[Ppnews] Operation Backfire Backfires on FBI

[Political Prisoner News]

Operation Backfire Backfires on FBI
by Jim Flynn
from the Earth First! Journal, May-June 2006
http://www.earthfirstjournal.org

Like the cleansing waters of Hurricane Katrina, 
the FBI’s attack on the environmental movement 
has done more for creating community and 
organizing resistance to government oppression 
than we were seemingly capable of doing 
ourselves. At first, everyone was hunkering down 
or running for cover, moving on or going on 
hasty, long-term vacations. You did not know who 
to talk to or who to trust. Except for the 
peaceniks, the once-radical streets of Eugene 
were strangely quiet. The bars are full though, 
and there is a lot of whispering and commiserating going on.

But out of the flooded backwaters of government 
repression a new power has risen. People are 
coming out of the woodwork to step up and help 
their friends in trouble—“retired” old-timers, 
family members and relatives, old friends and 
undaunted youngsters, too. Black Panthers, 
AIMsters, feminists, Vietnam-era activists and 
even those who lived through the McCarthy era are 
providing wisdom and camaraderie when, at one 
time, there was little connection. Some are 
organizing and taking off work to do grand jury 
roadshows, high school buddies and families are 
educating themselves and flying across the 
country to attend court hearings, food donations 
and an outpouring of support are being offered to 
affected families, proactive media collectives 
are forming, lawyers are volunteering their time, 
and environmental groups are being recruited for support.

One thing the FBI will never have is the 
outpouring of volunteer energy that comes with 
being part of a popular movement that is under attack.
As you all have probably heard, the FBI has come 
to town and made a few arrests. If you live in 
Eugene like I do, you HAVE HEARD THAT [CUT: know] 
the FBI [CUT: apparently] has been in town for 
many years now and that NOW they are going to 
town in an unfettered fashion! And, boy howdy, 
are they doing well for themselves! They’ve got a 
pyromaniac heroin addict who thinks it’s cool to 
dress up in body wires and go reminisce with 
(read: entrap) his old “friends,” many of whom 
didn’t even know who HE [CUT: Jake] was. (JAKE 
FERGUSON IS HIS NAME, AND, DESPITE ADMITTING TO 
PARTICIPATION IN MOST OF THE ARSONS, HE REMAINS 
FREE AND WITHOUT ANY CHARGES AGAINST HIM.) 
They’ve got a dead defendant and 11 live ones (15 
IF YOU COUNT THE ONES THEY DON’T HAVE), and the 
feds keep saying there are more to come. They’ve 
got subpoenas served and grand juries convened in 
Oregon, Washington, California, Colorado, and 
maybe Wyoming and Nevada soon. And, much to their 
utter joy and ecstasy, they’ve got people 
tripping over each other to sing. They’ve got 
this snitch in this jail and that snitch in that 
jail, juggling to keep them apart and [CUT: the] 
costs down. They’ve got site visits and fruitless 
digging (literally) for evidence. I’ll bet this 
is the most fun the FBI has had in years. I’ll 
bet they are yucking it up over there at the FBI 
water cooler. And they are laughing at us, watching to see what happens next.

The once-untouchable Earth Liberation Front (ELF) 
movement—so covert in what it did (does) that the 
FBI had no leads on the most notorious acts of 
politically motivated sabotage the country has 
seen since Sam Lovejoy and the Plowshares—has, at 
least in the media, been reduced to he said, she 
said. Now, after all the post-9/11 hearings, the 
FBI ain’t looking so good, but let me tell you, 
once upon a time this outfit had some respect in 
this country, some teeth and some muscle. So it 
is not the FBI at their best that is claiming to 
have beaten the ELF, and it is a shame to have 
them laughing at us instead of the other way around.

So what to do? Well, after doing everything we 
can to help our INDICTED friends, we need to make 
sure this never happens again. I’m not sure where 
we went wrong, but somewhere along the way 
someone forgot to tell SOMEONES not to talk to 
the police. That message seems to have gotten 
lost [CUT: here in Eugene], AND this is not good.

How to fix it? Well, the answer is one word: 
Community. I know many of you were hoping for me 
to say something rad like, “Snitches get 
stitches!” Sounds cool, but it just ain’t 
practical. If we WAS in the Irish Republican Army 
or the French Underground, we might be able to 
have some solidarity against the coppers and 
violently enforce a “don’t talk” rule. But, that 
ain’t us. Not only are we not that tight of a 
community, having grown up in different places 
and being a bit on the diverse side, but we also 
ain’t the violent types—despite what the feds are 
saying. We aren’t the ones who beat people up; we 
get beat up. We don’t kill people; we get killed. 
Never forget JUDI Bari, the car bombing and the 
millions of dollars the FBI had to pay. Why 
hasn’t that violent crime by unknown assailants 
ever been solved? Not politically convenient maybe?

So, that brings us back to community. Community 
is how you stop snitches. If someone knows they 
have a community to support them while they are 
awaiting trial or serving their sentence[ADD 
COMMA] and that it will be there for them when 
they get out, they are much less likely to inform 
on others. If we turn our backs on them or vilify 
them, then what motivation do they have to resist?

Many of the defendants are cooperating with the 
feds. Some talked right away, others had to be 
coerced. They span the whole spectrum, from Stan 
squealing like a pig and begging for mercy (read: 
admitting guilt for himself and others) within 
hours of being taken into custody, to those who 
just admitted their own roles right away, to 
those who held out for months until more than 
half a dozen others squealed on them AND WERE 
[CUT:, and they were literally] left with few 
options. I can understand some of their 
decisions, but we will not know who said exactly 
what and who gave up whom until the trial. I 
would suggest people not judge them too harshly until we have all the facts.

The old adage goes something like, “If you do the 
crime, be prepared to do the time.” Well, if when 
you commit a crime, you’re thinking, “Well, even 
if I get caught, what am I facing, five to 
eight?” And then when you do get accused of the 
crime, you’re facing life plus 335 years! Well
 
they CERTAINLY have changed the rules on us, and 
I don’t think any of us on the outside can judge 
what is going on in those interrogation rooms. 
BUT WE MUST LEARN TO NOT TALK TO THE COPS. 
REMEMBER THAT the feds had NEXT TO NOTHING [CUT: 
little] until they knocked over the first domino, 
then more began to fall. If Stan HAD kept HIS 
mouth shut, this would all probably have ended 
with one pyromaniac heroin addict trying to sell 
his story to the FBI for some more dope money and 
them telling him to bugger off.

Regardless of the guilt or innocence of those 
charged, there are some important lessons that we 
can learn from everything. I know this is going 
to sound really obvious in retrospect, but it 
must be said: Just cause someone commits a felony 
with you, and, therefore, could be busted as 
well, does not mean that they won’t talk about it 
to someone THEY ARE SLEEPING WITH [CUT: in a bar 
some day] or go straight to the feds if they get 
desperate. So choose your partners very wisely. 
Think long-term. How well do you really know this 
person? Where do you think their head will be at 
in 10 years? Does this person that you are 
considering committing a felony with have obvious 
weaknesses like a drug addiction, a dim bulb, a 
respectable job/career, a spouse or children? (No 
overt offense to the breeders among us, but the 
feds exploit family ties[CUT COMMA]. SO it has to 
be considered a “weakness” here in terms of 
something that can be used as leverage against 
you.) Is this person a happy, productive, 
long-term member of your community? Apart from 
your local community, is this person a member of 
the Movement [CAPITALIZE M IN MOVEMENT]? Do they 
share our biocentric philosophy or are they just 
interested in fucking shit up? Choose your “friends” wisely.

There is a lot of work to do, and we need to keep 
at it. Decry the huge sentences our comrades are 
facing, but bring the issue back to the state of 
the environment. Sooner or later the real 
ecoterrorists (the Bushes, Cheney, Rumsfeld and 
the corporations who work for them) must be 
brought to task for their crimes. It remains up 
to us, the radical environmental movement, to 
speak out and take action to stop the madness. 
With global climate change, rampant 
deforestation, massive species extinctions and 
toxics all around us, we know it is not long 
before all hell breaks loose and things get really messy.

Jim Flynn was a member of the EF! Journal 
editorial collective last century when all they 
had to worry about was being associated with the 
Unabomber, death threats from loggers, and 
Roselle smoking pot in the office. Ah, the good ol' days!

SUBSCRIBE TO EARTH FIRST!,
THE RADICAL ENVIRONMENTAL JOURNAL

Earth First! Journal, POB 3023, Tucson, AZ 85702, USA
(520) 620-6900; tortuga at earthfirstjournal.org
www.earthfirstjournal.org



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