Sabotage cases flare again in Northwest

Eco-sabotage - Tre Arrow says he's not guilty; homes burn near Seattle; a
jury deliberates in Tacoma
Tuesday, March 04, 2008
BRYAN DENSON
The Oregonian Staff

Tre Arrow appeared for the first time in a U.S. courtroom Monday to answer
government charges that he firebombed logging and concrete-mixing trucks
in the spring of 2001, acts of eco-sabotage that rocked the region.

The 34-year-old former fugitive, appearing beefier than in his days as one
of Oregon's most flamboyant environmental activists, pleaded not guilty in
Portland's U.S. District Court to an indictment accusing him of arson,
conspiracy and use of destructive devices as an Earth Liberation Front
saboteur.

Arrow's 14-minute court appearance came as the front led newscasts with a
pre-dawn arson in suburban Seattle and the trial of a suspected ELF
saboteur in Tacoma. The events, in three cities on a single day, marked a
momentary revival for a group that had been relatively quiet in the
Northwest for years.

Massive fires gutted three unoccupied luxury homes at a "Street of Dreams"
development in Woodinville, Wash., causing an estimated $7 million damage
but no injuries. The ELF left one of its trademark calling cards near the
ruins: A bedsheet painted with red letters said the "McMansions" weren't
"built green" -- meaning eco-friendly.

One of the homes, a four-bedroom $2 million dwelling called Copper Falls,
was designed by the Portland company Alan Mascord Design Associates. The
home featured low-flow toilets, energy-efficient appliances, and
countertops made of recycled content, said Mascord spokeswoman Amy Fullwiler.

"It's a shame what they did," Fullwiler said. "There's so much more being
wasted right now -- water to put these fires out, resources to build the
house, and all the manhours."

As arson investigators with the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms
and Explosives worked the fire scene, jurors in Tacoma's U.S. District
Court deliberated for a second day on the fate of suspected ELF saboteur
Briana Waters. The 32-year-old violin teacher from Oakland, Calif., faces
a mandatory minimum of 35 years in federal prison for her alleged role in
a 2001 arson at the University of Washington, which cost $7 million to
rebuild.

The timing of the firebombing in Woodinville struck supporters of Arrow
and Waters as misguided.

"Why would you choose to burn down a bunch of houses near Seattle,
claiming responsibility as ELF while Briana is on trial?" wrote one
anonymous complainant on the activist Web site Portland Independent Media.
"Do you even care that you may be responsible for unduly influencing the
jury and taking this beautiful woman away from her daughter?"

U.S. District Judge Franklin D. Burgess, presiding over Waters' trial,
asked jurors whether they had heard any news over the weekend or Monday
morning that would affect their ability to deliberate fairly, said Emily
Langlie, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Attorneys Office in the Western
District of Washington. No juror spoke up, she said, so Burgess allowed
them to keep deliberating.

Waters is one of 19 people suspected of taking a role in "The Family," a
loose collective of Earth Liberation Front and Animal Liberation Front
saboteurs which broke into groups and set at least 17 fires between 1996
and 2001, many in the Northwest, mostly to punish corporations they
accused of despoiling the natural world. She is the only suspect in the
case to go before a jury.

Twelve others pleaded guilty in the two states, and most are serving
prison terms. One suspect hanged himself in jail; another was a
cooperating witness scheduled for sentencing next month. Four others are
fugitives.

Waters, a former Evergreen State College student, is accused of acting as
a lookout in May 2001, as others torched the University of Washington's
Center for Urban Horticulture, mistakenly thinking the school was
genetically engineering trees. Another group of ELF saboteurs struck a
poplar farm in Clatskanie that same night, marking the first time the
front had conducted simultaneous arsons in two states.

Those crimes were not connected to the ones for which Arrow stands
accused. The one-time candidate for Congress, who legally changed his name
from Michael J. Scarpitti seven years ago, was indicted in July 2002 for
allegedly taking part in the Easter 2001 firebombing of three
concrete-mixing trucks at Ross Island Sand & Gravel, in Portland, and
several logging trucks belonging to Ray A. Schoppert Logging, near
Estacada.

By the time of his indictment, Arrow was a fugitive. He turned up in
British Columbia in March 2004, when a security guard at a home
improvement store caught him shoplifting. He spent nearly four years
declaring himself a political prisoner but was denied asylum three times
before being extradited last week.

About a dozen of Arrow's supporters, including older sister Shawna
Scarpitti, gathered before his arraignment in the mist outside the Mark O.
Hatfield federal courthouse. They beat a drum and held banners reading,
"Free Tree Arrow" and "Justice for All/Not Just Y'all."

Scarpitti said her brother consulted with his family and lawyers before
abandoning his extradition fight. "We didn't persuade Tre at all,"
Scarpitti said with a smile. "He's an independent thinker."

Arrow shuffled into U.S. Magistrate Judge Dennis J. Hubel's courtroom in
leg chains and a blue jail-issue jumpsuit. He looked jowly compared with
the gaunt activist Portlanders saw on the nightly news back in the summer
of 2000, when he climbed 30 feet onto a ledge at the U.S. Forest Service
office and stayed there 11 days to protest a contentious timber sale.

But the smile was the same. Arrow pushed his palms together and bowed to
supporters before taking a seat next to his attorney, Paul Loney.

Hubel accepted Arrow's not-guilty plea and ordered him to be jailed as a
flight risk. Hubel agreed with Loney that Arrow should be allowed to eat a
vegan, raw-food diet while awaiting trial, which he set for May 6.

The timing of the ELF arsons and trial of suspected ELF saboteur Waters
had little bearing on Arrow, said Scarpitti. She maintains her brother is
not guilty and will prove it, even though three of his co-defendants have
pleaded guilty, implicated him in the arsons and have already served their
prison terms.

"You know, Tre has never been connected to ELF," she said. "That's the
reason he's looking forward to his day in court."

Earth Liberation Front cells have in the past dedicated arsons such as
Monday's to fellow saboteurs who have been jailed or imprisoned for their
crimes. In June 2001, the ELF dedicated a vandalism spree against five
banks in New York to Jeffrey Luers, an Oregon saboteur serving a long
sentence for arson.

The dedications come by way of formal claims of responsibility, which are
channeled by the underground saboteurs to like-minded intermediaries, who
pass them to news media.

By late Monday, no such communique had been issued.

The Associated Press contributed to this report. Bryan Denson:
503-294-7614; bryandenson@news.oregonian.com