From: Declan McCullagh <declan@pathfinder.com>
Date: Mon, 23 Jun 1997 12:27:14 +0800
To: Anonymous <nobody@replay.com>
Subject: Re: Canarypunk: Jim Bell in a coalmine
In-Reply-To: <199706230158.DAA25236@basement.replay.com>
Message-ID: <Pine.GSO.3.95.970623001303.18526D-100000@cp.pathfinder.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain



Interesting theory, but unfortunately untrue. Bell is not being held
incommunicado. His mother told me she sees him regularly, if not daily.
His lawyer talks to him. He's able to make collect calls, like most
prisoners.

Hardly "incommunicado."

-Declan

PS: Note I'm not defending holding Bell without bail.


On Mon, 23 Jun 1997, Anonymous wrote:

> Free speech - Unless Govt. doesn't like it
> 
> From           talltom <"talltom(SPAMBLOCKER)"@ipns.com>
> Organization   Alternate Access Inc.
> Date           Sat, 21 Jun 1997 19:23:39 -0700
> Newsgroups     or.politics
> Message-ID     <33AC8CAB.199F@ipns.com>
> 
> This is in reference to a local, that's being held incommunicado
> in Tacoma. I've personally tried to contact Jim and the Marshalls 
> office said they'd "try" to get a message to him, wouldn't give me an 
> address, and were REALLY interested in my address.
> 
>  I believe the reason for holding Jim incomunicado is that the ACLU
> requires that the accused ask them for help, and the feds know that
> if Jim can't ask he won't get their help.
> 
> Vin covers the situation nicely...
> 
> [Vin Suprynowicz column:]
> 
>     In the summer of 1995, 39-year-old electronics engineer Jim Bell of
> Vancouver, Wash. (coincidentally the scene of the climactic battle 
> between militia and central government forces in Ian Slater's current 
> potboiler paperback "Showdown: U.S.A. vs. Militia,") penned an intriguing 
> and controversial essay called "Assassination Politics," which has since 
> been kicking around various Internet discussion groups, triggering 
> responses from delight to outrage.
> 
>   This section from Mr. Bell's introduction gives the gist:
> 
>   "A few months ago, I had a truly and quite literally 'revolutionary'
> idea, and I jokingly called it 'Assassination Politics': I speculated on
> the question of whether an organization could be set up to legally 
> announce that it would be awarding a cash prize to somebody who correctly
> 'predicted' the death of one of a list of violators of rights, usually
> either government employees, officeholders, or appointees. It could ask 
> for anonymous contributions from the public, and individuals would be able 
> send those contributions using digital cash.
> 
>   "I also speculated that using modern methods of public-key encryption 
> and anonymous 'digital cash,' it would be possible to make such awards in 
> such a way so that nobody knows who is getting awarded the money, only that 
> the award is being given. Even the organization itself would have no
> information that could help the authorities find the person responsible 
> for the prediction, let alone the one who caused the death. ...
> 
>   "Obviously, the problem with the general case is that the victim may be
> totally innocent under libertarian principles, which would make the 
> killing a crime, leading to the question of whether the person offering the 
> money was himself guilty.
> 
>   "(But) my speculation assumed that the 'victim' is a government 
> employee, presumably one who is not merely taking a paycheck of stolen tax 
> dollars, but also is guilty of extra violations of rights beyond this. 
> (Government agents responsible for the Ruby Ridge incident and Waco come 
> to mind.) In receiving such money and in his various acts, he violates the
> 'Non-aggression Principle' (NAP) and thus, presumably, any acts against 
> him are not the initiation of force under libertarian principles.
> 
>   "The organization set up to manage such a system could, presumably, 
> make up a list of people who had seriously violated the NAP, but who would 
> not see justice in our courts due to the fact that their actions were done 
> at the behest of the government. ..."
> 
>   In a followup essay titled "Fishing Expedition Swims Against the Tide,"
> published in the May 14 edition of the daily Portland Oregonian, Bell
> wrote, in part:
> 
>   "... I've been openly debating the idea on the Internet since then with
> anyone who will listen. My essay surprises many and shocks more than a
> few, but I am pleased that such a truly revolutionary concept has been so
> well received. Even the Columbian newspaper (www.columbian.com) has 
> decided to add a pointer to the essay.
> 
>   "The only 'threat' in the essay is to the jobs of the people who have
> been parasites on the rest of us for decades, as well as to the future of
> tyrannies around the world.  But that's why, on April 1, 20 federal 
> agents burst in and took my computer, told the news media I was 'armed and
> dangerous,' and began engaging in a fishing expedition including 
> harassing people simply for knowing me. (No arrest or charges so far.) ..."
> 
>   The charges were forthcoming.
> 
>   Jim Bell was arrested on Friday, May 16, and has been held ever since,
> without bond, in the Pierce County Jail in Tacoma, Wash., on a federal
> complaint which alleges:
> 
>   "Beginning at a time unknown, and continuing to the present, ... JAMES
> DALTON BELL did corruptly obstruct and impede ... the due administration 
> of the internal revenue laws, among other things, by collecting the names 
> and home addresses of agents and employees of the Internal Revenue Service
> ('IRS') in order to intimidate them in the performance of their official
> functions; by soliciting others to join in a scheme known as 'Assassination
> Politics' whereby those who killed IRS employees would be rewarded; by
> using social security account numbers that were not assigned to him to 
> hide his assets and thereby impede the IRS's ability to collect his unpaid
> taxes, and by contaminating the area outside of the office of the IRS in
> Vancouver, Washington, with mercaptan, a chemical that causes a powerful
> odor."
> 
>   Nor does the complaint stop short with an alleged "stink bomb" floor 
> mat, proceeding to allege that Mr. Bell has at times discussed poisoning 
> water supplies, sabotaging government computers, and, well ... 
> "overthrowing the Government of the United States."
> 
>   The question here would appear to be whether Mr. Bell has actually 
> taken substantive steps, as alleged, to "implement" the theory in his 
> speculative Internet essay, or whether it is the IRS -- who since Feb. 20 
> have seized the heretofore non-violent Mr. Bell's car, wages and bank 
> accounts (presumably stymying at the very last minute his plan to 
> "overthrow the Government of the United States") -- who are doing the 
> "threatening and intimidating," in an attempt to send a message to anyone 
> who dares speculate about how justice might ever be obtained against 
> federal agents ... given that they are rarely if ever indicted, even for 
> the willful murder of children, as at Waco and Ruby Ridge.
> 
>   If the defendant Bell has indeed taken substantive steps to set in 
> motion the murder of any specific government agent, that of course is a 
> crime, for which he should expect to face the consequences.
> 
>   On the other hand, if writings of the "what if someone ..." variety 
> have now become a felony so serious that one can be seized and held 
> without bond, most of America's adventure and science fiction writers -- 
> who up till now have felt safe spinning thinly-veiled yarns about 
> near-future government coups and such -- had better watch their 
> backsides.
> 
>   Mr. Bell's attorney, Peter Avenia of the Public Defenders Office in
> Tacoma, says he fully expects Mr. Bell to be indicted by a federal grand
> jury within the next few weeks.
> 
>   I asked Mr. Avenia if he believes the case will present substantive 
> First Amendment questions.
> 
>   "It certainly does concern me."
> 
>   Is the IRS making an example of Mr. Bell, to chill any further
> discussions on the Internet of how justice can ever be had in the case of
> uniformed killers who apparently need no longer fear being indicted or
> brought to trial in this country?
> 
>   "It's certainly a possibility. In the context of the Oklahoma City
> bombing it's certainly a hostile atmosphere for any such defendant. I 
> think we can certainly ask whether the government is trying to send a 
> message to people who pen inflammatory writings."
> 
>   Defense attorney Avenia can be reached at the Federal Public Defenders
> Office, 1551 Broadway, Suite 501, Tacoma, Wash. 98402. The essay
> "Assassination Politics" is available on the Internet at
> http://jya.com/ap.htm. The current federal complaint against Mr. Bell can
> be found at http://jya.com/jimbell3.htm
> 
> Vin Suprynowicz is the assistant editorial page editor of the Las Vegas
> Review-Journal. Readers may contact him via e-mail at vin@lvrj.com. The 
> web site for the Suprynowicz column is at http://www.nguworld.com/vindex/
> 
> ***
> 
> Vin Suprynowicz,   vin@lvrj.com
> 
> Voir Dire: A French term which means "jury stacking."
> 
> 
>