Part of the Series
The Whole World Is Watching: NATO in Chicago
Police at the NATO demonstrations in Chicago, May 18, 2012. (Photo: Zach Roberts / GregPalast.com)It was a solemn, tense scene on May 19 inside the courtroom at the Circuit Court of Cook County, where the group of three activists initially arrested in a late-night raid ahead of the NATO summits in Chicago, and now being referred to simply as the “NATO 3,” heard the charges leveled against them.
NATO 3 has become the moniker for three activists who arrived in Chicago to protest the NATO Summit – Brian Church, 22, of Fort Lauderdale, Florida; Jared Chase, 27, of Keene, New Hampshire; and Brent Betterly, 24, of Massachusetts.
They now face charges of “conspiring to commit domestic terrorism during the NATO summit” and “plotting to attack President Obama’s Chicago campaign headquarters, the Chicago mayor’s home and police stations.”
The three shared expressionless faces in the courtroom as they received their bail amount at a hearing, a lump sum of $1.5 million in a Southwest side Chicago criminal court.
They were part of a broader police raid, which took place close to midnight on May 17. Nine activists in Chicago for the summit from around the country were arrested by police and kept for up to 48 hours without charge. Six activists were eventually released.
According to CNN, their official charges read as: “material support for terrorism, conspiracy to commit terrorism, and possession of explosives or incendiary devices. They face up to possibly 85 years in prison if proven guilty on all charges.
“The three men also possessed or built improvised explosive or incendiary devices, a mortar gun, swords, a hunting bow, throwing stars, and knives with brass-knuckle handles,” CNN further explained.
Michael Deutsch, representing the NATO 3 and employed by the National Lawyers Guild and the Peoples’ Law Office, has alleged entrapment and possibly more as the activists charged with terrorism see their first day in court on May 22.
“We believe these are fabricated charges that are based on police informants and provocateurs,” said Deutsch. “This is a common pattern for people protesting. We know there were two police informants who infiltrated the group and we believe they’re the ones who provoked this and they’re the ones who had the illegal activity and the illegal materials. That’s our understanding.”
“Why would police do such a thing?,” Deutsch was asked in a press gathering in the aftermath of the bail hearing.
His response: “To discredit protesters that come to the city and to make it seem like the police are under attack when people are peacefully protesting.” Inside the courtroom, Deutsch said, “This is just propaganda to create a climate of fear. My clients came to peacefully protest.”
Entrapment, legally defined, is “when [a person] is induced or persuaded by law enforcement officers or their agents to commit a crime that he had no previous intent to commit; and the law as a matter of policy forbids conviction in such a case.”
Deutsch also said that there were two police informants that infiltrated the group, and “we believe they’re the ones that provoked this.”
The ACLU of Massachusett’s blog Privacy SOS, in a post on the charges against the NATO Three, brought up several other well-known cases of entrapment.
During the Republican National Convention in 2008, the FBI arrested a man for attempts to make Molotov cocktails during the convention. The blog notes that:“While this smells similar to the RNC 2008 molotov cocktail charges, Chicago police have produced no actual evidence of bomb-making or illegal activity in the case of the NATO 3.”
Eight activists in Cleveland, Ohio involved with Occupy were also arrested for conspiring to blow up a bridge. In that case, an FBI informant talked the plotters into blowing up the bridge, led them to an arms merchant and drove them to the bomb site, reported Rick Perlstein.
How the case of the NATO Three will develop remains to be seen, but civil liberties watchers are keeping a close eye on the case as it develops.
Truthout Is Preparing to Meet Trump’s Agenda With Resistance at Every Turn
Dear Truthout Community,
If you feel rage, despondency, confusion and deep fear today, you are not alone. We’re feeling it too. We are heartsick. Facing down Trump’s fascist agenda, we are desperately worried about the most vulnerable people among us, including our loved ones and everyone in the Truthout community, and our minds are racing a million miles a minute to try to map out all that needs to be done.
We must give ourselves space to grieve and feel our fear, feel our rage, and keep in the forefront of our mind the stark truth that millions of real human lives are on the line. And simultaneously, we’ve got to get to work, take stock of our resources, and prepare to throw ourselves full force into the movement.
Journalism is a linchpin of that movement. Even as we are reeling, we’re summoning up all the energy we can to face down what’s coming, because we know that one of the sharpest weapons against fascism is publishing the truth.
There are many terrifying planks to the Trump agenda, and we plan to devote ourselves to reporting thoroughly on each one and, crucially, covering the movements resisting them. We also recognize that Trump is a dire threat to journalism itself, and that we must take this seriously from the outset.
After the election, the four of us sat down to have some hard but necessary conversations about Truthout under a Trump presidency. How would we defend our publication from an avalanche of far right lawsuits that seek to bankrupt us? How would we keep our reporters safe if they need to cover outbreaks of political violence, or if they are targeted by authorities? How will we urgently produce the practical analysis, tools and movement coverage that you need right now — breaking through our normal routines to meet a terrifying moment in ways that best serve you?
It will be a tough, scary four years to produce social justice-driven journalism. We need to deliver news, strategy, liberatory ideas, tools and movement-sparking solutions with a force that we never have had to before. And at the same time, we desperately need to protect our ability to do so.
We know this is such a painful moment and donations may understandably be the last thing on your mind. But we must ask for your support, which is needed in a new and urgent way.
We promise we will kick into an even higher gear to give you truthful news that cuts against the disinformation and vitriol and hate and violence. We promise to publish analyses that will serve the needs of the movements we all rely on to survive the next four years, and even build for the future. We promise to be responsive, to recognize you as members of our community with a vital stake and voice in this work.
Please dig deep if you can, but a donation of any amount will be a truly meaningful and tangible action in this cataclysmic historical moment.
We’re with you. Let’s do all we can to move forward together.
With love, rage, and solidarity,
Maya, Negin, Saima, and Ziggy