Update on the 10 anti-fur activists in prison, Austria

The animal rights activists, who are supposed members of a criminal organization according to the hallucinations of the prosecutors, have now been sitting in jail for over two weeks. The next evaluation of their detention will take place on Friday June 6 and/or Monday June 9 in Wiener Neustadt. There the decision will be made as to whether the activists will remain in custody. The named reasons for their detention, Danger of Destruction of Evidence and Danger of Committing Further Crimes, enable the detention to be extended for 2 months (for Danger of Destruction of Evidence) to a year (Danger of Committing Further Crimes).

The work of their attorneys has been massively impeded so that the basic right to a fair trial is being undermined. Now as before, none of the attorneys has received complete access to the records of the current proceedings, which means among other things that the attorneys will have to make do at the evaluations of the detentions without sufficient knowledge of the charges, the investigations or the evidence. In fact, the activists were remanded to detention based on supposed evidence which has been withheld from both the attorneys and those imprisoned. Standard fare from the investigators such as, “There is evidence that the criminal organization committed specific criminal acts,” fill out the picture that the existence of the criminal organization is a construct and illusion of the prosecution.
The current state of the records would demand the release of the prisoners and an end to the detention on Friday.

The legal assessments lean unfortunately in another direction. We must assume that now as before there will be broad investigations. The widely applied surveillance of telephones and internet (such as the collection of call data, call locations, profiles of movement, transcripts of telephone calls, requests for IP-addresses from internet providers, e-mail logs, etc) offer the prosecution and the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (somewhat like the American FBI) an immense number of possible contacts as to who all could be part of the criminal organization. The police and the judiciary have no evidence or proof – they are investigating without any grounds following the motto, maybe we’ll get lucky and hit something.

What continues to apply:

We will not allow ourselves to be intimidated by the attempts at criminalization from the investigators. We do not accept that political opinions are being criminally persecuted. We demand the immediate release of the 10 animal rights activists and an end to all §278a proceedings. According to the logic of the prosecution any politically active (or formerly active) person can be a part of a criminal organization according to §278a!

Solidarity is more than just a word – much thanks to all those who have supported the work of the legal support team, actively participated, written letters or donated money!

Also the prisoners send out greetings and say thanks for the experienced solidarity! The protests which take place in front of and behind the various jails are heard by the prisoners. They are really happy about the solidarity demonstrations in front of the jails and in other cities.

Most of those imprisoned are doing well given the circumstances and are excited to receive mail! You can find information on the best way to write to them here:  http://antirep2008.lnxnt.org/?page_id=5

A few are directly targeted, but we are all intended targets!