How to Survive a Felony Trial

This zine is for anyone facing prison time as a result of participating in the struggle for a socially and ecologically sustainable future for the planet we live on and the beings that inhabit it. It may also be relevant to anyone engaged in that struggle whose activity is likely to lead to a collision with the massive edifice of inertia that is the legal system.

I can only speak from my own experience as a young white man navigating the criminal justice system. I hope that some of what I experienced can be useful to other people as well. I am not a lawyer or legal expert. The first version of this text appeared in 2004 [in Recipes for Disaster, An Anarchist Cookbook]; I wrote this in a different era and some of the advice I offer may be outdated. Take everything with a grain of salt, but be assured that my thoughts are with you, whoever you are. You are not the first person to go through this and you won’t be the last. You are part of a long and proud tradition that reaches around the world and stretches forward and backward through time.