11 Indicted in 'Eco-Terrorism' Case

SEATTLE, Jan. 20 -- After taking nine years to penetrate what they called a "vast eco-terrorism conspiracy" in Oregon and four other Western states, federal prosecutors announced on Friday the indictment of 11 people in connection with a five-year wave of arson and sabotage claimed by the Earth Liberation Front and the Animal Liberation Front. The 17 attacks, which occurred from 1996 to 2001, caused no deaths but resulted in an estimated $23 million in damage to lumber companies, a ski resort, meat plants, federal ranger stations and a high-voltage electric tower. The ALF was created in the mid-1970s in Britain as a radical outgrowth of the animal rights movement. The group became active in the United States in the late 1980s. Its Web site says that one of its primary goals is "to inflict economic damage to those who profit from the misery and exploitation of animals." The ELF emerged in Britain in the mid-1990s, and its organization and tactics are modeled after those of the ALF. Members of the two organizations often work together, Perlstein said. "These people have the ability to hide and stay away from law enforcement in a way that traditional criminals are not able to do," Perlstein said. Among those arrested in connection with the 17 attacks are college students from Virginia and Arizona, a firefighter from Oregon, and a woman who works in a group home for the developmentally disabled. The defendants were listed as Joseph Dibee, Chelsea Dawn Gerlach, Sarah Kendall Harvey, Daniel McGowan, Stanislas Meyerhoff, Josephine Overaker, Jonathan Christopher Mark Paul, Rebecca Rubin, Suzanne Nicole "India" Savoie, Darren Todd Thurston and Kevin Tubbs. Dibee, Overaker and Rubin have not been arrested. An unindicted co-conspirator in the case -- William C. Rodgers, 40, who was arrested in December in Arizona on related arson charges -- killed himself shortly after his arrest.