Lawrence "Pun" Plamondon (born April 27, 1945) is a former 1960s left-wing activist who helped found the

White Panther Party The White Panthers were an anti-racist political collective founded in November 1968 by Pun Plamondon, Leni Sinclair, and John Sinclair. It was started in response to an interview where Huey P. Newton, co-founder of the Black Panther Party, wa ...

. He was the first

hippie A hippie, also spelled hippy, especially in British English, is someone associated with the counterculture of the 1960s, originally a youth movement that began in the United States during the mid-1960s and spread to different countries around ...

to be listed on the

FBI The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic Intelligence agency, intelligence and Security agency, security service of the United States and its principal Federal law enforcement in the United States, federal law enforcement age ...

's Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list due to his alleged participation in a bombing, though charges were ultimately dropped due to high-level governmental agency misconduct.

Biography

Plamondon's birth father was half-

Odawa The Odawa (also Ottawa or Odaawaa ), said to mean "traders", are an Indigenous American ethnic group who primarily inhabit land in the Eastern Woodlands region, commonly known as the northeastern United States and southeastern Canada. They ha ...

and his birth mother was part-

Ojibwe The Ojibwe, Ojibwa, Chippewa, or Saulteaux are an Anishinaabe people in what is currently southern Canada, the northern Midwestern United States, and Northern Plains. According to the U.S. census, in the United States Ojibwe people are one of ...

, which he was unaware of early in life. A

Traverse City, Michigan Traverse City ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is the county seat of Grand Traverse County, although a small portion extends into Leelanau County. It is the largest city in the 21-county Northern Michigan region. The population was ...

, couple adopted him and gave him his name, Lawrence Robert Plamondon. Plamondon had a troubled childhood and left home as a teenager. At the age of 21, Plamondon was in Detroit, Michigan, in 1967, when the

protests against the Vietnam War Protests against the Vietnam War took place in the 1960s and 1970s. The protests were part of a movement in opposition to United States involvement in the Vietnam War. The majority of the protests were in the United States, but some took place ar ...

and a riot occurred. Making sandals during the day and smoking marijuana in the evening, he was soon meeting with John Sinclair. In 1968, Plamondon and a few friends moved to

Ann Arbor, Michigan Ann Arbor is a city in the U.S. state of Michigan and the county seat of Washtenaw County, Michigan, Washtenaw County. The 2020 United States census, 2020 census recorded its population to be 123,851. It is the principal city of the Ann Arbor ...

, where they established a

commune A commune is an alternative term for an intentional community. Commune or comună or comune or other derivations may also refer to: Administrative-territorial entities * Commune (administrative division), a municipality or township ** Communes of ...

at 1510 Hill Street. With John Sinclair, they founded the White Panther Party, which supported the goals of the

Black Panther Party The Black Panther Party (BPP), originally the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense, was a Marxist-Leninist and black power political organization founded by college students Bobby Seale and Huey P. Newton in October 1966 in Oakland, Califo ...

. He was indicted for

bomb A bomb is an explosive weapon that uses the Exothermic process, exothermic reaction of an explosive material to provide an extremely sudden and violent release of energy. Detonations inflict damage principally through ground- and atmosphere-t ...

ing a

CIA The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA ), known informally as the Agency and historically as the Company, is a civilian intelligence agency, foreign intelligence service of the federal government of the United States, officially tasked with gat ...

office in Ann Arbor on September 29, 1968. Changing his appearance, he went underground and fled to San Francisco, Seattle, New York, Germany, Italy, and finally to Algeria. In May 1970, he was listed on the

FBI's Ten Most Wanted Fugitives The FBI Ten Most Wanted Fugitives is a most wanted list maintained by the United States's Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). The list arose from a conversation held in late 1949 between J. Edgar Hoover, Director of the FBI, and William K ...

list. After a few months he covertly returned to the United States. In July 1970, Plamondon was discovered and arrested after being stopped for littering. He was the 307th fugitive to be placed on the FBI's Ten Most Wanted fugitives list and spent nearly three months on the list before being captured. While waiting trial and after being convicted, he spent 32 months in federal prison. During the trial, the government admitted to

wiretapping Telephone tapping (also wire tapping or wiretapping in American English) is the monitoring of telephone and Internet-based conversations by a third party, often by covert means. The wire tap received its name because, historically, the monitorin ...

without a warrant. The case went to the

United States Supreme Court The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that involve a point o ...

and was decided in ''

United States v. U.S. District Court ''United States v. U.S. District Court'', 407 U.S. 297 (1972), also known as the now famous Keith Case, was a landmark Supreme Court of the United States, United States Supreme Court decision that upheld, in a unanimous 8-0 ruling, the requirements ...

'', also now famously known as the Keith Case, which held that not even the invocation of "national security" by the president of the United States could insulate illegal activity from Constitutional rights to privacy (). The charges were dismissed. Later, Plamondon found work driving equipment trucks for rock bands including

Kiss A kiss is the touch or pressing of one's lips against another person or an object. Cultural connotations of kissing vary widely. Depending on the culture and context, a kiss can express sentiments of love, passion, romance, sexual attraction, ...

and Foreigner. Plamondon lives in

Barry County, Michigan Barry County is a county in the U.S. state of Michigan. As of the 2020 United States Census, the population was 62,423. The county seat is Hastings. History Before the present era, the Michigan peninsula was long occupied by bands of the Potowa ...

, with his wife Patricia Lynn. He is a self-employed carpenter. He tells American Indian stories to young children at schools, libraries, museums, and summer camps. His home is a gathering place for American Indian celebrations.

Writings

Plamondon's autobiography: *

References

General references

* Marsha Low, "'60s radical takes long trip back to his roots," ''

Detroit Free Press The ''Detroit Free Press'' is the largest daily newspaper in Detroit, Michigan, US. The Sunday edition is titled the ''Sunday Free Press''. It is sometimes referred to as the Freep (reflected in the paper's web address, www.freep.com). It primari ...

'', October 27, 2004, Sec. B. ''Adapted from the

Wikinfo The history of wikis began in 1994, when Ward Cunningham gave the name "WikiWikiWeb" to the knowledge base, which ran on his company's website at c2.com, and the wiki software that powered it. The wiki went public in March 1995, the date used ...

articl
Lawrence (Pun) Plamondon
(October 28, 2004, or earlier version) and is used under the

GNU Free Documentation License The GNU Free Documentation License (GNU FDL or simply GFDL) is a copyleft license for free documentation, designed by the Free Software Foundation (FSF) for the GNU Project. It is similar to the GNU General Public License, giving readers the r ...

External links

The Story of United States v. United States District Court (Keith): The Surveillance Power
{{DEFAULTSORT:Plamondon, Pun 1945 births Native American activists Anishinaabe people People from Ann Arbor, Michigan Native American writers COINTELPRO targets People from Barry County, Michigan Living people American adoptees FBI Ten Most Wanted Fugitives

Biography

See also

Writings

References

General references

External links