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<div class="entry-date">August 12, 2013<br>
<small><small><a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.counterpunch.org/2013/08/12/undercover-agents-infiltrated-tar-sands-resistance-camp-to-break-up-planned-protest/">http://www.counterpunch.org/2013/08/12/undercover-agents-infiltrated-tar-sands-resistance-camp-to-break-up-planned-protest/</a></small></small><br>
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<div class="subheadlinestyle"><b><big>TransCanada and Department of
Homeland Security Keep Close Eye on Activists, FOIA Documents Reveal</big></b></div>
<h1 class="article-title">Undercover Agents Infiltrated Tar Sands
Resistance Camp to Break Up Planned Protest</h1>
<div class="mainauthorstyle"><big><big>by ADAM FEDERMAN</big></big></div>
<div class="main-text"><big><big> </big></big>
<p><big><big>After a week of careful planning, environmentalists
attending a tar sands resistance action camp in Oklahoma thought they
had the element of surprise — but they would soon learn that their
moves were being closely watched by law enforcement officials and
TransCanada, the very company they were targeting.</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>On the morning of March 22 activists had planned to block
the gates at the company’s strategic oil reserves in Cushing, Oklahoma
as part of the larger protest movement against TransCanada’s tar sands
pipeline. But when they showed up in the early morning hours and began
unloading equipment from their vehicles they were confronted by police
officers. Stefan Warner, an organizer with Great Plains Tar Sands
Resistance, says some of the vehicles en route to the protest site were
pulled over even before they had reached Cushing. He estimates that
roughly 50 people would have participated— either risking arrest or
providing support. The act of nonviolent civil disobedience, weeks in
the planning, was called off.</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>“For a small sleepy Oklahoma town to be saturated with
police officers on a pre-dawn weekday leaves only one reasonable
conclusion,” says Ron Seifert, an organizer with an affiliated group
called Tar Sands Blockade. “They were there on purpose, expecting
something to happen.”</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>Seifert is exactly right. According to documents obtained
by <i>Earth Island Journal</i>, investigators from the Bryan County
Sherriff’s Department had been spying on a Great Plains Tar Sands
Resistance training camp that took place from March 18 to March 22 and
which brought together local landowners, Indigenous communities, and
environmental groups opposed to the pipeline.</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>At least two law enforcement officers infiltrated the
training camp and drafted a detailed report about the upcoming protest,
internal strategy, and the character of the protesters themselves. The
undercover investigator who wrote the report put the tar sands
opponents into five different groups: eco-activists (who “truly wanted
to live off the grid”); Occupy members; Native American activists (“who
blamed all forms of government for the poor state of being that most
American Indians are living in”); Anarchists (“many wore upside down
American flags”); and locals from Oklahoma (who “had concerns about the
pipeline harming the community”).</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>The undercover agent’s report was obtained by Douglas
Parr, an Oklahoma attorney who represented three activists (all
lifelong Oklahomans) who were arrested in mid April for blockading a
tar sands pipeline construction site. “During the discovery in the
Bryan county cases we received material indicating that there had been
infiltration of the Great Plains Tar Sands Resistance camp by police
agents,” Parr says. At least one of the undercover investigators
attended an “action planning” meeting during which everyone was asked
to put their cell phones or other electronic devices into a green
bucket for security reasons. The investigator goes on to explain that
he was able to obtain sensitive information regarding the location of
the upcoming Cushing protest, which would mark the culmination of the
week of training. “This investigator was able to obtain an approximate
location based off a question that he asked to the person in charge of
media,” he wrote. He then wryly notes that, “It did not appear…that our
phones had been tampered with.”</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>(The memo also states that organizers at the meeting went
to great lengths not to give police any cause to disrupt the gathering.
The investigator writes: “We were repeatedly told this was a substance
free camp. No drug or alcohol use would be permitted on the premises
and always ask permission before touching anyone. Investigators were
told that we did not need to give the police any reason to enter the
camp.” They were also given a pamphlet that instructed any agent of
TransCanada, the FBI, or other law enforcement agency to immediately
notify the event organizers.)</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>The infiltration of the Great Plains Tar Sands Resistance
action camp and pre-emption of the Cushing protest is part of a larger
pattern of government surveillance of tar sands protesters. According
to other documents obtained by <i>Earth Island Journal </i>under an
Open Records Act request, Department of Homeland Security staff has
been keeping close tabs on pipeline opponents — and routinely sharing
that information with TransCanada, and vice versa.</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>In March TransCanada gave a briefing on corporate security
to a Criminal Intelligence Analyst with the Oklahoma Information Fusion
Center, the state level branch of Homeland Security. The conversation
took place just as the action camp was getting underway. The following
day, Diane Hogue, the Center’s Intelligence Analyst, asked TransCanada
to review and comment on the agency’s classified situational awareness
bulletin. Michael Nagina, Corporate Security Advisor for TransCanada,
made two small suggestions and wrote, “With the above changes I am
comfortable with the content.”</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>Then, in an email to TransCanada on March 19 (the second
day of the action camp) Hogue seems to refer to the undercover
investigation taking place. “Our folks in the area say there are
between 120-150 participants,” Hogue wrote in an email to Nagina. (The
Oklahoma Information Fusion Center declined to comment for this story.)</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>It is unclear if the information gathered at the training
camp was shared directly with TransCanada. However, the company was
given access to the Fusion Center’s situational awareness bulletin just
a few days before the Cushing action was scheduled to take place.</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>In an emailed statement, TransCanada spokesperson Shawn
Howard did not directly address the Tar Sands Resistance training camp.
Howard described law enforcement as being interested in what the
company has done to prepare for activities designed to “slow approval
or construction” of the pipeline project. “When we are asked to share
what we have learned or are prepared for, we are there to share our
experience – not direct law enforcement,” he wrote.</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>The evidence of heightened cooperation between TransCanada
and law enforcement agencies in Oklahoma and Texas comes just over a
month after it was <a
href="http://www.earthisland.org/journal/index.php/elist/eListRead/transcanada_is_spying_on_keystone_xl_opponents/"
onclick="javascript:_gaq.push(['_trackEvent','outbound-article','http://www.earthisland.org']);">revealed</a>
that the company had given a PowerPoint presentation on corporate
security to the FBI and law enforcement officials in Nebraska.
TransCanada also held an “interactive session” with law enforcement in
Oklahoma City about the company’s security strategy in early 2012. In
their PowerPoint presentation, TransCanada employees suggested that
district attorneys should explore “state or federal anti-terrorism
laws” in prosecuting activists. They also included profiles of key
organizers and a list of activists previously arrested for acts of
nonviolent civil disobedience in Texas and Oklahoma. In addition to
TransCanada’s presentation, a representative of Nebraska’s Homeland
Security Fusion Center briefed attendees on an “intelligence sharing
role/plan relevant to the pipeline project.” This is likely related to
the Homeland Security Information Sharing Network, which provides
public and private sector partners as well as law enforcement access to
sensitive information.</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>The earlier cache of documents, first released to the
press by Bold Nebraska, an environmental organization opposed to the
pipeline, shows that TransCanada has established close ties with state
and federal law enforcement agencies along the proposed pipeline route.
For example, in an exchange with FBI agents in South Dakota,
TransCanada’s Corporate Security Advisor, Michael Nagina, jokes that,
“I can be the cure for insomnia so sure hope you can still attend!”
Although they were unable to make the Nebraska meeting, one of the
agents responded, “Assuming approval of the pipeline, we would like to
get together to discuss a timeline for installation through our
territory.”</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>The new documents also provide an interesting glimpse into
the revolving door between state law enforcement agencies and the
private sector, especially in areas where fracking and pipeline
construction have become big business. One of the individuals providing
information to the Texas Department of Homeland Security’s Intelligence
and Counterterrorism Division is currently the Security Manager at
Anadarko Petroleum, one of the world’s largest independent oil and
natural gas exploration and production companies. In 2011, at a natural
gas industry stakeholder relations conference, a spokesperson for
Anadarko compared the anti-drilling movement to an “insurgency” and
suggested that attendees download the US Army/Marine Corps
Counterinsurgency Manual.</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>LC Wilson, the Anadarko Security Manager shown by the
documents to be providing information to the Texas Fusion Center, is
more than just a friend of law enforcement. From 2009 to 2011 he served
as Regional Commander of the Texas Department of Public Safety, which
oversees law enforcement statewide. Wilson began his career with the
Department of Public Safety in 1979 and was named a Texas Ranger — an
elite law enforcement unit — in 1988, eventually working his way up to
Assistant Chief. Such connections would be of great value to a
corporation like Anadarko, which has invested heavily in security
operations.</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>In an email to Litto Paul Bacas, a Critical Infrastructure
Planner (and former intelligence analyst) with Texas Homeland Security,
Wilson, using his Anadarko address, writes, “we find no intel specific
for Texas. There is active recruitment for directed action to take
place in Oklahoma as per article. I will forward any intel we come
across on our end, especially if it concerns Texas.” The article he was
referring to was written by a member of Occupy Denver calling on all
“occupiers and occupy networks” to attend the Great Plains Tar Sands
Resistance training camp.</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>Wilson is not the only former law enforcement official on
Anadarko’s security team; Jeffrey Sweetin, the company’s Regional
Security Manager, was a special agent with the Drug Enforcement
Administration for more than 20 years heading up its Rocky Mountain
division. At Anadarko, according to Sweetin’s profile on Linkedin, his
responsibilities include “security program development” and “law
enforcement liaison.”</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>Other large oil and gas companies have recruited local law
enforcement to fill high-level security positions. In 2010, long-time
Bradford County Sheriff Steve Evans resigned to take a position as
senior security officer for Chesapeake Energy in Pennsylvania. Evans
was one of a handful of gas industry security directors to receive
intelligence bulletins compiled by a private security firm and
distributed by the Pennsylvania Department of Homeland Security.
Bradford County happens to be ground zero for natural gas drilling in
the Marcellus Shale, with more active wells than any other county in
the state. In addition to Evans, several deputies of the Bradford
County Sheriff’s office have worked for Chesapeake — through a private
contractor, TriCorps Security — as “off-duty” security personnel.
TransCanada has also come to rely on off duty police officers to patrol
construction sites and protest camps, raising questions about whose
interests the sworn officers are serving.</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big>Of course for corporations like TransCanada and Anadarko
having law enforcement on their side (or in their pocket) is more than
just a good business move. It gives them access to classified
information and valuable intelligence — essential weapons in any
counterinsurgency campaign.</big></big></p>
<big><big></big></big>
<p><big><big><em><strong>Adam Federman</strong> is a frequent
contributor to CounterPunch and the Earth Island Journal, where this
story originally appeared. You can find more of his work at <a
href="http://adamfederman.com/"
onclick="javascript:_gaq.push(['_trackEvent','outbound-article','http://adamfederman.com']);">adamfederman.com</a>.</em></big></big></p>
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