Category: Wilderness Defence

Spir­it of Free­dom (Decem­ber 2009)
Pro­duced by EARTH LIBERATION PRISONERS SUPPORT NETWORK

“The whole expe­ri­ence has been tough, but all the kind and strength­en­ing words and wise thoughts from strangers made it much eas­i­er!” (For­mer Swedish Ani­mal Rights Pris­on­er)

Wel­come to the Decem­ber 2009 edi­tion of Spir­it of Free­dom. A few months ago ELP report­ed the arrest of the Amer­i­can, Justin Solondz in Chi­na. As peo­ple will be aware Justin is want­ed for ques­tion­ing in con­nec­tion to an FBI inves­ti­ga­tion into the ELF that led to the Ore­gon and Wash­ing­ton Tri­als.

When ELP first heard of the arrest we wrong­ly believed, like many oth­ers, that Justin would be extra­dit­ed to Amer­i­ca where he would be remand­ed to stand tri­al for his alleged ELF activ­i­ty. How­ev­er, a cou­ple of days ago ELP learnt that rather than extra­dit­ing him, the Chi­nese decid­ed to put Justin on tri­al accused of drugs relat­ed activ­i­ty. Justin was duly found Guilty and sen­tenced to three years impris­on­ment fol­lowed by depor­ta­tion. This is of course very bad news for Justin and if any­one has any con­tact details for Justin (or knows what prison he is held in, in Chi­na, please con­tact ELP as soon as pos­si­ble).

Besides Justin’s impris­on­ment, sad­ly over the past few weeks ELP has learnt about the impris­on­ments of a num­ber of peo­ple across Europe and North Amer­i­ca accused of a vari­ety of activ­i­ty, this includes the impris­on­ment of for­mer Ital­ian ALF pris­on­er Ser­gio Ste­fani who has been accused of steal­ing a car and charged with “sub­ver­sive con­spir­a­cy” and placed in a jail specif­i­cal­ly designed for polit­i­cal activists! ELP encour­ages every­one to write urgent let­ter of sup­port to all of the new pris­on­ers on our list and remind them we are behind them. But also please don’t for­get our exist­ing pris­on­ers. All of the pris­on­ers list­ed below wel­come let­ters of sup­port.
So please, regard­less of what lan­guages you speak and regard­less of where you live in the world, your let­ters of sup­port real­ly do make the world of dif­fer­ence to the pris­on­ers. So please sup­port the eco-pris­on­ers and no com­pro­mise in defence of Moth­er Earth!

If any­one notices any of ELP’s pris­on­er details is out of date or we do not list a pris­on­er who we should list, please let ELP know as soon as pos­si­ble.
ELP is run by a small group of vol­un­teers and although we try to ensure our lists are accu­rate, we admit we do make mis­takes. So help us help keep the lists accu­rate by let­ting us know of any changes we need to make.

ECO-DEFENCE PRISONERS

Grant Barnes #137563, San Car­los Cor­rec­tion­al Facil­i­ty, PO Box 3, Pueblo, CO 81002, USA. Serv­ing 12 years for set­ting fire to a num­ber of SUV vehi­cles. The let­ters ELF were spray paint­ed onto all of the vehi­cles. (Grant is a veg­an).

Nathan Block, #36359–086, FCI Lom­poc, Fed­er­al Cor­rec­tion­al Insti­tu­tion, 3600 Guard Road, Lom­poc, CA 93436, USA. Serv­ing 7 years & 8 months for an ELF arson against a Poplar Tree Farm and an ELF arson against an SUV deal­er­ship. Also admit­ted his role in an ELF/ALF con­spir­a­cy. (Diet unknown).

Mar­co Camenisch, Post­fach 3143, CH-8105 Regens­dorf, Switzer­land. Serv­ing 18 years. 1) Ten years for using explo­sives to destroy elec­tric­i­ty pylons lead­ing from nuclear pow­er sta­tions. 2) Eight years for the mur­der of a Swiss Board­er Guard whilst on the run. In ’02 Mar­co com­plet­ed a 12-year sen­tence in Italy for destroy­ing elec­tric­i­ty pylons in Italy. (Mar­co is a meat eater who encour­ages organ­ic liv­ing).

Niall Har­nett, Castlerea Prison, Har­ris­town, Castlerea, Co. Roscom­mon, Repub­lic of Ire­land. Sev­er­ing 4 months for non-pay­ment of a fine. The fine was issued fol­low­ing Mau­ra’s involve­ment in an anti-Shell petrol com­pa­ny protest. (Diet unknown).

Mau­ra Har­ringon, Dochas Cen­tre, Moun­tjoy Gaol, North Cir­cu­lar Road, Dublin 7, Repub­lic of Ire­land. Sev­er­ing 8 months for non-pay­ment of a fine. The fine was issued fol­low­ing Mau­ra’s involve­ment in an anti-Shell petrol com­pa­ny protest. (Diet unknown).

Leonar­do Lan­di, Carcere San­re­mo, Via Armea, 144, 18038 San­re­mo (IM), Italy. Il Sil­vestre activist await­ing tri­al accused of rob­bery. (Leonar­do is a veg­e­tar­i­an).

Jef­frey Luers, # 13797671, CRCI, 9111 NE Sun­der­land Ave, Port­land, OR 97211–1708, USA. Serv­ing 10 years for arson on a SUV deal­er­ship & the attempt­ed arson of an oil truck. The orig­i­nal sen­tence was 22 years & 8 months, but was reduced on appeal. (Diet unknown).

Marie Jeanette Mason, #04672–061, FCI Wase­ca, Fed­er­al Cor­rec­tion­al Insti­tu­tion, PO Box 1731, Wase­ca, MN 56093, USA. Serv­ing 21 years and 10 months for her involve­ment in an ELF arson against a Uni­ver­si­ty build­ing car­ry­ing out Genet­i­cal­ly Mod­i­fied crop tests. Marie also plead­ed guilty to con­spir­ing to car­ry out ELF actions and admit­ted involve­ment in 12 oth­er ELF actions. (Marie is a veg­an).

Eric McDavid, 16209–097, FCI Vic­torville, Medi­um II, Fed­er­al Cor­rec­tion­al Insti­tu­tion, PO Box 5300, Ade­lan­to, CA 92301, USA. Serv­ing 19 years & 7 months for plan­ning to destroy the prop­er­ty of the U.S. Forestry Ser­vice, mobile phone masts and pow­er plants. At the point of his arrest no crim­i­nal
dam­age has actu­al­ly occurred. (Eric is a veg­an).

Daniel McGowan, 63794–053, USP Mar­i­on, US Pen­i­ten­tiary, PO Box 1000, Mar­i­on, IL 62959, USA. Serv­ing 7 years for an ELF arson against a Poplar Tree Farm and an ELF arson against an old growth log­ging cor­po­ra­tion. Also admit­ted his role in an ELF/ALF con­spir­a­cy. (Daniel is a veg­e­tar­i­an).

Steve Mur­phy #39013177 (for his most cur­rent prison address check out the web­site http://supportsteve.org/ ). On remand accused of attempt­ed arson and crim­i­nal dam­age at a town house con­struc­tion site in 2006. The FBI claim the action was done under the ban­ner of the ELF. (Steve is a veg­an).

Jonathan Paul — See details in Ani­mal Lib­er­a­tion Pris­on­ers List.

Justin Solondz (Address Unknown — Chi­na). Amer­i­can Green Scare defen­dant accused of direct action activ­i­ty in Amer­i­ca. Serv­ing 3 years in Chi­na for drugs relat­ed offences then due to be deport­ed back to Amer­i­ca. His exact prison loca­tion is cur­rent­ly unknown. (Diet unknown).

Jonatan Strand­berg, Box 248, 59323, Väster­vik, Swe­den. Serv­ing 15 months impris­on­ment after admit­ting dam­ag­ing a com­mu­ni­ca­tion tow­er used by the Depart­ment of Defence, cut­ting the cables on a crane used in cre­at­ing urban sprawl, and dam­ag­ing a vehi­cle used in the log­ging indus­try. Jonatan is a dia­bet­ic and fol­lows a paleo diet, demand­ing local­ly sourced food).

Michael Sykes 696693, Richard A. Hand­lon Cor­rec­tion­al Facil­i­ty, 1728 Blue­wa­ter High­way, Ionia, MI 48846, USA. Serv­ing four to ten years for anti-sprawl arsons, crim­i­nal dam­age to a util­i­ty pole, spray-paint­ing polit­i­cal graf­fi­ti and burn­ing the Amer­i­can flag. (Diet unknown)

Bri­ana Waters 36432–086, FCI Dan­bury, Fed­er­al Cor­rec­tion­al Insti­tu­tion, Route 37, Dan­bury, CT 06811, USA. Serv­ing six years for involve­ment in an ELF arson on a Uni­ver­si­ty. (Diet unknown).

Joy­an­na Zach­er, #36360–086, FCI Dublin, 5700 8th St.- Camp Parks- Unit F, Dublin, CA 94568, USA. Serv­ing 7 years & 8 months for an ELF arson against a Poplar Tree Farm and an ELF arson against an SUV deal­er­ship. Also admit­ted her role in an ELF/ALF con­spir­a­cy. (Diet unknown).

ANIMAL LIBERATION PRISONERS
(All Ani­mal Lib­er­a­tion Pris­on­ers fol­low a min­i­mum veg­e­tar­i­an diet and most are veg­an).

Anony­mous Female Pris­on­er One (E‑mail mes­sages of sup­port to
holland@die-tierbefreier.de ) Ger­man woman held on Remand accused of raid­ing a mink farm in Hol­land. (She is a veg­an).

Anony­mous Female Pris­on­er Two (E‑mail mes­sages of sup­port to
dbf-sg@riseup.net ) Dutch woman held on Remand accused of raid­ing a mink farm in Hol­land. (She is a veg­an).

Jon­ny Able­white TB4885, H.M. Prison, Hewell Lane, Red­ditch, Worcs B97 6QS, Eng­land. Serv­ing 12 years for attempt­ing to black­mail a farmer who sup­plied guinea pigs for vivi­sec­tion. (Jon is a veg­an).

Dan Amos VN7818, HMP Guys Marsh, Shaftes­bury, Dorset, SP7 0AH, Eng­land. Serv­ing 4 years for con­spir­a­cy to black­mail Hunt­ing­don Life Sci­ences. (Dan is a veg­an)

Gregg Avery TA7450, HMP Cold­in­g­ley, Shaftes­bury Road, Bis­ley, Wok­ing, Sur­rey GU24 9EX, Eng­land. Serv­ing 9 years for con­spir­a­cy to black­mail Hunt­ing­don Life Sci­ences. (Gregg is a veg­an).

Natasha Avery NR8987, HMP Send, Rip­ley Road, Wok­ing, Sur­rey, GU23 7LJ, Eng­land. Serv­ing 9 years for con­spir­a­cy to black­mail Hunt­ing­don Life Sci­ences. (Nat is a veg­an).

Mel Broughton A3892AE, HMP Fran­k­land, Bras­side, Durham, Coun­ty Durham DH1 5YD, Eng­land. Serv­ing 10 years for “con­spir­a­cy to com­mit arson” against Oxford Uni­ver­si­ty vivi­sec­tion depart­ment. (Mel is a veg­an).

Lau­ren Gaz­zo­la #93497–011, FCI Dan­bury, Fed­er­al Cor­rec­tion­al Insti­tu­tion, Route #37Danbury, CT 06811, USA. Serv­ing 54 months impris­on­ment for help­ing organ­ise the SHAC-USA cam­paign. (Lau­ren is a veg­an).

Alex Hall, Inmate #2009–06304, Davis Coun­ty Jail, 800 West State St., Farm­ing­ton, UT 84025, USA. On Remand accused of raid­ing a mink farm. Also accused of breach­ing bail con­di­tions whilst on bail. (William is a veg­an).

Kevin Kjon­aas #93502–011, FCI Sand­stone, PO Box 1000, Sand­stone, MN 55072 USA. Serv­ing 72 months impris­on­ment for help­ing organ­ise the SHAC-USA cam­paign. (Kevin is a veg­an).

Robert Lewis (address unknown — Eng­land). Serv­ing 18 months for send­ing threat­en­ing let­ters to a com­pa­ny linked to drugs test­ing. (Diet Unknown).

Daniel McGowan — See details in Eco Defence Pris­on­ers List.

Robert Grif­fiths (address unknown — Eng­land). Serv­ing 18 months for send­ing threat­en­ing let­ters to a com­pa­ny linked to drugs test­ing. (Diet unknown).

Gavin Medd-Hall WV9475, HMP Cold­in­g­ley, Shaftes­bury Road, Bis­ley, Wok­ing, Sur­rey GU24 9EX, Eng­land. Serv­ing 8 years for con­spir­a­cy to black­mail Hunt­ing­don Life Sci­ences. (Gavin is a veg­an).

Heather Nichol­son VM5859, HMP Fos­ton Hall, Fos­ton, Der­by, Der­byshire, DE65 5DN, Eng­land. Serv­ing 11 years for con­spir­a­cy to black­mail Hunt­ing­don Life Sci­ences. (Heather is a veg­an).

Kevin Olliff, #1300931, TTCF 161 D‑Pod, 450 Bauchet St., Los Ange­les, CA 90012, USA. On remand accused of stalk­ing. Exact details of the indict­ment have not yet been revealed but the charges appear to relate to a per­son employed by an edu­ca­tion­al facil­i­ty so may be linked to vivi­sec­tion. (Kevin is a veg­an).

Jonathan Paul, #07167–085, FCI Phoenix, Fed­er­al Cor­rec­tion­al Insti­tu­tion, 37910 N 45th Ave., Phoenix, AZ 85086, USA. Sen­tenced to 51 months for an ALF arson on a horse meat plant. Also admit­ted his role in an ELF/ALF con­spir­a­cy. (Jonathan is a veg­an).

Ster­gio Ste­fani — See Oth­er Polit­i­cal Pris­on­er List.

William James Viehl, Inmate #2009–05735, Davis Coun­ty Jail, 800 West State St., Farm­ing­ton, UT 84025, USA. Await­ing sen­tenc­ing hav­ing plead­ed guilty to raid­ing a mink farm. He is due to be sen­tenced in Decem­ber. (William is a veg­an).

Nicole Vosper VM9385, HMP Bronze­field, Wood­hthor­pe Road, Ash­ford, Mid­dx, TW15 3JZ, Eng­land. On remand accused of black­mail­ing Hunt­ing­don Life Sci­ences. (Nicole is a veg­an).

Dan Wad­ham, A5705AA, HMP Camp Hill, New­port, Isle of Wight, PO30 5PB, Eng­land. Serv­ing 5 years for con­spir­a­cy to black­mail Hunt­ing­don Life Sci­ences. (Dan is a veg­an).

Ker­ry Whit­burn TB4886, HMP Lowd­ham Grange, Lowd­ham, Not­ting­ham, NG14 7DA, Eng­land. Serv­ing 12 years for attempt­ing to black­mail a farmer who sup­plied guinea pigs for vivi­sec­tion. (Ker­ry is a veg­an).

Sarah White­head, VM7684, HMP Bronze­field, Woodthor­pe Road, Ash­ford, Mid­dx, TW15 3JZ, Eng­land. Serv­ing two years for: 1) res­cu­ing a pup­py from hor­rif­ic con­di­tions. 2) res­cu­ing over 100 ani­mals from a pet breed­er who was lat­er pros­e­cut­ed for ani­mal abuse. Also await­ing tri­al for SHAC activ­i­ty. (Sarah is a veg­an)

GRAND JURY RESISTERS
The fol­low­ing peo­ple have been jailed for refus­ing to tes­ti­fy before Grand Juries in Amer­i­ca which are inves­ti­gat­ing ALF & ELF activ­i­ty.

Car­olyn Feld­man, Wash­ing­ton Coun­ty Jail., 2185 Lex­ing­ton Blvd. PO Box 6, Wash­ing­ton, IA 52353, USA. (Diet unknown).

Mus­ca­tine Coun­ty Jail Inmate, c/o “Scott DeMuth”, 400 Wal­nut Street, Mus­ca­tine, Iowa 52761, USA. Scott has also recent­ly been indict­ed for con­spir­a­cy under the Ani­mal Enter­prise Ter­ror­ism Act. (Scott is a meat eater who advo­cates bow hunt­ing).

PLOUGHSHARES PRISONERS

Helen Wood­son, 03231–045, FMC Car­swell — Admin. Max. Unit, POB 27137, Ft. Worth, TX 76127, USA. Serv­ing 8 years 10 months for actions that focused on the inter­re­la­tion­ship of war & the destruc­tion of the nat­ur­al world. The actions includ­ed pour­ing red paint over the secu­ri­ty desk of a fed­er­al court and mak­ing threat­en­ing com­mu­ni­ca­tions. Pre­vi­ous­ly Helen had served 20½ years for: 1) Using a ham­mer to dis­arm a nuclear mis­sile silo. 2) Burn­ing $25,000 on the floor of a bank whilst denounc­ing war, envi­ron­men­tal destruc­tion & eco­nom­ic injus­tice. 3) Mail­ing warn­ing let­ters with bul­lets attached to Gov­ern­ment & cor­po­rate offi­cials. (Diet unknown).

OTHER ANTI-WAR PRISONERS

Eli­ja Smith VP 7551 HMP Lewes, 1 Brighton Rd, Lewes, Sus­sex, BN7 1EA, Eng­land. On remand accused of dis­arm­ing a weapons fac­to­ry, which, amongst oth­er things, makes Hell­fire Mis­siles. The action was in protest at Israel mil­i­tary action against Gaza. (Diet unknown).

THE LECCE DEFENDANTS
The Lec­ce Defen­dants have been charged with “sub­ver­sive asso­ci­a­tion” accused of dam­ag­ing Esso petrol pumps to oppose the War on Iraq; sab­o­tag­ing the cash machines of a bank which funds an immi­gra­tion cen­tre; and tar­get­ing the multi­na­tion­al com­pa­ny Benet­ton in sup­port of Mapuche land rights activists in Chile. All of the defen­dants are cur­rent­ly either under house arrest or released on bail.

ANTIFA PRISONERS

Alek­sey Bychin, FBU OIK‑2 IK‑7 otryad No. 7, ul. Kar­nal­li­to­vaya d. 98, g. Solikam­sk Permskiy Kray, 618545 Rus­sia. Serv­ing 5 years for defend­ing him­self against neo-nazis. (Diet unknown).

Andrei Mergen­ov, FGU IZ 64/1 OKB 2 komn. 73, Up. Kutyako­va 107, 410601 Sara­tov, Rus­sia. Serv­ing 3 years for fight­ing with neo-nazis. (Diet unknown)

Tomasz Wiloszews­ki, Zak­lad Karny, Orze­chowa 5, 98–200 Sier­adz, Poland. Serv­ing 15 years for acci­den­tal­ly killing a neo-nazi whilst defend­ing him­self. (Tomasz is a veg­e­tar­i­an).

OTHER PRISONERS

Pavel Deli­don, ul. Timiryazeva‑1, FGU IK‑7, 309990 Val­uy­ki Rus­sia. Anarchist/Animal Rights activist jailed for attempt­ing to obtain wages owed to him, but which had not been paid to him by his employ­er. IMPORTANT: Pavel can only receive let­ters writ­ten in Russ­ian. He is pun­ished by the prison if he receives a let­ter not writ­ten in Russ­ian so please, only send let­ters writ­ten in Russ­ian. (Diet unknown).

Richard Sills (Address Unknown, USA). Serv­ing 15 months for bomb hoax­ing a Uni­ver­si­ty say­ing they would be tar­get­ed by the ALF if they did­n’t stop their ani­mal exper­i­ments. (Diet unknown).

Alessan­dro Set­tepani, Carcere San Michele, Via Casale, 50/A, 15122 San Michele (AL), Italy. Co-defen­dant of Ser­gio Ste­fani. Arrest­ed for steal­ing a car and then remand­ed for “Sub­ver­sive Con­spir­a­cy” and remand­ed into a prison for polit­i­cal activists. (Alessan­dro is a veg­an).

Ser­gio Maria Ste­fani, Carcere San Michele, Via Casale, 50/A, 15122 San Michele (AL), Italy. For­mer ALF pris­on­er arrest­ed for steal­ing a car and then remand­ed for “Sub­ver­sive Con­spir­a­cy” and remand­ed into a prison for polit­i­cal activists. (Ser­gio is a veg­an).

Fran Thomp­son, #1090915, CCC, 3151 Lit­ton Dri­ve, Chill­i­cuthe, MO 64601, USA. Serv­ing Life for killing, in self-defence, a stalk­er who had bro­ken into her home. Before her impris­on­ment Fran was an eco, ani­mal & anti-nuke cam­paign­er. (Fran is a veg­an).

MOVE
MOVE is an eco-rev­o­lu­tion­ary group who car­ried out protests in defence of all life. All move pris­on­ers describe them­selves as veg­e­tar­i­ans. There are cur­rent­ly eight MOVE activists in prison each serv­ing 100 years after been framed for the mur­der of a cop in 1979. 9th defen­dant, Mer­le Africa, died in prison in 1998.

Deb­bie Simms Africa (006307), Janet Hol­loway Africa (006308) and Janine Philips Africa (006309) all at: SCI Cam­bridge Springs, 451 Fuller­ton Ave, Cam­bridge Springs, PA 16403–1238, USA.

Michael Davis Africa (AM4973) and Charles Simms Africa (AM4975) both at SCI Grater­ford, PO Box 244, Grater­ford, PA 19426–0244, USA.

Edward Good­man Africa (AM4974), SCI Mahanoy, 301 Morea Rd, Frackville, PA 17932, USA.

William Philips Africa (AM4984) and Del­bert Orr Africa (AM4985) both at SCI Dal­las Draw­er K, Dal­las, PA 18612, USA.

Mumia Abu Jamal, (AM8335), SCI Greene, 175 Progress Dri­ve, Way­nes­burg PA 15370, USA. In 1981 Mumia, for­mer Black Pan­ther and vocal sup­port­er of MOVE, was framed for the mur­der of a cop. He was orig­i­nal­ly sen­tenced to death but is cur­rent­ly await­ing re-sen­tenc­ing fol­low­ing a court hear­ing in 2001.

STATEMENT ON VIOLENCE
Some peo­ple list­ed in this newslet­ter have car­ried out vio­lent actions includ­ing assault and mur­der. ‘Spir­it of Free­dom’ does not con­done vio­lence. But we are also against cen­sor­ship & believe peo­ple can decide for them­selves who they wish to sup­port.

ABOUT E.L.P. SUPPORT NETWORK
ELP is an inter­na­tion­al eco-pris­on­er sup­port net­work found­ed, in Britain, in 1993 to sup­port jailed eco-activists. We sup­port the pris­on­ers by pro­duc­ing var­i­ous reg­u­lar pris­on­er lists:

Spir­it of Free­dom is ELP’s inter­na­tion­al month­ly pris­on­er list­ing which is cir­cu­lat­ed by e‑mail.

Urgent ELP! Bul­letin is an e‑mail ser­vice that dis­trib­utes the names of any new eco-pris­on­er as soon as ELP gets their details. For more info e‑mail ELP4321@hotmail.com

On-Line Newslet­ters — ELP has a num­ber of web­sites that pro­vide news, pris­on­er lists and addi­tion­al info about ELP & the pris­on­ers.

Eng­lish lan­guage ELP Web­site
www.spiritoffreedom.org.uk

Greek lan­guage ELP Web­site
http://greekelp.blogspot.com

North Amer­i­can ELP Web­site
www.ecoprisoners.org

Turk­ish lan­guage ELP Web­site
www.geocities.com/yesilanarsi/elp.htm

ELP Extra is an e‑mail group that cir­cu­lates the details of polit­i­cal pris­on­ers, ELP learns about, who do not fall with­in the remit for sup­port by ELP. To sub­scribe to the list e‑mail ELP4321@Hotmail.com

Aus­tralian ELP.SN is our Aus­tralian con­tact. For more info e‑mail elp4321@hotmail.com

Bel­gium ELP.SN is our Bel­gium con­tact. For more info e‑mail
elp_bel@hotmail.com

Ger­man ELP.SN is a pris­on­er led ini­tia­tive run by eco-pris­on­er Mar­co Camenisch. For more info con­tact Mar­co Camenisch, Post­fach 3143, CH-8105 Regens­dorf, Switzer­land.

Greek ELP.SN is our Greek con­tact. For more info e‑mail greekelp@yahoo.gr

North Amer­i­can ELP is our North Amer­i­can con­tact. For more infor­ma­tion e‑mail naelpsn@mutualaid.org

Turkey ELP.SN is our Turk­ish con­tact. For more info e‑mail
yesilanarsi@yahoo.com