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Federal prosecutors are seeking a 10-year prison sentence for Briana Waters, a California woman convicted in March by a federal grant jury of assisting in the 2001 Earth Liberation Front arson that destroyed the University of Washington's Urban Horticulture Center. That recommendation includes a "terrorism enhancement," according to a sentencing memorandum filed by prosecutors Wednesday in U.S. District Court. The UW arson sought to strike a blow against genetic engineering of poplar trees, and federal prosecutors say that meets the legal definition of a violent act "calculated to influence or affect the conduct of government by intimidation or coercion," according...

Invoking the Red Scare of the 1950s, some environmentalists claim the federal government is committing something similar against the green movement of the 2000s. Of course, it could simply be vigorous enforcement of laws against violence and property damage. According to court documents, Briana Waters, convicted in the 2001 arson at the University of Washington Center for Urban Horticulture, is afraid that by remaining in prison she will lose her deep connection with her three year old daughter, Kalliope. She has justification to be worried about her sentencing on Friday, May 30. Throughout the grand jury process, the indictments,...

U.S. prosecutors are asking that convicted eco-arsonist Briana Waters be held in jail pending her sentencing in federal court because she was involved in another Earth Liberation Front arson at a horse ranch in California, according to court documents. The U.S. Attorney's Office says it will introduce evidence of her participation in that fire in hopes of ensuring a lengthy prison sentence for her conviction on two counts of arson stemming from a May 2001 fire at the University of Washington's Center for Urban Horticulture. Waters was convicted by a federal jury in Tacoma last week following four days of...

Do the crime, do the time. That’s the rule in this country; there’s no mommy exception. If there were, environmental radical Briana Waters might not be looking at hard time after her conviction in Tacoma on Thursday on two counts of arson. Waters, a winsome 32-year-old mother, used to a be member of a violent Earth Liberation Front cell known as “The Family.” The Family was into torching other people’s property – including homes – it considered threats to the environment. It did a lot of this. One of its acts of ecoterror was the burning of the University of...

TACOMA — Jurors weighing the fate of Briana Waters struggled with a charge that would have sent the 32-year-old mother and violin teacher to prison for 30 years. Their verdict, delivered Thursday in a packed federal courtroom, recognized her participation in the 2001 arson at a University of Washington research center, but also her limited role in the crime and the modest prison sentences expected to be given to others involved. The arson was committed in the name of the Earth Liberation Front. While jurors convicted the Oakland, Calif., woman of two counts of arson, they deadlocked on three other...

A jury has found Briana Waters guilty of two counts of arson in the 2001 burning of the University of Washington's Center for Urban Horticulture by members of the Earth Liberation Front.....Assistant U.S. Attorney Mark Bartlett says the case was a success now that more than a dozen people involved have been brought to justice. "I think it sends an incredibly strong message, and that is, when you choose to become involved in these types of eco-terrorist activities, you may get away for awhile, but eventually...we'll track you down and you will be held accountable," said Bartlett, The 32-year-old from...

TACOMA — A 32-year-old violin teacher from California was found guilty this morning of two counts of arson for the 2001 fire at the University of Washington's Center for Urban Horticulture. A federal jury found that Briana Waters, a former Olympia resident, was among a group of ecosaboteurs who torched the center in the predawn hours of May 21, 2001, causing about $1.5 million in damage. The center was later rebuilt at a cost of about $7 million. Waters faces up to five years in prison for each count of arson. But the jury, which had been deliberating since Friday...

Eco-sabotage - Tre Arrow says he's not guilty; homes burn near Seattle; a jury deliberates in TacomaTre Arrow appeared for the first time in a U.S. courtroom Monday to answer government charges that he firebombed logging and concrete-mixing trucks in the spring of 2001, acts of eco-sabotage that rocked the region. The 34-year-old former fugitive, appearing beefier than in his days as one of Oregon's most flamboyant environmental activists, pleaded not guilty in Portland's U.S. District Court to an indictment accusing him of arson, conspiracy and use of destructive devices as an Earth Liberation Front saboteur. Arrow's 14-minute court appearance...

Briana Waters is on trial in Tacoma for her alleged role in the 2001 arson at the University of Washington's Center for Urban Horticulture. It was one of a number of incidents of vandalism in the Northwest attributed to Earth Liberation Front's campaign to rid the world of things that aren't "wild." So what is wild?On the afternoon of May 21, 2001, investigator Cheryl Glenn of the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF) walked through the charred remains of several buildings at the Jefferson Poplar Farm in Clatskanie, Ore. Periodically she would stop, adjust her gloves, get down...

Woman recalls confrontations with witnessesTACOMA -- A 32-year-old violin teacher and mother accused of conspiring with members of an Earth Liberation Front eco-terrorist cell took the stand in her own defense Wednesday and flatly denied any involvement in the 2001 firebombing of a University of Washington research center. Briana Waters and her attorneys sought to portray the main witnesses against her -- convicted eco-terrorists -- as liars, motivated by a desire to cut decades off their sentences and by sexually triggered anger. Waters, of Oakland, Calif., wore a white blouse with long blond hair tumbling down to her shoulders. "Did...

In May 2001, members of a Northwest group used arson to advance its agenda. They set fire to the Center for Urban Horticulture at the University of Washington because they believed one of the researchers was genetically engineering poplar trees. He wasn't. The arsonists destroyed plants and the research of several people other than the man whose work they targeted. None of their goals was served by the violence. "Misguided" is the word, I believe. I'd even call them ecoterrorists. The crime is back in the news because a woman accused of acting as a lookout for the Earth Liberation...

Jennifer Kolar and Lacey Phillabaum seem unlikely criminals. Well-educated young women passionate about environmental causes, they share a love of the outdoors and similar backgrounds. Both grew up in Spokane and attended the same public high school. Those who know Phillabaum call her bright, outspoken, sometimes in-your-face but never dull. She was a skilled debater in high school and college and once worked for a well-regarded non-profit that promotes sustainable agriculture. Kolar Kolar studied under one of the nation's top atmospheric scientists while pursuing a doctoral degree and had the makings of a good scientist, her adviser said, but her...

A mother that gives violin lessons will face trial in the northwestern US state of Washington on charges she was an environmental terrorist, prosecutors said. Briana Waters, 30, of the famously liberal California city of Berkeley, has pleaded innocent in a Seattle federal court that she that fire bombed a horticulture center in 2001. A US district court judge allowed Waters to remain free pending the start of her trial in June, but ordered that she turn in her passport and have her whereabouts monitored electronically. Waters was the first person charged in connection with an attack that destroyed the...