ST. PAUL, Minn.
Republican National Convention protesters targeted in a series of police raids Friday night and Saturday said they will not back down from their plans to march on Monday.
Organizers have said they hope to attract up to 50,000 people to the protest, timed to the first day of the convention.
Four people were arrested at two of the Minneapolis homes and booked on probable cause of conspiracy to commit a riot, said Gina Berglund, an attorney helping to represent protesters. There were no arrests at a third home targeted. Later, the Ramsey County Sheriff's Office said a fifth person was arrested at an undisclosed location.
"A lot of people in the activist community are really on pins and needles about who's next," Berglund said.
On Friday night, Ramsey County sheriff's deputies raided an organizing site of a group - the RNC Welcoming Committee - that has publicized plans to disrupt convention activities. No one was arrested.
"They will not crush our spirit," said protester Lisa Fithian from Austin, Texas, at a gathering of about 300 people in a Minneapolis park Saturday afternoon. "Our organization will continue. We will be on the streets."
The raids drew criticism from other than just those targeted.
Dave Thune, a St. Paul city councilman whose district includes the theater building used as a hub for the protesters, denounced the raid, saying they had a legal right to assemble there.
"We spent so much time trying to welcome people to the city and now this is the way we start out," he said. "It pretty much sucks."
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Arresting people on conspiracy charges to pre-empt disruptions is troubling because it stops people from exercising their free-speech rights, said Chuck Samuelson, executive director of ACLU in Minnesota. He said he was also concerned about the broad scope of the search warrant. ACLU attorneys were monitoring the arrests, Samuelson said.
In a statement, Sheriff Bob Fletcher said authorities moved to head off planned illegal acts.
"These acts include tactics to blockade and disable delegate buses, breaching venue security and injuring police officers," Fletcher said.
The RNC Welcoming Committee, a self-described anarchist/anti-authoritarian group, has worked to help other protest groups with food and housing, but has also strategized to map roadways, bridges and access points to aid in disruptive protests.
Jordan Kushner, head of the mass defense committee of the National Lawyers Guild's Minnesota chapter, denied that criminal activity was being planned.
"They took away all their means of communication, so that they can't engage in legitimate political expression," Kushner said. "This is police state harassment and spying."
The sheriff's office said it confiscated an assortment of weapons on Saturday including a machete, hatchet and several throwing knives, empty glass bottles, rags and flammable liquids, homemade devices used to disable buses, metal pipes, axes, bolt cutters, sledge hammers, empty plastic buckets made into shields, an Army helmet, and large amounts of urine.
Protesters said deputies also seized materials at their staging area including laptops, protest literature, bus schedules, sign-making materials and a topographical map of St. Paul, site of Xcel Energy Center, the convention hall.
Betsy Raasch-Gilman, a member of the RNC Welcoming Committee, said the city of St. Paul has decided to allow the building that was raided and closed Friday night to reopen later Saturday and remain a hub for protesters.
"We'll be using our space again," she said. "It's quite a significant victory and it shows the sheriff's department way overstepped last night."
The search warrants executed Saturday morning appeared to be identical to the one used Friday, said Bruce Nestor, another attorney helping the protesters. Bomb- making materials were on the search list, he said, along with urine and feces, which Nestor said police are fearful may be thrown on them by protesters during the march.
Randi McClure stood outside one of the houses that was raided Saturday morning where three people were arrested. Residents were forced to move out and told it was being boarded up for violations of undisclosed building codes.
"Where's their evidence? What are they doing? Obviously they're just trying to disrupt the protests," said McClure, 23, who was in the house at the time of the raid.
Thune, the councilman, said he spoke to Fletcher but got no answers on exactly what motivated the raid.
"Unless they find anthrax or weapons of mass destruction, it sure looks like a pre-emptive attempt to disrupt this group, discourage others and stifle free speech, and that's not what we've been advertising as a city," Thune said.
St. Paul police spokesman Tom Walsh said city officers helped the county carry out a search warrant as part of an ongoing criminal investigation. "Wait until you see the probable cause in the warrant," he said.
"We've known all along that there are people coming to our city who are not planning to conduct themselves in a lawful manner," Walsh said. "This is an affirmation of that."
Those arrested were Monica Bicking, 23, Eryn Trimmer, 23, Garrett Fitzgerald, 25, Nathanael Secor, 26, and Erik Oseland, 21. Nestor, one of their attorneys, said Bicking, Trimmer and Fitzgerald all are from Minneapolis. It wasn't immediately known where Secor or Oseland were from.
