A self-described scholar-activist and anti-imperialist arrested in June for four alleged arson attacks in Berkeley in support of the Palestinian cause was indicted by a federal grand jury on Wednesday.
Meanwhile, the allegations against Casey Goonan, a 34-year-old who holds a Ph.D. in African American studies from Northwestern University, continue to mount.
Goonan was arrested again on July 11, according to an Alameda County inmate report. A letter from the U.S. Attorney’s Office to U.S. Magistrate Judge Donna Ryu alleges that earlier that day, while out on bail, Goonan was spotted throwing rocks at the window of a federal office building on 12th Street in Oakland while in the possession of Molotov cocktails.
Goonan was “intending to break a window and toss one or more lit devices into an interior office,” according to the letter, signed by Assistant U.S. Attorney Nikhil Bhagat. Bhagat further alleges that once Goonan was spotted by a security guard, Goonan “placed the bag with Molotov cocktails inside a planter that abuts the 12th Street side of the building and lit it on fire before fleeing.”
The July 11 incident was not included in Wednesday’s indictment.
Goonan is now being tried in federal court on three felonies related to a June 1 firebombing of a UC Berkeley police vehicle. Two of the counts are related to the firebombing, and the third for allegedly carrying an unregistered weapon. (Charges were dropped in three other arson attacks on Cal’s campus that did little damage.) Goonan was originally charged in state court in Alameda County with seven arson-related felonies. The case has since been taken over by the federal government and is now being prosecuted by U.S. attorneys, according to a spokesperson for the Alameda County District Attorney’s office.
The activist group Palestine Action US released a July 15 statement of support for Goonan, who uses they/them pronouns. The statement read in part, “Casey knows they have the support of their community and appreciates everyone who has shown up in court, written letters, sent literature, and expressed care and solidarity. This will be a long struggle, and we commit ourselves to it until Casey is free. Please join us!”
Goonan’s lawyer, Jeff Wozniak, did not immediately respond to J.’s request for comment. Wozniak has maintained his client’s innocence in previous statements, saying there is no evidence connecting Goonan to the campus crimes and calling the government’s case a form of “political persecution.”
“It is an investigation focused on Mr. Goonan’s political beliefs in a free Palestine and against the ongoing genocide in Gaza,” Wozniak wrote in a June 18 statement to J.
Goonan has been hailed as a hero by some activists, including National Students for Justice in Palestine, which proclaimed “Free Casey Goonan” in an X post on June 20 and “long live the intifada.”
The grand jury indicted Goonan on charges of destruction of property of an institution receiving federal financial assistance; destruction of property related to interstate commerce; and for possessing an unregistered weapon. The first two felonies carry a mandatory minimum sentence of five years in prison and the third carries a prison term “up to 10 years.”
FBI agent Tiffany Speirs, who handles domestic terrorism, was a primary investigator in the case, according to a complaint recently unsealed in federal court. “As a Special Agent, my duties include investigating individuals who commit violent criminal acts in furtherance of their political or social ideology,” her statement said.
Goonan is being held in Santa Rita Jail in Dublin.
The July 11 incident is likely to increase the legal jeopardy facing the once-promising East Bay high school athlete.
The indictment, meanwhile, sheds more light on the allegations surrounding the June 1 arson. It states that in the early morning hours, Goonan arrived at the UC Berkeley campus carrying a shopping bag filled with six Molotov cocktails.
“Goonan kicked the shopping bag underneath the fuel tank of a marked UCPD patrol vehicle and ignited the Molotov cocktails,” the complaint states. “The patrol vehicle caught fire.” Officers from the nearby police station were able to extinguish the fire before the vehicle exploded, but it was declared a total loss, court filings say.
Goonan allegedly returned to the scene of the crime hours later, according to a separate court filing, “and, using what appears to be a mobile telephone, took several photographs of the UCPD vehicle that had been lit on fire earlier in the day from different angles.”
The following day a blog post appeared on a website called Abolition Media showing a photo of the charred vehicle. The post, published by “anon,” was titled “Student Intifada as our Historical Duty: Fulfill it or Betray it.”
“This act was: In solidarity with the students attacked by the fascist police state at uc santa cruz … In solidarity with the resistance axis for Palestinian life, liberation, and total decolonization of the zionist occupied lands,” the post said. “Knife to the throat of zionism. Death to amerikkka.”