An FBI agent with the New Hampshire Joint Terrorism Task Force is recruiting activists to inform on Free State Project members. That’s what activist Pete Eyre says in the above video, released by Cop Block yesterday.
Keene police brought marijuana activist Rich Paul to an interrogation room yesterday where FBI agent Phil Christiana asked him to wear a wire back to the Keene Activity Center (KAC), according to Eyre. There he would tell a story about an arrest that didn’t happen. Christiana reportedly wanted to know how the individuals at the KAC would react to the story.
The KAC is a meeting place used by liberty activists in Keene.
Earlier this year, former police officer Bradley Jardis, who resigned because he was unwilling to arrest medical marijuana users, reports also being contacted by Christiana.
In 2011, Christiana reportedly visited the home of Keene-area activist Kurt Hoffman where Christiana’s vehicle side-swiped a videographer.
In 2005, New Hampshire journalist Dave Ridley reported being invited to lunch by Christiana. Ridley described him as “creepy.”
Paul, Hoffman and Ridley are Free State Project (FSP) members and/or movers. Jardis is a resident of New Hampshire who has participated in activism projects organized by FSP members.
According to an article by Ademo Freeman published on the Cop Block website yesterday, the FBI may also be sending new people into the mix.
Top this off with a few sketchy visits from new movers, who I now believe to be FBI agents or informants, and it’s almost comical – if not so scary – how pathetic the FBI’s attempts are at infiltrating the Keene Activity Center (KAC). One guy, ‘Michael’, came to the KAC for a visit (which is typical of new movers) and after a long conversation – where I asked him directly if he was an agent of the state (he said he was not) – it was decided that “Michael’s” views are not acceptable to those who frequent the KAC and he was asked to leave. He has never attempted a return but it should be noted that this man may still be trying to infiltrate liberty groups. #
According to a file found via a Google search, Christiana, as of May 16, 2012, is with the FBI’s New Hampshire Joint Terrorism Task Force.
Reactions
the government wants to take down free keene …and slap some trumped up phoney crap charges on people.. #
It sounds like the FBI may be trying to set y’all up for some sort of entrapment scheme that they’re known for. Apparently this one goon thinks you guys are extra stooopid. :P #
Pete: So stopping internal / home grown terrorists isn’t important? Lot’s of internal plots have been stopped. Maybe there isn’t any “plotting” at the “KAC”. But look at some of the rhetoric you and some of your friends use. Look at the calls for violence on this site alone … there can be consequences for exercising that freedom. Sometimes….people pay attention. To you it may be innocent free speach….to others it can be cause for alarm. And that’s OK. #
Every single “home grown” terrorist crew and/or plot for the last 10 years has been either FBI planned, sponsored, or supplied. Every single one. If you want to do away with home grown terrorism, disband the FBI. #
A billboard saying “Phil Christiana, you and your fellow FBI thugs are not welcome around here” would be pretty amusing. #
Violence is the State’s M.O. not ours. #
One word of warning. I would NOT call Christiana (or any other cop), and definitely not without a recording device. Just having a conversation will give him an opportunity to lie about what you said. Review those “Flex your rights” videos if you doubt me. Being innocent is no guarantee of safety. #
Crazy!!! Keep an eye out for anyone who advocates violence…that’s how they frame innocent people. #
My Thoughts
Ademo Freeman, Pete Eyre and certainly many others I’m not aware of have done a great job rapidly bringing this situation to light. Rich Paul deserves at least as many kudos as this young lady got anti-kudos.
As Pete mentions in the above video, there is an urgent need for security culture. But I think there is an even greater need for transparency, honor and character. Paul, Jardis, Hoffman and Ridley let us know about their contact with Christiana because they are individuals of character who understand the importance of honor and the need to be transparent; i.e., the importance of releasing information to the public. Who has been asked to inform but hasn’t been transparent about it?
The fact is that the state is very powerful. The FBI has many resources at its disposal, including the newspapers and TV shows that shape jurors’ worldviews. If they want to bring liberty activists up on fake charges, they can do it. That’s a cakewalk for them. They did it me. (I actually have newly discovered audio in which the arresting marshal implies that he knows I was innocent of the assault he claims I committed. I’ll be releasing this soon.)
Violence is what the FBI is looking for. We have to give them nonviolence (satyagraha). This is not just the smartest and most effective strategy, but it’s also the safest. Articles such as “When you Should Shoot a Cop” by Larken Rose and published by Cop Block are inflammatory and wrong-headed. Talk of violence is pointless and only comes off as the idle boasting of the weakest. We are stronger than them. We don’t need to use violence.
Our task is to study the long history of nonviolent action and live peace in our words and our deeds. Only then can we have some chance at deflecting the inevitable state crackdown on our nascent liberty community.
Sources
- Cop Block: Phil Christiana – (FBI Agent) It’s Not My Friends You Should Be Looking At
- Cop Block: FBI – Your Tactics Aren’t Welcomed In This Peaceful Community
- Free Keene: The Keene Activity Center
- Cop Block: FBI Visits Activist in Keene, Hits Activist with Vehicle
- Phil Christiana PDF file
- Cop Block: When you Should Shoot a Cop
8 replies on “The FBI Wants to Infiltrate the Free State Project”
Thanks for sharing George. I definitely echo your advocacy for non-violent tactics. The means are and end in themselves.
One slight point of disagreement re: your point on Larken Rose’s write-up.
Admittedly yes, the title is damn provocative and likely causes many to have a negative knee-jerk reaction. So much so that they may not even read the article (as Ademo discovered was the case of the person who pushed out a heads-up memo to LEOs from the fusion center in AZ: http://www.copblock.org/10133/actic/).
Ultimately the article was couched on the right of defensive force, whether the aggressor happens to wear a badge or not. Such a perspective is obviously much different than an advocacy of the initiation of force.
Still, I personally don’t think it ideal to dwell on what-if scenarios but to be constructive and allocate time to sharing and living according to ideas based on peace, collaboration and mutual respect.
Thanks for commenting, Pete. The distinction between initiating force and using defensive force is not clear to everyone. It make complete sense to you, because you have been studying and talking about it for a long time. To liberty newbies, it is really confusing. Maybe you have fielded questions about this. To cops, especially when they read that the government is initiating force, it doesn’t make the slightest bit of difference. It’s all the same thing – unwanted violence – to them.
This is why telling people like Phil Christiana that Free Keeners live by the NAP is pointless even if he were to actually listen and completely grok what you are saying. All he cares about is violence. Defensive violence against the government is, for him, just as much of a concern as initiations of violence. That’s his job – to find and cage people who are open to the idea of using violence (of whatever kind) to advance a political agenda. Many libertarians, whether intellectually or in real life, are quite prepared and consider it quite justified to use (defensive) violence to weaken the government. In fact, that’s the end-game scenario of agorism.
My advocacy for nonviolence actually goes beyond just a tactical level. I advocate for principled nonviolence.
The bottom line is that our struggle for liberty is as much about the public relations aspect as it is the intellectual and economic sides. And if our public relations suck, we’re going to lose a lot of people – possibly turning them into enemies spreading misinformation – before they even get to know the intellectual, economic or other aspects of what we’re about.
So, on that note, the When to Shoot a Cop article is unmitigated FAIL.
“My advocacy for nonviolence actually goes beyond just a tactical level. I advocate for principled nonviolence.” – George Donnelly
I am curious what your view is on this, but I’m not sure what exactly your beliefs are based on what you said in your comment.
Do you advocate principled nonviolence in all situations, including situations with private criminals rather than government aggressors? Or do you only advocate principled nonviolence in situations involving the state?
My view is that if the masses *believe* that a given act of aggression is just (or that resistance to that act would be unjust) then, even though I believe that a person would have the *right* to forcefully resist that act, I advocate that they should strongly consider *not* resisting, because that is, in my view, the only way that the masses’ minds are going to be changed. Nonviolent social change (progress) is the only kind.
So, for example, if someone violently resists a cop who is trying to arrest them for possessing marijuana, then my view is that that person has the right to resist, but that their act of resistance is hurting the cause of a free society (or at the very least not helping it as much as nonviolent resistance would help it). Nobody is going to be persuaded that marijuana prohibition is unjust because a marijuana user shoots a cop who is trying to arrest him.
For another example, if there is a situation with a private criminal whose crime everybody already agrees is unjust (e.g. the gunman in Seattle who killed five people recently), then I do *not* advocate nonviolence because their is no social change to be done. Instead, I advocate that people defend themselves with violent and even deadly force, if need be.
In a third example, I don’t advocate not shooting a cop in *all* situations. I do support nonviolence in the vast majority of cases of government aggression in our current society (e.g. don’t violently resist cops arresting you for victimless crimes, not paying taxes, etc), but I do have some exceptions. Specifically, I make exceptions to my position of nonviolent resistance to government in those situations where the masses largely agree that the government’s actions are unjust–because again, the whole point of not defending oneself with violence despite having the moral right to do so is because refraining from defending yourself with force is a more effective way (or perhaps the only effective way) to change the minds’ of the masses to believe that the act committed against you is unjust. So if the masses already largely agree that a given act of government aggression is unjust, then there is no reason not to forcefully defend yourself, just as there is no reason not to forcefully defend yourself from the private aggressor (e.g. the gunman who killed five people in Seattle recently).
So in summary, I advocate nonviolent resistance to government in enough situations that I can say that my position is that I am against non-aggressive violent resistance to government (meaning I don’t prefer that they resist with force although I still believe that they have the right to), but I do make a few exceptions in some extreme situations. My answer to Larken Rose’s question, “When should you shoot a cop?” is thus not quite “never”. One example of an exception where I think exercising your right of self-defense is a good thing is the extreme example that Larken Rose gives in the portion of his article that I quote below. In such situations, the masses already agree that the tyrant’s acts of aggression are unjust, and thus my response is to go ahead and defend yourself and others with violent force as there is no social progress to be achieved through nonviolence:
“To get a little perspective, try watching a documentary or two about
some of the atrocities committed by the regimes of Stalin, or Lenin, or
Chairman Mao, or Hitler, or Pol Pot, or any number of other tyrants in
history. Pause the film when the jackboots are about to herd innocent
people into cattle cars, or gun them down as they stand on the edge of a
ditch, and THEN ask yourself the question, “When should you shoot a
cop?” – Larken Rose
Do you agree with my position? Or would you prefer that a person refrain from shooting a cop even as he herds innocent people into a cattle car on its way to a concentration camp? Surely there are some some situations where you would defend yourself or others with force against government aggression? Perhaps not as many situations as Larken Rose, but I don’t think the best answer is “never.” What’s the point of letting government officials violate peoples’ rights in these extreme examples if the vast majority of people already agree that the government is in the wrong and that you have the right to forcefully resist?
I know that this is a long comment and you are a busy person, so any size response would be great. Even just reading this would be appreciated. Peace.
I will publish my comments on this soon, thanks!
Your description of yourself on your Twitter as a satyagrahi lead me to read the Wikipedia article on satyagraha. It featured some of Ghandi’s comments on the Jewish Holocaust:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satyagraha#Satyagraha_and_the_Jewish_Holocaust
My opinion has already changed. Perhaps “never” is the best answer to “when should you shoot a cop.” I am sure that it will change even more as I read some of Ghandi’s work on this subject in the coming days. Thanks!
Glad to be of service!
The only time you can or should resist arrest is if your life is in immediate danger. Not letting someone have necessary medicine puts their life in danger, but not immediate danger. You can medicate if they let you out on bail.
In a similar vein, shooting someone, cop or anyone else, can & should only be done when your life is in immediate danger and you have no other options. (Such as running, hiding)
IMHO