Court targets Cuba

“If the government belongs to the people and we’re the government, then why is the government going after my pastor?” This question was put to attorneys for the Special Commissioner for Investigation (SCI) for the NYC Department of Education, which wants the New York State Supreme Court to hold IFCO/Pastors for Peace in contempt of court. It was asked by a member of the Rev. Lucius Walker Jr.’s church.

This question was on the minds of many friends and supporters who filled the courtroom on March 12 and sent messages of support objecting to efforts to punish Walker and his organization for their work in solidarity with Cuba.

On Dec. 23, IFCO received notice of a motion filed with the New York State Supreme Court, requesting a hearing, with the intention of holding IFCO/Pastors for Peace and its director in contempt of court.

The purpose of the hearing was to “punish the Inter-religious Foundation for Community Organization (IFCO) for contempt of court,” threatening them with “a fine or imprisonment or both.”

This is SCI’s second effort to punish IFCO for their work around Cuba and their refusal to provide names of students and teachers who traveled to Cuba. An IFCO statement noted, “In a broader sense we think they want to punish us as a means of intimidating the whole Cuba solidarity movement.”

At the hearing, IFCO was represented by attorney Linda Backiel, who argued that the critical issue is whether a state court judge should order IFCO to turn over to SCI the same information that has been demanded by the U.S. Treasury Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), information that IFCO has refused to provide as a matter of deeply-held principles. If SCI were given this information they would be mandated to turn it over to OFAC.

This hearing comes at the same time people all over the U.S. are asking the Obama administration to do away with restrictions on travel to Cuba. Judge Judith J. Gische did not make an immediate ruling.