Biography
Zurebu Gardner was a Black community activist in Riverside, California, one of two men charged with the April 1971 murder of two Riverside police officers — a prosecution his supporters, organized as the Riverside Political Prisoners Defense Committee, denounced as a frame-up. By 1974 Lawton and Gardner had been tried twice, with both trials ending in hung juries (reportedly 11 to 1 for acquittal), and a third trial was pending; the case never produced a conviction. Documented in The Black Panther (April 13, 1974).
A Riverside defense report reprinted in Seize the Time described Gardner’s murder charges being dismissed before Gary Lawton’s third trial, after two hung juries and more than a year in jail. VVAW’s November 1974 report dates the dismissal to October 3 and identifies Judge Estudillo. Gardner was separately arrested on March 25, 1974, during a courthouse confrontation involving defense supporters; dismissal of the earlier murder charge did not dispose of that later prosecution.
Seize the Time, Vol1No5, February1975, PDF page 6; www.vvaw.org.
