THE SPOKESMAN • TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 8, 2022 A5
Man gets community service for arson fire
that destroyed Redmond meatpacking plant
BY MAXINE BERNSTEIN
The Oregonian
A federal judge Tuesday sentenced
eco-saboteur Joseph M. Dibee to com-
munity service, rejecting the govern-
ment’s call for a seven-year-plus prison
term for the Seattle man who was a fu-
gitive for more than a decade before he
pleaded guilty to committing two arsons
in Oregon and California including a
Redmond meatpacking plant.
“I’m truly sorry for all the events that
have happened. I haven’t been involved
in this type of activity for many years,”
Dibee, 54, told U.S. District Judge Ann
Aiken, appearing by video for his sen-
tencing in federal court in Eugene. “I’ve
moved on with my life. It was a mistake
many years ago — many, many years ago
— and I paid a really heavy price for it.”
Assistant U.S. Attorney Quinn Har-
rington urged a prison term of seven
years and three months, arguing Dibee
shouldn’t be “rewarded with a lower sen-
tence after fleeing accountability.”
At the time of his
arsons, Dibee was
highly educated with
a supportive family,
yet he took more of
a leadership role in
igniting fires when
some of his co-defen-
Joseph Dibee
dants served more as
lookouts, Harrington in an FBI photo
taken in the
said.
early 1990s.
Defense lawyer
Matthew Schindler
argued for a sentence of time-served —
the two years and five months Dibee
was in jail before his pretrial release.
During his time in custody, Dibee suf-
fered a broken jaw from an assault by a
white supremacist that has left him per-
manently disfigured and was the first
to contract COVID-19 in Multnomah
County’s Inverness Jail, his lawyer said.
“He served an entire 29 months that
were just incredibly harsh and difficult,”
Schindler said.
Aiken, who has been with the case
since the beginning about three decades
ago, said she believed Dibee has recog-
nized his wrongs. She remains impressed
with how he’s working now to use his
“incredible engineering skills” to help In-
digenous tribes in Alaska, she said.
Bulletin file
A federal judge sentenced eco-saboteur Joseph Dibee to community service Tuesday for helping set fire to the Cavel West meat-
packing plant in Redmond in July 1997. The plant, seen here during the investigation of the fire, never reopened.
Dibee has been working with The
Native Conservancy Project, a com-
munity nonprofit, to help track kelp
production yields in Indigenous ocean
communities. The kelp farming is in-
tended to provide the communities
with a stable protein source and added
income as salmon runs have dramati-
cally fallen from overfishing and climate
change, according to Dibee and his law-
yer.
The judge said she hopes Dibee uses
this time as an opportunity to “be a con-
tributor to the greater good” and show
younger people “how to make change
through the rule of law.”
“You have demonstrated you have
learned lessons, although belatedly,”
Aiken said.
She ordered that he complete 1,000
hours of community service in the next
three years and pay about $1.3 million
in restitution, an amount shared by his
co-defendants.
Dibee, a fugitive for 12 years who was
finally tracked down in Cuba in Au-
gust 2018, pleaded guilty in April to two
counts of conspiracy to commit arson
and one count of arson in a string of
attacks that destroyed or damaged en-
vironmental targets in Oregon and Cal-
ifornia more than two decades ago. He
was held in Cuba based on an Interpol
notice reporting U.S. arrest warrants and
turned over to FBI agents.
Federal investigators said Dibee was
part of the largest group of eco-sabo-
teurs ever taken down by the FBI. They
called themselves “The Family” — more
than a dozen people who committed
crimes in the name of the Earth Libera-
tion Front and Animal Liberation Front
— and caused an estimated $40 million
in damage from 1996 to 2005.
He’s the 12th person to be sentenced
in the case. One remains a fugitive, Jo-
sephine Sunshine Overaker, who is still
listed on a FBI terrorism most wanted
list. The sentences of his co-defendants
have ranged from just over three years to
13 years in prison.
Dibee pleaded guilty to engaging
in a conspiracy to set fire to govern-
ment buildings and destroy other prop-
erty, driven by “ideology, and as part
of ‘direct actions,’” from October 1996
through December 2005, according to
Harrington.
Dibee also pleaded guilty to arson
tied to a fire he helped set at the Cavel
West Inc. meatpacking plant in Red-
mond in July 1997 and to conspiracy to
commit arson in a fire at the U.S. Bureau
of Land Management’s wild horse cor-
rals near Litchfield, California, in Octo-
ber 2001.
The judge said she weighed Dibee’s
decision to flee the country to escape
his indictment. She also considered that
Dibee suffered “extraordinary collateral
consequences” from what his lawyer
called Dibee’s torture in Cuba, his attack
in jail followed by “inappropriate negli-
gent medical care” that resulted in un-
treated facial fractures as well as his con-
tracting of COVID-19.
Aiken said she believed Dibee was
a changed man. Schindler and Dibee’s
prior defense lawyer have said Dibee is
now seeking to effect change through
the research and development of better
environmental practices that would fi-
nancially benefit companies.
The prosecution of the case, Aiken
said, was pivotal in impressing upon
environmental activists the importance
of “not using anger and violence as a
weapon for change.”
She also acknowledged that in society
to this day, “people are taking decisions
into their own hands and acting out in
ways that are both criminal and inap-
propriate and dangerous.”
Before issuing her sentence, she
quoted South African anti-apartheid ac-
tivist Nelson Mandela: “Great anger and
violence can never build a nation.”
The buildings at Cavel West were de-
stroyed, with the loss estimated to ex-
ceed the insured value of $1.2 million,
according to court records. The fire was
designed to end the processing of meat
from wild horses slaughtered by the
plant.
A co-conspirator recruited Dibee to
help plan and burn down Cavel West
after meeting him at a protest. Dibee
scouted out the location and then re-
ported back that they’d need more peo-
ple. On July 20, 1997, Dibee and a crew
returned to Cavel West, wearing dark
clothing, masks and gloves.
Dibee brought timers he created and
a fuel mixture. He drilled holes into the
building to pour flammable gel into,
stuffed rags into the holes and placed
buckets under the rags. One of three ex-
plosive devices ignited prematurely, the
building caught fire and he and others
fled.
They all ran back to a van, drove to
the staging area, took off their clothes,
shoes, masks and gloves and put them in
a previously dug hole, poured muriatic
acid on them and covered the hole with
dirt, according to prosecutors.
Four years later in California, Dibee
helped destroy the Bureau of Land Man-
agement’s wild horse corrals. Prosecu-
tors said he played a significant role in
drawing accomplices from Canada and
hosting them at his house in Seattle,
where they built explosives. One co-de-
fendant said Dibee suggested Litchfield
as a target.
Elect Jay Patrick
4 Mayor of Redmond
My primary goal as mayor is to “Keep Redmond, Redmond.” Growth is happening
but there are ways to manage that growth, to hold on to the heart of Redmond.
We must continue to keep the qualities, character, and our value system strong.
There are multiple projects planned that will keep Redmond moving forward:
• Constructing voter approved police/safety building
• Sewer plant renovation
• Airport terminal expansion
• Highway 97 improvements from Veterans Way to Yew Avenue
• Partnering with all stakeholders to ensure school safety
Growth mandates that we prioritize planning for safety, communication, water,
sewer, economic development, livability, infrastructure and our stewardship while
maintaining our personality. I bring leadership, transparency, and perseverance
to this position. I trust we share in the many values that Redmond holds; that
is what has brought us together, and together we will make a difference for
generations to come.
I have fond memories of growing up in Redmond. I graduated from Redmond High
School, finished my associates degree at COCC and married my best friend.
I’ve devoted 23 years balancing serving on city council while working with
technology for a school district. I’ve been involved in construction projects for
city hall, Deschutes County Fairgrounds, Redmond airport terminal, Highway 97
bypass, multiple street projects, Centennial Park, Hope Playground, and Maple
Street Bridge. These projects have developed relationships and insights on how to
approach future proposals to ensure the best outcomes. Let’s move Redmond into
the future together.
Endorsements:
Ron Bryant, Former Mayor
Mike McIntosh, Former School Superintendent
Jerry Thackery Former Mayor
Barry Campbell, Pastor
Gene Whisnant, Former State Representative
Elton Gregory, Former School Superintendent
Curt Nitschelm, Veterinarian
Dolly Gregory, Educator
Linda Swearingen, Former County Commissioner Mercedes Cook-Bostick, RAPRD Director
Tom Wright, Wright Ford
Kristy Cross, One Street Down
Nancy Blankenship, Former County Clerk
Joe Lochner, Insurance
Elect Jay Patrick 4 Mayor
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