<nettime> The New York Five

["Ivo Skoric" <ivo@reporters.net>]

In former Yugoslavia we had momster processes like the Belgrade 
6 or Ljubljana 4. Now in post-Yugoslav world we have citizens of 
various former Yugoslav origins arrested together under the Patriot 
Act: The New York 5.

Five people - including a B92 journalist on a tourist visa, a woman 
performance artist from Belgrade, that used to come for counseling 
to Raccoon, a straight edge kid who is here with dad and awaits a 
green card, a U.S. citizen originally from Sarajevo, and a Croat 
citizen with a pending asylum case, were arrested on 
Tuesday/Wednesday night at 1 am in Brooklyn (on the shore of 
East River with a view of Statue of Liberty) when three of them 
jumped over a fence to shoot some video footage (two of them are 
Hunter College film students).  They jumped over the closed gate 
(on which, however, was a sign "open for public" - NYPD said that 
assumed when the gate was open...). NYPD made a heroic arrest, 
seeing their car, brightly lit in the middle of the street, engine 
running, without any pretense that they should be hiding and 
offering no resistance. They busted them under The Patriot Act. 
B92 journalist was 65 hours in detention with no bed, healthy meal, 
shower or privacy. FBI aked them whether they fly airplanes, are 
they Muslim, compared the sound of their names to the list of 
Arabic names. The two most timid of them (B92 journalist and his 
friend who awaits a green card through his father) who did not 
jump, are so nervous and paranoid now, that I referred them for 
counceling to Raccoon's counselor. Finally the FBI dropped the 
charges of terrorism and now NYPD is just charging them with 
criminal tresspassing, and three of them have a trial on 22nd in 
Brooklyn. But two of those three DID not jump over the gate, and 
the third is a U.S. citizen, originally from Sarajevo. The women and 
the fifth guy - apparently a Croat citizen who is here in deportation 
proccedings with asylum case pending for the past 8 years, works 
as a bartender and studies film on Hunter - they are currently in 
Newark immigration prison awaiting deportation. Women's visa was 
expired (and as I remember, she was renewing tourist visa over and 
over again). Apparently they are all a part of the network of people 
who patronize Raccoon Space. So, we would like to help them. 
They need a lawyer, fast. Their trial is on July 22 in Brooklyn 
Criminal Court.

ivo

---------------------------------------------------------
Ivo Skoric
19 Baxter Street
Rutland VT 05701
802.775.7257
ivo@balkansnet.org
balkansnet.org

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