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Add an EventSIERRA CLUB SUPPORTS JUDI BARI vs. FBI LAWSUIT ON EVE OF TRIAL
CALLS FOR FULL SENATE INVESTIGATION
OPENING ARGUMENTS, FIRST WITNESSES POSSIBLE TODAY
NOON RALLY IN FRONT OF OAKLAND FEDERAL COURTHOUSE
CONTACT: Alicia Littletree, Darryl Cherney - 510/663-6330
Tracy Katelman 707/292-7442 (cell)
OAKLAND, CA - The long-awaited trial for the lawsuit by Judi Bari and Darryl Cherney against the FBI and the Oakland Police Department begins today with jury selection. It will be followed (possibly later today) by opening arguments and first witnesses. The trial will take place at the Oakland Federal Courthouse, 1301 Clay Street (at 12th), from 8:30 am to 1:30 pm Monday through Thursday, until May 24th. A list of witnesses and other persons involved in the trial will be available.
At noon today, Earth First! will hold a support rally in front of the courthouse. Speakers and performers will include acclaimed author and international activist Starhawk, Leonard Peltier Defense Committee spokesperson Linda Sixfeathers, musician and activist Alice diMicele, and Judi Bari’s oldest daughter Lisa Bari, who was nine when her mother was the victim of the bomb blast in her car.
Sierra Club Executive Director Carl Pope urged national support for the lawsuit and solicited other national environmental leaders to join him in sending a letter to Senator Patrick Leahy, Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, to continue hearings into FBI abuses. Citing “FBI handling of situations such as Ruby Ridge, Waco, Wen Ho Lee, and the Oklahoma City bombing,” he urged the Senate Judiciary Committee to investigate the Judi Bari/Darryl Cherney case. Pope stated in his letter to Sen. Leahy:
“No freedoms are more important to the people of the United States than the freedom of speech and freedom of assembly. This includes the right to carry out nonviolent protests against policies and practices, which citizens believe are wrong or destructive. The Redwood Summer Campaign which Judi and Darryl were organizing when the bombing occurred, was such a nonviolent protest.”
The historic lawsuit, more than a decade coming to trial, challenges the FBI’s handling of the 1990 car-bomb attack on the two prominent forest-protection advocates. Bari and Cherney were falsely arrested for carrying explosives but never charged. Instead of investigating the case, the FBI carried out a defamation campaign and violated the constitutional rights of the bombing victims. A legitimate investigation of the real bomber was never carried out and the case remains unsolved.
Bari and Cherney are suing the FBI and Oakland Police for violations of their First Amendment rights. FBI officials knew the victims were innocent yet blamed them of being guilty of bombing themselves. The FBI is also being charged with violations of the Fourth Amendment by conducting false arrest and illegal search and seizure. These charges have withstood the rigors of eleven years of challenges in federal court. In out-of-court settlement conferences prior to trial, Bari and Cherney have asked for: an investigation of the bombing, an investigation of the investigators, the Oakland Police to cease spying on peaceful political groups, an apology, and $20 million. The defendants turned down all demands and made no counter offer.
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To answer your question, re. DNA as far as I know, it was several of the suspects DNA that was tested, and linked to certain letters via stamps & envelopes, not directly to the bomb itself (yet). The results are not as specific as you might hope nor have they all been released. One of the suspects "male relatives" seem to match up rather than the suspect himself. But they don't know for sure which male relative it is. And it's possible that the person who wrote the letter was different than the person who licked the stamp. ("Hey bro, do you mind dropping this letter in the post for me?")
The FBI consistently refused to do DNA testing and actually tried to block DNA testing from being allowed as evidence in this trial. DNA testing was paid for by the only people who seem to be acutally doing an investigation, that is the plaintiffs. The results of this testing are not necessarily linked to this trial, since the trial is not a "whodunnit" case. It is simply a lawsuit against the FBI and OPD for not doing a REAL investigation, and for lying, blaming the victims and trying to discredit them. The results of the DNA therefore are not necessarily all going to be heard within this trial and may take even longer than the trial to nail down "whodunnit". There are many suspects and many DNA tests and they cost quite a bit, which neither the feds nor law enforcement are paying for. The plaintiffs (Darryl and the Bari estate) are extremely busy with the case at hand, and so the full results of all DNA testing may not be finished in time for the trial verdict. As much as everyone would like to see the name of the bomber all over the headlines by the end of this trial, it's not very likely that that will happen. If the FBI had done a proper investigation in the first place, including DNA testing years ago, then the bomber might be sitting in jail right now. But the FBI clearly had no interest in finding the real bomber, and that is why they are being sued!
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Re: Regarding the previous wingnut, flatland conspiracy comment. Go fuck yourself, your arguements are bankrupt, your proof is nil, your evidence is contrived and not even deemed admissable or even useful by the FBI themselves (who Bruce Anderson offered to help - but they shined him). John Foster is a phony, Irv Sutley is a gun-crazed spook and Bruce Anderson is a misogynist, alcoholic, washed-up, has-been who has globbed on to this ridiculous fiction that came straight from the king of misinfo, the police informant himself, ie Irv. And Jim Martin is being played like a cheap harmonica. Suckers!!
I have written three letters that have described facts I know to be the absolute truth:
1. Bari posed for a photograph (widely distributed in newspapers) in full fatigues holding a semi-automatic gun, hostile in stance and facial expression, and intended to frighten those who oppose her views.
2. Bari and Cherney distributed pamphlets they authored, printed, and distributed, and in fact held classes in spiking redwood trees and filling gas tanks with substances that could disable a truck on the freeway, endangering innocent people.
3. Darryl Cherney was famous in Southern Humboldt for pipe-bombing schools of fish in pristine waters to fill his freezer with fish for the winter months.
No one wants you to know this on this site, and the site master edits out any such truthful statements.
I have written three letters that have described facts I know to be the absolute truth:
1. Bari posed for a photograph (widely distributed in newspapers) in full fatigues holding a semi-automatic gun, hostile in stance and facial expression, and intended to frighten those who oppose her views.
2. Bari and Cherney distributed pamphlets they authored, printed, and distributed, and in fact held classes in spiking redwood trees and filling gas tanks with substances that could disable a truck on the freeway, endangering innocent people.
3. Darryl Cherney was famous in Southern Humboldt for pipe-bombing schools of fish in pristine waters to fill his freezer with fish for the winter months.
No one wants you to know this on this site, and the site master edits out any such truthful statements.
# 1 refers to the Uzi photo of Judi which was produced by agent-provocateur Irv Sutley as a supposed gag shot, then anonymously mailed to the cops with a hoax letter saying it was real and offering to snitch off Judi to the cops. Sutley has been linked by DNA tests to that letter, which he has denied writing for the last 11 years, even faking a polygraph test to try to prove his innocence.
#2 and 3 are total outright lies. Never happened, nowhere, nohow. Let's see the supposed pamphlet on how to spike trees and put grit in gas tanks. It doesn't exist, and if it did, there would be no way to connect it to Judi or Darryl because they didn't ever advocate tree-spiking or monkeywrenching. There are no reported incidents of monkeywrenching in the region where Judi and Darryl were EF! spokespeople. If there were, you can bet your last penny that the FBI lawyers would have brought it out at the Bari v. FBI trial just concluding. They didn't because it never happened.
http://www.liarunlimited.com
The sordid history of Bruce Anderson and the Anderson Valley Advertiser
(published by a long time victim of the AVA's hoax campaigns)
http://www.colemanhoax.com
Bruce Anderson has teamed up with the publishing arm of the ultra conservative Bradley Foundation to promote his hoaxes (they are publishing a book largely based on his decade long smear campaign against the late environmental activist Judi Bari)
http://www.oilempire.us/anderson.html
A National Enquirer of the Left
Anderson Valley Advertiser Oregon - attacks local businesses, local activists and liberal politicians without regard to accuracy in a style reminiscent of the FBI's COINTELPRO (counter intelligence program) campaigns to disrupt social justice organizations
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