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. . . .... ... ..