The Friday following Gypsy's murder in mid-Sep. 1998, John Campbell can be seen signing the "Headwaters Deal" in Sacramento on that Saturday morning's edition of the Times-Standard. In a 14 page decision on August 29th, 2002, Judge John Golden has issued a temporary restraining order to halt all operations on PL's 211,000 acres until a lawsuit filed by EPIC and the Sierra Club can be fully heard. Writer also believes that the steelworkers at Kaiser helped initiate the lawsuit with Epic & the SC back in 1999(time law suit was originally filed) while they were on strike against the evil corporate Charles Hurwitz. After years of delay for information from State Fish and Game, CDF and PL, the judge has ruled that the dragging out of this lawsuit is proposterous and time to take proactive measures to shut em down temporarily.
At issue is Maxxam/PL's "so called" sustained yield plan(SYP). The judge has apparently sided that it is in the public's best interest to halt all operations on their land. News of this came late Thursday afternoon as the Plaintiff's got the decision. An analyis is being done and more press to come on this soon.
Maxxam/PL has been dogged in recent months by direct action protests in the woods in the Mattole River and a few tree-sitters have been maintaining active sits in Freshwater and another on Gypsy mountain. The protests had slowed down previuously, but with so many THP's on the cutting block, forest defenders took to the woods. Now the courts have granted some temporary relief!!!
The woods will remain quite until the next hearing on this SYP case is heard on or about September 16-17-18, 2002. Details to come on the next hearing.
Yes, no logging operations are presently allowed on PL's land. Yarding of the already fallen logs can take place, but that's it. No more cutting until Judge John Golden has a chance to hear more on these issues.
It is expected that a copy of the ruling will be posted to SF indymedia as it becomes available and put into a pdf format. Stay tuned!
To see the AP article:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/news/archive/2002/08/30/state0321EDT0009.DTL EPIC didn't write this. It's posted for people's information, for all who have struggled to protect the ancient ones.
Also check out the SF Indymedia's Forest Defense feature page for ongoing news regarding No. Cal forest issues.
http://sf.indymedia.org/features/forest/ Charlie Hurwitz(Maxxam owner) lives in Houston He's also responsible for a portion of the Savings and Loan scandel that some of the business people in LA might be associated with. Seems as if there's a whole slew of corporate crooks in Houston these days. Arthur Andersen supposedly certified PL's operation as wise-use sustainable a year or so ago, probably at the same time they were cooking Enron's books. The corporate veil is coming unraveled these days!