Brutalized & Arrested in Cleveland for Posting "Bush Step Down" Posters
From: Steering Committee info@meetup.com
Subject: Brutalized & Arrested in Cleveland for Posting "Bush Step Down" Posters Date: Fri, 3 Feb 2006 14:27:27 -0500 (EST)
Your Organizer, Steering Committee, sent the following message to the members of The Broward County Impeach Bush Meetup Group:
The following is a first-hand account of police harrassment and brutality against a World Can't Wait organizer in Cleveland. If anything like this happens to you, let us know asap! Contact info@worldcantwait.org.
My name is Carol Fisher, and I am on the staff of Revolution Books in Cleveland OH. At the bookstore we have been immersed in building and supporting the initiatives of World Cant Wait. Yesterday, 1.28.06 I had set out from my house to post materials about our upcoming Cleveland event to Drown Out the State of the Union address, and the call to march around the White House on Feb. 4th.
I drove down a street in Cleveland Heights, another area known for its diversity and progressive history. Before long a cop called from across the street: "Ma'am! Hundred dollar fine unless you take those posters down." He is pursuing me across the street. OK fine, I say, I will take them down (not wanting to get into a confrontation, because I have lots to do today!) But this too is not enough for the cop. He wants my ID. I say I dont have my ID. He grabs my arm. I say let go of me, I am not doing anything wrong, I will take the posters down. People are watching to see what happens, are outraged but very afraid. The cop wont let go, he clearly wants more grief from me, and he is in the spotlight. He wants people to be scared. He pushes me against a store window and next thing I know I am face down on the sidewalk with two cops on top of me, one with his knee in my back. I am trying to call out to people, to tell them what the posters are about. They keep pushing my face into the sidewalk. I cant breathe.
I am 53 years old, not exactly a spring chicken. A hand comes down again to push my chin against the concrete. By this time there are four cops on the scene. My hands are tightly cuffed behind my back. They lift me up and shove me onto a parkbench and shackle my legs. I am still calling out, telling people what this is about. One of the cops says to me, "Shut up or I will kill you!", "I am sick of this anti-Bush shit!" "You are definitely going to the psyche ward." Then somebody calls the EMS, and a fire squad shows up.
I am lifted into the EMS truck, hands still cuffed behind my back. At the hospital, I am treated as an arch-criminal. Escorted by four policemen, I shuffle into the emergency room, legs still shackled, covered with leaves and mud. I think to myself, if I was Black, I would not have made it this far. I would probably be dead by now. People in the emergency room are shocked by the scene and by what I am saying happened. I probably do look pretty crazy by now.
They put me on a gurney and pull the curtains around. One female nurse and four male cops. I am cuffed to the bed.
After many hours a psychiatrist appears to determine my sanity. I dont want to talk to him, but have no choice.
I dont know it at the time, but outside in the waiting room all hell had broken loose. In a very short period of time, over a dozen WCW people showed up at the emergency room to demand that someone be allowed to see me.
At one point, there was a big confrontation between the WCW people and the police, right in the ER. My supporters said that we weren't going to leave until someone saw me. Some of them were sitting in the waiting room holding the big green WCW posters.
The police threatened WCW folks with arrest! They argued, stood their ground, called this shameful (both to the police but also to the nurses who did nothing to stand against this s...). The cops kept saying that there was no legal right to see me, but people responded that, in Bush's America, the law is whatever the police say it is and that there is a moral and ethical right to to check on someone who is in the hospital.
I was released on my own recognizance. The battle is far from over. This is but one example of the attempts that the state, their authorities and spokespeople will make to try to keep us from opposing the crimes of this regime, and especially now, 2 days before the State of the Union address. Our cause is as righteous as it gets, and no attempts to intimidate or suppress, with threats or laws or physical abuse, should stop us but instead strengthen the resolve, build our organization and further demonstrate to the world that this regime is doomed, they are vicious, and they must be stopped.
As it says in the Call, "If we speak the truth, they will try to silence us. If we act, they will try to stop us. But we speak for the majority, here and around the world, and as we get this going we are going to reach out to the people who have been so badly fooled by Sush and we are NOT going to stop...The future is unwritten. Which one we get is up to us."
Call the Cleveland Heights Police at 216-291-3883
Call Cleveland Heights City Hall at 216-291-4444
Please contact us at cleveland@worldcantwait.org or 216-633-6200
To visit The Broward County Impeach Bush Meetup Group, go here: http://impeachbush.meetup.com/83/
Informant: Be Kind Whenever Possible
http://omega.twoday.net/search?q=impeach
http://omega.twoday.net/search?q=Downing+Street+Memo
Subject: Brutalized & Arrested in Cleveland for Posting "Bush Step Down" Posters Date: Fri, 3 Feb 2006 14:27:27 -0500 (EST)
Your Organizer, Steering Committee, sent the following message to the members of The Broward County Impeach Bush Meetup Group:
The following is a first-hand account of police harrassment and brutality against a World Can't Wait organizer in Cleveland. If anything like this happens to you, let us know asap! Contact info@worldcantwait.org.
My name is Carol Fisher, and I am on the staff of Revolution Books in Cleveland OH. At the bookstore we have been immersed in building and supporting the initiatives of World Cant Wait. Yesterday, 1.28.06 I had set out from my house to post materials about our upcoming Cleveland event to Drown Out the State of the Union address, and the call to march around the White House on Feb. 4th.
I drove down a street in Cleveland Heights, another area known for its diversity and progressive history. Before long a cop called from across the street: "Ma'am! Hundred dollar fine unless you take those posters down." He is pursuing me across the street. OK fine, I say, I will take them down (not wanting to get into a confrontation, because I have lots to do today!) But this too is not enough for the cop. He wants my ID. I say I dont have my ID. He grabs my arm. I say let go of me, I am not doing anything wrong, I will take the posters down. People are watching to see what happens, are outraged but very afraid. The cop wont let go, he clearly wants more grief from me, and he is in the spotlight. He wants people to be scared. He pushes me against a store window and next thing I know I am face down on the sidewalk with two cops on top of me, one with his knee in my back. I am trying to call out to people, to tell them what the posters are about. They keep pushing my face into the sidewalk. I cant breathe.
I am 53 years old, not exactly a spring chicken. A hand comes down again to push my chin against the concrete. By this time there are four cops on the scene. My hands are tightly cuffed behind my back. They lift me up and shove me onto a parkbench and shackle my legs. I am still calling out, telling people what this is about. One of the cops says to me, "Shut up or I will kill you!", "I am sick of this anti-Bush shit!" "You are definitely going to the psyche ward." Then somebody calls the EMS, and a fire squad shows up.
I am lifted into the EMS truck, hands still cuffed behind my back. At the hospital, I am treated as an arch-criminal. Escorted by four policemen, I shuffle into the emergency room, legs still shackled, covered with leaves and mud. I think to myself, if I was Black, I would not have made it this far. I would probably be dead by now. People in the emergency room are shocked by the scene and by what I am saying happened. I probably do look pretty crazy by now.
They put me on a gurney and pull the curtains around. One female nurse and four male cops. I am cuffed to the bed.
After many hours a psychiatrist appears to determine my sanity. I dont want to talk to him, but have no choice.
I dont know it at the time, but outside in the waiting room all hell had broken loose. In a very short period of time, over a dozen WCW people showed up at the emergency room to demand that someone be allowed to see me.
At one point, there was a big confrontation between the WCW people and the police, right in the ER. My supporters said that we weren't going to leave until someone saw me. Some of them were sitting in the waiting room holding the big green WCW posters.
The police threatened WCW folks with arrest! They argued, stood their ground, called this shameful (both to the police but also to the nurses who did nothing to stand against this s...). The cops kept saying that there was no legal right to see me, but people responded that, in Bush's America, the law is whatever the police say it is and that there is a moral and ethical right to to check on someone who is in the hospital.
I was released on my own recognizance. The battle is far from over. This is but one example of the attempts that the state, their authorities and spokespeople will make to try to keep us from opposing the crimes of this regime, and especially now, 2 days before the State of the Union address. Our cause is as righteous as it gets, and no attempts to intimidate or suppress, with threats or laws or physical abuse, should stop us but instead strengthen the resolve, build our organization and further demonstrate to the world that this regime is doomed, they are vicious, and they must be stopped.
As it says in the Call, "If we speak the truth, they will try to silence us. If we act, they will try to stop us. But we speak for the majority, here and around the world, and as we get this going we are going to reach out to the people who have been so badly fooled by Sush and we are NOT going to stop...The future is unwritten. Which one we get is up to us."
Call the Cleveland Heights Police at 216-291-3883
Call Cleveland Heights City Hall at 216-291-4444
Please contact us at cleveland@worldcantwait.org or 216-633-6200
To visit The Broward County Impeach Bush Meetup Group, go here: http://impeachbush.meetup.com/83/
Informant: Be Kind Whenever Possible
http://omega.twoday.net/search?q=impeach
http://omega.twoday.net/search?q=Downing+Street+Memo
rudkla - 4. Feb, 10:54
