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In the past year I have thought
several times about Iva D’Aquino, probably because of the furor in the
media about Martha Stewart and her incarceration in Alderson. I won’t
spend much time on Miss Steward since I know she is still too fresh in
my mind, and probably yours, to warrant the effort. I think it
sufficient to say, for what ever it’s worth, that in my opinion, neither
she or Iva D’Aquino was of sufficient import to warrant the time and
money spent on their trials, convictions and subsequent prison time.
Both were guilty of monumentally poor judgment and dumb behavior at
times, but most of us are, especially those in Washington!
Iva D’Aquino was a victim, a victim of the radio and print media. In
particular Walter Winchell, who, in the forties, was a very powerful
radio personality who called himself a reporter! He launched a campaign
to have a part in the events of 1941-1946. Iva D’Aquino, who was an
American Citizen visiting the Orient at the beginning of WW2, and who,
despite her best efforts, was unable to be repatriated to the USA, was
branded a traitor by Winchell.
After the war she had been
investigated by the American Forces in Japan and found innocent of any
sort of collaboration with the enemy. She was getting ready to return
with her husband to the USA when she, somehow, came to the attention of
Winchell. He launched an attack against her, and what he called, “her
treason’!
Harry Truman, who I admire greatly, did a less than admirable thing,
when he, caving in to the pressure of Winchell, ordered Attorney General
Tom Clark, (who was the father of the much less than admired, Attorney
General Ramsey Clark, who, in my opinion, was likely guilty of much more
treasonable conduct than D’Aquino), to launch an investigation into the
case.
I knew Iva D’Aquino when she was incarcerated in the Federal Reformatory
for Women in Alderson. She worked in the prison hospital and during the
3 or 4 years that I knew her, was a lovely person to be around. She was
quite and well-spoken, kind and cooperative to everyone, well-liked by
staff and inmate alike!
I went to the Prisons Record Office and over several visits I read her
file and the transcript of her trial. That was when I began to have
doubts about the validity of the charges against her. The jury was very
reluctant to find her guilty and only after much pressure was exerted
did they find her guilty. It is interesting, that at her trial, none of
the transcriptions of radio broadcast that sat so prominently on the
evidence table and that were referred to so often, as ‘those records
sitting there,” were ever played. The reason, admitted later, was that
they did not contain even one broadcast by Iva D’Aquino!
I was on duty the morning of her release from Prison. We thought it was
a media circus at the time, but it was nothing compared to several in
later years. Compared to the Stewart craziness it was a mere blip in the
history of the FRW. I think that was the first time the prison had
experienced so much publicity. The media ranging from the New York Times
and NBC to the Monroe Watchman and WOAY was represented Alderson’s own
Duncan Johnson represented the Watchman!
When I came to the Front Gate at 4:00AM the photographers had unscrewed
the bulbs in the Gates flood-lights, and had screwed in their own
lights. Shortly thereafter her brothers arrived to pick her up, two
short, stout, somber men in black suits, the first time I saw “Oddjob”
in the James Bond movie, I was reminded of them. Both were cooperative
and mannerly, but also, obviously unaccustomed to the attention shown
them.
On this occasion, accompanied by prison staff, the brothers, in their
car, were allowed to drive to the Administration Building for their
reunion and their sister’s Release. In a few minutes they returned to
the Front Entrance with their sister Iva and Mrs. Carter, the prisons
Record Clerk, Iva and Mrs. Carter embraced and she wished them a safe
journey. Iva rolled her window down and thanked me for the kindness I
had shown her and said, “God Bless You, Mr. McCurdy. I said the same to
her and opened the gate; the car rolled through, stopped, allowed the
Media a few moments, and then, quite sedately, drove off into the
approaching dawn.
Iva D’Aquino returned to Chicago, she never saw her husband again, the
child they had wanted so much had been still-born, and she spent the
rest of her days there in that City.
Iva Togura D’Aquino was pardoned by President Gerald Ford on his last
day in office. Later, I heard that she, as an old woman, was running the
oriental import store her father had started in Chicago.
Note added in 2007:
Iva D’Aquino died in 2007; her death got little mention in the national
news. The TV commentator called her, in the final insult in a lifetime
of insults, “Ava Quino!
No one ever tried to return her life!
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