The Washington Post - USA (2022-05-28)

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SATURDAY, MAY 28 , 2022. WASHINGTONPOST.COM/LOCAL EZ RE B

RELIGION

How one pastor and an

obscure bylaw saved the

Southern Baptist sexual

abuse investigation. B2

MARYLAND

Action by the State Board

of Education could lead to

the Prince George’s school

board chair’s ouster. B3

OBITUARIES

Kristine Gebbie, 78, found

little room to effect

change as the first White

67 ° 74 ° 80 ° 76 ° House AIDS “czar.” B6

8 a.m. Noon 4 p.m. 8 p.m.

High today at

approx. 4 p.m.

80

°

Precip: 45%

Wind: W

7-14 mph

BY JENNA PORTNOY

Memorial Day weekend travel

combined with lax coronavirus

protections will likely trigger a

bump in already rising case levels,

health officials cautioned, repeat-

ing a pattern that has played out

after holidays since the early in

the pandemic.

As the course of the pandemic

has shifted, experts said, tracking

the shape of the virus has become

more challenging, and serious

consequences persist, even as

treatments such as Paxlovid have

helped the vulnerable avoid se-

vere disease.

“That is the hard thing to recon-

cile,” said Gabe Kelen, chair of the

emergency medicine department

at Johns Hopkins University. “I

get it that people are willing to

take a personal risk, but it is not a

personal risk. There are a lot of

people who are older, who are

immunocompromised who can’t

fully participate in society” be-

cause others “are not willing to do

the right thing.”

“The country has moved so far

to, ‘I’m only concerned about

me,’ ” he added.

With AAA predicting more

than 39 million people will travel

over the Memorial Day weekend,

local officials have opted not to

reinstate mask mandates and are

instead urging people to exercise

caution in hopes of tamping down

rising infection and hospitaliza-

tion rates.

“As we approach the Memorial

Day weekend, a lot of people will

be traveling, so it is an important

time to take precautions to pro-

tect yourself, friends, and family

from COVID-19 as much as possi-

ble,” Montgomery County Execu-

tive Marc Elrich said in a state-

ment Thursday. He encouraged

travelers to wear masks on public

SEE COVID ON B4

Holiday

seen as

magnet

for virus

WEEKEND TRAVEL

COULD CAUSE BUMP

Officials opt for warnings

instead of mandates

BY HOPE HODGE SECK

E

very year ahead of Memorial Day, a soldier from the Army’s 3rd

U.S. Infantry Regiment places a small American flag by the

vault of Navy Lt. Andrew J. Chabrol, an honor accorded to

every grave at Arlington National Cemetery.

The thought makes Judi Farmer sick.

Before the interment of Chabrol’s ashes at the nation’s most hallowed

military burial ground, he was executed by the commonwealth of

Virginia for the 1991 abduction, rape and murder of Petty Officer 2nd

Class Melissa Harrington, an enlisted sailor who’d reported him for

stalking and harassment. For those who remember Chabrol’s crimes, the

knowledge of his dignified resting place is an open wound — an insult to

her memory.

Farmer, herself a Navy veteran, is determined to see the remains

removed from Arlington, an act she believes will close a grim and

shameful chapter of military history. “Back in the early ’90s, there was

hardly any justice” for victims of sexual assault, she said. “All of the

things that should have been done to give her justice when she was

living didn’t even occur.”

Though Arlington officials have said they lack legal authority to

SEE CEMETERY ON B4

KRISTEN ZEIS FOR THE WASHINGTON POST

A fight over hallowed ground

Veteran seeks removal of murderer’s ashes from Arlington

CAROLYN VAN HOUTEN/THE WASHINGTON POST

BY GEORGE DEREK MUSGROVE

They came by the thousands. A

river of Black and Brown humani-

ty, flowing out of Malcolm X Park,

down 16th Street NW, then west

on U Street. Carrying red, black

and green flags and signs that

read “Africa for the Africans” and

“Help Free Angola, Boycott Gulf

[Oil],” they staged a raucous pro-

test outside the Portuguese Em-

bassy before splitting into smaller

groups to demonstrate outside

the Rhodesian Information Cen-

ter, the South Africa Embassy and

the U.S. State Department.

Continuing southward, the

three streams of protesters con-

verged at the Sylvan Theater on

the grounds of the Washington

Monument. There, a broad coali-

tion of the nation’s leading Black

political figures, from the Con-

gress of African People’s Amiri

Baraka to D.C. congressional del-

egate Walter Fauntroy, committed

themselves to a protracted strug-

gle against colonialism and White

minority rule in Africa and at

home.

Saturday marks the 50th anni-

versary of African Liberation Day,

one of the most influential gather-

ings in modern African American

and D.C. history. Though rallies

were held in dozens of U.S. cities,

Canada and the West Indies, the

D.C. event was the largest and

most consequential. Following

the 1972 protest, organizers con-

tinued to hold the demonstration,

gathering in Malcolm X Park from

1973 until 1991.

D.C. African Liberation Day

helped assemble and nurture a

SEE RETROPOLIS ON B8

RETROPOLIS

D.C.’s African Liberation

Day started a movement

1972 colonialism protest

was a seminal gathering

in local, Black history

TOP: Joe Harrington wipes down the grave of his late wife, Petty Officer 2nd Class Melissa Harrington, at Forest Lawn

Cemetery in Norfolk. In 1991, Harrington was murdered by former Navy lieutenant Andrew J. Chabrol, whose ashes are

interred at Arlington National Cemetery. ABOVE: Judi Farmer, also a Navy veteran, is petitioning to have his ashes removed.

BY ERIN COX

Candidates for governor wield-

ed divergent views on Maryland’s

looming gas tax hike like a cudgel

this week, seeking to score points

with voters ahead of a July pri-

mary while those in a position to

bring relief stood by.

The 18 percent increase, sched-

uled to automatically occur in

July, divided the crowded Demo-

cratic field as Republican candi-

dates capitalized on economic dis-

content. That’s a strategy that po-

litical experts noted smoothed a

path to victory in two elections for

Republican Gov. Larry Hogan in a

deeply Democratic state.

“This is already shaping up to

be a bad year for Democrats. This

is an issue tailor-made for Repub-

licans running in Maryland,” said

Todd Eberly, a political scientist at

St. Mary’s College.

SEE GAS TAX ON B5

Md. gas tax

hike is fuel

in race for

governor

July’s 18 percent increase

divides Democrats but

animates G OP candidates

government said in court filings.

In a video obtained by prosecu-

tors, the former soldier and

then-U.S. Army reservist asked in

2020, “I’m not saying Hitler did

nothing wrong, but did he do

anything wrong?”

Those beliefs, and his expres-

sions of support for a civil war,

convinced multiple federal judges

to keep Hale-Cusanelli in jail until

his trial. But McFadden said pros-

ecutors could not introduce evi-

dence of Hale-Cusanelli’s racist

beliefs, saying it would be too

prejudicial for a jury, and largely

irrelevant to the charges of ob-

structing an official proceeding.

Evidence of Hale-Cusanelli’s de-

sire for a civil war were permitted.

The trial focused on Hale-Cu-

sanelli’s actions on Jan. 6 and his

comments afterward to a room-

mate and federal investigators.

Hale-Cusanelli attended a portion

of Trump’s “Stop the Steal” rally at

the Ellipsis, then walked to the

Capitol and was among the very

first rioters to enter the Capitol

that afternoon. Surveillance video

showed him climbing through a

SEE JAN. 6 ON B5

Neck, N.J., worked as a security

guard and lived on the Naval

Weapons Station Earle there. In

addition to being a supporter of

President Donald Trump, he was

an open white supremacist who

supported Nazi ideology and ad-

mired Adolf Hitler, even wearing

a “Hitler mustache” to work, the

BY TOM JACKMAN

A New Jersey man who claimed

he didn’t know that Congress met

in the U.S. Capitol, and so couldn’t

have intended to disrupt the elec-

toral vote certification on Jan. 6,

2021, was convicted Friday by a

federal jury in Washington of felo-

ny obstruction of an official pro-

ceeding and four other misde-

meanors.

After the jury announced its

verdict, U.S. District Judge Trevor

N. McFadden said he would con-

sider an “obstruction of justice”

extension of Timothy Hale-Cu-

sanelli’s sentence because of his

testimony, in which he also said

he didn’t know he was interfering

with a police arrest on Jan. 6.

“I find these claims highly dubi-

ous,” the judge said.

Hale-Cusanelli, 32, of Colts

N.J. man found guilty in Jan. 6 case

Rioter convicted of felony

says he did not know

Congress met in Capitol

U.S. ATTORNEY FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA

Timothy Hale-Cusanelli’s

sentencing is set for Sept. 16.