My brother, Jonathan, was sentenced last year to 4 years 3 months in prison for the 1997 arson of the Cavel West horse slaughterhouse. He is now incarcerated in a medium security prison in Phoenix, Arizona and has been deemed a danger to society by the federal government.

Jonathan is my hero. Why? Because since he was a teenager Jonathan has been protecting animals. He has been a vegan for 25 years, which means he doesn’t eat any animals products: no meat, no dairy, no eggs, no honey, no gelatin. He wears no leather, wool nor silk. He uses no products tested on animals. He adopts cats from shelters and rescues abandoned dogs. He lives in line with his deep love for animals and respect for nature:

In 1987, Jonathan co-founded Hunt Saboteurs US, and for 5 years he protected bighorn sheep, tule elk, deer and black bears from being shot by hunters by putting his body between their guns and the animals.

In 1990, Jonathan spent a year documenting fur farms around the country. Posing as a legitimate buyer, he purchased a fur farm in Montana and rehabilitated over 65 mink, 2 Canadian Lynx and 2 bobcats.

In 1995, he co-founded the non-profit Sea Defense Alliance to stop the annual shark hunt in the waters off Santa Cruz, California, and to protest the low frequency sonar ships looking for oil off the coast of Santa Barbara, California.

In 1999, his organization Ocean Defense International worked for 4 years to protect whales off the Washington coast by steering their boats between the whales and Makah tribesmen with high powered rifles.

In 2005, he drove a Whale Bus up and down the west coast educating schoolchildren about whales and other endangered marine mammals. Jonathan has committed his life to stopping the suffering and killing of animals.

Jonathan was involved in animal liberations claimed by the Animal Liberation Front (ALF), an international underground organization of animal rescuers who break the law to rescue animals from research labs, fur farms, factory farms - anywhere animals are caged and mistreated. In 1997, he decided to only do above-ground work for animals, but for 2 decades Jonathan liberated dogs, cats, monkeys, mice and rabbits from research labs where they were held in tiny cages to be surgically operated on (often without anesthesia) all their lives. He released wild horses captured by the Bureau of Land Management to be killed for their meat by the highest bidder, and he freed minks raised on furs farms, executed for their coats by anal electrocution.

In 1997, Jonathan helped burn down the Cavel West Slaughterhouse, a slaughterhouse in Oregon that killed 500 horses a week. It is for that illegal act that Jonathan is serving over 4 years in prison. He received the harshest sentence proportionately of any other of the indicted activists, because he refused to name names of any other animal activists in exchange for a reduced sentence, and because the US government sees him as an animal rights leader.

I don’t advocate violence against humans in the name of stopping violence against animals. But do I support arson as a tactic to save imprisoned and tortured animals? This is a hard question. For years, residents in Redmond, Oregon, where the Cavel West Slaughterhouse is located, had tried to get the slaughterhouse closed because they hated its stench, the cries of the horses as they died and the horse blood that clogged the local sewers. Animal welfare groups have lobbied for decades for an outright ban on horse slaughter. Meanwhile, 500 horses a week were being systematically killed. When that building burned (and it was never rebuilt), it could no longer be used to kill horses. Does that justify the risk of setting a fire?

The problem for me with the arson of Cavel West is that fire endangers firefighters and others. In his sentencing statement, Jonathan expressed strong regret that people may have been hurt because of his actions. The ALF believes in taking “all necessary precautions against harming any animal, human and non-human”, and no one has ever been even hurt in over 1,200 actions, but when it comes to fire, anything can happen. I have no qualms in wholeheartedly supporting lab break-ins, but arson concerns me. Another problem with more aggressive tactics to save animals is that the labs and slaughterhouses become more impenetrable, making it more difficult for liberators to free animals in the future.

The fact that Jonathan did something illegal to protect horses doesn’t bother me. The moral issue of the suffering inside that building is so much greater than the importance of a wooden structure. If there is ever a situation that calls for action outside current law, it is the protection of those who cannot protect themselves, and it amazes me when critics fail to address what was going on inside the building, as if the loss of the building is so much more heinous than the loss of 25,000 horse lives a year.

People who obey laws rather than following their conscience frame themselves as responsible and moral. They may argue for change, yet they won’t step out of line. But just because it is legal, doesn’t mean it is right. If you really take a look at what is being done to animals in labs, factory farms and slaughterhouses, perhaps you will see that Society’s complacent acceptance of how we get our cheap food and our “safe” drugs is more immoral than anything any Animal Liberation Front activist has ever done. Maybe one day our laws will value all sentient beings, but how long do we wait, how many animals must suffer and die, and how do we get the law on the side of all living beings?

Ironically, Jonathan became a highly decorated firefighter and EMT in Oregon in 1999. He has always wanted to make the world a better place, and he was inspired by our sister, Caroline, who was a San Francisco firefighter for 13 years. Jonathan was named Rookie Firefighter of the Year in 1999, Firefighter of the Year 3 times thereafter, was EMS Provider of the Year, and received the Award of Excellence twice. Even the day before he went to prison, he stopped at a car accident to help an injured driver. I explore the ironies of all this in an essay I wrote earlier this year.

Since November, 2007, Jonathan has been at the federal prison just north of Phoenix, in Arizona. His release date is 2011. He remains a vegan, which is not easy because regular prison fare is full of animal by-products –even all the vegetables are cooked in butter. Letters are so important, so if you are so moved, please write an encouraging word to him at:

Jonathan Paul
#07167-085
FCI Phoenix
37910 North 45th Avenue
Phoenix, AZ 85086

IMPORTANT: Here is a link to the rules about writing to a prisoner:
http://www.supportjonathan.org/write.htm

I understand that many people may not agree with my beliefs, but I urge you to learn more about how animals are treated before you criticize animals rights advocates and activists. Go to

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals www.peta.org
Animal Concerns www.animalconcerns.org
Humane Society of the United States www.hsus.org
Last Chance for Animals www.lcanimal.org
In Defense of Animals www.idausa.org
Physician’s Committee for Responsible Medicine: www.pcrm.org

For a good list of books on animal rights issues: http://www.veganism.com/books.html

For more information on Jonathan, please go to www.SupportJonathan.org

To learn more about Jonathan’s arrest, google Operation Backfire and Green Scare, or go to: http://www.supportjonathan.org/links.htm

For Caroline Paul’s Los Angeles Times editorial on Jonathan’s terrorism charge, go to: www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oe-paul24may24,0,482874.story?coll=la-opinion-rightrail

For more photos of Jonathan, click here.