Energy In Depth's Shawn reports on Ohio law enforcement putting extreme environmental groups on notice:

"Extreme environmental activist groups have been put on notice by Ohio’s law enforcement, due primarily to the activities of outside organizations coming into Ohio to disrupt oil and gas development.  Authorities like the Ohio State Highway Patrol have begun to acknowledge that these groups’ actions are a threat to human health and safety, and as such are working to ensure they pose no threat to workers or the public in general.

As we first reported in the fall, Earth First! Climber’s Guild held a retreat near Athens, Ohio in order to train extreme activists with the climbing skills needed to temporarily disrupt oil and gas activities in Ohio, much like we saw earlier this month in New Matamoras.  In the beginning, these exercises were little more than a stunt; we never figured they would actually carry out these sorts of activities in Ohio, a state where we have developed oil and gas for over 150 years.  But it wasn’t until a few weeks ago when these groups put their practice into illegal action. Even more disturbing: we found out that Ohio is not isolated from these fringe groups infiltrating states in order to disrupt safety protocol, not to mention jobs and prosperity.

Earth First! and Appalachian Resist staged a dangerous display of activism a month ago in New Matamoras at a GreenHunter Class II storage site.  The event brought out 100 activists dressed in Hazmat suits to demonstrate against the facility, all while a fellow member constructed a pole tied to equipment on site.  In the end, they disrupted business activities for five hours and had 10 people arrested. Seven of them were from out of state.

Now that these groups have put their teaching into actions, they have not only gained attention from those working in the field, but also law enforcement. For example, Sgt. Greg McCutcheon with the Ohio State Highway Patrol recently said: “These are fringe groups and our Central Intelligence Unit is monitoring them.” That’s reassuring, to say the least."

READ THE REST: http://www.eidohio.org/ohio-law-enforcement-monitoring-extreme-envi...