'We are not guilty': Members of St. Pete Uhuru Movement address federal charges filed against them
ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. - Three members of the Uhuru Movement are calling the federal charges against them bogus. They're accused of colluding with Russia.
The three spoke Wednesday for the first time since their indictment last month. The press conference was in the Uhuru House in St. Petersburg, one of the buildings the FBI raided last summer as part of the investigation.
"I am one of the Uhuru three indicted on baseless charges by the federal government," Jesse Nevel said.
Federal investigators accuse Nevel, Uhuru Chairman Omali Yeshitela and Penny Hess of working with and taking money from Aleksander Ionov. He's the founder of the Anti-Globalization Movement of Russia that’s headquartered in Moscow and is funded by the Russian government.
"My crime is my absolute belief in free speech," Yeshitela said.
Four others are listed on the indictment, including Ionov, who’s accused of funding and influencing US politics. The indictment accuses the three Uhuru members of spreading pro-Russian propaganda and influencing local elections.
"We are not guilty of the absurd charges that we are Russian spies deployed by the kremlin to disrupt the local St. Pete elections," Nevel said.
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Nevel ran in the 2017 St. Pete mayoral race. The indictment also said Russian money funded and supervised a candidate for St. Pete City Council in 2019. That candidate isn’t named in the indictment.
"We should all be outraged and disgusted at this blatant, despicable and shameful campaign of oppression that the US Government is waging against Chairman Omali Yeshitela and the Uhuru Movement," Nevel said. "The charges against the Chairman, Penny and myself are false, but they’re not just false. They’re false to an idiotic and laughable extreme."
Yeshitela, Nevel and Hess said they’re innocent and that the charges are a coordinated attack on their freedom of speech.
"The First Amendment is not allowed to extend to those who fight for the interests of the poor and working-class Black community?" Hess asked.
"Clearly we’re talking about a situation where the First Amendment is being denied," Hess said.
"I denounce these horrific attacks on their presumed rights to freedom of speech and political expression by the US Government’s so-called Department of Justice," Nevel said. "These charges are illegitimate, and we should all be outraged and disgusted at this blatant and despicable and shameful campaign of oppression."
They’re calling for the charges to be dropped. Their trial is set for July.