"those of a fascistic disposition"

[pynchonoid]

In my own backyard:

<http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2003/05/26/MN227953.DTL>

Artist tests line between provocative, provocateur 
Verbal threat on Bush lands him in jail 

Joe Garofoli, Chronicle Staff Writer 	Monday, May 26,
2003  

Barry Schwartz was sickened by what he took to be the
softball coverage of the fall of Baghdad. So the
44-year-old artist turned off CNN and went out to do
an errand, determined to provoke deeper reflection
along his way. 

By nightfall, police deemed the balding artist with a
clean record a little too provocative in these
orange-alerted days. 

During a heated political argument in an Emeryville
furniture store, he mentioned the words "kill Bush."
Wrong move in a place filled with American flags and
run by military veterans who support the president --
and who didn't get Schwartz's provocateur intentions. 

Store employees called police, who alerted the Secret
Service. Hours after entering the furniture store to
buy cubicle partitions for a fellow artist's project,
Schwartz was sitting in a small room in the Emeryville
police station, 

being interrogated by two Secret Service agents. 

By nightfall on the day CNN broadcast Baghdad
residents celebrating their newfound freedom, Schwartz
had been booked into the Oakland jail for making "a
death threat with intent to terrorize" --
specifically, one of the furniture store workers along
with the president. He remained there for two days. 

Schwartz had succeeded in being provocative. But not
the way he intended. Not in these times. 

Instead, he painfully learned the answer to a question
that has become increasingly vexing to everyone from
educators and law enforcement officials to guys
working in furniture stores and artists: Where's the
line between free speech and making a terroristic
threat? 

Threatening the president's life wasn't any more legal
before Sept. 11, noted Special Agent Richard Stribling
of the Secret Service's San Francisco office. It could
land the threat-maker in jail for up to five years.
"Any time we learn of a threat, we're obligated to
look into it," he said. 

While Stribling hasn't seen an increase in threats
against the president during the five years that he's
been in the Bay Area, the nation's intermittent high
security alerts have made many people more sensitive
to what others are saying. 


CONTRASTING REACTIONS

Couple that with the highly charged emotions flowing
the day this incident happened. While many Americans,
like the pro-administration furniture store employees,
were celebrating the U.S. victory in Iraq, for others,
like Schwartz, the day inspired more soul-searching
about U.S. actions overseas. 

So everybody was on edge. 

"Since Sept. 11, you pay more attention to what people
are saying," said Sgt. Randy Horton, a 28-year veteran
of the Emeryville Police Department. "Unless you know
the person you're dealing with, you have to take
everything a little more seriously." 

Last month, two Oakland High School sophomores got a
visit from the Secret Service after their teacher
heard them make comments about "getting" Bush. 

The Secret Service interviewed the students, without
their parents present, but have not pursued any
further action. 

While reports differ to what the two teenage boys
said, their defenders wondered about the decision to
call in the authorities so quickly. 

"You have to remember that these were kids," said
Larry Felson, an Oakland High English teacher whom the
students confided in after the incident happened April
22. "If we were to call the police every time a
student said something like that in class, we'd have
the police here 24 hours a day." 

Schwartz learned that the rules aren't that different
for adults. 

"I wanted to make a statement," he said of his actions
April 9, after watching endless replays of the head
from a toppled Saddam Hussein statue being dragged
through Baghdad. "Not on behalf of anyone else or any
group. I was just trying to say, 'Let's actively
reflect on what's going on here.' " 


A MEDIUM WITH A MESSAGE

That's his nature, he said -- he challenges
conventional thought. His daring is reflected in his
signature medium: He creates sound and lightscapes
with high-voltage wires, often plucking electrified
piano strings while standing in nonconductive liquid. 

But Michael Vercelli didn't know Schwartz's background
or intentions when the 5-foot-5-inch artist walked
into the furniture supply store where he works. 

"We heard this guy outside yelling at the fireman
about the flag being counterfeit, then he came in here
and started saying the same thing," Vercelli said.
"Hey, I'm a Navy veteran. I'm one of those, 'If you
don't like this country you can leave it,' type of
guys. But I'd have listened to him more if he wasn't
being so belligerent. 

"I don't think he was doing what he was doing just to
be provocative." 

Vercelli, backed by another store employee, said
Schwartz threatened to kill him. Schwartz denied that.
When Schwartz left the store and drove away, the
employees relayed his license plate number to police. 

Not that police had trouble finding him. Schwartz
found them. 

After leaving the store, he saw three Emeryville
police officers talking at a mall. Schwartz pulled up
and shouted, "Homeland security doesn't work." Police
say he used an expletive in his homeland security
appraisal, which Schwartz denies. 

Police noticed that he matched a description of the
man at the furniture store. They went through the
contents of his car, had it towed and took him to the
police station, where the Secret Service took over. 

Schwartz said agents asked if he would release his
medical records to them. He declined. He also declined
to let them peruse the journal in his car. The Secret
Service would not comment on the interrogation. 


NO CHARGES

Two days later, Schwartz was released from jail. The
Alameda County district attorney declined to pursue
charges, as Vercelli didn't want to prosecute. 

"I wish something more positive had happened to him
than just sitting in jail," Vercelli said. "I wanted
to find out why he did it." 

The Secret Service agents "did not believe Schwartz
made a direct threat on the life of the president of
the United States," according to an Emeryville police
report. "The threat was a more indirect threat to get
a reaction out of another person." 

Reflecting on the incident recently, Schwartz wonders
how it would have gone "if I hadn't been a
middle-class white guy" with access to a lawyer. "I
wonder if I'd be out of (jail)." 

Next, Schwartz plans to make art out of his
experience. It's a safer way to express his feelings
about tightening free speech boundaries in these
times, he said. 

"And," he said with a smile, "I'm going to invite the
Secret Service to the show." 


	
 

 

 





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