Judi Bari

Judi Bari (November 7, 1949 – March 2, 1997) was an American environmentalist and labor leader, a feminist, and the principal organizer of Earth First! campaigns against logging in the ancient redwood forests of Northern California in the 1980s and '90. She also organized efforts through Earth First! - Industrial Workers of the World Local 1 to bring timber workers and environmentalists together in common cause.

Bari was born to an ethnically mixed marriage in Silver Spring, Maryland; her parents were politically active in leftwing politics. She was educated to college level, dropping out in her fifth year attending University of Maryland. Out in the work world, Bari was a union organizer in the work force of a chain grocery store. She then became a mail handler for the United States Postal Service in Maryland.

She moved to Sonoma County, California to settle into married life. At that time unemployed, she became active in opposition to official U. S. policies in Central America. She formed a political style based on her original music. She was flamboyant in her lyrics; the publicity she gained was often tainted by her portrayal as an obstructionist and a saboteur.

Bari became active in pro-choice demonstrations and deep ecology activities. She eventually moved to the vicinity of Willits, California. She joined Earth First! and began organizing protests against overcutting old growth redwoods. Her actions were seen by many timber workers as threatening their livelihoods. The controversy moved to formal politics with Proposition 130, dubbed "Forests Forever", being placed before voters as a plan to prevent overharvesting of the state's timber. Redwood Summer was founded, with Bari having the major influence in adapting Freedom Summer tactics to Redwood Summer.

On 24 May 1990, in Oakland, California, Bari and Darryl Cherney were blown up by a bomb planted in their vehicle. Bari was severely injured by the blast, as the bomb was under her seat; Cherney suffered minor injuries. Bari was falsely arrested for transporting explosives while she was still in critical medical condition with a smashed pelvis and other major injuries.

The attempted murder catapulted Bari and Cherney into national media attention. The Federal Bureau of Investigation had taken jurisdiction of the case away from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, saying it was a terrorism case. The Oakland Police Department was the local agency on the case. The case would go unsolved. Bari's wounds would disable her to the extent she had to curtail her activities. While she lay convalescing, Redwood Summer became a series of demonstrations by thousands of ecologists and counter-demonstrations by roughly equal numbers of timber workers and their families.

In late July 1990, the Oakland District Attorney declined to press charges on Bari and Cherney, claiming insufficient evidence. The false arrests and illegal search warrants became the basis of Bari's civil rights suit, filed the following year. On 6 November 1990, Proposition 130 went down to defeat.

In May 1992, Bari claimed in an essay to have feminized Earth First!. By late 1996, she was working as a para-legal. In 1997, she headed the congressional committee that was responsible for compensating lumber workers laid off because Headwaters Forest Reserve was founded.

On 2 March 1997, Judith Beatrice Bari died at home of breast cancer. On 14 November, the Headwaters Forest Reserve compensation bill was passed.

The civil rights law suit Judi Bari and Darryl Cherney filed a year after the bombing would outlive Bari herself. The law enforcement agents who were named in the suit lost their bid for immunity from prosecution on 15 October 1997. The suit eventually went to trial in 2002, and Bari's estate and Cherney were awarded $4.4 million as compensation for violations of Bari's and Cherney's First Amendment and Fourth Amendment rights. After the trial's gag order was lifted, jurors made it clear they believed the agents were blatant liars.