Green Scare: The Lauren Regan Interview
Activist-Lawyer Lauren Regan is Jeff “Free” Luers lawyer. She is outspoken about what is happening to activists in the US and speaks to The Justice Barker for the Abolitionist on what is commonly called “The Green Scare” in the United States today.
“Environmental groups are being harassed, infiltrated and spied on by the FBI and the police as never before”. Regan urges activists to be cautious in their homes, at work, and in legal actions such as civil disobedience. “Everyone who is an activist is a target” she stressed.
But Regan, executive director of the Civil Liberties Defense Center in Eugene , equally stressed the importance of legal environmental activism. “The resistance movement has always been an integral part of our democracy,” she said, adding that activists must constantly speak out against what she believes are heavy-handed and illegal government tactics.
“Be very vocal,” she said. “Shedding light on it is a great way to put an end to it.”
JB: How's it going?
LR: It's going....I'm kinda up to my ass in a million different things going on...but I'm going to be walking around with a hands free head set while were doing this so if for any reason if you get to much background noise of anything I'll head back to my desk.
JB: No worries. Is this a busy time for you?
LR: Well always...I run a law office in addition to running a very active non-profit right now so there lot of shit hitting the fan the last week or so.
JB: Really? What's happening?
LR: Well the new indictments...we had someone go to jail for contempt of court on a grand jury...etc etc.
JB: What's happening in Oregon ? Are you working on cases through out the country or what?
LR: Well the Civil Liberty Defense Center, the nonprofit I work for, is basically keeping tabs on and being involved in the all of the Green Scare cases that are going right now, which basically references the Eugene indictment. We just had a second superseding indictment filed on May 18 which add about 14 charges to one of the defendants that was early named in the cases and we got the Seattle indictment, the Tacoma indictment, the Vail indictment, the Susanville Californian (out of Sacramento ) indictment as well. So there's 5 different federal cases going on across the country right now, alleging conspiracy and alleging arson related crimes, and the Feds intend to prove it's a conspiracy of the ELF and ALF people.
So that's been pretty major, and then last Thursday there was two individuals that were subpoenaed to grand juries, one being Jeff Houge. He was subpoenaed to a grand jury here in Eugene Oregon. He chose not to cooperate with the grand jury and he's currently in the Lane County Jail on contempt of court charges. He may remain in jail until the grand jury term expires which is on September 30 or he has the possibility of getting out earlier if his attorney is successful in filing motions for his release. The second person was Burt Morris who was subpoenaed to a grand jury in Vail in Denver . Basically the Feds were looking for him to collaborate some statements that Jake Ferguson made as a federal informant and Mr. Morris was not able to collaborate those statements because they were untrue and he was not taken into jail. He minimally answered some questions and he was allowed to return to Oregon were he lives. So all that going on in the last week alone keeps a gal busy
JB: Wow... It's really scary times for activists right now. You call it The Green Scare....When did this start? When did the ball start rolling?
LR: Well I guess technically the ball probably slightly started rolling back in 1996 when the first incident happened. At least we know cops were called and investigations were done at that time, including arson investigations, but up until pretty recently the Federal government had no leads, and no suspects in any of the cases at all. It was in 2001 when the federal government started having grand juries, attempting to put names to incidences but they weren't getting anywhere with that.
It wasn't until Jake Ferguson who now has apparently admitted his leadership role in over a dozen arsons including admissions that he had a heroin addiction and that he's going to receive a large amount of money in exchange for his testimony. Apparently he will not do any, we're not 100 percent sure of this yet, but it sure doesn't look like he's going to be doing any jail time, even though he has admitted being the leader.
Without his testimonial and without the information he's provided to the federal government, the Feds would not have had a case against any of the individuals who are named as defendants and with many of the cases they were running up on the Statue of Limitation, meaning they only have a certain number of years to file certain types of federal cases (in the case of arson the time period is 5 years) and many of them were at that 5 year line at the time that Mr. Ferguson chose to provide info to the federal government.
So it's been going on for several years but the first of the indictments weren't issued until this past December of 2005. That was when the first indictments were issued and the first arrests were made and since that time they have continued to expand their search for more people that have agreed to cooperate with the government. It's pretty
much a mess at this point. Every week something new comes up that should probably be disturbing to most people who are working on any type of resistance movement issues, whether that be Animal Rights, Environmental Rights, Anti-War, Labor, etc.
When you combine what we see going with Green Scare with the governments pretty blatant unlawful spying on US citizens and numerous other breaks in the law for the federal government it definitely seems like the government is trying to give itself
further law enforcement power and give itself more power to repress dissenting views.
It is using incidents like these eco cases as the reason why they need additional tools or why they need expanded power... which is really a crock... which is really a load! But because they control the media so carefully they are able to put out their message in a very spin doctored way
Just the fact that the head attorney for the United States, Alberto Gonzales on the day the indictments were issued took them to the stairs of the White House and held a press conference where he labelled all the defendants in these cases as eco-terrorists.
That is a symptom of a much larger problem for a couple different reasons. Number one, this man is the head attorney for the United States and he should know defendants are presumed innocent until proven guilty by a court of law so for him to be making statements labelling people as eco terrorists is very problematic
Number two, the statements he made to the entire American public were based solely on the testimony of this single snitch. His belief that these people are eco-terrorists was based on statements made by Jacob Ferguson, a heroin addict who is basically willing to lie his way out of troubles so he doesn't go to jail and in receipt of probably close to $100,000 dollars, so it just seems like no lawyer in their right mind would get behind something like that and make such grandiose statements based on the amount of information he had at that time.
And of course the third facet, the use of that term “eco-terrorist” is such a bastardization of the English language. Eco-terrorism is what happen in Bhopal India , eco-terrorism is when Saddam Hussein blew up all the oil rigs and let a bunch of oil into the ocean, those are acts of eco-terrorism. What we have with these cases are acts of property destruction, pure and simple.
Call it arson if you want to but it's not a terrorist act and in fact the 83 page indictment against these people, never once does is use the word “terrorist”. There are no terrorist crime allegations in the indictment. It's just simply a use of media spin to basically make a political point rather then actually prosecuting people based on the law
JB: Mass arrests, infiltration, wiretapping... Do you think its going to get worse before it gets better, what going to happen?
LR: Well I think what we saw as a result of Conintelpro during the 60's and 70's is that there was a time period were the government was almost successful in bringing resistance movements to their knees, but it will never last. I think the one most important things we can do as activists is to continue doing all of the good work we have all been working on, cause we are being attacked by the federal government, the worst thing we could do is allow them to win.
Obviously the attacks are meant to scare the crap out of everyone, to silence people who might speak out against the government normally. We know that Rumsfield and company have made statement like “You are either with us or you are against us” or "You are either for the war in Iraq or you are a terrorist”. Just crazy statements like that.
So I think connecting to the larger public, trying to form new alliances with groups that we may not have worked with before and just making sure that everybody understands that this not about condemning or condoning the individual acts of arson that are being alleged in these cases, that there are certainly a much greater more sinister motivation going on by the Federal Government.
Of course they will never admit to it, they never admitted to Conintelpro or any of the other illegalities that they committed in history, but history repeats itself and so when the movement is effective and the government doesn't like it, they certainly have the power and resources to try to crush the resistance movement.
I think the WTO and some of the global protests that have come out against corporations and business have pissed off those million bazillion dollar corporations and they are now using their funding to buy off representatives and legislators. They are using that money and power to create unconstitutional laws like this Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act and similar legislation like that.
So it's not a time for anyone to slow down their work, it's time for people to be getting really focused, gearing up and being committed to see this thing through. We are not the first victims of this and we probably won't be the last, but how we conduct ourselves and how educate our fellow citizens about what is going on will be imperative.
JB: Do you think for the time being with all these things happening that these scare tactics have created distrust and have reduced the amount of activity in the movement or has just sent the movement further underground?
LR: Well I don't know if I would necessarily be the expert to speak to that. From my vantage point part of my practice is federal environmental law and I see the environmental groups I work with everyday working hard to save areas from timber sales and to continue to litigate endangered species acts, clean water and clean air. The normal things we have worked on for decades continue to go on. I think that there certainly is a reason to be looking once again to security culture and to be reaffirming some of those lessons that people have been taught over the years.
When you have a government that blatantly says we believe we are allowed to spy on you and record all your phone calls even though your simply an American citizen, certainly puts out to the world that this is not a time were privacy is being valued by our government.
Big Brother is certainly spying on everyone, not only resistance groups and as a result of that, a change in tactics and a change in communication and all sorts of other things will take place and if the government thinks that we are just going to continue to talk on the phone and let them spy on us then they are ignorant.
Movements have been extremely effective under times of repression and I think that all of the movements and all of us involved with will continue to be effective and that we will change and grow. I don't think government repression with have an easy time bringing these movements to their knees.
I think that we should assume we are being spied on and we should be looking really carefully at the people we are working with. We shouldn't simply allow the government to be spying on us, throwing up our hands and saying “Oh! There's nothing to be done so I guess I'll assume everything I'm doing is being monitored”. You should probably act like that, you should stand up and talk about how wrong it is and try to develop ways so you won't be spied on.
JB: When USA Today article came out about the NSA spying I assumed that the general American public would value privacy and there would be hysteria but the article came out and there was some chat about it but it died. Were you surprised at the reaction or do you think there is still a building movement against the spying?
LR: I think that there still a lot work to be done on the issue. I have just heard that the ACLU is gearing up to do something in response to the NSA warrantless spying. So I don't think we have seen the end of it but when I first heard about this and the pending indictment against Karl Rove and all these other issues coming up I thought, “God if this doesn't get the administration impeached what will?”
Clinton gets a blow job and an impeachment hearing begins on him yet we have all this outrageous stuff happening. We have members of congress that are standing up speaking out in congress about this warrantless wiretapping and asking why it's being allowed to continue and under what lawful basis is it being allowed.
At the very highest levels it seems people are reacting strongly to it and asking how did this happen? How did things get so out of control in our government?
I think the response now needs to be how do we correct this? We need to remove those people from office to send a clear message that we are watching and that they are still accountable to us, we the people. Otherwise if we just allow this to continue, again if we just throw up our hands and say there's nothing we can do, we are just lowly citizens...then we are going to get what we deserve. I think it's time everybody declared what side of the fence they are on and get ready to fight. I mean that in calling representatives and writing letters. Doing anything and everything you can, talking to church groups, what ever it happens to be... we need a mass mobilization if we are going to take our government back from the fascist that are taking control of our lives at this point.
JB: As a lawyer what can I do as a citizen working within the system against this wiretapping and other things. I mean it's illegal to be listening to this conversation we are having right now. How much power do I have within the legal system to take on government?
LR: Well, I think at this point the groups like Center for Constitutional Rights and the ACLU and some of these large well funded non-profit organisations have taken the lead in filing lawsuits and starting mass mobilisation campaigns. The ACLU now has a sign on letter to send off the to FCC because apparently the FCC has been
allowing the Feds to monitor phone conversations. So people are starting to get creative with where can we apply pressure to try to force change to the situation...
About things you can do as a citizen...If you have never called your elected official this could be the time. People may think that may not be effective and it's not effective if one or two wing nuts call every week with the same ol same ol but when they get thousands of their constituents calling with the same message, it really forces them to pay attention and respond.
I think letters to the editor in all various papers is great. I just heard a statistic that 90% of all newspaper readers read the letters to the editor and I think that is also a really effective way to communicate with your community. The bottom line from a lawyers perspective is the US Supreme Court at some point soon is going to reach a decision as to whether this is legal or illegal in their opinion. That's supposed to be based on the law but we recognise Bush has been putting his cronies on the bench now for a while so the make up of the Supreme Court has certainly tilted in his favour.
The law is the law and as a lawyer, and I guess maybe I naively have optimism, there is no way a fellow lawyer or the US Supreme Court can read the constitution and the Bill of Rights, can read binding case law and believe the US government is allowed to spy on its fellow citizens without warrants on a continuous basis like this, regardless of whether they're calling it the “war on terror” or not. This is an unprecedented action by the government.
JB: Do you think this is limited to the Bush administration? In 2008 or 2007 if he is impeached do think the ball will continue to roll? If a Democrat or another Republican gets in do you think these things will change or do you think he has started this terrible thing that will continue?
LR: I think it's going to take major shake-up to in order to steer the course from where it is going now. Democrats, Republican ....I think we can all agree that these are labels that are being put on a sort of oatmeal type of elected representative. So I certainly would never say “Oh... once the Democrats are in we will be fine" That's certainly not the case .... Once your rights have been eroded it almost impossible to get them back. When you have laws like the Patriot Act on the books it will be extremely difficult to undo the damage that has already been done! The downward spiral is going continue regardless whether you have a Democrat or Republican in the White House unless something major happens to shake that regime up.
JB: I want to talk about the underground movement. We can talk about the Bush Administration all day long but everyone else is doing the same thing. How effective do you think the underground movement is in forwarding Animal Rights, Environmental Rights and Stopping the War?
LR: I don't know. I wouldn't call myself an expert on the underground movement and I certainly I am not part of it so I don't really think I should speak to that group, their tactics and their effectiveness.
JB: OK. You have talked about infiltration happening to the underground movement and the non-profit world. Greenpeace, PETA and others... How far do you think this infiltration has gone? Is it to the very top levels of these organisations?
LR: I think that that's probably the case. I think the infiltration will be very systematic. An example I use is of the Socialist Workers Party. The Feds infiltrated that movement in the span of three decades, they put over 13 hundred informants and infiltrators into that movement. Over 300 of them were actual paid employees of the
Socialist Workers Party and after 30 years of infiltration and investigation by the Feds, not a single criminal prosecution resulted.
So when you look back on history there's no doubt that the federal government and its spies have managed to get themselves placed in pretty strategic positions, partly by our own naivety. The other perspective that I've heard is if they want to lick envelopes for the cause then well let them lick envelopes, cause we are not doing anything wrong we are just saving the planet.
I'd say it's fairly safe to assume that if you are being effective at what your doing and what you are doing is contrary to the current regimes politic, chances are that someone you are working with is reporting back to the Feds. I think the case of the Sacramento Three and the Anna who at age 18 was recruited by the FBI and paid an annual salary for her work.
She got special permission from the federal government to break the law. There was special form that was filed on her behalf that said go ahead and commit arson and if you get caught we'll save you. I think that they are getting a little bit more astute in being able to place infiltrators in groups.
Also we see this in the huge sentences being imposed in jail terms for crimes that used to carry 5-10 years are now carrying 30 to life. That makes the Feds job a lot easier to convert people to their side. If they find a 19 year old who has just committed a crime and they say you are going to go to jail for the rest of your life unless you become an informant... well it's pretty easy to see how a 19 year old might go for that and then spend many years in the movement relaying information to the government.
JB: From my stand point I have seen dramatic changes in stances in the non-profit world. Do you think these infiltrators, these informants are having an effect on the way organisations are run, their tactics and on issues at hand?
LR: I don't know if I would necessarily be a good person to speak to that. It's not something that I have focused on in my work yet. I think that the use of government surveillances and infiltration over the last 5 years has some impact on the way non-profit organisations might run. But 99.999 % of non-profit organisations are doing legal, above ground work and you can put Feds in there to figure out what timber sales they are going to sue over next, but the reality is the vast majority of people who are involved in these movements are just not breaking the law. To think that the threat of infiltration is changing, lets say, the Cascadia Wildlands Project annual plan is
probably an exaggeration. I don't, for instance, think it's going on there.
JB: You represent Jeff ‘Free' Luers...How is he doing?
LR: Well he's doing....you know. We are coming up to the 6th year he's been in custody. He was given a sentence of 22 years and 8 months. We still don't have a decision yet on his appeal. As soon as he was convicted an appeal was started on his behalf and based on some case law that came down on the US Supreme Court and in Oregon , his appeal was excessively stalled... It's been over 5 years, basically waiting for this appeal to run its course and we still don't have a decision yet!
So I think that's been frustrating. His co defendant has been out of jail for a few years now so that's got to be hard on him. They're having problems getting him educational programs in jail. Every year on June 9-11 is the weekend of resistances on his behalf and he has asked this year, that that event be focused on resisting the Green Scare .I know many places across the US are having events that weekend in a show of solidarity with the eco defence prisoners. He is certainly watching what is unfolding with a lot of concern for folks that are facing even longer jail sentences then he had.
JB: He seems, and I hate to say this, the poster child of what happening...Why do you think his case created such an uproar in the community and around the world?
LR: I think that the facts speak for themselves. His crimes, when all is said and done and you get rid of the hype that has surrounded it, is he burned the tires on two SUVs that were replaced and sold. That's the extent of the damage he did. He's a young man. He's very intelligent and he had no prior crime history. He was served an
extremely excessive sentence and I think alliances were made with people that may have never supported him or what he did but they were so shocked and appalled at the excessiveness of the punishment. It drew people into his situation who might not of normally shown much support for him. That's the back lash of these excessive sentences.
We are still really optimistic that his appeals with be successful and that sometime soon we are really hoping when all is said and done the courts will rule he has served his time and will allow him out with what he has served. Certainly 5 years is a reasonable sentence for someone that burned the tires on 3 SUVs. So if we still have any sense in equality and fairness in sentencing in our court system this would certainly be a tough case for that as well.
JB: Fingers crossed for sure! About you...You do a lot of pro bono work for activists like Jeff...How do you survive yourself?
LR: Laughs ...Well I live pretty simply. I have chosen not to have kids or other expenses like that and I just live in a manner that allows me to work on issues that are important to me. I have just kinda made those accommodations in my life.
That's why I went to law school and got myself a law degree and so I could participate in this way. But we also did form a non-profit call the Civil Liberties Defense Center and we are certainly welcome donations from folks, our website is http://www.clbc.org and any donations we do raise goes into the program work we are doing, for Jeff and the Green Scare and a lot of other projects we have going right now.
JB: I have 24 hours in my day. How many do you have in yours? Is it just non-stop for you?
I just keep hoping when I wake up there will be a little clone sitting next to my pillow because I could use two brains. There is far more work then a single person can do. There's far more work then any of us can do but I try to keep my priorities clear and I do work 14 hours a day most days...but it's a pretty urgent time. I hope
to be able to slow the pace down in a year but right now it's not really the time to prioritize recreation or free time.
JB: There's this debate within my head and I'm sure other peoples heads too. Do you work within the system? Do you go to law school and get a law degree or do you stand back and fight the system from the outside? Your creating change and helping lots of people ...What's your belief?
LR: I hear that debate and I talk to lots of people who are considering going to law school and people who are in law school and it's definitely a hard decision because I always tell people law school is like a sausage grinder, you have to be really clear on why you're in there so you can get out still intact. A law school education is a pretty mainstream institution.
It's a lot to swallow and regurgitate sometimes and it is also for me personally...My
experience was having friends go to jail and not understanding the system they were being put into so I just felt like it was a key to unlock stuff that not everybody has access to.
Not everybody has the mainstream grades or the ability to fund getting into law school. It's definitely a major decision.
For me I just feel like some of us of have to sacrifice ourselves to go this road.. We are going to have people in jail, we are going to have unconstitutional legislation passed, we are going to have illegal timber sales planned and if we don't have people who are of our brains willing to take on those roles we will be ineffective as a movement.
There's that old saying "It's going to take all the tools in the toolbox to be successful” and I consider myself and legal background another tool in the tool box and we certainly could use a lot more of them! With people going to jail for long time periods and so many issues that are going to come up as the police state rackets down and the ramifications become heightened... I would encourage people to consider law as a way to be a part of the movement, but is certainly not for everyone!
JB: Thank you so much for what your doing and good luck. I will be following you cases and what your doing for sure!
LR: Hopefully I won't end up in a jail cell too
JB: I hope not!
But Regan, executive director of the Civil Liberties Defense Center in Eugene , equally stressed the importance of legal environmental activism. “The resistance movement has always been an integral part of our democracy,” she said, adding that activists must constantly speak out against what she believes are heavy-handed and illegal government tactics.
“Be very vocal,” she said. “Shedding light on it is a great way to put an end to it.”
JB: How's it going?
LR: It's going....I'm kinda up to my ass in a million different things going on...but I'm going to be walking around with a hands free head set while were doing this so if for any reason if you get to much background noise of anything I'll head back to my desk.
JB: No worries. Is this a busy time for you?
LR: Well always...I run a law office in addition to running a very active non-profit right now so there lot of shit hitting the fan the last week or so.
JB: Really? What's happening?
LR: Well the new indictments...we had someone go to jail for contempt of court on a grand jury...etc etc.
JB: What's happening in Oregon ? Are you working on cases through out the country or what?
LR: Well the Civil Liberty Defense Center, the nonprofit I work for, is basically keeping tabs on and being involved in the all of the Green Scare cases that are going right now, which basically references the Eugene indictment. We just had a second superseding indictment filed on May 18 which add about 14 charges to one of the defendants that was early named in the cases and we got the Seattle indictment, the Tacoma indictment, the Vail indictment, the Susanville Californian (out of Sacramento ) indictment as well. So there's 5 different federal cases going on across the country right now, alleging conspiracy and alleging arson related crimes, and the Feds intend to prove it's a conspiracy of the ELF and ALF people.
So that's been pretty major, and then last Thursday there was two individuals that were subpoenaed to grand juries, one being Jeff Houge. He was subpoenaed to a grand jury here in Eugene Oregon. He chose not to cooperate with the grand jury and he's currently in the Lane County Jail on contempt of court charges. He may remain in jail until the grand jury term expires which is on September 30 or he has the possibility of getting out earlier if his attorney is successful in filing motions for his release. The second person was Burt Morris who was subpoenaed to a grand jury in Vail in Denver . Basically the Feds were looking for him to collaborate some statements that Jake Ferguson made as a federal informant and Mr. Morris was not able to collaborate those statements because they were untrue and he was not taken into jail. He minimally answered some questions and he was allowed to return to Oregon were he lives. So all that going on in the last week alone keeps a gal busy
JB: Wow... It's really scary times for activists right now. You call it The Green Scare....When did this start? When did the ball start rolling?
LR: Well I guess technically the ball probably slightly started rolling back in 1996 when the first incident happened. At least we know cops were called and investigations were done at that time, including arson investigations, but up until pretty recently the Federal government had no leads, and no suspects in any of the cases at all. It was in 2001 when the federal government started having grand juries, attempting to put names to incidences but they weren't getting anywhere with that.
It wasn't until Jake Ferguson who now has apparently admitted his leadership role in over a dozen arsons including admissions that he had a heroin addiction and that he's going to receive a large amount of money in exchange for his testimony. Apparently he will not do any, we're not 100 percent sure of this yet, but it sure doesn't look like he's going to be doing any jail time, even though he has admitted being the leader.
Without his testimonial and without the information he's provided to the federal government, the Feds would not have had a case against any of the individuals who are named as defendants and with many of the cases they were running up on the Statue of Limitation, meaning they only have a certain number of years to file certain types of federal cases (in the case of arson the time period is 5 years) and many of them were at that 5 year line at the time that Mr. Ferguson chose to provide info to the federal government.
So it's been going on for several years but the first of the indictments weren't issued until this past December of 2005. That was when the first indictments were issued and the first arrests were made and since that time they have continued to expand their search for more people that have agreed to cooperate with the government. It's pretty
much a mess at this point. Every week something new comes up that should probably be disturbing to most people who are working on any type of resistance movement issues, whether that be Animal Rights, Environmental Rights, Anti-War, Labor, etc.
When you combine what we see going with Green Scare with the governments pretty blatant unlawful spying on US citizens and numerous other breaks in the law for the federal government it definitely seems like the government is trying to give itself
further law enforcement power and give itself more power to repress dissenting views.
It is using incidents like these eco cases as the reason why they need additional tools or why they need expanded power... which is really a crock... which is really a load! But because they control the media so carefully they are able to put out their message in a very spin doctored way
Just the fact that the head attorney for the United States, Alberto Gonzales on the day the indictments were issued took them to the stairs of the White House and held a press conference where he labelled all the defendants in these cases as eco-terrorists.
That is a symptom of a much larger problem for a couple different reasons. Number one, this man is the head attorney for the United States and he should know defendants are presumed innocent until proven guilty by a court of law so for him to be making statements labelling people as eco terrorists is very problematic
Number two, the statements he made to the entire American public were based solely on the testimony of this single snitch. His belief that these people are eco-terrorists was based on statements made by Jacob Ferguson, a heroin addict who is basically willing to lie his way out of troubles so he doesn't go to jail and in receipt of probably close to $100,000 dollars, so it just seems like no lawyer in their right mind would get behind something like that and make such grandiose statements based on the amount of information he had at that time.
And of course the third facet, the use of that term “eco-terrorist” is such a bastardization of the English language. Eco-terrorism is what happen in Bhopal India , eco-terrorism is when Saddam Hussein blew up all the oil rigs and let a bunch of oil into the ocean, those are acts of eco-terrorism. What we have with these cases are acts of property destruction, pure and simple.
Call it arson if you want to but it's not a terrorist act and in fact the 83 page indictment against these people, never once does is use the word “terrorist”. There are no terrorist crime allegations in the indictment. It's just simply a use of media spin to basically make a political point rather then actually prosecuting people based on the law
JB: Mass arrests, infiltration, wiretapping... Do you think its going to get worse before it gets better, what going to happen?
LR: Well I think what we saw as a result of Conintelpro during the 60's and 70's is that there was a time period were the government was almost successful in bringing resistance movements to their knees, but it will never last. I think the one most important things we can do as activists is to continue doing all of the good work we have all been working on, cause we are being attacked by the federal government, the worst thing we could do is allow them to win.
Obviously the attacks are meant to scare the crap out of everyone, to silence people who might speak out against the government normally. We know that Rumsfield and company have made statement like “You are either with us or you are against us” or "You are either for the war in Iraq or you are a terrorist”. Just crazy statements like that.
So I think connecting to the larger public, trying to form new alliances with groups that we may not have worked with before and just making sure that everybody understands that this not about condemning or condoning the individual acts of arson that are being alleged in these cases, that there are certainly a much greater more sinister motivation going on by the Federal Government.
Of course they will never admit to it, they never admitted to Conintelpro or any of the other illegalities that they committed in history, but history repeats itself and so when the movement is effective and the government doesn't like it, they certainly have the power and resources to try to crush the resistance movement.
I think the WTO and some of the global protests that have come out against corporations and business have pissed off those million bazillion dollar corporations and they are now using their funding to buy off representatives and legislators. They are using that money and power to create unconstitutional laws like this Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act and similar legislation like that.
So it's not a time for anyone to slow down their work, it's time for people to be getting really focused, gearing up and being committed to see this thing through. We are not the first victims of this and we probably won't be the last, but how we conduct ourselves and how educate our fellow citizens about what is going on will be imperative.
JB: Do you think for the time being with all these things happening that these scare tactics have created distrust and have reduced the amount of activity in the movement or has just sent the movement further underground?
LR: Well I don't know if I would necessarily be the expert to speak to that. From my vantage point part of my practice is federal environmental law and I see the environmental groups I work with everyday working hard to save areas from timber sales and to continue to litigate endangered species acts, clean water and clean air. The normal things we have worked on for decades continue to go on. I think that there certainly is a reason to be looking once again to security culture and to be reaffirming some of those lessons that people have been taught over the years.
When you have a government that blatantly says we believe we are allowed to spy on you and record all your phone calls even though your simply an American citizen, certainly puts out to the world that this is not a time were privacy is being valued by our government.
Big Brother is certainly spying on everyone, not only resistance groups and as a result of that, a change in tactics and a change in communication and all sorts of other things will take place and if the government thinks that we are just going to continue to talk on the phone and let them spy on us then they are ignorant.
Movements have been extremely effective under times of repression and I think that all of the movements and all of us involved with will continue to be effective and that we will change and grow. I don't think government repression with have an easy time bringing these movements to their knees.
I think that we should assume we are being spied on and we should be looking really carefully at the people we are working with. We shouldn't simply allow the government to be spying on us, throwing up our hands and saying “Oh! There's nothing to be done so I guess I'll assume everything I'm doing is being monitored”. You should probably act like that, you should stand up and talk about how wrong it is and try to develop ways so you won't be spied on.
JB: When USA Today article came out about the NSA spying I assumed that the general American public would value privacy and there would be hysteria but the article came out and there was some chat about it but it died. Were you surprised at the reaction or do you think there is still a building movement against the spying?
LR: I think that there still a lot work to be done on the issue. I have just heard that the ACLU is gearing up to do something in response to the NSA warrantless spying. So I don't think we have seen the end of it but when I first heard about this and the pending indictment against Karl Rove and all these other issues coming up I thought, “God if this doesn't get the administration impeached what will?”
Clinton gets a blow job and an impeachment hearing begins on him yet we have all this outrageous stuff happening. We have members of congress that are standing up speaking out in congress about this warrantless wiretapping and asking why it's being allowed to continue and under what lawful basis is it being allowed.
At the very highest levels it seems people are reacting strongly to it and asking how did this happen? How did things get so out of control in our government?
I think the response now needs to be how do we correct this? We need to remove those people from office to send a clear message that we are watching and that they are still accountable to us, we the people. Otherwise if we just allow this to continue, again if we just throw up our hands and say there's nothing we can do, we are just lowly citizens...then we are going to get what we deserve. I think it's time everybody declared what side of the fence they are on and get ready to fight. I mean that in calling representatives and writing letters. Doing anything and everything you can, talking to church groups, what ever it happens to be... we need a mass mobilization if we are going to take our government back from the fascist that are taking control of our lives at this point.
JB: As a lawyer what can I do as a citizen working within the system against this wiretapping and other things. I mean it's illegal to be listening to this conversation we are having right now. How much power do I have within the legal system to take on government?
LR: Well, I think at this point the groups like Center for Constitutional Rights and the ACLU and some of these large well funded non-profit organisations have taken the lead in filing lawsuits and starting mass mobilisation campaigns. The ACLU now has a sign on letter to send off the to FCC because apparently the FCC has been
allowing the Feds to monitor phone conversations. So people are starting to get creative with where can we apply pressure to try to force change to the situation...
About things you can do as a citizen...If you have never called your elected official this could be the time. People may think that may not be effective and it's not effective if one or two wing nuts call every week with the same ol same ol but when they get thousands of their constituents calling with the same message, it really forces them to pay attention and respond.
I think letters to the editor in all various papers is great. I just heard a statistic that 90% of all newspaper readers read the letters to the editor and I think that is also a really effective way to communicate with your community. The bottom line from a lawyers perspective is the US Supreme Court at some point soon is going to reach a decision as to whether this is legal or illegal in their opinion. That's supposed to be based on the law but we recognise Bush has been putting his cronies on the bench now for a while so the make up of the Supreme Court has certainly tilted in his favour.
The law is the law and as a lawyer, and I guess maybe I naively have optimism, there is no way a fellow lawyer or the US Supreme Court can read the constitution and the Bill of Rights, can read binding case law and believe the US government is allowed to spy on its fellow citizens without warrants on a continuous basis like this, regardless of whether they're calling it the “war on terror” or not. This is an unprecedented action by the government.
JB: Do you think this is limited to the Bush administration? In 2008 or 2007 if he is impeached do think the ball will continue to roll? If a Democrat or another Republican gets in do you think these things will change or do you think he has started this terrible thing that will continue?
LR: I think it's going to take major shake-up to in order to steer the course from where it is going now. Democrats, Republican ....I think we can all agree that these are labels that are being put on a sort of oatmeal type of elected representative. So I certainly would never say “Oh... once the Democrats are in we will be fine" That's certainly not the case .... Once your rights have been eroded it almost impossible to get them back. When you have laws like the Patriot Act on the books it will be extremely difficult to undo the damage that has already been done! The downward spiral is going continue regardless whether you have a Democrat or Republican in the White House unless something major happens to shake that regime up.
JB: I want to talk about the underground movement. We can talk about the Bush Administration all day long but everyone else is doing the same thing. How effective do you think the underground movement is in forwarding Animal Rights, Environmental Rights and Stopping the War?
LR: I don't know. I wouldn't call myself an expert on the underground movement and I certainly I am not part of it so I don't really think I should speak to that group, their tactics and their effectiveness.
JB: OK. You have talked about infiltration happening to the underground movement and the non-profit world. Greenpeace, PETA and others... How far do you think this infiltration has gone? Is it to the very top levels of these organisations?
LR: I think that that's probably the case. I think the infiltration will be very systematic. An example I use is of the Socialist Workers Party. The Feds infiltrated that movement in the span of three decades, they put over 13 hundred informants and infiltrators into that movement. Over 300 of them were actual paid employees of the
Socialist Workers Party and after 30 years of infiltration and investigation by the Feds, not a single criminal prosecution resulted.
So when you look back on history there's no doubt that the federal government and its spies have managed to get themselves placed in pretty strategic positions, partly by our own naivety. The other perspective that I've heard is if they want to lick envelopes for the cause then well let them lick envelopes, cause we are not doing anything wrong we are just saving the planet.
I'd say it's fairly safe to assume that if you are being effective at what your doing and what you are doing is contrary to the current regimes politic, chances are that someone you are working with is reporting back to the Feds. I think the case of the Sacramento Three and the Anna who at age 18 was recruited by the FBI and paid an annual salary for her work.
She got special permission from the federal government to break the law. There was special form that was filed on her behalf that said go ahead and commit arson and if you get caught we'll save you. I think that they are getting a little bit more astute in being able to place infiltrators in groups.
Also we see this in the huge sentences being imposed in jail terms for crimes that used to carry 5-10 years are now carrying 30 to life. That makes the Feds job a lot easier to convert people to their side. If they find a 19 year old who has just committed a crime and they say you are going to go to jail for the rest of your life unless you become an informant... well it's pretty easy to see how a 19 year old might go for that and then spend many years in the movement relaying information to the government.
JB: From my stand point I have seen dramatic changes in stances in the non-profit world. Do you think these infiltrators, these informants are having an effect on the way organisations are run, their tactics and on issues at hand?
LR: I don't know if I would necessarily be a good person to speak to that. It's not something that I have focused on in my work yet. I think that the use of government surveillances and infiltration over the last 5 years has some impact on the way non-profit organisations might run. But 99.999 % of non-profit organisations are doing legal, above ground work and you can put Feds in there to figure out what timber sales they are going to sue over next, but the reality is the vast majority of people who are involved in these movements are just not breaking the law. To think that the threat of infiltration is changing, lets say, the Cascadia Wildlands Project annual plan is
probably an exaggeration. I don't, for instance, think it's going on there.
JB: You represent Jeff ‘Free' Luers...How is he doing?
LR: Well he's doing....you know. We are coming up to the 6th year he's been in custody. He was given a sentence of 22 years and 8 months. We still don't have a decision yet on his appeal. As soon as he was convicted an appeal was started on his behalf and based on some case law that came down on the US Supreme Court and in Oregon , his appeal was excessively stalled... It's been over 5 years, basically waiting for this appeal to run its course and we still don't have a decision yet!
So I think that's been frustrating. His co defendant has been out of jail for a few years now so that's got to be hard on him. They're having problems getting him educational programs in jail. Every year on June 9-11 is the weekend of resistances on his behalf and he has asked this year, that that event be focused on resisting the Green Scare .I know many places across the US are having events that weekend in a show of solidarity with the eco defence prisoners. He is certainly watching what is unfolding with a lot of concern for folks that are facing even longer jail sentences then he had.
JB: He seems, and I hate to say this, the poster child of what happening...Why do you think his case created such an uproar in the community and around the world?
LR: I think that the facts speak for themselves. His crimes, when all is said and done and you get rid of the hype that has surrounded it, is he burned the tires on two SUVs that were replaced and sold. That's the extent of the damage he did. He's a young man. He's very intelligent and he had no prior crime history. He was served an
extremely excessive sentence and I think alliances were made with people that may have never supported him or what he did but they were so shocked and appalled at the excessiveness of the punishment. It drew people into his situation who might not of normally shown much support for him. That's the back lash of these excessive sentences.
We are still really optimistic that his appeals with be successful and that sometime soon we are really hoping when all is said and done the courts will rule he has served his time and will allow him out with what he has served. Certainly 5 years is a reasonable sentence for someone that burned the tires on 3 SUVs. So if we still have any sense in equality and fairness in sentencing in our court system this would certainly be a tough case for that as well.
JB: Fingers crossed for sure! About you...You do a lot of pro bono work for activists like Jeff...How do you survive yourself?
LR: Laughs ...Well I live pretty simply. I have chosen not to have kids or other expenses like that and I just live in a manner that allows me to work on issues that are important to me. I have just kinda made those accommodations in my life.
That's why I went to law school and got myself a law degree and so I could participate in this way. But we also did form a non-profit call the Civil Liberties Defense Center and we are certainly welcome donations from folks, our website is http://www.clbc.org and any donations we do raise goes into the program work we are doing, for Jeff and the Green Scare and a lot of other projects we have going right now.
JB: I have 24 hours in my day. How many do you have in yours? Is it just non-stop for you?
I just keep hoping when I wake up there will be a little clone sitting next to my pillow because I could use two brains. There is far more work then a single person can do. There's far more work then any of us can do but I try to keep my priorities clear and I do work 14 hours a day most days...but it's a pretty urgent time. I hope
to be able to slow the pace down in a year but right now it's not really the time to prioritize recreation or free time.
JB: There's this debate within my head and I'm sure other peoples heads too. Do you work within the system? Do you go to law school and get a law degree or do you stand back and fight the system from the outside? Your creating change and helping lots of people ...What's your belief?
LR: I hear that debate and I talk to lots of people who are considering going to law school and people who are in law school and it's definitely a hard decision because I always tell people law school is like a sausage grinder, you have to be really clear on why you're in there so you can get out still intact. A law school education is a pretty mainstream institution.
It's a lot to swallow and regurgitate sometimes and it is also for me personally...My
experience was having friends go to jail and not understanding the system they were being put into so I just felt like it was a key to unlock stuff that not everybody has access to.
Not everybody has the mainstream grades or the ability to fund getting into law school. It's definitely a major decision.
For me I just feel like some of us of have to sacrifice ourselves to go this road.. We are going to have people in jail, we are going to have unconstitutional legislation passed, we are going to have illegal timber sales planned and if we don't have people who are of our brains willing to take on those roles we will be ineffective as a movement.
There's that old saying "It's going to take all the tools in the toolbox to be successful” and I consider myself and legal background another tool in the tool box and we certainly could use a lot more of them! With people going to jail for long time periods and so many issues that are going to come up as the police state rackets down and the ramifications become heightened... I would encourage people to consider law as a way to be a part of the movement, but is certainly not for everyone!
JB: Thank you so much for what your doing and good luck. I will be following you cases and what your doing for sure!
LR: Hopefully I won't end up in a jail cell too
JB: I hope not!
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