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 Legal Updates 12/02/00 Update from: R2K Legal Court Update After four days of deliberation on the puppet and van case motions, all defense motions were denied except for the puppet case motion in regard to suppression of evidence. This means that nothing that the police confiscated from the warehouse during the raid can be used as evidence by the prosecution. Over the past four days those of us who have sat in the courtroom and watched these motions be argued by our team of eight lawyers and three pro se defendants(!) have grown more and more enraged. Our lawyers and pro se defendants made passionate arguments for free speech, the 1st and 4th amendment, and expressed our message. They slammed a system that would support a police department's prior restraint on free speech, the destruction of property and evidence, and a pre-emptive strike on a puppet-making warehouse in order to not only keep dissenters off the streets, but the message of those dissenters which was captured in our art. They slammed a system that would go to such lengths as to send in undercover state troopers and set up surveillance of artists and activists all to keep dissenters locked away instead of on the street. However, as we all are well aware, there is not justice in this system and the majority of our motions were denied. Those who were in court today did a protest in order to take back some of the power and dignity that this court had been trying to take from us all week. We were tired of slander after slander of our tactics, of our message, and of our movement. After one of the pro se defendants gave his closing statement, beautifully articulating our message and our passion, we stood up in court, covered our mouths with tape that had written across it "Silenced Again". We held up banners that read "Criminal INjustice: Alive and Well in this courtroom", "Dissent is a Right", "We must fight injustice wherever it may be", etc. As we left the courtroom another pro se defendant made her closing statement about how the injustice in this courtroom is exactly what we were out protesting against. She exited the courtroom chanting "No Justice, No Peace". The puppet trials will start December 11th. The Van Case trial will start January 3rd. In Solidarity, R2K Legal |
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