Dissident's Wife Seeks U.S. Support

The wife of an imprisoned Soviet dissident yesterday appealed to American lawyers and the American public to help free her husband at a New England Conference on Soviet Law, Human Rights and Soviet Jewry held at the Law School.

Avital Shcharansky said relatives of her husband, Anatoly Shcharansky, had asked her to urge Americans to contact Konstantin Apraksyn, chairman of the Municipal Kollege Barristers of Moscow. Apraksyn "promised me and others that he would provide adequate counsel for my husband," she said.

Anatoly Shcharansky, a computer scientist, was imprisoned in March 1977 after repeated applications to emigrate to Israel.

The Soviet press accused him of communicating with the Central Intelligence Agency, but the Soviet government has not announced any charges.

In response to Avital Shcharansky's plea, Alan Dershowitz, professor of Law, said yesterday he and Rep. Robert Drinan (D-Mass) will send an offer of assistance to Silvia Dubrovskaya, the lawyer the Soviet government has appointed to defend Anatoly Shcharansky.

Critical Information

"Since Soviet law requires you to present all information favorable to the accused, and since we have critical information favorable to Shcharansky to which you do not have access, there is every reason for you to agree to meet with us and no reason why you should be unwilling to receive our important information. We are confident therefore that you will be as anxious to meet with us as we are to meet with you," Drinan and Dershowitz say in a telegram that they will send to Dubrovskaya today.

Dershowitz said yesterday he would like to be able to observe the trial, but the Soviet authorities said they will not allow any interference in the case by foreign lawyers.

The conference speakers also explored the nature of human rights in the Soviet Union and discussed how American lawyers can effect change in the Soviet legal process.

Telford Taylor, professor emeritus at Columbia Law School and visiting professor at the Law School, said that despite the Soviet Union's insistence that other countries not interfere in its legal system, American lawyers must try to "break through this wall."

Taylor said lawyers cannot restrict themselves to conventional methods of communication, and should protest any abuses that exist.

Other speakers included George Ginsburgs, professor of foreign and comparative law at Rutgers University, and Burton Caine, professor of Law at Temple University.

The American Jewish Congress-New England Region and the Jewish Community Council of Metropolitan Boston sponsored the conference in cooperation with the Harvard Jewish Law Students Association