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Over 100 people gathered to witness the Women's Blockade Monday morning. Twenty women were arrested in a diverse array of tactics that halted logging operations in the Fiddler timber sale for nearly seven hours. The on-the-ground campaign to save Fiddler Mountain is one week old; 42 people have been arrested. Resistance continues and a tree-sit is in place in unit seven. "The broad-based coalition of activists from local woodsmen, local business owners, teachers, retirees, to Earth First! vow to continue protesting and blocking logging roads. We are united in a historic confrontation. The outcome of this struggle will have implications for national forest policy for decades to come," said Laurel Sutherlin of the Oxygen Collective. Treatment of jailed forest defenders in Josephine County Jail "cruel and unusual punishment and unconstitutional" While serious and violent offenders are released on a daily basis from the new Josephine County Jail, non-violent protestors are held, and even put into "lockdown" or segregation based upon their First Amendment-protected beliefs. This form of lockdown or solitary confinement is an extreme form of punishment, particularly for non-violent protestors who were engaging in civil disobedience. "It is unconstitutional to punish a citizen prior to a Court hearing and jury determination of guilt. This gulag-style treatment is a travesty to a fair and just society," said Attorney Lauren Regan of the Civil Liberties Defense Center. The deputies at the jail have been intimidating and attempting to coerce people by placing them into solitary confinement because of their opinions or beliefs. [ pdx indymedia Save The Biscuit stories | more at Rogue Valley IMC ]
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