Biography
Jonathan Paul is an animal activist who was involved in animal liberations through the Animal Liberation Front (ALF), an international, underground organization of animal rescuers who seek to free captive animals from research labs, fur farms, factory farms and anywhere else animals are being caged and mistreated. He was sentenced in June 2007 to four years and three months in prison for his involvement in the arson of the Cavel West Horsemeat Slaughterhouse in Oregon, a company that killed 500 horses a week. Jonathan received the harshest sentence in proportion to any of the other indicted activists because he refused to reveal the names of the individuals involved in exchange for a reduced sentence, and because the US government viewed him as an “animal rights leader.” He was released on July 1st, 2011 after spending 3 years in prison and six months in a half-way house.
In 1987, Jonathan co-founded Hunt Saboteurs US, a worldwide organization that uses direct action to stop the hunting of animals. For five years, he protected bighorn sheep, deer, Tule elk 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 the horrific practices of fur farms around the country. In 1995, he co-founded the non-profit Sea Defense Alliance which seeks 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 four years to protect whales off the Washington coast by steering their boats between the whales and Makah tribesmen with high powered rifles.
The Tankersley opinion also records affirmance of Jonathan Christopher Mark Paul’s sentence in appeal 07-30310. It supplies no new individual custody interval for Paul. Source: https://cases.justia.com/federal/appellate-courts/ca9/07-30334/920080811/0.pdf#page=2
Contemporary custody chronology
The Warrior Wind, issue1 (February2006), p3 reports Paul arrested January17,2006 and a bail hearing January26. It states Paul, Suzanne Savoie and Daniel McGowan actually received conditional pretrial release around those hearings, without identifying each person’s exact physical-release day. This is evidence of a separate pretrial detention episode; it must not replace his later recorded prison admission or imply continuous custody from January2006.
Source: The Warrior Wind, issue1, February2006, an advocacy newsletter. Bail orders, future hearings and actual release are distinguished.
Conditional release and the no-contact list
Page6 reports that a no-contact list was presented to Paul on February1,2006 while he was on bail. This provides contemporary context for conditional pretrial freedom, not a new prison admission or an exact day of physical jail release. It supports keeping his early2006 detention and subsequent bail distinct from his later2007 prison term. The existing earlier-source note already records that separate-episode distinction.
The Warrior Wind, issue2, mid-April2006, an advocacy newsletter; source claims and completed custody events are distinguished.
The National Activist Network’s contemporary account of grand-jury resistance reports that Jonathan Paul personally spent 158 days behind bars after refusing questions about activists and political activities. The article distinguishes this earlier confinement from any later criminal prosecution. The source does not give the physical admission or release dates. The individual 158-day figure is more specific than its nearby summary of approximately five months.
Earth First! Journal, August 1, 1994, PDF pages 11, 12 (printed pages 10, 11).
Fire to the Prisons, issue 2, lists Jonathan Paul as then confined at FCI Phoenix, Arizona. Its Operation Backfire roster distinguishes the guilty plea and imposed sentence from the fact of ongoing prison custody. This is a historical location listing; it does not establish the original reporting day, a transfer date or final discharge, and it does not replace the existing institution field for other phases.
The December 2011 ALF Supporters Group newsletter reports that Nathan Block, Daniel McGowan, Jonathan Paul and Joyanna Zacher entered non-cooperation plea agreements in November 2006: they accepted responsibility for their own actions but did not agree to provide information or testify against anyone. This dates the agreements to a month, not an independently verified plea-hearing day.
In his first-person essay, Paul says he was arrested in1990 for alleged involvement in the University of Oregon animal-laboratory raid, faced four felony counts, and obtained dismissal when the government did not comply with the judge's discovery deadline. The article separately identifies his1993 grand-jury refusal and five actual months in Washington jail. These are different matters. No1990 prison admission, physical release or actual duration is established; the1990 arrest is YEAR precision only. The existing more specific158actualdays and unknown endpoints for the separate grand-jury confinement remain unchanged.
The April 2011 ALF Supporters Group update reports that Jonathan Paul left FCI Phoenix for a Seattle halfway house on January 17, 2011. This records a custody transition rather than a final end to federal custody.
