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“Another Nigger fried. No big deal.”
-- April 16, 2011, Statement by New York City Police Officer Michael Daragjati, boasting of his false arrest of another African-American male.
Brutal Force:
Syria Occupied!
Syria Occupied!
PUBLISHED: 11:34 AM EST, Mon January 9, 2012
MODIFIED: 09:47 AM PST, Mon January 9, 2012
Damascus, Syria (WCJB) -- Opposing protests Monday highlighted Syria's new reality: The country is more divided today than it was just a few months ago. In Damascus, a large pro-government rally felt like a celebration, with a festival atmosphere as demonstrators hailed President Bashar al-Assad. Meanwhile, just outside the capital, a funeral procession and anti-Assad rally was filled with anger. Participants showed media sources what they said were gunshot wounds from forces loyal to al-Assad.
Media sources inside Syria, were able to witness some events on the ground after a long period of the Syrian regime refusing the entry of international journalists. However, the media crew's equipment was confiscated upon arrival, so no live video could be transmitted. And a government minder is assigned to the media source, though he has not accompanied the media source at every turn.
Seven people were killed Monday in Syria, according to opposition activists with the Local Coordination Committees of Syria. The deaths include two women and a child, the activists said. Four deaths were reported in Idlib and one each in Homs, the Damascus suburbs and Hama. State-run news agency SANA reported that seven "martyrs" from the army and security forces were buried Monday. Violence and death have become a daily part of life in parts of Syria amid the government's crackdown on an uprising. A blast on Friday killed 26. The government said the suicide bombing, which also wounded more than 60 people, was a terrorist attack. There were dozens of deaths over the weekend that opposition activists attributed to regime forces. Thousands have been reported killed by security forces throughout the uprising, despite ongoing international pressure on the Syrian regime to halt the crackdown. Death estimates range between 5,000 to 6,000. Arab League officials are scrambling to end the bloodshed.
Media sources followed monitors from the Arab League to a funeral procession. Tens of thousands of people turned out, holding up pictures and lining the streets. Many were in tears. At one funeral, crowds chanted, "Overthrow Assad, overthrow the regime!" They blamed the man's death on government forces. At a separate funeral in Damascus, another crowd mourned a man, this time chanting slogans supporting al-Assad and blaming that death on opposition forces.
The alliance on Sunday decided to bolster its mission to Syria. In a statement released after a meeting in Cairo, the alliance condemned violence against civilians and pledged to add to its 165 observers already in the country. Al-Assad's regime insists it is operating against armed terrorists, whom it blames for the bloodshed. Syria's Foreign Ministry said the government has not hidden anything from the Arab League monitors. The Arab League fact-finding mission under way in the nation is part of a larger initiative to end security forces' attacks on peaceful protesters.
Media sources were not able to independently verify reports from Syria because of the restrictions the government has placed on media.
Brutal Suppression
of a
Global Occupation!
of a
Global Occupation!
Justified Force:
Chapel Hill!
Chapel Hill!
PUBLISHED SAT, JAN 07, 2012 01:08 PM
MODIFIED SUN, JAN 08, 2012 03:51 PM PST
CHAPEL HILL, N.C. -- The Chapel Hill Police Department’s heavily armed raid on a former downtown car dealership taken over by squatters in November was appropriate and in the best interests of the town, according to a report released Saturday by Town Manager Roger Stancil.
The long-awaited internal review says the goal was to remove a group that had illegally entered the former Yates Motor Co. building at 419 W. Franklin St. without injury to anyone. The building was unsafe for occupancy and the squatters had indicated they planned to stay in the building indefinitely, Stancil said in a statement.
"The actions of the on-scene police commanders on November 13 were the best decisions that could be made given the information available at the time,” Stancil said. The town has also received a petition signed by many residents asking for an independent, outside review of the incident, in which eight people were arrested and about a dozen more people, including two reporters, were detained in plastic zip-tie cuffs. Police charged seven people inside the buildings with breaking and entering and an eighth with delay and obstruct for talking with a police officer at the scene. No weapons were found inside the building.
Occupation Eygpt:
Tahrir Square!
Tahrir Square!
Posted: 2:06 PM EST, Tue December 27, 2011 - Updated: 4:18 PM PST, Sun Janaury 08, 2012
Cairo, Egypt (WCJB) -- An Egyptian administrative court issued an order Tuesday banning virginity tests for female detainees, months after several women alleged they were subjected to such examinations following a March protest in Cairo's Tahrir Square. The ruling comes in the case of Samira Ibrahim, a 25-year-old marketing manager who took the country's military led-government to court in August, alleging she was among those subjected to the test after her arrest during the March 9 protest. She said she faced death threats after bringing the case. "Justice has been served today," Ibrahim told media sources. "These tests are a crime and also do not comply with the constitution, which states equality between men and woman. I will not give up my rights as a woman or a human being."
Egyptian authorities initially denied requiring virginity tests, but in May, a senior general who asked not to be identified acknowledged the practice. Aly Hassan, a judicial consultant affiliated with Ministry of Justice, said the order only affects the use of such tests in military prisons and on women in temporary detention. "Those tests are not considered a crime or else the file would be in the Criminal Court," Hassan said. "It's the circumstances of the alleged test that may be in question here."
In March, the human rights group Amnesty International reported that Egyptian troops beat, shocked and strip-searched women arrested during the protest in Cairo and forced them to submit to virginity tests. The general said the tests were performed as a safeguard against the women accusing authorities of sexual assault, and he defended the tests. "The girls who were detained were not like your daughter or mine," the general told media sources at the time. "These were girls who had camped out in tents with male protesters in Tahrir Square, and we found in the tents Molotov cocktails and (drugs)."
But Ibrahim said her treatment clearly showed the tests were meant to "degrade the protesters."
"The military tortured me, labeled me a prostitute and humiliated me by forcing on me a virginity test conducted by a male doctor where my body was fully exposed while military soldiers watched," she said. Another protester arrested in the March 9 protest, Salwa Hosseini, offered a similar account, according to an Amnesty International report on the allegations.
In addition to Ibrahim, a member of the No to Military Trials to Civilians group, Maha Mamoun, joined the legal action even though she was not subjected to a test, said Ahmed Ragab, an attorney with the Hisham Mubarak Law Center who handled Ibrahim's case. Ragab said government lawyers initially denied that the tests were administered and the case was repeatedly delayed before Tuesday's ruling.
Occupy Berkeley!
Posted: Wed. December 21, 2011 - Updated: Thurs. December 22, 2011 4:47 PM PST
San Jose: Re-Occupied!
Posted: December 19, 2011 7:59 AM PST - Updated: December 21, 2011 12:46 PM PST
SAN JOSE, CA (WCJB) – Occupy San Jose protesters returned to City Hall Plaza, but the demonstrators are this time trying to skirt the city’s “no camping” ordinance by not actually sleeping in their tents. Over the weekend, a handful of tents went up at San Jose City Hall, but protesters said they were simply assembling them as part of the nationwide anti-Wall Street movement. They pledged to take the tents down nightly. “If we were camping, we would certainly have campfires, s’mores and sing-alongs. We are not camping, we are occupying a minor corner of City Hall Plaza as a free speech manifestation of the vast homelessness caused by corporate manipulation of this nation’s economy,” a member of Occupy San Jose recently told the San Jose City Council. The city, meanwhile, maintains that “no camping” means no tents. The city manager’s office has said it will enforce that rule to the extent that resources allow.OCCUPY UC Fallout!
Posted: Wed Dec 14, 2011 10:11am PST - Updated:
Occupation Los Angeles:
Five-O Deepcover!
Five-O Deepcover!
Posted: Sun Dec 11, 2011 1:49pm EST - Updated: Sun Dec 11, 2011 2:37pm PST
"It's demeaning to the movement. It suggests that we are not who we say we are. It suggests that they don't trust us."
-- Elise Whitaker, an Occupy LA organizer, saying she was not surprised to hear that L.A. police sent undercover officers into the Occupy LA encampment.
Los Angeles Police Department officers arrest an Occupy LA protester at the encampment at LA city hall November 30, 2011.
Los Angeles, CA (WCJB) - Undercover police officers infiltrated Occupy LA's tent city last month to spy on people they suspected of stockpiling human waste and crude weapons for resisting an eventual eviction, police and city government sources said. Authorities also used security cameras mounted outside City Hall, where the camp was located, and monitored publicly available Internet chatter and video on social-networking sites such as Twitter, sources said. Evidence gathered through the surveillance led to more than 40 arrests for drug use, public intoxication and other offenses in the weeks before police shut down the camp on November 30, one senior official in the Los Angeles Police Department said. That official and most other sources spoke to media sources on condition of anonymity because of department policy barring police from publicly discussing undercover operations. They insisted that covert surveillance of the camp was aimed not at anti-Wall Street activists exercising their constitutional right to freedom of expression but at those they considered anti-government extremists bent on violence. "We had reports that there were individuals advocating violence against police and taking steps to commit violence," the senior LAPD source said. "In that vein we investigated that. What we didn't do was spy or monitor or interact with those engaged with First Amendment activities."Civil liberties advocates said they were troubled by law enforcement's infiltration of peaceful demonstrations, although the LAPD's undercover efforts were not unique. Elise Whitaker, an Occupy LA organizer, said she was not surprised to hear that police sent undercover officers into the camp but said she believes such surveillance proved unwarranted because the demonstration was peaceful. "I'm not thrilled about it," she said. "It's demeaning to the movement. It suggests that we are not who we say we are. It suggests that they don't trust us."
The Los Angeles encampment had been among the largest on the West Coast aligned with a movement that began in New York in September to protest against economic inequality and excesses of the U.S. financial system. At its peak, officials said, some 2,000 people and more than 500 tents were present there. Los Angeles officials had allowed the camp to remain open even as other cities forced the removal of similar compounds. But mounting complaints of sanitation problems, property damage, drugs and the presence of children prompted L.A. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa to finally order the tenty city closed. In the end, nearly 300 Los Angeles demonstrators were arrested the night police raided their encampment, nearly all for defying orders to leave but with little violence.
After clearing the encampment, however, police found buckets of feces, water bottles filled with urine and pieces of bamboo with sharpened tips stashed in bushes and trees, police and city sources told media sources. One police source said officers discovered a pickup truck parked near City Hall the night before the eviction with about 100 sharpened bamboo sticks stashed in the bed of the vehicle. Another, LAPD Commander Andy Smith, said bamboo spears were thrown from the crowd at police at the outset of the November 30 eviction raid, though no one was reported hurt.
The City Attorney's Office has so far filed formal charges against seven people arrested before the raid and accused of violations ranging from weapons possession, battery, assault with a deadly weapon and lewd conduct. The cases, all misdemeanors, included an alleged gang-related fight and a person arrested on accusations of masturbating in the presence of children, prosecutors said.
One Law School professor said that while such covert actions may raise questions about intrusions on civil liberties, police officers in or out of uniform have the same right to be in a public space as anyone else. The attorney added that there was nothing to suggest the LAPD's surveillance violated Fourth Amendment safeguards against unreasonable searches and seizures. "It's always worrisome, of course, when you're doing undercover operations, but sometimes it's necessary," the attorney said. "It's completely expected for safety reasons, if nothing else. They wanted to know what they were going to confront."
The founding dean of another school of law, said courts have been unreceptive to claims that protest infiltration by undercover police undermines the First Amendment. Still, he called such surveillance very troubling because it "risks chilling free-speech activity." The executive director of the First Amendment Coalition, agreed. "It should make everybody at least uncomfortable, he said, adding, "That's the fundamental difference between America's free democratic system and the kind of system one would expect to find in Iran."
Police said a key concern about the eviction stemmed from some individuals in the camp identified as belonging to or affiliated with radical organizations such as Sovereign Citizens, which the FBI classifies as an "extremist anti-government group," and the Black Riders Liberation Party, deemed a "domestic terrorist group" by the LAPD.
Asher Simcha, a spokesman for Sovereign Citizens, a group that rejects the legitimacy of government institutions, including tax collection, said he and other members of the group were uniting with Occupy LA protesters against what he called corruption. But he denied that the group posed a danger, saying, "We don't believe in violence." Laa Laa Shakur, chief of staff for the Black Riders Liberation Party, said members of her group dropped into the Occupy LA camp on occasion to pass out literature promoting unity within "oppressed communities," but said that they did not camp there or take part in the protests. "They're slandering the organization," she said. The Black Riders, a spin-off of the Black Panther Party, once threatened to take over four Los Angeles police stations and kill as many officers as possible in furtherance of its black separatist and anti-government agenda, according to a 2009 LAPD report on policing terrorism.
Occupy LA was not alone. According to media sources in New York, NYPD also sent plainclothes officers into Zuccotti Park in Manhattan to gather intelligence on protesters there.
Occupation Moscow:
Demonstrative Opposition!
Demonstrative Opposition!
Posted: 12:39 PM EST, Thu December 29, 2011 - Updated: 4:00 PM PST, SUN January 08, 2012
Moscow (WCJB) -- Hundreds of demonstrators gathered in central Moscow on Thursday to protest the detention of Russian opposition activist Sergey Udaltsov. About 3,000 people said they might attend ahead of the event, according to its Facebook page, although Udaltsov's wife Anastasia said city hall had refused to give permission for the rally. Reporters at the scene estimated that several hundred protesters had turned out. The mood was calm, with no attempt by police to break up the rally despite its unauthorized status. That may reflect an apparent change in approach by Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, who was initially dismissive of protesters but has in recent days struck a more conciliatory tone.
Udaltsov, the leader of the opposition Leftist Front movement, had his 15-day detention extended by another 10 days on Sunday, Russia's news agency said. He was arrested on December 4 for not serving out the full term of his previous administrative detention and escaping from a hospital, according to a Russian news agency.
Udaltsov is staging a hunger strike in protest of his detention and has been hospitalized twice during it, RIA Novosti reported. He was taken to the hospital again after his term was extended.
Tens of thousands of Russians have taken to the streets to protest the December 4 parliamentary election results amid claims of fraud. Rights groups say hundreds of people have been detained over the protests and have called for claims of police mistreatment to be investigated.
Putin's ruling United Russia Party received 49.5% of the vote, down from 64% four years ago, in an election widely viewed as marred by vote rigging and ballot-box stuffing. It kept Putin's party in power, although in diminished form. Putin intends to run in the country's presidential elections in March.
Posted: Saturday, 10 Dec 2011, 2:33 PM PST
“We exist!” “We exist!”
-- Tens of thousands of Russians chanting, rallying and protesting in central Moscow on Saturday, December 10, 2011, against Russian Prime Minister Vladimir V. Putin after allegations of fraudulent parliamentary elections last Sunday.
MOSCOW, RUSSIA — Tens of thousands of Russians took to the streets in Moscow on Saturday shouting “Putin is a thief” and “Russia without Putin,” forcing the Kremlin to confront a level of public discontent that has not been seen here since Vladimir V. Putin first became president 12 years ago. The crowd overflowed from a central city square, forcing stragglers to climb trees or watch from the opposite riverbank. “We exist!” they chanted. “We exist!” In Moscow, the police estimated the crowd at 25,000, though organizers said there were more than twice that many. The Moscow protest was accompanied by dozens of smaller rallies across Russia’s nine time zones, with a crowd of 3,000 reported in Tomsk, and 7,000 in St. Petersburg, the police said.
Calls for protest have been mounting since parliamentary elections last Sunday, which domestic and international observers said were tainted by ballot-stuffing and fraud on behalf of Mr. Putin’s party, United Russia. But an equally crucial event, many said, was Mr. Putin’s announcement in September that he would run for the presidency in March. He is almost certain to win a six-year term, meaning he will have been Russia’s paramount leader for 18 years. “People are just tired, they have already crossed all the boundaries,” said Yana Larionova, 26, a real estate agent. “You see all these people who are well dressed and earn a good salary, going out onto the streets on Saturday and saying, ‘No more.’ That’s when you know you need a change.” Older participants were reminded of the oceans of demonstrators who marched on the Kremlin in the early 1990s, heralding the collapse of the Soviet Union.
09:06 AM PST - DEC 06, 2011
Moscow -- Russia's beleaguered opposition has been energized by the vote, staging its biggest protest in Moscow in a number of years. Late Monday, thousands marched chanting "Russia without [Russian Prime Minister Vladimir] Putin!" Anti-corruption blogger Alexei Navalny was sentenced to 15 days in jail for his role in a protest in Moscow Monday, when about 300 people were arrested, media sources reported. "There is not a single doubt that my case is under the special control of the party of crooks and thieves," Navalny tells reporters in a courtroom ahead of being charged, referring to the term he uses to describe Putin's United Russia party. Many opposition leaders and well-known bloggers, including Navalny, were reportedly among those detained. Another source reported that among the detained was Boris Nemtsov, a leader of the liberal opposition. A Moscow court sentenced Ilya Yashin, one of the organizers on Monday's rally, to 15 days in detention. "Of course we will continue protesting," he later told reporters. "This is no doubt a political decision aimed at intimidating me and my colleagues. We are not going to stop our struggle," he said, adding that his verdict could "arouse even bigger discontent among the people."
Earlier at least 50 people has arrested in Moscow amid clashes between police and protesters angry over alleged voter fraud in Russia's parliamentary elections, according to Russian media sources. United Russia won about 50 percent of Sunday's vote, a result that opposition politicians and election monitors said was inflated because of ballot-box stuffing and other vote fraud. It was a significant drop from the 2007 election when the party took 64 percent, gaining a two-thirds majority that allowed it to change the constitution. But Putin said the party had retained a "stable" majority.
Russian media sources say that reports on Twitter from people at the scene say there are about 5,000 opposition supporters, 2,000 pro-government young men, some wearing emblems of the Young Guards, United Russia's youth wing, also were seen at the square and 1,000 police. Russian sources say Pro-government supporters are trying to upstage the protest. The riot police presence, backed by water cannons, are "definitely noticeable" in Triumphal Square, according to the same reports.
On Tuesday evening, American sources reported that hundreds of police had blocked off Triumphal Square, adjacent to the capital's main boulevard, after reports that anti-Putin demonstrators would try to gather there. Police also cordoned off a monument to the 1905 Revolution. Police then began chasing demonstrators, seizing some and throwing them harshly into police vehicles.
An aide to Putin warned Tuesday that police would prevent protesters staging rallies without official permission. "The actions of those who hold unsanctioned demonstrations must be stopped," spokesman Dmitry Peskov said the day after up to 5,000 Russians protested against the result of Sunday's parliamentary election, which they said was rigged.
Occupation: Boston!
Posted: Saturday, 10 Dec 2011, 2:26 PM PST
BOSTON, MA (WCJB) – Police officers swept through Dewey Square early Saturday, tearing down tents at the Occupy Boston encampment and arresting dozens of protesters, bringing a peaceful end to the 10-week demonstration. Officers began moving into the encampment at about 5 a.m. to "ensure compliance with the trespassing law," police spokeswoman Elaine Driscoll said. The city had set a deadline for midnight Thursday for the protesters to abandon the site but police took no action until early Saturday, making Boston the latest city where officials moved to oust protesters demonstrating against what they call corporate greed and economic injustice.
As police moved in, about two dozen demonstrators linked arms and sat down in nonviolent protest and officers soon began arresting them. The protesters were "very accommodating" to the officers, Driscoll said. Forty-six people were arrested on charges of trespassing and disorderly conduct, police said. No injuries were reported. The entire operation lasted less than an hour.
Occupy Boston said though its space was gone, the movement would continue. The group planned a meeting for Saturday evening in Boston Common. "We might have been evicted, but we shall not be moved," the group said on its website Saturday. "We remain invested in the future of our movement. We will continue to challenge Wall Street's occupation of our government."
Occupation: San Francisco!
Updated: Tuesday, 07 Dec 2011, 9:58 AM PST
Occupy D.C.!
09:30 AM PST - DEC 05, 2011
Occupy Denver!
Posted: 10/14/2011 05:47:17 AM MDT
Updated: 10/14/2011 02:03:22 PM PDT
Movie Intermission!
DALLAS SWAT!
Description: A quiet Memorial Day weekend erupts when SWAT is called in to subdue a home intruder, whose startling method of entry leaves the team scratching their heads. © 2010 A&E Television Networks
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