The St. Paul Police Department initially vowed that the city would present a welcoming face to Republican delegates and protesters alike. But on the opening day of the convention the streets of downtown St. Paul were lined with hundreds of cops clad head to toe in riot gear. The first day witnessed the most violent clashes of the gathering — with protesters shattering downtown windows and slashing tires, and the cops responding with the liberal use of pepper spray and flash-bang grenades — but the confrontations and arrests would continue throughout the four-day gathering.
By the time John McCain accepted the Republican nomination for president more than 800 people had been arrested, the vast majority of them in mass sweeps. So how many of these people were actually engaged in prosecutable criminal activities? A year later the answer is clear: not many.
Ultimately 676 of these cases were referred to the St. Paul City Attorney’s office for possible misdemeanor charges. But almost immediately the cases began collapsing. It was initially announced that 39 journalists who had been detained would not face criminal charges. Then in February St. Paul City Attorney John Choi let it be known that more than 300 people swept up in a mass arrest on the final night of the RNC would not be prosecuted. Ultimately more than 80 percent of the cases handled by the St. Paul City Attorney’s office didn’t result in charges.
“The overwhelming majority of arrests clearly didn’t have any basis,” says Jordan Kushner, a defense attorney who is handling several RNC-related cases.
Chuck Samuelson, executive director of the Minnesota chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, argues that the heavy-handed police tactics and large-scale arrests were simply designed to quell dissent. He notes that in 2004, when the RNC was held in New York, there were roughly 500,000 protesters and 1,600 arrests. By contrast, in St. Paul there were an estimated 10,000 protesters and nearly 800 arrests — a strikingly higher ratio.
“The First Amendment is messy, because it allows people to speak their mind,” Samuelson says. “You need to be prepared for messy.”
But Choi maintains that the low rate of successful prosecutions isn’t necessarily indicative of wrongful arrests. He notes that the standards for making arrests and prosecuting charges are very different.
“What we’re looking at is whether we could actually obtain a conviction at trial, prove the charges beyond a reasonable doubt,” Choi says. “That’s a really high bar. When you have situations involving First Amendment issues, mass arrest situations and a confusing fact pattern, it’s really difficult to get to believing that we would have a likelihood of success at trial.”
While the misdemeanor charges handled by Choi’s office have largely evaporated, many of the more serious criminal cases continue to work their way through the courts. On Monday, for instance, the trial of two defendants — Christina Vana and Karen Meissner — began in Ramsey County District Court on charges of aiding and abetting second-degree assault. The pair are accused of throwing a metal sign off the Marion Street bridge onto Interstate 94.
Other high-profile felony cases have resulted in guilty pleas. Bradley Crowder and David McKay, activists from Austin, Texas, eventually pleaded guilty to federal charges related to manufacturing molotov cocktails. In May, Crowder was sentenced to 24 months in prison. That same month McKay, whose initial trial resulted in a hung jury, received a 48-month sentence.
But the most conspicuous criminal charges, those involving the so-called RNC Eight, look to still be a long ways from trial. The eight defendants are charged with an elaborate, nationwide criminal conspiracy to disrupt — and ultimately bring to a halt – the convention. In a series of raids during the days leading up to the convention, Ramsey County Sheriff’s deputies seized seized smoke bombs, sling shots, bottles of vinegar, buckets of nails and other purported evidence of this conspiracy.
The eight activists alleged to be behind the criminal plot — Erik Oseland, Eryn Trimmer, Garrett Fitzgerald, Luce Guillen-Givens, Max Specktor, Monica Bicking, Rob Czernik and Nathanael Secor — were initially charged with felony counts of conspiracy to commit riot in the second degree in furtherance of terrorism. In March, however, the more incendiary terrorism aspect of the charges were dropped by the Ramsey County Attorney’s Office.
But attorney Larry Leventhal, who is representing Specktor, argues that the terrorism designation has already damaged the reputations of the defendants. “Everybody’s against terrorism,” he notes. “You use words like that for inflammatory purposes.”
The cases were slated for a hearing last month, but it got postponed owing to a scheduling conflict. Two thorny issues must be settled before the case can proceed to trial: whether all the defendants will be tried together and exactly what evidence will be deemed admissable. No trial date has been set. The defendants have stated repeatedly that they intend to fight the charges.
“I am not going to take a plea bargain,” says Rob Czernik. “I want to fight this. I want to see it through to the end. If I get found guilty I get found gulty. I’m not going to go down without a fight.”
Cernik and others largely blame the prosecutions on the strong-arm tactics of the Ramsey County Sherrif’s Department, which conducted the undercover investigations that led to the RNC Eight arrests. In particular, they believe Sheriff Bob Fletcher was guilty of fear-mongering with regards to the aims of anti-RNC activists.
“I totally think this is a creation of Bob Fletcher’s mind,” Czernik of the investgation.
But Fletcher says the strength of the evidence will ultimately be weighed by a jury. “That’s why we have a court system,” he says. “The facts will speak for themselves at trial.”
Even less settled than criminal matters is the civil litigation resulting from RNC activities. Many cases are just now entering the court system. In February, for example, seven cases were filed in U.S. District Court by plaintiffs charging that their civil rights were violated.
On Tuesday a class-action lawsuit is expected to be filed on behalf of individuals who were arrested during a mass sweep on the first day of the RNC. According to Robert Kolstad, one of three attorneys handling the case, there will initially be two dozen plaintiffs attached to the case, but that the list of litigants could grow to as many as 200 individuals.
The City of St. Paul (or any other government entity involved in RNC security) won’t likely be on the hook for a dime from such lawsuits. That’s in part because the city negotiated with the Minneapolis-St. Paul Host Committee — the nonprofit group charged with organizing the event — to purchase a $10 million insurance policy to cover any legal liabilities. Some have argued that this allowed officers to behave with impunity when facing off with protesters.
“It was carte blanche for the police to do whatever they wanted,” says defense attorney Kushner. “They didn’t have any financial liability to face so they had no disincentive for violating people’s rights.”
But Choi states that this theory is “fatally flawed.” He points out that the city is always covered by an insurance policy for police matters. The only difference in this instance was that the RNC host committee picked up the tab for the plan. “No matter what we would have had insurance,” he says.
How much will ultimately be paid out in lawsuits likely won’t be known for years. But the damage to the credibility of the cops is likely irreparable in the minds of many activists.
In part that’s because the expectation created by the St. Paul Police Department of a relatively benign security presence during the RNC hardly gelled with reality. This was among the criticisms voiced by former U.S. Attorney Tom Heffelfinger and former federal prosecutor Andy Luger in an 82-page report on RNC policing that was released in January. It’s a viewpoint that’s also shared by Fletcher.
“It was a flawed attempt to keep everyone happy,” he says. “What was needed was more honesty about the type of enforcement that was gong to occur.”
The Minnesota chapter of the ACLU is currently suing Fletcher’s office over the seizure of literature in the days leading up to the RNC. But Samuelson agrees that Minnesotans were misled about what to expect during the RNC and weren’t prepared for the heavy presence of law enforcement.
“The people of this state believed what they were told by law enforcement,” he says. “I think maybe a lot more skepticism might be in order the next time we entertain one of these events.”
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