Free Republic

The Oregon Court of Appeals on Wednesday overturned the 22-year sentence given to environmental activist Jeffrey Michael Luers for burning three SUVs at the former Romania truck lot and for trying to set fire to the Tyree Oil Co. in Eugene. The court upheld all 10 of Luers' felony convictions from his 2001 trial, but ruled that he was improperly sentenced to back-to-back prison terms in each of the crimes. Luers, 28, is considered a "political prisoner" among some activists who contend his 22-year, eight-month sentence is disproportionately harsh, considering that no one was injured in either crime and damage...

The Oregon Court of Appeals on Wednesday ordered a judge in Eugene to resentence a radical environmentalist now serving the stiffest sentence in U.S. history for eco-sabotage. Jeffrey Luers, known in Eugene's anarchist circles as "Free," was sentenced in June 2001 to 22 years, 8 months for setting fire to three pickups and attempting to ignite a gasoline tanker in the spring of 2000. Since Judge Lyle C. Velure imposed the sentence, not one major act of eco-sabotage has occurred in Oregon, which once stood as the epicenter for a series of kindred arsons by the Earth Liberation Front and...