Police the Police

It’s Legal To Film Cops

October 20, 2014 Christopher Mathias, www.huffingtonpost.com Organize! Ferguson, Freedom of Speech and Assembly, Journalism, Media, police brutality, Police the Police, Racial Justice

NEW YORK -- It's becoming clearer and clearer that smartphones have ushered in a new era of police accountability. Since mid-July, when a bystander on Staten Island filmed the death of Eric Garner in a prohibited police chokehold, at least eight other unsettling videos, most of them captured by smartphone, have emerged showing instances of apparent excessive force by NYPD officers. Four such videos have appeared this month alone. Although police might intimidate bystanders into thinking otherwise, it's perfectly legal to film the cops -- not only in New York, but everywhere in the U.S. -- as long as you don't get in their way. Donna Lieberman, executive director of the New York Civil Liberties Union, encourages people to keep using their phones to film troubling police incidents. The more people who post these videos online, she said, the more likely it is that other people will reach for their own phones when they see cops doing something questionable.

Denver Jury Awards $4.6 Million In Police Killing Of Homeless Preacher

October 18, 2014 Susan Greene, www.coloradoindependent.com Organize! Denver, Justice, Law, police brutality, Police the Police

A federal jury has delivered what may be the costliest verdict yet in a Denver excessive force case. The $4.6 million jury award to Marvin Booker’s family came after jurors found five Denver sheriff deputies excessively restrained and subdued homeless street preacher Marvin Booker, failed to try to save his life and acted with “evil motive” or intent when he died in July 2010 on the floor of the city jail booking room. “The truth has finally been spoken and now our brother and father can rest in peace,” said Calvin Booker, a pastor in the Booker family’s hometown of Memphis. “The jury spoke loud and clear about what’s sick in the sheriffs department and sick in the city. It’s corruption, plain and simple. It’s corruption that needs to be cleaned up from the top down.”

Inside Urban Shield – The Video!

October 18, 2014 Occupy Oakland, www.occupyoakland.org Organize! Militarized police, Oakland, Police the Police

It was to be expected, I suppose. Three Oakland police units, having nothing better to do on a Friday evening in a town where no one ever complains about crime, showed up before the Inside Urban Shield forum on the militarization of police, ostensibly to inquire into whether a gathering convened expressly to listen to speakers in an auditorium was getting ready to hella march. Fortunately, they must have gotten an emergency call for donut delivery, as they eventually left some eighty odd of us attendees to listen to excellent talks by Shane Bauer, Joshua Smith, Susan Harman and Julia Wong. Here is a video of the four speakers, with the time each begins listed, and some excerpts below...

Beyond Police, Chicago Residents Band Together To Curb Street Violence

October 17, 2014 Panyin Conduah, www.wagingnonviolence.org Create! Chicago, Community, police brutality, Police the Police

As a highly segregated and economically unequal city, Chicago has long had high rates of violence, particularly in the neighborhoods with the most poverty and least access to resources. While the city government has responded to the violence by increasing the presence of police, many community members like Brooks have sought ways to deescalate the violence without involving the police or the criminal justice system. Earlier this year, Brooks spoke with other Chicago residents on his radio station and quickly realized he was not the only one that desired change in Chicago. Thus, the community-led initiative was born as part of the church’s broader Project Help Others Obtain Destiny campaign, known as Project HOOD. By the beginning of the summer, the initiative had accumulated 150 core volunteers. Male volunteers walk the blocks of the south, east and west side neighborhoods during three-hour shifts every Friday from 6 to 9 p.m. and from 9 p.m. to midnight. Female volunteers work as mentors on the streets Saturday afternoons from noon to 3 p.m.

Slave Patrols Alive And Well, Part 1: Vonderrit Myers

October 16, 2014 Dr. Marsha Coleman-Adebayo, www.blackagendareport.com Educate! Ferguson, police brutality, Police the Police, Racial Justice, Vonderrit Myers

“This latest yet unidentified St. Louis police executioner claimed that he followed Myers and his friends because he felt that the teens were acting suspiciously.” Ten minutes earlier he had taken the turkey sandwich Berhe Beyet made him and cradled it away from his friend's playful snatching. Then stood breaking off a piece that he shared with another friend. By now, his mother has seen this tape of him standing in silhouette, and watched his peaceful chewing. On his way out the door he gives yet another friend a bite of what he did not know was his last supper, walking off into a night every parent in America cannot begin to imagine. A night every black person in America knows is coming and that the next one coming could be them—might as well be them—every time they imagine the high caliber bullet shattering his cheek bone, eye socket, aorta the medical examiner identified as the cause of death.

LAPD Manhandles Father’s Baby Then Tazes, Beats And Arrests Dad

October 16, 2014 Alissa Kokkins, www.theantimedia.org Resist! police brutality, Police the Police, Racial Justice

LOS ANGELES, CA – Around the block from where Ezell Ford was killed by LAPD, officers from the Newton Division stopped, Brandon Dawson, 26, on Sunday evening. Dawson had just finished his shift as a dental assistant and was picking up his seven-month-old daughter from his grandmother’s house. He was strapping the baby’s carrier into the car when officers stopped Brandon asking why Brandon had parked in the private driveway. Brandon explained that there were no other spaces available and he had just pulled up to pick up his daughter.Photo via Linda WashingtonThe police asked for no papers, and told Brandon to put his hands up as they snatched the father’s baby. Soon after, Brandon would be tazered, beaten, and arrested by police on suspicion of assaulting a gang officer from LAPD’s Newton Division, according to Officer Lilliana Preciado.

My Cousin Was Shot Dead By A Police Officer

October 15, 2014 Anand Jahi, www.yesmagazine.org Organize! New Economy, police brutality, Police the Police, Racial Justice

My cousin, Charles Goodridge, was one of many unarmed black men killed by police this past summer. Black communities across the country have mobilized in response to this spate of high profile police killings. Much of the recent organizing and activism has rightfully focused on the destructive role of police in the black community. But as my cousin’s and other victims’ stories reveal, fighting to eradicate racist policing is not enough—as long as a racist economy is left intact. I believe that if Charles had been white, the officer who killed him would not have been so quick to arrest or shoot him. But before he was a victim of racist policing, Charles was a victim of a racist economy.

The Execution Of John Crawford III

October 13, 2014 Dr. Marsha Coleman-Adebayo, www.blackagendareport.com Educate! John Crawford, police brutality, Police the Police, Racial Justice, Racism, Walmart

Beavercreek, Ohio, police officers Sean Williams and David Darkow came into Wal-Mart with weapons drawn, prepared to spill blood. Within minutes, John Crawford III, an unarmed 22-year old shopping for a BB gun, was fatally shot lying in a pool of blood. This was the second kill for Officer Williams. A grand jury investigating the murder determined that Crawford had not committed a crime nor did he do anything wrong. John’s father, John Crawford Jr., expressing the families shock and disbelief, questioned how a young man can go into a store as a customer and be murdered by police. "If he did nothing wrong, if he did not commit a crime, then why is he not here with us? I'm at a loss for words. I'm appalled." The video that contains the 911 call shows the execution of John Crawford III by police. Viewers should be warned; the video is graphic and deeply disturbing. The surveillance video from Wal-Mart was released before the grand jury announcement.

House Of Cards Level Corruption In Ferguson And Beyond

October 4, 2014 Shaun King, www.dailykos.com Educate! Corruption, Ferguson, Law, police brutality, Police the Police

On August 10, 2014, St. Louis County Police Chief John Belmar held his first press conference on the murder of Mike Brown by Officer Darren Wilson of the nearby Missouri Ferguson Police Department. His force had been called in to take over the investigation for the much smaller local department. The shooting had occurred less than 24 hours earlier, and the tensions on the ground in Ferguson were already red hot and boiling over. As we are now likely to just be a few weeks away from a grand jury decision in this case, citizens and journalists have been left to do what police and prosecutors seem to have very little interest in—pushing for the real facts to find justice for a young man who was killed with his hands in the air.

Parents Of Kids Murdered By Cops Confront NYPD

October 3, 2014 Amy K. Nelson, www.animalnewyork.com Organize! Community, Law, NYPD, police brutality, Police the Police

It was around 7:30PM when Margarita Rosario took the microphone at the Sunset Park rec center, turned to a table that seated five police officers and told the story of how her son had been murdered by NYPD cops. “My son, Anthony Rosario, had 14 bullets in his back, face down on the floor,” Rosario said. “Now who is the criminal? My son? Or [the police officers]?” Rosario, three others parents whose children had been killed by the NYPD, and hundreds of residents in this diverse community, came together at an old gymnasium on Wednesday night for a town hall on police brutality.

Police Departments Retaliate Against ‘Cop Watch’ Groups

October 3, 2014 Candice Bernd, www.truth-out.org Educate! Human Rights, Law, Media, police brutality, Police the Police

Across the nation, local police departments are responding to organized cop watching patrols by targeting perceived leaders, making arrests, threatening arrests, yanking cameras out of hands and even labeling particular groups "domestic extremist" organizations and part of the sovereign citizens movement - the activities of which the FBI classifies as domestic terrorism. Sources who have participated in various organized cop watching groups in cities such as New York, Chicago, Cleveland, Las Vegas, Oakland, Arlington, Texas, Austin and lastly Ferguson, Missouri, told Truthout they have experienced a range of police intimidation tactics, some of which have been caught on film. Cop watchers told Truthout they have been arrested in several states, including Texas, New York, Ohio and California in retaliation for their filming activity.

ACLU Wants Police Banned From Using ‘Keep Moving’ Rule

October 1, 2014 Jennifer S. Mann, www.stltoday.com Resist! Ferguson, Law, Police the Police, Protests

A crowd-control tactic designed to enforce curfew during the most volatile nights of the Ferguson protests was applied in the most calm of daytime situations by mistake, St. Louis County Police Chief Jon Belmar testified in federal court Monday. He was one of several witnesses called during a day-long hearing, in which the ACLU asked a judge to put an end to a “keep moving” rule that police began enforcing on Aug. 18 along West Florissant Avenue in Ferguson. Some activists are calling it the “five-second rule” — referring to how police would give them five seconds to move or face arrest. Among those who took the stand Monday were a legal observer who said he was threatened with jail after stopping to take information from a handcuffed protester, and an ACLU worker who said he was told he would be arrested after pausing to pray.

Cop Kills Unarmed Civilian, Tries For Killer-Cop Competition

September 20, 2014 Alyssa Figueroa, www.alternet.org Educate! police brutality, Police the Police

Around 3am one night in May 2011, 22-year-old Alan Gomez was outside his brother Eric’s house in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Nervous because she believed Gomez was acting erratically, Eric's girlfriend called the police. After about an hour, Albuquerque police officer Sean Wallace arrived. Wallace saw Alan Gomez leave the house and then turn to go back inside. According to a subsequent Department of Justice report, Gomez was unarmed and did not pose an immediate threat to the officers or anyone inside the house. Sean Wallace, however, fired a shot, striking Gomez in the back. Gomez died on the scene, while Wallace was never punished. “He was never indicted, never suspended, nothing,” Mike Gomez, Alan’s father, said. “It was like it never happened.” The officer was given three days of paid leave and $500 from the police union to decompress after “stressful events."

Newark Police Break Hand Of 17 Year Old Student

September 12, 2014 Global Revolution, www.storify.com Resist! police brutality, Police the Police, Protest

A lot happened yesterday. Quite a lot. We, the Newark Students Union, blocked traffic on the busiest street in Newark, shutdown two schools with help from students from other schools including college students, pissed off the police multiple times, and sadly, some of us were manhandled by the police and security agents. When witnessing one of my closest friends, Kristin Towkaniuk, being harmed by a police officer, I didn't know what to do. I was attached to PVC pipes holding an important blockade, but I was tempted at that point to literally go to the police officer and harm him so much just so he could experience a fraction of the pain he was forcing on a 17 year old girl. I could only try to stay composed, so I thought of what would happen in the near future and I began to smile. I thought that due to the tears and pain that all of my friends and I were receiving, we could make through this moment and surpass all of the challenges. I didn't smile because I was happy nor because I thought any of this pain was funny but I smiled because everyone else refused to.

Murder, Mass Incarceration, Militarization, Genocide

September 11, 2014 Dr. Marsha Coleman-Adebayo and Kevin Berends, www.blackagendareport.com Educate! Law, Police, Police the Police, Racial Justice

In these lawless and insufferable times we often find those charged with upholding the Constitution mouthing platitudes about the wisdom of the Founding Fathers, their brilliance in establishing checks and balances to ward off tyranny and their commitment to equal justice under the law. Yet while these same Constitution-quoters are bathed in pomp and applause at a podium, others in their charge or under their influence suffer force-feeding, "humanitarian bombings" and incursions—in short, abuses that the Founders would rightly have thrown off. And then some. The time's lawlessness owes to the chief executive and attorney general of the United States publicly acknowledging the commission of crimes—including torture—while giving their predecessors a free pass on their accountability. This is the leitmotif of justice in 21st century America. Witness the wars of aggression, the treasonous manufactured pretense that forced the public's consent for and the implementation of asymmetrical industrial warfare against civilian populations using internationally prohibited weapons. All of it, and no one held to account. Until Ferguson we might have thought the use of those tactics would never be visited upon Americans, on American soil, by other Americans. But this would require omitting certain other Americans: African-Americans and people of color. Black Americans might ask themselves: If we are to emulate our vaunted Founders, what will it take for us to declare for ourselves: But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. —Declaration of Independence, 1776

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