Indymedia Reporter Detained in 'No Man's Land' Enroute to Vancouver

Indymedia Reporter Detained in "No Mans Land" on his way to Vancouver Olympics

by Vancouver Media Co-op →2010 Olympics

RUSH TRANSCRIPT

VMC: Another independent journalist was turned away at the US-Canada
border Tuesday on his way to Vancouver to cover protests at the 2010
Olympic Games. John Weston Osburn, a long time indymedia activist,
drove 2,000 miles from Salt Lake City to cover Games with the
Vancouver Media Cooperative. He was interrogated and denied entry into
Canada, making him the second US journalist to be denied entry in the
last four days.

After he was turned around, he went back to the US and tried to
re-enter Canada, this time at the truck crossing, where he was again
denied entry due to past convictions for misdemeanors. This time, he
flipped on his video camera to record the experience. Stopped by
homeland security, Osburn was again interrogated about the Olympic
protests. When he told homeland security that he wanted to speak to a
lawyer,

OSBURN: They told me I didn’t have that right, and I wasn’t in US or
in Canada, I was in no mans land, as the officer described it. I asked
again for my lawyer and he replied that he “owned me,” he said “I own
you,” I was told to spread my legs and I was searched, then the put me
in a holding cell, I was in the holding cell for about two hours, at
one point I asked to use the bathroom, which they later allowed me to
do but only, uh, they did so watching me.

VMC: In a disturbing pattern of recent interrogations of journalists
coming to Vancouver, border guards seized Osburn’s computer and
notebooks.

OSBURN: Basically they ransacked my truck, they went through and they
took my journals, my sketchbooks, my computer, my digital camera, they
thumbed through that, I’m assuming they made copies but that I don’t
want to speculate on that, but they did definitely go through it. Then
I was fingerprinted and I was photographed, when I asked if I had a
choice of being fingerprinted and photographed I was told no, my tape
of filming being turned away, they erased the tape.

VMC: Osburn says he was prepared to have to deal with some issues at
the border, but he was surprised by his experience.

OSBURN: I was kind of expecting, I was expecting to get kind of shook
down, but I wasn’s expecting the type of just, the animosity and just
the humiliation. Even though it was only two hours, it was a really
unsettling experience, because they made me well aware that I had no
rights, they made me well aware that I had no rights and there was no
one there to protect me.

VMC: Though Osburn is the first to be interrogated by US homeland
security, his experience shadows that of other independent journalists
trying to enter Canada on the eve of the 2010 Olympics. Democracy Now!
Host Amy Goodman was interrogated about the games in November. Last
Saturday, US journalist Martin Macias Jr was turned away at the
border. At least two other independent journalists were subjected to
lengthy interrogations at the US-Canada border on their way to
Vancouver to cover resistance to the 2010 Games.