Feds target Earth/Animal Activists across county
author: batten the hatches
|
The FBI and Homeland Security agents have stepped up their campaign against anarchists and animal rights and environmental activists. Raids in Arizona, NYC, arrests in NYC, AZ, grand jury subpeonas in OR.
|
U.S - The FBI and Homeland Security agents have stepped up their campaign against anarchists and animal rights and environmental activists. On Wednesday, in New York City, a 30 year old member of the Friends of Jeffrey Luers prisoner support group was arrested while at school. His apartment was also raided and computer and person affects seized. His arrest may be in connection with a May 2001 Earth Liberation Front arson at Jefferson Poplar Farms near Portland Oregon. The arraignment will be at 11:00 am Thursday morning on the second floor of the Federal Court Building, which is located at at 225 Cadman Plaza East in Brooklyn.
Portland activists, Frank Winbigler and Shannon (Nonny) Urick were approached in a cafe by three FBI agents, one agent from Homeland Security, and an Oregon Sheriff. They were served with papers ordering them to be witnesses in a federal Grand Jury investigation, and were also advised that they are both targets of the same investigation. The Grand Jury is scheduled for March 16th of next year in Eugene, Oregon.
Later in the day more than a dozen FBI agents, along with Joint Terrorism Task Force and local police officers raided The Catalyst Infoshop in Prescott, Arizona. Environmental publications were seized and one of the groups founding members was arrested. The arraignment is scheduled for 10:00 am Thursday morning in Flagstaff where the federal courthouse is. Police in Arizona consider anarchists to be a terrorist threat. A second person has been reported arrested in Flagstaff according to www.arizona.indymedia.org
Earlier in the week federal agents were asking around Boston for Daniel Andreas San Diego, who they allege is responsible for placing an explosive pipe bomb at Chiron Corp in Emeryville, California on August 28, 2003. The Chiron Corp, a biotechnology company, was a target of the animal rights campaign to shut down Huntingdon Life Sciences, a company that performs cruel experiments on animals.
This most recent attack on the earth and animal liberation movements was obviously well coordinated and planned far in advance. Activists across the country have been doing what they can to protect themselves by sharing information about how to avoid dealing with authorities a developing a better security culture.
At least 2 additional people served with subpoenas.
I (Jennifer Adrian) was also served a subpeona today, December 7, 2005.
I was approached at my workplace by two FBI agents, and was told that many arrests had been made across the country today for animal rights actions. I was also told that many other people were talking, and was pressured to "come clean" for my own good. When I insisted on talking to an attorney, I was issued a subpeona for a Grand Jury set for the same date as the one listed for the other people mentioned here.
I was told I would see all kinds of arrests on the news tonight, but I didn't see anything, so I was looking on the Internet for information and found your site.
Before dawn, this morning, two FBI agents from the Eugene office and several state police officers came to Southern Oregon to subpoena Suzanne Savoie, to appear before a federal grand jury on February 16, 2005 in Eugene.
Savoie believes she was under surveillance for a couple days prior to the visit. Agents claimed they were going to visit people all over the country today, trying to intimidate and scare people into talking. They are claiming that Savoie took part in three arsons that took place years ago, the Jefferson Poplar farm on the OR coast, the Superior Lumber Company in Glendale, OR, and Romania car dealership in Eugene.
They told Savoie that if she didn't start giving them information she would take the fall for all the men they said were involved. They said women usually take the fall for men and that she shouldn't let that happen. They showed Savoie four named photos of men who they said were the "bombmakers" and that they wanted her to give information about them. The FBI also used the usual tactics of threatening 60 years in jail to intimidate Savoie.
Most recently Savoie has been doing local community organizing in the Applegate Valley, fighting to stop the Bald Lick timber sale and a long term campaign to preserve Black Mountain on the Siskiyou Crest.
Usually a private person, Savoie nonetheless believes that this is a time for people who have been targeted to tell their stories.
I personally believe that it is important for all who know those targeted to offer the utmost support for them at this time.
-----
www.nyc.indymedia.org
www.arizona.indymedia.org
www.portland.indymedia.org
 http://bombsandshields.blogspot.com/
|
contribute to this article
contribute to this article
add comment to discussion
|
By GENE JOHNSON
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
SEATTLE -- Six people have been arrested in connection with ecoterrorism attacks in Oregon and Washington dating back to 1998, including the destruction of a Bonneville Power Administration tower near Bend, Ore., on the eve of the millennium, federal prosecutors said Thursday.
The arrests were made Wednesday in New York, Virginia, Oregon and Arizona, and each of the defendants has been indicted in Oregon or Washington. Besides the tower's destruction, the attacks included three arsons in Oregon and one in Olympia.
One of the fires caused more than $500,000 in damage, and the other three caused more than $1 million, investigators said. The Earth Liberation Front and the Animal Liberation Front claimed responsibility for most of the acts.
Chelsea Dawn Gerlach, 28, of Portland, Ore., was charged with conspiring to destroy an energy facility and destruction of an energy facility in the attack on the transmission tower. She faces up to 25 years in prison if convicted.
Two of the defendants - Stanislas Gregory Meyerhoff, 28, and Daniel Gerard McGowan, 31 - face up to life in prison if convicted of setting fires Jan. 2, 2001, at the Superior Lumber Co. in Glendale, Ore., and May 21, 2001, at the Jefferson Poplar Farm in Clatskanie, Ore. Damage from each fire exceeded $1 million.
Meyerhoff was arrested in Charlottesville, Va., where he was attending Piedmont Community College. McGowan was arrested in New York City.
Kevin M. Tubbs, 36, and William C. Rodgers, 40, face up to 20 years each if convicted of a June 21, 1998, arson at the Animal and Plant and Health Inspection Services facility in Olympia, which caused $1.2 million in damage. Tubbs was arrested in Springfield, Ore., and Rodgers was arrested in Prescott, Ariz.
Sarah Kendall Harvey, a 28-year-old student at Northern Arizona University, was arrested in Flagstaff after being charged with a Dec. 27, 1998, fire at U.S. Forest Industries in Medford, Ore. That fire caused an estimated $500,000 in damage.
The defendants were scheduled to make initial appearances in federal court in the districts where they were arrested.
The U.S. Attorney's office in Seattle said the investigation is continuing.