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From: "Dan Yurman" <djysrv@usa.net><br>
Subject: Feds indict four on '98 Vail fire<br>
Date: Sun, 21 May 2006 10:38:42 -0600<br><br>
<br>
Note to Readers<br><br>
This is a good review of how the FBI has categorized arson and vandalism
by<br>
members of the Earth Liberation Front as "domestic
terrorism." See quote<br>
from Mark Potek at the end. The FBI has used the arson attacks as
a<br>
justification for spying on other environmental groups, peace groups, and
a<br>
wide variety of activist organizations according to this news
report.<br><br>
The hard news peg in this article is buried paragraphs deep. Four
people<br>
have been indicted on the 1998 firebombing of a resort center at the
Vail,<br>
Colorado. Wire service reports on the indictments handed down on
Friday<br>
5/19 can be found on Google News with the keywords: Vail
fire<br><br>
Full text of the Seattle Times article follows below.<br><br>
<a href="http://www.twincities.com/mld/twincities/news/nation/14623047.htm" eudora="autourl">
http://www.twincities.com/mld/twincities/news/nation/14623047.htm<br><br>
</a>Posted on Sun, May. 21, 2006<br><br>
Government struggling to classify eco-sabotage<br>
Do perpetrators of property-only crimes merit the 'terrorist'
label?<br><br>
BY HAL BERNTON<br>
Seattle Times<br><br>
SEATTLE - Who is a terrorist?<br><br>
After the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing that killed 168 people, it was<br>
clean-cut Timothy McVeigh, a brooding loner - infused with hatred of
the<br>
government - who was convicted and put to death for that crime.<br><br>
After Sept. 11, which claimed the lives of more than 2,900 people, it
was<br>
the bearded visage of Osama bin Laden.<br><br>
This year, the Bush administration has touted the arrests of terrorists
of a<br>
different kind - homegrown militants who have embarked on arson attacks
to<br>
protest treatment of animals and the environment.<br><br>
During the past three years alone, FBI counterterrorism agents have<br>
conducted at least 190 investigations into property crimes claimed by
the<br>
Earth Liberation Front, or ELF, and the Animal Liberation Front, or
ALF.<br>
None of the crimes injured or killed people.<br><br>
"Terrorism is terrorism - no matter what the motive," declared
FBI director<br>
Robert Mueller on Jan. 20, when he announced the indictment of 11 people
in<br>
an alleged conspiracy that involved 17 attacks. Those include arsons at
a<br>
ski resort in Vail, Colo., a horse slaughterhouse in Oregon, a
federal<br>
wildlife research center in Olympia and the University of Washington
Center<br>
for Urban Horticulture.<br><br>
On Friday, a federal grand jury indicted four people in the Vail
firebombing<br>
and more indictments are expected in the months ahead as federal
grand<br>
juries meet in Seattle, Eugene, Ore., San Francisco and other cities.
Most<br>
of those indicted earlier this year could face decades in federal prison.
A<br>
few may face life sentences, if tried and convicted.<br><br>
Some balk at putting the terrorism label on activists who have
targeted<br>
property - not people.<br><br>
In the post-Sept. 11 era, they say that the word tilts the
criminal-justice<br>
system against defendants and helps the Bush administration justify
a<br>
broader infiltration - and surveillance - of groups that protest
government<br>
policies.<br><br>
Documents obtained by the American Civil Liberties Union indicate that
the<br>
FBI has monitored the activities of some environmental, animal-rights
and<br>
peace groups.<br><br>
"You couple spying on political dissenters with grand jury subpoenas
and a<br>
series of arrests, it's had a huge effect," said Alejandro Queral,
executive<br>
director of the Northwest Constitutional Rights Center. "There is a
serious<br>
danger of chilling dissenting points of view."<br><br>
The FBI decision to run these investigations through a
counterterrorism<br>
branch also has been questioned by its own Office of Inspector
General,<br>
which in a 2003 report recommended that the cases should be handled by
its<br>
criminal division.<br><br>
In Oregon, the power of the terrorism label also generated concern from
a<br>
federal judge. In a 2002 hearing in Portland, U.S. District Court
Judge<br>
James Redden told a federal prosecutor not to use the word terrorist in
the<br>
trial of Jacob Sherman, an Oregon man inspired by ELF to set fire to
three<br>
logging trucks.<br><br>
"Basically, he (Redden) thought it was a fairness issue, and that it
could<br>
prejudice the jury," said Andrew Bates, a defense attorney for
Sherman, who<br>
avoided trial through a plea agreement.<br><br>
Redden's concern underscores the lack of a universal definition for<br>
terrorism. Even within the U.S. government, there still is no
unanimity,<br>
according to the Government Accountability Office.<br><br>
For example, the State Department, when assessing violence abroad,
defines<br>
terrorism as "premeditated politically motivated violence
perpetrated<br>
against non-combatants" - in other words, attacks designed to injure
or kill<br>
people.<br><br>
Other federal laws and codes use a broader definition of terrorism that
can<br>
include attacks on property as well as people. The statutes define
domestic<br>
terrorism as acts of violence intended to influence the conduct of<br>
government or "intimidate or coerce a civilian
population."<br><br>
Even those definitions are open to interpretation. For example, the
vast<br>
majority of attacks on abortion clinics, including those that have killed
at<br>
least six people since 1993, are not classified by the FBI as
terrorism.<br><br>
Among federal prosecutors in Oregon, there is no debate that the ELF and
ALF<br>
arsons add up to terrorism.<br><br>
They say the attacks have posed a danger to humans, including
firefighters<br>
who respond to put out the blazes, and were intended to further a
political<br>
agenda.<br><br>
A slaughterhouse was burned in Oregon, for example, to protest the
killing<br>
of wild horses brought in from the range.<br><br>
The overall goal of the ELF - defined in a 2001 pamphlet distributed by
its<br>
North American press office - is to use "direct action in the form
of<br>
economic sabotage to stop the exploitation and destruction of the
natural<br>
environment."<br><br>
Handling a case as terrorism can influence the number of arson and
other<br>
charges that a prosecutor may seek from a grand jury. And, if terrorism
is<br>
proved as a motive for arson, federal sentencing guidelines
recommend<br>
substantially longer prison terms.<br><br>
"There was never any question about how these (crimes) would be
treated,"<br>
said Stephen Peifer, a Portland-based assistant U.S. attorney involved
in<br>
the prosecution.<br><br>
Since 1976, animal-rights and environmental militants have been involved
in<br>
more than 1,100 actions that have caused more than $110 million worth
of<br>
damage, according to FBI statistics.<br><br>
The FBI is worried that some groups want to ratchet up the
violence.<br><br>
The ALF advocates "direct action" attacks against property,
such as<br>
laboratories and slaughterhouses, but rejects harming humans.<br><br>
Meanwhile, splinter groups believe that it may be morally justified
to<br>
injure or even kill a human being - if the action could save many
animal<br>
lives, according to Jerry Vlasak, a Los Angeles trauma surgeon who has
acted<br>
as a spokesman for the ALF since 2004.<br><br>
FBI officials say such beliefs justify investigating these cases<br>
aggressively as terrorist acts.<br><br>
Some outside the agency question the FBI's ranking of those groups as a
top<br>
domestic-terrorism threat, since they haven't killed or injured
people.<br><br>
But among the domestic-terrorism incidents included in the FBI
database,<br>
individuals with ties to white-supremacist and other anti-government
groups<br>
killed six people and injured more than 135 people since 1996.<br><br>
During the past decade, the Justice Department has uncovered
numerous<br>
right-wing plots to assassinate police officers, judges, politicians
and<br>
civil-rights figures, as well as to amass missiles, explosives and
chemical<br>
weapons, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center's Intelligence
Report.<br><br>
"In my opinion, they (the FBI) are mistaking the frequency of
incidents with<br>
the overall threat," said Mark Potok, editor of a report that
monitors<br>
extremist crimes for the Southern Poverty Law Center.<br><br>
The vast majority of attacks on abortion clinics, including those that
have<br>
killed at least six people since 1993, are not classified by the FBI
as<br>
terrorism<br><br>
<br><br>
<br><br>
<br>
Dan Yurman djysrv@usa.net Cell 208-521-5726<br>
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