A New York-based anarchist has been arrested by the FBI and charged with hindering prosecution after he allegedly used the social networking site Twitter to help protesters at the G20 summit in Pittsburgh evade the police.
Elliot Madison, 41, from Queens, had his home raided and was put on $30,000 (£19,000) bail after he and Michael Wallschlaeger, 46, were tracked to the Carefree Inn motel in Pittsburgh during the summit on 24 and 25 September. […]
The FBI said that as well as the computers and radio scanning equipment discovered at the motel, they also confiscated from Madison’s home 11 gas masks, five pairs of goggles and test tubes and beakers. They said they also took away anarchist books and pictures of Marx and Lenin.
Guardian: New York man accused of using Twitter to direct protesters during G20 summit
Unconscionable.
October 6, 2009 at 10:32 pm
Umm…there may be something here I’m not getting, but what are these people actually charged with? Is calling someone and telling them what you hear on a police scanner a crime? Anarchist literature? Pictures of Lenin and Marx? Possession of gas masks and goggles? Now, all of this stuff would get you a long, unpleasant conversation with most cops, but what are they actually charged with? I’m not being snide — I suspect that there’s some law about conspiracy to impede justice or something — but this doesn’t seem to map to any charges I’ve heard of.
October 7, 2009 at 3:02 pm
Ok. Ok. Obstruction of justice. They should have set up a pirate radio station, then it wouldn’t have been coordinating illegal protests, it would have been “news”.