IF A TREE FALLS: A STORY OF THE EARTH LIBERATION FRONT (DOCUMENTARY FILM)

Summary

A documentary film about the radical environmental protest group known as the Earth Liberation Front, and about the arrest and legal issues surrounding Daniel McGowan, one of its former members. On December 7th, 2005, Daniel McGowan was arrested by the FBI for his complicity in a series of arsons committed by the Earth Liberation Front, or ELF, in the late 1990's and early 2000's. The ELF targeted sites they felt were responsible for environmental devastation, such as lumber mills and meat-packing plants. McGowan's sister Lisa pays his bail and he is placed under house arrest in her apartment until his trial. Accusations of terrorism have been leveled against McGowan, which abhors him, as he feels that the ELF's motives cannot be classified as such. The government wants him to testify against other ELF members they have arrested, or else he could face life in prison. McGowan was born in Brooklyn in 1974 and moved to Rockaway Beach, Queens when he was a child. He had what his family describes as a normal childhood; he went to a Catholic high school where he ran on the track team, and then majored in business in college. After college he got a job with a public relations firm, where he was working when he found out about the Wetlands Preserve, a bar in Union Square that donated its proceeds to running an environmental center. There, McGowan was shown documentary films about environmental mistreatment which convinced him to involve himself in environmentalist movements, constantly engaging in protesting and letter-writing. This included a protest in Crandon, Wisconsin where he was first exposed to the wilderness, and was later arrested during a protest of a mine. In Eugene, Oregon, McGowan met activist and filmmaker Tim Lewis. Lewis remembers McGowan as a "disgruntled" figure in the protest movement. Lewis was heavily involved in a series of protests in 1995 in nearby Warner Creek, Oregon, which the United States Forest Service planned to open up for logging. Lewis and other protesters erected a series of blockades, complete with a wall and drawbridge, to keep logging vehicles out of the area. Lewis also made a film entitled "Pickaxe" to document the protest. While many protested with nonviolent methods, others took to sabotaging logging vehicles, known as "monkeywrenching." After a year of keeping the loggers out, Forest Service law enforcement officials arrested the protestors and tore down their blockades. Lewis says that this action "escalated" matters between the protesters and the police. One protester that Lewis was close friends with, Jake Ferguson, was incensed at the police's response and in retaliation burned down the ranger station in Oakridge, Oregon. Soon environmentalist protesters in Eugene were divided over Ferguson's actions; some condemned him but others were more supportive. In the summer of 1997, the company Symantec planned to cut down several trees in downtown Eugene to make room for a parking lot. Protesters planned on discussing the matter with the city council, but the city suddenly announced it was moving the time of the tree-felling to one day before the city council meeting. Some protesters climbed the trees in the middle of the night to delay the felling until the city council meeting. The police responded in force, utilizing pepper spray and tear gas against both the protesters in the trees and the assembled crowd until the area was cleared. This convinced many that nonviolent protests were ineffective against deforestation. McGowan remains in the apartment, worried about his future. His girlfriend Jenny Synan has moved in with him. He discovers that several of the arrested ELF members have agreed to cooperate with the federal government, despite promising to the other members that they would not. He is hurt that the people he once trusted have apparently turned on him. McGowan and Synan get married; their families attend and it is a happy occasion for all. On July 21st, 1997, Ferguson and a few of his allies snuck into the Cavel West meat packing plant in Redmond, Oregon and burned it to the ground. This was done to stop the plant from rounding up and slaughtering wild horses from government land; for ten years residents had been protesting the plant without any result. Ferguson and his group felt that they accomplished what the protesters could not. In 1998, McGowan moved to northern California, angered by what he viewed as the "arrogance" of logging companies. Ferguson and the fledgling ELF expanded their influence and soon more sites were the targets of arson. A press office was formed for the ELF, made up of people unaware of their true identities who went on television to explain the reasoning behind the ELF's actions. The press office encouraged the creation of other cells of the ELF across the nation, urging that no life be harmed in the process. Eugene celebrated the ELF's methods, causing the local police to increase the level of their response to protesters. Each side provoked the other as their methods grew increasingly more extreme. McGowan examined the situation, interpreting it as proof that nonviolent protests were useless in this case. The tensions in the community came to a head during the 1999 World Trade Summit in Seattle, where tens of thousands of protesters gathered to protest the WTO. The police responded in riot gear and forced protesters back. While the police were occupied, the ELF acted, smashing the windows of companies they felt were hurting the environment. McGowan remarks on the intensity of the police response, calling it a "war zone." The World Trade Summit protest set off waves of controversy throughout Seattle. Police singled out McGowan as one of the leaders of the extremists. Around this time McGowan met Ferguson and became intrigued by him and his actions. The next target of the ELF was the offices of Superior Lumber, a large lumber company in Oregon. Steve Swanson, president of Superior Lumber, defends his company as being concerned with the environment and not a destructive entity, as some believe. McGowan and his then-girlfriend Suzanne Savoie served as lookouts during ELF's attack on Superior Lumber while Ferguson and a few others set up incendiary devices. The arson was successfully completed in about fifteen minutes in the middle of the night. McGowan remarks that he didn't think about the long-term effects of the arson at the time. McGowan gets released from house arrest after seven months of good behavior, and goes out to meet Synan for a date. He reflects on being called a "terrorist;" he states he is only guilty of property destruction and nothing else. Over time the ELF became more organized and covert in its operations. They started a "book club," wherein they would pass around ordinary books encoded with secret messages to each other. They created manuals that they could use to train each other in the use of incendiary devices, and meticulously tested each one. The ELF worked carefully to create convincing cover stories and even took care with their clothing selection. Their many precautions made it difficult for the police to investigate them, leaving them unable to trace the sources of the arsons. In May 2001, the ELF launched an operation against two sites at once: a laboratory at the University of Washington, and the Jefferson Poplar Tree Farm in Clatskanie, Oregon. The ELF believed that the tree farm had been producing genetically engineered trees for paper production. McGowan was part of the arson attempt against the tree farm; this time he was actually planting incendiary devices instead of serving as a lookout. He worked to light the farms' SUVs on fire, thus engulfing the entire place in flames. Afterwards, McGowan found himself disillusioned with the ELF's cause. The fire in Washington spread out of control and engulfed the university's library as well, and it was discovered that the tree farm was not engaging in any genetic engineering. McGowan also noted that the media was focusing on the destruction itself rather than the issues the ELF was trying to bring attention to, thus he came to think of the ELF's actions as ultimately futile. He and several other members thought the ELF was taking things too far, while others wanted to escalate their attacks even further. This schism shattered the cohesion of the environmentalist movements in the northwestern United States. During a trip back to New York City to visit his family, McGowan met Synan and decided to move back to New York permanently. He came to work for a domestic violence organization until his arrest. The ELF ceased their arson attempts but the Oregon police continued their investigation. Three years later, they still had no clues until they focused on one particular arson attempt and found evidence linking it back to Ferguson. After following Ferguson for a time, they interrogated him and bluffed that they had hard evidence confirming his involvement in the ELF. They offered him an ultimatum: become an informant and expose the other members of the ELF, or be sent to prison. Ferguson chose the former and revealed a great deal of information. Soon over 300 FBI agents were involved with the case, tracking down ELF members throughout the United States. Ferguson was flown out to "accidentally" meet ELF members while wearing a recording device, thus exposing them. McGowan was exposed in this manner when Ferguson met him at an animal rights conference in Washington Heights. McGown recounts that he should have been suspicious of the meeting and paid for his mistake. The FBI made their arrests of the ELF members virtually simultaneously in 2005; McGowan was among them. McGowan's lawyers negotiate a plea bargain wherein he will take responsibility for the arsons in exchange for not requiring him to name other ELF members. McGowan attends his niece's birthday party, realizing that it may be the last time he sees both her and the rest of his family. There he announces he is agreeing to the plea bargain, which could result in eight years of jail time. A federal judge is to decide whether his crimes fit the definition of terrorism. If it does, it means that he will be transferred to a special high-security facility built for terrorists after 9/11. McGowan is frustrated at how the term "eco-terrorism" is used in the media. Opinions are divided as to whether McGowan's actions could be considered terrorism or not. McGowan's lawyers attempt to argue that the definition of "terrorism" only applies when innocent life is being directly threatened, although others beg to differ. McGowan is sentenced to 84 months in prison, and his actions are ruled as terrorism. McGowan's lawyers tell the press that the "terrorism" label is "legally and factually wrong" in this instance. McGowan prepares himself mentally for his time in federal prison. He bids a tearful goodbye to his loved ones. The epilogue states that McGowan turned himself in to the New York Metropolitan Detention Center on July 2nd, 2007. He was transferred to the Communications Management Unit, a prison built to hold terrorists, in Marion, Illinois. He is allowed one fifteen-minute call per week and one visit per month.

Details

• NETWORK: N/A
• DATE: 2011
• RUNNING TIME: 1:25:41
• COLOR/B&W: Color
• CATALOG ID: 107229
• GENRE: Public affairs/Documentaries
• SUBJECT HEADING: Public affairs/Documentaries
• SERIES RUN: N/A
• COMMERCIALS: N/A

CREDITS

• Stephen Bannatyne … Executive Producer
• Sally Jo Fifer … Executive Producer
• Simon Kilmurry … Executive Producer
• Nick Fraser … Executive Producer
• Marshall Curry … Producer, Director, Writer
• Sam Cullman … Producer, Director
• Bill Gallagher … Line Producer
• Matthew Hamachek … Writer
• James Baxter … Music by
• The National … Music by
• Bill Barton
• Kirk Engdall
• Jake Ferguson
• Jim Flynn
• Alberto Gonzales
• Greg Harvey
• Tim Lewis
• Dan McGowan
• Daniel McGowan
• Lisa McGowan
• Stephen Peifer
• Leslie James Pickering
• Lauren Regan
• Don Rice
• Suzanne Savoie
• Steve Swanson
• Jenny Synan
• Susan Synan
• Chuck Tilby
• Chuck Wert