The bond for the three Occupy protesters Bryan Church, Jarred Chase and Brent Betterly, who were arrested and charged with conspiracy to commit terrorism as well as other felonies, has been set for $1.5 million each.
From the Chicago Sun-Times:
The NATO Summit protesters charged with plotting terrorist acts in Chicago planned to attack President Barack Obama’s campaign headquarters and Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s home — and firebomb police stations and squad cars to divert attention, according to sources and prosecutors.
The National Lawyers Guild released a statement about the charges on their facebook early this morning saying, “The National Lawyers Guild deplores the charges against Occupy activists in the strongest degree,” said Sarah Gelsomino with the NLG and the People’s Law Office. “It’s outrageous for the city to apply terrorism charges when it’s the police who have been terrorizing activists and threatening their right to protest.”
The Chicago Police Superintendent, Garry McCarthy made it very clear in his press conference about the arrests and the raid that this was “not protest behavior” but “criminal behavior.”
It is now being reported that the “NATO3,” as protesters have labeled them, have had a long history of run-ins with the law including burglary to an unoccupied structure, grand theft and criminal mischief. Police have reported that the arrested protesters identify with the “Black Bloc” group that routinely shows up to Occupy events to cause violence, destruction and vandalism.
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