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Revision as of 15:59, 16 October 2008 by Contrivance (talk | contribs) (Undid revision 245632938 by No POV involved. Characterization of WR's actual words as "dramatic" is objective and neutral.)(diff) ← Previous revision | Latest revision (diff) | Newer revision → (diff)For other uses, see William Rodriguez (disambiguation).
William Rodríguez was a janitor at the North Tower of the World Trade Center during the September 11, 2001 attacks and was in the basement of the North Tower when American Airlines Flight 11 crashed into the building. Subsequently, Rodriguez became prominent in the 9/11 Truth Movement and has traveled around talking about conspiracy theories, his experiences on 9/11, Motivational lectures and Disaster Management. He claimed in federal court documents that he single-handedly rescued fifteen people from the burning north tower and has claimed that he saved hundreds of people by using a master key to open locked emergency exit doors..
In a transcript from CNN from 9/11, Rodriguez stated:"I was in the basement, which is the support floor for the maintenance company, and we hear like a big rumble. Not like an impact, like a rumble, like moving furniture in a massive way. And all of sudden we hear another rumble, and a guy comes running, running into our office, and all of skin was off his body. All of the skin... So, I went up with the police officer and a group of firemen."
Later his account of the "rumble" became more dramatic. In a show in Los Angeles filmed by C-Span in 2007, Rodriguez said he was in the American Building Maintenance office in the basement of the WTC talking to his supervisor "when all of a sudden ... we hear 'BOOM!' (yells). An explosion so powerful and so loud that push us upwards in the air, coming from below." (see 1:08:30)
In 2004, Rodriguez sued President George W. Bush and 155 others, accusing them of complicity in the terrorist attacks.
Biography
Magician's assistant
When Rodriguez was a young man, he worked under the stage name "Roudy" as an assistant to magician James Randi. Rodriguez mentioned in an interview with Benjamin Smith of the New York Sun that he helped Randi expose fraudulent faith healers and psychics. In a December, 2005 article published on the Internet, it was claimed that Rodriguez was adroit at insinuating himself into the good graces of Randi's targets and eliciting incriminating information, and that he had previously been featured on television in Puerto Rico escaping from a chained straightjacket while hanging from a burning rope.
WTC janitor
Rodriguez emigrated to New York from Puerto Rico and, according to the New York Sun article linked above, he "found himself a small fish in the big pond of New York magicians" and, as a result, took a day job as a custodian at the World Trade Center.
The article goes on to say that Rodriguez's show business aspirations fell by the wayside when his responsibilities for cleaning the office of Governor Mario Cuomo at the WTC expanded to include organizing Governor Cuomo's press conferences, and that after Cuomo left office in 1994, Rodriguez went back to cleaning the staircases of the North Tower.
Rodriguez worked as a janitor at the World Trade Center for 19 years.
9/11 attacks
According to Rodriguez, he usually clocked in at 8:00 a.m. and rode an elevator to the 106th floor, where Hispanic employees of Windows on the World fed him a free breakfast. On 9/11, however, he was half an hour late so he did not go for breakfast but reported to a basement office of his employer, American Building Maintenance.
Rodriguez's early accounts repeatedly mentioned a large fireball that shot down the elevator shafts and exploded through the doors, causing serious burn injuries to a man who happened to be standing in front of one of the freight elevator doors. This was consistent with similar reports by numerous other witnesses who saw fireballs erupting and blowing out elevator doors and burning people. In September 2002, Rodriguez said in an CNN interview:
And at that terrible day when I took people out of the office, one of them totally burned because he was standing in front of the freight elevator and the ball of fire came down the duct of the elevator itself, I put him on the ambulance.
Rodriguez said that he assisted the injured man out of the building and into an ambulance and then returned to the north tower to continue his efforts to help.
At a public meeting held by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in 2004, Rodriguez continued to refer to the fireball, saying nothing about a blast below:
The fire, the ball of fire, for example, I was in the basement when the first plane hit the building. And at that moment, I thought it was an electrical generator that blew up at that moment. A person comes running into the office saying 'explosion, explosion, explosion.' When I look at this guy; has all his skin pulled off of his body. Hanging from the top of his fingertips like it was a glove. And I said, what happened? He said the elevators. What happened was the ball of fire went down with such a force down the elevator shaft on the 58th (50A) – freight elevator, the biggest freight elevator that we have in the North Tower, it went out with such a force that it broke the cables. It went down, I think seven flights. The person survived because he was pulled from the B3 level. But this person, being in front of the doors waiting for the elevator, practically got his skin vaporized."
At that same public meeting, Rodriguez inaccurately described himself to NIST investigators as "the last survivor pulled from the rubble". There were, in fact, at least 18 survivors pulled from the rubble of the North Tower long after Rodriguez walked out of the building unharmed. The last survivor was Jenelle Guzman-McMillan, who was rescued some 26 hours later at approximately 12:30 p.m. on September 12, 2001.
In an article published on the Internet on December 30, 2005, he said that from his location in the basement, he heard and felt a massive explosion from below, and that seconds later, he heard another, smaller explosion above, which he attributed to Flight 11 crashing into the tower.
Rodriguez also claims to have seen hijacker Mohand al-Shehri scoping out the building prior to the attacks, in June 2001, and he claims to have told the FBI and the 9/11 Commission that he recognized the man after a brief, chance encounter months prior to the terrorist attacks.
Rodriguez gave evidence to the 9/11 Commission. Like the vast majority of the more than 1200 witnesses who gave evidence to the Commission, Rodriguez's evidence was not given in public, and was not specifically itemized in the final report. Of the 1200+ witnesses whose testimony was taken by the Commission, only approximately 155 were conducted publicly.. Rodriguez complains that it never appeared on the final report and that many of the survivors were not called to testify. The Commission, on this matter, stated on page 14 (fourth Block)of the report the following: "This final report is only a summary of what we have done,citing only a fraction of the sources we have consulted. But in an event of this scale, touching so many issues and organizations, we are conscious of our limits.We have not interviewed every knowledgeable person or found every relevant piece of paper. New information inevitably will come to light. We present this report as a foundation for a better understanding of a landmark in the history of our nation."
RICO lawsuit
In October 2004, Rodriguez sued the President of the United States and 155 other parties, accusing them of complicity in the 9/11 attacks.
His 237-page civil lawsuit included allegations pursuant to the RICO, directed against The United States Of America, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the Department of Homeland Security, George Herbert Walker Bush, George Walker Bush, Richard Cheney, Donald H. Rumsfeld,and numerous others, totaling 156 defendants in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.
In his lawsuit, Rodriquez made hundreds of allegations, including – but not limited to – allegations that the Twin Towers were destroyed by means of “controlled demolitions”; that members of the FDNY were ordered, on instructions of the CIA, not to talk about it; that the FDNY conspired with Larry Silverstein to deliberately destroy 7WTC; that missiles were fired at the Twin Towers from “pods” affixed to the underside of the planes that struck them; that FEMA is working with the US government to create “American Gulag” concentration camps which FEMA will run once the government’s plan to impose martial law is in place; that phone calls made by some of the victims, as reported by their family members, were not actually made but were "faked" by the government using "voice morphing" technology; that a missile, not American Airlines Flight 77, struck the Pentagon; that United Airlines Flight 93 was shot down by the US military; that the defendants had foreknowledge of the attacks and actively conspired to bring them about; that the defendants engaged in kidnapping, arson, murder, treason, conspiracy, trafficking in narcotics, embezzlement, securities fraud, insider trading, identity and credit card theft, blackmail, trafficking in humans, and the abduction and sale of women and children for sex. In his Complaint, Rodriquez also alleged that he "single-handedly rescued fifteen (15) persons from the WTC" . No evidence in support of any of Rodriguez's claims was ever provided by Rodriguez.
In December 2004, the only three defendants who had been served with Rodriguez's Complaint (FEMA, the USA and the DHS) filed a motion to dismiss, or, in the alternative, to transfer the case on the grounds of lack of jurisdiction and/or improper venue. This was premised on the fact that the Air Transportation Safety and System Stabilization Act vests exclusive jurisdiction for litigation relating to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 in the courts of the Southern District of New York.
The Pennsylvania court granted the defendants' motion to transfer the case to the Southern District of New York on May 2, 2005.
On September 30, 2005, the same three defendants (USA, DHS, and FEMA) brought a motion to dismiss Rodriguez's claims, based on, inter alia, lack of subject matter jurisdiction.
In January 2006, Rodriquez swore and filed a 51 page affidavit in opposition to the defendants' motion to dismiss, in which he reiterated and expanded upon his numerous conspiracy allegations.
On June 26, 2006, the court dismissed Rodriguez's claims against the three defendants (USA, FEMA, DHS) and gave Rodriguez until July 7, 2006 to show cause why his lawsuit should not be dismissed with respect to the other 153 defendants.
Rodriguez did not do so, and the court dismissed all of his claims against the remaining 153 defendants on July 17, 2006.
International travels
In May of 2005, Rodriguez and his lawyer Philip Berg did tours of speaking engagements in Europe financed by multi-millionaire Jimmy Walter. .
In 2006, Rodriguez traveled to Malaysia appearing at a conference with Michael Collins Piper and with Jimmy Walter.
In February, 2007, Rodriguez toured in the UK with former MI5 agent Annie Machon. Rodriguez's Glasgow appearance was written up in The Herald (Glasgow).
In June, 2007, he was a guest speaker at the International Islamic Fair in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Also in 2007, Rodriguez spoke at the Global Peace and Unity Conference in London.
In 2008 He toured latin America, he spoke for 1000 of Guatemala's top leaders about Disaster Management and facing adversity.
Other events
Rodriguez has been written about in the NY Post, the Christian Science Monitor, New York Magazine, and the Herald of Glasgow. He has appeared on the Cristina show, on BBC, on Dutch national TV, and on C-Span. In 2002, with the help of Kenneth Feinberg, Special Master of the September 11th Victim Compensation Fund, he helped to institute an economic amnesty program for victims of 9/11 who were undocumented workers.
Rodriguez received a National Hero Award from the Senate of Puerto Rico, was once a member of the Families Advisory Council created by the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation, and was an organizer and president of the Hispanic Victims Group.
Rodriguez converted to Islam in 2006.
In 2007 the Herald newspaper of Glasgow commented in Rodriguez' story, saying "the only evidence put forward in two hours of discussion was his own testimony." On September 11, 2008, Rodriguez announced on the "Power Hour" internet radio program that he was "distancing himself" from many of the 9//11 truth leaders. He pointed that there were people for example on the Richard Gage organisation attacking him, and that researchers and truth movement leaders were not "doing the right thing." He said he wanted to "disassociate" his mission from the 9/11 truth movement.
He also alleges that he turned down Hollywood movie deals worth millions and book contracts "from every publisher" because he "wanted to maintain integrity."
He co-wrote and self published the book "Tuesday of Horror" (Martes de Horror)in spanish with the help of a retired Liutenant Coronel from the Armed Forces of Colombia There is also an Italian book called "11 settembre Bush ha mentito"of William Rodriguez's story
Also in 2006, he received the Latin Pride National Award for Lifetime Achievement helping the Latino Community
Between November 1 - 7, 2007, Rodriguez took his self-titled "Last Man Out" program on tour on the west coast of the USA. In Oakland, California, he was introduced by Cindy Sheehan.
In 2007 the Herald newspaper of Glasgow commented in Rodriguez' story, saying "the only evidence put forward in two hours of discussion was his own testimony." On September 11, 2008, Rodriguez announced on the "Power Hour" internet radio program that he was "distancing himself" from many of the 9//11 truth leaders. He pointed that there were people for example on the Richard Gage organisation attacking him, and that researchers and truth movement leaders were not "doing the right thing." He said he wanted to "disassociate" his mission from the 9/11 truth movement.
Also on September 11th, 2008, Rodriguez was the host of a television special about Tango, for PBS NJN Television Network.
Press coverage
- 2004 March 25: The Christian Science Monitor
- 2004 April 15: "eltiempolatino.com"
- 2005 December 30: Scoop
- 2007 February 16: The Herald (Glasgow)
- 2007 November 5: The Eureka Reporter
References
- http://www.yamidamat.com.co/Contenido/Video.asp?Mostrar=SEPTIEMBRE17.wmv
- http://www.caracol.com.co/llevar.aspx?id=669027
- http://www.terra.com.co/actualidad/articulo/html/acu15057.htm
- http://terratv.terra.com.co/templates/channelContents.aspx?channel=845&contentid=71054
- http://www.radiocaracol.com/programa.aspx?id=130984&au=669027
- http://www.estereofonica.com/article.php?sid=10380
- http://www.elboomeran.com/video/14/william-rodriguez/
- http://www.rtve.es/comunicacion/mantenimiento/entry.php?id=3678
- http://cgnnoticiasdeguatemala.wordpress.com/2008/08/25/de-las-torres-gemelas-a-guatemala/
- "Rodriguez Complaint" (PDF).
- The Badger Herald - Trade Center custodian shares story
- Twin Towers hero speaks in East Lancs (From Lancashire Telegraph)
- http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0109/11/bn.24.html
- http://www.videosift.com/video/William-Rodriguez-Janitor-at-the-WTC-on-911-CSPAN
- The Faith Healers, by James Randi, Prometheus Books; 2nd edition (1989) ISBN-10 0879755350 p. 133.
- Flim-Flam! Psychics, ESP, Unicorns, and Other Delusions, by James Randi. Prometheus Books (June 1982) ISBN 0879751983, pp.293, 306, 323.
- ^ Scoop: UQ Wire: Russ Wellen - The Magic Man
- http://latinpridenationalawards.com/lpna_web_william.html
- NIST Report NISTNSTAR1 sections 2.4 and 3.4
- CNN.com - Transcripts
- Microsoft Word - Public Transcript 021204 Final.doc
- TIME: September 11 — 11 Lives — The Survivor
- "Janitor tells 9/11 panel of brush with WTC thug". New York Daily News. June 2004. Retrieved 2007-11-27.
- National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States
- http://www.theconservativevoice.com/articles/article.html?id=7762
- http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/38307
- http://govinfo.library.unt.edu/911/report/911Report.pdf
- "Rodriguez Complaint" (PDF).
- "Rodriguez Lawsuit Page".
- "Rodriguez Complaint" (PDF).
- "Gov't Motion to Dismiss" (PDF).
- "Gov't Motion to Dismiss" (PDF).
- "Order Granting Motion to Transfer" (PDF).
- "Gov't Motion to Dismiss" (PDF).
- "Memo in Support of Motion" (PDF).
- "Rodriguez Affidavit January 2006" (PDF).
- "Order Dismissing Complaint against USA, DHS, and FEMA" (PDF).
- "Order Dismissing Complaint against Balance of Defendants" (PDF).
- Press Release 18
- ^ The Herald : Features: MAIN FEATURES
- http://cgnnoticiasdeguatemala.wordpress.com/2008/08/25/de-las-torres-gemelas-a-guatemala/
- Gotham Gazette - The Citizen
- Lower Manhattan Development Corporation - CHAIRMAN WHITEHEAD ANNOUNCES LMDC ADVISORY COUNCILS
- Portal Rasmi Negeri Pahang Darul Makmur - Bil 01/August/07 (01 - 15 August, 2007) (Vol. 3)
- http://stoplying.ca/williepowerhour.mp3
- http://www.lancashiretelegraph.co.uk/news/1527870.0/
- http://noticias.terra.com/articulo/html/act183099.htm
- http://www.wuz.it/recensione-libro/312/recensione-settembre.html
- lpna_coverage
- William Rodriguez- Last Man Out World Tour
- http://stoplying.ca/williepowerhour.mp3
- http://www.njn.net/television/njnseries/imagesimagenes/english/season07-08/3516.html
- A key force behind the 9/11 commission | csmonitor.com
- El Tiempo Latino
- Eureka Reporter http://www.eurekareporter.com/node/93817
External links
- http://911forthetruth.com Rodriguez RICO Act lawsuit vs George W. Bush
- http://rodriguezlawsuit.googlepages.com/home Rodriguez lawsuit site
- US 9/11 group seeks aid of Dr M, June 13, 2006
- http://latinpridenationalawards.com/lpna_web_inside.html William Rodriguez-Lifetime Achievement Award
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William Rodriguez, a 9-11 Survivor By Deanna Spingola http://www.spingola.com/william_rodriguez.htm
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