Six face felony charges after rally

2 from Evergreen, 1 from SPSCC, 3 from California

By Jeremy Pawloski | The Olympian • Published May 03, 2008

The six people jailed Thursday after a May Day demonstration in Olympia turned violent include two Evergreen State College students, a South Puget Sound Community College student and three men from California — including one described by a prosecutor as a professional protester.

The three from California are Bryan Riggins, 20, identified in court papers as having been arrested in March during a war protest in San Francisco; Daniel Wilson, 20, identified in court papers as a transient who has a prior arrest for third-degree theft out of Seattle; and a man who identifies himself as Forest A. Student, 20, who has a pending case for allegedly spraying graffiti at Evergreen.

Deputy Prosecuting Attorney Terri Gailfus called Riggins "a professional protester" in court before Thurston County Superior Court Judge Anne Hirsch on Friday. The three local students are Daniel Busby, 20, a South Puget Sound Community College student originally from Milwaukee; and Evergreen students Randall Hunt, 23, and Stephanie Gottschalk, 19.

During Thursday's May Day parade in downtown Olympia, U.S. Bank sustained $4,500 worth of damage after vandals smashed windows there with rocks. Vandals also broke four windows at the Bank of America; officials with that bank did not return phone calls about damage estimates.

When police moved in to try to arrest people suspected of throwing rocks at the windows, marchers grabbed and punched officers and tried to get between them and the suspects, said Olympia Police Cmdr. Tor Bjornstad. Police waved batons and fired pepper-spray rounds at marchers, as what was supposed to be a celebration of worker and immigrant rights turned violent.

Bjornstad said that six to 10 masked suspects are thought to have thrown rocks at windows; three of the people who appeared in court Friday were accused of rock-throwing. Police noticed the masked suspects from a distance as they watched the march, and saw them grab rocks from backpacks as they hurled them at the windows, Bjornstad said. It is not against the law to wear a mask in public, and police did not intervene before the vandalism, he said. Those who were arrested appeared in court Friday, with a crowd of nearly 50 supporters on hand.