BK/NY – Saturday, May 21st – The Hydra We Face (CLDC Benefit)

WHAT: Civil Liberties Defense Center Fundraiser
WHEN: 7:00-11:00pm, Saturday, May 21 2016
WHERE: Brooklyn Commons – 388 Atlantic Avenue (Between Bond and Hoyt Streets)
COST: $10

MORE:
Come hear from friends fighting the repression of eco, animal liberation & and social justice activists in the Pacific Northwest, Buffalo and in America’s prisons. We will also hear what people are doing to fight back against this via the Freedom of Information Act, proactive lawsuits and more.

with:
•Lauren Regan, Executive Director, Civil Liberties Defense Center (Eugene, OR).
•Leslie James Pickering, owner, Burning Books (Buffalo, NY), press officer, Earth Liberation Front Press office.
•Rachel Meeropol, Staff Attorney, Center for Constitutional Rights.

The Commons has a wonderful cafe and bar which features organic/fair trade coffee, beer, wine, non-alcoholic drinks, dessert and more. Please come on an empty stomach and support the Commons!

This event takes place during the Left Forum which is happening at John Jay College 5.20-5.22

Presentations:
Lauren will provide case examples, tips, and traps regarding government and corporate surveillance of climate activists and frontline communities, their campaigns, and their lawyers, and why everyone needs to take security issues seriously to be a serious activist, advocate or attorney.

Rachel will discuss her legal challenges to the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act, which allows for the prosecution of non-violent property damage as a federal crime of terrorism, as well as the suppression of dissent within the federal bureau of prisons, where animal rights and environmental activists are singled out post-conviction, along with other unpopular prisoners, for heightened restrictions and surveillance.

Leslie James Pickering highlights two decades of activism through secret files pried loose from the FBI. From living under federal surveillance to being targeted by informants to supporting underground liberation movements, this presentation offers a rare glimpse into maintaining the struggle in spite of repression.

Directions:
Hoyt-Schermerhorn: A, C and G
Bergen Street: F
Atlantic Ave – Barclay Center: B, M, Q, R, 2, 3, 4 and 5,
Flatbush Avenue: LIRR
B63 and B65

BK/NY – Wednesday, April 9th – FOIA Street Fighter Ryan Shapiro at The Base

WHAT: Ryan Shapiro on Fighting to Expose the U.S. Government’s War on Mandela, Occupy, Animal Rights, & More
WHEN: 8:00pm, Wednesday, April 9th
WHERE: The Base – 1302 Myrtle Avenue Brooklyn, New York 11221 (Directions below)
COST: Free, but donations are appreciated.
Come join NYC ABC and The Base for a discussion with “FOIA Street Fighter” Ryan Shapiro.

Will Potter has called Ryan Shapiro “The FBI’s Worst Nightmare,” and a recent article about Shapiro’s work opened by declaring, “Depending on whom you ask, Ryan Shapiro is either the country’s ‘FOIA superhero’ or a ‘threat to national security.’” Shapiro is a longtime radical social justice activist and now also a PhD candidate in MIT’s Department of Science, Technology, & Society (HASTS). Shapiro’s research focuses on the political functioning of national security and the policing of dissent. To this end, he currently has over 700 Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests in motion with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), and National Security Agency (NSA), as well as numerous ongoing lawsuits against these agencies for failure to comply with his FOIA requests. The FBI is even now arguing that Shapiro’s dissertation research on FBI campaigns against animal rights and environmental protesters is itself a threat to national security.

A recent revelation resulting from Shapiro’s research is the FBI monitoring of Occupy Houston. As important as the monitoring itself, is the fact that the FBI uncovered a plot to assassinate Occupy “leaders,” yet did not share this information with potentially endangered activists.

Additionally, through his FOIA research and lawsuits against the FBI, Shapiro has exposed FBI attempts to bring Animal Enterprise Terrorism charges against animal rights activists conducting undercover investigations of factory farms. Notably, Shapiro is also one of the plaintiffs in the federal lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act.

And just last week, Shapiro and his attorney filed a law suit against the NSA, FBI, CIA, and DIA for their failure to comply with Freedom of Information Act requests filed shortly after the death of Nelson Mandela. In this particular series of FOIA requests, Shapiro is trying to determine the role the United States played in Mandela’s 1962 arrest, and to answer why the U.S. government kept Mandela on a terrorist watch list until 2008 and what qualified him as a terrorist in the first place.