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Cody Duty / AP
Occupy Houston protesters lay in the exit ramp at the Port of Houston Authority on Dec. 12.
Seven Occupy protesters were indicted on felony charges by a grand jury in Houston on Tuesday, a spokeswoman for the district attorney's office says, in connection with their demonstration at the local port as part of a national day of action by the movement.
The decision comes nearly a week after a judge initially dismissed the charges, saying the protesters could not be charged with possessing or using a "criminal instrument" – a felony in Texas – for their use of PVC pipe.
The protesters -- three from Austin, four from Houston -- put their arms through the pipe and used latches on it to connect together, making their arrest more difficult but not preventing it, said one of their attorneys, Daphne Silverman, of the National Lawyer's Guild in Houston. Donna Hawkins, a spokeswoman for the District Attorney's Office, confirmed the indictment.
"They are feeling, 'wow,' is the word. ... They're in a lot of shock. They were very happy with the justice's decision last week, they believed in her, they believed in the justice system," Silverman said. "These people ... are not criminals. These folks are out there attempting to make the country better for all of us."
Silverman, who noted that she believed the law had been wrongly applied by the prosecutor, said it's likely the protesters will be back in court in January to talk about the next step, such as negotiations or to go to trial. If convicted, they face up to two years in jail.
Protester Dustin Phipps -- who is not one of the seven charged -- said it was a "strategic move" by local police to discourage others from participating in civil disobedience.
"We definitely plan on fighting it," said Phipps, 28, a pre-medical student at the University of Houston. "We're going to move forward ... with faith and determination because we understand we have the rights and the upper hand, and we're going to make sure justice is served."
The protesters had joined with other Occupy outfits across the country that were conducting port shutdowns on Dec. 12 to economically disrupt what they called "Wall Street on the waterfront.”
Arrests on felony arrests were occurring in other cities, such as Denver and New York. Civil rights lawyers have suggested the use of felony charges was another form of crackdown on the movement.
The Houston Police Department has used the "criminal instrument" against protesters on previous occasions, according to Attorney Randall Kallinen, who is representing one of the seven protesters. The charge usually does not hold up in court in such cases, but because it is a felony charge it has a chilling effect on would-be activists, he said.
"We’ve been seeing more of them (felony arrests), especially beginning of November," said Gideon Oliver of the lawyers guild in New York. The police and the district attorney’s office have discretion in determining the charges, "and so there are two sort of steps in the process where ... the police or the DA, if they conducted a reasonable investigation, I think, in a lot of these cases would realize that they’re overcharging."
Msnbc.com's Kari Huus contributed to this report.
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Wow! That means co-conspirators are accessories as well. Bet neither Obama, the DNC, SIEU, Soros or anyone else is indited.
That prosecutor should be disbarred. Fascist thugs like that guy are turning this country into a banana republic.
These indictments are a disgrace and a preview of things to come. OWS protesters get indited and Wall Street and banking exec's get big bonuses for their corruption and manipulation. Watch this carefully America .
There are some nice prison camps in North Korea where we can send the OWS protesters for their heinous crimes against humanity. That will serve as a valuable lesson to any other protesters who dare to question economic policy in this great democracy. If they could only find some historic event to name themselves after, we could give them a pass. Let's see...tea baggers is already taken...
Wow. Just wow.
Wake up, you really need to take your meds. Care to offer pics/proof/source of knowledge of the fema camps?
There is a FEMA camp just outside Austin, TX. Plenty of folks here can give you a tour.
Could that perhaps be where some of the people from Katrina ended up?
A Great American Journalist once said,
"We must not confuse dissent with disloyalty. We must remember always that accusation is not proof and that conviction depends upon evidence and due process of law. We will not walk in fear, one of another.We will not be driven by fear into an age of unreason, if we dig deep in our history and our doctrine, and remember that we are not descended from fearful men - not from men who feared to write, to speak, to associate, and to defend causes that were, for the moment, unpopular"
--Edward R. Murrow
Maybe the corrupt Government can fine these US Citizens a few grand for exercising their rights...
But that wont stop the 99%, or freedom...
They did not have the right to do what they did. I payed the price to do a job few want to do so now I can get a job any where any time and it pays good. They May pay the price for their civil disobedience.
Texas bending the law again....and again.....again.
Must be something in the water down there.
It takes brave souls to protest anything in Texas.
Communist Prosecutors are all over this Country. They always have an agenda and it always is self serving.
You should learn what Communism really is then you can make a comment that makes since.
Hey Auto....get a spellchecker so you make sense.
Vote for Ron Paul and we won't have these problems.
The Texas system of justice is mostly a joke. Look at how many bad murder convictions have been overturned there. No, not on technicalities but on appeal with DNA proof and sometimes the exposing of ridiculously flawed coerced confessions. Unfortunately, the defendant has by that time spent 10+ years in jail. The DA's usually still fight the overturning of an obviously incorrect verdict. It bothers me to see almost assembly line capital punishment doled out by such a sloppy, flawed system. At least do it correctly, and hopefully through an impartial system.
Texas has the right idea. Do what needs to be done and don't worry about insulting or offending. These OWS jackoffs are worthless and serve no purpose.
I say throw these useless to society, criminal, fleabitten, parasites UNDER the jail. Also, hopefully someone will hack off the scumbag hackers fingers (below link) as they have done in other places. That will cure the hacking and threats against our law enforcement officers!!! POS OWS slimeball thugs!!!
are you sure you are an American? You sound very Chinese to me (ruling party's ideology).
BTW, these useless freeloading parasites want to be in jail. That way they get free lodging and meals from hard working taxpayers.
Haven't you read 1984 people? It's becoming non-fiction at a terrifying speed.
If anyone here is an American wishing jail time- up to 2 years- for a fellow American protesting, then you are simply empowering the powers that be who will inevitably one day wind up at your door, or your children's door, or your grandchildren's door, and you or they will be taken away.
All because you once gave your consent when others were losing their freedom.
Good old Texas, once you think you have heard it all they show you that you have not heard anything yet. I do not really see this as resisting arrest when the original reason for the arrest was unwarranted. A sane judge will throw the case out, and by sane I mean intelligent and not greased.
Next year should be interesting though, anyone want to take bets if we start seeing military units taking protesters into custody now that passe comitatus is history?
******************Charging PEACEFUL Protesters is not justified in the world in todays society it is a crime against EVERYTHING AMERICAN!!!!***************The problem here is with the corporate establishment. OWS has every American right to protest. In fact charging them is an act of war on the American people, its Communism. To charge OWS while Peacefully Protesting with any illegal activity is an act of pure evil towards freedom. It really doesn't matter what ANYONE thinks about OWS, you have a right to think what you want about any demonstration of Freedom and that is your own personal protest. But guess what, in America we all have the freedom of speech and expression. WE all have the right to protest anything, especially New World Order Corporate America, and we all have the right to get attention in a peaceful way. The conservative baby boomer generation, and especially many of those children raised by them were brainwashed into an extreme Republican-Extreme-Capitalist-American way of thinking. I am not saying republican or capitalism is bad, but narrow-mindedness in any political mongering is dangerous. It has lead many successful conservative Americans to hate anything different than their own views. They hate anything that reminds them of how selfish and un-american they really are, and those are the people that have destroyed America.
The law is this what they say or tell you to do is right and if you don't do what they tell you to do then they have the right to arrest you. These protester are causeing more trouble to our country and need to go home and protest there. If they don't like how things are here leave AMERICA and see if things are better else where.