BLM Auction Saboteur - "Ethically, I have to take that chance" - UT's Biggest Defense Atty Helping

[hatrack]

The best part? He's studying economics!!!

Tim DeChristopher stood alone Friday when he placed bogus bids on drilling parcels near two Utah national parks, single-handedly sabotaging an oil- and gas-lease sale that caught the attention of Congress and the incoming Obama administration.

Now, the 27-year-old University of Utah economics student stands with powerful new friends, including Pat Shea, former head of the Bureau of Land Management; Utah's most prominent defense attorney, Ron Yengich; and hundreds of supporters promising to contribute to his legal-defense fund.

Others led him to this point, inspiring DeChristopher to oppose a government he fears is leading the world to climate disaster. His mother, Christine, helped start the West Virginia chapter of the Sierra Club and took him as a small child to anti-coal rallies. Terry Root, a Stanford University scientist who worked with Al Gore and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, put her hand on DeChristopher's shoulder and apologized for being too late to avert the worst effects of global warming. And Gore called on young people to commit acts of civil disobedience to stop greenhouse-gas belching coal-fired power plants. "I don't ever want to have to look back at 2008 and know that there was still a slight chance that we could have done something to make a difference, and I didn't take that chance," DeChristopher said Monday. "Ethically, I have to pursue that chance."

That pursuit could land him in federal court. Melodie Rydalch, spokeswoman for the U.S. Attorney's Office in Salt Lake City, said Monday that her office hadn't seen the U.S. Bureau of Land Management's investigative report. Federal prosecutors likely will do their own inquiry on whether DeChristopher's case should be brought before a grand jury, which wouldn't happen for weeks.

EDIT

http://www.sltrib.com/ci_11289406