VIRUSMYTH HOMEPAGE
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
ACT UP Cleared of Violence During Six-Minute "Riot"
16 March 2001
Victory declared as San Francisco jury finds AIDS activists not guilty of
battery against Project Inform employees.
San Francisco -- After 20 hours of deliberation that capped off a dramatic
two week trial, a San Francisco jury unanimously acquitted two ACT UP members
of battery against organizers of a pharmaceutical industry AIDS treatment
forum. Activists David Pasquarelli and Todd Swindell were each cleared of
violent battery charges alleging they hurled rock hard pills into the face of
Project Inform Founding Director Martin Delaney. Similarly, Pasquarelli was
found innocent of another battery charge stemming from accusations that he
injured Project Inform staffer Judith Leahy-Hogan by deliberately shoving her
to the ground during the April 17, 2000 ACT UP protest.
Pasquarelli and Swindell said they plan to appeal guilty verdicts they
received on charges of riot, unlawful assembly and disturbing the peace --
convictions they say resulted from Judge Thomas Mellon's introduction of
unfairly prejudicial evidence and confusing, last-minute jury instructions
urging prosecution under the legal loophole of principals, aiders and
abettors. ACT UP activist Michael Bellefountaine, who was found guilty of
unlawful assembly but acquitted on riot and disturbing the peace charges,
also plans to appeal.
"According to the District Attorney, the only reason they pursued this case
in court was because of the violent battery charges, which ultimately didn't
hold up," commented Bellefountaine. "Instead, by employing a back door legal
technicality, a lawful protest was transformed by the D.A. into an unlawful
six-minute 'riot.' This anti-activist maneuver will have a chilling effect on
all political protesters and community organizers in San Francisco and we
plan to fight it."
The forum disruption occurred last April when ACT UP activists confronted
Delaney over his public about-face in promoting absolute patient compliance
to lifelong dosing regimens of experimental protease inhibitors. Angry
activists stormed the public forum on Structured Treatment Interruption to
raise awareness that five years ago Delaney, who has no formal medical
training or license to prescribe medicine, warned HIV positive gay men to get
on -- and stay on -- combinations of new AIDS drugs for life without missing
a single dose. Missing a dose, he warned in 1996, would create a "resistant
virus that could be passed on sexually to someone else" -- a scary but
thoroughly unsubstantiated viral claim. However, in the year 2000, with
alarming reports of deadly drug-related side effects and grotesque
deformities caused by protease inhibitors and a shocking reversal of federal
guidelines that previously urged doctors to "hit early, hit hard" with toxic
anti-HIV medications, Delaney and Project Inform quietly reversed course by
changing their tune to allow once prohibited "drug holidays." Unfortunately,
this recommended revision arrived too late for the thousands of gay men
injured or killed by Project Inform's now-abandoned terror message demanding
absolute AIDS drug compliance.
Activists charge that despite months of one-sided media reports, advertising
campaigns and a boycott of ACT UP coordinated by Project Inform that
characterized the defendants as "misogynistic, pill-throwing thugs," the jury
rejected personal testimony of an ACT UP assault from Delaney, Leahy-Hogan,
and coworker Brenda Lein as lacking credibility and truth. Furthermore, ACT
UP members are quick to point out that while the jury chose to convict
demonstrators on charges of participating in a riot, they were not accused,
charged or convicted of the more serious crime of inciting one. Activists say
they plan to file charges of their own against Project Inform's Leahy-Hogan
and hotline volunteer Bill Cagle after it was revealed during criminal
testimony that Leahy-Hogan led angry audience chants of "Shame! Shut Up! Get
Out!" and Cagle incited audience members to violence by physically assaulting
ACT UP protesters David Pasquarelli and Andrea Lindsay and by screaming
obscene fighting words at them to drown out their message about AIDS drugs.
Astute jurors also picked up on inconsistencies in the testimony of Project
Inform employee Sana Chehimi and Survive AIDS! member Hank Wilson regarding
outrageous allegations that gay-identified ACT UP activists yelled "Die,
Faggots, Die!" at the April 17 protest. During the defense team's closing
arguments, jurors nodded in agreement with the conclusion that, given the mob
scene initiated by Project Inform employees and volunteers, it was far more
likely that the epithet, if said at all, was shouted at the unwelcome AIDS
dissidents by out-of-control audience members.
"It's no surprise to community watchdogs who have kept an eye on Project
Inform since its inception as a drug smuggling ring through years of
conducting illegal medical experiments on gay men to its present incarnation
as an unethical pharmaceutical front group that the organization has a
serious credibility problem," commented HIV-positive protester David
Pasquarelli. "Martin Delaney testified under oath that he gets paid $120,000
a year yet all he does is push drugs and lie about the damage they cause. The
jury saw through his deceptive claim that he was assaulted by ACT UP members.
His uncritical promotion of protease inhibitors has been exposed as a drug
company financed sham. AIDS is over and so is the reign of terror, corruption
and greed promoted by this madman with a messiah complex."
CONTACT:
David Pasquarelli: (415) 637-4666
Michael Bellefountaine: (415) 487-9954
Excerpt from the book "Acceptable Risks" by Jonathan Kwitny:
When it became clear they weren't going to agree on parallel track, [FDA
Commissioner] Young steered the conversation to religion -- something he knew
had been a major part of both their lives. He knew Delaney had been in a
seminary, and they talked about it and Young's own dedication to
fundamentalist Christianity. Young proudly told him that the Christian c
ommunity Young lived in had just taken a group of black women with AIDS into
their homes.
"You know," Young told him, "Jesus said, 'What you do to the least of these
you do to me.' But" -- and he paused -- "it's always been difficult for me to
understand homosexuality. How men could be that way with each other. But I
think you're a fine person, and that shouldn't stand between us." Then the
conversation returned to religion.
It was good to be reminded of the human side of your adversary, Delaney
thought. He also wondered what all the reporters who were targeting him --
not to mention other AIDS activists -- would say if they knew about this
conversation."
(Account of a July 19, 1989 meeting between Martin Delaney and FDA
Commissioner Frank Young, an ultraconservative Reagan appointee, homophobe,
and advocate of Food and Drug Administration deregulation for dangerous
anti-HIV drugs.)
ACT UP San Francisco
1884 Market Street * San Francisco, CA 94102
Phone: (415) 864-6686 * Fax: (415) 864-6687 * www.actupsf.com
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