Big Bean Raid

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The trustee of the bankrupt warehouse brought Cryts before a federal grand jury in Missouri on a charge of theft of property under the protection of a bankruptcy court. The grand jury refused to indict Cryts, but the trustee then haled him into bankruptcy court. Federal Judge Charles W. Baker, who is hearing the bankruptcy case against the elevator, granted Cryts immunity against any further proceedings if he would divulge the names of farmers who had helped him stage the raid. Cryts refused, pleading the Fifth Amendment. Judge Baker then ordered Cryts and his family to pay $300,000 in damages to the trustee and sent the farmer to jail until he would disclose the names.

Cryts had served 17 days in the Pope County detention center in Russellville, Ark., when Kansas Senator Robert Dole, chairman of a Senate judiciary subcommittee on the courts, got him released last week on a three-day pass, later extended to five days. The handsome, deceptively mild-mannered bean farmer testified before a congressional committee on behalf of bills that would give farmers a priority claim on goods stored in bankrupt warehouses. The fate of those bills is uncertain, and so is that of Cryts: he went back to jail on Friday. Meanwhile, he has become a farmland paladin. His home town of Puxico has sprouted yellow ribbons, like those displayed for the Iran hostages, and the crowbar used to break open the elevator wall has been auctioned off for $5,000 as a memento of the Great Soybean Raid. Cryts is totally unrepentant. Said he, testifying last week: "We believe there's more justice in this country than there is any place [else] in the world. But, you know, justice is not always brought and set in your lap. Sometimes you just have to stand up and reach for it."