[Ppnews] Charred SUVs and the End of Citizen Eco-Activism

[Political Prisoner News]

http://www.counterpunch.org/donnelly06142007.html

June 14, 2007

America's Newest Political Prisoners


Charred SUVs and the End of Citizen Eco-Activism

By MICHAEL DONNELLY

On June 16, 2000, 22-year-old forest activist Jeffrey "Free" Leurs 
joined with Craig "Critter" Marshall and proceeded to a Eugene, 
Oregon car dealership and set fire to three SUVs as a statement 
against such vehicles' contribution to Global Warming. The fire was 
put out quickly; no one was hurt; the SUVs sustained less than 
$40,000 in damages and were restored and later sold. An arson expert 
later testified that no one was ever in danger as the fire was small 
and far from any fuel sources.

Leurs was arrested within 30 minutes of the arson by three undercover 
agents who it seems were following him that night. How they got on to 
him remains a mystery as does the question of why they didn't stop 
the arson in the first place.

A year later, on June 1, 2001, Leurs was sentenced by Judge Lyle 
Velure to 22 years and 8 months in prison. He has been in the Oregon 
State Penitentiary ever since. He filed an Appeal of the sentence in 
January 2002. After three-and-a-half years, the Appeal was finally 
heard on November 30, 2005. Another year dragged on before, on 
February 14, 2007 the Court of Appeals unanimously ruled to reverse 
the case and remand it back to the Circuit Court for resentencing -- 
an effort likely to reduce the Draconian sentence by 15 years. A new 
trial date for appeal has yet to be set and Jeff Leurs continues to 
be confined.

Property Destruction = Terrorism

Obviously, Leurs' sentence was a message to Eugene activists that 
property destruction dissent would not be tolerated -- a message 
driven home recently with the Green Scare arsonists also getting 
sentences much larger than the median for no human injury property 
offenses. Symbolic property destruction -- a la the Boston Tea Party 
-- was effectively morphed into "terrorism" upon Leurs' sentence. 
(Judge Velure and prosecutor Karen Tracy would put Sam Adams away for 
decades if they could.)

A comparative analysis of Oregon sentences handed down in 2001 in 
other cases with human harm (arsons, rapes, murders, assaults) is 
available at <http://freefreenow.org/sentences.html>freefreenow.org/. 
Of course the disparity between sentences for political property 
damage and those with harm against persons make it very clear that 
this was a political sentencing. Whether one agrees with such arsons 
or not (I do not), it is clear that Jeffrey Leurs is a political 
prisoner -- the judge made it quite clear.

Free "Free"

On Wednesday, June 13th, the <http://freefreenow.org>Jeff Luers' 
Support Group, the <http://www.cldc.org/>Civil Liberties Defense 
Center and the International Socialist Organization co-sponsored a 
gathering of activists in Eugene to note Leurs seventh year in prison 
and to get updates on his appeal and the recent sentencings of the 
Green Scare defendants. They also saw the premier showing of Brooklyn 
filmmaker Lauren Cynamon's new film on Leurs' life: How I Became an 
Eco-Warrior.

What's Next

The wave of political arsons that started with charred SUVs and 
culminated with the Green Scare sentences (check the CLDC website for 
a list of sentences) has weakened the forest protection movement to 
such a point that on June 12th, the US Fish and Wildlife Service 
announced plans to remove hard-won protection for the Northern 
spotted owl on over 1.5 million acres of their habitat -- 22% of the 
set aside habitat that was inadequate to begin with in 1993 when Bill 
Clinton resumed old growth logging in public-owned owl habitat.

Such a blatant timber grab would rightly have been met with sustained 
resistance just a few years ago. But, now opposition has evaporated. 
The defense has been left to the very foundation grant-dependent 
folks -- eco-attorneys EarthJustice and other Big Greens -- who 
signed off on Clinton's plan in the first place. Predictably 
EarthJustice attorney Kristen Boyles bleated "There's no scientific 
justification for this," referring to the new Bush plan. As if there 
was any "scientific justification" for the insufficient Clinton plan 
EarthJustice rammed down the throats of their eco-plaintiffs back in 1993!

"If they don't have a seat at the table, they got nothing to sell."
--Steve Spahr

Even more predictably, the token Big Green forest ecologist on the 
panel that came up with the new plan, foundation carpetbagger 
Dominick DellaSalla of the World Wildlife Fund failed miserably. He 
failed to defend the wildlife dependent on the lands to be stripped 
of protection; he failed to expose it to the depleted grassroots (who 
had to wait for press reports to find out) and he failed to lambaste 
the obvious non-science pressure emanating out of DC while the plan 
was being concocted - preferring to keep silent and protect his "seat 
at the table" instead, when exposing it while on the drawing board 
was the only way to derail it.

The "terrorism" label applied to non-lawyer, non-foundation-dependent 
eco-activism by industry and their captive politicians and judges has 
paid off -- for now. The unpaid, effective, non-property destruction 
activism of just a decade ago has evaporated.

Jeff Leurs' Appeal will proceed and his outrageous sentence will be 
changed and he likely will be released on time served. The Green 
Scare sentences will also likely be reduced after another round of 
excruciatingly slow Appeals. In the end, the damage done to SUVs, 
genetic tree farms, feral horse slaughtering plants, etc., pales 
compared to the damage done to the forest protection movement.

MICHAEL DONNELLY was plaintiff in the first successful lawsuit over 
continued destruction of Ancient Forest habitat. Ultimately, that led 
to the habitat set asides. He can be reached at 
<mailto:pahtoo at aol.com>pahtoo at aol.com




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