Bari/Cherney: Judge Wilken Affirms Order to FBI to Submit Evidence for Independent Testing

by Ben Rosenfeld Indybay.org
Monday Apr 2nd, 2012

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
April 3, 2012

Federal Court Orders FBI To Turn Over Evidence
for Independent Forensic Analysis in 1990 Judi Bari Car Bombing Case

In an order dated March 31, 2012 and released today, Honorable Claudia
Wilken, United States District Judge of the Northern District of
California, affirmed a March 21, 2011 Order by Magistrate Judge James
Larson, directing the United States, through the FBI, to turn over
evidence in the 1990 car bomb assassination attempt of Judi Bari in
Oakland, CA to a third party forensic laboratory for independent testing.

“This is a historic and momentous development,” said Ben Rosenfeld,
attorney for plaintiff Darryl Cherney, Judi Bari’s co-organizer in the
sustained campaign to preserve California’s ancient redwoods, who was also
injured when the bomb went off. Cherney went to Court in 2010 to prevent
the FBI from destroying the evidence. That evidence includes a mostly
intact explosive device built by the same hands as the car bomb, a
cardboard sign, and latent fingerprints. “We now have a real chance at
solving the attempted murder of Judi Bari and Darryl Cherney, and finding
out just how deep the FBI cover-up goes,” said Attorney Rosenfeld.

The FBI never subjected this evidence to basic forensic examination. Its
lawyers contacted Cherney’s lawyers in 2010 announcing plans to destroy
the evidence. In 2002, an Oakland federal jury found three FBI agents and
three Oakland police officers liable for violating Bari and Cherney’s
First and Fourth Amendment Rights and trying to frame them by falsely
accusing them of transporting the bomb which nearly killed them. The FBI
never looked elsewhere.

Cherney alone has continued to pursue the bomber(s). With co-Director Mary
Liz Thompson, he just released a new documentary entitled Who Bombed Judi
Bari? (http://whobombedjudibari.com/). The evidence, hitherto sealed away
in an FBI locker, may finally yield an answer to that question.

Request a copy of the Court order via one of the contacts above, or look
it up on PACER under federal Case No. 91-01057 (Document Number 686). For
historic information about the case, visit http://www.judibari.org/.