Biography
Gary Eugene Rader was an Army Special Forces reservist who burned his draft card while wearing his Green Beret uniform at the April 15, 1967 Spring Mobilization in Central Park. FBI agents arrested him at his Evanston, Illinois home on April 18. He spent that night in a Chicago jail and was released on bail the following day. Contemporary accounts continued to describe possible federal prosecution and court-martial, but no conviction has been verified. Rader was later arrested and jailed again during the October 1967 March on the Pentagon; the release date for that separate confinement remains unresolved.
Judy Willis’s account of the November 6, 1967 press conference documents the demonstrators’ testimony about actual custody following the October 21 Pentagon mobilization. It describes segregation, coercive processing and abuse. It specifically places Rader and Kauffman still imprisoned and fasting; a claimed official release is not accepted as an actual discharge. Washington Free Press, November23,1967 vol2 no19, original PDF page 3. Source: https://washingtonareaspark.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/1967-11-23-wfp-vol-2-no-19.pdf#page=3
The November 6, 1967 press-conference report specifically places Rader in D.C. Jail on hunger strike, despite officials telling visitors he had been released. The force-feeding account is attributed to contemporary reporting.
