Friday March 23, 2007 SGN.org |
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Volume 35 Issue 12 |
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Friday, Aug 29, 2008
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Civil rights attorney Lynne Stewart takes on 'Patriot Act America' |
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| Civil rights attorney Lynne Stewart takes on 'Patriot Act America' | ||
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SEATTLE, WA -- With short gray hair, twinkling eyes, and a robust presence, New York attorney Lynne Stewart hardly seems like a terrorist threat. Those who came to hear her speak on March 10 at a lively International Women's Day celebration at Seattle University's Pigott Auditorium didn't appear to think so. She was greeted with a standing ovation by the crowd of over 300 and was repeatedly applauded as she discussed the fight against her conviction for "abetting terrorism" and her views of politics and the law. Stewart, a longtime civil rights activist and criminal defense attorney, was convicted in 2005 of providing support for terrorism by delivering a handwritten press release to Reuters from Sheikh Omar Abdel-Rahman, a client she had been appointed to represent. Though prosecutors sought a 30-year prison sentence, Stewart was sentenced in 2006 to serve 28 months. The drastically shorter sentence, the judge said, was in recognition of her "service to the nation" as a representative of the poor and unpopular. Disbarred upon her conviction, she remains free while appealing the ruling and was in Seattle on the final stop of a West Coast tour. Stewart believes she was singled out for prosecution because she is a woman, an outspoken critic of the government, a defender of unpopular clients, and a victim of political reaction to the World Trade Center attack. Other lawyers, including former Attorney General Ramsey Clark, had delivered press statements for the sheikh with no consequences. Stewart was not only arrested, but then-Attorney General John Ashcroft announced the action on the David Letterman Show as an example of the government's get-tough policy. Stewart's client was serving a life sentence for plotting attacks against Egypt's president and New York City landmarks. Blind, severely diabetic, and in his eighties, the sheikh was held in solitary confinement in a Minnesota Federal prison, in conditions that Stewart says, "since Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo have been recognized as key elements of torture." Her only motive in contacting Reuters New Service, Stewart contends, was to help keep Abdel-Rahman's plight in the world's eye and enable him to return to his native Egypt. The administration's case was based on two years of government eavesdropping on communications between the attorney and her client. Stewart said prosecutors purposely "blurred the distinction between the sheikh's theocratic politics and my radical leftist ideas." At age 67, Stewart viewed the government's insistence on a 30-year sentence as a "death penalty for exercising freedom of speech." She was concerned not just for her own sake but for the chilling effect on other attorneys, the "merry few" whose zealous defense of vilified clients is vital to the justice system. What made the difference in her sentence, Stewart claims, is "over a thousand letters, many of them from Seattle," telling the judge why she should not be confined. Stewart's speech was introduced by Seattle University Professor Mako Fitts of the sociology department, who praised Stewart's "tenacity in defense of her client in these xenophobic times." In a spirited exchange with the audience following her speech, Stewart commented on topics as wide-ranging as current antiwar protests in Tacoma, progress for women lawyers, the immigrant rights movement, and the fate of Mumia Abu-Jamal, the journalist on Death Row whom many believe to be innocent. She commented that she agreed with event co-sponsor Radical Women that Democrats were "Heartbreak Hotel" for workers. She excoriated the "prison-industrial complex" and exhorted the audience: "Save the schools." She pointed to the need for an education system that refuses to "churn out prison fodder." Asked what individuals could do to fight injustice, she recommended that people ally themselves with progressive groups and "agitate!" At the reception following the presentation, DeCharlene Williams of the Central Area Chamber of Commerce praised Stewart for making the connection between the increasing prison population and the failure of schools: "They are building more prisons, dividing us and leaving people without hope or resources." Arab American Community Coalition leader Ziyad Zaitoun and Filipino-American organizer Annaliza Torres liked the wide range of topics that Lynne Stewart addressed knowledgably. Said Zaitoun, "She must be very busy with her own concerns but she still knows what's going on from Florida to California and takes an interest in those political cases." Queer militant and Radical Women activist Gina Petry was impressed that Stewart "doesn't draw lines between different groups of people. She's not giving in to divide-and-conquer pressures. She's taking a stand." Israel-born feminist Raya Fidel appreciated how Stewart "inspires people to not just complain, but join a group and change the system." The event included cultural connections to International Women's Day through banners and a song on the theme of "Bread and Roses," and a rousing hiphop performance by the local duo, Canary Sing. Stewart named her personal heroes from the pantheon of women's history, among them Harriet Tubman, Mother Jones, Bernadette Devlin McAliskey, Yuri Kochiyama, Fanny Lou Hamer, and one of her own lawyers, Liz Fink. International Women's Day (March 8) was inspired by turbulent strikes of working women in the U.S. and was initiated in 1911 by socialist leader Clara Zetkin. The day has been the occasion of history-making protests and demonstrations by women worldwide, including the massive strikes that launched the Russian Revolution of 1917. Co-sponsors of the event were Seattle Radical Women; Seattle University Departments and Programs of Anthropology, Sociology and Social Work, Criminal Justice, Political Science, Pre-Law, and Women Studies; Arab American Community Coalition; Black Panther Party Reunion Committee; Freedom Socialist Party; National Lawyers Guild - Seattle and SU Law School Chapters. More information on Lynne Stewart's case is available at www.lynnestewart.org. A Radical Women press release |
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