RECRUITMENT-OFFICE PROTEST If only he’d put women’s underwear on his head instead ...

BY CAMILLE DODERO

The Boston Phoenix Issue Date: June 4 - 10, 2004
http://www.bostonphoenix.com/boston/news_features/this_just_in/documents/03885837.asp

It was a skinny pair of stereo wires that got 21-year-
old Joe Previtera charged with two felonies. A week ago
on Wednesday, the Boston College student poked his head
through a gauzy shawl, donned a black pointy hood, and
ascended a milk crate positioned to the right of the
Armed Forces Recruitment Center’s Tremont Street
entrance. He extended his arms like a tired scarecrow;
stereo wires dangled from his fingers onto the ground
below. Without those wires, the Westwood native could
have been mistaken for an eyeless Klansman dipped in
black, or maybe even the Wicked Witch of the West. But
those snaky cords made the costume’s import clear:
Previtera was a dead ringer for one of Abu Ghraib’s
Iraqi prisoners — specifically, the faceless man who’d
allegedly been forced to balance on a cardboard box
lest he be electrocuted.

"We found that street theater can be more effective in
conveying a message than a flier," Previtera says
nearly a week later, explaining why he’d dressed up
like the Abu Ghraib prisoner. "We picked the location
because we wanted to make people think about what they
might be called or forced to do if they enlist in the
military."

But the demonstration didn’t go as planned. Previtera —
along with four friends who’d come out to shoot photos
and protect the blinded activist in case, as fellow BC
student Nick Fuller-Googins put it, "some hyper-
nationalist character came up and punched him in the
stomach" — figured the cops would warn him before they
tossed him in the clink. But they didn’t. First,
Previtera’s friends say, someone came out of the
recruitment office and told him to get down; when
Previtera didn’t, the person went inside. (No one from
the Armed Forces Recruitment Center could be reached
for comment.) Soon after, the cops appeared and watched
the spectacle from their cruisers; shortly thereafter,
the Boston Police bomb squad rolled up. Less than 90
minutes after the protest began, the police began
taping off the area around him, and when Previtera
stepped down, they took him into custody for
"disturbing the peace." But Previtera had remained
silent the entire time. "I was really trying to play
the role as accurately as possible," he says. "So I was
not speaking with anyone, just trying to stay there as
still as possible." Any disturbance came from the crowd
of gawking spectators that, witnesses say, assembled
once the policeman showed.

At the precinct, Previtera discovered that in addition
to the initial misdemeanor, he’d been charged with two
felonies: "false report of location of explosives" and
a "hoax device."

"This was supposed to be more symbolic than anything,"
says Previtera, who never imagined they’d nab him for a
false bomb threat. "I never wanted to scare anyone into
thinking I had a bomb. I just wanted to make people
think about international affairs." He adds, "I never
uttered the word bomb or explosive."

Previtera’s friend Soula was surprised too. But she
realizes this kind of escalated police response has
sadly become the norm for activists. "In the world and
time that we are living right now — most people will
say the post-9/11 world — when you go out to some
demonstration or in any way display your dissent for
anything related to the government or the status quo,
you’re putting yourself at risk," she says. And the
same day of Previtera’s protest, a report in the Boston
Globe warning of possible terrorist threats read:
"Officials were urged to take note of people dressed in
bulky jackets in warm weather ... or trailing
electrical wires."

So if Previtera didn’t mention a bomb, what exactly
constitutes a bomb threat? "It can be implied, with
fingers and wires — especially in a heightened state of
alert, as we are," says Officer Michael McCarthy,
Boston Police Department spokesman. And McCarthy thinks
this is common knowledge, even if the wires are
accessories to a costume. "Mr. Previtera should know
better. He’s a young adult educated at Boston College
from a wealthy suburb. I’m sure he knows wires attached
to his fingers, running to a milk crate, would arouse
suspicion outside a military recruiters’ office [when
he’s] dressed in prisoner’s garb. If he has any
questions as to why people think he may’ve had a bomb,
then he needs to maybe go back to Boston College to
brush up on his public policy. Or at least common
sense, but they can’t really teach that there."