The New Media Journal | China Jails Eco-Terrorist Wanted in US

The New Media Journal | China Jails Eco-Terrorist Wanted in US: "Justin Franchi Solondz, an environmental activist from New Jersey who spent years evading charges of eco-terrorism in the United States by hiding out in China, was sentenced to three years in prison by a local court on Friday on charges of manufacturing drugs in this backpacker haven.

After serving his time, Mr. Solondz, 30, who is on the FBI’s wanted list, will be deported to the United States, where he faces charges stemming from what the authorities say was his role in an arson rampage that destroyed buildings in three western states as a member of-a group related to the environmental extremist organization Earth Liberation Front. He was indicted in absentia in 2006.

The story of Mr. Solondz’s life on the lam spanned three continents, involved at least two aliases and ended in a smoky bar in one of the world’s most authoritarian countries.

Mr. Solondz’s journey started in the fall of 2005, when he joined his mother in Italy for a wedding and then traveled around Europe and Asia. His parents say he stopped communicating with them in March 2006, just before the FBI announced the charges.

The trail went cold until March 2009, when the Chinese police arrested Mr. Solondz here in the mountains of Yunnan Province after he was caught with drugs and fake Canadian identification, according to his parents. During a daylong trial last month, Mr. Solondz pleaded guilty to drug charges and asked to be deported to the United States.

According to his father, Paul Solondz, the Dali police said they discovered 33 pounds of marijuana buried in the courtyard of the house that the younger Mr. Solondz rented, as well as what the prosecutor described as a drug laboratory inside the house.

Friends of Mr. Solondz in Dali said he went by the name Isaac Cox and was a familiar figure who favored black clothing, had a dog and rode a bicycle through the stone streets of Dali’s old section. (His mother, however, said court documents said he used the name David Isaac Hart.)

“He looked like a man on the run,” said a man who knew Mr. Solondz and did not give his name for fear of retribution from authorities and fellow foreigners. “Everyone who comes to this town is running away from something, some more than others.”

Marijuana grows wild in the region, and local women approach foreigners with the greeting, “Smoke ganja?” Until Mr. Solondz’s arrest, residents said, several bars and hostels catering to foreigners allowed people to openly sell and smoke marijuana."