They Killed Sister Dorothy': Sister Dorothy Stang's mission was saving rainforests

[Judi Lynn]

They Killed Sister Dorothy': Sister Dorothy Stang's mission was saving rainforests

BY David Hinckley
DAILY NEWS TV CRITIC

Wednesday, March 25th 2009, 4:00 AM

The murder of a 73-year-old nun in a remote region of Brazil might seem tragic, but isolated - if it weren't for the fact Sister Dorothy Stang was fighting one of the defining battles of planet Earth.

Ohio-born Stang's mission was to preserve the rainforests of Brazil, where she moved in 1966 and which she adopted as her permanent home.

She pushed hard for a "sustainable agriculture" program known as PDS, under which peasant farmers would be given a 250-acre plot of land on the condition they farm only 20% of it, or 50 acres. The other 200 acres would remain uncut.

This enabled peasants to own, often for the first time, enough workable land to earn a living. At the same time, it stopped the large-scale ranchers and loggers who bought or simply appropriated thousands of acres of rainforest and clear-cut the whole thing.

Not surprisingly, there were people in Brazil who loved Stang and her work, and others who saw her as an evil interloper hindering their march to wealth.

On Feb. 12, 2005, Stang was murdered, shot six times at point-blank range.

The killer, who confessed, was a small-time local who had little personal stake in anything Stang was doing. Nor did his accused accomplice, a shadier character.

The widespread suspicion, which this documentary does much to support and little to deflect, is that Stang was killed on orders of one or perhaps two major local ranchers.

Both had led public protests against Stang and the PDS program.

More:
http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/tv/2009/03/25/2009-03-25_they_killed_sister_dorothy_sister_doroth.html

[Judi Lynn]

1. Information on the life and death of Dorothy Stang, killed by greedy ranchers.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dorothy_Stang

Published on Tuesday, February 15, 2005 by the Independent/UK
The Life and Brutal Death of Sister Dorothy, a Rainforest Martyr
On the Lawless Fringe of Brazil's Amazon Jungle - Where Illegal Loggers Have Devastated the Rainforest - the American Nun Dorothy Stang Defended the Poor,Then the Gunmen Came for Her
by Andrew Buncombe

Sister Dorothy Stang lived among those who wanted her dead. When they finally came for her she read passages from the Bible to her killers. They listened for a moment, then fired. Her body was found face down in the mud, blood staining the back of her white blouse.

The town of Anapu, on the edge of the Amazon rainforest, is most notable for the dust that clogs its streets and for the number of shops selling chain-saws. It is also the place that Sister Dorothy called home for more than 30 years and where she organised her efforts to try to protect the rainforest and its people from disastrous and often illegal exploitation by logging firms and ranchers. Now Anapu will be known as the place where Sister Dorothy is buried.

Sister Dorothy Stang lived among those who wanted her dead. When they finally came for her she read passages from the Bible to her killers. They listened for a moment, then fired. Her body was found face down in the mud, blood staining the back of her white blouse.

The town of Anapu, on the edge of the Amazon rainforest, is most notable for the dust that clogs its streets and for the number of shops selling chain-saws. It is also the place that Sister Dorothy called home for more than 30 years and where she organised her efforts to try to protect the rainforest and its people from disastrous and often illegal exploitation by logging firms and ranchers. Now Anapu will be known as the place where Sister Dorothy is buried.


People walk 4 kilometers (2.5 miles) on the transamazonic highway carrying the coffin containing the body of American missionary Dorothy Stang from the airport to the Santas Missoes Church (Holy Missions Church) where Stang's wake took place in Anapu, northern Brazil, Monday, Feb. 14, 2005. Stang was gunned down Saturday Feb. 12, 2005, at the Boa Esperanca settlement where she worked with some 400 poor families near Anapu, a rural town about 1,300 miles (2,100 kilometers) north of Rio de Janeiro. (AP Photo/Paulo Santos)
The 74-year-old activist was laid to rest yesterday morning after being assassinated by two gunmen on Saturday at a remote encampment in the jungle about 30 miles from the town. Sister Dorothy - the most prominent activist to be murdered in the Amazon since Chico Mendez in 1988 - was shot six times in the head, throat and body at close range. "She was on a list of people marked for death. And little by little they're ticking those names off the list," said Nilde Sousa, an official with a local women's group who worked with the nun.

As with the death of Mr Mendez, a rubber tapper, the murder of Sister Dorothy has triggered waves of outrage among environmental and human rights activists who say she dedicated her life to helping the area's poor, landless peasants and confronting the businesses that see the rainforest only as a resource to be plundered and which have already destroyed 20 per cent of its 1.6 million square miles.

~snip~
While the suspects' names have not yet been released, Sister Dorothy's supporters say there is little doubt as to who was responsible. While the local people called her Dora or "the angel of the Trans-Amazonian", loggers and other opponents called her a "terrorist" and accused of supplying guns to the peasants. The Pastoral Land Commission of the Roman Catholic Church, which she worked for, said in a statement: "The hatred of ranchers and loggers respects nothing. The reprehensible murder of our sister brings back to us memories of a past that we had thought was closed."

More:
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/0215-03.htm

[raccoon]

2. Rec'd. She's one of my heroes/heroines. nt

[Judi Lynn]

5. She's a rare American, isn't she? n/t

[EFerrari]

3. Here's a link from Amy's last update in early December of 2008:

http://www.democracynow.org/2008/12/29/headlines#10

[Judi Lynn]

4. It's good to know she reports on the story.

Went to look for the name of the rancher mentioned in her story, found this short article, and a good little 3 minute video. It's the first time I've ever seen a moving image of Dorothy Stang, and heard her voice:

Brazil: rancher claims land US nun Dorothy Stang defended
Share: by rahul | November 11, 2008 at 08:17 pm

2008-11-11 23:34:03 - BRASILIA, Brazil (AP) - A Brazilian rancher suspected in the slaying of a U.S. nun now claims he owns land she died trying to defend, a prosecutor said Tuesday.The action by Regivaldo Galvao appears to cast doubt on one of his alibis in the 2005 slaying of Dorothy Stang: Galvao long insisted he had no motive to kill Stang because he had no interest in the plot of Amazon rain forest he now seeks. Prosecutor Felicio Pontes told The Associated Press that Galvao went before Brazil's Incra land reform agency last week to present documents showing he owns the disputed land deep in Para state. Incra sent The Associated Press an e-mail confirming that Galvao presented a claim on the land.
Stang, 73, was born in Dayton, Ohio, and spent three decades trying to preserve the rain forest and defending the rights of poor settlers who confronted powerful ranchers seeking their lands on the Amazon's wild frontier. Prosecutors say Galvao and another rancher hired men to kill Stang over the land she said should be brought under federal protection. Galvao was freed on bail by Brazil's Supreme Court in 2006 and he has since used appeals to avoid trial. «Everything has now changed,» Pontes said. «He always denied any involvement with the crime and (said) that he had no interest in that land. With this meeting with Incra, he showed that he has direct interest and always had. The AP could not locate a phone number to contact Galvao. Pontes said he has asked police to investigate the authenticity of the land deeds Galvao presented to Incra but declined to say what other legal action might be taken. Confessed gunman Rayfran das Neves Sales was sentenced last year to 28 years in prison and remains behind bars. But the 2007 conviction of the other suspected mastermind in the killing _ rancher Vitalmiro Moura _ was overturned earlier this year following conflicting testimony by das Neves and he was freed.
Unclear land ownership in the vast Amazon region has prompted frequent confrontations between settlers and ranchers, who often use forged deeds and force poor farmers off at gunpoint.

http://www.nowpublic.com/world/brazil-rancher-claims-land-us-nun-dorothy-stang-defended