Jacobin Radio: Thanasis Kampagiannis, Kevin Ovenden, and Jon Wiener

Suzi looks at two historic trials, in different countries and different eras, beginning with Greece, where the extraordinary trial of the neo-fascist political party Golden Dawn (https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/oct/14/greece-golden-dawn-neo-nazi-prison-sentences) has just ended after five and half years, resulting in convictions and prison sentences for its top leadership. Golden Dawn was at one point the third largest political party in Greece and is known for its violence and intimidation against its opponents, immigrants, and LGBTQ communities. Suzi spoke to Attorney Thanasis Kampagiannis (https://www.jacobinmag.com/author/thanasis-kampagiannis), one of the lawyers who pursued this case, and journalist and analyst Kevin Ovenden (https://kevinovenden.wordpress.com/about/) to get their account and analysis of the trial and of Golden Dawn, a criminal organization that operated under the guise of being a democratically elected party. Since we spoke on October 15, the state prosecutor has proposed suspension of the sentencing until appeals hearings for all but one of the Nazi convicts, which could take years. Thanasis Kampagiannis has told the media that the state prosecutor is acting as a public defender for Golden Dawn. We get the continuing story. The second trial is the Chicago 8 (and then Chicago 7) Conspiracy Trial that riveted the world in 1969, lasting five months. Suzi speaks to historian Jon Wiener (https://jonwiener.com/bio/), whose 2006 book Conspiracy in the Streets: The extraordinary Trial of the Chicago 7 (https://jonwiener.com/conspiracy-in-the-streets/) has been reissued to coincide with the release on Netflix this week of the Aaron Sorkin film called “The Trial of the Chicago 7 (https://www.netflix.com/title/81043755)”. The Chicago Conspiracy trial brought together Yippies, antiwar activists and Black Panthers to face conspiracy charges following massive protest at the 1968 Democratic Convention in Chicago. We’ll talk about the film and the actual history of the trial, noting the significance of that moment in history for our own.