Human Rights Trumps Terrorism

Animal rights extremist receive convictions due to their disruptive approach of disagreement.
ht-Machelle Malkin

AP story goes on to say -

A jury returned its (guilty) verdict against Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty and six of its members on Thursday after three days of deliberations.

The government charged that SHAC waged a five-year campaign against Huntingdon Life Sciences, posting on its Web site information about the lab's employees and those who do business with Huntingdon. The information included their home phone numbers, addresses and where their children attended school. Many of those people saw their homes vandalized, and they and their families received threatening e-mails, faxes and phone calls.
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The defendants were not accused of directly making threats or carrying out vandalism. Instead, they were charged with animal enterprise terrorism, stalking and other offenses.

Mike Caulfield, Huntingdon's general manager, said the verdict was “a victory for democracy, research and patients.” “The government and this jury have sent a strong message to those who would ignore the democratic process and resort to criminal activity to advance their political views,” Caulfield said in a statement.
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SHAC President Pamelyn Ferdin said the jury was fooled by the government's case and the judge's order to remove victims' names and home addresses from its Web site reeked of fascism.

“This is a scary path for all Americans,” said Ferdin, a former child star who was the voice of Lucy in the “Peanuts” movies and played Felix Unger's daughter Edna on TV's “The Odd Couple.”
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Many of the targets of the harassment testified that they started looking over their shoulders when walking or driving, changed their phone numbers or even moved. Some kept their children from playing outdoors, and several bought guns.

Sally Dillenback broke into tears as she recounted an anonymous e-mail that threatened to cut open her son and fill him with poison “the way Huntingdon does with the animals.”

Marian Harlos testified she got late-night calls in which someone asked: “Are you scared? Do you think the puppies should be scared?”

She said masked protesters parked down the street from her house, videotaping her comings and goings. They barged into her office, screaming and tossing leaflets, and others ruined the rear door with glue and animal stickers, she said.

And now, in a move of international solidarity, this from the TIMES in the UK -

New York is next target of animal rights group
By Nicola Woolcock and Patrick Foster

ANIMAL rights activists targeting Oxford University are taking their campaign to America, where extremists were last week convicted of inciting terrorism.

Protesters will single out clubs and restaurants hosting reunion events arranged by the Oxford Alumni Association of New York. It is the first time that Speak, a group opposed to the construction of a £20 million research facility at the university, has taken its protest abroad.
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Last week the American branch of Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty (Shac), which aims to close down Huntingdon Life Sciences (HLS) in Cambridgeshire, was convicted, along with six of its members, of inciting violence and harassment against the staff and families of HLS and their clients. Now Speak is mobilising support in the US. On its website, it encourages activists to contact venues in New York to persuade them to cancel bookings for alumni dinners next month. It says: “Let’s not forget: the reason these events take place is in order to raise money for the university. Some of this money will then undoubtedly find its way to those who are torturing and abusing animals.”

A Speak spokesman said: “We’re pretty confident our friends in New York will come to our assistance. There will be a number of people at various venues, educating them about exactly what goes on in vivisection laboratories.”

Work on the Oxford laboratory was suspended for 16 months after the previous contractors pulled out after threats from extremists. It resumed in December last year, amid high security. Speak has since adopted new tactics, including targeting groups with only tenuous connections to the university.

Let us all hope, after they cross the pond, they cross the line while acting out and get arrested. I prefer the recent activities and approach to disagreement taken by PETA posted earlier here at MAXINE.