Lining the sidewalk outside the federal courthouse in Trenton, NJ on June 1,
2005, some of the signs they hold show pictures of restrained, mutilated or tortured
animals from experiments worthy of the imagination of Dr. Josef Mengele, involving
elaborate and brutal head restraints on terrified primates, wired brain implants
on prostrate, living house cats and disemboweled beagle puppies. Other signs call
for the defense of free speech, invoking the First Amendment of the Bill of Rights.
The sun is out but the breeze keeps them cool. They are nicely, even conservatively
dressed, middle class and mostly white, and they maintain an orderly composure
while police deploy linked metal barricades in front of them. Armed federal police
guard the entrance of the courthouse behind them, clad in bullet-proof kevlar
vests. They do not taunt the police, but they do chant loudly, enegetically and
in unison: “Human freedom, animal rights! One struggle, one fight!”
Inside the courthouse, the trial of the SHAC 7 has begun.
The SHAC 7
On May 26, 2004, a federal grand jury indicted seven activists on “terrorism”
charges. Kevin Jonas, Jake Conroy, Lauren Gazzola, Darius Fulmer, Andy Stepanian,
Josh Harper and John McGee were indicted on charges of “animal enterprise terrorism”
under the Animal Enterprise Protection Act of 1992.
At heart, this is a free speech fight. The specifics of the indictment state that
the seven are alleged to have run a website that reported on protests aimed at
pressuring investors, stockbrokers and customers of the animal experimentation
facility Huntington Life Sciences to divest from the facility. The indictment
alleges the seven conspired to encourage the disruption of commerce at HLS. The
government's interpretation of the AEP Act seeks to define as domestic terrorism
any such third party action that has the effect of limiting commerce, whether
criminal in method or not and no matter how peaceful, encompassing a variety of
tactics such as civil disobedience, demonstrations and divestment campaigns.
Industry spokesmen like David Martosko of the Center for Consumer Freedom, a front
group for the meat, dairy and restaurant industry, have smugly described SHAC
as the “mainstream animal-rights movement's Achilles Heel.” Their hope is that
should the SHAC 7 trial end in a guilty verdict, it will effectively criminalize
any dissent. The AEP Act could then be used to prosecute other organizations,
like People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA). This trial is a test
case of the principle that advocating non-violent change -- and being effective
at it -- is the same as engaging in violent terrorist activity.
This principle has been applied before in US history. It is the same twisted logic
that lead to the imprisonment and execution of the Haymarket Martyrs, late nineteenth
century labor organizers and anarchists who fought for the 8-hour day. This principle
sent Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti to the electric chair. Like these figures
from history, the SHAC activists scarcely fit the bill of the hardened thugs they
are made out to be.
Soft-spoken Kevin Jonas volunteered for nursing homes, worked for PIRG and founded
an Amnesty International chapter at his alma mater, Midwestern University. Jake
Conroy went to art school. Lauren Gazzola is a magna cum laude grad of NYU. Darius
Fulmer works as an EMT. Andy Stepanian spends his weekends with a group that cooks
food for the homeless. Josh Harper went to school for drama and runs his own video
production company. John McGee is a law student. These are twenty to thirty year-olds
more likely to discuss where they can find tasty vegan ice cream than plot harm
to anyone or anything, yet the government ranks them as terrorists equivalent
to Iraqi suicide bomb mastermind Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. Despite efforts to portray
them as such, several government officials openly ackowledged that SHAC has not
violated the Animal Enterprise Protection Act.
FBI Deputy Assitant Director John Lewis stated that “the activities of SHAC generally
fall outside the scope of the AEP statute. In fact, SHAC members are typically
quite conversant in the elements of the federal statute.”
McGregor Scott, US Attorney for California's Eastern District, admitted that “While
animal 'terrorists' [sic] are increasingly targeting not only animal enterprises
themselves...but also anyone who is believed to be engaged in the provision of
services to such animal enterprises, federal law does not currently equip the
Department with the necessary tools to effectively prosecute the perpetrators
of such conduct.”
Despite these admissions, the government is moving lockstep with animal testing
industry groups like the bogus Center for Consumer Freedom and with Huntington
Life Sciences itself, as well as corporate investors who face the prospect of
public pressure and exposure due to their morally questionable business ventures.
Having failed to gain any headway on more militant, clandestine groups such as
the Animal Liberation Front, the government is seeking to destroy the animal rights
movement's above-ground and transparent activist base.
The immensely effective SHAC campaign (having already bankrupted Huntington Life
Sciences twice before financial intervention by the UK government, a move unprecedented
in history) is first on the list, but the government's tactics of intimidation
and calculated suppression of dissent can easily be extrapolated to other grassroots
movements, a fact that should deeply concern anyone interested in civil liberties
or social justice.
SHAC: a Blueprint for Effective Activism
Just as the animal research industry's motives are obvious, the government's reasoning
is simple: their greatest fear is that other activists will learn from the SHAC
campaign and integrate those tactics into their own endeavors. From the global
social justice and anti-war movements to anti-racist, labor and community activism,
the potency of SHAC's methods are compelling.
In only three years, by means of secondary and tertiary targeting of companies
investing in HLS that do not actually need HLS to remain financially secure, and
by enabling the free-flow of information about actions conducted by other groups
in a coordinated manner, the lab lost 90% of its worth as companies divested or
cancelled contracts. Insurance firms will no longer cover HLS. Accounting firms
will not do their taxes. All this has been accomplished by a simple understanding
of corporate hierarchies, knowledge of the pressure necessary to isolate and discourage
investment and the application of time, energy and the concerted activity of committed
activists.
Key to these tactics are an aggressive, no-compromise stance. Activists do not
simply protest HLS, they protest anyone who has any business dealings with HLS.
In some cases, activists have sent black faxes to companies' fax machines, burning
out print cartridges after 20 copies, a tactic the federal indictment cites as
a violation of the FCC's indecency provisions. Other actions in the campaign have
involved demonstrations at the homes of executives and investors. While these
tactics are aggressive and rude, they simply do not fall into the category of
violent terrorism.
This has the government grasping for straws and reacting in desperate ways. Central
to the government's case against the SHAC defendants is the accusation that SHAC
activists are violent extremists. These accusations carry no weight in reality,
only the threat of guilt by association. For instance, Executive Assitant US Attorney
Charles McKenna revealed in the first day of trial that the government may seek
to include testimony from Brian Cass, an HLS managing director from England who
was attacked outside of his home by unknown, unidentified assailants. The only
connection made between the SHAC defendants in the United States and Cass is that
Cass worked for the same firm they targeted for protest, but at its UK facility.
Other insinuations come straight from HLS execs themselves. HLS general manager
Mike Caulfield called the SHAC 7 “extremists” and said the trial is about whether
HLS employees “should have to fear for their lives.” This is a convenient scare
tactic used by a company whose direct financial interests are threatened by the
exposure of its practices and are completely unsupported in fact. The mindset
also betrays an egregious political double standard, shared by the Republican
Party.
Definition of a Domestic Terrorists
On May 18, 2005, the Senate's Committee on Environment and Public Works held an
oversight hearing regarding the prevalence of “eco-terrorism,” specifically focusing
on the activities of the Earth Liberation Front and Animal Liberation Front. In
testimony, FBI Deputy Assistant Director Lewis told the committee that animal
rights and environmental extremists are the nation's top domestic terror threat,
beyond even violent neo-nazi groups like the Aryan Nations. He included SHAC in
his assessment.
Republican Senator from Louisiana David Vitter echoed this conclusion, discussing
the actions of “ALF vandals” at Lousiana State University. Although unable to
produce a single instance of an individual being injured in any way, he ended
by saying that “It is only a matter of time until these attacks by domestic terrorists
involving arson result in human deaths.”
Democratic Senator from Vermont Jim Jeffords questioned the entire proceeding.
“I am puzzled why the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee is examining
the issue of animal rights and eco-terrorism since the Committee lacks jurisdiction
over criminal law enforcement issues.”
Jeffords went on to express his frustration that Democratic Congressman Bennie
Thompson, ranking member of the House of Representatives Homeland Security Committee,
had been barred by the Republican EPW Committee Chair, James Inhofe of Oklahoma,
from testifying about the danger posed by demonstrably violent right-wing extremists.
Jeffords stated, “I’d like to submit for the record a report Congressman Thompson
prepared, entitled - quote - 'Ten Years After the Oklahoma City Bombing, the Department
of Homeland Security Must Do More to Fight Right-Wing Domestic Terrorists.' The
report highlights the apparent failure of DHS to assess the threat posed by right-wing
domestic terrorist groups in the Department’s five-year budget planning document.
I share his concern that the Department of Homeland Security needs to protect
us from all terrorist threats and should not focus on eco-terrorism at the expense
of other domestic terrorist groups, such as the KKK, right wing militias, abortion
bombers and skin heads.”
Jeffords' concerns have good cause. In February of 2005, the husband and mother
of US District Judge Joan Lefkow were murdered, execution style, in the basement
of her home in Chicago's suburbs. Judge Lefkow had issued a copyright infringement
ruling against a white supremacist group called the World Church of the Creator
and ordered its leader, Matt Hale, to change its name and cease using documents
bearing the group's name. Matt Hale then attempted to contract a hit on Judge
Lefkow's life. As he awaited sentencing for that conviction, Lefkow's family was
murdered.
Other incidents by white supremacists and right-wing extremists in the past involved
a racist, three-day shooting spree in Illinois and Indiana in 1999, attempts to
manufacture or acquire weapons of mass destruction, including biological and chemical
agents, abortion clinic bombings and assassinations of doctors who practice abortion
procedures, the delivery of home-made anthrax through the mail by neo-nazis against
“lawyers with Jewish-sounding names,” and best known, the Oklahoma City bombings
of 1995 that killed nearly two-hundred men, women and children.
The reality is that right-wing extremists have proven exceedingly violent and
brutal in recent years, while animal rights and environmental campaigners have
simply been extremely effective activists. Right-wing extremists might kill people,
but animal rights and environmental activists hit corporate profits.
The government wears its political self-interest on its sleeve, a self-interest
that mirrors the interests of the animal research industry: a total disregard
for the suffering of living beings and the blind pursuit of profit through intimidation
and lies.
...and Then There Were Six.
Actions by prosecutors on the opening day of the trial expose the inherent weakness
of the government's case against SHAC. Attorney Josh Markowitz announced to reporters
that his client, John McGee, was no longer part of the case and that Markowitz
expected that the charges against McGee would be dismissed.
Indeed, it seems that none of the other defendants even knew who McGee was and
many people openly questioned why he was indicted in the first place. The extent
of McGee's involvement in the SHAC campaign remains unclear. However, the government's
insistence on investigating and indicting someone with no discernable involvement
in the group has several explanations.
First, the government wants to nail SHAC and nail them bad. It is so desperate
that it pursues every possible lead with maximum pressure, including the use of
illegal methods. A defendant's car windshield was even smashed recently and a
laptop stolen from that defendant's car; $50 in cash was left untouched.
It is easy to understand John McGee's indictment in this context. If he had any
connection to protests against HLS or to the animal rights movement more generally,
a federal indictment against him would up the ante considerably, forcing him into
a position where he could be coerced into helping the government's case against
SHAC, either with information or through testimony. The leverage gained by a federal
indictment is considerable, but it remains to be seen what impact any information
gained in this way would have considering the questionable and indirect circumstances
of McGee's involvement.
Still, even if McGee had absolutely no connection to the SHAC campaign or the
activists currently on trial and has not been coerced in this manner, being the
federal government means never having to say you're sorry.
Second, the government wants to send a clear message to animal rights and other
activists in the United States: if you are effective, you will face an unprecedented
level of pressure from federal agencies regardless of the legitimacy or the methods
of your activities. The conclusion that social justice, animal rights and other
activists should draw from this is stark. The war on dissent is real, it is coordinated
and the need for solidarity between different movements has never been more urgent.
One Struggle, One Fight
Animal rights activists have largely been part of an insular, single issue movement.
Their activity rarely extends beyond specific concerns. Many animal rights activists
have only recently begun to engage in a broader analysis of human society, but
that engagement has begun, if slowly. The animal rights movement has always been
effective at addressing the question of what, but it is equally important to answer
the question why: why companies such as HLS pursue these actions, why the US,
UK and other governments seek to protect them and why many people do not share
the animal rights movement's concerns. The answers are not always as simple as
some would like to believe. If vivisection ended today, the basic motivation behind
its pursuit would still remain: it is a capitalist enterprise driven by greed.
As long as that incentive remains built into the structure of society, so will
animal cruelty.
For their part, social justice, anti-capitalist and anti-war activists have largely
been content with mass protests, marches and petitions with the occasional foray
into direct action. Labor activists have been content with fighting for better
working conditions in a limited sense while expanding or preserving current membership.
Many anti-globalization activists pine for the summit-hopping days following the
Battle of Seattle. Coordinated, long-term campaigns with specific goals are rarely
undertaken and tactics often bog down into predictable and increasingly ineffective
patterns. If there is one thing the animal rights movement can teach other movements
is that a listserv, mass membership, two meetings a week or a zine on do-it-yourself
herb gardening can never replace energy, lean organization, clear objectives,
perseverance and innovative, strategically targeted direct action.
But is such an understanding possible? If it is not, we already have a taste of
what the future holds for us. Our future is being played out right now inside
a federal courtroom in Trenton, NJ against six young activists who were bold enough
to stand by their conscience and act. They stand there now, as much for us and
our liberties as for the lives of the animals they chose to defend. We must stand
with them, not because we wish to save ourselves, but because our liberation is
bound up in theirs.