Victory for Forest Activists in Pepper Spray Trial

San Francisco - After three days of deliberations, the Federal jury returned a verdict finding that Humboldt County Sheriffs used excessive force when they daubed liquid pepper spray into the eyes of forest activists. The eight activist plaintiffs were arrested in 1987 at three separate protests in Humboldt County as they worked to save the Headwaters Forest from logging.

The unprecedented application of pepper spray on passive, immobile protesters was part of a "get tough policy" implemented by the County as more and more people protested liquidation logging of redwoods in Northern California. The activists injured by the sheriffs’ applications of pepper spray sued the Humboldt County Sheriffs' Dept. and Eureka Police in 1998, arriving at the current trial in federal court in San Francisco after two previous trials that ended without verdict.

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