Climate Activist Arrested For Playing His Cello Outside Citibank Faces 7 Years In Prison – CleanTechnica

Sign up for daily news updates from CleanTechnica on email. Or follow us on Google News!

---

John Rozendaal, an adjunct music instructor at Princeton university, and Alec Connon, director of the climate nonprofit group Stop the Money Pipeline, were arrested for criminal contempt in the public park at the global headquarters of Citibank in New York City on August 8, 2024, according to a report by The Guardian.

Rozendaal’s crime? Playing the cello. Now you might think playing a cello in a public park would be permitted in America, but you would be wrong. You see, the reason Rozendaal was playing his cello outside the headquarters of Citibank was to protest against it being one of the biggest institutional lenders to the fossil fuel industry since the Paris climate accords were signed in December of 2015, according the latest Banking On Climate Chaos report.

Since June 10, climate activists have been peacefully protesting against Citibank’s financial support for new fossil fuel projects as part of the “Summer of Heat on Wall Street” campaign. At least 3,700 people have participated in the nonviolent civil disobedience, repeatedly blockading the entrance to its global headquarters. More than 475 people, including faith leaders, scientists, and elders have been arrested while calling on Citibank to stop financing new coal, oil, and methane gas projects.

Accusing Citibank Of Irresponsible Lending Practices

The climate advocates accuse Citibank and the NYPD of coordinated and escalating efforts to suppress nonviolent protests in retaliation for drawing attention to the banking giant’s key role in funding fossil projects globally. Over the course of five days in July, four high profile “summer of heat” organizers and activists were arrested on what they say are bogus charges targeting campaign leaders — an escalation condemned by hundreds of celebrities, scientists, lawmakers, students, nonprofits, and climate activists.

“The window to avert the worst impacts of climate change is rapidly closing … efforts by the fossil fuel industry and its allies to criminalize and suppress protests imperil democratic freedoms and obstruct meaningful climate action,” said Kathy Mulvey from the Union of Concerned Scientists.

In 2021, the International Energy Agency warned that the world must immediately halt investment in new upstream oil and gas development, in order to have any hope of complying with the Paris climate accords and curtailing global heating to 1.5C (35F). Since then, Citibank has provided $60 billion to companies that are expanding oil, methane, and coal operations.

Rozendaal and Connon were first arrested on July 18 and charged with assault — falsely they say — against James Flynn, who is working with Citibank’s private security team. The Guardian says that Flynn appears to have previously worked as a NYPD detective, according to publicly available databases, information from his social media, and his own comments to protesters.

Flynn was granted temporary restraining orders, reviewed by The Guardian, against Rozendaal and Connon which prohibit them from communicating with him or going near his person, home, business, or workplace for six months. They claim the restraining orders are invalid on several grounds that any first year law student would understand, starting with freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, and being so vague as to deny them the ability to understand what conduct might be viewed as violating them.

Curiously, those restraining orders do not specify where any of these locations might be, so Flynn can show up anywhere he pleases and if those two miscreants are anywhere nearby, they can be arrested and charged with violating a court order, which is precisely what happened in this case. Since Flynn has restraining orders, and since Flynn still works for Citibank, Rozendaal and Cannon cannot enter a public park near Citibank without putting the redoubtable Flynn in fear for his life and summoning his buddies in the NYPD to arrest them. This is what passes for justice in America today.

Just Punch Him In The F-king Head!

Citibank hardly holds the moral high ground here. On July 21, 2024, videographer and Summer of Heat organizer Teddy Ogborn was arrested and held in a cell for more than eight hours, days after he filmed an alleged Citi employee apparently inciting violence against climate protesters blocking the entrance. “Just punch him in the f–king head! Punch him in the f–king head,” shouted the woman, identified by protesters as the executive assistant to Citi’s co-head of Global Financial Strategy. “Get a machine gun and f–king kill them all,” she screeched. “These comments are unacceptable,” a Citi spokesperson said. “We are looking into the matter and it will be addressed appropriately.” She can probably expect a nice bonus from the bank.

At an earlier protest, Ogborn also captured Citi’s general counsel apparently shoving a female protester who was among a group blocking the entrance. A Citi spokesperson said the protesters’ claims were false and that an employee was initially hit by a barricade before pushing it out of his way. Ogborn was charged with obstruction of governmental administration, a misdemeanor, for allegedly having placed a hand on a barricade that was being moved by activists a week earlier. The charge was dropped two weeks later. (Is that a crime any of you have ever heard of? It’s a new one on us.)

“We have made the bank synonymous with environmental destruction, violence and fossil fuels, and I have been capturing moments that are damaging for Citi,” said Ogborn, cofounder of Planet over Profits. “The escalation against organizers is targeted, and attempts to use bogus charges to harass and intimidate protesters.”

Last year, Citibank financed almost twice as much fossil fuel energy as clean energy and less than JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America. In order to meet global climate goals, banks must finance four times as much clean energy as fossil fuel energy, according to research by BloombergNEF.

The methodology used to calculate fossil fuel financing has been previously disputed by some banks. A spokesperson for Citi said the bank is “transparent” about its “climate-related activities” and its approach reflects the need to transition and meet global energy needs. “We are supporting the transition to a low-carbon economy through our net zero commitments and our $1 trillion sustainable finance goal.”

Citibank Draws Rebuke From Councilman

“The Summer of Heat campaign has mobilized thousands of everyday people and brought financial executives face-to-face with the very communities they are harming through the billions they bankroll in fossil fuels,” said New York City council member Alexa Avilés. “Rather than engage on the merits of their arguments and acknowledge the role they play, Citibank has chosen to unleash a brutal police crackdown on organizers. You cannot incarcerate your way to a livable planet.”

That’s so, but you can certainly try, and some will excuse such belligerence because, hey, it’s just business. Jim Angel, a finance professor at Georgetown University, wasn’t surprised to see banks were top investors in fossil fuels. Banks invest in projects. That’s just what they do, he told Marketplace. “My first reaction is water is wet. Our banks are big; they lend money to everybody. Our oil and gas companies are big, they need to borrow a lot of money. So it’s not surprising that our banks are lending a lot of money to the fossil fuel industry.”

As for American banks topping the list, there are a couple reasons for that, Marketplace said. Reason one: “The banks that are based in the US are just the biggest banks in the world. I mean, that’s not just true of oil and gas; that’s true of all sorts of lines of business,” said University of Pennsylvania finance professor Dan Garrett.

Reason two: Banks are under pressure to keep funding the fossil fuel industry. “Texas banned banks from participating in their public finance market that is underwriting municipal bonds, or advising on state pension funds, that sort of thing. If they had, the word is ‘discriminated against’ oil and gas companies,” Garrett said.

‘There is good news, however. Banks loaned less to fossil fuel projects than they did last year, and last year they loaned less than the year before. “So it starts to look like a trend, and I want to be hopeful about that,” said April Merleaux of Rainforest Action Network. The majority of the loans banks are giving to the oil and gas industry will get paid back before 2030, and that’s likely on purpose, “Because the fossil fuel client business models just aren’t compatible with climate reality,” she said. Still, there’s a long way to go to reach the word’s climate goals. “Customers who aren’t happy about their bank investing in fossil fuels should tell them that or think about moving their money to another institution,” Merleaux added. That seems like good advice.

The Takeaway

What we can we learn from the struggles of John Rozendaal and Alex Connon? That the fossil fuel industry owns the world’s biggest banks, the New York Police Department, the courts, the judges, most of the members of Congress, and the press. George Carlin tried to warn us, but we just laughed and went about our business. Perhaps the best advice of all was given by Elie Wiesel, the man who spent his entire adult life tracking down Nazis after the Holocaust. “There may be times when we are powerless to prevent injustice, but we must never fail to protest.” Amen to that.