2008 ANNUAL REPORT - National Lawyers Guild

Monitoring the National Conventions
For over a year the Guild’s Denver and
Minneapolis Chapters readied for the
2008 political conventions, anticipating
the full array of unlawful police
practices that we witnessed in 2000 and 2004.
Lawyers were on call during and after the conventions,
our members set up hotlines to track
arrestees, and we submitted many pre-event
legal challenges to restrictions to the exercise of
free speech. Lawsuits challenging unconstitutional
government actions are being brought in
order to ensure that we stop these practices.
Minneapolis
The crackdown on lawful dissent was nothing
short of astonishing. At the Republican Convention,
Guild members witnessed the culmination
of years of tracking, spying and gathering
information on independent media and activists.
Officers in riot gear burst into organizers’ and
journalists’ houses brandishing semi-automatic
weapons and seized computers, journals, video
equipment and political pamphlets. NLG attorneys
were handcuffed and others were forced
onto the floor.
Confidential informants, on behalf of law
enforcement, infiltrated the RNC Welcoming
Committee. In what appears to be the first use
of criminal charges under the 2002 Minnesota
version of the PATRIOT Act, Ramsey County
Prosecutors charged alleged leaders of the Committee
with Conspiracy to Riot in Furtherance
of Terrorism. Affidavits released by law enforcement
(which were filed in support of search
warrants used in several raids the weekend preceding
the RNC) alleged that members of the
group sought to kidnap RNC delegates, assault
police officers with firebombs and explosives,
and sabotage airports in St. Paul. There has
been no corroboration of these allegations with
physical or other evidence.
“These charges are an effort to equate publicly
stated plans to blockade traffic and disrupt the
RNC as being the same as acts of terrorism.
This both trivializes real violence and attempts
to place the stated political views of the defendants
on trial,” said Minneapolis NLG President
Bruce Nestor. “The charges represent an
abuse of the criminal justice system and seek
to intimidate any person organizing large scale
public demonstrations potentially involving
civil disobedience.”
Denver
Under the leadership of Guild members Brian
Vicente, Thom Cincotta, Hans Meyer, and Tim
Quinn, the Colorado Guild prepared for over a
year before the Convention to recruit volunteer
attorneys and legal observers. On numerous
instances, observers were present to dissuade
police misconduct, and to record it when it
happened. On one night of mass arrests, Guild
attorneys rushed to a temporary warehouse jail
and demanded to meet with arrestees. When
Denver judges decided, without any notice to
the public, to keep the courts open overnight
and began bringing arrestees still covered in
pepper spray to arraignments, Guild attorneys
and law student volunteers worked 10 - and
14-hour overnight shifts at the county court
providing legal advice and representation to
each arrestee.
Post-convention, the Colorado Guild organized
Guild representation for dozens of arrestees
with criminal cases, assisted with the filing of
internal affairs complaints, collecting evidence
and preparing for possible civil cases.