Luis Kutner
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Luis Kutner | |
|---|---|
| Born | June 9, 1908 |
| Died | March 1, 1993 (aged 84) |
| Alma mater | University of Chicago Law School, 1927 |
| Occupations | Lawyer, Author |
| Known for | Snitching on Fred Hampton and reporting him to the FBI, leading to Hampton's eventual assassination in Chicago. Development of the living will and advocacy of world habeas corpus |
| External image | |
|---|---|
 http://www.corbisimages.com/stock-photo/rights-managed/U1194767INP/attorney-luis-kutner-holding-petition Luis Kutner with petition for United Nations writ of habeas corpus to be filed with the UN Commission on Human Rights on behalf of William N. Oatis, 1952. Corbis Images. |
Luis Kutner (June 9, 1908 – March 1, 1993) was a US human rights activist, FBI informant,[1] and lawyer who was on the National Advisory Council of the US branch of Amnesty International during its early years[2] and created the concept of a living will.[3] He was also notable for his advocacy of "world habeas corpus", the development of an international writ of habeas corpus to protect individual human rights.[4][5] He was a founder of World Habeas Corpus,[6] an organization created to fight for international policies which would protect individuals against unwarranted imprisonment.[7] Kutner's papers are at the Hoover Institution Archives at Stanford University.[8]
Luis Kutner was born in Chicago to Jewish-Russian immigrants.[9] At the age of 15, he entered the law school of the University of Chicago.[9]
During the late 1940s, Kutner built up his reputation as a human rights lawyer. During his career he also gained the release of over 1,000 people, mainly as they were wrongfully convicted or being held without charge.[10]
Kutner gained national recognition[11] in 1949, when he obtained freedom for a black mechanic from Waukegan, Illinois, James Montgomery, who had served 26 years of a life term sentence for raping an itinerant. A Federal judge described as "a sham" the defendant's 1924 trial in which a vengeful prosecutor withheld vital evidence. He also helped free Hungarian Cardinal József Mindszenty, American fascist poet Ezra Pound, former Congo President Moise Tshombe and represented the Dalai Lama and Tibet. Kutner is widely known as one of the most prominent human-rights attorneys of the twentieth century.[12]
He is also accredited for the first acknowledged federal lawsuit against a prison warden by inmates in 1949. In 1952, Kutner filed a lawsuit on behalf of a Black passenger against Illinois Greyhound Lines, four years prior to the federal Montgomery bus lawsuit Browder v. Gayle.
In 1966, Kutner participated in a lawsuit against George Lincoln Rockwell and the American Nazi Party.
Intelligence service
Declassified records show that Kutner had a history of collusion with the FBI and the CIA.[1] In 1969, he reported Fred Hampton to the FBI in the days leading to Hampton's death at the hands of the Chicago Police.[13] In 1973, he petitioned the CIA for $250k to set up an NGO in Beijing, in return letting the agency "staff it completely with our own people."[14]
