Humboldt Forest Defense updates

ACTIVISTS WIN A ROUND: The legal team representing nine forest activists who were pepper-sprayed in 1997 won another big legal victory Monday, after the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear an appeal brought by Humboldt County's attorneys. The court's action meant that Judge Vaughn Walker -- whom the activists have accused of bias -- will be prevented from conducting the trial in the case, scheduled to begin on Sept. 7 at the Federal District Court in San Francisco. The activists' lawsuit against the county seeks damages for three incidents in which sheriff's deputies swabbed pepper spray directly into the eyes of protesters. Walker dismissed the suit in 1998, after a jury that heard it reached a split decision; the 9th Circuit later ordered it to be re-tried.


FASTING FOR THE FOREST: Earth First! activist Naomi Wagner, who this week began a 40-day jail sentence for resisting arrest during a logging protest in Freshwater last March, said she will fast during her imprisonment. Joining the 58-year-old Wagner in the fast, outside the courthouse, will be fellow activist Jeanette Jungers, a Eureka teacher. "We are fasting to focus maximum attention on the fate of the forest, especially the old growth, at the hands of Maxxam/Pacific Lumber Co.," the women said in a statement. If the trees were houses, they said, "they would be protected as historical monuments." Wagner, a Petrolia resident, and Jungers chained themselves to the base of a redwood when the Pacific Lumber Co. began removing tree-sitters from its land off Greenwood Heights Road in March 2003. Wagner was acquitted of trespassing but the appeal on her conviction for resisting arrest was denied.

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