Profiling: How the FBI Tracks Eco-Terror Suspects

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http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/111305H.shtml

 

 

 

 

Profiling: How the FBI Tracks Eco-Terror Suspects

By Michael Isikoff

Newsweek

 

21 November 2005 Issue

 

The FBI collected detailed data on political activities and Web

postings of suspected members of a tiny environmentalist commune in

southern California two years ago as part of a high-profile

counterterrorism probe, bureau records show. Facing further new

disclosures about the matter, the bureau last week agreed to settle a

lawsuit and to pay $100,000 to Josh Connole, a 27-year-old ex-commune

member who had been arrested-and later released-on suspicions he was

one of the eco-terrorists who had firebombed SUV dealerships in the

summer of 2003. But the bureau's rare concession of error, expected to

be publicly announced soon, could bring new attention to what

civil-liberties groups say is a disturbing trend: the stepped-up

monitoring of domestic political activity by FBI counter-terror agents.

 

Connole, an anti-Iraq-war protester, had been living in a Pomona,

Calif., vegan commune when a Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF)

targeted him after arson attacks on four nearby Hummer dealers-acts

blamed on the shadowy Earth Liberation Front (ELF), which the bureau

considers a domestic terror group. The case was considered serious

enough that Director Robert Mueller briefed President Bush. After

concluding Connole looked like a lanky, goateed suspect caught on

surveillance tape, agents arrested him at gunpoint on Sept. 12, 2003,

then raided the commune. After being interrogated and held for four

days, he was released. Another suspect with no connection to the

commune was later arrested and convicted.

 

In their wrongful-arrest lawsuit, Connole's lawyers demanded to

know why the FBI looked at Connole in the first place. Court documents

show agents were initially tipped off by a neighbor to " suspicious "

activity at the commune the night of the attacks. (In fact, says

Connole, members were simply helping one of the residents move out.)

Agents placed the commune under surveillance and developed a political

profile of the residents, discovering the owner of the house and his

father " have posted statements on websites opposing the use of fossil

fuels, " one doc reads. Another says the owner had ties to a local

chapter of Food Not Bombs, an " anarcho-vegan food distribution group. "

Among activities flagged in bureau docs: the father of the owner had

conducted a " one man' daily protest " outside a Toyota office, was

interviewed for an article called " Dude, Where's my Electric Car!? "

and posted info on a Web site announcing " Stop Norway Whaling! "

Critics say such info has been increasingly collected by agents since

the then Attorney General John Ashcroft relaxed FBI guidelines in

2002. " How does advocacy of electric cars become the basis for

suspicion? " asks Bill Paparian, Connole's lawyer. Bureau officials say

they collect such info only when there might be ties to violence or

terrorism. A spokesman declined to comment on Connole's case, saying

that because no settlement has been entered into the court record, it

remains " a pending legal matter. "

 

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