Socialist Action that once you are fingered as a former IRA man your life is in immediate danger. So Sean McGowan had no choice but to leave-or face death.

Deportation equals death sentence McGowan, who had been to the United States on two previous occasions, came to stay in 1985 when he settled in San Francisco and worked in construction. And like thousands of other undocumented workers, he constantly had to look over his shoulder in fear of being nabbed by the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), the hated La Migra.

But McGowan's luck ran out in September, 1989, when he was apprehended by the INS and arrested with another man who was their main target. Since then, McGowan has been out on bail fighting his case.

The centerpiece of McGowan's political asylum appeal was that he faced a death sentence if he was returned to Northern Ireland. Judge Lawrence DiConstanzo, who heard the case, was obviously convinced. He ruled that there was justifiable reason to believe that McGowan's life would be in danger if he was deported to Northern land.

According to an article written by Mary O'Donnell in the November 1992 San Francisco Gael, a local Irish community newspaper:

"The testimony presented by McGowan's lawyers, Jim Byme and Susanna Iglehert, included 'corroborative evidence with regard to threats made on his life, details of the SAN FRANCISCO GAEL British government's Stevens Inquiry, which verified reports of collaboration between the British security forces and loyalist paramilitary death squads, and substantiation that killings by loyalist death squads have dramatically increased."

Judge DiConstanzo was also swayed by the testimony of McGowan himself, who related how he had to check his car every planted.

With his three year ordeal now behind him, McGowan is tremendously relieved and wants only to "get on with my life.

But political activists in the Irish community here are understandably optimistic about the chances of winning political asylum for Smyth, Art, and many other Irish Republicans who came to the U.S. to escape British terror.

They don't want any more Irish Republicans to end up like Joe Doherty, who was imprisoned for years in the United States before being deported to Northern Irelandwhere he now languishes in prison.

PUBLIC FORUM

Hear JIMMY SMYTH, GERRY MCGEOUGH, and KAREN SNELL, Smyth's Ass't Federal Public Defender, explain the background and the facts of these landmark defense cases for the right of political asylum.

(415) 821-0458 Donation: $4 - $2 students, unemployed, and retired Sponsored by: H-Block 2 Committee for Justice, Irish-American Unity Conference, Soclalist Action Forum * 500 hurts:

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In Detense of Irish Political Prisoners The Cases of Jimmy Smyth and Gerry McGeough

Friday, Dec. 11, 8 PM 3425 Army St., S.F.