Statements by Jeff ‘Free’ Luers and June 11th Crew

from june11.org:

Statement from Jeff ‘Free’ Luers

Today is a sad day for me because I continue a legacy that started with me, but sadly does not end there. June 11th 2001 was the day I was sentenced to 22yrs and 8 months in prison. It is a day that both forever changed my life and the life of this struggle.

But, rather than collapse under the weight of the states repression we rose. It took time. It took years actually but in 2004, after 4 years in prison, my support group and I organized the first annual international day of solidarity with myself, Jeffrey Luers. It always feels weird to say that.

48 cities in a dozen countries spread across 4 continents held solidarity events and actions demanding my release. And those numbers held true the next and the year after that.

In 2006, the hammer really fell and what started with the arrests of Critter and me spread to radical communities across the nation. To this day the FBI is actively hunting down eco-saboteurs and activist both underground and above. We have numerous of our people in prison today: Marie Mason, Eric McDavid, Daniel McGowan, Nathan Exile Block, Joyanna Sadie Zacher, Grant Barnes, Michael Skyes, and Steve Murphy, with Briana Waters fate still unknown.

This June 11th marks the first international day of Solidarity with Eric McDavid, Marie Mason, and all our long-term anarchist political prisoners. We are here to honor them, support them, remind them that they are not forgotten, and most importantly to demand their release.

June 11th is a reminder to us that though we spend our days outside of a prison many of our friends and allies spend theirs behind bars having sacrificed what little freedom they had to fight for something greater than themselves. We have a responsibility to them and to ourselves to struggle and fight until all are free.

I may no longer be imprisoned, but I cannot and will not rest until my friends are back home with their families and our struggle for Earth, Animal, and Human liberation is successful.

We must free our political prisoners and prisoners of war.

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Statement by the Sacramento June 11th Crew

Dear Friends and Comrades,

As June 11th quickly approaches we wanted to share some thoughts with you about what this day means to us, and why we have felt it necessary to give it to all of you- to build and strengthen the work you do in your own communities, but also to weave us all together a little tighter and bring our bonds that much closer to unbreakable.

For that is partly why we find ourselves in this predicament to begin with, is it not?

Both Eric and Marie are in cages due in no small part to the fact that people they loved betrayed them— and people that they thought were deeply committed to the same causes they were proved to be more interested in saving their own assess than in struggling for the earth and for liberation.

In organizing for June 11th, we are forced to remember why we do the work that we do in the first place. And why supporting each other can be such a powerful tool with which to attack the very systems and institutions we are struggling against.

Eric and Marie are locked away because they felt like they could no longer sit idly by while everything they loved was being destroyed. Their motivations were the same as ours when we do the work we do every day. And when we feel the people we love being torn from us, we know that searing pain in our chests will only be quelled by working against that which would tear us apart.

But this needs to be more than some well-intentioned, youthful rebellion. Marie and Eric know this. They are both spending 2 decades in prison. Marie will be in her 60s when she is released, and Eric well into his 40s. But they carry on from inside those walls—having sacrificed their freedom for resistance. A resistance free of spatial or temporal limits.

And if we are going to continue support them—we need to be just as committed. For the earth, for Eric and Marie, for each other. For ourselves. We need to be in this for the long-haul. And for longevity’s sake, we need to be rock solid in understanding why these struggles matter. Otherwise, when the shit hits the fan people’s priorities seem to suddenly shift in unacceptable directions.

If we are serious about liberation, we also need to be serious about how we deal with the consequences of fighting for it. Because repression is an inevitable part of any real, viable struggle. And prison is an inevitable part of repression. We will not let our friends disappear into the belly of the beast. They are an integral part of our movement—they were on the outside and they remain so on the inside. If we let their voices go unheard, we are complicit in their silencing. If we don’t include them in our strategizing, our process, the work we do—we are the ones who lose.

June 11th is for those who are forced to fight against this prison society in its most tangible manifestations. For people who are quite literally fighting for their lives and their liberation. The forms are probably eerily similar to what they experiences on the outside—but the content is horrifyingly more blunt and forceful.

What we ask from each of you is a commitment. A commitment to the work that you do. To the people that you love. To the movements of resistance. A commitment that is unwavering and timeless and indestructible. It is no small task. But it is the only thing that will see us through to the end. And to a new beginning…

Until all are free,

The Sacramento June 11th Crew