From late 2019 by 2021, a minimum of 115 Water Protectors have been arrested in Aitkin County, Minnesota (inhabitants 15,800) for his or her resistance to Enbridge Inc.’s Line 3 tar sands pipeline. At the moment, 50 defendants proceed to face expenses, in accordance with Marla Marcum of the Local weather Disobedience Middle, which has been monitoring circumstances and providing help to defendants. Open circumstances embody seven social media-based prosecutions together with of Winona LaDuke, co-founder of the Native advocacy group Honor the Earth, and Tara Houska, an administrator of the Giniw Collective. These circumstances, which reference social media exercise in charging paperwork, have produced trumped-up expenses starting from “harassment of legislation enforcement” for yelling to expenses that derive from Minnesota’s 2002 Anti-Terrorism Act, which was handed in response to the September 11 assaults.
“When Minnesota and different states handed Anti-Terrorism legal guidelines within the wake of 9/11, we have been deeply involved that they’d be used to stifle protest and dissent. That’s clearly what is going on on this case,” Sue Udry, government director of Defending Rights & Dissent, instructed Truthout. “The truth that a legislation meant to arm legislation enforcement and prosecutors with the instruments to ‘be certain that terrorists who commit atrocities in our state are dropped at justice and obtain most punishment to match their dastardly crimes,’ has been deployed in opposition to protesters engaged in civil disobedience is harmful, and disingenuous,” she continued.
Different open circumstances embody felony “aiding tried suicide” expenses that protection motions have characterised as a “misinterpretation of the legislation” by the Aitkin County Lawyer’s Workplace, warning that the circumstances might set broadly dangerous precedents for protest rights.
Writing in response to Aitkin County Atorney James Ratz’s pursuit of aiding tried suicide expenses in opposition to protesters who crawled right into a section of non-functioning pipeline, protection legal professional Jordan Kushner argued:
Underneath the state’s misinterpretation of the legislation, any protester who climbs and stays in a tree the place they’re in potential hazard of falling down, attaches themselves to a development car the place they may doubtlessly be topic to an accident, sits on a roadway the place they may doubtlessly be run over, or engages in any motion that locations them in potential hazard, or helps another person commit such actions, could possibly be accused of aiding an tried suicide.
In whole, the remaining 50 defendants face a complete of six felonies, 28 gross misdemeanors and 115 misdemeanors, in accordance with a Truthout evaluation.
“Instances Have Simply Completely Stalled”
Protection attorneys are actually elevating alarm about delays within the Water Protector circumstances in Aitkin. Protection legal professional Kira Kelley instructed Truthout that “prior to now three months Water Protector circumstances have simply completely stalled.” Some defendants have been ready for hearings since June and July.
A Truthout evaluation exhibits that Water Protectors in Aitkin County face an extended courtroom course of in comparison with typical prison defendants within the county. The evaluation examined all prison circumstances filed in Aitkin over the primary 5 months of 2021. Through the five-month interval, expenses have been filed in opposition to 61 Water Protectors, 38 of which, or 62.3 p.c, stay open. This compares to 202 typical prison circumstances, of which solely 18, or 8.9 p.c, stay open. Meaning Water Protector circumstances from January-Could 2021 are seven instances extra prone to stay unresolved, in comparison with non-Water Protector circumstances. (This evaluation excludes 14 “dormant” circumstances, together with one “dormant” Water Protector case.)
When circumstances are dragged out, defendants stay in a state of limbo for longer, the place they are often stigmatized as prison defendants by employment, housing and academic establishments. A delayed case extends the time defendants should adhere to bail situations and be obtainable to seem in courtroom. Bail situations have barred defendants from attending public hearings about Enbridge-owned infrastructure and meant that in the event that they obtained arrested once more or entered an “Enbridge Exclusion Zone,” their bail could possibly be revoked resulting in their incarceration and/or they could possibly be charged with further crimes.
These revelations exacerbate worries that Water Protectors aren’t receiving equal due course of within the county, given the existence of a scheme that noticed the Aitkin County Sheriff’s Workplace obtain $355,393 of direct funding from Enbridge Inc. for issues like crowd management supplies and time spent policing Water Protectors who opposed the corporate’s pipeline, which was accomplished in September 2021. Protection legal professional motions argue the association quantities to third-party affect on legislation enforcement, one thing prohibited by the due course of doctrine.
This additionally follows revelations that the Aitkin County Lawyer’s Workplace supported the County Sheriff Daniel Guida’s pursuit of prison expenses in opposition to protection attorneys who sought to compel Guida to testify below oath concerning the monetary association.
Is the Court docket Letting the Prosecutor Run the Present?
Prosecutions within the county have stalled, partly attributable to what protection attorneys describe as a “breakdown within the separation of powers” between the county legal professional (government department) and the courtroom system (judicial department).
Protection attorneys instructed Truthout that courtroom clerks and judges within the county have allowed the county legal professional to dictate listening to schedules, leading to important delays within the circumstances, in accordance with protection attorneys and courtroom data.
“I’ve by no means had a clerk attain out to me from Aitkin to see when I’m obtainable,” Claire Glenn, an legal professional with the Water Protector Authorized Collective and the Civil Liberties Protection Middle, instructed Truthout, referring to the usual observe that sees courts coordinate equally with protection attorneys and prosecutors when scheduling courtroom dates. “It’s weird that clerks really feel so beholden to the prosecutor, even after months of not receiving a response. The courts’ clerks are performing just like the prosecutor’s secretary quite than an unbiased arbiter who the prosecutor needs to be deferring to,” Glenn continued.
In a single case involving felony and gross misdemeanor expenses, courtroom transcripts obtained from the county by Truthout present that on November 10, 2022, prosecutors used an unprecedented argument to justify courtroom delays.
Within the listening to, assistant prosecutor Sarah Winge instructed the courtroom that hearings had been delayed attributable to county legal professional Ratz’s “contested” election marketing campaign.
The decide had by no means heard such an argument. “I’ve been concerned within the prison justice system for about 50 years,” mentioned Choose John DeSanto. “The prosecutor’s workplace shall be conducting its duties and obligations no matter elections.”
Through the listening to, Glenn expressed concern that “there are such a lot of Water Protector circumstances which can be simply languishing at this level.”
“We all know that [Aitkin County Attorney] Ratz didn’t wish to litigate these circumstances when there was an election pending, regardless of the purpose, and has simply refused to answer the clerks’ emails to schedule hearings,” Glenn instructed Truthout.
Glenn later instructed Truthout that the clerk knowledgeable her in early December that the County Lawyer’s Workplace “lastly” responded to the courtroom’s questions on their schedule. However that doesn’t clarify why the courtroom clerks (the judicial department) aren’t consulting protection attorneys and prosecutors equally. “It’s a breakdown within the separation of powers,” Kelley instructed Truthout.
Ratz and the Aitkin County courtroom administrator haven’t responded to electronic mail inquiries.
Protection Attorneys Intimidated and Sidelined
Together with “languishing” Water Protector circumstances and the “breakdown within the separation of powers,” protection attorneys are nonetheless adjusting to Ratz’s complicity in obvious intimidation by Sheriff Guida. A movement by Kelley particulars how Guida refused a subpoena to testify below oath. That represents a “breakdown within the rule of legislation,” because it’s the job of the sheriff to implement subpoenas. Not solely this, Guida and Ratz sought trespassing expenses in opposition to the attorneys — Kelley and Sandra Freeman — after they tried to serve Guida with the subpoena exterior his dwelling.
In a November movement, filed on behalf of Winona LaDuke, Glenn wrote to the courtroom — in response to the prosecutor’s pursuit of prison expenses in opposition to Water Protector protection attorneys Kelley and Freeman — saying:
Mr. Ratz’s conduct provides a brand new dimension to the disturbing nature of this whole incident. Mr. Ratz is himself a Minnesota-barred legal professional, apparently failed to acknowledge any downside with Sheriff Guida’s misconduct. Not solely that, he doubled-down on Sheriff Guida’s misconduct by referring Attorneys Kelley and Freeman for prosecution.
Together with the obvious preferential therapy given to prosecutors when scheduling circumstances, attorneys representing Water Protectors in Aitkin County are dealing with the specter of their very own prison prosecution for pursuing subpoenas.
“It’s no exaggeration that criminalizing members of the bar who symbolize the accused merely for doing our jobs heralds a complete breakdown of the rule of legislation,” Glenn wrote. Her movement additionally drew consideration to the existence of a “file” concerning the incident that features a number of “experiences” — which the county legal professional has refused at hand over.
The attorneys are coping with all these dynamics whereas concurrently defending Water Protectors from egregious authorized theories.
Little Prospect for Justice
Through the November 10, 2022, listening to, Choose DeSanto mentioned he would take no additional motion to hurry up the courtroom course of — until the defendant filed a movement for a speedy trial, which might provoke a 90-day countdown for trial.
Nevertheless, with grossly exaggerated expenses hanging over them, heading to trial could also be a false alternative for the Water Protectors, since defendants need circumstances dropped, not taken to a trial that dangers years in jail.
Observe: This text has been amended to make clear Tara Houska’s title, and to make clear that Sarah Winge’s testimony specified that the hearings had been delayed quite than canceled.
