June 11: International Day of Solidarity with Marie Mason and Eric McDavid

June 11th began as an inter­na­tion­al day of sol­i­dar­i­ty with long-term eco-pris­on­er Jeff “Free” Luers in 2004. At the time, Jeff was serv­ing 22+ years. Infu­ri­at­ed by the envi­ron­men­tal dev­as­ta­tion he saw occur­ring on a glob­al scale, Jeff torched three SUVs at a car deal­er­ship in Eugene, OR. The sen­tence imposed on him was meant to send a clear mes­sage to oth­ers who were angered by capitalism’s con­tin­ued war on the Earth’s ecosys­tems – and to those who were will­ing to take action to put a stop to it. Jeff is, after all, not alone in his con­cerns about cli­mate change, fos­sil fuels, pol­lu­tion and genet­i­cal­ly mod­i­fied organ­isms.

After years of strug­gle, Jeff and his legal team won a reduc­tion in his sen­tence and he was released from prison in Decem­ber 2009. But in the years inter­ven­ing Jeff’s arrest and release, the FBI had car­ried out a series of indict­ments and arrests in an attempt to dev­as­tate the rad­i­cal envi­ron­men­tal and anar­chist com­mu­ni­ties. Two of the peo­ple caught up in this mael­strom of repres­sion were Eric McDavid and Marie Mason.

Eric McDavid was arrest­ed in Jan­u­ary 2006 after being entrapped by a paid gov­ern­ment infor­mant – “Anna” – and was charged with a sin­gle count of con­spir­a­cy. Eric – who nev­er car­ried out any actions and was accused of what amounts to “thought crime” – refused to coop­er­ate with the state and took his case to tri­al. After a tri­al fraught with errors, the jury con­vict­ed Eric. He was sub­se­quent­ly sen­tenced to almost 20 years in prison. More infor­ma­tion on Eric’s case can be found at www.supporteric.org

Marie Mason was arrest­ed in March 2008 after her for­mer part­ner – Frank Ambrose – turned infor­mant for the FBI. Fac­ing a life sen­tence if she went to tri­al, Marie accept­ed a plea bar­gain in Sep­tem­ber 2008, admit­ting her involve­ment in the burn­ing of an office con­nect­ed to GMO research and the destruc­tion of a piece of log­ging equip­ment. At her sen­tenc­ing in Feb­ru­ary the fol­low­ing year, she received a sen­tence of almost 22 years. More infor­ma­tion on Marie’s case can be found at www.supportmariemason.org

Marie Mason and Eric McDavid share the unfor­tu­nate dis­tinc­tion of hav­ing the longest stand­ing sen­tences of any envi­ron­men­tal pris­on­ers in the Unit­ed States. Please join us in an inter­na­tion­al day of sol­i­dar­i­ty with Marie Mason, Eric McDavid, and oth­er long-term anar­chist pris­on­ers on every June 11th. This is a time to remem­ber our friends who are in prison – who are con­tin­u­ing their strug­gles on the inside. This is a time to con­tin­ue and strength­en the very work for which Eric and Marie are now serv­ing so much time – to strug­gle against cap­i­tal­ism, eco­log­i­cal dev­as­ta­tion, and the ever more dif­fuse forms of con­trol in this prison soci­ety.

Free Marie and Eric! Free all pris­on­ers!