Account of Eastbay car caravan to homes of Huntingdon customer employees

This got in newspapers such as USA Today where it was read by people in airports everywhere. http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/biotech/2004-08-21-biotech-protests_x.htm
Personal editorial note: I suggest that this approach with well-advertised events is very high risk, given the current FBI focus on ALF and the SHAC members specifically. If you only advertise your event on indymedia, usually perhaps <10 people will show up, but the media and police do scan these pages. Here's an example - during this past week I heard a quiet noise outside after midnight and looked outside, and a truck with crane on the back had someone doing something with wires on the pole outside, and right after this, people's cable internet and cable TV connections in the building were all down. No one else besides me noticed the truck or would have known what occurred. We assumed that it was the cable company mistakenly cutting the wrong cable when trying to cut off neighboring people who didn't pay their internet bill, but what it turned out to be was the FCC. Comcast said that FCC agents troll the streets with instruments searching for connections with high 'signal leakage' where radiofrequencies apparently emit from cable internet connections and interfere with police radio and air traffic control, so they just cut the cables and run, and they are so unprofessional that they do this after midnight and don't leave a note explaining or anything. If Federal Agents are capable of such stealthy operations, I think animal rights enthusiasts could be too.

Sunday, August 22, 2004 - 3:36:59 AM PST

Protesters, police get lost in chase

Animal rights activists briefly detained, warned

to stay out of Oakland Hills

By Glenn Chapman, STAFF WRITER

OAKLAND -- A small group of animal rights activists and a team of police officers played cat and mouse in the Oakland hills Saturday, each losing their way at times on the serpentine streets above Montclair Village.

Oakland police eventually corralled a carload of aspiring protesters in Montclair Village, where the Animal Rights Direct Action caravan regrouped to get its bearings.

Eighteen activists set out in three cars from the MacArthur BART station at 12:30 p.m. in a demonstration organized by Direct Action of San Francisco.

Members of the group headed for Manzuela Drive, where more than a half-dozen marked patrol cars and a pack of uniformed police officers waited, determined to prevent trouble at the homes of two pharmaceutical company employees. A surly private security guard recorded the street scene with a digital movie camera.

Residents in the neighborhood broke from weekend diversions to inquire about the swarm of cops, some of which asked locals for help finding streets. Spotty radio reception proved vexing for officers trying to weave a protective perimeter and track the movements of the approaching activists, who retreated to Montclair Village to regroup after two of their cars went astray.

The mission of the demonstrators was to persuade pharmaceutical companies such as Valent Biosciences Corp. of Walnut Creek to stop resorting to animal testing in its research and product testing, Direct Action organizer Andrea Lindsay said at the BART station.

"There are hundreds of alternatives to animal testing," Lindsay said. "If anything, animal research is slowing down medical progress. It is unreliable, and basically meant to cover the tails of pharmaceutical companies."

The contingent of activists planned to protest at the home of a 65-year-old lawyer who is a Valent executive, Lindsay said. An employee of Otsuka America Pharmaceuticals of San Francisco also lives on the short street. Valent and Otsuka are both clients of Huntingdon Life Sciences, a British pharmaceutical testing company that uses animals.

Police officers tracked the activists to Montclair Village and stopped a Honda Civic containing about a half-dozen activists about 2 p.m.

"We've done absolutely nothing," Lindsay said, outraged by the detention of her peers.

The police involvement apparently stemmed from an animal rights protest a week earlier that reportedly included smashing a door panel of the Valent executive's house.

Police warned the activists at Montclair Village that they would be arrested if they ventured into the Oakland hills, Lindsay said.

A day later, protesters broke windows of a Chiron Corp. worker's Orinda home in an effort to flood the house. The man's neighbors stopped protesters from using garden hoses to channel water into the house.

The Orinda incident is considered a prime factor in a judge's decision Friday to issue a restraining order barring members of the animal rights group, Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty USA, from threatening or harassing Chiron workers or their family members.

Lindsay contended Saturday that animal rights organizers that plan peaceful protests can't control all who take part.

"It's not just angst-ridden teens," said Lindsay of demonstrators who resort to vandalism. "Some are people who sincerely believe in the cause and are convinced that economic sabotage is the only way to bring about change."

Police warned the activists at Montclair Village that they would be arrested if they ventured into the Oakland hills, Lindsay said.

"It seemed as though it was just one thing after another blocking us today," Lindsay concluded. "We will be out there again, just not this afternoon."