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Protesters Charged With Terrorism In Atlanta

March 10, 2023 People's Dispatch. , , , , ,
At least 23 protesters have been charged with domestic terrorism amid a week of action against the construction of “Cop City” in Atlanta, a proposed $90 million police training complex. Atlanta police detained 35 people and arrested 23 on the night of March 5, they claim, for vandalism against the Cop City construction site and violence towards police. Activists dispute this narrative. While video footage shows a small group torching the construction site and throwing fireworks towards police, according to activists, none of the 35 people detained were detained at the construction site itself.

Rally In Solidarity With Resistance To Cop City In Avon, Massachusetts

March 7, 2023 IGD Worldwide, It's Going Down. , , , , , ,
The Weelaunee Forest in Atlanta is the proposed site of a massive police training facility, known to most as “Cop City.” Cop City is the logical outgrowth of violent, racialized capitalism in the United States. Corporations and wealthy Atlantans believe that they need a large and well-equipped police force to tamp down “crime” in the city they are working to gentrify, and have thus contributed financially to this project. As landlords and cops push Black residents out, wealthy, mostly white neighborhoods like Buckhead demand ever more police intervention to keep them and their ill-gotten wealth “safe.” With all their militarized training, equipment, and qualified immunity from prosecution, police murder thousands of people per year — disproportionately Black, Brown, and Indigenous.

Cop City Aims To Transform Police Into A Paramilitary Force

March 6, 2023 Margaret Flowers, Clearing the FOG. , , ,
Atlanta, Georgia, with the support of the police force, banks and corporations, is trying to build a paramilitary police base in the Weelaunie Forest on 300 acres that was promised as a recreation space to the majority-black community living nearby. The base will be used to house police from across the nation and internationally to train them in urban warfare. The local community is largely opposed to it. They have been using traditional tactics of education, demonstrations and holding space through an occupation of the forest. This has all been met with state repression - violence, the murder of a 26-year old forest defender, arrests and felony terrorism charges. Kamau Franklin, of Community Movement Builders, speaks about the efforts to stop Cop City and why it represents the next level in the escalation of the militarization of police that will impact all of us. A week of action is currently underway.

Police Raid Atlanta Forest After ‘Cop City’ Opponents Overrun Security Post

March 6, 2023 Unicorn Riot. , , ,
Dekalb County, Georgia – At least 30 people were arrested on Sunday evening in the South River Forest during a ‘week of action’ music festival taking place near the location of the proposed controversial ‘Cop City’ facility. UPDATE: 3/6/23 – According to the Atlanta Police Department press release, there were at least 35 people detained. Unicorn Riot also learned that of those arrested, approximately 22 were charged with state-level domestic terrorism charges. Earlier in the evening, a march of several hundred opponents of the project (generally known as ‘forest defenders’) took over a police surveillance outpost along a power line clearing near Intrenchment Creek.

Voices On The Frontlines Of The Fight To Stop Cop City

March 6, 2023 IGD Worldwide, It's Going Down. , , , ,
Atlanta, Georgia - “A massive victory,” is how one participant, “Jean,” who spoke to It’s Going Down in a recent interview, described this weekend’s mobilization against “Cop City” in Atlanta. The movement is currently at a high-point, following an outpouring of support and rage over the brutal murder of Manuel “Tortuguita” Teran, an anarchist and forest defender, who was shot and killed by law enforcement during a raid on tree-sits and protest encampments on January 18th. Statements of solidarity and support have come in from across the Left and the environmental movement, spanning from the Sierra Club and 350.org, to grassroots collectives and organizations all over the US and the world.

‘Stop Cop City’ Week Of Action Begins In Atlanta

March 5, 2023 Unicorn Riot. , , , ,
Atlanta, Georgia – Atlanta-area forest defenders, community activists and their allies from around the country and the world are initiating a ‘week of action’ against a proposed ‘Cop City’ urban warfare campus and a movie industry facility that would demolish much of the largest urban forest in the country. The upcoming week of protests and direct actions comes less than two months after Georgia State Patrol shot and killed Manuel ‘Tortuguita’ Terán in suspicious circumstances at a defense encampment near the proposed site on January 18, 2023. The week of action is kicking off with a rally at Gresham Park, with a music festival scheduled for the rest of the weekend.

Atlanta Activists Say Prosecutors Plan To Indict Them On RICO Charges

February 27, 2023 Ryan Fatica, Unicorn Riot. , , ,
Atlanta, Georgia – Community organizations involved in the ongoing campaign to defend the South River Forest outside Atlanta, Georgia and ‘Stop Cop City’ say state prosecutors are planning on releasing indictments in the coming weeks charging them as a “criminal organization” under RICO statutes. The Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, or RICO, targets organized criminal enterprises and was created in the 1970s to more effectively prosecute the mafia. Since then, RICO statutes have been used against participants in the 2019 college admissions scandal, anti-abortion groups, insider traders, and now, environmental and climate justice activists.

There Is No Cop City In The Beloved Community

February 25, 2023 Jasmine Gurley, Morehouse College Faculty. , , , ,
Atlanta, Georgia - As members of the Morehouse College faculty, we have grown accustomed to consoling and counseling our students as they attempt to grapple with cycles of police brutality. Year after year, as Black people continue to be abused and killed at the hands of the police, jailed and surveilled in barbaric ways, we struggle to make sense of it all. We struggle to help our students determine where we go from here. But events that have transpired in Atlanta in recent months—specifically, the City’s initiative to build a $90 million police training facility, commonly known as “Cop City”—give us a clear indication of where we need to direct our energies.

Forest Defenders Vow Resistance After Court Okays Phase I Of ‘Cop City’

February 24, 2023 Candice Bernd, Truthout. , , ,
Georgia - The Superior Court of Fulton County, Georgia, issued an order last week denying three plaintiffs’ request for a temporary restraining order to halt clearing and construction work at the forested site of a planned police training facility that activists in Atlanta have dubbed “Cop City.” The ruling paves the way for construction activity even as the DeKalb County Zoning Board of Appeals considers the merits of the plaintiffs’ legal appeal of the project’s land disturbance permit. The 85-acre, $90 million police militarization and training complex is being spearheaded by the Atlanta Police Foundation.

No Cop City Anywhere

February 23, 2023 Benji Hart, In These Times. , , , , , , ,
Chicago, Illinois and Atlanta, Georgia - A monumental struggle is currently taking place in the Weelaunee Forest in DeKalb County near Atlanta, Georgia. The local government plans to level 85 acres of the forest to build a $90 million police training facility. The natural environment that would be lost is not only a precious recreational resource for Atlanta residents, but a crucial bulwark protecting against flooding and other climate change-related disasters, which are on the rise. Despite city leaders’ commitment to ramming the project through undemocratically, a decentralized campaign known as #StopCopCity is fighting back.

Formerly Incarcerated People Seek ‘Protected Class’ Status

February 18, 2023 Ella Fassler, Truthout. , , ,
Atlanta, Georgia - Bridgette Simpson said she was a bright-eyed and bushy tailed 23-year-old college graduate when she suddenly found herself living a nightmare. A judge had just ruled on her traffic ticket in New Jersey, when she was suddenly surrounded by a sea of cops. Her ex-fiancé had used her car for robberies in Georgia, and she was being arrested and extradited for accessory to armed robbery. “I thought my life was going to be one way and it did not turn out that way,” Simpson told Truthout. “My district attorney, Paul Howard, knew I didn’t commit the crimes. He didn’t care. They were very adamant about getting me locked up.”

As Pressure Mounts Against Cop City, Mass Mobilization On March 4-11

February 17, 2023 Defend The Atlanta Forest. , , , ,
Atlanta, Georgia - Nearly two years after the beginning of the movement to Defend the Atlanta Forest, Georgia State Patrol officers murdered an activist found alone in the forest. Repressive forces continue their legacy of attacking civil rights protesters in Atlanta, supposedly “The City Too Busy to Hate.” The people of Atlanta have had enough. We will no longer accept “The Atlanta Way,” the backroom deals made between corporations and those in city government who pledge to support their constituents. Atlanta is not for sale. We are fighting against corruption and tyranny, we are fighting to defend public space and the right to protest.

Building The Movement To Stop Cop City: Three Theories Of Victory

February 12, 2023 Unity and Struggle, It's Going Down. , , , ,
The struggle in Atlanta’s Weelaunee forest and against Cop City has been waged on many fronts: treesits, rallies, community meetings, targeted property destruction, lawsuits. Recently, police attacks and the assassination of Tortuguita dealt many of us a devastating blow. But the choice by Mayor Dickens to continue with Cop City in the face of mounting nationwide opposition also poses risks for the Atlanta ruling class. If we size up our enemy’s vulnerabilities, and strike effectively, we can win. For the last two years, a diverse movement has defended the last forested land in metro Atlanta and prevented the construction of “Cop City,” a massive police training complex slated to be built in a Black working class area of Dekalb county.

‘Cop City’ Opposition Spreads Beyond Georgia Forest Defenders

February 9, 2023 Timothy Pratt,The Guardian. , , ,
Atlanta, Georgia - The headlines surrounding the “Cop City” project in Atlanta have focused on the death of Manuel Paez Terán, a 26-year-old killed when police fired at least 12 shots during a raid on the forest where the eco-activist, who went by Tortuguita, and others had been camped out, seeking to stop the building of a police and fire department training center. But in fact the movement opposed to the center – planned for the South River forest in an area south-east of the Georgia city – has drawn attention and concern from a broad range of local and national US voices who worry about the social and environmental impact of the huge complex. Two editorials on the $90m, 85-acre project, called “Cop City” by activists, recently appeared in the New York Times, both calling attention to flaws in the democratic process that led Atlanta city council to approve the training center in late 2021.

Training Center Permit Challenged By Its Own Review Committee Member

February 7, 2023 John Ruch, Saporta Report. , , , ,
Atlanta, Georgia - The Atlanta public safety training center’s land disturbance permit (LDP) is being challenged by a member of the project’s own review committee, and another member has resigned in outrage over the police killing of a protester at the site. Atlanta Mayor Andre Dickens and DeKalb CEO Michael Thurmond just days ago publicly praised the project’s Community Stakeholder Advisory Committee (CSAC) as ensuring ongoing citizen input into the controversial plan, with Thurmond claiming it was “speaking truth to power.” Neither said that one citizen had already quit and they did not see the other member’s rebuke coming in the form of an appeal. CSAC member Amy Taylor filed an appeal on Feb. 6 with the DeKalb County Zoning Board of Appeal (ZBA). The appeal claims the County improperly issued the LDP because the project would violate a state limit on sediment runoff and because its lease gives an inaccurately large number for the amount of green space set aside.
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