Judge Throws Out Ship-Boarding Charges Against Greenpeace

[Hasaler]

It's heartening to know that the judge just threw it out.

http://ap.tbo.com/ap/florida/MGA0D3VUFUD.html

MIAMI (AP) - A judge Wednesday tossed out federal ship-boarding charges against Greenpeace, ruling there was not enough evidence for the case to go to the jury.
U.S. District Judge Adalberto Jordan ended the case after the prosecution rested in the nation's first federal indictment targeting an advocacy group for its protest tactics.

The environmental group was accused of violating a 1872 law, not used in more than a century, when its members boarded a ship to protest the Amazon mahogany lumber that was part of its cargo.

[Sequoia]

1. Heh, heh...walk the plank Ashcroft!

Heh, heh, heh. Victory!

[dArKeR]

12. LOL! All you guys here make my day so happy. I can't stop laughing

Sequoia!

'Update message': as the laughing stops I get pissed off how 66% of Americans have no idea what idiot Bush and his Repuke immoral cronies want to do. Appoint more immoral and dishonest and crimminal Federal Judges like Thomas; Scalia, Rehnquist... I have nothing against a few honest conservative Federal Judges but what Bush and the Repuke leadership are doing are appointing rubber stamp, in their pocket and/or blackmailed judges (just like Bush is trying to blackmail prisoners in Iraq and hold it over them until the day they are needed), who will make immoral decisions based on politics and not on honest evalution of our Constitution and passed laws.

U.S. District Judge Adalberto Jordan is REAL AMERICAN HERO. And nothing like a bullshit actor Ah-no trying to pretend he knows something about America and our constitution who just got some fame from movies.

Greenpeace was the first organization I had joined. I was about 9 to 11 years old. I had saved up the allowance my Dad gave me. I sent in $5 and joined to help save the whales.

[sonias]

2. Great news!

Congratulations to Greenpeace.

Sonia

[Cronus Protagonist]

3. A poke in the eye for Ashcroft!!

http://brainbuttons.com/home.asp?stashid=13

[Just Me]

4. Wooooo Hooooo!!!!

Up yours, Asscroft!!!

Hee hee hee hee haw HAW HAW HAW!!!

Wonderful!!! Wonderful!!!!

:bounce:

[icymist]

5. Yea!!!!!

:party: :toast: :bounce: :toast: :party: :bounce: :spank: :toast: :bounce: :party: :evilgrin: O8) :kick: :kick: :kick:
Can you tell I like Greenpeace?

[LoZoccolo]

6. I keep thinking of this...

Arrested at the Mardi Gras for jumpin' on a float.
My man MCA's got a beard like a billy goat.
- The Beastie Boys, "Shake Your Rump"

[joefree1]

7. A win for our side!

Thanks for posting. S'cuse me while I e-mail all my right wing friends.



http://ediablo.com/ediablojokes.html

"If you have no enemies, it is a sign fortune has forgot you."
- Thomas Fuller (1608 - 1661)

[jpak]

8. Damned liberal judges!

Don't they know them environmentalists is all terra-isms????

[Political_Junkie]

9. Yes!

I just knew that one wasn't gonna fly.

[rocktivity]

10. Avast, John Ashcroft, you're scuttled!

And how predictably ironic--I understand that the original purpose of that was to discourage prostitutes...Arrrr!

:headbang:
rocknation

[hatrack]

27. Arrgh! Arrgh, ye scurvy knave!! Arrgh!!

Davy Jones' locker beckons ye Ashcroft, ye scabrous catamite!!

[tom_paine]

11. I still say the judiciary has proven to be the most resilient branch

in the field of resisting Tyranny.

I mean, look at the Congress, for God's Sake. There is very little actual resistance there, most of it comes from Old Folks who will pass away soon (and be replaced by WHAT?), and it still resides firmly in an ever more detatched.

And, of course the current Executive (Imperial Branch) is the SOURCE of Tyranny.

No, it seems to me that many of these non-Bushevik judges take their oath perhaps more seriously than modern doctors.

Even given the judicial situation (which resembles the rest of the National Situation...a very short distance from full-blown Totalitarianism).

[Big_Mike]

13. I love it

Try using a 19th century law to make an issue from nothing. As I read it, it was originally used to prevent dockside "wharf"walkers from getting sailors off ships. Hmm...I never saw a sailor needed help in that regard. Stupid law then.

Excretory law now.

Idiots.

[tom_paine]

15. I don't know if it was a bad law, then

I guess I don't know enough about the history of impressment to say anything.

But I do know that the Forcible Impressment of sailors was a very real thing as late as the 1820s, maybe much later.

Might be worth a Google Search to see what I can find out.

Of course, whatever the law was originally intended to do is probably unnecessary at this time and Ashcroft used it....welll, used it like you would expect a Totalitarian to use it, out of context and strictly politically rather than lawfully.

[WannaJumpMyScooter]

28. Not a stupid law then. A very big problem for merchant ships in

foreign ports. Imagine having your cargos trapped in port because there were not enough hands to sail the ship somewhere else safely because the French/Royal/US/Spanish Navy had taken all the crewmembers who were available.
That was the issue. Commerce, as always with US laws.

Maybe Greenpeace was trying to press sailors into being environmental activists?

[icymist]

14. More the reason to fight for un-biased judges...

I pray to God that our Congress will work out. I thank God every day for Ted Kennedy and hope he will never quit Congress. I have to have faith that there are some young liberals and progressives learning our political 'ropes'.

[lil-petunia]

17. young uns

New blood is necessary. But given the rabid, attack dog bull that candidates must undergo, all too many smart honest people just don't want to justify the color of the underwear they wore in 1965. Today's attack dog politics started off with the political mentor of one G W Shrub. He died of brain tumors, played country guitar, and for the life of me, I can't 'member his name.

[icymist]

23. Maybe the attack dog's attack dog needs attacked!

I simply cannot imagine living life constantly fearing what that, what is in my past, or perceived in my past, become relevant now. Are we a nation of laws or are we a nation of grudges? This is not to say that really heinous crimes should go unnoticed, only that our opponents have a tendency to make mountains out of molehills!

[tom_paine]

18. Agreed. But I wonder about the next "generation" of Congress

What will ahppen when the Last Senators and Reps of the Old Republic die off. What will they be replaced with? People who don't understand freedom?

People who blindly assume that CNN is the Leftist Equivalent of Faux?

People who are already VERY comfortable with mild oppression and it wouldn't take much to push them further (think unPATRIOT Act)

Nations change character normally this way. Old generations with old values pass on. New generations take their place.

Now, it isn't an automatic-given that each generation is worse than the last or anything.

But given the current Amerikan Trends, it is reasonable to assume that Congress, like the rest of Imperial Amerikan Subjects, will grow more comfortable over time with Lies, Frauid, Tyranny and Orwellian Double-Standards.

In truth, they seem pretty comfortable with those things now, with rare exceptions.

I hope you are right, but history seems to say that is unlikely.

[dArKeR]

16. Email him - Born 1961 in Havana, Cuba - Jordan, Adalberto Jose

Jordan, Adalberto Jose
Born 1961 in Havana, Cuba

Federal Judicial Service:
U. S. District Court, Southern District of Florida
Nominated by William J. Clinton on March 15, 1999, to a seat vacated by Lenore Carrero Nesbitt; Confirmed by the Senate on September 8, 1999, and received commission on September 9, 1999.

Education:
University of Miami, B.A., 1984

University of Miami, J.D., 1987

Professional Career:
Law clerk, Hon. Thomas Clark, U.S. Court of Appeals, Eleventh Circuit, 1987-1988
Law clerk, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, Supreme Court of the United States, 1988-1989
Private practice, Miami, FL, 1989-1994
Adjunct professor, University of Miami School of Law, 1990-present
U.S. Attorney's Office, Southern District of FL, 1994-1999


Race or Ethnicity: Hispanic

Gender: Male

http://air.fjc.gov/servlet/tGetInfo?jid=2831

------------------

Judge Adalberto Jordan 301 North Miami Avenue, 8th Floor Miami, FL 33128

[e-mail]

[MasonJar]

19. This at least deserves a little chorus from Handel's Messiah.

[blm]

20. Heh....that is GREAT news.

.

[Cocoa]

21. soft on sailormongering!

damn activist judges!

[ceile]

22. Oh Thank Heaven!!

I was a little worried there for a moment-really.:bounce:

[UpInArms]

24. Yes!

Advocacy groups had said a conviction of Greenpeace could have had a "chilling" effect on free speech and legitimate protests. It would also be a blow to Brazilian efforts to win more backing for its fight against the illegal mahogany trade from the United States, the biggest market for a wood so valuable it boasts fatter profit margins than cocaine.

Hopefully, the judiciary will continue to see the truth about the bogus charges that this WH is bringing against our country and its citizens.

[salin]

25. what... Ashcroft wastes *more* taxpayer money chasing

his own political agenda even when it is so absurd that *even he* knows it will lose? What a surprise?!

[DieboldMustDie]

26. Here's a more detailed Reuters report that Common Dreams picked up.

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0519-11.htm

[Tellurian]

29. YAY, for GREENPEACE!

More so- Congrats to the Judge that didn't succumb under pressure.