TACOMA, Wash. (AP) — A California woman awaiting retrial for her role in a 2001 ecoterror attack that destroyed a Seattle research center has pleaded guilty to several charges.
Briana Waters admitted in U.S. District Court in Tacoma Tuesday that she served as a lookout during the blaze that destroyed a University of Washington research center and that a partner built the incendiary bombs for the arson at her Olympia, Wash., home. She also admitted she participated in the 2001 arson of horse corrals in Susanville, Calif.
The 35-year-old violin teacher pleaded guilty to conspiracy, arson, possession of an unregistered destructive device and using a destructive device during a violent crime.
Waters was tried and found guilty of arson in 2008 related to the UW blaze. A federal appeals court overturned her conviction last year.
She was connected to a cell of radical environmentalists based in Washington and Oregon that carried out attacks throughout the West from 1996 to 2001, causing more than US$80 million in damage.
