ACLU Challenges Law that Outlaws Speech Causing “Mental Anguish”
By Noel Brinkerhoff and Steve Straehley | AllGov | January 14, 2015
A new Pennsylvania law has been challenged by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) for trying to stifle the speech of those who cause “mental anguish” with their remarks.
Lawmakers adopted the Revictimization Relief Act (pdf) after Mumia Abu-Jamal, who was convicted of killing Philadelphia police officer Daniel Faulkner in 1981, delivered a recorded commencement address to students at Goddard College in Vermont, where he had attended college. Faulkner’s widow said at the time that the speech was an “outrage,” but there was no evidence she attended the address, nor was there any mention of the murder or Faulker’s widow in the speech. Nonetheless, Republican state rep. Mike Vereb, a former police officer, proposed the legislation last Oct. 2, saying Abu-Jamal was continuing to traumatize Faulkner’s widow. Gov. Tom Corbett (R), who lost a re-election bid a couple weeks later in a landslide, signed the bill an extraordinarily short amount of time later, on Oct. 21.
The ACLU of Pennsylvania contends the law amounts to a “Silencing Act” on free speech. “Laws designed to silence anyone, even people society may find disagreeable, are unconstitutional and bad for democracy,” Reggie Shuford, executive director of the ACLU of Pennsylvania, said in a statement. “This law reaches broadly, and could prevent innocent prisoners from seeking clemency, journalists from using sources to expose prison abuse and formerly incarcerated persons from speaking publicly.”
The ACLU was joined in the suit by journalists, news outlets and advocacy organizations, as well as four former convicts who fear the law will stifle their ability to speak publicly.
Abu-Jamal has become a cause célèbre for the right. President Barack Obama’s nomination of Debo Adegbile to be head of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division was blocked at least in part because Adegbile helped represent Abu-Jamal during his appeal.
To Learn More:
ACLU Lawsuit: PA Law To Silence Offenders’ Speech Violates First Amendment (by Andrew Staub, Pennsylvania Independent )
ACLU Calls PA ‘Silencing Law’ Prior Restraint (by Andrew Thompson, Courthouse News Service )
Goddard Commencement (pdf)
If It’s Okay that John Roberts Defended a Mass Murderer, Why was Debo Adegbile Rejected by the Senate for Defending a Cop Killer? (by Steve Straehley, AllGov )
A checkpoint in Hebron
International Solidarity Movement | January 14, 2015
Hebron, Occupied Palestine – Checkpoints are numerous and inescapable in the H2 area of al-Khalil (Hebron), where thousands of soldiers guard around 600 Israeli Zionist settlers occupying heavily militarised settlement enclaves in the heart of the most populous Palestinian city in the West Bank. The Israeli military imposes numerous restrictions on the freedom of movement of Palestinians in the neighbourhoods of H2, affecting people as they attempt to live, work, study, and travel through their city. Shuhada checkpoint, leading from the H2 neighbourhood of Tel Rumeida into Palestinian-administered H1, is one of the larger and more heavily manned checkpoints.
One Israeli soldier looked through the purse of a young Palestinian woman as her daughter looked on. Even Palestinian children too young to carry bags for a soldier to search are subjected to the everyday sight of their older relatives being stopped, searched, questioned and detained by Israeli forces. Over a period of a couple of hours on Tuesday afternoon, an ISM activist witnessed Israeli soldiers stop and search around fifty Palestinian children, women, and men.
Barbed wire and fences frame the entry way into Shuhada checkpoint, as Israeli soldiers patrol the heavily militarised passage between the Palestinian neighbourhoods of Tel Rumeida and Bab el-Zawiye.
A very young Palestinian girl took a moment to look up at the heavily armed Israeli soldiers standing in her path. Armed with enormous rifles, chests strapped with body armour complete with pockets full of stun grenades and tear gas, the soldiers looked incongruous on the otherwise quiet, sunny street.
“I don’t understand why people think we want war, we just want peace,” one Israeli soldier told an ISM activist. The absurdity of his statement, as he stood with his rifle beside the checkpoint, seemed entirely lost on him. Deploying eighteen-year-olds with M16s to search kids’ shopping bags and their mothers’ purses, giving them control over the lives of Palestinians trying to keep surviving in the neighbourhoods of H2 in al-Khalil, creates a situation which, though it may sometimes seem quiet, is anything but peaceful. The soldiers stop whole families at the checkpoint: mothers, grandfathers, sisters laden with shopping bags. This young girl stood waiting off to the side as the Israeli military checked to make sure her relatives did not pose a “threat.”
Photo credits – ISM
Saudi Arabia Adds 5 Years to Human Rights Lawyer’s Prison Sentence
Al-Akhbar | January 13, 2015
A Saudi judge has sentenced a prominent human rights lawyer to an additional five years in jail, after he refused to show remorse or recognize the court that handed down his original 10-year term for sedition.
Waleed Abu al-Khair, founder and director of watchdog group Monitor of Human Rights in Saudi Arabia (MHRSA), was sentenced last year to 10 years in jail on charges that included breaking his allegiance to King Abdullah, showing disrespect for the authorities and creating an unauthorized association.
The Specialized Criminal Court in Riyadh also gave Abu al-Khair a five-year suspended sentence, fined him 200,000 riyals ($53,300), banned him from leaving the kingdom for a further 15 years after his eventual release, and shut down all his websites.
Abu al-Khair’s wife, rights activist Samar Badawi, said the court had decided on Monday to increase his sentence after an appeal by the public prosecutor, who had argued that the lawyer had failed to retract his views or express remorse over them. The judge accepted the request and increased the sentence to 15 years of imprisonment.
Badawi said her husband, who is 35, had long objected to the tribunal set up in 2008 to try terrorism suspects. It has since been used to send rights campaigners to prison.
“Waleed sees this court as lacking basic international standards for any tribunal and had objected to trying even terrorists in it, let alone rights activists,” she said.
Abu al-Khair has also been critical of a Saudi anti-terrorism law passed in early 2014, which is widely seen by activists as a tool to stifle dissent.
The anti-terrorism law says terrorist crimes include any act that “disturbs public order, shakes the security of society or subjects its national unity to danger, or obstructs the primary system of rule or harms the reputation of the state.” … Full article
A puzzling question about Egyptians’ silence towards the razing of Rafah
Arabi21 | January 11, 2015
The Governor of North Sinai Abdel-Fattah Harhoor has announced that the authorities intend to raze completely the city of Rafah along the borders between Egypt and the Gaza Strip. His announcement has been met with a deafening silence except for very few voices that condemned the decision. According to informed sources, 100 houses out of a total of 1,220 were evacuated last Thursday as part of the second phase of the operation aimed at setting up a buffer zone along the Gaza Strip.
A step by step measure
In interviews conducted by Arabi21, activists have given a variety of interpretations for the deafening silence in Egypt regarding what is going on in Rafah and Sinai. One of these interpretations suggests that in the beginning, the coup authorities did not openly announce their intention to raze the city of Rafah and that the measure took place gradually as of October 2014 until today. It began with the announcement that a half kilometre deep border strip was going to be created. This decision was implemented within hours. Houses were bombed and the people of Sinai were forced out of their homes. Then there was a decision to expand the border strip to the depth of one kilometre. And finally, there was the announcement by the Governor of Sinai three days ago that the entire city of Rafah would be razed to the ground completely, as activist Asmaa Al-Sayyid explains.
The media and the constant blaming of Gaza
Journalist Samya Mahmoud has said that “the media played a major role in paving the way for these measures by repeatedly claiming that Sinai was a hotbed for terrorism and takfiris. According to her, the media used the attack on soldiers as a pretext in order to accuse Gaza of responsibility and call on the coup leader to evacuate the border strip.
Hajar Faafat said: “This is not all. Throughout that period the media continued to deny the authenticity of any videos or pictures that illustrated the amount of suffering and the violations perpetrated against the people of Egyptian Rafah.”
Ali Ghanim, on the other hand, was content with reciting some poetry to highlight the dimensions of the catastrophe brought upon the people of Rafah on the Egyptian side:
We once had in our country a town called Rafah, It was the home of beauty and tranquillity, All a gift from the Almighty Allah, Then came the oppressor who has been awful to his own religion, He went on destroying its houses, extinguishing its lights and murdering its people, He razed it to the ground as a favour to the Zionists, Yet, his followers, barking like dogs, continue to justify his actions.
An easy bite for the Zionists
Ibrahim Al-Husayni said: “In this way the curtain is drawn. The only beneficiary from the Egyptian revolution has been the Zionist entity and for the Muslims there has been no solace.”
Shaymaa Said said: “Indeed, the main reason for razing Rafah to the ground is the desire to break the back of the Palestinian resistance in Gaza and offer it as an easy bite to the Zionists. This is the clearest evidence that Al-Sisi and the leaders of his army are all agents. However, through its resistance Gaza has proven it is not an easy bite but a thorn in the throat of the Zionists and their agents who will perish with the help of God.”
Is Israel now safe?
A number of activists shared the statement made by Professor of Political Science Seif Abdel-Fattah who said in a tweet: “The Egyptian authorities will completely raze Rafah to the ground to set up a buffer zone with Israel. Is Israel now safe? Is this Egyptian national security?”
Activists also shared the remarks made by Egyptian actor Khalid Abu Al-Naja in an interview conducted with him by the Huffington Post. He said: “I do not usually talk about politics at all but usually I talk about the people who live in unfair conditions. This is something I cannot keep quiet about. I began my interview with talking about the Egyptian families who were banished from their homes along the borders. I believe this to be a gross injustice. You just cannot do this. This is how it all started. I am not an expert in politics. If you were to ask me about the difference between Marx and any other person you would not get an answer from me.”
Submitting all the credential papers
The social network activists also shared the statement issued by Hatim Azzam, deputy leader of the Al-Wasat Party, who addressed the issue of the banishment of the people of Sinai saying: “This is the plan through which the military coup leader is seeking to appease the Israeli occupation by means of submitting all the possible credential papers to the Zionist entity and to the powers that support it, foremost among them is the United States. The purpose is to guarantee the support of these powers for the coup to remain in power.”
In his communique, Hatim Azzam noted that the razing of the city of Rafah is a major disaster, especially after the initiation of a third governorate, which is called “Central Sinai”. He explained that this is a prelude to marginalising the North Sinai Governorate, a measure that involves relinquishing one of the most important and strategic cities in North Sinai, Rafah, and perhaps the complete negligence of the entire North Sinai Governorate.
Sinai activist Misaad Abu Fajr, former member of the Committee of Fifty for amending the constitution, said that the deportation of the people of Sinai amounts to a declaration of war on the three biggest tribes in Sinai, which are – from south to north – Trabin, Swarkah and Irmailat.
In a previous Facebook blog he wrote: “Don’t think of it as a decision that will pass just like previous decisions. If now you come into Cairo having arrived from a region affected by terrorism and you are paying a price for it, next time you will enter Egypt having arrived from a war zone. Undoubtedly, you know well that the price then will be much bigger.”
Translated by MEMO
Minister leads UK-Egypt trade visit, despite human rights concerns
Reprieve | January 13, 2015
The UK has launched its biggest trade delegation to Egypt in a generation, despite widespread concerns about mass trials and death sentences handed down by authorities in the country.
The Foreign Office Minister for the Middle East and North Africa, Tobias Ellwood, is this week leading a major UK trade delegation to Egypt in an effort to take advantage of what the Foreign Office has called “signs of recovery after recent turbulence.” In a statement late last year, the Foreign Office said that the UK was “by far the largest foreign investor in Egypt” and that UK firms in the country have enjoyed “continued profitably [sic] and growth… even in the difficult years” – an apparent reference to the 2011 revolution and subsequent 2013 ousting of Mohammed Morsi’s government.
The UK embassy in Egypt tweeted last week that the visit was “the biggest British trade delegation to #Egypt in more than 15 years”.
Scores of protestors have been arrested in Egypt since 2013 and put on trial en masse, with hundreds receiving death sentences in proceedings that have been condemned by the UN, rights groups and countries including the UK. Speaking last September, Prime Minister David Cameron said the Egyptian government must “ensure human rights are respected in Egypt.”
Legal organisation Reprieve has written to Mr Ellwood raising concerns about the timing and scale of the trade visit in light of an ongoing mass trial of nearly 500 people, who face potential death sentences if convicted by the Cairo court. Among them is an Irish teenager, 19 year old Ibrahim Halawa, who was arrested at a 2013 protest when he was 17, and legally a juvenile. Mr Halawa has been subjected to continued mistreatment during his 2 years of confinement in Cairo’s Tora prison. Last week saw the latest of several recent hearings in which he was not brought into the court.
Maya Foa, director of the death penalty team at Reprieve, which is assisting Mr Halawa, said: “It beggars belief that the UK is taking a ‘business as usual’ approach to a country where hundreds of people, including children, face potential death sentences in farcical mass trials. If David Cameron’s proclamations about the need for human rights in Egypt are to be believed, why is his government boasting about its biggest trade visit there in 15 years?”
Israel: ‘Je Suis Hypocrite’
By Rasha B. Foda • SHAREverything • January 12, 2015
It is no small irony that the West, who now so vociferously speak against the so-called “intolerance of Islam” (while practicing their own censorship), should seek comfort and support from Israelis, of all people, who now too eagerly sing the hymns of free speech, while being one of the most egregious perpetrators of violence against journalists the world has ever known. Indeed, last year alone, Israelis achieved the dubious honor of being named the world’s second most lethal state against journalists, according to the watchdog Reporters Without Borders. And that’s no small accomplishment given that thanks to ISIS, only war-torn Syria beat Israel, and apparently only because Syria is engulfed in armed conflict all year round, whereas all 15 journalists killed by Israel in 2014 (only 7 of which Reporters counted as having been killed on duty) were killed during the 50 days of Operation “Protective Edge.”
So basically, Israel is second only to ISIS, who they could have beat had their Operation against Gaza lasted a little longer. Meanwhile, israel never did anything to punish the IDF soldier who killed Welsh cameraman, producer, and director James Miller almost 11 years ago.
The documentary which Miller was making on the day of his death (Death in Gaza, released by HBO in 2004) depicts Miller and his colleagues leaving the home of a Palestinian family in the Rafah refugee camp after dark, carrying a white flag. They had walked about 20 metres from the veranda when the first shot rang out.[15] For 13 seconds, there was silence broken only by Shah’s cry: “We are British journalists.” Then came the second shot, which killed Miller. He was shot in the front of his neck.[15]
That is one strange bedfellow to choose in championing the cause of free speech for journalists.
‘Thought police’: Academic freedom threatened by anti-terror bill, MPs warn
RT | January 12, 2015
Universities should be exempted from new counter-terrorism laws because they will ‘restrict’ freedom of speech, the government’s human rights watchdog has said.
The Joint Committee on Human Rights said government plans to make universities legally obliged to refer suspected would-be terrorists to the authorities would undermine academic freedom.
Under the bill, Home Secretary Theresa May would be given authority to force universities to ban speakers who are considered “extremist.”
The warning comes before the Counter-Terrorism and Security Bill’s second reading in the House of Lords on Tuesday.
May’s bill, introduced to Parliament in November last year, is likely to receive boosted support in the wake of the terrorist attacks in France last week, which left 17 people dead.
Committee members are concerned about a legal duty that would require universities to refer students at risk of becoming terrorists to external anti-radicalization programs.
Universities would also be required to ban ‘extremists’ from speaking on campuses.
Parliament’s human rights watchdog, made up of MPs and peers, says it is “concerned about the implications for both freedom of expression and academic freedom as a result of the applicability of the proposed new duty to universities.”
Failure to comply with the new duties would result in direct intervention by the secretary of state, and “ultimately, a mandatory court order backed by criminal sanctions for contempt of court.”
The committee also argued that terms such as ‘extremist’ are ambiguous.
“Broad terms such as ‘extremist’ or ‘radical’ are not capable of being defined with sufficient precision to enable universities to know with sufficient certainty whether they risk being found to be in breach of the new duty.”
Dr Hywel Francis, Labour MP and chair of the committee, said: “As open and rigorous debate about ideas is itself one of the most powerful tools in the struggle against terrorism, and the extremism which often breeds terrorism, this is surely counter-productive.”
Martin Hall, former vice-chancellor of the University of Salford, also voiced opposition to the proposed bill, calling it “draconian.”
Writing in the Times Higher Education on Thursday, Hall warned that such legal obligations on universities could “be used against opponents of fracking, or animal rights activists, or anti-nuclear movements, or any radical opposition to the status quo.”
“There is a danger of us being turned into a thought police,” he added.
Hall also cautioned against what he sees as a disproportionate response to terrorism by the state.
“Given that the 2011 census recorded 2.7 million Muslims living in the UK and that the Home Office is currently concerned about 500 individuals, there is a question of effectiveness and proportionality.”
The warning by the Joint Committee on Human Rights comes as Prime Minister David Cameron says he will re-introduce the ‘snooper’s charter’ bill if the Tories win the general election in May.
Speaking to ITV News on Sunday, he said: “We cannot allow modern forms of communication to be exempt from the ability, in extremis, with a warrant signed by the home secretary, to be exempt from being listened to.”
The Draft Communications Data Bill would require internet and mobile phone companies to maintain records – but not the content – of customer’s internet browsing history, email correspondence, phone calls and messages.
It was previously blocked by both Labour and the Liberal Democrats on the grounds it would infringe on people’s right to privacy.
READ MORE: Military intelligence get £100m anti-terror fund, hunt ‘self-starter’ extremists – Osborne
Police asked to investigate G4S over Guantanamo role
Reprieve | January 12, 2015
British security firm G4S could be criminally liable for its involvement in Guantanamo Bay, according to a new complaint filed with the Metropolitan Police.
Legal charity Reprieve, which represents several Guantanamo detainees, has reported the UK company to police after learning of a $113 million (£71 million) contract for G4S to supply ‘base services’ at the US prison through its US subsidiary, G4S Government Solutions (G4S GS). The exact nature of the services to be provided under the contract is unclear, prompting concerns that the company could be complicit in rights abuses under way at the prison, such as force-feeding.
G4S sold G4S GS to an undisclosed buyer for $135m (£89m) at the end of last year, and Reprieve’s complaint argues that both the contract itself and the sale could amount to an offence under the 2002 Proceeds of Crime Act.
127 men remain imprisoned without charge or trial in Guantanamo Bay, including British resident Shaker Aamer. The UK government has repeatedly said that Mr Aamer, who has twice been cleared for release, must be urgently returned to his British wife and children in London. Mr Aamer’s lawyers are urging the Prime Minister to secure his release during an upcoming US visit.
Kevin Lo, an investigator at Reprieve, said: “It is a scandal that, while British resident Shaker Aamer still languishes at Guantanamo, G4S has been seeking to profit from the sale of a contract that supports the abuses he and others suffer daily. No British firm should be profiting from a prison that UK ministers have rightly called a ‘shocking affront to the principles of democracy’. The authorities in the UK must hold G4S to account for its actions.”
African-American leaders visit Palestine, vow solidarity with Palestinian liberation movement
Dream Defenders in Nazareth (image by Dream Defenders)
By Celine Hagbard | IMEMC News | January 11, 2015
A delegation of young African American leaders from Ferguson and other US cities organized by ‘Dream Defenders’ are traveling through the Occupied Palestinian Territories this week to see first-hand the reality of life under military occupation.
According to one of the delegation organizers, Ahmad Abuznaid, “The goals were primarily to allow for the group members to experience and see first hand the occupation, ethnic cleansing and brutality Israel has levied against Palestinians, but also to build real relationships with those on the ground leading the fight for liberation. In the spirit of Malcolm X, Angela Davis, Stokely Carmichael and many others, we thought the connections between the African American leadership of the movement in the US and those on the ground in Palestine needed to be reestablished and fortified.”
Abuznaid added, “As a Palestinian who has learned a great deal about struggle, movement, militancy and liberation from African Americans in the US, I dreamt of the day where I could bring that power back to my people in Palestine. This trip is a part of that process.”
Soon after the delegation arrived in Palestine, one of the members of the delegation tweeted, “Our brother, Legal & Policy Director, and the organizer of this trip, Ahmad Abuznaid is only allowed in Jerusalem, the place of his birth, on a work permit now. Due to the fact he is Palestinian, he can only get into Jerusalem by walking through a Checkpoint. Today, we joined him on his journey through gates that reminded us of cattle pens. #WeCantBreathe.”
Some of the organizations represented in the delegation include Black Lives Matter and the Black Youth Project 100 (BYP100). Patrisse Cullors, a co-founder of Black Lives Matter, told reporters from Ebony magazine that her first impression of occupied Palestine was that, “This is an apartheid state. We can’t deny that and if we do deny it we are apart of the Zionist violence. There are two different systems here in occupied Palestine. Two completely different systems. Folks are unable to go to parts of their own country. Folks are barred from their own country.”
Cherell Brown, another participant in the delegation, noted that “So many parallels exist between how the US polices, incarcerates, and perpetuates violence on the black community and how the Zionist state that exists in Israel perpetuates the same on Palestinians. This is not to say there aren’t vast differences and nuances that need to always be named, but our oppressors are literally collaborating together, learning from one another – and as oppressed people we have to do the same.”
The delegation has traveled to refugee camps in Bethlehem, as well as visiting Jerusalem, Ramallah, Haifa and Nazareth and meeting with various organizations.
Hip-hop artist Tef Poe wrote upon the conclusion of the delegation, “When I get home I get off the plane and go back to the north side of St. Louis a place where most of us are in just as much bondage as these people but the difference is we don’t know it or acknowledge it ….Power concedes to righteousness eventually.”
Four Charged with Violating Utah’s “Ag-Gag” Law
By Ken Broder | AllGov | January 11, 2015
Four Californians stopped in Utah for taking pictures of agricultural buildings last September are apparently the first non-residents to be charged with violating the state’s controversial “ag-gag” law.
It has been against the law in Utah since 2012 to photograph agricultural operations, including the mistreatment of animals. Utah and a half a dozen other states have enacted laws to crack down on animal rights activists and others who have documented cruel and unsanitary conditions around the country.
The four, members of the Farm Animal Rights Movement (FARM), were each charged with one count of misdemeanor criminal trespass on agricultural land and agricultural operation interference, according to the Salt Lake City Tribune. They said they were aware of the ag-gag law and were filming a documentary tracing pigs’ journey from Utah to a Los Angeles slaughterhouse.
Sarah Jane Hardt, one of the defendants, told the Tribune they planned to legally record events at the Circle Four pig farm from vantage points on public property, not surreptitiously. But someone ratted them out and deputies handed them citations. The other three charged are Robert Penney, Harold Weiss and Bryan Monell. Circle Four is owned by a Chinese company, the Shuanghui Group.
A lawsuit (pdf) challenging the statute as unconstitutional was filed in July 2013 by the Animal Legal Defense Fund, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) and others. One of the plaintiffs, Amy Meyer, was arrested five months earlier after she used her cellphone to record images while on private property next to a slaughterhouse.
One of the pictures was of a sick cow being pushed by a bulldozer. The charge against her was dismissed after three months. Will Potter at Green Is the New Red says that the two Utah cases are the only ag-gag enforcements, nationally.
The Utah law defines four activities that are used by whistleblowers to uncover illegal behavior as, themselves, illegal: recording an image or sound without the operator’s permission; gaining “access to an agricultural operation under false pretenses;” asking for a job at a place for the purpose of making recordings; and making a recording while trespassing.
The lawsuit says the statute threatens groups like PETA as well as the investigators and whistleblowers they support:
“These statutes have the effect of criminalizing undercover investigative activities targeting agricultural operations, as well as the planning and assistance of such activity, thereby making the investigations and the journalism surrounding such events virtually impossible.”
The format for Utah’s ag-gag law was drafted in 2002 by the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), a corporate-funded conservative political organization that brings lawmakers and lobbyists together to draw up model legislation that can be adopted in multiple venues.
To Learn More:
California Activists Charged under Utah’s “Ag-Gag” Law for Photographing Pig Farm (by Jessica Miller, Salt Lake Tribune )
4 People Prosecuted Under #AgGag Law for Photographing Factory Farm from the Road (by Will Potter, Green Is the New Red)
Judge Won’t Toss Suit Challenging Utah’s “Ag Gag” Law (by Marissa Lang The Salt Lake Tribune )
An Overview of “Ag-Gag” Laws (by Jeff Zalesin, Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press)
Animal Rights Groups Sue Utah over Law Criminalizing Undercover Photography of Farm Abuse (by Matt Bewig, AllGov )
Animal Legal Defense Fund, et al v. Governor Gary R. Herbert and Attorney General Josh Swallow (U.S. District Court District of Utah Central Division) (pdf)
Minnesota mom faces up to 2 years in prison for saving son’s life with cannabis oil
Trey Brown in the hospital due to his brain injury
Police State USA | January 9, 2015
MADISON, MN — A mother has been criminally charged for the efforts she took to save her son’s life with cannabis oil, and could spend up to two years in prison if convicted.
In 2011, eleven-year-old Trey Brown suffered a traumatic brain injury. Trey was struck in the skull with a baseball and put into a coma due to bleeding in his brain. When he finally awoke, he was “a shell of himself” and suffered from chronic pain, seizures, learning disabilities, and suicidal thoughts.
“I cry like every day before I go to bed,” Trey, now 15 years old, told CBS News. “Like my brain is about to blow up, cause there is so much pressure.”
Trey’s mother, 38-year-old Angela Brown, searched for ways to alleviate her son’s agony. He was put on 18 different pharmaceutical drugs but the problems persisted, and the side effects made him even more suicidal. He told his mother that he “didn’t want to live anymore.”
Mrs. Brown saw one final option: cannabis oil. Recently approved for medical use in a number of states, the oil has shown remarkable results in patients with pain and seizures. A doctor recommended the family seek the treatment in Colorado. So, in March of 2014, the family took a trip to Boulder, Colorado, to obtain a bottle of cannabis oil legally from one of the state’s medical marijuana dispensaries.
The results were incredible. Trey’s pain subsided and the migraines went away. The muscle spasms stopped, too. Trey was finally able to do better in school.
“It was a miracle in a bottle,” his mother said.
Trey continued taking the oil for about a month. The family’s good fortunate was soon stamped out by oppressive forces in their home state. Trey’s school became inquisitive about how the teen had shown so much improvement at school. Mrs. Brown — who describes herself as “an open book” — eagerly told his teachers about the successful treatment.
“I said ‘Well, I gave him an oil that we’d gotten from Colorado,’” Angela recalled to CBS. “‘It’s derived from a marijuana plant.’ And then you could feel the tension in the room.”
School administrators wasted no time in reporting Ms. Brown to law enforcement. She had technically broken the law by returning to Minnesota with the forbidden oil. The Chippewa County Sheriff’s Department arrested Angela Brown and she was charged with two gross misdemeanors, including child endangerment due to substance possession (609.378) and criminal jurisdiction which contributes to the need for child protective services (260C.425).
Trey’s oil was confiscated and his treatment ceased. The agonizing pain, swelling, and muscle spasms returned. “School was really hard again,” he said.
Ironically, the problem is not a refusal of the Minnesota state legislature to ease up on cannabis patients. In May 2014, Minnesota became the 22nd state to pass a medical marijuana law. The problem is that it doesn’t go into effect until July 2015.
But with Trey’s constant suicidal thoughts, Angela Brown said that her son could not wait for relief.
“I stupidly opened my mouth to the wrong people and I got turned in,” she said. “When people ask me questions, I’m an open book. It got me in trouble. The only thing I did wrong was open my mouth.”
The two gross misdemeanor charges could land Mrs. Brown in prison for up to two years and result in a $6,000 fine. Her children could also be taken away.
* * * * *
FOLLOW UP
The Brown family is now embroiled in legal problems and preparing to defend Angela’s actions in court. Supporters have shown up to court hearings but the district attorney refused to drop the charges.
“This simply is not a situation where someone has endangered their child,” said attorney Michael Hughes, who filed a motion to dismiss on behalf of Mrs. Brown. The judge reportedly has 90 days to decide whether to grant the motion.
“We are good hard working people that were just trying to save our son’s life. It has been a living hell since his injury and this just adds to our ever growing stress,” the Brown family stated on their GoFundMe Page — set up to raise funds for the Angela’s legal defense.
The family has indicated that they plan to move to Colorado to resume Trey’s treatment with cannabis oil. Whether Angela will be able to join them remains to be seen.
SPEAK OUT FOR THE BROWN FAMILY
Demand charges be dropped against Angela Brown.Chippewa County District Attorney’s Office (Montevideo, Minnesota)
D.A. David Gilbertson
Phone: (320) 269-7138
Provide feedback to the police for coldly enforcing unjust laws.
Chippewa County Sheriff’s Department (Montevideo, Minnesota)
Phone: (320) 269-2121
Email: Contact Form
(Photo Credit: Angela Brown)
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Book Review
New paperback: Butchered by “Healthcare”
Lies are Unbekoming | October 20, 2026
Butchered by “Healthcare” is Robert Yoho’s plain-spoken account of how American medicine stopped being a profession and became an industry. 341 pages. Over a thousand references. Thirty-eight chapters.
“Screening Tests Are Useless”, on tests that find diseases that would never have hurt you. “The FDA Protects the Big Drug Companies”, on an agency funded by the companies it regulates. “The Journals’ Sins Are the Editors’ Sins”, on ghostwritten studies and captured peer review. “Opioids and ‘Pain Management’”, on how a generation was prescribed its way into addiction. “Prozac and Relatives” and “Antipsychotics Are Disastrous”, on what psychiatry does to adults and children. “Surgery: Money Before Patients”. “Failed Cancer Treatments”. “Futile CPR and Overprescribing”. “Billing Scams & Specialty Warfare”. “Hospitals Are Sharks”. Each with a Patient Tips section at the end on how to survive it.
If you have ever walked out of a doctor’s office with a prescription you didn’t ask for, or watched a parent put through a treatment that made them worse, this is the book you want on your shelf before the next appointment. … Full review
Butchered by “Healthcare” is available on Lulu now.
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- Another Round Against Iran Will Break What Is Left of the Gulf
- SVR Report on Ukraine’s Mexican Drug Gang Links Could Pressure Zelensky, Won’t Change US Policy
- British Government Employees Were Fact-Checking the News at the BBC. Nobody Told You.
- Albania on fire: who’s behind the riots?
- If Americans Knew
- Mysterious bot accounts reportedly spread fake ‘man on the street’ videos for Michigan Senate candidate
- Israeli Defense Minister Katz Says Over 60 Lebanon Villages Have Been Destroyed
- Why Is Israel Running TV Ads in Iowa Ahead of the Midterms?
- Hind Rajab’s Alleged Killer Is in the United States. HRF Demands His Arrest.
- US Officials Face Fresh Pressure After Another American ‘Brutalized’ by Israeli Settlers in West Bank
- Israel-Backed Palestinian Militias Terrorize Displaced Families in Gaza
- FBI subpoenas pro-Palestine activists over Israeli weapons plant disruption
- Fourth winter arrives in wartorn Gaza, too early – Daily Update
- More on how Bari Weiss is using CBS on behalf of Israel
- What the UK Is Doing to Pro-Palestine Novelist Sally Rooney Is an Act of Orwellian Villainy
- No Tricks Zone
- Predictions Made By Renowned Climate Proifessor Over Past Decades Have Been Proven To Be Poor
- New Study Suggests Large Regions Of The Pacific Ocean Have Been Cooling For The Last 80 Years
- Germany’s Green Energy Debacle: High Energy Costs Force Kahla Porzellan to Close After 182 Years!
- New Study: 50 Years Of The Most Aggressive ‘Net Zero’ Policies Can Only Affect The Global Climate By 0.03°C
- US September “Heat” Was No Record…Many Records Set Decades Ago
- Latest European Green Energy Debacle; Portugal’s Largest Flagship Solar Park Insolvent!
- Green Energy Debacle: German Expert Professor Fritz Vahrenholt Warns Of Severe Economic And Social Consequences
- Two More Paleo Reconstructions Affirm Meters-Higher Sea Levels Across Ireland, Brazil 7000-6000 Years Ago
- New Study: Earth And Venus Surface Warmth Largely Explained By Convection And Lapse Rate, Not CO2 Or Radiation
- 2025 Nature Paper Claiming Worsening Global Drought Gets RETRACTED …Heavily Flawed
