◆ SpookStack

Nos. 77-1698, 77-1210 & 77-1370 9 At the conclusion of this trial, the district judge prepared a lengthy “Summary” of the evidence which il- luminated the court’s rationale in directing the verdicts of April 15 and June 20, 1977.4 Upon a comparison of the extensive record, including the received and im- Properly rejected evidence, and the trial judge’s Sum- mary, there can be no doubt that the district judge erred by supporting his grant of the directed verdicts with evidence which was. considered in the light most favorable to the defendants, Furthermore, we are .com- pelled to conclude that, once again, as in Byrd, the dis- trict judge weighed the. evidence, thereby invading the province of the jury. We recite the facts adduced at trial to determine whether the plaintiffs presented a prima facie case against any defendant which warranted submission to a Jury. The facts can be considered in three stages: pre- raid, the raid itself, and post-raid. A. Pre-Raid In August 1967 the FBI initiated a national covert counterintelligence program called “COINTELPRO” which was designed to neutralize a variety of political organizations including those which the Bureau characterized ‘as “Black Nationalist Hate Groups.” Directives from Washington ordered the Chicago office of the FBI to implement the program in the Chicago area. While the Black Panther Party was not an original target of this program, it was included within the ambit of COINTELPRO’s scrutiny by September 1968.5 The 4 Judge Perry elected to provide the parties with a Summary of the evidence approximately one month after the trial’s con- clusion. Although the judge stated in a letter attached to the Summary that it was not intended to be an official memoran- . dum in the case, we see no reason why the Summary is not a part of the record and therefore properly before us: 5 The organizations originally the subject of COINTELPRO ‘included the Southern Christian Leadership Conference SCLC), the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee SNCC), and the Nation of Islam.