Sambor, MOVE on 'Donahue'

NEW YORK - Philadelphia Police Commissioner Gregore Sambor and two members of MOVE appeared together on national television this morning and exchanged charges of responsibility for the shootout and fire that killed 11 people and destroyed or damaged 61 homes last week.

"Do you feel you had the right to be the judge, jury and executioner of 11 people?" Sambor was asked on the "Donahue" show by MOVE member Louise James Africa, whose son, Frank James Africa, has been identified as one of the 11 MOVE members killed in last Monday's fire.

"I do not feel at any time that I was judge, jury or executioner," Sambor replied.

"Did you not drop a bomb?" James asked.

"I did not drop a bomb," the commissioner said.

"Did you not participate in the dropping of a bomb?" she asked.

"I did not participate in the dropping of any bomb," Sambor answered.

The exchange was one of the highlights of the hour-long show during which Sambor continually referred to a "device that was employed" while the MOVE members, attorney William Kunstler and Phil Donahue, the show's host, continually used the term "bomb." All were referring to the explosive dropped by city police on the roof of the MOVE home on Osage Avenue in West Philadelphia last Monday night. The resultant explosion was followed by the devastating fire.

Sambor told reporters afterward in an elevator that he had "not been asked to resign (as commissioner) and I do not intend to."

His appearance on the ABC television show came shortly after it had been disclosed that Sambor had resigned from the National Association of Chiefs of Police after its executive director, Gerald S. Arenberg, had criticized Sambor's handling of the MOVE crisis. Sambor said he considered Arenberg's criticism "reprehensible."

Sambor was unruffled throughout the television show, which was aired in Philadelphia on Channel 6. James and Laverne Sims Africa both showed emotion on occasion, although they generally spoke calmly and articulately. The women are sisters of John Africa, founder of the radical MOVE group that began as a back-to-nature movement but has concentrated more on anti-authority practices in recent years.

Donahue pointed out at the beginning of the show that James had lost a son in the fire and Sims had two children in prison as a result of a 1978 MOVE- police gunfight in which a policeman was killed.

James, after the exchange with Sambor over the "dropping of a bomb," almost sobbed as, her voice cracking, she said: "There were people in that house, one of whom was my son. When I was called (later) from the medical examiner's office, they were talking about pieces of people - an arm, a leg. . . "

The small studio audience listened quietly to most of the exchanges. When Donahue first asked for a question from the audience, a woman said to the MOVE members:

"Just what are you about? " There was loud applause.

The audience applauded again later when another woman asked, "What is M - O - V - E?" spelling the word.

At one point the audience groaned audibly when Kunstler - a lawyer nationally known for his support of radical, unpopular causes - remarked that ''the victims have become the villains."

There were several exchanges between Sambor and the MOVE women on the question of negotiations. Sambor said he had tried several times to bring about a peaceful solution through negotiations, but the women said they had been rebuffed in efforts to talk with Sambor, Mayor Goode and - in the hours before the fire - with the MOVE members in the besieged house.

Donahue, after hearing James give a lengthy review of MOVE history, in which she charged excessive police brutality toward the cult, remarked:

"It looks like you're still living with a legacy of hatred generated by the Frank Rizzo administration. It looks like you're fighting that old aggressive, macho organization. But it's gone, it was over two administrations ago."

James denied Donahue's interpretation and said police harassment of MOVE had continued over the years.