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Tuesday, August 9, 2011
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
Probe of fatal APD shooting continues
Gunfire followed car, foot pursuit
* Executive Producer: Melissa Dosher
* Web Producer: Bill Diven
ALBUQUERQUE (KRQE) - One man is dead, another gone from the scene and an Albuquerque police officer is on leave.
The officer fatally shot Andrew Lopez, 19 early Sunday morning after he led Albuquerque police officers on a high-speed car chase lasting 11 minutes.
Police said Lopez had a gun.
After stopping near 51st Street and Rincon Road NW, Lopez and his unidentified passenger jumped out and ran away. Officers caught up to Lopez in a dark area.
Lopez then turned on one of the officers in an aggressive manner with something in his hand, according to Albuquerque Police Department spokesman John Walsh
The officer fired shots in response.
Police are still looking for Lopez's passenger and the gun they believe was in the car.
The officer who fired the shots has been identified as Justin Montgomery, 28, who has been with APD for 2 1/2 years.
* Executive Producer: Melissa Dosher
* Web Producer: Bill Diven
ALBUQUERQUE (KRQE) - One man is dead, another gone from the scene and an Albuquerque police officer is on leave.
The officer fatally shot Andrew Lopez, 19 early Sunday morning after he led Albuquerque police officers on a high-speed car chase lasting 11 minutes.
Police said Lopez had a gun.
After stopping near 51st Street and Rincon Road NW, Lopez and his unidentified passenger jumped out and ran away. Officers caught up to Lopez in a dark area.
Lopez then turned on one of the officers in an aggressive manner with something in his hand, according to Albuquerque Police Department spokesman John Walsh
The officer fired shots in response.
Police are still looking for Lopez's passenger and the gun they believe was in the car.
The officer who fired the shots has been identified as Justin Montgomery, 28, who has been with APD for 2 1/2 years.
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
Another Youth Murdered by APD
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
Police ID Man Killed by Officer
By Jeff Proctor, Albuquerque Journal Staff Writer
Police have identified the man fatally shot by an officer after an 11-minute pursuit through southwest Albuquerque early Sunday as Andrew Lopez, a 19-year-old suspected gang member with a felony warrant out for his arrest.
Albuquerque Police Department Officer Justin Montgomery, a 28-year-old just more than two years out of the academy, shot Lopez shortly after 3 a.m. after he and other officers backed Lopez into a corner, police spokesman John Walsh said.
Lopez "turned in an aggressive manner with an object in his hand" and was shot an undetermined number of times, Walsh said.
An "extensive search" of the area near the intersection of 51st and Rincon NW turned up only a silver-colored cell phone, he said. No weapon has been found.
A second man, who had been a passenger in Lopez's vehicle when police began to follow it, managed to get away and was still at large late Monday, Walsh said. He was around the same age as Lopez and was wearing dark clothing.
Police began following the vehicle, a beige 1980s-model two-door sedan, because it was driving with no lights on, he said. There had been calls of shots fired in the area that matched up with the vehicle Lopez was driving.
Officers pursued the vehicle for nearly 11 minutes, Walsh said, and, at one point, Lopez stuck his hand out the window with "an object officers believed to be a weapon."
The vehicle began to slow down as it approached 51st, and before it had come to a stop, the passenger bailed out and fled on foot, he said. The vehicle then came to a halt, Lopez got out and ran in the other direction.
He ran down a "darkened area," Walsh said and was eventually boxed into a corner by Montgomery and other officers. That's when Lopez turned around and was shot.
Police have been searching the several-mile area the vehicle and foot pursuits covered for weapons and witnesses, he said. So far, no weapon has been found, but several possible witnesses and acquaintances of Lopez have been interviewed.
Lopez had a felony warrant out for his arrest on drug and aggravated battery charges, according to court records.
Montgomery is on standard paid 72-hour leave while APD, the Bernalillo County Sheriff's Department, State Police, the District Attorney's Office and the Office of the Medical Investigator complete their investigation, Walsh said.
Police ID Man Killed by Officer
By Jeff Proctor, Albuquerque Journal Staff Writer
Police have identified the man fatally shot by an officer after an 11-minute pursuit through southwest Albuquerque early Sunday as Andrew Lopez, a 19-year-old suspected gang member with a felony warrant out for his arrest.
Albuquerque Police Department Officer Justin Montgomery, a 28-year-old just more than two years out of the academy, shot Lopez shortly after 3 a.m. after he and other officers backed Lopez into a corner, police spokesman John Walsh said.
Lopez "turned in an aggressive manner with an object in his hand" and was shot an undetermined number of times, Walsh said.
An "extensive search" of the area near the intersection of 51st and Rincon NW turned up only a silver-colored cell phone, he said. No weapon has been found.
A second man, who had been a passenger in Lopez's vehicle when police began to follow it, managed to get away and was still at large late Monday, Walsh said. He was around the same age as Lopez and was wearing dark clothing.
Police began following the vehicle, a beige 1980s-model two-door sedan, because it was driving with no lights on, he said. There had been calls of shots fired in the area that matched up with the vehicle Lopez was driving.
Officers pursued the vehicle for nearly 11 minutes, Walsh said, and, at one point, Lopez stuck his hand out the window with "an object officers believed to be a weapon."
The vehicle began to slow down as it approached 51st, and before it had come to a stop, the passenger bailed out and fled on foot, he said. The vehicle then came to a halt, Lopez got out and ran in the other direction.
He ran down a "darkened area," Walsh said and was eventually boxed into a corner by Montgomery and other officers. That's when Lopez turned around and was shot.
Police have been searching the several-mile area the vehicle and foot pursuits covered for weapons and witnesses, he said. So far, no weapon has been found, but several possible witnesses and acquaintances of Lopez have been interviewed.
Lopez had a felony warrant out for his arrest on drug and aggravated battery charges, according to court records.
Montgomery is on standard paid 72-hour leave while APD, the Bernalillo County Sheriff's Department, State Police, the District Attorney's Office and the Office of the Medical Investigator complete their investigation, Walsh said.
Saturday, January 10, 2009
Popular Fury at Yet Another Police Murder
Oakland's Not for Burning?
By GEORGE CICCARIELLO-MAHER
from CounterPunch
Oakland.
In 1968, Amory Bradford penned a volume entitled Oakland’s Not For Burning, documenting the tinderbox that the city had become, and the lamenting the inevitability with which it would explode. But the assertion contained in the book’s title was hardly credible, coming as it was from a Yale-educated former Wall Street lawyer and New York Times general manager whose only business in Oakland came via the U.S. Commerce Department. Some forty years later, in the early hours of this year of ostensible hope, the reality of the persistence of racism in Oakland became devastatingly clear, sparking a powerful response the likes of which this city hasn’t seen in years. But luckily, the condescending voices of moderation, like that of Bradford a generation prior, seem have little traction with those who have seen enough police murder.
A New Year’s Execution
After responding to reports of “a fight” on a Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) train, BART police detained the train at the Fruitvale station, forcibly removing several young men from the train as dozens of bystanders watched. Several of the men, all young and mostly black, were lined up, seated, along the platform. Some were cuffed, Oscar Grant was not. As he was attempting to defuse the situation, BART police decided to detain him, placing him face-down on the platform, with one officer kneeling near his neck, and another straddling his legs. For some still unexplained reason, one officer, now identified as Johannes Mehserle stood up, pulled his gun, and fired a shot directly into Oscar Grant’s back.
The bullet went through Grant’s back, ricocheting off the platform and puncturing his lung. There are gasps from the bystanders and shock on the face of the other officers, who clearly didn’t expect the shot to be fired. Grant, who was begging not to be Tasered at the time of the shot, clearly didn’t expect it either. But this surprise notwithstanding, the decision was then made to cuff the young man as he lay dying. As an added precaution, BART police then sought immediately to confiscate all videophones held by the train passengers, in an effort to cover up the murder. Luckily for everyone but the BART P.D. and Mehserle, several videos managed to make it into the public domain, where they went viral and were viewed on Youtube hundreds of thousands of times in the following days. In a rare show of journalistic integrity, local Fox affiliate KTVU aired one of the videos in its entirety.
The standard protocol---deny, distort, cover-up---had clearly been disrupted, and BART spokesman Linton Johnson even went so far as to criticize the leaking of the video, arguing that rather than clarifying events, public access to the video would “taint” the investigation. BART was on a back foot, and popular anger was on the offensive.
A Corporate Police Force
BART Police are a notoriously problematic organization, existing in a gray area between public and private, funded by taxpayers but operating under a corporate structure which lacks all accountability and oversight. According to the San Francisco Bay Guardian:
The structure of the BART police force is a recipe for disaster. BART’s general manager (who is not an elected official and has no expertise in law enforcement) hires the BART police chief… There is no police commission, no police review board, not even a committee of the elected BART board designated to handle complaints against and issues with the BART police… There is, in other words, no civilian oversight.
And this “disaster” has been more than merely hypothetical: in 1992, a BART cop shot unarmed Jerrold Hall in the back of the head with a shotgun as he walked away, after firing a warning shot. In 2001, BART police shot a mentally ill man who was unarmed and naked. And according to Tim Redmond, writing in the same paper, “BART made a monumental effort to cover [the Hall slaying] up,” and in the end, “Nothing happened… BART called the shooting justified.” As of yesterday, BART hadn’t yet interviewed the officer, Johannes Mehserle, who insisted on invoking Fifth Amendment rights not to speak. And just when they claim to have compelled him to do so, he abruptly resigned, thereby ending any internal affairs investigation that may have taken place. There still remains, according to BART, a criminal investigation, but if the past is any indicator, this won’t get far.
But let’s not fool ourselves. Even publicly-run organizations like the Oakland Police Department, which has all the ties in the world to elected power, operates with an informal shoot-to-kill policy for black teenagers. This was as clear in the 2007 murder of Gary King as it is with Oscar Grant today. And since the district attorney responsible for bringing charges against the police works closely with these same police on a daily basis and in a shared enterprise of delivering convictions, we should not be surprised that not a single police murder in recent years has even seen disciplinary action. “No one we talked with,” writes the Chronicle, “from the district attorney's office to lawyers who work either side of police shootings - could remember a case in the last 20 years in which an on-duty officer had been charged in a fatal shooting in Alameda County.”
Does It Matter What Really Happened?
We have all seen the video, and rumors are swirling about how to interpret its contents. The officer clearly fires a fatal shot into Oscar Grant’s back while the latter is face-down on the floor. A flurry of “experts” have intervened to give their analysis. While such expert testimony usually functions to justify the police, even among these experts some are shocked and disgusted by what they see. One expert, after concluding that the gun had accidentally gone off, watched video from another angle, after which he changed his conclusion: “Looking at it, I hate to say this, it looks like an execution to me.”
Others are insisting that Mehserle meant to pull out his (less fatal) Taser, but this theory has since been discredited. Firstly, a Sig-Sauer handgun weighs three times what a Taser weighs, and the shape is completely distinct, and another expert noticed in the tape that the officer had previously withdrawn his Taser, located for safety reasons on the other side of his belt. In other words, he knew he was going for the gun. Hence the claim of accidental discharge, but this too raises a serious question of plausibility: when Mehserle drew his gun, Grant couldn’t see it, and so there could be no claim that it was meant to threaten the victim into passivity. In the end, if Mehserle is ever forced to give a statement, he will likely turn to the tried-and-true excuse that he “suspected” Grant had a gun in his pants.
But none of this matters, all the debate of the officer’s “intention” only serves to reinforce the fact that, while white cops are allowed to have intention, this is a quantity denied to their victims. This fact of racist double-standards is not lost on those who, realizing that there will be no “justice” in this case, have taken to the streets to demonstrate their rage at the unprovoked execution.
“I’m Feeling Pretty Violent Right About Now”
While friends and family were gathered for Grant’s funeral, a number of organizations called a demonstration where he was killed, at Fruitvale BART station. Circulating by internet and Facebook, the call reached many thousands, and in the end some 500-600 protestors and mourners came together to make speeches and lament this murder. At a makeshift memorial behind the BART station, candles are burning, and hand-written messages appear: “Oscar, we watched you grow up from a lil’ boy down the street into a man,” and “O., RIP, peaceful journey, God only pick da best.”
As an indication of the contrasting sentiments that divided the crowd, where someone had scribbled “Fuck the police,” another had covered the expletive with another message: “Forgive.” But forgiveness wasn’t on the minds of many. Several of the more radical protestors climbed onto the BART turnstiles, displaying a red, black, and green flag. One shouted:
I’ve got the mentality of my parents who were Black Panthers, I’m tired of talking, I’m thinking like L.A. in 1992. Y’all can have your megaphone speeches, I been through that, I’m black, I don’t need more speeches. Let’s take a stand today, because tomorrow ain’t promised!
While some on the mic attempted to soothe the crowd, insisting that burning up the city was “too easy” and “useless,” the message didn’t seem to resonate much with the crowd. And why should it? We were standing in the middle of “Fruitvale Village,” a corporate paradise in the middle of a historically Latino district, which clearly doesn’t belong to the local residents. It was clear where the momentum was going, as the biggest cheers went up for the more radical voices who seized the mic: “I’m feelin pretty violent right now,” one insisted, “I’m on some Malcolm X shit: by any means necessary. If I don’t see some action, I’ma cause a ruckus myself.”
Oakland Burning
While some remained to hear additional speakers, including hyphy hip-hopper Mistah FAB and the recently-founded Coalition Against Police Executions (CAPE), several hundred set out on a militant and rapidly-moving march north on International Boulevard. The police response was initially hands-off, despite the tenor of the chants: “No Justice, No Peace: Fuck the Police,” and “La Migra, La Policia: La Misma Porqueria.” If those in the passing cars and stuck in traffic were of any indication, the local population knew exactly what was going on, why we were protesting, and were largely sympathetic.
As the march wound around Lake Merritt, it turned sharply to the left, a shortcut to BART headquarters. This seems to have thrown off the police, who were clearly unprepared for what came next. A single police car, parked sideways at 8th and Madison to prevent access to the BART headquarters, became the target of the crowd’s increasing fury. Sensing the tone of the crowd, a cop reached in and grabbed her helmet before scurrying away. Within moments, the police car was destroyed and nearly flipped over, and a nearby dumpster was burning.
A few seconds later, the air was thick with teargas. Evidently, seeing their own property destroyed was too much for the police to stomach. (Note: there is no truth to the CNN report that tear gas was deployed to protect a surrounded officer). I get a noseful of teargas, and a protestor near me is shot in the stomach with a rubber bullet, and needs to be helped off, as the crowd quickly sprints north toward downtown. Passing through Chinatown, dumpsters full of fresh produce are emptied into the street to slow the march of a line of riot police. When the crowd reaches Broadway, there is momentary confusion, with some continuing straight to Old Oakland, some pushing left toward Jack London Square, and others urging a move rightward toward the city center.
The police took advantage of this momentary indecision, with a full line charge that send many of the furious demonstrators sprinting and left many arrested. When the crowd regrouped, it was promptly encircled at 14th and Broadway, and a standoff ensued. Either by design or by a predictable quirk of the police organization, nearly every riot cop in the street was white, some sneering defiantly. And if the crowd of demonstrators was largely multiethnic, it was clear by this point that the functional vanguard was composed largely of the young, black teenagers most acutely aware of their relationship to the police. There were chants of “We are all Oscar Grant!” and several protestors lay in the middle of the street with their hands behind their backs, mimicking the position in which Grant was executed.
Some small fires were set, and the police moved in again, pushing the crowd down 14th toward Lake Merritt. The spearhead of the demonstrators rushed forward to shouts of “We the police today!” smashing and torching vehicles, and while this was done out of anger it was far from irrational, as the press will certainly present it. Rather, it was the result of a very clear line of reasoning that goes something like this: we have to do something, and in the face of police impunity, this is all we can do. Nothing would be more irrational than a blind faith that the police will do the right thing, given all the historical evidence to the contrary. While the press is doing its best to find bystanders to decry the “vandalism” involved, it couldn’t ignore the testimony Oakland Post reporter Ken Epstein, who was writing an article on the killing when he looked out his office window to see his Honda CRV in flames: “I’m sorry my car was burned,” Epstein admitted, “but the issue is very upsetting.”
The crisp wintry air swirled and the lights twinkled along the surface of Lake Merritt as demonstrators demolished a local McDonalds, at which point a line had clearly been crossed: a police armored personnel carrier came tearing down the street at 45 miles per hour, firing rubber bullets and sending the crowd scattering. The scene was surreal, with padded riot cops leaping off the vehicle in an effort to win an impossible footrace with younger and fitter demonstrators.
Dellums Steps In, Steps Out
From the early moments of the demonstration, the position of the mayor, Ron Dellums, was at issue. Here was a mayor with a great deal of popular respect, with longstanding civil rights credentials, but who had done little to slow the pace of police killing, among the other ongoing ills plaguing postindustrial Oakland. With tear gas swirling and the APCs circling, the mayor decided to make his appearance at around 9pm, walking the few blocks from City Hall down to 14th and Jackson to address the angry crowd himself. Several times he attempted to scurry away under hard questions that he could not answer, with the standard responses: we should all take it down a notch; there will be an investigation.
I don’t remember what it was exactly that I yelled at the mayor, but it certainly got to him. As he was leaving the crowd, he turned and walked directly up to me, putting his face a mere inches from my own.
Dellums: What I want people to do now is calm down. I’ve told the police to stand down, and I hope you all can do the same. Both sides need to be peaceful right now so we can find out exactly what happened.
Me: But we know what happened! We’ve all seen the video: A cop pulled his gun and shot an unarmed black man in the back. And you know there are reasons that certain people have guns pulled on them and others don’t.
Dellums: There are two processes currently underway…
Me: The process is if I shoot someone, I’m arrested. But if a cop shoots someone, he gets put on paid administrative leave until everyone forgets about it.
Dellums: I’m asking both sides to be peaceful…
Me: Both sides? I haven’t killed anybody, this crowd hasn’t killed anybody. The police have killed somebody, and you’re in charge of the police! Who runs this city? When will the prisoners be released?
Dellums: Soon…
Dellums then returned to City Hall, surveying the damage. But as he entered, the angry crowd booed thunderously. And despite his claim that the police had been ordered to stand down, clashes broke out immediately on the same block, more fires broke out, and more teargas was deployed. The mayor’s intervention could do little to calm Oakland’s frazzled nerves. His claim that the people have lost faith in the police rings empty for people who never had such faith in the first place, people who have seen vicious police murder after police murder without so much as an indictment.
The demonstrators continued to express their pent-up rage, engaging in running battles until nearly 11pm, when a mass arrest seems to have quelled the resistance for the moment. All in all, official numbers show 105 arrests (including 21 juveniles), more than 80 of which occurred after Dellums claims to have told OPD to stand down. Who knows if his promise of a speedy release means anything at all. Support and solidarity demonstrations are scheduled this week for the prisoners’ arraignments, and with another mass mobilization scheduled for next Wednesday, this is far from over.
Intention as Privilege
As I have said, and at the risk of controversy I will repeat: it doesn’t matter if Mehserle meant to pull the trigger. He had already assumed the role of sole arbiter over the life or death of Oscar Grant. He had already decided that Grant, by virtue of his skin color and appearance, was worth less than other citizens. And rather than acquitting the officer, all of the psychological analyses and possible explanations of the shooting that have been trotted-out in the press, and all the discussion of the irrelevant elements of Grant’s criminal history, have only proven this fundamental point.
If a young black or Latino male pulls a gun and someone winds up dead, intention is never the issue, and first-degree murder charges are on the agenda, as well as likely murder charges for anyone of the wrong color standing nearby. If we reverse the current situation, and the gun is in Oscar Grant’s hand, then racist voices would be squealing for the death penalty regardless of intention. And yet when it’s a cop pulling the trigger, all the media and public opinion resources are deployed to justify, understand, and empathize with this unconscionable act. One side is automatically condemned; the other automatically excused.
For now, the fires are out. But despite the soothing words of Barack Obama and Ron Dellums, there is no lack of fuel and no lack of spark in Oakland.
George Ciccariello-Maher is a Ph.D. candidate in political theory at UC Berkeley. He lives in Oakland, and can be reached at gjcm(at)berkeley.edu.
By GEORGE CICCARIELLO-MAHER
from CounterPunch
Oakland.
In 1968, Amory Bradford penned a volume entitled Oakland’s Not For Burning, documenting the tinderbox that the city had become, and the lamenting the inevitability with which it would explode. But the assertion contained in the book’s title was hardly credible, coming as it was from a Yale-educated former Wall Street lawyer and New York Times general manager whose only business in Oakland came via the U.S. Commerce Department. Some forty years later, in the early hours of this year of ostensible hope, the reality of the persistence of racism in Oakland became devastatingly clear, sparking a powerful response the likes of which this city hasn’t seen in years. But luckily, the condescending voices of moderation, like that of Bradford a generation prior, seem have little traction with those who have seen enough police murder.
A New Year’s Execution
After responding to reports of “a fight” on a Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) train, BART police detained the train at the Fruitvale station, forcibly removing several young men from the train as dozens of bystanders watched. Several of the men, all young and mostly black, were lined up, seated, along the platform. Some were cuffed, Oscar Grant was not. As he was attempting to defuse the situation, BART police decided to detain him, placing him face-down on the platform, with one officer kneeling near his neck, and another straddling his legs. For some still unexplained reason, one officer, now identified as Johannes Mehserle stood up, pulled his gun, and fired a shot directly into Oscar Grant’s back.
The bullet went through Grant’s back, ricocheting off the platform and puncturing his lung. There are gasps from the bystanders and shock on the face of the other officers, who clearly didn’t expect the shot to be fired. Grant, who was begging not to be Tasered at the time of the shot, clearly didn’t expect it either. But this surprise notwithstanding, the decision was then made to cuff the young man as he lay dying. As an added precaution, BART police then sought immediately to confiscate all videophones held by the train passengers, in an effort to cover up the murder. Luckily for everyone but the BART P.D. and Mehserle, several videos managed to make it into the public domain, where they went viral and were viewed on Youtube hundreds of thousands of times in the following days. In a rare show of journalistic integrity, local Fox affiliate KTVU aired one of the videos in its entirety.
The standard protocol---deny, distort, cover-up---had clearly been disrupted, and BART spokesman Linton Johnson even went so far as to criticize the leaking of the video, arguing that rather than clarifying events, public access to the video would “taint” the investigation. BART was on a back foot, and popular anger was on the offensive.
A Corporate Police Force
BART Police are a notoriously problematic organization, existing in a gray area between public and private, funded by taxpayers but operating under a corporate structure which lacks all accountability and oversight. According to the San Francisco Bay Guardian:
The structure of the BART police force is a recipe for disaster. BART’s general manager (who is not an elected official and has no expertise in law enforcement) hires the BART police chief… There is no police commission, no police review board, not even a committee of the elected BART board designated to handle complaints against and issues with the BART police… There is, in other words, no civilian oversight.
And this “disaster” has been more than merely hypothetical: in 1992, a BART cop shot unarmed Jerrold Hall in the back of the head with a shotgun as he walked away, after firing a warning shot. In 2001, BART police shot a mentally ill man who was unarmed and naked. And according to Tim Redmond, writing in the same paper, “BART made a monumental effort to cover [the Hall slaying] up,” and in the end, “Nothing happened… BART called the shooting justified.” As of yesterday, BART hadn’t yet interviewed the officer, Johannes Mehserle, who insisted on invoking Fifth Amendment rights not to speak. And just when they claim to have compelled him to do so, he abruptly resigned, thereby ending any internal affairs investigation that may have taken place. There still remains, according to BART, a criminal investigation, but if the past is any indicator, this won’t get far.
But let’s not fool ourselves. Even publicly-run organizations like the Oakland Police Department, which has all the ties in the world to elected power, operates with an informal shoot-to-kill policy for black teenagers. This was as clear in the 2007 murder of Gary King as it is with Oscar Grant today. And since the district attorney responsible for bringing charges against the police works closely with these same police on a daily basis and in a shared enterprise of delivering convictions, we should not be surprised that not a single police murder in recent years has even seen disciplinary action. “No one we talked with,” writes the Chronicle, “from the district attorney's office to lawyers who work either side of police shootings - could remember a case in the last 20 years in which an on-duty officer had been charged in a fatal shooting in Alameda County.”
Does It Matter What Really Happened?
We have all seen the video, and rumors are swirling about how to interpret its contents. The officer clearly fires a fatal shot into Oscar Grant’s back while the latter is face-down on the floor. A flurry of “experts” have intervened to give their analysis. While such expert testimony usually functions to justify the police, even among these experts some are shocked and disgusted by what they see. One expert, after concluding that the gun had accidentally gone off, watched video from another angle, after which he changed his conclusion: “Looking at it, I hate to say this, it looks like an execution to me.”
Others are insisting that Mehserle meant to pull out his (less fatal) Taser, but this theory has since been discredited. Firstly, a Sig-Sauer handgun weighs three times what a Taser weighs, and the shape is completely distinct, and another expert noticed in the tape that the officer had previously withdrawn his Taser, located for safety reasons on the other side of his belt. In other words, he knew he was going for the gun. Hence the claim of accidental discharge, but this too raises a serious question of plausibility: when Mehserle drew his gun, Grant couldn’t see it, and so there could be no claim that it was meant to threaten the victim into passivity. In the end, if Mehserle is ever forced to give a statement, he will likely turn to the tried-and-true excuse that he “suspected” Grant had a gun in his pants.
But none of this matters, all the debate of the officer’s “intention” only serves to reinforce the fact that, while white cops are allowed to have intention, this is a quantity denied to their victims. This fact of racist double-standards is not lost on those who, realizing that there will be no “justice” in this case, have taken to the streets to demonstrate their rage at the unprovoked execution.
“I’m Feeling Pretty Violent Right About Now”
While friends and family were gathered for Grant’s funeral, a number of organizations called a demonstration where he was killed, at Fruitvale BART station. Circulating by internet and Facebook, the call reached many thousands, and in the end some 500-600 protestors and mourners came together to make speeches and lament this murder. At a makeshift memorial behind the BART station, candles are burning, and hand-written messages appear: “Oscar, we watched you grow up from a lil’ boy down the street into a man,” and “O., RIP, peaceful journey, God only pick da best.”
As an indication of the contrasting sentiments that divided the crowd, where someone had scribbled “Fuck the police,” another had covered the expletive with another message: “Forgive.” But forgiveness wasn’t on the minds of many. Several of the more radical protestors climbed onto the BART turnstiles, displaying a red, black, and green flag. One shouted:
I’ve got the mentality of my parents who were Black Panthers, I’m tired of talking, I’m thinking like L.A. in 1992. Y’all can have your megaphone speeches, I been through that, I’m black, I don’t need more speeches. Let’s take a stand today, because tomorrow ain’t promised!
While some on the mic attempted to soothe the crowd, insisting that burning up the city was “too easy” and “useless,” the message didn’t seem to resonate much with the crowd. And why should it? We were standing in the middle of “Fruitvale Village,” a corporate paradise in the middle of a historically Latino district, which clearly doesn’t belong to the local residents. It was clear where the momentum was going, as the biggest cheers went up for the more radical voices who seized the mic: “I’m feelin pretty violent right now,” one insisted, “I’m on some Malcolm X shit: by any means necessary. If I don’t see some action, I’ma cause a ruckus myself.”
Oakland Burning
While some remained to hear additional speakers, including hyphy hip-hopper Mistah FAB and the recently-founded Coalition Against Police Executions (CAPE), several hundred set out on a militant and rapidly-moving march north on International Boulevard. The police response was initially hands-off, despite the tenor of the chants: “No Justice, No Peace: Fuck the Police,” and “La Migra, La Policia: La Misma Porqueria.” If those in the passing cars and stuck in traffic were of any indication, the local population knew exactly what was going on, why we were protesting, and were largely sympathetic.
As the march wound around Lake Merritt, it turned sharply to the left, a shortcut to BART headquarters. This seems to have thrown off the police, who were clearly unprepared for what came next. A single police car, parked sideways at 8th and Madison to prevent access to the BART headquarters, became the target of the crowd’s increasing fury. Sensing the tone of the crowd, a cop reached in and grabbed her helmet before scurrying away. Within moments, the police car was destroyed and nearly flipped over, and a nearby dumpster was burning.
A few seconds later, the air was thick with teargas. Evidently, seeing their own property destroyed was too much for the police to stomach. (Note: there is no truth to the CNN report that tear gas was deployed to protect a surrounded officer). I get a noseful of teargas, and a protestor near me is shot in the stomach with a rubber bullet, and needs to be helped off, as the crowd quickly sprints north toward downtown. Passing through Chinatown, dumpsters full of fresh produce are emptied into the street to slow the march of a line of riot police. When the crowd reaches Broadway, there is momentary confusion, with some continuing straight to Old Oakland, some pushing left toward Jack London Square, and others urging a move rightward toward the city center.
The police took advantage of this momentary indecision, with a full line charge that send many of the furious demonstrators sprinting and left many arrested. When the crowd regrouped, it was promptly encircled at 14th and Broadway, and a standoff ensued. Either by design or by a predictable quirk of the police organization, nearly every riot cop in the street was white, some sneering defiantly. And if the crowd of demonstrators was largely multiethnic, it was clear by this point that the functional vanguard was composed largely of the young, black teenagers most acutely aware of their relationship to the police. There were chants of “We are all Oscar Grant!” and several protestors lay in the middle of the street with their hands behind their backs, mimicking the position in which Grant was executed.
Some small fires were set, and the police moved in again, pushing the crowd down 14th toward Lake Merritt. The spearhead of the demonstrators rushed forward to shouts of “We the police today!” smashing and torching vehicles, and while this was done out of anger it was far from irrational, as the press will certainly present it. Rather, it was the result of a very clear line of reasoning that goes something like this: we have to do something, and in the face of police impunity, this is all we can do. Nothing would be more irrational than a blind faith that the police will do the right thing, given all the historical evidence to the contrary. While the press is doing its best to find bystanders to decry the “vandalism” involved, it couldn’t ignore the testimony Oakland Post reporter Ken Epstein, who was writing an article on the killing when he looked out his office window to see his Honda CRV in flames: “I’m sorry my car was burned,” Epstein admitted, “but the issue is very upsetting.”
The crisp wintry air swirled and the lights twinkled along the surface of Lake Merritt as demonstrators demolished a local McDonalds, at which point a line had clearly been crossed: a police armored personnel carrier came tearing down the street at 45 miles per hour, firing rubber bullets and sending the crowd scattering. The scene was surreal, with padded riot cops leaping off the vehicle in an effort to win an impossible footrace with younger and fitter demonstrators.
Dellums Steps In, Steps Out
From the early moments of the demonstration, the position of the mayor, Ron Dellums, was at issue. Here was a mayor with a great deal of popular respect, with longstanding civil rights credentials, but who had done little to slow the pace of police killing, among the other ongoing ills plaguing postindustrial Oakland. With tear gas swirling and the APCs circling, the mayor decided to make his appearance at around 9pm, walking the few blocks from City Hall down to 14th and Jackson to address the angry crowd himself. Several times he attempted to scurry away under hard questions that he could not answer, with the standard responses: we should all take it down a notch; there will be an investigation.
I don’t remember what it was exactly that I yelled at the mayor, but it certainly got to him. As he was leaving the crowd, he turned and walked directly up to me, putting his face a mere inches from my own.
Dellums: What I want people to do now is calm down. I’ve told the police to stand down, and I hope you all can do the same. Both sides need to be peaceful right now so we can find out exactly what happened.
Me: But we know what happened! We’ve all seen the video: A cop pulled his gun and shot an unarmed black man in the back. And you know there are reasons that certain people have guns pulled on them and others don’t.
Dellums: There are two processes currently underway…
Me: The process is if I shoot someone, I’m arrested. But if a cop shoots someone, he gets put on paid administrative leave until everyone forgets about it.
Dellums: I’m asking both sides to be peaceful…
Me: Both sides? I haven’t killed anybody, this crowd hasn’t killed anybody. The police have killed somebody, and you’re in charge of the police! Who runs this city? When will the prisoners be released?
Dellums: Soon…
Dellums then returned to City Hall, surveying the damage. But as he entered, the angry crowd booed thunderously. And despite his claim that the police had been ordered to stand down, clashes broke out immediately on the same block, more fires broke out, and more teargas was deployed. The mayor’s intervention could do little to calm Oakland’s frazzled nerves. His claim that the people have lost faith in the police rings empty for people who never had such faith in the first place, people who have seen vicious police murder after police murder without so much as an indictment.
The demonstrators continued to express their pent-up rage, engaging in running battles until nearly 11pm, when a mass arrest seems to have quelled the resistance for the moment. All in all, official numbers show 105 arrests (including 21 juveniles), more than 80 of which occurred after Dellums claims to have told OPD to stand down. Who knows if his promise of a speedy release means anything at all. Support and solidarity demonstrations are scheduled this week for the prisoners’ arraignments, and with another mass mobilization scheduled for next Wednesday, this is far from over.
Intention as Privilege
As I have said, and at the risk of controversy I will repeat: it doesn’t matter if Mehserle meant to pull the trigger. He had already assumed the role of sole arbiter over the life or death of Oscar Grant. He had already decided that Grant, by virtue of his skin color and appearance, was worth less than other citizens. And rather than acquitting the officer, all of the psychological analyses and possible explanations of the shooting that have been trotted-out in the press, and all the discussion of the irrelevant elements of Grant’s criminal history, have only proven this fundamental point.
If a young black or Latino male pulls a gun and someone winds up dead, intention is never the issue, and first-degree murder charges are on the agenda, as well as likely murder charges for anyone of the wrong color standing nearby. If we reverse the current situation, and the gun is in Oscar Grant’s hand, then racist voices would be squealing for the death penalty regardless of intention. And yet when it’s a cop pulling the trigger, all the media and public opinion resources are deployed to justify, understand, and empathize with this unconscionable act. One side is automatically condemned; the other automatically excused.
For now, the fires are out. But despite the soothing words of Barack Obama and Ron Dellums, there is no lack of fuel and no lack of spark in Oakland.
George Ciccariello-Maher is a Ph.D. candidate in political theory at UC Berkeley. He lives in Oakland, and can be reached at gjcm(at)berkeley.edu.
Saturday, October 4, 2008
Mutual Aid Conference to Include Albuquerque Copwatch
Laugh, Learn, Educate,
More info: fnb_505@yahoo.com foodnotbombsburque.blogspot.com
mutualburqaid.lovarchy.org or mike @ (505) 242-0497
O R G A N I Z E!
Schedule for the conference on building community, rejecting war, and having fun
Sponsored by Food Not Bombs Albuquerque
Friday October 24, 2008
Albuquerque Peace and Justice Center 202 Harvard SE
6:00 p.m. Registration, opening remarks, introductions, and Potluck dinner
7:00 Presentation on Coalition of Immokalee Workers and report back of trip to Immokalee, Florida by Alexandra Smith and Mike Butler
7:45 Open Mic and Open Forum
8:40 clean up
Saturday October 25, 2008
Albuquerque Peace and Justice Center 202 Harvard SE
3:00 p.m. Registration, opening remarks, and introductions
3:15 first workshops/discussion groups
No borders, Fair Trade, Zine Making, Climate Change,
4:00 dinner prep
4:15 second workshops
Copwatch Abq, Nuclearism in New Mexico, The Death Penalty,
5:10 Dinner and discussion groups
Student Labor Coalition, Fair Trade, Zine Making,
6:00 Demilitarize UNM
6:50 Closing
7:30 Social gathering(pajama party) begins at Trinty House: 1925 Five Points Road SE
8:30 showing of Film on Oaxaca Uprising in 2006 @ Trinity House
12:00 Midnight Bike Ride from Trinity House
Sunday October 26, 2008
Food Not Bombs Meal Sharing
Trinity House Catholic Worker 1925 Five Points Road SW
9:00 am Soup prep: cutting veggies, adding spices, etc.
11:00 Fruit salad and tea prep
1:00 p.m. Share Meal at Soldiers and Sailors Park (13th and Central)
2:00 Clean up @ Trinity House
More info: fnb_505@yahoo.com foodnotbombsburque.blogspot.com
mutualburqaid.lovarchy.org or mike @ (505) 242-0497
Wednesday, October 1, 2008
He's 80, She's 69 — and They're Under Arrest
By T.J. Wilham, Copyright © 2008 Albuquerque Journal
Marvin Gladstone is an 80-year-old retired attorney with gray hair and a heart condition. His 69-year-old wife, Patti, is a semiretired accountant and an amputee who uses a prosthetic leg to walk.
Earlier this summer, Marvin Gladstone was considered a "threat" by Albuquerque police. He was handcuffed, arrested, charged and put in the back of a squad car. In a separate altercation with police later that afternoon, his wife was handcuffed, arrested and carted off to jail.
During his arrest, Marvin Gladstone suffered a heart attack and had to be rushed to the hospital, his attorneys say.
Patti Gladstone was arrested at the hospital after police apparently thought she was trying to break her husband out of custody when she rolled him away from officers in a wheelchair — although she said she was just looking for a place to sit.
When police tried to book Patti Gladstone into jail, her blood pressure was so high that the medical staff at the Metropolitan Detention Center wouldn't take her.
The couple's alleged crimes? Assaulting an officer, refusing to obey an officer, disorderly conduct and cruelty to an animal.
While they await court dates on the various criminal charges, they are considering filing a lawsuit against the Albuquerque Police Department.
APD officials say the officer, Lena Deyapp, acted appropriately and did everything she could to avoid cuffing the Gladstones but was left with no option because they continually assaulted her.
"Mr. and Mrs. Gladstone felt they were above the law and could do whatever they pleased," police spokesman John Walsh said. "The last thing our officer wanted was to take them into custody, but they chose to escalate the situation, act the way they did and, quite frankly, they should have known better."
Dog in an SUV
The encounter occurred June 18 at a Foothills supermarket. According to attorney Mary Han, Patti Gladstone went inside to shop while Marvin Gladstone stayed in the couple's sport utility vehicle with the family dog, a large mixed breed.
After several minutes, the dog's water was running low, and Marvin Gladstone went into the store to get more, Han said. He left the windows cracked and shut off the engine.
How long the Gladstones left the dog unattended and how hot it was in the car are in dispute.
Han claims that it was still cool inside the vehicle; a city vet says that, based on outside temperatures and what is usually safe, he believes that the animal was in danger of dying. It was about 2 p.m and police dispatchers noted the temperature as 94 degrees.
After Marvin Gladstone left the vehicle, someone called 911 and reported that the dog was panting, in distress and that the windows were "slightly" cracked, police say.
Han said Gladstone was only gone about 10 minutes, but, according to dispatch reports, it took 19 minutes for an APD officer to get to the vehicle.
APD officials said the officer couldn't find the vehicle's owners, tried to have them paged inside the store and made contact with them 32 minutes after the 911 call — about 13 minutes after she arrived at the scene.
Han says the Gladstones' veterinarian will testify that they are "very responsible" pet owners.
"The dog was within minutes of being dead," said Craig J. Mabray, chief of veterinary services for the Albuquerque Animal Welfare Department, who didn't examine the pet, which was ultimately allowed to return with the Gladstones. He based his comments on a formula for how long animals can safely be in an enclosed area at a certain temperature. "This dog was in trouble."
The city has been cracking down on people who leave pets unattended in vehicles, and police have made such calls from citizens a top priority. Under city law, it's illegal to leave an animal or child in an enclosed vehicle for a period of time that could result in danger.
Patti Gladstone told police that they had been gone 10 minutes.
When the officer went back to her squad car to wait for animal control officers, Marvin Gladstone approached her and said, "How long is this going to take? We have stuff to do," according to APD reports.
Deyapp told him that animal control was on its way and to get back in his SUV. For "officer safety reasons," Deyapp walked him back to his vehicle, where his wife also told the officer that the couple had things to do, including a doctor's appointment. The dog remained in the car with the Gladstones with the air conditioning on.
Marvin Gladstone approached the officer again a short time later. This time, the conversation escalated.
Police order
Marvin Gladstone asked the officer, "Is there anything I can do to expedite the situation?" according to police reports.
Deyapp replied, "No sir, and I am giving you an order to stay inside your vehicle."
Police say Marvin Gladstone became irate, began to yell and told Deyapp that she was a disgrace to the police department. He was a few inches from her and pointed at her face.
Deyapp wrote in her report that she took a step back because she was in "immediate fear of battery."
Deyapp said Marvin Gladstone said, at one point, that he wanted to go to jail.
Police reports don't make it clear how long it took for an animal control officer to arrive. When the officer arrived, it was determined that the dog was OK. But the officer cited Patti Gladstone, who was driving the vehicle, for cruelty to an animal.
APD officials said city ordinance requires that dogs left unattended in a car must have an opening large enough for the dog to get its head out.
After the citation, police say Marvin Gladstone got out of his vehicle again, approached Deyapp in an "aggressive manner" and asked for her name and badge number.
Deyapp says she provided the information, then placed him under arrest for refusing to obey because he didn't stay inside his vehicle.
"Our officer was placed in a position where she had to take action because of his irresponsible acts," Walsh said.
While sitting cuffed in the back of a police car, Marvin Gladstone, who has had triple bypass surgery, started to have chest pains. An ambulance took him to the hospital, where he was treated for a heart attack, Han said. A doctor's note showed that he had suffered a mild heart attack.
Han said officers refused to let Gladstone take nitroglycerin tablets, which she said might have prevented the attack.
Patti Gladstone took the dog home and met her husband at the hospital. Three officers also showed up.
'Out of control'
While there, police say they told Patti Gladstone that her husband couldn't leave their custody.
A surveillance video of the emergency room waiting area shows her pushing her husband's wheelchair away from the group of officers. It appears she was looking for a seat.
The officers didn't appear to be concerned at first. Suddenly, all three approached her, forced her away from the wheelchair and rushed her outside.
Han says Patti Gladstone was thrown against a wall, cuffed and arrested for acting disorderly. She was taken to the county jail, where staff refused to book her.
According to Deyapp's report, Patti Gladstone was told that she couldn't move away from the officers, refused to return when ordered and insisted she needed to sit down.
When the officers grabbed the wheelchair, she shouted at them, "No, you will not." Police say she wouldn't let go of the wheelchair.
Marvin Gladstone wasn't booked but was given a summons to appear in court. He was treated and released several hours later. He has been charged with refusing to obey a lawful order and assault upon a peace officer.
Police also settled on giving Patti Gladstone a summons after jail staff refused to book her. She has been charged with refusing to obey an officer, cruelty to an animal and disorderly conduct.
"APD is out of control," Han said. "Imagine that this was your mom or your father. It's pretty outrageous, isn't it?
"One person is an artist, a grandmother of seven, and the other is a retired lawyer. These are people who believe in the system."
Marvin Gladstone is an 80-year-old retired attorney with gray hair and a heart condition. His 69-year-old wife, Patti, is a semiretired accountant and an amputee who uses a prosthetic leg to walk.
Earlier this summer, Marvin Gladstone was considered a "threat" by Albuquerque police. He was handcuffed, arrested, charged and put in the back of a squad car. In a separate altercation with police later that afternoon, his wife was handcuffed, arrested and carted off to jail.
During his arrest, Marvin Gladstone suffered a heart attack and had to be rushed to the hospital, his attorneys say.
Patti Gladstone was arrested at the hospital after police apparently thought she was trying to break her husband out of custody when she rolled him away from officers in a wheelchair — although she said she was just looking for a place to sit.
When police tried to book Patti Gladstone into jail, her blood pressure was so high that the medical staff at the Metropolitan Detention Center wouldn't take her.
The couple's alleged crimes? Assaulting an officer, refusing to obey an officer, disorderly conduct and cruelty to an animal.
While they await court dates on the various criminal charges, they are considering filing a lawsuit against the Albuquerque Police Department.
APD officials say the officer, Lena Deyapp, acted appropriately and did everything she could to avoid cuffing the Gladstones but was left with no option because they continually assaulted her.
"Mr. and Mrs. Gladstone felt they were above the law and could do whatever they pleased," police spokesman John Walsh said. "The last thing our officer wanted was to take them into custody, but they chose to escalate the situation, act the way they did and, quite frankly, they should have known better."
Dog in an SUV
The encounter occurred June 18 at a Foothills supermarket. According to attorney Mary Han, Patti Gladstone went inside to shop while Marvin Gladstone stayed in the couple's sport utility vehicle with the family dog, a large mixed breed.
After several minutes, the dog's water was running low, and Marvin Gladstone went into the store to get more, Han said. He left the windows cracked and shut off the engine.
How long the Gladstones left the dog unattended and how hot it was in the car are in dispute.
Han claims that it was still cool inside the vehicle; a city vet says that, based on outside temperatures and what is usually safe, he believes that the animal was in danger of dying. It was about 2 p.m and police dispatchers noted the temperature as 94 degrees.
After Marvin Gladstone left the vehicle, someone called 911 and reported that the dog was panting, in distress and that the windows were "slightly" cracked, police say.
Han said Gladstone was only gone about 10 minutes, but, according to dispatch reports, it took 19 minutes for an APD officer to get to the vehicle.
APD officials said the officer couldn't find the vehicle's owners, tried to have them paged inside the store and made contact with them 32 minutes after the 911 call — about 13 minutes after she arrived at the scene.
Han says the Gladstones' veterinarian will testify that they are "very responsible" pet owners.
"The dog was within minutes of being dead," said Craig J. Mabray, chief of veterinary services for the Albuquerque Animal Welfare Department, who didn't examine the pet, which was ultimately allowed to return with the Gladstones. He based his comments on a formula for how long animals can safely be in an enclosed area at a certain temperature. "This dog was in trouble."
The city has been cracking down on people who leave pets unattended in vehicles, and police have made such calls from citizens a top priority. Under city law, it's illegal to leave an animal or child in an enclosed vehicle for a period of time that could result in danger.
Patti Gladstone told police that they had been gone 10 minutes.
When the officer went back to her squad car to wait for animal control officers, Marvin Gladstone approached her and said, "How long is this going to take? We have stuff to do," according to APD reports.
Deyapp told him that animal control was on its way and to get back in his SUV. For "officer safety reasons," Deyapp walked him back to his vehicle, where his wife also told the officer that the couple had things to do, including a doctor's appointment. The dog remained in the car with the Gladstones with the air conditioning on.
Marvin Gladstone approached the officer again a short time later. This time, the conversation escalated.
Police order
Marvin Gladstone asked the officer, "Is there anything I can do to expedite the situation?" according to police reports.
Deyapp replied, "No sir, and I am giving you an order to stay inside your vehicle."
Police say Marvin Gladstone became irate, began to yell and told Deyapp that she was a disgrace to the police department. He was a few inches from her and pointed at her face.
Deyapp wrote in her report that she took a step back because she was in "immediate fear of battery."
Deyapp said Marvin Gladstone said, at one point, that he wanted to go to jail.
Police reports don't make it clear how long it took for an animal control officer to arrive. When the officer arrived, it was determined that the dog was OK. But the officer cited Patti Gladstone, who was driving the vehicle, for cruelty to an animal.
APD officials said city ordinance requires that dogs left unattended in a car must have an opening large enough for the dog to get its head out.
After the citation, police say Marvin Gladstone got out of his vehicle again, approached Deyapp in an "aggressive manner" and asked for her name and badge number.
Deyapp says she provided the information, then placed him under arrest for refusing to obey because he didn't stay inside his vehicle.
"Our officer was placed in a position where she had to take action because of his irresponsible acts," Walsh said.
While sitting cuffed in the back of a police car, Marvin Gladstone, who has had triple bypass surgery, started to have chest pains. An ambulance took him to the hospital, where he was treated for a heart attack, Han said. A doctor's note showed that he had suffered a mild heart attack.
Han said officers refused to let Gladstone take nitroglycerin tablets, which she said might have prevented the attack.
Patti Gladstone took the dog home and met her husband at the hospital. Three officers also showed up.
'Out of control'
While there, police say they told Patti Gladstone that her husband couldn't leave their custody.
A surveillance video of the emergency room waiting area shows her pushing her husband's wheelchair away from the group of officers. It appears she was looking for a seat.
The officers didn't appear to be concerned at first. Suddenly, all three approached her, forced her away from the wheelchair and rushed her outside.
Han says Patti Gladstone was thrown against a wall, cuffed and arrested for acting disorderly. She was taken to the county jail, where staff refused to book her.
According to Deyapp's report, Patti Gladstone was told that she couldn't move away from the officers, refused to return when ordered and insisted she needed to sit down.
When the officers grabbed the wheelchair, she shouted at them, "No, you will not." Police say she wouldn't let go of the wheelchair.
Marvin Gladstone wasn't booked but was given a summons to appear in court. He was treated and released several hours later. He has been charged with refusing to obey a lawful order and assault upon a peace officer.
Police also settled on giving Patti Gladstone a summons after jail staff refused to book her. She has been charged with refusing to obey an officer, cruelty to an animal and disorderly conduct.
"APD is out of control," Han said. "Imagine that this was your mom or your father. It's pretty outrageous, isn't it?
"One person is an artist, a grandmother of seven, and the other is a retired lawyer. These are people who believe in the system."
Friday, September 26, 2008
When Officers Go Too Far
By Joline Gutierrez Krueger, Journal Staff Writer
It was the second time in the dead of that cold autumn night that Angela Saiz woke her husband, Mark, because somebody was pounding on their door.
The first time, it was urgent knocking, but no one was there.
This time, it sounded like someone kicking in the front door, determined to break in.
Twice in the last three months, thieves had broken into the insurance office of Mark Saiz's father, which is adjacent to their home on Sarah NW. Maybe, they thought, the thieves had returned.
Maybe it was juvenile thugs roaming the North Valley.
Maybe it was worse.
Mark Saiz, clad in T-shirt and boxers, grabbed his 12-gauge shotgun from the closet. Through a window, he saw movement in the darkness outside, the black blur of intruders scurrying behind the garage.
He opened the door, fired a warning blast of birdshot into the sky and shouted for the intruders to go away.
"I was so scared, very scared," Angela Saiz says.
But what the Saizes say happened next that October 2006 night was scarier still.
For the next three hours, Mark Saiz says the intruders humiliated, intimidated and emasculated him. He contends he was handcuffed and forced to the ground, punched twice in the face while restrained. He was called a "vigilante son of a bitch" and other angry vulgarities. He was pulled barefoot across his graveled yard. His shoulder was dislocated.
Worst of all, Saiz, 49, says he was helpless to protect his family and property.
All the while, he had no idea what the intruders wanted.
Then Saiz, a gentle and proud man who had never incurred more than a traffic offense, was tossed into the Metropolitan Detention Center on four felony counts of aggravated assault against a peace officer.
Yup. The four intruders that surreal night were Bernalillo County sheriff's deputies.
This week in a federal courtroom in Albuquerque, Saiz and the deputies squared off in the latest legal battle over whether homeowners have the right to protect their domiciles even if it means pulling the trigger — and even if the invaders are law enforcement agents.
Saiz's federal lawsuit accuses three deputies (one deputy, Chris Romero, was dismissed from the case at the end of trial) of violating his civil rights by their use of unreasonable and excessive force.
The deputies, including the alleged potty-mouthed pugilist, are also accused of battery.
Saiz testified that the deputies had not identified themselves as law enforcement agents. There had been no squad cars visible, no lights or sirens.
Once he knew, however, Saiz says he complied with all their commands.
It didn't matter. He had already incurred the wrath normally reserved for cop killers, baby rapers and defense attorneys.
"It's not enough I have to be worried about the criminals out there, I have to be worried about being shot by you!" one deputy shouts in a recording from a deputy's belt tape.
Deputies David Priemazon and Jason Foster and then-trainee Matthew Ray blamed their agitated moods on their own fears that night.
"I was very angered, very upset and very scared," Priemazon, the deputy accused of punching Saiz, testified. "I was almost shot."
Priemazon, who cops to the vulgar diatribe, says he had seen the glint of Saiz's glasses in the dark house and the shotgun barrel aimed straight at Romero's head.
The deputies ran for cover, but Priemazon was trapped by the "fatal funnel" of a walled courtyard with no defensive cover. He swears the gunfire came so close to his right shoulder that he had initially believed he was hit.
But no small projectiles found in the birdshot slug — the same stuff Dick Cheney fired in the face of his hunting buddy — were recovered from the walls where Priemazon had cowered, as one might have expected had Saiz aimed at him and not the air.
Maybe that's why a grand jury refused to indict Saiz on the felony assault charges but merely for negligent use of a deadly weapon, a petty misdemeanor.
That charge evaporated, too, when the District Attorney's Office asked to dismiss the case "for the reason that after reviewing the evidence the state believes that it is not in the state's best interest to pursue the indicted charge."
Priemazon, now a violent crimes detective, denied the punches. Ray, so terrified that he considered quitting the force, denied dislocating Saiz's arm. Lt. Jason Katz, the deputies' supervisor that night, denied telling the Saiz family that what had happened had been one big misunderstanding.
You remember Katz, who two months before the Saiz incident was one of three deputies accused of plucking Al Unser Sr. from his vehicle and tossing him face-first into a patch of goatheads during another one of those big misunderstandings.
What happened at the Saiz home had not been a misunderstanding but a mistake from the start, launched as a welfare check on a possible domestic violence victim who had made a 911 call on a cell phone that abruptly ended.
The phone number had been traced to Sarah NW, but, oops, she didn't live there anymore.
On Thursday, after just 1 1/2 hours of deliberation, jurors sided with the deputies, apparently convinced that whatever brutality had been rained on the Saizes that night was part of the job.
No death, no foul, no money.
The job of a law enforcement officer is dangerous and tough, and we've attended too many funerals for too many men and woman killed in the line of duty to think otherwise.
But when justified caution gives way to the unbridled bravado of the badge, especially in the sanctity of our own homes, it harms not just the public but the image of those who truly protect and serve without provoking and savaging.
You can reach Joline at 823-3603 or jkrueger@abqjournal.com.
It was the second time in the dead of that cold autumn night that Angela Saiz woke her husband, Mark, because somebody was pounding on their door.
The first time, it was urgent knocking, but no one was there.
This time, it sounded like someone kicking in the front door, determined to break in.
Twice in the last three months, thieves had broken into the insurance office of Mark Saiz's father, which is adjacent to their home on Sarah NW. Maybe, they thought, the thieves had returned.
Maybe it was juvenile thugs roaming the North Valley.
Maybe it was worse.
Mark Saiz, clad in T-shirt and boxers, grabbed his 12-gauge shotgun from the closet. Through a window, he saw movement in the darkness outside, the black blur of intruders scurrying behind the garage.
He opened the door, fired a warning blast of birdshot into the sky and shouted for the intruders to go away.
"I was so scared, very scared," Angela Saiz says.
But what the Saizes say happened next that October 2006 night was scarier still.
For the next three hours, Mark Saiz says the intruders humiliated, intimidated and emasculated him. He contends he was handcuffed and forced to the ground, punched twice in the face while restrained. He was called a "vigilante son of a bitch" and other angry vulgarities. He was pulled barefoot across his graveled yard. His shoulder was dislocated.
Worst of all, Saiz, 49, says he was helpless to protect his family and property.
All the while, he had no idea what the intruders wanted.
Then Saiz, a gentle and proud man who had never incurred more than a traffic offense, was tossed into the Metropolitan Detention Center on four felony counts of aggravated assault against a peace officer.
Yup. The four intruders that surreal night were Bernalillo County sheriff's deputies.
This week in a federal courtroom in Albuquerque, Saiz and the deputies squared off in the latest legal battle over whether homeowners have the right to protect their domiciles even if it means pulling the trigger — and even if the invaders are law enforcement agents.
Saiz's federal lawsuit accuses three deputies (one deputy, Chris Romero, was dismissed from the case at the end of trial) of violating his civil rights by their use of unreasonable and excessive force.
The deputies, including the alleged potty-mouthed pugilist, are also accused of battery.
Saiz testified that the deputies had not identified themselves as law enforcement agents. There had been no squad cars visible, no lights or sirens.
Once he knew, however, Saiz says he complied with all their commands.
It didn't matter. He had already incurred the wrath normally reserved for cop killers, baby rapers and defense attorneys.
"It's not enough I have to be worried about the criminals out there, I have to be worried about being shot by you!" one deputy shouts in a recording from a deputy's belt tape.
Deputies David Priemazon and Jason Foster and then-trainee Matthew Ray blamed their agitated moods on their own fears that night.
"I was very angered, very upset and very scared," Priemazon, the deputy accused of punching Saiz, testified. "I was almost shot."
Priemazon, who cops to the vulgar diatribe, says he had seen the glint of Saiz's glasses in the dark house and the shotgun barrel aimed straight at Romero's head.
The deputies ran for cover, but Priemazon was trapped by the "fatal funnel" of a walled courtyard with no defensive cover. He swears the gunfire came so close to his right shoulder that he had initially believed he was hit.
But no small projectiles found in the birdshot slug — the same stuff Dick Cheney fired in the face of his hunting buddy — were recovered from the walls where Priemazon had cowered, as one might have expected had Saiz aimed at him and not the air.
Maybe that's why a grand jury refused to indict Saiz on the felony assault charges but merely for negligent use of a deadly weapon, a petty misdemeanor.
That charge evaporated, too, when the District Attorney's Office asked to dismiss the case "for the reason that after reviewing the evidence the state believes that it is not in the state's best interest to pursue the indicted charge."
Priemazon, now a violent crimes detective, denied the punches. Ray, so terrified that he considered quitting the force, denied dislocating Saiz's arm. Lt. Jason Katz, the deputies' supervisor that night, denied telling the Saiz family that what had happened had been one big misunderstanding.
You remember Katz, who two months before the Saiz incident was one of three deputies accused of plucking Al Unser Sr. from his vehicle and tossing him face-first into a patch of goatheads during another one of those big misunderstandings.
What happened at the Saiz home had not been a misunderstanding but a mistake from the start, launched as a welfare check on a possible domestic violence victim who had made a 911 call on a cell phone that abruptly ended.
The phone number had been traced to Sarah NW, but, oops, she didn't live there anymore.
On Thursday, after just 1 1/2 hours of deliberation, jurors sided with the deputies, apparently convinced that whatever brutality had been rained on the Saizes that night was part of the job.
No death, no foul, no money.
The job of a law enforcement officer is dangerous and tough, and we've attended too many funerals for too many men and woman killed in the line of duty to think otherwise.
But when justified caution gives way to the unbridled bravado of the badge, especially in the sanctity of our own homes, it harms not just the public but the image of those who truly protect and serve without provoking and savaging.
You can reach Joline at 823-3603 or jkrueger@abqjournal.com.
Thursday, July 31, 2008
Man Shot by Officers Critical
By Hailey Heinz, Journal Staff Writer
A man who initially called authorities to his home complaining of chest pain was in critical condition Wednesday after he refused treatment, said he had a gun, and was shot by officers.
Fire officials were called to the man's home on the 9700 block of Mesa Arriba NE and told the man they wanted to take him to the hospital for treatment, Albuquerque police spokeswoman Nadine Hamby said. The man, who police said is in his 30s, then became agitated and told them he had a weapon.
Firefighters withdrew and called police, who arrived at the home and got the man's family out of the house. The man also left the house, and police saw that he had a handgun, Hamby said. She said the man ignored police commands and appeared to be walking toward a neighbor's house when the officers shot him. It was unclear Wednesday whether all three officers fired or who hit him, but all were considered "involved," Hamby said.
The three have been placed on paid administrative leave while the department investigates the incident.
The man was taken to University of New Mexico Hospital with gunshot wounds, where he was in critical condition Wednesday night. Hamby declined to say whether police had previously been called to the house or whether the man had a criminal record. She also declined to say whether the man drew his gun or whether officers were armed with less-lethal weapons such as rubber bullets or stun guns.
Bryan Andrada, a neighbor, was riding his bicycle past the man's home when the shooting happened about 6 p.m. Andrada said he had seen police cars in the neighborhood and went to get a closer look when an officer with a drawn gun warned him not to get any closer. He said he couldn't hear the words between the officers and the victim but saw police shoot and watched the man fall. He said five shots were fired.
"To see somebody just go limp like that, it's pretty disturbing," he said. Andrada said he didn't see the man draw his gun or point it at officers.
Neighbors clustered near the shooting scene said the neighborhood is usually quiet, and even close neighbors said they didn't know the victim, who was a renter.
"It's such a quiet neighborhood," said Karen Armstrong, who has lived there for 14 years. "We put in speed bumps because speeders were our biggest concern."
A man who initially called authorities to his home complaining of chest pain was in critical condition Wednesday after he refused treatment, said he had a gun, and was shot by officers.
Fire officials were called to the man's home on the 9700 block of Mesa Arriba NE and told the man they wanted to take him to the hospital for treatment, Albuquerque police spokeswoman Nadine Hamby said. The man, who police said is in his 30s, then became agitated and told them he had a weapon.
Firefighters withdrew and called police, who arrived at the home and got the man's family out of the house. The man also left the house, and police saw that he had a handgun, Hamby said. She said the man ignored police commands and appeared to be walking toward a neighbor's house when the officers shot him. It was unclear Wednesday whether all three officers fired or who hit him, but all were considered "involved," Hamby said.
The three have been placed on paid administrative leave while the department investigates the incident.
The man was taken to University of New Mexico Hospital with gunshot wounds, where he was in critical condition Wednesday night. Hamby declined to say whether police had previously been called to the house or whether the man had a criminal record. She also declined to say whether the man drew his gun or whether officers were armed with less-lethal weapons such as rubber bullets or stun guns.
Bryan Andrada, a neighbor, was riding his bicycle past the man's home when the shooting happened about 6 p.m. Andrada said he had seen police cars in the neighborhood and went to get a closer look when an officer with a drawn gun warned him not to get any closer. He said he couldn't hear the words between the officers and the victim but saw police shoot and watched the man fall. He said five shots were fired.
"To see somebody just go limp like that, it's pretty disturbing," he said. Andrada said he didn't see the man draw his gun or point it at officers.
Neighbors clustered near the shooting scene said the neighborhood is usually quiet, and even close neighbors said they didn't know the victim, who was a renter.
"It's such a quiet neighborhood," said Karen Armstrong, who has lived there for 14 years. "We put in speed bumps because speeders were our biggest concern."
Wednesday, July 30, 2008
Court: Police Not Entitled To Immunity
Associated Press
The 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver has upheld a lower court's ruling that Albuquerque police officers are not entitled to qualified immunity on claims they retaliated against protesters at an anti-war rally.
More than a dozen people who participated in the University of New Mexico campus rally in March 2003 sued the city of Albuquerque, Mayor Martin Chávez and several Albuquerque police officers, claiming their First Amendment rights to freedom of expression and assembly were violated.
The protest drew between 500 and 1,000 people, who spilled onto city sidewalks and the crosswalks of adjacent streets.
The Albuquerque Police Department claimed protesters were blocking traffic and began tossing canisters of tear gas and using pepper spray after protesters failed repeated warnings to clear the streets.
Several protesters were arrested.
A U.S. District Court dismissed most of the plaintiffs' claims against the officers, but analyzed their First Amendment claims of retaliation and determined the officers were not entitled to qualified immunity on the claim.
The court determined there was "no question" that protesting a war is a constitutionally protected activity and the use of tear gas, pepper spray and physical force to disperse plaintiffs and protesters "could have chilled a person of ordinary firmness from continuing to participate in the demonstration."
The officers conceded that the use of tear gas and pepper spray affected certain plaintiffs but said their actions, even "assuming an improper motive," could not have affected plaintiffs who did not witness the officers' actions.
The officers argued on appeal that, because the plaintiffs knew of the officers' aggressive actions at places along the route, "these plaintiffs were thus chilled." The officers contended they were entitled to qualified immunity with respect to those who did not witness or were not affected by their actions.
The appellate court, based in Denver, rejected the officers' arguments because they were not brought before the lower court. City Attorney Bob White said Monday he had not seen the ruling. "We'll have to review the decision and decide how we proceed in the case from here," he said.
The 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver has upheld a lower court's ruling that Albuquerque police officers are not entitled to qualified immunity on claims they retaliated against protesters at an anti-war rally.
More than a dozen people who participated in the University of New Mexico campus rally in March 2003 sued the city of Albuquerque, Mayor Martin Chávez and several Albuquerque police officers, claiming their First Amendment rights to freedom of expression and assembly were violated.
The protest drew between 500 and 1,000 people, who spilled onto city sidewalks and the crosswalks of adjacent streets.
The Albuquerque Police Department claimed protesters were blocking traffic and began tossing canisters of tear gas and using pepper spray after protesters failed repeated warnings to clear the streets.
Several protesters were arrested.
A U.S. District Court dismissed most of the plaintiffs' claims against the officers, but analyzed their First Amendment claims of retaliation and determined the officers were not entitled to qualified immunity on the claim.
The court determined there was "no question" that protesting a war is a constitutionally protected activity and the use of tear gas, pepper spray and physical force to disperse plaintiffs and protesters "could have chilled a person of ordinary firmness from continuing to participate in the demonstration."
The officers conceded that the use of tear gas and pepper spray affected certain plaintiffs but said their actions, even "assuming an improper motive," could not have affected plaintiffs who did not witness the officers' actions.
The officers argued on appeal that, because the plaintiffs knew of the officers' aggressive actions at places along the route, "these plaintiffs were thus chilled." The officers contended they were entitled to qualified immunity with respect to those who did not witness or were not affected by their actions.
The appellate court, based in Denver, rejected the officers' arguments because they were not brought before the lower court. City Attorney Bob White said Monday he had not seen the ruling. "We'll have to review the decision and decide how we proceed in the case from here," he said.
Saturday, July 26, 2008
Anabolic Steroid Use and Abuse by Police Officers: Policy & Prevention
By Commander Kim R. Humphrey, Professional Standards Bureau, Phoenix, Arizona, Police Department; Kathleen P. Decker, M.D., U.S. Air Force; Linn Goldberg, M.D., Oregon Health and Science University, Portland, Oregon; Harrison G. Pope Jr., M.D., Harvard Medical School; Joseph Gutman, M.D., Practicing Endocrinologist,Tempe, Arizona; and Gary Green, M.D., University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA)
from Police Chief Magazine:
http://policechiefmagazine.org/magazine/index.cfm?fuseaction=display&article_id=1512&issue_id=62008
Although physical fitness is an essential part of policing, as described in the previous article, some officers go too far to ensure their strength—endangering not only themselves but also the public they are sworn to defend.
officer crashes a police car and seriously injures an innocent bystander. The investigation reveals that the officer was acting erratically, had bloodshot eyes, and slurred his speech. The officer’s supervisor is called, and the decision is made to test for alcohol consumption. The test results determine that the officer was in fact intoxicated. Disciplinary action is taken, resulting in the officer’s termination for drinking alcohol while driving on duty. Though exposed to liability, the department recognizes the dangers of alcohol abuse and appropriately responds when a dangerous situation presents itself. Another officer, involved in several shootings and use-of-force incidents, garners significant attention within his agency and the media. Investigations reveal that the unrelated incidents were questionable but lawful and, according to the officer, justified based on perceived threats. The agency’s use-of-force review reluctantly finds the officer within policy but awaits the next incident. How many police leaders would recognize that this of ficer could have a problem similar to the one in the first example? If the officer’s appearance indicated he was exceptionally muscular, would they consider the possible abuse of anabolic steroids? What would prompt them to believe that excessive use of force could be associated with “’roid rage,” a hyperaggressive, violent state of mind supposedly brought on by steroid use? When and how would they confirm that their suspicions are true? What if a defense or civil attorney proposed that an officer was a steroid abuser based on the officer’s appearance and witnessed behaviors? Compared with alcohol and other illicit drugs, anabolic steroids (also known as anabolic-androgenic steroids, or AASs) are not easily detected. Supervisors typically are trained to look for inappropriate behaviors that might justify a “just cause” drug screen; however, with AASs the behaviors and other indicators might not be as easily recognized. Recently, accounts of major league baseball’s steroid era have come to light, Olympic athletes have admitted use, and many other major sporting icons have been stripped of their titles after being caught using performance-enhancing drugs such as AASs and human growth hormone (HGH). Unfortunately, growing evidence suggests a similar abuse of AASs and other performance-enhancing drugs by law enforcement professionals. Across the United States, several investigations associated with Internet pharmacies and “antiaging” clinics in association with unscrupulous physicians have revealed officers caught up in this web of illicit drug use. Although the traditional reason for the use of AASs is to improve athletic performance, AASs also appeal to officers wanting a tactical edge or an intimidating appearance. Unlike with other forms of drug abuse, steroid users do not take their drug recreationally; on the contrary, some state they need these drugs in order to do their job effectively or improve their “job performance.” From street officers who consider themselves vulnerable to bigger, more aggressive criminals to special-assignment officers who are regularly tested for their physical abilities, officers are turning to performance-enhancing drugs such as AASs and HGH as a shortcut to improved performance. This article will not delve into the abuse of HGH, which is not a controlled substance but is obtained by prescription only and has very limited use—none for normal adults. In addition to the normal health concerns, there is one further issue when discussing abuse of steroids by those in the law enforcement profession. Officers carry weapons, are authorized to use lethal force, and are often involved in physically controlling or restraining people. If the stories of ’roid rage are true, how often are the officers who use anabolic steroids involved in unnecessary use-offorce incidents that could become a major liability for their agencies? Considering the legal issues, health effects, and commensurate costs associated with inappropriate use, agencies should proactiv ly address this issue. Rather than look back on what could be an embarrassing “steroid era” of law enforcement—one in which the profession might be riddled with lawsuits, corruption, and claims of heavy-handedness—it is critical to address the current and future impact of this issue head-on. Over the past few decades, several stories have surfaced regarding law enforcement personnel involved with anabolic steroids. The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) recently led Operation Raw Deal, considered the largest international steroid investigation to date. The operation discovered several links to current or former law enforcement officers. This was predicted almost 20 years ago by an article in the FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin that stated, “Anabolic steroid abuse by police officers is a serious problem that merits greater awareness by departments across the country.”1 In addition, a story on the television program 60 Minutes in 1989 titled “Beefing up the Force” featured three police officers who admitted steroid use and claimed that their resulting aggression got them in serious trouble. In the past year, a book titled Falling Off the Thin Blue Line was written and published by former Texas police officer David Johnson, who describes his addiction to steroids and speaks about the prevalence of steroid abuse in the law enforcement community.2 Recently, investigations into illegal steroid purchases revealed the names of several officers on pharmacy distribution lists, garnering national media attention. Unfortunately, agencies looking for methods to confront steroid abuse find few examples of effective policies and practices. This article summarizes the Phoenix, Arizona, Police Department’s experience in this area over the past several years and suggests policy and testing considerations for anabolic steroids in the law enforcement community. Problems with Testing In 2005, the Phoenix Police Department (PPD) investigated several incidents either directly or indirectly involving officers accused of abusing anabolic steroids. As a result, the city formed a committee to determine policy changes and address the issue with public safety agencies (that is, police and fire departments) as well as all other city employees. Due to the demands of the law enforcement profession and the legal precedent supporting random drug testing, policies are naturally more stringent for police than for other city departments. The police department, with support from its labor organization, added anabolic steroids to the random testing process for all officers and the preemployment screen. Research is clear that significant health risks result from nontherapeutic uses of anabolic steroids. 3 For this reason, the PPD’s focus on prevention revolved around a prevention video with questions and answers from a local endocrinologist who specializes in steroid abuse treatment. Regarding testing, the task seemed simple enough: contact a local laboratory and test officers for performance-enhancing substances. However, implementation proved less than simple. First, adding AASs to the PPD’s random test tripled its drug testing costs. Additionally, local laboratories were able to provide only an initial urine screen that tested for a handful of the growing number of AASs. Furthermore, compounding the difficulty of the task, testing for anabolic steroids goes beyond looking for the specific synthetic AAS; it also needs to detect compounds naturally created by the human body, such as testosterone. This entails an analysis of an individual’s ratio of testosterone to epitestosterone (abbreviated T/E); when this value is found to be out of normal range, it may indicate the use of illegal substances. Additionally, as noted previously, HGH does not fall under the Anabolic Steroid Control Act, and currently there is no reliable test to detect it in the human body. Testing for performance-enhancing substances presents a myriad of challenges:
How can an agency test for “all” illegal AASs, and what does it do if a T/E ratio is not normal?
How can an agency prove that someone is illegally or inappropriately using anabolic steroids?
What if an officer who tests positive provides a prescription, and the prescribing physician indicates that the officer has a condition that necessitates the use of these drugs? Additionally, what constitutes abuse of prescribed drugs?
Do ’roid rage and other psychiatric disturbances claimed to result from steroid abuse actually exist, and do they present a liability to an abuser’s organization? Jumping into a testing policy before answering these questions will lead agencies to the realization that testing for these substances is not as straightforward as, say, discovering heroin in a drug screen. Officers might present a prescription or might have ordered something over the Internet in what they believe is a legal transaction. The DEA works regularly to shut down numerous unscrupulous doctors who seek to make money by connecting with pharmacies and engaging in illegal distribution, using the few very specific legitimate uses for AASs as cover for their operation. In these cases, ignorance is a common excuse from officers, who typically state that a doctor prescribed the drug, so it must be “okay.”
Illicit “Benefits” of AASs AASs can be taken orally, by injection, as a skin patch or cream, or sometimes by placing them between the cheek and gum. When combined with a high-protein diet and vigorous weightlifting, AASs “work.” That means that they stimulate the formation of muscle tissue and are known to cause enlargement of muscle fibers. It is widely understood that testosterone (the major natural male AAS hormone in normal, healthy men) stimulates an increase in fat-free muscle mass while at the same time decreasing fat. Doses of AASs that exceed the normal production rate of testosterone can amplify this effect, resulting in supernormal gains in lean muscle mass and strength.
Patterns of Illegitimate Use
Many users reported taking a weekly dose in excess of (the equivalent of) 1,000 mg of testosterone. For comparison, adult human testicles normally produce 5–10 mg of testosterone per day—generally less than 100 mg/week.
Most AAS users reported self-administering by injecting the drug directly into their muscles.
Some studies reveal that approximately 25 percent of those who inject AASs share needles or vials, increasing the risk of HIV infection, viral hepatitis, or other infections.
Over 95 percent of AAS users reported self-administering multiple substances, with 25 percent taking growth hormone and/or insulin in addition to AASs.
Users have been found to move on to illegal drugs other than athletic performance enhancers.
Nearly 100 percent of AAS users reported noticeable side effects—but most users claim that these effects are mild and do not deter them from continuing to use AASs.
Users often become fixated on their muscularity and are reluctant to stop using AASs for fear that they will get smaller again.
General Medical Effects of Use
Decreased sperm production
Abscess at the site of injection
Increased or even severe acne
Increased blood pressure
Increased “bad” (LDL) and lower “good” (HDL) cholesterol, with attendant increased risk of heart attack
Thickening of the wall of the heart (especiall y in the left ventricle)
Increased or decreased sex drive (libido)
Increased appetite
Liver disease, especially with AASs taken orally (infrequent)
Death from several causes, including suicide, atherosclerosis (hardening of the arteries leading to heart attacks or strokes), and cardiac complications
HIV and similar risk issues associated with the sharing of needles or the use of nonsterile needles
Psychological Effects Users of AASs can experience psychiatric symptoms during use, abuse, or withdrawal. Symptoms differ depending on the drug’s absence or presence in the body. Symptoms tend to correlate with the size of the weekly dose and can worsen with long-term use. Importantly, the psychiatric symptoms are idiosyncratic; some men taking=2 0a given dose of AASs may show no psychiatric effects at all, whereas a few men taking an identical dose might show extreme effects.6 The reasons for this variability are not known, but it is clear that reactions to AASs cannot be predicted on the basis of an individual’s baseline personality. In other words, even if a man has a mildmannered, gentle personality when not taking AASs, there is still a risk that he might develop a sudden personality change and become uncharacteristically aggressive and violent while taking AASs.7
Symptoms Associated with Use or Abuse:
Mania or hypomania (high energy levels associated with increased self-confidence, increased activity, impaired judgment, and reckless behavior)
Psychosis—loss of touch with reality (for example, paranoia or delusions of grandeur; infrequent)
Personality changes
Laws and Regulations Associated with AASs The use of AASs for per formance enhancement is banned by all major sports bodies, including the International Olympic Committee, the National Basketball Association, the National Hockey League, the National Football League, Major League Baseball, the Union of European Football Associations, and Fédération Internationale de Football Association. In the late 1980s, the U.S. Congress considered listing AASs in the Controlled Substances Act. Based on evidence of widespread abuse, AASs are now classified by the FDA and DEA as Schedule III controlled substances. The Crime Control Act of 1990, approved on November 29, 1990, includes provisions for control of these drugs and penalties for inappropriate trafficking in them. The Anabolic Steroid Control Act of 2004 further amended this law to increase the number of AASs that were included and make it easier to add additional drugs.
The drug or other substance has a potential for abuse that is less than the drugs or other substances in Schedules I and II.
The drug or other substance has a currently accepted medical use in treatment in the United States. Abuse of the drug or other substance may lead to moderate or low physical dependence or high psychological dependence.
Too long to fit here... Read on !!!
http://policechiefmagazine.org/magazine/index.cfm?fuseaction=display&article_id=1512&issue_id=62008
from Police Chief Magazine:
http://policechiefmagazine.org/magazine/index.cfm?fuseaction=display&article_id=1512&issue_id=62008
Although physical fitness is an essential part of policing, as described in the previous article, some officers go too far to ensure their strength—endangering not only themselves but also the public they are sworn to defend.
officer crashes a police car and seriously injures an innocent bystander. The investigation reveals that the officer was acting erratically, had bloodshot eyes, and slurred his speech. The officer’s supervisor is called, and the decision is made to test for alcohol consumption. The test results determine that the officer was in fact intoxicated. Disciplinary action is taken, resulting in the officer’s termination for drinking alcohol while driving on duty. Though exposed to liability, the department recognizes the dangers of alcohol abuse and appropriately responds when a dangerous situation presents itself. Another officer, involved in several shootings and use-of-force incidents, garners significant attention within his agency and the media. Investigations reveal that the unrelated incidents were questionable but lawful and, according to the officer, justified based on perceived threats. The agency’s use-of-force review reluctantly finds the officer within policy but awaits the next incident. How many police leaders would recognize that this of ficer could have a problem similar to the one in the first example? If the officer’s appearance indicated he was exceptionally muscular, would they consider the possible abuse of anabolic steroids? What would prompt them to believe that excessive use of force could be associated with “’roid rage,” a hyperaggressive, violent state of mind supposedly brought on by steroid use? When and how would they confirm that their suspicions are true? What if a defense or civil attorney proposed that an officer was a steroid abuser based on the officer’s appearance and witnessed behaviors? Compared with alcohol and other illicit drugs, anabolic steroids (also known as anabolic-androgenic steroids, or AASs) are not easily detected. Supervisors typically are trained to look for inappropriate behaviors that might justify a “just cause” drug screen; however, with AASs the behaviors and other indicators might not be as easily recognized. Recently, accounts of major league baseball’s steroid era have come to light, Olympic athletes have admitted use, and many other major sporting icons have been stripped of their titles after being caught using performance-enhancing drugs such as AASs and human growth hormone (HGH). Unfortunately, growing evidence suggests a similar abuse of AASs and other performance-enhancing drugs by law enforcement professionals. Across the United States, several investigations associated with Internet pharmacies and “antiaging” clinics in association with unscrupulous physicians have revealed officers caught up in this web of illicit drug use. Although the traditional reason for the use of AASs is to improve athletic performance, AASs also appeal to officers wanting a tactical edge or an intimidating appearance. Unlike with other forms of drug abuse, steroid users do not take their drug recreationally; on the contrary, some state they need these drugs in order to do their job effectively or improve their “job performance.” From street officers who consider themselves vulnerable to bigger, more aggressive criminals to special-assignment officers who are regularly tested for their physical abilities, officers are turning to performance-enhancing drugs such as AASs and HGH as a shortcut to improved performance. This article will not delve into the abuse of HGH, which is not a controlled substance but is obtained by prescription only and has very limited use—none for normal adults. In addition to the normal health concerns, there is one further issue when discussing abuse of steroids by those in the law enforcement profession. Officers carry weapons, are authorized to use lethal force, and are often involved in physically controlling or restraining people. If the stories of ’roid rage are true, how often are the officers who use anabolic steroids involved in unnecessary use-offorce incidents that could become a major liability for their agencies? Considering the legal issues, health effects, and commensurate costs associated with inappropriate use, agencies should proactiv ly address this issue. Rather than look back on what could be an embarrassing “steroid era” of law enforcement—one in which the profession might be riddled with lawsuits, corruption, and claims of heavy-handedness—it is critical to address the current and future impact of this issue head-on. Over the past few decades, several stories have surfaced regarding law enforcement personnel involved with anabolic steroids. The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) recently led Operation Raw Deal, considered the largest international steroid investigation to date. The operation discovered several links to current or former law enforcement officers. This was predicted almost 20 years ago by an article in the FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin that stated, “Anabolic steroid abuse by police officers is a serious problem that merits greater awareness by departments across the country.”1 In addition, a story on the television program 60 Minutes in 1989 titled “Beefing up the Force” featured three police officers who admitted steroid use and claimed that their resulting aggression got them in serious trouble. In the past year, a book titled Falling Off the Thin Blue Line was written and published by former Texas police officer David Johnson, who describes his addiction to steroids and speaks about the prevalence of steroid abuse in the law enforcement community.2 Recently, investigations into illegal steroid purchases revealed the names of several officers on pharmacy distribution lists, garnering national media attention. Unfortunately, agencies looking for methods to confront steroid abuse find few examples of effective policies and practices. This article summarizes the Phoenix, Arizona, Police Department’s experience in this area over the past several years and suggests policy and testing considerations for anabolic steroids in the law enforcement community. Problems with Testing In 2005, the Phoenix Police Department (PPD) investigated several incidents either directly or indirectly involving officers accused of abusing anabolic steroids. As a result, the city formed a committee to determine policy changes and address the issue with public safety agencies (that is, police and fire departments) as well as all other city employees. Due to the demands of the law enforcement profession and the legal precedent supporting random drug testing, policies are naturally more stringent for police than for other city departments. The police department, with support from its labor organization, added anabolic steroids to the random testing process for all officers and the preemployment screen. Research is clear that significant health risks result from nontherapeutic uses of anabolic steroids. 3 For this reason, the PPD’s focus on prevention revolved around a prevention video with questions and answers from a local endocrinologist who specializes in steroid abuse treatment. Regarding testing, the task seemed simple enough: contact a local laboratory and test officers for performance-enhancing substances. However, implementation proved less than simple. First, adding AASs to the PPD’s random test tripled its drug testing costs. Additionally, local laboratories were able to provide only an initial urine screen that tested for a handful of the growing number of AASs. Furthermore, compounding the difficulty of the task, testing for anabolic steroids goes beyond looking for the specific synthetic AAS; it also needs to detect compounds naturally created by the human body, such as testosterone. This entails an analysis of an individual’s ratio of testosterone to epitestosterone (abbreviated T/E); when this value is found to be out of normal range, it may indicate the use of illegal substances. Additionally, as noted previously, HGH does not fall under the Anabolic Steroid Control Act, and currently there is no reliable test to detect it in the human body. Testing for performance-enhancing substances presents a myriad of challenges:
How can an agency test for “all” illegal AASs, and what does it do if a T/E ratio is not normal?
How can an agency prove that someone is illegally or inappropriately using anabolic steroids?
What if an officer who tests positive provides a prescription, and the prescribing physician indicates that the officer has a condition that necessitates the use of these drugs? Additionally, what constitutes abuse of prescribed drugs?
Do ’roid rage and other psychiatric disturbances claimed to result from steroid abuse actually exist, and do they present a liability to an abuser’s organization? Jumping into a testing policy before answering these questions will lead agencies to the realization that testing for these substances is not as straightforward as, say, discovering heroin in a drug screen. Officers might present a prescription or might have ordered something over the Internet in what they believe is a legal transaction. The DEA works regularly to shut down numerous unscrupulous doctors who seek to make money by connecting with pharmacies and engaging in illegal distribution, using the few very specific legitimate uses for AASs as cover for their operation. In these cases, ignorance is a common excuse from officers, who typically state that a doctor prescribed the drug, so it must be “okay.”
Illicit “Benefits” of AASs AASs can be taken orally, by injection, as a skin patch or cream, or sometimes by placing them between the cheek and gum. When combined with a high-protein diet and vigorous weightlifting, AASs “work.” That means that they stimulate the formation of muscle tissue and are known to cause enlargement of muscle fibers. It is widely understood that testosterone (the major natural male AAS hormone in normal, healthy men) stimulates an increase in fat-free muscle mass while at the same time decreasing fat. Doses of AASs that exceed the normal production rate of testosterone can amplify this effect, resulting in supernormal gains in lean muscle mass and strength.
Patterns of Illegitimate Use
Many users reported taking a weekly dose in excess of (the equivalent of) 1,000 mg of testosterone. For comparison, adult human testicles normally produce 5–10 mg of testosterone per day—generally less than 100 mg/week.
Most AAS users reported self-administering by injecting the drug directly into their muscles.
Some studies reveal that approximately 25 percent of those who inject AASs share needles or vials, increasing the risk of HIV infection, viral hepatitis, or other infections.
Over 95 percent of AAS users reported self-administering multiple substances, with 25 percent taking growth hormone and/or insulin in addition to AASs.
Users have been found to move on to illegal drugs other than athletic performance enhancers.
Nearly 100 percent of AAS users reported noticeable side effects—but most users claim that these effects are mild and do not deter them from continuing to use AASs.
Users often become fixated on their muscularity and are reluctant to stop using AASs for fear that they will get smaller again.
General Medical Effects of Use
Decreased sperm production
Abscess at the site of injection
Increased or even severe acne
Increased blood pressure
Increased “bad” (LDL) and lower “good” (HDL) cholesterol, with attendant increased risk of heart attack
Thickening of the wall of the heart (especiall y in the left ventricle)
Increased or decreased sex drive (libido)
Increased appetite
Liver disease, especially with AASs taken orally (infrequent)
Death from several causes, including suicide, atherosclerosis (hardening of the arteries leading to heart attacks or strokes), and cardiac complications
HIV and similar risk issues associated with the sharing of needles or the use of nonsterile needles
Psychological Effects Users of AASs can experience psychiatric symptoms during use, abuse, or withdrawal. Symptoms differ depending on the drug’s absence or presence in the body. Symptoms tend to correlate with the size of the weekly dose and can worsen with long-term use. Importantly, the psychiatric symptoms are idiosyncratic; some men taking=2 0a given dose of AASs may show no psychiatric effects at all, whereas a few men taking an identical dose might show extreme effects.6 The reasons for this variability are not known, but it is clear that reactions to AASs cannot be predicted on the basis of an individual’s baseline personality. In other words, even if a man has a mildmannered, gentle personality when not taking AASs, there is still a risk that he might develop a sudden personality change and become uncharacteristically aggressive and violent while taking AASs.7
Symptoms Associated with Use or Abuse:
Mania or hypomania (high energy levels associated with increased self-confidence, increased activity, impaired judgment, and reckless behavior)
Psychosis—loss of touch with reality (for example, paranoia or delusions of grandeur; infrequent)
Personality changes
Laws and Regulations Associated with AASs The use of AASs for per formance enhancement is banned by all major sports bodies, including the International Olympic Committee, the National Basketball Association, the National Hockey League, the National Football League, Major League Baseball, the Union of European Football Associations, and Fédération Internationale de Football Association. In the late 1980s, the U.S. Congress considered listing AASs in the Controlled Substances Act. Based on evidence of widespread abuse, AASs are now classified by the FDA and DEA as Schedule III controlled substances. The Crime Control Act of 1990, approved on November 29, 1990, includes provisions for control of these drugs and penalties for inappropriate trafficking in them. The Anabolic Steroid Control Act of 2004 further amended this law to increase the number of AASs that were included and make it easier to add additional drugs.
The drug or other substance has a potential for abuse that is less than the drugs or other substances in Schedules I and II.
The drug or other substance has a currently accepted medical use in treatment in the United States. Abuse of the drug or other substance may lead to moderate or low physical dependence or high psychological dependence.
Too long to fit here... Read on !!!
http://policechiefmagazine.org/magazine/index.cfm?fuseaction=display&article_id=1512&issue_id=62008
Monday, July 21, 2008
When Repression Rains, It Pours
Submitted by Elliott
Something has lit a fire in my gut lately, and it's not the tangy gazpacho chilling in my fridge. It's not the body bags piling up in Iraq, or the precipitous decline of our planet's wild systems, or any of the other train wrecks concocted by elites in the Global North. For the last three weeks, I've been spitting barbs because so many people I know have been getting targeted, terrorized and thrown in jail by the police.
The number of folks in my field of vision who've been rounded up since mid-June is startling, and I feel compelled to write about them here. Though they might appear in the news as a series of disparate, isolated incidents, I think my friends' stories indicate a broader pattern of police repression that's all too common--particularly against activists of color.
NYC
Following the April 26th acquittal of four cops who killed Sean Bell and wounded two others in a hail of 50 bullets, NYC saw a surge of social movement calling for police accountability and community power. Rallies, marches, and a near-riot popped off around the city, while Al Sharpton's "slowdown" blockades on May 8th captured national media attention. Since that time, actions specific to the Bell case have largely subsided, and much of the public energy and outrage has dissipated (or, at least, been brought to a simmer.)
At the same time, a few sustained projects have taken root in the wake of the NYPD's most brazen murder yet of an unarmed person of color. Among these is a series of citywide copwatch trainings being promoted by the People's Justice Coalition and Malcolm X Grassroots Movement, coupled with a growing interest in community alternatives to policing generally.
Caught in this climate is Rebel Diaz. A conscious hip hop crew comprised of three MCs--Chilean brothers RodStarz and G1, and Afro-Boricua rapper Lah Tere--Rebel Diaz is well known in both activist circles and hip hop scenes in NYC. In the crowd I run with, they're public figures you can count on to be outspoken about imperialism, racism, gentrification and police brutality. So it's not surprising that they were singled out for special treatment by New York's Finest.
On June 18th, Rodstarz and G1 stopped to observe several police officers harassing a street vendor in the Hunts Point area of the Bronx. Knowing a sense of public accountability can deter police abuses, the two MCs asked for the badge numbers of the cops in question. But this time the strategy backfired: the police snapped, dragged the two men to the ground, beat them up a little, and hauled them off to the 41st precinct. They were later charged with "obstruction of justice" and "resisting arrest."
Within hours of RodStarz and G1's arrest, a citywide call went out for folks to demonstrate at the building where the brothers were being held, and to barrage the precinct with calls in protest. (In Michigan at the time, I was hit with a stream of text messages about the situation.) The emergency actions drew a big response, and both brothers were released the following morning; their court cases are pending.
If the story ended there, I'd take it as a sign that cops are touchy about public confrontations following the Bell trial, but that prompt action on our part can keep their abuses in check. Unfortunately, there's more to tell. A week after the brothers' arrest, in the early hours of June 25th, unidentified police officers burst into G1's apartment in Harlem with guns drawn. According to G1's official statement
The uniformed police officers did not knock, nor announce themselves, nor verbally identify themselves before or during their entry into my apartment.
They pointed their guns at us the whole time as they verbally barraged [my roommate DW, my friend] MM and I with questions as to who we were and what we were doing there.
As I lay on the ground with my hands up, I replied loudly and clearly that I lived there, and that everyone in the house was supposed to be there.
They replied incredulously, repeatedly yelling their questions as to who we were, with threats as to what would happen to us if I was found to be lying.
After various other taunts and threats, including accusing us of harboring a fugitive criminal suspect, they departed just as quickly as they had arrived, down a side stairway adjacent to my apartment.
They did not stay to search me or my roommates, or the apartment for any signs of the supposed fugitive they were looking for.
G1 did get the badge numbers of two officers involved in the raid--by running into the middle of the street and flagging down a police vehicle that was peeling away from the scene. But even with that information, the incursion remains a mystery: "Both the 25th and 23rd NYPD precinct, which patrol my block, have denied that the officers involved are from their command."
Two weeks ago, this news filled me with a sense of dread. I asked myself: where did the officers who raided G1's apartment come from? Is this a police scare tactic, considering the high profile of the Rebel Diaz crew? Are police officers in New York veering into the realm of paramilitary-style violence against activists of color?
There's still only sketchy information available at this point, but alongside other recent cases of police abuse, a formula seems to be emerging. The sequence of events goes like this: first a high-profile case of police brutality evokes public outrage and disgust; then, a few modest grassroots projects emerge to curtail police violence; finally, the cops execute targeted crackdowns on activists who're bringing them scrutiny. By late June I had a feeling that the events in NYC contained an inner logic. My hunch was confirmed when I heard about a recent house raid in Philadelphia.
Philly
In the city of brotherly love, the same formula was repeated almost verbatim. First there was a case of police brutality: on May 5th, 12 to 14 Philadelphia cops were caught on camera by a Fox News helicopter as they dragged three shooting suspects from a vehicle and took turns kicking and beating them en masse. Much like the Bell case, footage of a rampaging mob of Philly police also prompted a broad public response. In fact, just a day after protesting the acquittal of Sean Bell's killers, Al Sharpton announced his intention to travel to Philadelphia to address the situation. But beyond public speakers and movement figureheads, action was also a-brewin' at the grassroots.
Some movement crystallized in the Francisville area of Philly, where a multiracial collective house started circulating petitions to address growing police harassment. Like many soon-to-be gentrifying neighborhoods, Francisville has endured aggressive policing as cops patrol on behalf of wealthy landlords and residents from encroaching developments. The house's petition confronted the climate of fear and intimidation by calling on Philadelphia's Mayor and Police Commissioner to attend community meetings on police brutality, surveillance cameras, and "stop and frisk" policies.
The response was fast and flagrant: on June 13th, the Francisville house was raided by plainclothes police officers. As in New York, the cops entered without a warrant, and in this case the housemates were detained for 12 hours without charge. The pretext used by police to enter the house still isn't clear (officers on the scene called the housemates a "hate group," alleging they found "literature about killing cops" and "propaganda against the government" on the premises) but it is known that the Department of Homeland Security, the Housing Authority and the Department of Licensing all conducted tours of the property within hours.
When the residents eventually returned home, they found their building closed by the city for code violations, and it became clear later that the property had been thoroughly searched. Daniel Moffat, a resident of the Francisville house, found that
My computer was gone. I was informed that the Department of State had taken my computer for evidence. I couldn't find my phone list that was posted on the wall. I couldn't find a notepad with a bunch of my notes in it. I couldn't find this little book with a lot of phone numbers in it.
News of the raid in Philly reached me just a few days after the arrests of RodStarz and G1, and it shook me up. Not only was it troubling that a measly petition could draw the ire of the power structure, but two of my friends had stayed in the Francisville house just weeks before it was raided, and thus narrowly escaped being detained themselves.
Right now the folks in Philadelphia have regained access to their house, but continue to fight a legal battle over the building's alleged code violations. Investigation also continues into why the house was targeted by local and federal agencies in the first place, and much like in New York, many questions remain. I'm troubled by events in Philly and the implications they could have for us in NYC--but at the same time, I'm preoccupied with yet another case of repression that recently exploded on the west coast.
LA
After the Rodney King beating and the 1992 riots, the LAPD may be most famous for its crackdown on the Los Angeles May Day rally in 2007. As a huge, peaceful rally of community organizations and migrant groups came to a close in MacArthur Park that spring, the LAPD waded into the crowd, firing rubber bullets at families and elders and clubbing those who didn't disperse fast enough. Police helicopters hovering above the scene declared the rally closed, while below a phalanx of cops in riot gear chased people into the surrounding blocks.
Outcry over police brutality at the May Day rally received sympathetic coverage on national news networks, mostly because members of the corporate media were shoved, clubbed and beaten along with rally-goers as police swept through the park. At the same time, the LAPD's actions further solidified the work of Copwatch LA, an organization that documented the police attack on the rally and had been active for several months beforehand.
To my knowledge, Copwatch LA is the most active group of its kind in the United States. After gaining big public attention from a police brutality case early in its existence (a video they publicized of officers beating a man while suffocating him made the front page of Yahoo News), the group has built a large network of volunteers to document police activity around the city. Their website even features live feeds of copwatch photos from cellphones around LA, which is an impressive techy feat for a non-funded, grassroots group. Yet the early successes of the Copwatch LA have also put a powerful spotlight on the group's organizers--particularly a young man named Joaquin Cienfuegos.
Joaquin is a Latino anarchist from South Central LA, who came to New York this summer to meet folks struggling on the East coast, and share an almost-finished documentary on the 2007 attacks. He crashed in my apartment in June after a raucous evening in lower Manhattan, and we emailed a little afterward. Just a few days ago, I received word that he had been arrested and was being held on $40,000 bail.
Fearing a repeat of NYC and Philly, I emailed for more info, and found the situation even higher-stakes. On June 27th, police officers pulled over Joaquin and a friend on their way home from a fundraiser for Copwatch LA and an Anarchist People of Color regional gathering. The anonymous friend put out a public statement a few days ago:
Joaquin said "they're pulling us over" as we were turning down my block (La Mirada Avenue). I told Joaquin not to stop until we got in front of my house, because if they were going to kill us or beat our asses, it was going to happen on my block and in front of my house where people could see.
The police approached the car, and found Joaquin didn't have his license on him (it had been stolen a few weeks earlier.) This was reason enough to cuff Joaquin immediately, at which poin I also told them Joaquin needed to get my wheelchair out of his trunk so I can get out of his car. The pig came to the driver's side of the car and popped the trunk, went to the back and put the wheelchair together. At that point the pig saw a machete in the trunk and asked Joaquin "what was he doing with a machete?" Joaquin said that "he does gardening work from time to time and it shouldn't be 'illegal' to have a machete in his trunk."
As I exited the car. they told me I could go home. So I crossed the street and observed them from in front of my home. From afar, I hear the pig ask Joaquin, "what's in this case?"
In the case was a gun owned by Joaquin, which resulted in a felony charge of "possession of a concealed firearm."
I can't comment on the prevalence of guns in Los Angeles activist circles, never having worked on the streets of South Central. But I do know that the LAPD has proven itself at least as dangerous with loaded firearms as activists on the left, and at the same time, I know that the LAPD has a habit of throwing arms charges at activists they see as a threat.
In fact, the same thing happened recently to members of the Black Riders Liberation Party, a political formation made up of former gang members and black youth from around Los Angeles modeled on the Black Panther Party. Last fall, most of the Riders' leadership was rounded up in a statewide sweep, charged with "conspiracy to purchase a concealed weapon," and held on $500,000 bail. Joaquin had been working closely with members of the BRLP to document their legal struggle, and Riders were in attendance at the fundraiser the night of Joaquin's arrest. These connections, one imagines, would've been enough for the police to put Joaquin in their sights.
Today
As of this post, Joaquin has just been released from jail, where he was held on lockdown for most of his time inside. He now faces a lengthy legal battle, along with a fundraising effort to cover the loans needed to bail him out. And after the house raid in Philly, the attack on G1 in NYC, and this new arrest in Los Angeles, I'm struck by the brazenness of police attacks on activists of color in the U.S.
Three times in the last six weeks, the same formula came into play: after an incident of police brutality evoked public outcry and was met with a modest grassroots response, the power structure went to extreme lengths to target and eliminate activists working against cop impunity. This pattern suggests activists working for accountability and community power can expect repressive responses from local authorities, often without regard to public oversight or legal constraints and with the backing of federal agencies. Yikes.
At the same time, these acts of repression remind us of the scope of our struggles, and of the hurdles any movement that wishes to fundamentally transform our world must inevitably face. It's a frightening prospect, sure, but it's also an arena that can shape our tactics and strategies beyond theory and booklearnin'. To face these challenges, I've heard, you need to have a fire in your gut.
Something has lit a fire in my gut lately, and it's not the tangy gazpacho chilling in my fridge. It's not the body bags piling up in Iraq, or the precipitous decline of our planet's wild systems, or any of the other train wrecks concocted by elites in the Global North. For the last three weeks, I've been spitting barbs because so many people I know have been getting targeted, terrorized and thrown in jail by the police.
The number of folks in my field of vision who've been rounded up since mid-June is startling, and I feel compelled to write about them here. Though they might appear in the news as a series of disparate, isolated incidents, I think my friends' stories indicate a broader pattern of police repression that's all too common--particularly against activists of color.
NYC
Following the April 26th acquittal of four cops who killed Sean Bell and wounded two others in a hail of 50 bullets, NYC saw a surge of social movement calling for police accountability and community power. Rallies, marches, and a near-riot popped off around the city, while Al Sharpton's "slowdown" blockades on May 8th captured national media attention. Since that time, actions specific to the Bell case have largely subsided, and much of the public energy and outrage has dissipated (or, at least, been brought to a simmer.)
At the same time, a few sustained projects have taken root in the wake of the NYPD's most brazen murder yet of an unarmed person of color. Among these is a series of citywide copwatch trainings being promoted by the People's Justice Coalition and Malcolm X Grassroots Movement, coupled with a growing interest in community alternatives to policing generally.
Caught in this climate is Rebel Diaz. A conscious hip hop crew comprised of three MCs--Chilean brothers RodStarz and G1, and Afro-Boricua rapper Lah Tere--Rebel Diaz is well known in both activist circles and hip hop scenes in NYC. In the crowd I run with, they're public figures you can count on to be outspoken about imperialism, racism, gentrification and police brutality. So it's not surprising that they were singled out for special treatment by New York's Finest.
On June 18th, Rodstarz and G1 stopped to observe several police officers harassing a street vendor in the Hunts Point area of the Bronx. Knowing a sense of public accountability can deter police abuses, the two MCs asked for the badge numbers of the cops in question. But this time the strategy backfired: the police snapped, dragged the two men to the ground, beat them up a little, and hauled them off to the 41st precinct. They were later charged with "obstruction of justice" and "resisting arrest."
Within hours of RodStarz and G1's arrest, a citywide call went out for folks to demonstrate at the building where the brothers were being held, and to barrage the precinct with calls in protest. (In Michigan at the time, I was hit with a stream of text messages about the situation.) The emergency actions drew a big response, and both brothers were released the following morning; their court cases are pending.
If the story ended there, I'd take it as a sign that cops are touchy about public confrontations following the Bell trial, but that prompt action on our part can keep their abuses in check. Unfortunately, there's more to tell. A week after the brothers' arrest, in the early hours of June 25th, unidentified police officers burst into G1's apartment in Harlem with guns drawn. According to G1's official statement
The uniformed police officers did not knock, nor announce themselves, nor verbally identify themselves before or during their entry into my apartment.
They pointed their guns at us the whole time as they verbally barraged [my roommate DW, my friend] MM and I with questions as to who we were and what we were doing there.
As I lay on the ground with my hands up, I replied loudly and clearly that I lived there, and that everyone in the house was supposed to be there.
They replied incredulously, repeatedly yelling their questions as to who we were, with threats as to what would happen to us if I was found to be lying.
After various other taunts and threats, including accusing us of harboring a fugitive criminal suspect, they departed just as quickly as they had arrived, down a side stairway adjacent to my apartment.
They did not stay to search me or my roommates, or the apartment for any signs of the supposed fugitive they were looking for.
G1 did get the badge numbers of two officers involved in the raid--by running into the middle of the street and flagging down a police vehicle that was peeling away from the scene. But even with that information, the incursion remains a mystery: "Both the 25th and 23rd NYPD precinct, which patrol my block, have denied that the officers involved are from their command."
Two weeks ago, this news filled me with a sense of dread. I asked myself: where did the officers who raided G1's apartment come from? Is this a police scare tactic, considering the high profile of the Rebel Diaz crew? Are police officers in New York veering into the realm of paramilitary-style violence against activists of color?
There's still only sketchy information available at this point, but alongside other recent cases of police abuse, a formula seems to be emerging. The sequence of events goes like this: first a high-profile case of police brutality evokes public outrage and disgust; then, a few modest grassroots projects emerge to curtail police violence; finally, the cops execute targeted crackdowns on activists who're bringing them scrutiny. By late June I had a feeling that the events in NYC contained an inner logic. My hunch was confirmed when I heard about a recent house raid in Philadelphia.
Philly
In the city of brotherly love, the same formula was repeated almost verbatim. First there was a case of police brutality: on May 5th, 12 to 14 Philadelphia cops were caught on camera by a Fox News helicopter as they dragged three shooting suspects from a vehicle and took turns kicking and beating them en masse. Much like the Bell case, footage of a rampaging mob of Philly police also prompted a broad public response. In fact, just a day after protesting the acquittal of Sean Bell's killers, Al Sharpton announced his intention to travel to Philadelphia to address the situation. But beyond public speakers and movement figureheads, action was also a-brewin' at the grassroots.
Some movement crystallized in the Francisville area of Philly, where a multiracial collective house started circulating petitions to address growing police harassment. Like many soon-to-be gentrifying neighborhoods, Francisville has endured aggressive policing as cops patrol on behalf of wealthy landlords and residents from encroaching developments. The house's petition confronted the climate of fear and intimidation by calling on Philadelphia's Mayor and Police Commissioner to attend community meetings on police brutality, surveillance cameras, and "stop and frisk" policies.
The response was fast and flagrant: on June 13th, the Francisville house was raided by plainclothes police officers. As in New York, the cops entered without a warrant, and in this case the housemates were detained for 12 hours without charge. The pretext used by police to enter the house still isn't clear (officers on the scene called the housemates a "hate group," alleging they found "literature about killing cops" and "propaganda against the government" on the premises) but it is known that the Department of Homeland Security, the Housing Authority and the Department of Licensing all conducted tours of the property within hours.
When the residents eventually returned home, they found their building closed by the city for code violations, and it became clear later that the property had been thoroughly searched. Daniel Moffat, a resident of the Francisville house, found that
My computer was gone. I was informed that the Department of State had taken my computer for evidence. I couldn't find my phone list that was posted on the wall. I couldn't find a notepad with a bunch of my notes in it. I couldn't find this little book with a lot of phone numbers in it.
News of the raid in Philly reached me just a few days after the arrests of RodStarz and G1, and it shook me up. Not only was it troubling that a measly petition could draw the ire of the power structure, but two of my friends had stayed in the Francisville house just weeks before it was raided, and thus narrowly escaped being detained themselves.
Right now the folks in Philadelphia have regained access to their house, but continue to fight a legal battle over the building's alleged code violations. Investigation also continues into why the house was targeted by local and federal agencies in the first place, and much like in New York, many questions remain. I'm troubled by events in Philly and the implications they could have for us in NYC--but at the same time, I'm preoccupied with yet another case of repression that recently exploded on the west coast.
LA
After the Rodney King beating and the 1992 riots, the LAPD may be most famous for its crackdown on the Los Angeles May Day rally in 2007. As a huge, peaceful rally of community organizations and migrant groups came to a close in MacArthur Park that spring, the LAPD waded into the crowd, firing rubber bullets at families and elders and clubbing those who didn't disperse fast enough. Police helicopters hovering above the scene declared the rally closed, while below a phalanx of cops in riot gear chased people into the surrounding blocks.
Outcry over police brutality at the May Day rally received sympathetic coverage on national news networks, mostly because members of the corporate media were shoved, clubbed and beaten along with rally-goers as police swept through the park. At the same time, the LAPD's actions further solidified the work of Copwatch LA, an organization that documented the police attack on the rally and had been active for several months beforehand.
To my knowledge, Copwatch LA is the most active group of its kind in the United States. After gaining big public attention from a police brutality case early in its existence (a video they publicized of officers beating a man while suffocating him made the front page of Yahoo News), the group has built a large network of volunteers to document police activity around the city. Their website even features live feeds of copwatch photos from cellphones around LA, which is an impressive techy feat for a non-funded, grassroots group. Yet the early successes of the Copwatch LA have also put a powerful spotlight on the group's organizers--particularly a young man named Joaquin Cienfuegos.
Joaquin is a Latino anarchist from South Central LA, who came to New York this summer to meet folks struggling on the East coast, and share an almost-finished documentary on the 2007 attacks. He crashed in my apartment in June after a raucous evening in lower Manhattan, and we emailed a little afterward. Just a few days ago, I received word that he had been arrested and was being held on $40,000 bail.
Fearing a repeat of NYC and Philly, I emailed for more info, and found the situation even higher-stakes. On June 27th, police officers pulled over Joaquin and a friend on their way home from a fundraiser for Copwatch LA and an Anarchist People of Color regional gathering. The anonymous friend put out a public statement a few days ago:
Joaquin said "they're pulling us over" as we were turning down my block (La Mirada Avenue). I told Joaquin not to stop until we got in front of my house, because if they were going to kill us or beat our asses, it was going to happen on my block and in front of my house where people could see.
The police approached the car, and found Joaquin didn't have his license on him (it had been stolen a few weeks earlier.) This was reason enough to cuff Joaquin immediately, at which poin I also told them Joaquin needed to get my wheelchair out of his trunk so I can get out of his car. The pig came to the driver's side of the car and popped the trunk, went to the back and put the wheelchair together. At that point the pig saw a machete in the trunk and asked Joaquin "what was he doing with a machete?" Joaquin said that "he does gardening work from time to time and it shouldn't be 'illegal' to have a machete in his trunk."
As I exited the car. they told me I could go home. So I crossed the street and observed them from in front of my home. From afar, I hear the pig ask Joaquin, "what's in this case?"
In the case was a gun owned by Joaquin, which resulted in a felony charge of "possession of a concealed firearm."
I can't comment on the prevalence of guns in Los Angeles activist circles, never having worked on the streets of South Central. But I do know that the LAPD has proven itself at least as dangerous with loaded firearms as activists on the left, and at the same time, I know that the LAPD has a habit of throwing arms charges at activists they see as a threat.
In fact, the same thing happened recently to members of the Black Riders Liberation Party, a political formation made up of former gang members and black youth from around Los Angeles modeled on the Black Panther Party. Last fall, most of the Riders' leadership was rounded up in a statewide sweep, charged with "conspiracy to purchase a concealed weapon," and held on $500,000 bail. Joaquin had been working closely with members of the BRLP to document their legal struggle, and Riders were in attendance at the fundraiser the night of Joaquin's arrest. These connections, one imagines, would've been enough for the police to put Joaquin in their sights.
Today
As of this post, Joaquin has just been released from jail, where he was held on lockdown for most of his time inside. He now faces a lengthy legal battle, along with a fundraising effort to cover the loans needed to bail him out. And after the house raid in Philly, the attack on G1 in NYC, and this new arrest in Los Angeles, I'm struck by the brazenness of police attacks on activists of color in the U.S.
Three times in the last six weeks, the same formula came into play: after an incident of police brutality evoked public outcry and was met with a modest grassroots response, the power structure went to extreme lengths to target and eliminate activists working against cop impunity. This pattern suggests activists working for accountability and community power can expect repressive responses from local authorities, often without regard to public oversight or legal constraints and with the backing of federal agencies. Yikes.
At the same time, these acts of repression remind us of the scope of our struggles, and of the hurdles any movement that wishes to fundamentally transform our world must inevitably face. It's a frightening prospect, sure, but it's also an arena that can shape our tactics and strategies beyond theory and booklearnin'. To face these challenges, I've heard, you need to have a fire in your gut.
Thursday, July 3, 2008
APD Must 'fess Up, Revise Interrogation Procedures
from the Albuquerque Journal
By Jeff Buckels, New Mexico Public Defender Department
Journal readers can't have missed Saturday's front-page story about how DNA evidence cleared my client Robert Gonzales of murder after two and a half years in jail. And you can't have missed that Robert confessed to the murder at the time.
It was a false confession, and it's not that rare. Nearly a fourth of 218 DNA exonerations documented by the national Innocence Project have involved false confessions.
Police use sophisticated techniques to get confessions. They start by putting the suspect off-guard with friendly chitchat, visiting about the suspect's school, family, favorite TV shows.
Having established that they are the suspect's pal, interrogators put the confession machinery in gear. They accuse the suspect of the crime and refuse to credit his denials. To make resistance seem pointless, they exaggerate or simply lie about the evidence they already have (“You were seen with the victim!”). In virtually every case of false confession involving compliant suspects, the interrogators minimize the suspect's blameworthiness (“I'd have done the same thing!”) and offer face-saving excuses which seem to promise leniency (“We know you were provoked!”). If the suspect still resists, they tell him that confessing is the only way to make the interrogation ordeal come to an end (“You've got to help us if you want to get this over with!”). If he still resists, the interrogators say he's wrong, and insist again and again that the only way to make the ordeal end is to get it right.
These techniques and others are mixed and repeated over and over, for hours if necessary. Every one was used on Robert Gonzales, who stopped resisting and confessed to a murder he didn't commit.
I expect this reaction from many readers: “If I were accused of a crime I didn't commit, nothing, except maybe torture, would make me confess.” I don't doubt it. But while you are enjoying your morning coffee and newspaper, consider whether you are not different from Robert Gonzales in at least two important ways.
First, you are not unusually vulnerable to manipulation and suggestion. Even persons of normal and high intelligence have succumbed to the interrogator's bag of tricks. Retarded and youthful suspects are like putty in a trained interrogator's hands.
Second, you have not been arrested, shackled and stuffed in the back seat of a police car. You are not surrounded by armed police in an interrogation room. Your mug shot will not be on the six o'clock news. You are not scared out of your wits. You are not easy pickings.
Robert Gonzales was. And it took a double-whammy of DNA evidence to stop what interrogation procedure and a false confession started.
More than two years ago, the police learned that scores of scientific tests — DNA evidence, fingerprints, hair samples, fiber evidence — had failed to place Robert at the scene of the crime or connect him to the victim in any way. The DNA pointed consistently to a single unknown person — not Robert. But in the teeth of the scientific evidence, the prosecution pushed on, relying on Robert's “confession” alone.
Two weeks ago, the other shoe fell. The DNA taken from the victim matched a prisoner at the federal lockdown outside Estancia. Then and only then did the prosecution throw in the towel.
I am not writing to vent or to celebrate (“All's well that ends well!”). I am writing to call attention to police policy and training — or rather the lack of it.
The two senior APD officers who interrogated Robert Gonzales knew they were dealing with a suspect who was young and probably retarded in some degree. He told them he was in special education classes in school. Yet they admitted in pretrial interviews and under oath at a hearing that they didn't even consider handling Robert's interrogation differently than any other. The fact is, APD had provided them with no training in interrogating developmentally disabled suspects.
Such training and policies exist and are in effect in other police departments. This specialized training helps officers recognize suspects who are retarded and requires them to make sure the suspects really do understand Miranda warnings. They are to curtail the usual tricks to elicit confessions, treat confessions skeptically, and do double duty corroborating such confessions before committing to prosecution.
Maybe if procedures like this had been in place at APD when Robert Gonzales was arrested, Robert wouldn't have given a false confession or maybe the police wouldn't have believed it. Failing that, maybe they would have gotten the message when the DNA evidence came in over two years ago and pointed to somebody else. This would have saved the prosecuting authorities, the court system and the taxpayers a lot of time, trouble and money.
And it would have saved a vulnerable young man from serving thirty-two months in jail for a horrific crime he did not commit.
Jeff Buckels is the supervising attorney of the Capital Crimes Unit of the Public Defender Department.
By Jeff Buckels, New Mexico Public Defender Department
Journal readers can't have missed Saturday's front-page story about how DNA evidence cleared my client Robert Gonzales of murder after two and a half years in jail. And you can't have missed that Robert confessed to the murder at the time.
It was a false confession, and it's not that rare. Nearly a fourth of 218 DNA exonerations documented by the national Innocence Project have involved false confessions.
Police use sophisticated techniques to get confessions. They start by putting the suspect off-guard with friendly chitchat, visiting about the suspect's school, family, favorite TV shows.
Having established that they are the suspect's pal, interrogators put the confession machinery in gear. They accuse the suspect of the crime and refuse to credit his denials. To make resistance seem pointless, they exaggerate or simply lie about the evidence they already have (“You were seen with the victim!”). In virtually every case of false confession involving compliant suspects, the interrogators minimize the suspect's blameworthiness (“I'd have done the same thing!”) and offer face-saving excuses which seem to promise leniency (“We know you were provoked!”). If the suspect still resists, they tell him that confessing is the only way to make the interrogation ordeal come to an end (“You've got to help us if you want to get this over with!”). If he still resists, the interrogators say he's wrong, and insist again and again that the only way to make the ordeal end is to get it right.
These techniques and others are mixed and repeated over and over, for hours if necessary. Every one was used on Robert Gonzales, who stopped resisting and confessed to a murder he didn't commit.
I expect this reaction from many readers: “If I were accused of a crime I didn't commit, nothing, except maybe torture, would make me confess.” I don't doubt it. But while you are enjoying your morning coffee and newspaper, consider whether you are not different from Robert Gonzales in at least two important ways.
First, you are not unusually vulnerable to manipulation and suggestion. Even persons of normal and high intelligence have succumbed to the interrogator's bag of tricks. Retarded and youthful suspects are like putty in a trained interrogator's hands.
Second, you have not been arrested, shackled and stuffed in the back seat of a police car. You are not surrounded by armed police in an interrogation room. Your mug shot will not be on the six o'clock news. You are not scared out of your wits. You are not easy pickings.
Robert Gonzales was. And it took a double-whammy of DNA evidence to stop what interrogation procedure and a false confession started.
More than two years ago, the police learned that scores of scientific tests — DNA evidence, fingerprints, hair samples, fiber evidence — had failed to place Robert at the scene of the crime or connect him to the victim in any way. The DNA pointed consistently to a single unknown person — not Robert. But in the teeth of the scientific evidence, the prosecution pushed on, relying on Robert's “confession” alone.
Two weeks ago, the other shoe fell. The DNA taken from the victim matched a prisoner at the federal lockdown outside Estancia. Then and only then did the prosecution throw in the towel.
I am not writing to vent or to celebrate (“All's well that ends well!”). I am writing to call attention to police policy and training — or rather the lack of it.
The two senior APD officers who interrogated Robert Gonzales knew they were dealing with a suspect who was young and probably retarded in some degree. He told them he was in special education classes in school. Yet they admitted in pretrial interviews and under oath at a hearing that they didn't even consider handling Robert's interrogation differently than any other. The fact is, APD had provided them with no training in interrogating developmentally disabled suspects.
Such training and policies exist and are in effect in other police departments. This specialized training helps officers recognize suspects who are retarded and requires them to make sure the suspects really do understand Miranda warnings. They are to curtail the usual tricks to elicit confessions, treat confessions skeptically, and do double duty corroborating such confessions before committing to prosecution.
Maybe if procedures like this had been in place at APD when Robert Gonzales was arrested, Robert wouldn't have given a false confession or maybe the police wouldn't have believed it. Failing that, maybe they would have gotten the message when the DNA evidence came in over two years ago and pointed to somebody else. This would have saved the prosecuting authorities, the court system and the taxpayers a lot of time, trouble and money.
And it would have saved a vulnerable young man from serving thirty-two months in jail for a horrific crime he did not commit.
Jeff Buckels is the supervising attorney of the Capital Crimes Unit of the Public Defender Department.
Tuesday, July 1, 2008
Cameraman's Charges Dropped
Wednesday, July 02, 2008
By Joline Gutierrez Krueger And T.J. Wilham, Journal Staff Writer
The attorney for veteran KOB-TV cameraman Rick Foley claims police illegally searched his client’s news vehicle and failed to read him his Miranda rights before cuffing him, throwing him in the back of a police car and charging him with refusing to obey an officer.
Charges against Foley were dropped Tuesday.
APD officials said Tuesday they were trying to determine if a search had occurred. A police spokesman said it’s common for officers to do an “inventory” during someone’s arrest.
Foley was covering a police standoff near Copper and Charleston NE on May 29 when rookie officer Daniel Guzman told Foley to move to a different location, according to a police report. A video captured by Foley’s camera shows the officer lunging at him. Foley was handcuffed, placed in the back of a police car and cited.
Guzman was placed on administrative leave last weekend pending a disciplinary hearing scheduled for next week.
The refusing to obey charge was dismissed Tuesday after Metro Court Judge Benjamin Chavez ruled that Guzman had not provided sufficient facts, or probable cause, to support the allegation.
Chavez said Guzman had incorrectly used a traffic citation form and not a criminal complaint when citing Foley and that he had only repeated the charge and not the circumstances of the case on the citation.
Chavez dismissed the charge without prejudice, meaning that police can refile the charges at a later date.
“I think this case is dead,” Foley’s attorney, Matthew Coyte, said afterward. “It was dead from the beginning.”
Foley said after Tuesday’s hearing that police never read him his rights before charging him.
In a statement released to the Journal through Coyte, Foley said he watched in “amazement” as police searched his news vehicle without a warrant.
According to legal experts, the law allows police to search vehicles if the driver is in the process of being arrested. If the car is being towed, police can take an “inventory” of the vehicle to make sure valuables don’t come up missing.
Foley was not taken to jail.
APD spokesman John Walsh said officers routinely search the vehicle of someone who is being arrested and taken to jail.
In Foley’s case, Walsh said an officer might have taken inventory anticipating that Foley was going to be taken to jail — if his vehicle was searched at all.
Walsh also noted that neither Foley nor KOB-TV has filed a complaint with the department alleging an illegal search.
By Joline Gutierrez Krueger And T.J. Wilham, Journal Staff Writer
The attorney for veteran KOB-TV cameraman Rick Foley claims police illegally searched his client’s news vehicle and failed to read him his Miranda rights before cuffing him, throwing him in the back of a police car and charging him with refusing to obey an officer.
Charges against Foley were dropped Tuesday.
APD officials said Tuesday they were trying to determine if a search had occurred. A police spokesman said it’s common for officers to do an “inventory” during someone’s arrest.
Foley was covering a police standoff near Copper and Charleston NE on May 29 when rookie officer Daniel Guzman told Foley to move to a different location, according to a police report. A video captured by Foley’s camera shows the officer lunging at him. Foley was handcuffed, placed in the back of a police car and cited.
Guzman was placed on administrative leave last weekend pending a disciplinary hearing scheduled for next week.
The refusing to obey charge was dismissed Tuesday after Metro Court Judge Benjamin Chavez ruled that Guzman had not provided sufficient facts, or probable cause, to support the allegation.
Chavez said Guzman had incorrectly used a traffic citation form and not a criminal complaint when citing Foley and that he had only repeated the charge and not the circumstances of the case on the citation.
Chavez dismissed the charge without prejudice, meaning that police can refile the charges at a later date.
“I think this case is dead,” Foley’s attorney, Matthew Coyte, said afterward. “It was dead from the beginning.”
Foley said after Tuesday’s hearing that police never read him his rights before charging him.
In a statement released to the Journal through Coyte, Foley said he watched in “amazement” as police searched his news vehicle without a warrant.
According to legal experts, the law allows police to search vehicles if the driver is in the process of being arrested. If the car is being towed, police can take an “inventory” of the vehicle to make sure valuables don’t come up missing.
Foley was not taken to jail.
APD spokesman John Walsh said officers routinely search the vehicle of someone who is being arrested and taken to jail.
In Foley’s case, Walsh said an officer might have taken inventory anticipating that Foley was going to be taken to jail — if his vehicle was searched at all.
Walsh also noted that neither Foley nor KOB-TV has filed a complaint with the department alleging an illegal search.
Officer on Leave After Attack
By T.J. Wilham, Journal Staff Writer
An Albuquerque police officer who was captured on video attacking a KOB-TV news photographer has been placed on leave.
Officer Daniel Guzman, who had been working with another officer since the May 29 incident, is to appear at a disciplinary hearing next week. Afterward, Police Chief Ray Schultz will decide what disciplinary action, if any, should be taken against the officer.
Veteran KOB photographer Rick Foley was covering a police standoff near Copper and Charleston NE when Guzman, a rookie, told Foley to move to a different location, according to a police report. Foley was some distance from the police cars blocking the street and outside an area that had been blocked by officers.
Shortly after Guzman told Foley to move, the two argued, and Foley asked Guzman for his name and badge number.
A video captured by Foley's camera shows the officer lunging at him. Foley was handcuffed, placed in the back of a police car and cited for refusing to obey an officer.
Foley has a court appearance today in Metropolitan Court. In a statement released through his attorney, Foley on Monday called for Guzman to seek dismissal of the charges.
“In my 27 years covering the news, I have never interfered in officers performing their difficult jobs, nor would I,” the statement said. “My father was a career police officer, and I have been brought up with the greatest respect for the job they do. Yet one officer found time to grab me on a public street, handcuff me, place me in a police car and prevent me from doing mine.
“I hope the officer will do the correct thing and dismiss this criminal case.”
Shortly after the incident, Schultz asked the city's independent review officer to conduct the investigation.
Schultz said he made the decision to place Guzman on leave after reading the independent review officer's report, which he received Friday.
He declined to comment further.
“There is very little I can say until the disciplinary hearing is conducted,” Schultz said. “I can say the reason he is on leave is related to the incident.”
Schultz has acknowledged that “mistakes” were made during the incident, and he has drafted a new policy on how to deal with onlookers.
He has met with members of the local news media to discuss the new policy.
An Albuquerque police officer who was captured on video attacking a KOB-TV news photographer has been placed on leave.
Officer Daniel Guzman, who had been working with another officer since the May 29 incident, is to appear at a disciplinary hearing next week. Afterward, Police Chief Ray Schultz will decide what disciplinary action, if any, should be taken against the officer.
Veteran KOB photographer Rick Foley was covering a police standoff near Copper and Charleston NE when Guzman, a rookie, told Foley to move to a different location, according to a police report. Foley was some distance from the police cars blocking the street and outside an area that had been blocked by officers.
Shortly after Guzman told Foley to move, the two argued, and Foley asked Guzman for his name and badge number.
A video captured by Foley's camera shows the officer lunging at him. Foley was handcuffed, placed in the back of a police car and cited for refusing to obey an officer.
Foley has a court appearance today in Metropolitan Court. In a statement released through his attorney, Foley on Monday called for Guzman to seek dismissal of the charges.
“In my 27 years covering the news, I have never interfered in officers performing their difficult jobs, nor would I,” the statement said. “My father was a career police officer, and I have been brought up with the greatest respect for the job they do. Yet one officer found time to grab me on a public street, handcuff me, place me in a police car and prevent me from doing mine.
“I hope the officer will do the correct thing and dismiss this criminal case.”
Shortly after the incident, Schultz asked the city's independent review officer to conduct the investigation.
Schultz said he made the decision to place Guzman on leave after reading the independent review officer's report, which he received Friday.
He declined to comment further.
“There is very little I can say until the disciplinary hearing is conducted,” Schultz said. “I can say the reason he is on leave is related to the incident.”
Schultz has acknowledged that “mistakes” were made during the incident, and he has drafted a new policy on how to deal with onlookers.
He has met with members of the local news media to discuss the new policy.
Sunday, June 29, 2008
Does Law Aid Officers, Or Is It Abused by Them?
Sunday, June 29, 2008
By T.J. Wilham, Journal Staff Writer Copyright © 2008 Albuquerque Journal
You could be arrested for having a party.
Interrupting a police officer could land you in jail.
And if you videotape a crime scene on a public street, you could be cuffed, thrown in a police car and charged.
All of this has happened in Albuquerque: people engaged in what appear to be legal acts arrested and charged by police for “refusing to obey” a lawful order.
But are the orders lawful and is refusing to obey them a crime that is jokingly referred to in legal circles as “contempt of cop”?
It’s not a joke, of course. In addition to a possible trip to jail that night, refusing to obey carries a fine of up to $500 plus up to 90 days in the slammer.
But the charges frequently wash out when they hit the courthouse.
In 2007, Metropolitan Court judges dismissed 70 percent of the refusing to obey charge in 517 arrests made by police and sheriff’s deputies in Bernalillo County under a city ordinance called “resisting, obstructing or refusing to obey an officer.”
The top reason: 45 percent of the dismissals were due to a lack of prosecution, the officer was unwilling to proceed with the charges in court, a lack of probable cause or proper reports were not filed. Thirty percent of the dismissals were due to a plea agreement in which the defendant pleaded guilty to other charges.
“This law they are arresting people under is unconstitutional,” said Albuquerque attorney Ray Twohig. “Police in Albuquerque think they can give whatever order they want. You have constitutional violations happening in Albuquerque wholesale.”
The city ordinance that gives police the authority to arrest someone who disobeys them was adopted in 1973, a year before the city charter was written. Part of the ordinance says a person can be charged if he or she refuses to obey or comply with any lawful process or order given by a police officer. Anyone found guilty could be sentenced to up to 90 days in jail.
Albuquerque Police Chief Ray Schultz said the ordinance is needed because officers face situations when they have no choice but to arrest someone to avoid violence.
For example, police might respond to a domestic violence call in which both sides are arguing, and the situation will likely escalate. Officers will ask one side of the dispute to leave in order to avoid violence. If they don’t, they get arrested.
Many of these cases get dismissed.
Overlapping laws
Defense attorneys like Twohig question why the ordinance is needed since New Mexico already has a law called “resisting, evading or obstructing an officer.”
Twohig said the city ordinance gives police too much authority and is much more broad than state law, which does not include the word “obey.”
“Police in Albuquerque have more power than officers in any other jurisdiction in the state,” said Twohig, who last year represented a Roswell city councilwoman who successfully fought her arrest under the state’s version of the law. “You have a whole lot of people being arrested in Albuquerque for ‘contempt of cop,’ and it seems to me this law encourages it.”
Schultz acknowledged that sometimes it is questionable whether the order is lawful, but, he said, that’s what the courts are for.
“The courts recognize it’s a tool that law enforcement has to use to separate parties or to get someone to do something they don’t want to do,” Schultz said. “Without that tool, it would ratchet it up to the next level, and it is going to result in physical violence or a serious crime as a result of the parties not being separated.”
The ordinance does not explain what a “lawful order” is. According to legal experts, it’s a “gray area.”
Retired Judge Woody Smith said that when he was on the District Court bench, he judged each case individually and always looked for whether someone’s constitutional rights were violated by the order.
“You can’t define what a lawful order is,” said Smith, also a former prosecutor, Metropolitan Court judge and public defender. “It depends on the circumstances. Police have a lot of discretion, and lot of times it is determined after all of the facts are known.”
Smith noted that he felt the law at times was “overused” and certain police officers tended to use it more than others.
Schultz said most of the arrests are coupled with other charges. In the rare circumstances in which someone is only charged with refusing to obey, those arrests are closely scrutinized by supervisors who review the arresting officer’s report and criminal complaint to make sure there is enough probable cause.
“A clear majority of the cases, had the person just left the area and done what they were being asked, they wouldn’t have been arrested,” Schultz said. “These charges are the result of someone saying ‘No, I don’t want to, I don’t have to.’
“The officer just can’t leave — then the calling party would be upset at us for not intervening. This charge is used as a last resort. When the officer has no other option.”
TV photographer
The law was spotlighted last month when KOB-TV cameraman Rick Foley was arrested for refusing to obey an officer.
Foley was covering a police standoff May 29 near Copper and Charleston NE when rookie officer Daniel Guzman told Foley to move to a different location, according to a police report.
Foley at the time was some distance from the police cars blocking the street and was outside an area that had been blocked by officers.
Shortly after Guzman told Foley he needed to move, the two exchanged more words and Foley asked Guzman to provide his name and badge number.
A video captured by Foley’s camera shows the officer lunging at Foley. Foley was handcuffed, placed in the back of a police car and cited.
An investigation into Guzman’s conduct is under way, while criminal charges against Foley are pending.
Since then, Schultz has acknowledged that “mistakes” were made and has drafted a new policy on how to deal with onlookers. Guzman, meanwhile, has been paired with a veteran officer until the investigation is complete .
Recent cases
After Foley’s arrest, the Journal examined 36 recent arrests in which the defendant was charged only with “refusing to obey” an officer under the city ordinance.
Some of those arrests include:
Nestor Pons Ocana, 47, was arrested May 4 after he interrupted an Albuquerque police officer. According to court records, Ocana was a passenger in a car that was stopped for a noise violation. The officer was citing the driver for the violation when Ocana told the driver not to sign the citation because the officer’s action was “racist.” The officer noted that he told Ocana to be quiet, but Ocana continued to yell, preventing the officer from hearing the driver. Charges against Ocana were dismissed due to a “lack of probable cause.”
Raymond Medina, 37, was arrested Dec. 29 because he refused to end a party at his apartment. Officers had responded to a noise complaint. When they arrived, police told Medina that he had to end the party. Medina said he would “keep it down,” but officers insisted the party was over and his guests had to leave.
Medina refused, saying he didn’t want his guests to get DWIs. An officer then stuck his foot in front of Medina’s door, preventing him from closing it, and took him into custody. Charges against Medina were dismissed due to a lack of prosecution. Medina was never charged with violating the city’s noise ordinance. Even if he had been, city attorneys acknowledge, officers can’t force everyone to leave.
Antonio Serna, 39, was arrested Dec. 4 when he initially refused to let police into his house. The officers did not have a warrant. According to court records, officers were looking for Serna’s son in connection with a child abuse case. They went to Serna’s home looking for him. Serna told officers his son was not home. When officers insisted on searching Serna’s house, Serna responded that they needed a warrant and tried to shut the door. The officers said Serna was “preventing the possibility of further investigation.” The officers peeked in, saw his son and arrested both of them. Refusing to obey charges against Serna were dismissed because officers failed to file a report.
Peter Simonson, New Mexico director of the American Civil Liberties Union, said his organization has received several complaints from people arrested under the city ordinance. The ACLU has successfully represented clients charged under the ordinance.
He said he doesn’t think the law is unconstitutional, just APD’s interpretation of it.
Simonson said he takes issue with Schultz’s theory of letting the courts sort things out.
“It shouldn’t have to get to that point,” Simonson said. “It is up to the police to properly enforce a law like this and not rely on the court to correct their errors. People should not have to go to court to prove they were not violating the law.”
Robert Saavedra decided not to prove his innocence.
Saavedra and his friend were Downtown on Dec. 21 when someone shot his friend’s truck.
They waited for several hours while police investigated. After awhile, Saavedra and his friend thought the investigation was over, so they started to get in the truck to leave, Saavedra said.
Officers got upset and took Saavedra’s friend into custody for refusing to obey, he said. Saavedra, who was not in the truck, called his friend’s brother to tell him what was going on when officers told him to leave the scene and to get off the cell phone.
Officers said in a criminal complaint that Saavedra took one step back, but proceeded to make a phone call and refused to move back on the sidewalk.
Saavedra was then arrested and taken to jail with his friend.
Saavedra decided not to fight the charges. He said he didn’t have enough money to hire an attorney. Instead, he said the officer told him that if he paid some fines and agreed to stay out of trouble, his case would be dismissed.
According to metro court records, that occurred in 16 percent of the cases in 2007.
“I didn’t back-talk him. I wasn’t mean. I just tried to explain that I was on the phone with my buddy’s brother so he could bond him out,” Saavedra said. “They didn’t want to listen. They just wanted to take someone to jail that night.”
In Saavedra’s criminal complaint, the arresting officers maintained that Saavedra refused to leave the area despite being told several times to do so.
Similar laws exist throughout the country.
But over time, some jurisdictions have eliminated the laws because homeless advocates have challenged their use, said William Walsh, a former New York City police officer and director of the Southern Police Institute in Louisville, Ky. Walsh said a similar law was in place when he was a police officer in New York City in the 1960s.
He said that officers mainly used the law when they needed to arrest someone involved in a riot, and he cautioned against getting rid of such laws.
“Police officers get called to disputes, and they are expected to settle them. They can’t walk away,” Walsh said. “The only tools they have is their own persuasion, their use of force and the law.”
City Code 12-2-19 RESISTING, OBSTRUCTING OR REFUSING TO OBEY AN OFFICER.
Resisting, obstructing or refusing to obey an officer consists of either:
(A) Knowingly obstructing, resisting or opposing any officer of this state or any other duly authorized person serving or attempting to serve or execute any process or any rule or order of any of the courts of this state or any other judicial writ or process; or
(B) Resisting or abusing any judge, magistrate or peace officer in the lawful discharge of his duties; or
(C) Refusing to obey or comply with any lawful process or order given by any police officer acting in the lawful discharge of his duties; or
(D) Interfering with, obstructing or opposing any officer in the lawful discharge of his regular and affixed duties.
By T.J. Wilham, Journal Staff Writer Copyright © 2008 Albuquerque Journal
You could be arrested for having a party.
Interrupting a police officer could land you in jail.
And if you videotape a crime scene on a public street, you could be cuffed, thrown in a police car and charged.
All of this has happened in Albuquerque: people engaged in what appear to be legal acts arrested and charged by police for “refusing to obey” a lawful order.
But are the orders lawful and is refusing to obey them a crime that is jokingly referred to in legal circles as “contempt of cop”?
It’s not a joke, of course. In addition to a possible trip to jail that night, refusing to obey carries a fine of up to $500 plus up to 90 days in the slammer.
But the charges frequently wash out when they hit the courthouse.
In 2007, Metropolitan Court judges dismissed 70 percent of the refusing to obey charge in 517 arrests made by police and sheriff’s deputies in Bernalillo County under a city ordinance called “resisting, obstructing or refusing to obey an officer.”
The top reason: 45 percent of the dismissals were due to a lack of prosecution, the officer was unwilling to proceed with the charges in court, a lack of probable cause or proper reports were not filed. Thirty percent of the dismissals were due to a plea agreement in which the defendant pleaded guilty to other charges.
“This law they are arresting people under is unconstitutional,” said Albuquerque attorney Ray Twohig. “Police in Albuquerque think they can give whatever order they want. You have constitutional violations happening in Albuquerque wholesale.”
The city ordinance that gives police the authority to arrest someone who disobeys them was adopted in 1973, a year before the city charter was written. Part of the ordinance says a person can be charged if he or she refuses to obey or comply with any lawful process or order given by a police officer. Anyone found guilty could be sentenced to up to 90 days in jail.
Albuquerque Police Chief Ray Schultz said the ordinance is needed because officers face situations when they have no choice but to arrest someone to avoid violence.
For example, police might respond to a domestic violence call in which both sides are arguing, and the situation will likely escalate. Officers will ask one side of the dispute to leave in order to avoid violence. If they don’t, they get arrested.
Many of these cases get dismissed.
Overlapping laws
Defense attorneys like Twohig question why the ordinance is needed since New Mexico already has a law called “resisting, evading or obstructing an officer.”
Twohig said the city ordinance gives police too much authority and is much more broad than state law, which does not include the word “obey.”
“Police in Albuquerque have more power than officers in any other jurisdiction in the state,” said Twohig, who last year represented a Roswell city councilwoman who successfully fought her arrest under the state’s version of the law. “You have a whole lot of people being arrested in Albuquerque for ‘contempt of cop,’ and it seems to me this law encourages it.”
Schultz acknowledged that sometimes it is questionable whether the order is lawful, but, he said, that’s what the courts are for.
“The courts recognize it’s a tool that law enforcement has to use to separate parties or to get someone to do something they don’t want to do,” Schultz said. “Without that tool, it would ratchet it up to the next level, and it is going to result in physical violence or a serious crime as a result of the parties not being separated.”
The ordinance does not explain what a “lawful order” is. According to legal experts, it’s a “gray area.”
Retired Judge Woody Smith said that when he was on the District Court bench, he judged each case individually and always looked for whether someone’s constitutional rights were violated by the order.
“You can’t define what a lawful order is,” said Smith, also a former prosecutor, Metropolitan Court judge and public defender. “It depends on the circumstances. Police have a lot of discretion, and lot of times it is determined after all of the facts are known.”
Smith noted that he felt the law at times was “overused” and certain police officers tended to use it more than others.
Schultz said most of the arrests are coupled with other charges. In the rare circumstances in which someone is only charged with refusing to obey, those arrests are closely scrutinized by supervisors who review the arresting officer’s report and criminal complaint to make sure there is enough probable cause.
“A clear majority of the cases, had the person just left the area and done what they were being asked, they wouldn’t have been arrested,” Schultz said. “These charges are the result of someone saying ‘No, I don’t want to, I don’t have to.’
“The officer just can’t leave — then the calling party would be upset at us for not intervening. This charge is used as a last resort. When the officer has no other option.”
TV photographer
The law was spotlighted last month when KOB-TV cameraman Rick Foley was arrested for refusing to obey an officer.
Foley was covering a police standoff May 29 near Copper and Charleston NE when rookie officer Daniel Guzman told Foley to move to a different location, according to a police report.
Foley at the time was some distance from the police cars blocking the street and was outside an area that had been blocked by officers.
Shortly after Guzman told Foley he needed to move, the two exchanged more words and Foley asked Guzman to provide his name and badge number.
A video captured by Foley’s camera shows the officer lunging at Foley. Foley was handcuffed, placed in the back of a police car and cited.
An investigation into Guzman’s conduct is under way, while criminal charges against Foley are pending.
Since then, Schultz has acknowledged that “mistakes” were made and has drafted a new policy on how to deal with onlookers. Guzman, meanwhile, has been paired with a veteran officer until the investigation is complete .
Recent cases
After Foley’s arrest, the Journal examined 36 recent arrests in which the defendant was charged only with “refusing to obey” an officer under the city ordinance.
Some of those arrests include:
Nestor Pons Ocana, 47, was arrested May 4 after he interrupted an Albuquerque police officer. According to court records, Ocana was a passenger in a car that was stopped for a noise violation. The officer was citing the driver for the violation when Ocana told the driver not to sign the citation because the officer’s action was “racist.” The officer noted that he told Ocana to be quiet, but Ocana continued to yell, preventing the officer from hearing the driver. Charges against Ocana were dismissed due to a “lack of probable cause.”
Raymond Medina, 37, was arrested Dec. 29 because he refused to end a party at his apartment. Officers had responded to a noise complaint. When they arrived, police told Medina that he had to end the party. Medina said he would “keep it down,” but officers insisted the party was over and his guests had to leave.
Medina refused, saying he didn’t want his guests to get DWIs. An officer then stuck his foot in front of Medina’s door, preventing him from closing it, and took him into custody. Charges against Medina were dismissed due to a lack of prosecution. Medina was never charged with violating the city’s noise ordinance. Even if he had been, city attorneys acknowledge, officers can’t force everyone to leave.
Antonio Serna, 39, was arrested Dec. 4 when he initially refused to let police into his house. The officers did not have a warrant. According to court records, officers were looking for Serna’s son in connection with a child abuse case. They went to Serna’s home looking for him. Serna told officers his son was not home. When officers insisted on searching Serna’s house, Serna responded that they needed a warrant and tried to shut the door. The officers said Serna was “preventing the possibility of further investigation.” The officers peeked in, saw his son and arrested both of them. Refusing to obey charges against Serna were dismissed because officers failed to file a report.
Peter Simonson, New Mexico director of the American Civil Liberties Union, said his organization has received several complaints from people arrested under the city ordinance. The ACLU has successfully represented clients charged under the ordinance.
He said he doesn’t think the law is unconstitutional, just APD’s interpretation of it.
Simonson said he takes issue with Schultz’s theory of letting the courts sort things out.
“It shouldn’t have to get to that point,” Simonson said. “It is up to the police to properly enforce a law like this and not rely on the court to correct their errors. People should not have to go to court to prove they were not violating the law.”
Robert Saavedra decided not to prove his innocence.
Saavedra and his friend were Downtown on Dec. 21 when someone shot his friend’s truck.
They waited for several hours while police investigated. After awhile, Saavedra and his friend thought the investigation was over, so they started to get in the truck to leave, Saavedra said.
Officers got upset and took Saavedra’s friend into custody for refusing to obey, he said. Saavedra, who was not in the truck, called his friend’s brother to tell him what was going on when officers told him to leave the scene and to get off the cell phone.
Officers said in a criminal complaint that Saavedra took one step back, but proceeded to make a phone call and refused to move back on the sidewalk.
Saavedra was then arrested and taken to jail with his friend.
Saavedra decided not to fight the charges. He said he didn’t have enough money to hire an attorney. Instead, he said the officer told him that if he paid some fines and agreed to stay out of trouble, his case would be dismissed.
According to metro court records, that occurred in 16 percent of the cases in 2007.
“I didn’t back-talk him. I wasn’t mean. I just tried to explain that I was on the phone with my buddy’s brother so he could bond him out,” Saavedra said. “They didn’t want to listen. They just wanted to take someone to jail that night.”
In Saavedra’s criminal complaint, the arresting officers maintained that Saavedra refused to leave the area despite being told several times to do so.
Similar laws exist throughout the country.
But over time, some jurisdictions have eliminated the laws because homeless advocates have challenged their use, said William Walsh, a former New York City police officer and director of the Southern Police Institute in Louisville, Ky. Walsh said a similar law was in place when he was a police officer in New York City in the 1960s.
He said that officers mainly used the law when they needed to arrest someone involved in a riot, and he cautioned against getting rid of such laws.
“Police officers get called to disputes, and they are expected to settle them. They can’t walk away,” Walsh said. “The only tools they have is their own persuasion, their use of force and the law.”
City Code 12-2-19 RESISTING, OBSTRUCTING OR REFUSING TO OBEY AN OFFICER.
Resisting, obstructing or refusing to obey an officer consists of either:
(A) Knowingly obstructing, resisting or opposing any officer of this state or any other duly authorized person serving or attempting to serve or execute any process or any rule or order of any of the courts of this state or any other judicial writ or process; or
(B) Resisting or abusing any judge, magistrate or peace officer in the lawful discharge of his duties; or
(C) Refusing to obey or comply with any lawful process or order given by any police officer acting in the lawful discharge of his duties; or
(D) Interfering with, obstructing or opposing any officer in the lawful discharge of his regular and affixed duties.
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