SHAC 7: “Doin’ Time Without Doing a Crime”

by Will Potter on January 6, 2007

in Terrorism Court Cases

I love this: new from the SHAC 7 support committee:

Tagged as:

  • Joe

    How is terrorizing whole families of people just because of where they work not a crime?

    This group ran a website that encouraged and applauded violence against all who worked at HLS, including posting their children names,photo and school schedule. Would any of you want the same to be posted on the web?…… I know…….I know you will come back with the same old animal rights rhetoric of how HLS uses animals in medical research so the shac7 were justified in terrorizing the people that work there….guess what they weren’t and now they got what they deserve…..prison.

  • cyon

    Joe is confusing two issues: whether the actual actions against HLS and its suppliers was illegal, and whether the running of the website was illegal. The relation between SHAC and the people who actual did the actions is like that between PETA and the ALF. SHAC and PETA are above-ground organizations engaged in legally protected freedom of speech. None of the imprisoned SHAC activists were found guilty of any illegal action such as threats, vandalism, or property destruction. They were imprisoned for running a website.

    Threatening people is, in fact, against the law and is called “assault.” Liberating animals from laboratories is also illegal and is theft. Publicizing these activities is not illegal, unless Joe perhaps would like to have reporters for the New York Times arrested when they report on such activities.

    The SHAC website did not actually tell people to go and engage in threatening behavior. It merely reported this this was happening. It’s the same with Bite Back, which does not say: go steal animals out of laboratories. Bite Back just reports on this. What, then? Should it be illegal to inform the public that animals are being stolen out of laboratories? Then bye-bye freedom of the press! If it’s against the law not only to engage in rebellion, but even to tell the public that rebellion is occurring, then we are living in a dictatorship.

    Perhaps Joe would like to go live in China. There have been thousands of demonstrations by peasants against seizure of their land. The Chinese government will not permit any reportage of these rebellions. If it is illegal not only to engage in illegal direct action for animals, but also to report on this in the media,including internet media, then we are living in a dictatorship.

  • Denise

    the Anti-Abortonists did the exact same thing…in fact they even massacred some doctors and blew up
    clinics WITH PEOPLE IN THEM!!!

  • Guy

    Nobody WANTS to be called a terrorist, just like nobody ever thinks THEY are the enemy. It’s always the other guy who’s doing something wrong, right? So it comes as no surprise that people who engage in campaigns to disrupt, intimidate, and put fear into people in the name of an idiology are simply doing “the right thing.” And how can one be compromising one’s own morals when doing the right thing?

    What I find ironic is, you see the Bush administration compromising American’s freedoms with this war on terror, because “it’s the right thing to do,” with the belief that such invasions of privacy in the lives on ordinary citizens would not happen during “peace-time.” But I would ask those who target HLS in the way that SHAC and its supporters have: Would you target your neighbor with the same kind of attacks if you disagreed with some aspect of how they lived their lives? Do you give permission to hard-right religious groups to organize such campaigns of relentless intimidation against gays who are/want to be married? If I strongly believe the world should be the way I want it, should I stop at nothing to remake the world in my own image?

    I’ve often heard caution given to activists to only do what’s “within the law.” But that begs a lot of moral and ethical questions, such as: how much would you really be willing to do if you were unrestrained by the law? Is “the law” the predominant moral compass? Just “how LOW would YOU go?”

    Now I can hear the responses that it’s not US who are LOW, it’s THEM for even engaging in animal testing to begin with! I understand to many, the killing of animals for research or food is a moral issue that may supercede all others; after all, it’s an “animal holocaust” out there.

    Though I’ve never heard it been said, it struck me that the ultimate goal of animal rights activists can only be to completely eliminate the use of animals from human agriculture, a process that’s existed for as long as man has. If that’s a movement that isn’t extreme, than I don’t know what is!

    Oh, and there’s no muddy definition of terrorism, any dictionary will gladly spell out its meaning. It’s a shame that you can’t get any straight talk on this side of the argument, there’s just as much rhetoric here; the SHAC 7 were “SIMPLY running a website…” (child pornographers also SIMPLY run websites). We all love animals, how can we possibly be terrorists as well???

  • cyon

    The previous post by Guy contains numerous inaccuracies.

    (1) Guy states that the use of animals in agriculture has existed as long as humans have. Not so. Humans have been around for about two million years, but agriculture has existed for only about 10,000 years, the beginning of the Neolithic. Before that time, our ancestors were hunter-gatherers. They did kill animals through hunting and fishing, but did not domesticate animals through agriculture. Some anthropologists follow the “man the hunter” theory according to which hunting and meat-eating were essential to human evolution, but other anthropologists prefer the “woman the gatherer” theory according to which hunting on a large scale began around 40,000 years ago, before which time our ancestors relied on gathering of edible plants. See Nancy Tanner, On Becoming Human, Cambridge, 1981.

    (2) Guy states that there is no muddy definition of terrorism. On the contrary, “terrorism” has many incompatible definitions. “US industries and the state capitalize on the vagueness of the term ‘terrorism’ to apply it in any way they see fit to suit their purposes.” (Steven Best and Anthony Nocella, Terrorists or Freedom Fighters: Reflections on the Liberation of Animals, New York: Lantern Books, 2004, p. 363.) Best and Nocella list 32 different and incompatible definitions that have been given by various authorities. They note that these definitions generally exclude (a) US and state-sponsored terrorism, and (b) species terrorism.

    (3) Guy confuses speech which is constitutionally protected and speech which is not. Child pornography is not constitutionally protected speech, but a website reporting on illegal activites of animal liberationists is so protected. In the former case, the content of the website (child pornography) is itself criminal; in the latter case, the content of the website is reportage of illegal acts like freeing animals from fur farms or laboratories. This content is not itself criminal–unless Guy would perhaps like to see journalists punished whenever they report illegal activities.

    (4) Guy confuses invasion of privacy of individuals by corporations and the state with lifting the veil of secrecy from corporations and the state by individuals. The computer revolution has made it possible for governments and corporations to spy on private individuals as never before, and this erodes our freedom. But the same techological revolution has also made it harder for governments, corporations, and other massive structure to operate in secrecy, because now private citizens can much more easily spy on the power structure. And that is exactly what SHAC was doing: making clever and creative use of new technologies to lift the veil of secrecy behind which the vivisection industry traditionally operates. If new technologies have given governments, the police, and big business more ability to spy on the people, the only real antidote to this loss of freedom is for ordinary people, private citizens, to turn it around and use these new technologies to spy on governments and big business. Government wants to keep tabs on every person, in a total surveillance society, while becoming more secretive in its own operations. Corporations also wish to operate behind a veil of secrecy. The only way to preserve our freedom is to exploit the possibilities of new technologies to spy on the power structure. The remedy for surveillance is “sousveillance”–spying on the Eye of Power. See Michel Foucault, Discipline and Punish, on the “panopticon.”

  • Karin

    I love your posts, cyon!

  • D.Ayala

    great post cyon!

    found this on another blog and felt it to be vital
    information for every Activist:
    (the guide is in .pdf format for printout)

    Guide to Help Activists Deal with Police Encounters: Know your Rights When Dealing With Police

    http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2007/01/08/18345001.php

    excerpt:
    KNOW YOUR RIGHTS & Resist the Police State

    Our system of laws exists to maintain the dominance of those in power, and the police are its armed enforcers. If you doubt this for a minute, look at who are the selective targets of local laws: The homeless, the young, the poor, dissenters. Globally, look at who dies and who gets rich from our wars and other disasters.

    For 250 years in this country, the government and their enforcers have consistently fought against people working for liberation: Indigenous resistance, land reformers, slave revolts, abolitionists, labor organizers & workers, free-speech advocates, women and civil rights workers, anti-war and anti-globalization protesters, and recently, animal rights and environmental activists.

    Your relationship with the police is at heart adversarial. While there may be cops with hearts of gold, the job of all police is to arrest and prosecute you. As such, it is almost never in your best interest to cooperate with the police.

  • Brescht

    You basically get two completely different stories depending on where you read about this. Either they were terror masterminds, or they just ran a website. I am curious about that thing he said where they were “posting their children names,photo and school schedule.” on the website? No one really commented on that. Is that made up, or is that something they actually did?

  • Joe

    Here are a few examples of the kinds of information that SHAC distributes. All of this information was posted on the Internet. (Personal information has been edited out.)

    S—–’s direct work number is ###-###-####
    Her work e-mail address is [EMAIL]

    R—— is about 50 and can run an 8K in 46:16

    They have a kid named B—-, possibly one named R– and possibly another named J—–. J—– plays soccer. They may have a maid named B———-.

    B—-’s teacher’s name is probably Ms. B——-. One of them attends R——- Middle School.

    Their previous address (until at least July 01) was:
    #### B— Drive
    [city], TX #####

    Their car insurance agent is (until July 01 at least)
    Allstate, D—— X. J——–
    (###) ###-####

    They have a green 95 Ford Windstar
    Vehicle ID: #XXXX####XXX#####.
    The insurance policy number is # ## ###### ##/##.
    The license for the Windstar is [license plate].

    They have another car, license [license plate]. It’s gray.

    Their American Airlines AAdvantage number is Xxxxxxxxx.

    They attend Christ Church in Xxxxxx, TX. They are members of the Xxxxx Xxxxxx Country Club, [address].

    S—– has a relative who is a CPA, her name is K——- X. [Last Name] and she works for the [company] in Portland, Maine. Her office number is ###-###-####.

    Don’t forget P—— …he needs pressure NOW to let him know this is only the beginning of the headache!

    P—— [Last Name] (President and Director) lives at:
    [address]
    [city], NY #####
    Home phone: ###-###-####
    other number: ###-###-####

    Management of the Building:
    M——— [Last Name] ###-###-#### (contact C——–).
    Lobby phone number: ###-###-####

    Weekend home:
    [address]
    [city], MA #####
    Phone: ###-###-####

    P—— has a blonde wife, son, and black and white dog named B—–.

    He is about 6 feet, 180 pounds, in his 40s.
    Wears glasses and a baseball cap.
    Drives a bright blue Audi Coupe; license plate number [license plate] Mass. plates.

    His brother – W—— [Last Name] – works as an attorney and is in [company] often. He lives at:
    [address]
    [city], NY #####
    Home Phone: ###-###-####

    Call and urge him to put pressure on his brother.
    SHAC’s website warns employees of targeted companies: “We know where you work, we know where you eat, we know where you sleep.”

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