error"The would-be teen terroristy"
Posted on Thursday, February 14 @ 09:56:21 EST

By Mitch Jones
YellowTimes.ORG Columnist (United States)

(YellowTimes.ORG) – Sherman Austin is 18. He is currently in the custody of the Feds as a result of a charge of disorderly conduct and unlawful assembly during the World Economic Forum protests in New York. The FBI became interested with his website, raisethefist.com, long before the WEF protests.

Various government agencies had been monitoring his site long before September 11, 2001. In January, 2002, his mother’s house was raided by the FBI who had obtained a warrant in response to an affidavit citing Title 18, United States Code, Section 842(p), which prohibits the dissemination of information regarding the making or use of explosives, and, Title 18, United States Code, Sections 1030 which prohibits computer fraud and abuse including denial of service net-strikes and other “hacking” techniques.

The warrant commands agents to search the premises for, most significantly, “Records, documents, programs, applications and materials which reflect malicious computer activity including copies of computer exploits, hacking tools and programs, lists of user names, passwords, credit card numbers, computerized logs, account names, personal telephone books, personal address books, exploits and other programs used to obtain unauthorized access of computer systems or information or launch denial of service attacks on computer systems,” and, “Records, documents, programs, applications and materials regarding explosives, destructive devices, weapons of mass destruction, improvised explosive devices, New World Order, NWO, International Monetary Fund, IMF, World Economic Forum, WEF, and threats against the United States Government, the President, and its officials including documentation, correspondence, notes, bulletin postings, Internet Relay Chat logs, electronic mails, webpages, computer program computer code, and programming manuals.”

Raisethefist.com existed for a short time as a base for information regarding why the site was taken down after Sherman Austin’s house was raided. I had a conversation over e-mail with the anonymous webmaster of the site before the WEF actions on January 31 through February 4. The content of those e-mails follows:

YellowTimes.ORG: What was raisethefist.com, who was its founder and what else was he involved in?

Raisethefist.com: Raisethefist.com is an activist/anarchist information collective site That allows anyone that visits to share information and publish articles on the site. The founder was involved in doing banner drops and protests.

YT: Who was monitoring the site?

RTF: The U.S. government site was (and still is) monitoring the site. Governments from Australia and Europe also monitor the site daily.

YT: Who conducted the raid?

RTF: The raid was a cooperation with the LAPD, Los Angeles Terrorist Task Force, and Secret Service/FBI.

YT: What reasons did they give for shutting RTF down?

RTF: They gave reasons for shutting down the site because of militancy.

YT: What legal actions have been taken to protect RTF's founder and/or alleviate the injustice of this attack on a free press?

RTF: Right now the founder is seeking an attorney if such charges arise. We Are spreading the word with the help of the activist community and working to get the site back up.

YT: Has the ACLU or any other civil liberties organization gotten involved?

RTF: At the point I am not informed if the ACLU is involved.

He also stated that in the future, everyone involved with the site is going to be made anonymous.

Although the actual raid took place a while ago, it is important to speak about this now. It is important for the pacifist/peace movement to discuss this issue because there are civil rights implications that are far reaching.

Sherman was arrested by the NYPD, released, and then rearrested by the FBI in New York. No arrest was made when the raid took place.

Also, one of his convictions, that of “Possession of a deadly weapon without paying taxes or having it registered,” was based solely on the fact that the FBI found Snapple bottles, wicks, duct tape and fertilizer in his room (some sources say his car) and these materials can be used to make Molotov Cocktails.

On his website, Sherman had links to pages that said how to make Molotov Cocktails, but there are hundreds of violent sites, some racist, political and even senseless, that say how to make weapons. Most of these sites have not been raided and taken down. In fact, you can buy the Anarchist Cookbook and other bomb making books right off Amazon.com. Does that mean that Amazon.com should be shut down?

The mainstream media has not reported this story other than a New York Post article that focused on the WEF protests in New York and was obviously slanted, calling Sherman Austin a “would-be teen terrorist.” Not even the alternative press has given this much attention other than the Los Angeles Independent Media Center (http://la.indymedia.org). This story is an important example of the impact on civil liberties that war hysteria has caused.

Mitch Jones encourages your comments: mjones@YellowTimes.ORG

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