Star Tribune. Published Sunday, February 6, 2000
HAVANA -- Revolutionary fighter or bloody cop killer in hiding?
Under U.S. law, there is no question. Charles Hill is an alleged murderer and an airplane hijacker who for more than 28 years has avoided justice by living in Cuba.
"A common, cowardly thug," is how he was described by Darren White, secretary of the New Mexico Department of Public Safety, in a recent interview with the Washington Post.
On Nov. 8, 1971, Hill and two others, Michael Finney and Ralph Goodwin, were driving a car filled with guns and explosives from California to Louisiana. As they crossed New Mexico, they were stopped by a 28-year-old state trooper, Robert Rosenbloom. A standoff ended when Rosenbloom was shot
dead.
Nineteen days later, with state and federal law enforcement officers scouring the region, the three fugitives went to the airport in Albuquerque, N.M., and hijacked a TWA flight bound for Chicago. After allowing engers to disembark in Tampa, Fla., the three demanded that they be taken to
Havana. Hill and Finney have lived in Cuba ever since, protected from extradition by the Cuban government. Goodwin drowned in Cuba in 1973.
Hill has not been forgotten by the U.S. Department of Justice.
"We know he's down there and we know we can't get him back," said John Russell, a Justice Department spokesman in Washington, D.C. "But if there's ever a treaty [with Cuba], boom, we'll be after him. We have an elephant's memory. We never forget."
In late January, photographer Jerry Holt and I were in Cuba covering the University of St. Thomas baseball team for the Star Tribune. Hill, 50, on the recommendation of another newspaper photographer who had used his services previously, was our guide and interpreter. At the time, we did not
know the full extent of the crimes Hill allegedly had committed. Over a seven-day period, he talked about his perception of the events that led to the killing in New Mexico and of his life since the TWA plane touched down in Havana.
He said he believes the U.S. government has made frequent efforts to have him sent back.
"Every two or three years, the United States government asks for the return of the 'bloody murderers,' " Hill said. "It's always a one-sided story."
And so, he said, in the last year he has decided to go public with his story, a story he also has told in recent months to the New York Times and the Washington Post.
He doesn't say exactly why he's coming forward after years of silence. But Hill apparently hopes that doing some interviews will help him land a publisher to do the story of his life and times.
A good life, for Cuba
Start with his life in Cuba. Although he's not a Cuban citizen, his Cuban identification card does give him access to ration tickets for food and free medical care. As appears to be the case with most Cubans, his lifestyle seems to be only a few notches above empty-stomach poverty.
He lives in a tiny, one-bedroom concrete house with a woman and her son. He's among the lucky ones in Cuba because somehow he has managed to get his hands on a few quarts of paint to cover his interior walls with light pinks and yellows, freeing him from the washed-out grays found in most
structures.
Cooking is done on a two-burner kerosene stove; clothes are hand-scrubbed in a sink, which is located on a tiny porch at the back of their home. They have a TV set and Hill keeps up on U.S. events by listening to a Miami all-news radio station. He has a 14-year-old daughter who lives with her
mother in another part of Havana.
A story he tells about a friend's gift underscores the sparse living conditions of Cubans.
"A friend of mine [from the United States] always brings me surprises," Hill said. "On his last trip, he said, 'This time, I've got something really special.' He had a classic can of Ritz crackers, cheese spread with jalapeño in it and some ham. I thought I'd died and gone
to heaven."
The crackers are long gone -- the empty can sits atop an old refrigerator that is squeezed into a dining room that is big enough to seat three people.
And Hill's not in heaven at all. He's in Cuba -- and he can never leave. He's one of about 80 U.S. fugitives there. He has no with a U.S. son who was born in 1970 while Hill was living in Alaska. He knows he'll never see a U.S. grandchild.
But he says he never looks back. Or, at least, almost never looks back. He won't say who shot Rosenbloom. The closest he comes to expressing regret over the trooper's death is to say that he wishes the trooper hadn't pulled his gun.
A man of the revolution
A wounded Vietnam War vet who received a less-than-honorable discharge, Hill was a member of the Republic of New Afrika -- a small organization that still seeks a black separatist nation within the United States -- on that day he was crossing New Mexico with his comrades. The three were trying
to get weapons to Louisiana, where they believed Republic of New Afrika leaders were "under attack" by the FBI.
He still sees himself as a man of the revolution. But his big disappointment has been that he never was allowed to Cuban soldiers who attempted to help overthrow governments in African nations in the 1980s. His requests to be "dropped into the mountains to the fight" were
denied by Cuban officials.
Hill has worked a variety of jobs in Cuba, ranging from cutting sugar cane when he first arrived to being an interpreter for various bureaucracies.
When he arrived in Cuba, he was accepted by Fidel Castro's government as a soldier of the people's revolution. In the early 1970s, he said, the streets were filled with self-proclaimed revolutionaries from all over the world. They're gone now because, for the present, Cuba can't afford to be in
the international revolution business.
So Hill has become a hustler and a dealmaker with connections all over a complex city that he travels through easily.
Want a T-shirt, a book, a deal on cigars?
Hill knows a guy. (And always gets a little piece of the action.)
When he's having good economic times, he smokes American cigarettes. Otherwise, it's unfiltered Cuban smokes. He reads American writers ranging from Noam Chomsky to Toni Morrison to John Grisham. He practices Santeria, an African-based religion more popular in Cuba than Catholicism.
He and a friend, a teacher at the University of Havana, have squeezed an outdoor gym into a small courtyard among houses in Hill's neighborhood. The gym, which appears to be open to all comers, is a cross between Nautilus and Swiss Family Robinson.
Like many in Cuba, Hill is capable of sarcastic comments about government inefficiencies. But mostly, he appears to be a true believer in Castro and, at times, angrily denounces Cubans who express dissatisfaction with conditions in the country.
"Fools compare us to the United States, not to other Third-World countries," he fumes of those who complain. "I believe that this government does try to act in the best interest of the people."
Of course, it would not be in his interest to criticize a government that shields him from extradition. He says he's certain Cuba will never give him up -- although he hasn't been a model resident in Cuba, either. In 1979, he was imprisoned for 14 months for falsifying currency receipts, and
he's served time for possession of marijuana.
Angry over racism
He was born in a small town in Illinois and attended high school in Oakland, Calif., his anger growing as he saw bigotry around him. At 17, he ed the Army and was stationed in . Although he rose in rank rapidly, he said he grew increasingly angry at the racism he saw and felt from
both Germans and his fellow soldiers. He said he became an agitator, an attitude that he believes was the reason he was transferred to Vietnam, where his anger increased until he snapped.
After being wounded, he says, he refused to return to combat. The Army finally agreed with his assessment that "I was no longer fit to fight."
After being discharged, he lived briefly in Alaska before moving back to Oakland. He found friends among those who were involved in the militant Republic of New Afrika. He took the name Fela Olatunji, and then came the 1971 journey.
He described what happened:
"He [Rosenbloom] sees us, three black cats, big Afros, and he pulls us over. Racist dude. He wanted to search the car. . . . He says, 'What's in the trunk, what's under there?' He must have thought he was John Wayne. He pulls his gun. What happened next was self-defense, but who's going to
believe that? They [the authorities] said he was riddled with bullets. He was shot once, in the throat. . . .
"The one thing I wonder about is why didn't he just let us go, and call ahead for a roadblock? But he had to stop us by himself."
The desperate trio moved underground in Albuquerque, finally deciding, "There was only one way to get out of Dodge."
The hijacking was stunningly simple, Hill said. The armed fugitives didn't enter the terminal. Rather, they spent the night in the desert near the airport. Then, they stuck a gun in the face of a tow-truck driver and told him to deliver them to the terminal area where planes were taking on
engers. Heavily armed, they scrambled aboard the plane.
"I knew there was going to be no turning back," he said.
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