On Wednesday, 2010-02-03 Mike was released from jail on personal recognizance. The judge in the case finally looked at the motion filings at around noon on the same day, and order Mike’s release shortly thereafter.

After the usual bureaucratic snafus and paperwork shuffling, Mike was released around 18:00.

Tyler & Eirene’s extradition hearing was held on 2009-10-13 at 08:00 in Manchester District Court. Cassidy and I got there at 08:00 to observe, but the hearing didn’t start until after 10:00 (as usual, the last case being heard). Tyler & Eirene had separate public defenders. The Governor’s Warrant had been signed, and they’d both agreed to not fight extradition, so they were returned to custody pending the actual extradition.

The State of Arizona was given until 2009-10-26 at 23:00 to send their officials to New Hampshire; otherwise, a new hearing would take place on 2009-10-27. On 2009-10-23, the Arizona officials arrived and Tyler & Eirene Sanstail were extradited.

The arraignment for Bill Walker’s perjury case was held on 2009-10-08 at 09:00 at Belknap Superior Court. After the usual interminable wait in a court lobby, Bill met with a public defender, filed a not guilty plea (waiving arraignment in front of an actual judge), and was released on $5,000 personal-recognizance bail.

Being a Superior Court case, there are several upcoming court dates scheduled: A dispositional conference is scheduled on 2009-12-04 at 08:30, a final pre-trial conference on 2010-01-20 at 13:30, and jury selection for 2010-02-01 at 09:00. No actual trial date is scheduled yet. All of these court dates are in Belknap Superior Court.

At around 03:00 on 2009-09-14, Tyler & Eirene Sanstail, two Free State Project participants, were arrested in a Manchester park for an outstanding warrant for several felony counts from Arizona. They were arrested and their vehicle was impounded.

The arraignment was held the next morning at 09:00, but didn’t get underway until 11:00. Several Manchester courtroom activists attended to observe and report. Tyler & Eirene were arraigned on multiple felony counts of some sort of child abuse allegations. Mike reported that he didn’t “want to break the news about who was involved or why they were there. It’s going to come out in a few days; a Union Leader reporter was in court and is doing a story on it, and it’s not going to be a good story.”

Tyler & Eirene’s bail was set at $100,000 cash only, and the extradition hearing was scheduled for 2009-10-13 at 08:00. After the arraignment, both of them were returned to jail.

NH-CLOG has minimal involvement in this case, as Tyler & Eirene have decided to hire public defenders. However, since several activists are peripherally connected to this case, or are friends with the Sanstails, we’ve decided to cover it briefly here.

On 2009-09-01, the Keene Police Prosecutor, Eliezer Rivera, sent Cassidy a letter notifying her that they were dropping the charges against her for going topless in Keene as an act of civil disobedience against discriminatory indecent-exposure laws.

In a Keene Sentinel article published on 2009-09-08, the Keene police and prosecutor admitted that they had made a mistake when they charged Cassidy, agreeing that exposing one’s breasts isn’t “gross lewdness.” Keene police officer Lt. Jay U. Duguay explicitly admitted that the Keene Police Department wanted to avoid the possibility of a Supreme Court challenge to the law if Cassidy were convicted and appealed.

We’ll continue following this case and any future similar events that end up leading to charges.

On 2009-08-25, Ivy was extradited to Rhode Island to stand trial for the charges for which she was arrested in June.

The Rhode Island arraignment happened on 2009-08-26 at 08:00 in Providence Superior Court. Bill Walker, Cassidy Nicosia, and myself made the trip down to attend the arraignment. With the help of a prominent R.I. lawyer who happens to be friends with a behind-the-scenes NH-CLOG contributor, Ivy was released on personal-recognizance bail. Once again, Ivy is free.

We all made it back to New Hampshire by 18:30.

More details will be posted tomorrow.

On 2009-08-23, Cassidy Nicosia was arrested in Keene for going topless in public. She was charged with RSA 645:1, “Indecent Exposure and Lewdness.” This was a planned event to promote topless equality, following much discussion (1, 2) on the Free Keene forum, in which several men also went with no shirts. None of the men were arrested.

On 2009-09-01, charges were dropped by the prosecutor.