Introduction
The Earth Liberation Front (ELF) is an ecoterrorist group made up of autonomous cells that carry out attacks on those the group accuses of damaging the environment. ELF emerged in 1992 in Brighton, England, as an offshoot of the British Earth First movement. ELF began operations in the United States later that decade with an October 1996 arson attack on a U.S. Forest Service truck in Oregon.*
ELF’s primary tactic is arson. It has set fire to research labs, homes, and businesses. ELF has also engaged in vandalism, including breaking windows and graffiti.* Between 1996 and 2002, the FBI estimated that ELF and the Animal Liberation Front (ALF) were together responsible for some 600 criminal acts in the United States totaling more than $42 million in damages.* Between 1995 and 2010, ELF was responsible for 55 percent of 239 arson and bombing attacks recorded by the Department of Homeland security and attributed to environmental terrorists.* Specifically, a cell of ELF and ALF members known as “the Family” were responsible for a series of fires between 1995 and 2001.*Conrad Wilson, “Eco-activist and former international fugitive Joseph Dibee pleads guilty in 1997 Oregon arson,” OPB, April 21, 2022, https://www.opb.org/article/2022/04/21/joseph-dibee-environmental-terrorism-oregon-washington-earth-liberation-front-animal/.x The group set approximately 20 fires in Oregon, Washington, California, Wyoming, and Colorado blamed by federal investigators on the Family. The alleged ringleader, William C. Rodgers, a.k.a. Avalon, was arrested in December 2005 and committed suicide in an Arizona jail that month.*Associated Press, “2 plead guilty in 1998 arson of Vail ski resort; attack caused $12M in damage,” USA Today, December 14, 2006, http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/nation/2006-12-14-vail-arsons_x.htm; Vanessa Grigoriadis, “The Rise and Fall of the Eco-Radical Underground,” Rolling Stone, June 21, 2011, https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-news/the-rise-and-fall-of-the-eco-radical-underground-245345/.x
After the 9/11 terror attacks, the FBI focused its efforts on domestic terrorist threats, while corporate lobbying pushed the government to take decisive action against ecoterrorists specifically. The FBI labeled ELF a domestic terrorist organization and the Justice Department began a campaign pursuing ecoterrorists as the nation’s top domestic terrorist threat.* ELF mouthpiece North American Earth Liberation Front Press Office (NAELFPO) called the FBI’s focus on the ELF a “clear sign that the ELF is successfully threatening that nation state which is destroying life on the planet.”*
ELF no longer carries out as many actions as it did in the 1990s or early 2000s, but federal agencies continue to be vigilant of the group.* In April 2022, Joseph Mahmoud Dibee pleaded guilty to involvement in multiple arsons committed by a cell of ELF and ALF members known as “the Family.” Dibee was arrested in 2018 and his case renewed public interest in the group.*
Leadership
ELF is a leaderless organization.*
Base of Operations
International.
Website
Not determined.
Membership Size and Relevance
ELF does not maintain membership records. It is decentralized into anonymous, autonomous cells to prevent infiltration by law enforcement and accused animal abusers.* ELF cells act independently of each other.*
In December 2001, domestic terrorism section chief of the FBI, James Jarboe, called ALF and ELF “the No. 1 priority in the domestic terrorism program.”* In congressional testimony in 2004, John Lewis, deputy assistant director of the FBI Counterterrorism Division, called the investigation of animal rights extremists and ecoterrorism matters the FBI’s highest domestic terrorism investigative priority.* The ELF was the subject of a 2011 documentary film called “If a Tree Falls: A Story of the Earth Liberation Front,” which documented the group’s ideology and terrorist tactics.*
Recruitment and Propaganda
The North American Earth Liberation Front Press Office (NAELFPO) distributed press materials on behalf of the ELF. The NAELFPO claimed to be “a legal, above ground news service dedicated to exposing the political and social motives behind the direct actions of the ELF.”* The NAELFPO admitted public support for the ELF and “acts of economic sabotage against those who profit from the destruction of the natural environment.”* Craig Rosebraugh and Leslie James Pickering founded the NAELFPO in 1999. Rosebraugh became known as the national spokesman for the ELF until he stepped down in the early 2000s while claiming disappointment with the escalation of the group’s recent attacks.* The NAELFPO’s website is now offline.
Violent Activities
- March 3, 2008: Five “green” luxury homes were destroyed or heavily damaged by arson in Maltby, Washington. ELF signs were found at the site. There were no reported casualties.*
- August 1, 2003: Suspected ELF members set fire to the construction site of a University City housing project in San Diego, California, resulting in $50 million worth of damage. It was the costliest act of ecoterrorism in the United States. ELF banners were found at the scene. There were no reported casualties.*
- October 2001: Joseph Mahmoud Dibee and others attempted to destroy the U.S. Bureau of Land Management’s Wild Horse Corrals, a government-owned facility used to remove wild horses from public lands located near Litchfield, California. The attack destroyed a barn and its contents.*
- January 2, 2001: ELF members set fire to Superior Lumber Company in Glendale, Oregon, causing $400,000 in damages. There were reported no casualties.*
- January 2001: ELF members set fire to new homes under construction in Suffolk County, Long Island, New York. The homes were constructed on what was previously farmland. There were no reported casualties.*
- November 2000: ELF claimed credit for burning down a $2 million home under construction in Colorado. There were reported no casualties.*
- October 19, 1998: Members of ALF and ELF, known as “the Family,” ignited diesel firebombs at the Two Elk Resort in Vail Mountain, Colorado, destroying the lodge. ELF claims told the fire was intended to deter development in Blue Sky Basin, which they said was habitat for the Canada lynx. In December 2006, two of the conspirators, Chelsea Dawn Gerlach and Stanislas Gregory Meyerhoff, pleaded guilty to federal arson charges. Another conspirator, Rebecca Rubin, fled to Canada. After five years as a fugitive, Rubin turned herself over to the FBI in November 2012. In February 2014, Rubin was sentenced to five years in prison. Josephine Sunshine Overaker remains at large. Authorities believe she fled to Europe.*
- November 29, 1997: ELF members released wild horses and burned down a Bureau of Land Management Horse Corral in Oregon, causing approximately $450,000 in damage. There were no reported casualties.*
- July 21, 1997: Joseph Mahmoud Dibee and other members of ELF and ALF destroyed the Cavel West Meat Packing Plant in Redmond, Oregon, causing $1.2 million in damages. In April 2022, Dibee pleaded guilty to arson and conspiracy to commit arson in the District of Oregon and conspiracy to commit arson in the Eastern District of California.*
- October 1996: ELF activists carry out an arson attack on a U.S. Forest Service truck in Oregon.*“ECO-TERRORISM SPECIFICALLY EXAMINING THE EARTH LIBERATION FRONT AND THE ANIMAL LIBERATION FRONT – HEARING BEFORE THE COMMITTEE ON ENVIRONMENT AND PUBLIC WORKS UNITED STATES SENATE ONE HUNDRED NINTH CONGRESS FIRST SESSION,” Govinfo, May 18, 2005, https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CHRG-109shrg32209/html/CHRG-109shrg32209.htm.x
Rhetoric
- Craig Rosebraugh, ELF spokesman, October 2001: “If the U.S. government is truly concerned with eradicating terrorism in the world, then that effort must begin with abolishing U.S. imperialism. Members of this governing body, both in the House and Senate as well as those who hold positions in the executive branch, constitute the largest group of terrorists and terrorist representatives currently threatening life on this planet.”*
- ELF banner left at arson site in California, September 2003: “Environmental murder. Nature demands justice. The E.L.F.s are mad.”*
- ELF banner left at site of firebombed construction site in San Diego, California, August 1, 2003: “If you build it, we will burn it. The E.L.F.s are mad.” *
- Frequently Asked Questions about the Earth Liberation Front, North American ELF Press Office, 2001: “This hypocrisy and genocide against the horse nation will not go unchallenged! The practice of rounding up and auctioning wild horses must be stopped.”*
- Frequently Asked Questions about the Earth Liberation Front, North American ELF Press Office, 2001: “The choice to use economic sabotage is a very deliberate and purposeful strategy to target the real underlying threat to life – the quest for profit and power. The ELF does not engage in state sanctioned tactics or those which physically harm people or life in general due to the group’s belief that economic sabotage is the best, most direct way to take the profit motive out of destroying the planet.”*
- Frequently Asked Questions about the Earth Liberation Front, North American ELF Press Office, 2001: “The real violence and danger comes from businesses clear-cutting forests and destroying ecosystems, from pollutants carelessly pumped into our air by industrial and consumer society, from water being poisoned to the point of being undrinkable, by people eating commercially grown non-organic food, and many, many more. Very often by labeling the ELF as violent it is a means by which mainstream society, government, and big business can attempt to forget about the real true violence which occurs everyday, the violence against life.”*
Social Media
Not determined.