Posted on behalf of Roberta Kwok
A federal terrorism task force has arrested four people accused of participating in violent protests and threats against university researchers in California. Two were arrested in North Carolina on Thursday by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and the others were arrested in California on Friday (press release).
Three of the suspects are accused of an attempt to invade a University of California, Santa Cruz researcher’s home in February 2008, which resulted in the researcher’s husband being hit by an object. Investigators also claim evidence shows that three suspects helped produce and distribute fliers listing names and contact information for UC researchers, with a message saying “beware we know where you live”.
The university is “extremely grateful” to the law enforcement agencies involved, said Stephen E. Thorsett, dean of UC Santa Cruz’s Division of Physical and Biological Sciences (San Jose Mercury News). “Our students, staff, and faculty — who are doing important research into the causes and cures for human diseases such as cancer and Parkinson’s — deserve to work and live in a safe environment, without fear that they and their families will be targets of violent actions and threats.”
One of the suspects, Joseph Buddenberg of Berkeley, California, wrote an article for the Berkeley Daily Planet saying he had been part of protests by a group called Stop Cal Vivisection, which used to list researchers’ home addresses on a Web site. Another suspect, Adriana Stumpo of Long Beach, California, has called the company Huntingdon Life Sciences “the modern day Holocaust for animals” on a Web site (San Francisco Chronicle).
The other suspects are Nathan Pope of Oceanside, California, and Maryam Khajavi of Pinole, California.
“With so many legal options to make their voices heard and to effect policy change, it is inexcusable and cowardly for these people to resort to terrorizing the families of those with whom they do not agree,” said Charlene B. Thornton, an FBI special agent in San Francisco (Los Angeles Times).
The charges do not relate to the firebombings of two UC Santa Cruz biomedical researchers’ homes in August 2008 (Mercury News). That investigation is on-going, says FBI spokesman Joseph M. Schadler.