How the FBI Targeted Environmental Activists as Domestic Terrorists

In the offices of Women's Law, Daniel McGowan sits in his cubicle. Today, he's making holiday cards for donors, diligently working like any other day. Outside, the cold wind whips through the skyscrapers of midtown Manhattan. It's December 7th, 2005. Daniel Mcgowan's life is about to change forever. [McGowan: I'm getting ready to go, and I have the holiday cards in my hand, and I stand up, and I see these two guys in the entrance to the cubicle.] His past is about to catch up with him. Four federal agents enter the offices of the domestic violence non-profit. Two approach McGowan, cuff him,

and shove him out of the building. [McGowan: They say my name, and they were like, they literally closed the gap in a second, and I'm handcuffed, and they say to me "you're going back to Oregon."] The long arm of the law had finally tracked down its white whale. But McGowan wasn't the first, nor was he the last person to be detained on that cold December day. Daniel McGowan, after all, was part of an especially effective cell of eco-saboteurs that had wreaked havoc on the Pacific Northwest for years: the Earth Liberation Front. But the story doesn't end with McGowan's arrest. From the local to the national level, the search for the Earth Liberation Front would

come to reveal a fundamental incompetence of law enforcement, state overreach, and industrial scheming. The pursuit would cross multiple states and end in betrayal and death. It would paint a group that killed no one as the number one domestic terrorist threat in the United States. [Robert Mueller: terrorism is terrorism, no matter what the motive… including acts of domestic terorrism in the name of animal rights or the environment] This is the hunt for the Earth Liberation Front. Part 2: The Fall Our Changing Climate's finances aren't looking amazing. So, I want to make quick ask for your

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two nights apart. One at Oakridge Ranger Station, the second at the Detroit Ranger Station, both in Oregon. In the rubble, a ranger found the letters "ELF" scrawled in spray paint on the side of a building at the Detroit Ranger Station. Fire and property destruction on federal lands. The Earth Liberation Front had just declared war against the state. These two arsons were no longer just under the jurisdiction of local police. Sabotage on federal property meant federal agents. The FBI was immediately involved. The case was open, and the Earth Liberation Front

was now on their radar. It was time for them to get to work, except for one small problem… The ELF had lit their fires well. The federal agents couldn't find much evidence to work off of other than the burnt remains of incendiary devices at the two sites. So, they pressured the only people they knew who were connected to the Earth Liberation Front, the messengers… Craig Rosebraugh the Grand Jury It's early in the morning on a hot June day. The year is 1997. Eight months after the Earth Liberation Front set fire to the Oakridge and Detroit ranger stations. Just a month before the cell would strike again at

the Cavel West horse rendering plant in Redmond, Oregon and send a communiqué to Craig Rosebraugh claiming responsibility for the action. Today, however, Rosebraugh sits in his home office in the back of his co-op in Portland, known as the Cleveland house. It's quiet; his housemates are either out working or sleeping in. It's quiet, that is, until he hears a sharp knock at the door. Thinking it was a pesky salesperson or a church representative, Rosebraugh shuffles to the door, pushes down the latch, and two agents immediately thrust FBI badges into his face.

They ask to come in and ask him questions. Reeling from seeing two federal agents at his doorstep, and assuming they just want to talk about an Animal Liberation Front communiqué Rosebraugh had received and announced to the public, he lets them in. An act that he would quickly regret. The two agents sit Rosebraugh on his couch. For over half an hour they grill him about communiqués and illicit activities, trying to catch him in a lie. But, having now collected his wits, Rosebraugh stonewalls them. Rosebraugh sits on that couch and answers he either didn't know or didn't remember to almost all the questions the agents ask him. Because,

after all, Craig Rosebraugh is just the messenger. Annoyed, and frazzled from obtaining very little information, the two agents storm out of the house. Unfortunately, those agents were just a taste of what was to come for Rosebraugh. Over the next few months, agents parked outside Rosebraugh's house, tailed him on the way to work, and harassed him while he was gardening in his backyard. Then, early in September of 1997, another knock comes at the door, Rosebraugh once again opens the it. Deja vú. The same two agents from that fateful June day are back, except this time, they have a subpoena in hand.

Rosebraugh scans through it. A federal court was ordering him to testify before a federal grand jury about the Cavel West fire in just a few weeks. The ramification of this subpoena chilled Rosebraugh to the bone. If he didn't cooperate, he could potentially face over a year of jail time. After failing to intimidate Rosebraugh through surveillance and questioning, the cops had decided to force him into answering questions. This time under oath. It seemed the choice was jail time or snitch, but as the day of the grand jury arrived, Rosebraugh had some tricks up his sleeve to escape the bullying tactics of the state…

On October 17th, 1997, Craig Rosebraugh walks through a crowd of 40 supporters up to the steps of the US Courthouse in downtown Portland. His body is wracked with nerves. In the five weeks since he received the subpoena, Rosebraugh consulted with an attorney. He discovered that if he refused to answer the grand jury's questions or was perceived to be uncooperative by the judge, he could be imprisoned for up to a year and four months. To make matters worse, grand jury questioning is conducted in closed sessions, and witnesses are not allowed to consult a lawyer during the process. Craig Rosebraugh would be going it alone.

It's 11:00am. A U.S. Marshall escorts Rosebraugh through the courthouse into a large room. Rosebraugh sits down in a lone chair positioned in front of the 23 members of the grand jury. Their glares burn holes through Rosebraugh. It seems that the prosecutors and federal agents had prepped the jurors. According to Rosebraugh, they already consider him a guilty man. With little fanfare, the questions begin. "Are you a member of the Animal Liberation Front?" Rosebraugh settles in for the fight. He answers "No." Then they start in on the actions, asking questions like "What was

the source of the communiqué? Did you have any prior knowledge of the incident? Did anyone tell you about the incident?" Three questions in and Rosebraugh starts pleading the fifth. Conscious that at any time, the judge could deem him in contempt and throw him into jail. Question after question, Rosebraugh refuses to answer. And with each refusal, the Assistant US Attorney gets more and more agitated. The jurors question and argue with Rosebraugh about morality of the ELF and ALF. Rosebraugh later recalls that they snicker and cut off many of his responses. It soon dawns on

Rosebraugh that the grand jury is being used as an intimidation tactic by the state, and Rosebraugh calls their bluff. In their comprehensive book on Grand Juries, Marvin E. Frankel and Gary P. Naftalis write that "The opportunity to bully, to harass, to intimidate is surely present inside the grand jury room, and it has surely been exploited on too many occasions." And that's what seemed to have occurred in the grand jury room that day. After an hour and 45 minutes of questioning, however, it's over. Rosebraugh manages to run the gauntlet unscathed. By 12:45pm, he exits the

courthouse to cheers from support from the crowd below. Releasing a long breath of air, Rosebraugh smiles. It's done. He can now go back to his normal life. At least that's what he thinks. In the coming months, however, the state would stalk Craig Rosebraugh like hungry wolves. FBI and ATF agents parked across the street from Rosebraugh's home in their forest green sedan and watched his every move. Part intimidation, part surveillance, it seemed that the agents wanted Rosebraugh to know he was on thin ice. They wanted to spook him into making a wrong move. But Rosebraugh soldiered on. Together with his comrade Leslie Pickering,

they created an official North American Earth Liberation Press Office. A place where they could field communiqués from the Earth Liberation Front and liaise with press who had questions about the underground movement. Rosebraugh continued doing the work, because he had, after all, done nothing wrong except to publicly read letters from the ELF and argue for their ideological positions on TV. [Reporter: Do you think an arson will win over the American people Craig Rosebraugh: That's not the immediate goal I don't believe. The immediate goal is to cause economic damage]

But it seems the federal agents were getting fed up with finding nothing. So they slapped Rosebraugh with two more subpoenas on December 17, 1997. One to appear before a grand jury, and another to produce all evidence related to a number of Earth Liberation fires. Federal investigators were grasping at straws. Again, Rosebraugh was dragged in front of the grand jury, and again he pleaded the fifth. He would give them nothing. He would not play their games. The investigation was failing. The state was desperately trying to stop the Earth Liberation

Front. They needed to shield the businesses and property they had sworn to protect. Over the course of the next nine years, federal agents served Rosebraugh with 5 more grand jury summons, and raided his house two times. During the second raid, they completely trashed the place, even the rooms of his roommates who were not connected to Rosebraugh's movement work. But these intimidation tactics, at least in the late 1990s, was failing. Across the country, the ELF was picking up steam. Gaining momentum. Hundreds of miles south in 1998, Avalon stands on the ridgeline of Vail overlooking the raging inferno he just created. While federal

agents were stalking and subpoenaing Craig Rosebraugh, the ELF continued to burn down the infrastructure of extractive industries. In 1999, an ELF arson burned down the Boise Cascade logging company, while the offices of Michigan State University GMO researcher, Catherine Ives, were reduced to ashes. In 2000, luxury homes and construction equipment burst into flames in Bloomington, Indiana, while over ten more burned to the ground across a series of ELF arsons in Long Island. In early 2001, Avalon, McGowan and eight other ELF members destroyed

the offices of a University of Washington GMO researcher and the Jefferson Poplar research farm on the same day. ELF cells go on to claim tens more fires and actions, dealing tens of millions of dollars in property destruction. But those flames would soon be quenched. False trails It was in this boiling soup of protest, of ELF fires and violent state repression in hotbeds like Eugene, that we first meet a local Eugene cop named Greg Harvey. It's June 18, 1999, and it's Harvey's first day on the Eugene force. It's almost two years to the day when his soon-to-be colleagues chemically

tortured Jim Flynn with pepper spray, so the city could cut down a tree to build a parking garage. Very little has changed over those two years, because on the first day on the job, Greg Harvey's coworkers are tear gassing protestors taking to the streets against capitalist globalization. [Newscaster: Is there any reason why they targeted Banks?] But Harvey wasn't brought in to pepper-spray activists into submission. He was slated to be a detective for the Eugene Police Department's Special Investigations Unit. His purpose: to track down and uncover the identities of the now infamous Pacific Northwest ELF Cell. But

up until Harvey joined the force, the cops had very little useful evidence or information. So, Harvey attempted to weasel out information another way; he went undercover. In what can only be described as the most undercover-cop looking disguise you can imagine, Harvey donned a wig and tried to infiltrate the eco-anarchist and environmental activist circles of Eugene. He went to student meetings, punk gatherings, and protests. He brought a digital camera and taped people he thought might be important, and tried to map out the connections of the

Eugene organizing community. But Harvey was coming up dry. The ELF was eluding him. So, he tried a different approach. In an interview with the Intercept many years later, Harvey explains that "one of the things we were really trying to focus on was breaking the movement." And a key lever to destroying this movement of land defenders, was getting people to snitch. While Harvey paraded around in an old Jesus wig on the streets of Eugene, his counterparts at the FBI were floundering. The leaderless resistance model of the Earth Liberation Front was proving

to be an effective strategy for avoiding state backlash. With the increased media attention from national news stories like Vail or the University of Washington arsons, the FBI, the government, and industry needed a win. Authorities were stumped. Even the most promising clues - the gas cans that Avalon left behind at Vail that were found by hunters two years later - had been wiped clean of fingerprints. If the state couldn't catch these environmentalists, the goal, then, was to paint them as despicable enemies of the State. The cops needed to warp the

ELF's messaging, and to turn the public against them. The ELF were putting issues like logging and suburban sprawl into the national spotlight. Federal agents needed to turn that light around. They wanted to avert public attention away from capitalist destruction and towards the evil eco-terrorist. The media proved to be an amenable partner in this endeavor. [KATU abc: "Do you smell something burning? Well it could be houses in your neighborhood, torched by radicals who say their saving the earth"] [Seattle Mayor: "This is a fascist attack, which means a finger in Seattle's eye."]

[KATU ABC: "Some of these activists are just clueless and cruel, and then they're so smug about it"] [ABC news - "The fbi said it was the most dangerous groups in the country"] [KATU ABC: - John stossol to Craig - "You're just a clueless kid who doesn't like America"] The State, alongside the media, built up this image of the ELF as terrorists, even though not a single person was killed in over 462 actions that took place in the United States. The Earth Liberation Front perhaps struck fear in the hearts of corporations watching their bottom line,

but judging by the ELF's guidelines its actions never sought to terrorize everyday people. The goal was to slow down extraction by destroying the tools causing that extraction. Regardless, the FBI used terms like "The Family" and "The Book Club" to paint the ELF, and particularly the Pacific Northwest ELF cell, as mafia-like, as a cult. As evil criminals. [McGowan: "The Family" is a fictional term used by the United States attorney's office to talk about the defendants- the idea that the group had a name is patently absurd…When you say "the

family," what comes to mind is the manson family or the mafia… When you call us the family, you make us sound like a cult- when in fact I'm just a normal fucking person that just gave a shit] Once the public's image of the Earth Liberation Front was tainted, their anti-capitalist, anti-extraction, environmental messaging could be pushed to the side. The FBI, then, could use any means necessary to hunt "eco-terrorists" down. [Bron Taylor: if you can label a group a terrorist, it's then not that hard to make the general public quiescent when you go out and exterminate them] 12:04[Bill Goodman: the legal definition of terrorism is very clear- what is says is that

most civil disobedience is terrorism- so rosa parks and martin luther king are terrorists] But crafting an anti-ELF narrative was only half the battle. By the summer of 2001, Greg Harvey and federal agents were still fumbling around in the dark. They had made very little progress in their investigation. So instead, they decided to terrorize the Eugene activist community. They started knocking on doors, going to community gathering places, and neighborhoods where the list of 30 to 40 people they suspected might be part of the Earth Liberation Front hung out. Their goal,

as one investigator told The Intercept, was to "induce a little bit of paranoia." Planting "some seeds of doubt" to start members of the ELF thinking "Are they on to us? Are they watching me? Are they on my phone? Are they monitoring my email account?" But this strategy was unsuccessful, at least initially. Despite the constant surveillance and aggressive tactics across the Eugene environmental organizing community, the police and federal agents failed to shake anything loose, and the property destruction of the Earth Liberation Front was spreading. That is, until

two planes hit the World Trade Center and another tore into the Pentagon on September 11th, 2001. Things would never be the same for the Earth Liberation Front. Politicians and industry capitalized on the horrors of 9/11. Just a day after the attacks, while the dust was still settling in New York City, Don Young, a house representative for Alaska at the time, speculated that "there's a strong possibility" the attacks were perpetrated by eco-terrorists. Setting the tone for the backlash against ecoterrorism that would piggyback off of the broader war on terror that the United States would wage…

A month after 9/11, the Patriot act became law. [Play clip of Bush signing the patriot act] Purportedly, the Patriot act sought to step up US national security against external threats, but in reality it also meant copious resources to hunt the enemy within. State repression and invasion of privacy dramatically increased. [SourceCode anchor: The Patriot Act became law in October of 2001… That act has been used to justify warrantless spying on the American people] Terrorism became front of mind for the American public, and for the captains of industry in the Pacific Northwest, this was the opportunity of a lifetime. Now that terrorism was a hot-button issue, they could finally push the state into high

gear to protect their property and hunt down the eco-saboteurs they had long viewed as terrorists. The Patriot Act, especially its newly expanded definition of domestic terrorism in section 802, was just the lubricant local cops, federal agents, and corporations needed. [SourceCode anchor: Because as long as section 802 of the Patriot act remains in effect, engaging in activism or dissent, particularly pro-environmental dissent, redefines you as a terrorist.] The U.S. government was about to bring the full weight of its power against the Earth Liberation Front. This looming government crackdown-a campaign of surveillance,

prosecution, and intimidation aimed at environmental activists-would soon send shockwaves through activist groups, kicking off what's known as the Green Scare. The Tale of "Free" A year before, on June 16, 2000, the signs of what would become known as the Green Scare were already emerging. That night, Jeff Luers, known to his friends as "Free," and Craig "Critter" Marshall, sneak up to the Romania Chevrolet dealership, under the cover of the stars. It's 1:00am. The two move quietly through the rows of trucks.

Unbeknownst to either of them, Luers and Marshall were being followed. Greg Harvey and his cohorts' tactic of constant surveillance and paranoia had finally paid off. Luers and Marshall light three Silverado trucks on fire. As the cars burn, Free and Critter flee the scene, only to be caught moments later by the agents tailing them. For the Eugene Police Department, it felt as though they had finally caught a break. They had finally shackled the Earth Liberation Front. Except for one small problem. Jeff Luers and Craig Marshall didn't have any connection to the ELF cell the Eugene police were hunting. They were just

ecoanarchists frustrated with inaction on global warming and overconsumption. [Jeff Luers: We're the number one polluter in the world… Over all, the majority of pollution that comes from the United States, comes from passenger trucks and vehicles. I mean we have almost 250 million of them, and you take SUVs into consideration as being the number one polluter in that vehicle class. Well, those are my reasons right there.] Regardless of his reasons, the cops threw Jeff Luers in jail, held him there until his trial (and subsequent sentencing) which was set for June 11, 2001. A fateful timing, as it would, unbeknownst

to Luers, land just a few months after another fire that would change the tone of his case. As Luers sat in his jail cell awaiting his sentencing for setting fire to three trucks, and the Eugene Police Department celebrated the arrest, the ELF struck in retribution. On March 30, 2001 five members, including Avalon and Kevin Tubbs, finished what Luers had started. The plan was simple, Avalon waited in the van, Kevin Tubbs was the lookout, while three others placed pans filled with gasoline under a number of SUVs.

The three then draped fuel-soaked rags between each pan, connecting them in a daisy chain, much like Daniel McGowan would do at Jefferson Poplar Farm two months later. They strike a match, and soon 35 Chevys are on fire. The next morning, a communiqué lands in Craig Rosebraugh's inbox. It reads: "Sucking the land dry, gas-guzzling SUVs are at the forefront of this vile imperialistic culture's caravan towards self-destruction." and "The fire that burns within Free and Critter burns within all of us and cannot be extinguished by locking them up." This retribution, however, backfired. When 35 SUVs burned down at the same Chevy dealership

Luers had attacked a year before, the state made an example of him. Jeff Luer's property destruction was remolded into domestic terrorism and connected to the many other ELF actions. So, While Critter managed to get off with a plea deal for 5 and a half years, the judge sentenced Luers to 22 years and 8 months in prison. An unheard-of sentencing for a comparably small arson, especially considering that arson at most would get you five to eight years in prison. The sentence was so long, because the judge tacked on a "terrorist" enhancement to Luers' sentence.

[Jeff Luers: I'm not really sure I stood much of a chance] [Luers' dad: We don't necessarily agree with all of Jeff's philosophy's and ideologies. But it's our belief that in a democratic society, we have a right to those. Quite frankly, we think that the majority of Jeff's punishment is being heaped upon him not for his crime, but for his ideology.] "Free" was no longer free. The fires at Romania Chevrolet would mark a crucial turn in the story of the Pacific Northwest Earth Liberation Front cell. Not only did they signal a marked increase in the repression of ecological saboteurs and one of the first crackdowns of the Green Scare, but it was there, a year later, that Detective Greg Harvey would

finally stumble into an incongruity that would break the case wide open. The Shield of Capital As the rubble cleared from the World Trade Center attacks, and the ELF continued to mount attacks against property and capitalist symbols, the state shifted into high gear. The cops needed to protect the interests of capitalists. As reporting from The Intercept reveals, the "FBI and Justice Department collaborated with a range of industry groups including Americans for Medical Progress, the Fur Commission, the National Board of Fur Farm Organizations, the Foundation for Biomedical Research, and the American Feed

Industry Association," to repress animal rights and environmental groups. Throughout the 1990s, corporations were getting hammered by attacks by the Animal and Earth Liberation Fronts, and pushed heavily for the government to put an end to the reign of property destruction, which, again, had not killed a single person. The threat, it seemed, was to the profits of corporations. This pressure and lobbying gave rise to the 1992 Animal Enterprise Protection Act, which, as journalist Alleen Brown explains, "was aimed at anyone who physically disrupted or conspired

to disrupt an animal enterprise by intentionally damaging or causing the loss of its property. It created a legal pathway to imprison a broad range of saboteurs and their allies." But as industrial sabotage continued to mount with fires at Vail, Superior Lumber, and Long Island, the barons of industry needed more. The Animal Enterprise Protection Act allowed the state to characterize ecological direct action as criminal, but this was only effective if they could capture those dissidents. The corporations needed results. 9/11 would inject newfound life into this manhunt.

By 2002, a newfound anti-terror verve swept the halls of Congress. Politicians, like Oregon representative Greg Walden, who received campaign funding from logging companies like Georgia Pacific and Willamette Industries, capitalized on this momentum. On February 12, 2002, the congressional subcommittee on Forests and Health commenced a session titled "Eco-Terrorism and Lawlessness on the National Forests." The witness stand was full of industrial big wigs from Vail, federal agents, and logging and industry sympathizers. The hearing was a sham.

A piece of propaganda characterizing the Earth Liberation Front as terrorists and industrial extractivists as helpless victims. During the hearing, Greg Walden was clear with his attacks, "Let us call ELF and ALF for what they truly are: terrorist organizations. Their combatants wear no uniform. They blend with the civilian population. They destroy private and government property." And a representative from Washington argues: "How best to deal with this home-grown brand of Al Qaeda? I propose that we use the model that has worked so well in Afghanistan." During the hearing,

the FBI was taking notes. When asked by a member of Congress whether federal agents were devoting time to catching the ELF, the deputy director of the FBI Jim Jarboe, announced "The No. 1 priority in the Domestic Terrorism Program, which I run, is ALF/ELF." That's right. Two environmental groups, which had killed zero people, were now the number one domestic terror threat in the United States. The only person requested at the hearing with any connection to this domestic terror threat, to the Earth Liberation Front, was Craig Rosebraugh. Rosebraugh was not invited to

the hearing for his arguments, he was there to put a face to these so-called eco-terrorists. Although he refused to attend, he did submit a letter for the record. In a telling section, he writes "A major hypocrisy exists when the U.S. government labels an organization such as the Earth Liberation Front a terrorist group while simultaneously failing to acknowledge its own terrorist history… If the U.S. government is truly concerned with eradicating terrorism in the world, then that effort must begin with abolishing U.S. imperialism."

In the aftermath of 9/11, the tide of anti-terror sentiment, and more particularly the Patriot Act, however, didn't just lead to subcommittee hearings and politicians getting on soapboxes. It also meant an influx of resources funneled towards cops and counterterrorism divisions. [McGowan: What happened is that 9/11 happened. When 9/11 happened and joint terrorism task forces were established between Oregon State Police, Eugene Police, ATF like all the different law enforcements.] Ongoing investigations on the Earth Liberation Front, like Greg Harvey's, were brought together and infused with cash.

[Money essentially just buys staff time]. And this new show of force against eco saboteurs across the country would soon become known as Operation Backfire. An operation that would come down hard on a group of people for burning industrial property in defense of the planet. The war on terror had turned its spotlight on the Earth Liberation Front. A movement that hadn't killed anyone and was, in the group's eyes, attempting to save the lives of animals, plants, and human beings. In doing so, the US state and its law

enforcement agents revealed one of their core directives: to protect the property and profits of capitalists. From its origins patrolling for runaway enslaved people in the American south, to breaking up strikes by murdering workers throughout the 19th and 20th century, to the COINTELPRO program that assassinated left wing leaders like Fred Hampton of the Black Panthers, policing is used to eliminate, sideline, and detain anyone who threatens corporate extraction. Operation Backfire was just another iteration of this history. But little did federal agents and local officers know, they would soon be chasing ghosts.

The Dissolution of the Cell By 2002, the FBI were hunting a cell that no longer existed, at least in the Pacific Northwest. In the aftermath of the double attack on Jefferson Poplar and the University of Washington, Daniel McGowan was feeling conflicted about the group. Some felt they had gone too far, some felt like it wasn't enough, others just wanted to focus on other organizing projects. But it was ultimately ideological disagreements that drove the final wedges between those in the cell. At what would become the final meeting of the Pacific Northwest Earth Liberation Front group, some wanted to discuss

the idea of assassinating barons of industry. A suggestion that would leave the cell in splinters. [Daniel McGowan: The last circle meeting basically cleaved between people that seemingly wanted to talk about it. Not even, like, plan it, but they were like "we should talk about it" and the people that were repulsed by it. And, really, that, like, ideological divide is what ended it. That was it.] The dissolution of the Pacific Northwest cell, however, did not mean the end of the Earth Liberation Front. Indeed, the largest attack under the ELF name had yet to come.

The Snitch It was in the midst of this falling out, a tremendous amount of resources was poured into the investigation into the Earth Liberation Front cell. Oregon law enforcement were handed money, personnel, and time, which they used to look back through old cases that had gone cold. ["We would take a cold case approach" and worked just the 35 cars burned down in Romania Chevy case." We came together and decided that we would take a cold-case approach on one arson] That's assistant US attorney Kirk Engdall, interviewed for the documentary If A Tree Falls. He adds, they took this approach

[To see if we could turn any suspects in that particular arson. And the arson we chose was one that occurred in the city of Eugene, and it was the Joe Romania Truck Center arson, wherein which 35 SUVs Were burned to the ground.] With just the Romania dealership fires in their sites, they worked the old case, and discovered something unusual. [Greg Harvey: The night of Romania, Jake Ferguson, was accused of stealing a truck.] Greg Harvey, Engdall, and the Federal agents thought they had cracked it. For them, the stolen truck was the getaway car, and Jacob Ferguson was one of the perpetrators. Cut and

dry. Except for the fact that Jacob Ferguson had nothing to do with the Romania fires. It was a coincidence. A coincidence that would spark a chain of events leading to betrayal and death. Those working the case didn't know that, so they tailed Ferguson, pressured his friends with grand jury subpoenas much like they did with Craig Rosebraugh, and surveilled him ceaselessly. They let his paranoia build. [harvey or engdall talking about how they got him paranoid] Once the cops were satisfied Ferguson was sufficiently stewed, they hauled him into the United States attorney's office. Jacob Ferguson, the man who dug trenches shoulder to shoulder with

Avalon at Warner Creek, who helped plan the Vail fires, who was an active member of the ELF cell in the Pacific Northwest, was questioned for a crime he didn't even commit. Prosecutors and the FBI suspected he had a hand in just a few arsons, but didn't have the evidence to connect him to it. [Greg Harvey: "Could we have really put him away for a long time? At that point, probably not"] So, the FBI and US attorneys lied. They told him that he could get a life sentence for the arsons, and that they could connect him to the ELF cell, which, at that point, they couldn't. Finally,

they drove the knife in deeper. They preyed on Ferguson's connection with his son, which assistant US attorney, Kirk Engdall describes in the documentary If A Tree Falls [Kirk Engdall: I described to him, tried to paint an image of him walking through the forest on a road, some sunny, summer afternoon, hand-in-hand with his son, instead of looking at his son through bulletproof glass.] After hearing all of this, Ferguson was rattled. He and his attorney excused themselves from the room and within minutes came to a decision that would denounce

all he had stood for over the last decade. Ferguson was about to betray the ELF cell. He walked back into the conference room and started talking. To save himself from prison time, Ferguson told the federal agents all about the ranger stations he set on fire in Oakridge and Detroit, the planning of the Vail inferno, Cavel West, and more. The cops sat stunned. Ferguson was their smoking gun, and he was way more connected than they assumed. [play clip of cops explaining that he knew way more than he assumed] Operation Backfire blew wide open, and it wasn't because of the hard work of the FBI,

or the genius of a cop, but instead it was because of the betrayal of a single man. In the eyes of the courts, however, Ferguson's testimony would be questionable. His checkered past and struggles with heroin addiction, would, the agents of the state believed, put a bitter taste in the mouth of judges and juries. So, Ferguson would have to go one step further than his already egregious snitching betrayal. He was going to wear a wire… [play transition music] The Fire in San Diego Meanwhile, down the west coast of the U.S., in San Diego's upscale University Town Centre neighborhood,

a massive construction project was underway. Covering 34 acres, the private developer was in the midst of building 1,500 luxury apartment condos. Suburban sprawl had come to San Diego, at least according to a newly emerged California Earth Liberation Front cell. This could not stand. So, in the middle of the night on August 1st, 2003 the ELF set fire to a 206 unit building. [play news clip describing the fire]

As the blaze rose higher and higher, 400 people needed to evacuate the surrounding buildings. The flames eventually reach as high as 200 feet into the air- showering the sky in flames, denouncing the reach of urban sprawl in a cloud of sparks. Sparks that threatened to start a wildfire in the dry San Diego climate flew everywhere. Luckily, no brambles caught fire. But the flames took their toll on the condo complex. The total damages were estimated to be $50 million. Over the sprawling inferno, the saboteurs hung a banner with a simple message: "You build it, we burn it. ELF." But they weren't done. Seemingly,

the same group would attack again three weeks later, this time they set fire to 125 SUVs in Los Angeles. A month after that, 3 more luxury condos would burn to the ground. Betraying Friends As this San Diego cell burst onto the scene with a massive inferno, by 2003, the cell in the Pacific Northwest had all but gone quiet. Daniel Mcgowan moved back to New York, closer to where he grew up in Queens, and was still active in the animal and eco activist community. Chelsea Gerlach, who went by Country Girl, traveled to Portland where she made a living DJing at night clubs.

Seattle, who's real name was Joseph Dibee, put his engineering knowledge to work at Microsoft, while Bill Rodgers shed the name of Avalon, and settled in Prescott, Arizona where he opened up Catalyst Infoshop, a community space and bookshop for activists, anarchists, and organizers. Many from the cell put their ELF past behind them, de-escalating their tactics, engaging with their community, or just fully unplugging from lives of activism. For over two years, McGowan, Rodgers, and other from the cell lived with this massive secret hanging over their head.

[McGowan: 52:26 - I was living above ground with a fucking huge secret] Then one day in 2005, Daniel McGowan attended an animal rights conference in Manhattan. All was normal, until he bumped into Jacob Ferguson. [McGowan describes meeting] Little did McGowan know, but Ferguson had already visited a number of other former ELF members to "reminisce" about the good old days. To assure that he never saw the inside of a federal prison, Ferguson entrapped and sold out his friends. McGowan and Ferguson went on a walk [McGowan: I knew something was off"]. Underneath his clothes, Ferguson wore a recording device, and over the

course of their chat, he nudged McGowan to talk about the actions that they'd taken 4 years ago. [Ferguson: Lets go left, we can kick it at a park bench] [McGowan: Sure] [McGowan: I'm pretty firmly convinced that if there were ever any hair or fingerprints… it already woulda hit.] [Ferguson: Right] [McGowan: As long as people never try to rat each other out, then it'll be fine] And just like that, Ferguson had sealed McGowan's fate. To save his own skin, Jacob Ferguson threw Daniel McGowan into the den of wolves. The Green Scare From 2000 to 2015, 70 environmental activists would be arrested and sentenced, in what would come to be known as the Green Scare. 18 of those arrested would be charged as terrorists. State backlash was

fierce against those trying to defend their environments from the predation of capital. ["What the patriot act has had the effect of doing, is taking something like arsons that might have been punished by a few years in prison and raised them to bona fide terrorism."] During the Green Scare cops detained and intimidated the environmental community across the United States through grand jury subpoenas and prison time. In 2003, Christopher McIntosh was slapped with an eight-year sentence for setting a fire that dealt $5,000 in damages to a McDonalds. In 2006, longtime Animal Rights activist, Rod Coronado,

was charged with a felony and thrown in jail for describing an incendiary device in a public speech. That same year, a paid FBI informant, Zoe Elizabeth Voss, taught 3 green anarchists how to make firebombs and encouraged them to commit acts of sabotage against a local utility and dam. This was entrapment, plain and simple. And after the FBI felt that Voss had collected enough evidence, they swooped in for the arrests. One of the defendants who was entrapped, Eric McDavid, was sentenced to 20 years in prison for an operation that Voss allegedly spearheaded and encouraged.

[Newscaster: Eric McDavids role in the plot is unclear, but the defense is arguing that his love interest, an FBI informant, is a major factor] One by one, radical environmental activists were picked off. And as the American government took down these supposedly dangerous environmental terrorists at home, they were simultaneously flattening Iraq and Afghanistan abroad. Committing acts of property destruction and terror at levels that far outstripped the ELF in the name of oil and profit. Soldiers with stars and stripes mowed down civilian non-combatants, while bombs from

Raytheon and Lockheed Martin flattened whole cities and towns. [XX play clip of newscast] 600,000 dead at the hands of the U.S. chasing after "weapons of mass destruction" that never existed. Meanwhile, a few people who burned down a ski resort in defense of the lynx or a logging headquarters to protect an ancient forest are deemed the number one domestic terrorist threat in the country. Downfall from within But ultimately, the downfall of the ELF came from the inside. Jacob Ferguson's betrayal was the first, but it wasn't the last. The land defenders would soon turn to informants.

On December 7th, 2006, federal agents across the country raided businesses and homes. Chelsea Gerlach, Daniel McGowan, Bill Rodgers, and three others were shackled and brought in for questioning. Even more arrests would follow in the subsequent months. The notorious Earth Liberation Front cell had finally been apprehended. [press conference explaining that they had captured ELF cell] But the wire taps and Ferguson's word weren't enough. So, federal agents did what they did best. They interrogated each of the defendants and claimed they could put them away for years with the evidence they had, but if they co-operated and told their story, they would get off with

a smaller sentence. Many caved- giving up their former comrades to escape a long life in jail. [the FBI definitely did their homework they had everyone psychologically profiled they found the weak people they found the people they could push] [McGowan: Chelsea was arrested on December 7th, and by January 26th, she was ratting on everyone she knew and the remaining year, she was meeting with all the co-defendents trying to convince them to rat…She went to the national forest to dig up stuff to turn in her boyfriend and her ex-boyfriend]

With Jacob Ferguson as the catalyst, those who had long said they would never snitch on their comrades told everything. Chelsea Gerlach, Suzanne Savoie, the lookout at Superior Lumber, and Kevin Tubbs, and five others told the cops everything they knew. As the dust settled, only four members of the cell refused to co-operate, while four more fled the country. But the fight, and indeed the story of ELF didn't end with the arrests. The sentencing would come down, and the Green scare would reach its peak. 11 people faced decades in prison, and one of them would not make it out alive…

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