Vigil/rally for Jason Pero

On November 8th, 14 year old Jason Pero was shot and killed by an Ashland County Deputy in front of his home in Odanah Wisconsin on the Bad River reservation. 

Neighbors and relatives challenge the official story put out by the Wisconsin Dept. of Justice, and their videos contradict the officer's claim that he was in danger from a middle school kid with a knife. The Bad River tribe has demanded a federal investigation.

Come bring lights, drums, and songs to remember this young singer, drummer, and keeper of his Anishinabe peoples' traditions. Demand justice for him and protection for indigenous people across the world as we close out Native American Heritage month in the U.S.A. Our heritage should no longer excuse violence against our indigenous relatives.

We will begin at Wisconsin DOJ's office on West Main Street and proceed to the US Attorney's office on West Washington Avenue.

Thursday, November 30th, 4:30-5:30pm

Please come and invite your friends.

"Enbridge Six" all bonded out

Thursday, August 31 2017

The water protectors arrested yesterday morning at the Line 3 construction site in Douglas County, WI have all been bailed out of jail. They all have restraining orders barring them from contact with Enbridge employees or their contract workers. Status conferences mid-October.

Thanks to Carl Lemke Oliver Sack, Patricia K Hammel, Tara Zhaabowekwe Houska, Holly T. Bird, Angela Bibens, David Joe Bates, Ta'Sina Sapa Win, Valentina Valle and everybody else who contributed to the bail fund, provided jail/court support or spent the better part of the day wrangling legal support for them yesterday.

#MniWiconi
#NoLine3


Photo by Carl Sack

Six Arrested Protesting Pipeline Construction in Wisconsin

Yesterday, August 29th, six water protectors were arrested in Douglas County, Wisconsin, while engaging in peaceful non-violent direct action to stop construction of the Line 3 pipeline project.

One water protector locked his body to construction equipment, while dozens of water protectors provided support and protection via media. When police arrived onsite, they gave a ten minute warning, but immediately began arrests, targeting anyone holding a camera or cellphone. One water protector was pulled out of a vehicle while attempting to comply with dispersal orders.

Line 3 is a proposed Enbridge tar sands line from Alberta, Canada, that will send nearly 900,000 barrels of tar sands per day through the headwaters of the Mississippi River to the shores of Lake Superior. After years of fighting environmental review in the courts, Enbridge was forced to engage in an Environmental Impact Statement in the state of Minnesota. Public hearings are scheduled for the coming months, with a final decision scheduled for Spring 2018.

Despite lacking approval in Minnesota, Enbridge has begun construction of Line 3 in Wisconsin and Canada. Indigenous resistance is growing daily, with the formation of several frontlines camps. Landowners in Wisconsin are currently suing Enbridge for failure to comply with state insurance requirements, in Dane County v. Enbridge.

 While locked to a machine, Alexander Good-Cane-Milk (Yankton Sioux Tribe) said, “We are the change...we want clean water, clean air, clean earth.”

 To donate bail funds, please visit: Michigan Water Protectors Legal Task Force on Facebook.

Pipeline protest at Standing Rock

Truthout has a great article about what is going on at Standing Rock and how lawyers can help out there.

There have been more than 80 arrests charging criminal trespass and nonviolent direct actions, including lockdowns on earthmoving equipment to prevent Dakota Access, LLC from building the pipeline from the Bakken oil fields in western North Dakota to the Midwest, and ultimately the Gulf of Mexico. If completed, the leak-certain pipeline would go under the Missouri River and Lake Oahe and will threaten the sacred sites of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe and clean water for the tribe and 20 million others who get their drinking water from the Missouri River. It would also guarantee the production and transportation of more than 500,000 barrels of oil a day to the Midwest and Gulf, with the same carbon footprint as 12 million cars.

Our office, with very limited phone service and internet, is a windowless tent at the top of a windblown hill overlooking the vast entryway to the camp marked by the flags of more than 250 Indigenous nations that have been present. They have come on horseback, some in canoes down the Missouri River and most in buses and caravans from as far away as Alaska. When representatives of the Tribal Nations arrive, they ask permission to enter Standing Rock Sioux territory, and when officially welcomed, they share their traditional dances and songs and words of solidarity and bring gifts.

Our Red Owl Collective has done jail interviews with most of those arrested, bonded them out with funds from the crowdfunding campaign, and are called to monitor the protest sites. We were also successful in getting Dakota Access, LLC's injunction in federal court in Bismarck against anyone "interfering with the pipeline" dissolved. Currently, we are in the process of connecting with and recruiting North Dakota lawyers to represent those charged. Indigenous attorney Angela Bibens is a regular in our office and National Lawyers Guild lawyers make week-long visits. Even when out-of-state lawyers are admitted to practice, they must work with local counsel. The defendants have asked for court-appointed lawyers, and if the lawyers and arrestees are willing, we will provide legal support and research to the North Dakota lawyers and find lawyers to appear with them.

Our own PK Hammel was there for several weeks already. As the truthout article explains:

Currently, we need more attorneys and legal workers to come to Standing Rock. There were not enough Red Owl Collective members at camp on Sunday or Tuesday to be present at the different actions. Lawyers and legal workers are needed to come to the camp for a week or few days to be part of the Red Owl Collective. We guarantee you will be inspired by the spirit and actions of the camp. "It's not perfect," someone at camp said. "We have to get a few kinks out, but we haven't done this in 140 years."

I encourage everyone to support this monumental coming together of Tribal Nations and supporters to protect their (our) water, sacred sites and the Earth, and to boycott DAPL's bank financiers. The Standing Rock Water Protectors want to support other local and national efforts to achieve the same goals. "Water is Life" is true for all of us.

Local lawsuit against Enbridge pipeline

Local Guild members are representing landowners in their lawsuit against the Enbridge pipeline. The suit is not actually to stop the expansion of the pipeline but to require the company to get full insurance to cover spills should the pipeline break down (an all to common event with Enbridge pipelines). Last year, the state legislature removed the insurance requirement at the behest of Enbridge.

The first hearing in the case is set for April 11th at 1:30pm at the Dane County Courthouse, 5th Floor, Courtroom 5D–Branch 9, 217 S. Hamilton St., Madison. You can read details about the law suit and recent court filings at this post and this other post at 350 Madison.