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UC Trumpets Unfounded Charges Against Oak Grove Tree-Sitters 10-5-2007 For Immediate Release - Contact: Oak Grove Tree Sit: Ayr: 510-938-9944; Zachary Running Wolf: 510-467-4482 Berkeley, CA-UC Berkeley Police are using rumor and innuendo in a campaign to blame an innocent tree-sit supporter for a burned police van on campus. The arson on the van happened in the pre-dawn hours on Thursday. The accusations are completely unfounded, according to longtime oak grove campaign ground support leader Ayr. Tree Sit Campaign representative Zachary Running Wolf maintains this is another effort in a series to vilify the tree sitters and make them appear as threats to the community, even to the point of terrorist accusations. "It doesn't make any sense that UC is questioning Dan about the van fire. He was at the Oak Grove all night, there are several of us who were here with him. We are positive that he was not involved. It seems like the University wants to blame anything that happens on campus on the oak grove protest," Ayr stated. UC has not charged Dan, but continue to hold him in custody. The van accusations may be an attempt by the University to persuade Judge Keller to change or extend his civil court preliminary injunction ruling on the tree sit, in which he found one tree sitter, David Galloway, subject to a court ruling to cease and desist from tree sitting. UC has requested to appear again before Judge Keller to ask him to extend his ruling to other tree-sitters and will undoubtedly use this arson accusation to try to convince him to do so. In media reports Friday, UC law enforcement representative Mitch Celaya disingenuously said UC police were "trying very carefully not to connect the tree protests with the van fire," acknowledging, "We cannot say this was connected with the tree protest." But it was UC police's early morning accusations trumpeted to media (SF Chronicle, showing up in their on-line version before 7 am) that they were looking at oak grove protesters as suspects that started the firestorm of unsubstantiated accusations. Meanwhile, in the separate lawsuit pitting the city of Berkeley, Panoramic Hill Association and California Oaks Foundation vs. the UC Regents over the future of the oak grove, closing arguments are scheduled to be heard before Judge Barbara Miller in Alameda County Court in Hayward on October 11th. ###  << Back to Press Release Archive | Latest Press Release | Newsroom Subscribe Get action alerts, updates, and other important news in your email inbox by signing up with your email address here: Learn more about events | See the BACHList FAQ |
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