Here's an issue I'll bet all of us can get behind and support.
Mike Spann's Widow in Dire Financial Straits
newsmax.com
Monday, July 15, 2002 6:28 p.m. EDT
The widow of CIA hero-agent Johnny "Mike" Spann, who was killed during an al Qaeda prison uprising in Afghanistan last November that included American Taliban "Jihad" Johnny Walker Lindh, revealed Monday that she is facing financial trouble.
During an interview on her reaction to the Lindh plea bargain announced earlier in the day, nationally syndicated radio host Sean Hannity asked Shannon Spann, "How are you financially - is everything OK?"
After some hesitation, Mrs. Spann nervously admitted, "Well, yeah - that is, no. There's a strong 'no' to that answer.
"I'm actually taking some time this next week to figure out how I'm going to get out of this mess and get myself back to work so I can start supporting my family," she added.
The Spanns' three children are now ages 1, 7 and 10 years old.
The widow of America's first combat casualty in the war on terror did not go into further detail on the air, but she told Hannity during a commercial break that the CIA pays her late husband's salary for only a year after his death.
Reacting to the Lindh plea bargain, Mrs. Spann said she believed the American Taliban would have been convicted had the case gone to trial.
"Part of me wishes that prosecutors would have gone in that direction," she told Hannity, adding, "Can you imagine Winston Churchill allowing this kind of thing?"
But Mrs. Spann said it would have been difficult for her to sit through a trial where Lindh maintained that he did not participate in activities that betrayed his country. "Plainly he had," she insisted.
"Part of me has to say, well, at least there's some reasonableness in the world if he was able to come to a point where he would admit his guilt," she explained. "All of the American people know that he's a terrorist, so at least on this day he has said so himself."
Lindh pleaded guilty to two counts of a 10-count indictment, which covered charges that he trained at two al Qaeda-backed terrorist camps. He also pleaded guilty to a new charge - carrying explosives while in the commission of a felony.
He could be sentenced to up to 20 years in jail as part of the agreement.
After Mrs. Spann left the phone, Hannity told his audience that he would establish a fund to help the Spann family get back on their feet, with details to be announced on Wednesday. |
