The Michigan Daily
ol. LXXXVI, No. 50-S Ann Arbor, Michigan-Wednesday, July 21, 1976 10c Twelve Pages plus Supplement
Sheriff Postill booked
By LANI JORDAN
Washtenaw County Sheriff Frederick Postill surrendered him-
self to authorities in Chelsea yesterday after being issued with a
warrant charging him with felonious assault. He later filed law-
suits totaling $90 million against five parties, stemming from the
publication of allegedly libelous material following his involvement
in a brawl at a wedding reception two weeks ago.
The arrest warrant, signed by District Court Judge Henry
Arkinson in Saline, was the result of a complaint filed by sheriff's
deputy Basil Baysinger. In the complaint, Postill was accused of
assaulting Baysinger and his wife during the fight.
JAIL ADMINISTRATOR Frank Donley, also a participant in
the incident, was not named in the complaint on the warrant.
Postill, however, was booked and arraigned in Chelsea and
then traveled to the Washtenaw County Jail where he was finger-
printed and released.
Postill later accompanied Donley and their attorneys to the
county clerk's office yesterday afternoon to file the lawsuits
against the Ann Arbor News, reporter William Treml, the Michigan
Police Officers Association and its president, Carl Parsell, and
Baysinger. According to the attorneys, these suits are the result
of the defendants' refusal to retract "untrue, malicious and
libelous statements."
JACK GARRIS, attorney for Baysinger, stated at a press
conference yesterday morning that his client "asserts (that) the
statements concerning death threats made to himself and his
wife by Postill are true. There will be no retraction."
Baysinger appeared before the judge Monday morning to
testify abost events occurring during the assault. The complaint
against Postill was signed at 10 a.m. yesterday after Baysinger
complied with the court's request for security costs of $200.
Meanwhile, the attorney general's office has announced that
investigations of the brawl have turned up sufficient evidence to
charge both Postill and Donley with assaulting the Baysingers.
County prosecutor William Delhey commented, "There is
See SHERIFF, Page 6
SHERIFF FREDERICK POSTILL, left, and his attorney Laurence Burgess stop to answer ques-
tions inside the Washtenaw County Building yesterday. Earlier in the day Postill surrendered to
authorities after a warrant was issued for his arrest charging him with felonious assault.
Mars through the looking-glass
By JEFF RISTINE
Special To The Daily
Viking made a safe landing on
Mars yesterday morning and
discovered a New World strewn
with countless rocks beneath a
bright sky.
The robot landing craft set
down on Chryse Planitia, the
Gold Plains, at 7:54 am. and
within minutes began transmit-
ting two sharply detailed pic-
tures of the Martian landscape,
the first 'photographs ever sent
from the surface of another
planet.
THE PICTURES showed signs
of meteor impacts, the planet's
fierce winds, water erosion and,
some scientists believed, clouds
in the sky overhead. There was
no evidence of life, either past
or present. The threelife-de-
tecting biological experiments
aboard Viking will not begin
their work until next Wednes-
day.
"The details are just incred-
ible," said Dr. Thomas Mutch,
the geologist in charge of the
photographic equipment. "It
just couldn't be better."
Viking Project officials at the
Jet Propulsion Laboratory in
Pasadena, Calif., received radio
signals at 8:12 confirming the
spacecraft had settled. Even at
the speed of light, it takes 18
minutes for a signal to travel
the 212 million milestbetween
Mars and Earth.
THE 1,300-LB. lander hit the
Martian surface at a velocity of
about eight feet per second and
only 17 seconds off schedule.
Earlier, the spacecraft had
separated from the orbiter it
had been attached to since be-
ing launched from Cape Cana-
veral last August and made a
three-hour, 12-minute descent of
more than 12,600 miles. The
lander's descent was slowed by
atmospheric drag, a parachute
(which was jettisoned before
landing) and three rockets. It
settled during Mars' late after-
noon.
Viking's landing spot, Chryse
(pronounced CRY-see) is the
low northwest region of what is
believed to be an ancient flood
plain. Scientists think it is one
of the areas on Mars most like-
ly to support life.
THE FIRST black-and-white
picture showed one of the land-
er's three large footpaths and
a grainy surface with many
rocks, from less than an inch
to six inches in size.
It was the second photograph,
however, that was most excit-
ing. Transmitting in a drama-
tic line-by-line process that
yielded a new scene every few
seconds, Viking returned a pan-
orama of the rocky landscape.
Swinging in a c i r c 1 e, the
camera showed the horizon, a
few miles away, the Martian
sky .- somewhat brighter than
project scientists expected-and
parts of the lander itself.
The panorama shot also in-
cluded what appeared to be a
wavy pattern of clouds, unlike
any ever seen on earth. At least
part of the pattern, however,
was apparently caused by a de-
fect of the photographic system
used by Viking. But some scien-
tists insisted the pictures did
show evidence of some clouds.
THE PICTURES also showed
rims of a few craters and jag-
ged rocks shaped by Mars dust
storms. Other rocks appeared
to have rounded edges, however
-possible evidence of water
erosion at some time in Mar-
tian history. Still others appear-
ed to have cracks similar to
those in earth rocks by frozen
moisture. Rocks visible on the
horizon may be several yards
wide, one scientist speculated.
T h e photographs (actually
data-bits "translated" into im-
age form), were sharper than
scientists had anticipated, and
will be made even more detail-
ed through a process called
computer enhancement. Today,
the cameras will transmit a
color picture of the Martian
s a r f a c e, probably revealing
brick-red or red-orange mate-
See IT'S, Page 10
Art fair ovens today
Wooden barricades were hastily thrown up
along State St., Maynard, East University,
South University and Main yesterday, provid-
ing reminders to motorists that they had
better not venture past them. The skeletal
frames of wooden booths lined South U.,
serene except for the few summer shoppers
and the frequent clatter of hammers. Several
men strained in front of the Brown Jug to get
a refreshment trailer in place.
In short, the city was bracing itself for the
annual rite of summer - the Art Fair - that
annual four day blitz which fills the streets
with artisans and onlookers. And yesterday,
last minute preparations were being made
~ before the crowds early today begin to swell
the usually quiet college town streets of
summer.
BANNERS AND signs were hoisted, and
hot dog carts were in place; but there was
still much to be done last night, especially in
the realm of making the booths habitable for
the sculptors, ceramists, jewelry makers and
painters who will display their wares and
talents there.
"We're worried about the roofing," said one
young, yellow T-shirted worker on South
University. "We're worried about the pos-
sibility of rain," he said, adding that the
booths' roofing was scheduled to be laid late
last night.
However, he confidently predicted it would
not delay the fair.
ALSO ABSENT was the electrical wiring,
which will have to be put in place so the
artists will have the means to perform their
programs
Meanwhile, Mother Nature may cooperate
fully today. Partly sunny skies and tempera-
tures in the 80s were predicted to make it a
beautiful day for the first batch of the expected
2W,000 fairgoers.
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