FBI warns of possible threat against media
The FBI warned Boston television stations yesterday that news trucks might be attacked by members of a radical domestic group that wants to disrupt next week's Democratic National Convention.
''The FBI is investigating information that members of a domestic group plan to disrupt the [convention] by attacking media vehicles," FBI spokeswoman Gail Marcinkiewicz said last night.
The FBI didn't release any other details, including the name of the group, when it might attack, or whether the information has been deemed credible.
Marcinkiewicz said the information is being investigated by the FBI's Joint Terrorism Task Force in Boston.
Bev Ford, a spokeswoman for the Boston Police Department, said the FBI warned Boston police yesterday that media vehicles might be targeted by a domestic group, but, ''We've got no information on where or when or how."
Officers will seal off a huge swath of land and roadway leading to the FleetCenter, where the convention will be held Monday through Thursday.
A prosecutor revealed during a hearing yesterday in federal court concerning protests that the US Secret Service has ''some specific information" about possible violence being planned.
But Assistant US Attorney George Henderson would not elaborate on what the information was in the courtroom, which was packed with reporters and protesters, saying it had to be kept secret for security reasons.
US District Judge Douglas P. Woodlock, who was considering whether a designated protest zone across from the FleetCenter needed to be enclosed with fences and other barriers and then met with Henderson in a private conference. Woodlock said afterward that the information did not affect his refusal to open up or move the protest zone.
Charles Kravetz, the vice president of news for NECN, said his station received a call from an FBI spokeswoman in the afternoon saying that the agency had information about a threat to news media vehicles during the convention.
He said his station was among several planning a conference call for today to discuss whether they need to take additional security precautions. Local stations are positioning their satellite trucks at two main sites and sharing the cost for police details.
