Crackdown in Des Moines

February 9, 2004

The crackdown is upon us.

The U.S. government has issued subpoenas to four nonviolent peace activists in Des Moines to appear before a federal grand jury. The local U.S. Attorney's office has also subpoenaed Drake University to turn over documents about who attended an anti-war conference on campus in November and who the leaders of the local National Lawyers' Guild chapter are.

Civil libertarians see this as one of the most blatant signs that John Ashcroft and George Bush are intolerant of dissent.

"The entire Guild has been both shocked and outraged," says Heidi Boghosian, executive director of the National Lawyers' Guild. "We see this as an attempt to intimidate and further silence any dissent and criticism of the government's policies."

Anthony Romero, executive director of the ACLU, says this crackdown harkens back to the FBI abuses during the Fifties and Sixties. "We've heard protestations from the FBI that they've learned from those mistakes, but what's going on at Drake means that we have a lot more to be concerned about," he says. "We now find that the government is doing precisely what it promised it wouldn't do, which is to target individuals engaged in lawful First Amendment activities."

Brian Terrell is one of the peace activists who was hit with a subpoena. The executive director of the Catholic Peace Ministry in Des Moines, Terrell was on his way to the office on February 4. "I got a call that a detective with the Joint FBI Terrorism Task Force was here to serve me papers," he recalls. Jeff Warford of the Polk County Sheriff's Department left his card, which mentioned he was with the task force, Terrell says.

"I'm appalled," says Terrell, who participated in the November 15 conference at Drake called "End the Occupation, Bring the Iowa Guard Home" and helped organize a nonviolent protest the next day at the National Guard's local headquarters.

The U.S. Attorney, Stephen Patrick O'Meara, said publicly on February 4 that there had been a "savage attack" on a police officer at the protest.

But according to Ben Stone, the executive director of the Iowa ACLU, the only person who was charged with assault was Christine Gaunt, a librarian at Grinnell College who had gone limp when the police tried to arrest her. She was offered a $50 fine if she agreed to plead to a trespass charge in exchange for the dropping of the assault charge, Stone says. Gaunt could not be reached for comment.

Terrell denies there was any assault whatsoever. "I saw people acting in a very dignified, disciplined, and nonviolent way," he says, "and this guy [U.S. Attorney O'Meara] who wasn't even there but is an officer of the U.S. government and has tremendous power to disrupt people's lives is characterizing it as a savage attack. It's ludicrous."

O'Meara did not return a phone call for comment. And Al Overbaugh, a spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney's office, said he could not comment on the case.

Elton Davis was also issued a subpoena. A member of the Catholic Worker community in Des Moines, Davis returned to his home last week only to find "the subpoena was taped to my door. It was kind of scary."

Terrell was one of a dozen people arrested on November 16 for protesting at the National Guard. "I have no idea what they're after," he says.

The other two people subpoenaed were Patti McKee, coordinator of the Iowa Peace Network, who gave a nonviolent training at the Drake conference, and Wendy Vasquez, a local Quaker and anti-war activist who visited Iraq in 2002. Both McKee and Vasquez engaged in nonviolent civil disobedience on November 16 and were arrested.

Drake University can't even discuss the issue. "There is a federal gag order," says Linda Ryan, senior assistant to the president of Drake. "We can't talk about it."

The Des Moines crackdown reinforces "a chilling effect now being felt all across the country," says Romero of the ACLU. "Individuals who might consider going to a protest or public forum now will think twice about those actions if they're worried that government scrutiny might follow."

Terrell confirms this. "After the November demonstration, I got a phone call from someone who had written a letter to the county complaining about how the sheriff's department had handled the demonstration," he says. "But her husband had told her not to send it because she could get on some list. It's awful that today in America that's a consideration."

The grand jury was supposed to hear testimony from the supboenaed parties on February 10, but the U.S. Attorney has postponed that date till March 9.

In the meantime, the National Lawyers' Guild has filed a motion to quash the subpoenas.

"The records the government is seeking would infringe on our members' rights to freely associate together under the First Amendment," says Bruce Nestor, an attorney in Minneapolis who is representing the Des Moines chapter. Nestor is also the immediate past president of the National Lawyers' Guild. "We have a month to really build opposition to this abusive grand jury and to try to bring a halt to this investigation."

Addendum:

Late on February 9, the office of U.S. Attorney Stephen Patrick O'Meara released a statement that it is "conducting an investigation into an event that occurred on the premises of Camp Dodge on November 16, 2003. . . . The narrow purpose and scope of that inquiry is to determine whether there were any violations of federal law, or prior agreements to violate federal law, regarding unlawful entry onto military property."

It said the matter is not being investigated by the Joint Terrorism Task Force, and that the U.S. Attorney does not consider this an "anti-terrorism" matter.

The statement also said: "The United States Attorney's Office does not prosecute persons peacefully and lawfully engaged in rallies which are conducted under the protection of the First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States."