History is being made this week in a packed Seattle-area courtroom as five activists standing trial for blocking an oil train argue that they were compelled to act because of the threat of climate change.
The trial marks the first time a U.S. judge has permitted the “necessity defense” to be used in a case relating to climate action.
“Their direct action, their civil disobedience was a necessary act to prevent the greater harm of climate change,” activist Tim DeChristopher of the Climate Disobedience Center told local news KIRO7 on Monday. “In this case, the greater harm of the risk of oil explosions as the trains go through local communities.”
During opening proceedings on Monday, defendant Patrick Mazza, who is representing himself, told the courtroom that he and his co-defendants will “present evidence about the oil train threat,” arguing that the impact of so-called “bomb trains” and the subsequent carbon emissions are so serious that the group’s actions were necessary to avert them.
In September 2014, the defendants, known as the Delta 5, staged an 8-hour blockade of a BNSF rail line carrying crude oil through the town of Everett. The group tied themselves to a 25-foot tripod structure which they had erected over the tracks. Mazza, along with Abby Brockway, Mike Lapointe, Jackie Minchew, and Liz Spoerri have been charged with “criminal trespass.”
“I believe what they did was justified. I believe if things keep going the way they’re going, we’re heading toward climate disaster,” said Diane Cortese, who was among the 100 or so supporters who gathered in front of the South Snohomish County District Court in Lynnwood, Washington. “In order to see change, we’re all going to need more civil disobedience,” she said.
The trial has garnered national attention. Environmentalists fed up with the continued and dangerous expansion of fossil fuels hope the climate necessity defense will prove to be a valuable legal tool as the need for direct action grows.
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