From the San Francisco Chronicle via RSN
Oakland police have begun arresting protesters at the sprawling Occupy Oakland encampment outside City Hall while hundreds of law-enforcement officers square off against protesters downtown in the second such raid of the tent city.
Law-enforcement officers from numerous Bay Area agencies began arriving in force at 5 a.m. as a police helicopter flew overhead. Clad in armor and riot helmets, they stood in lines and surrounded the camp near the corner of 14th Street and Broadway adjacent to Frank Ogawa Plaza, where dozens of demonstrators have been camping to protest economic inequity and corporate greed.
About 6 a.m., police began arresting protesters at an “interfaith tent” on the plaza, 40 minutes after police issued an order to disperse. They sang “We Shall Overcome” as they were handcuffed. Other officers have begun clearing out tents on the plaza and have set up metal barricades at the corner.
The bulk of the protesters were outside the camp, milling about at 14th and Broadway, where some danced a few feet from police while others marched in a circle. A number of protesters are wearing bandanas, gas masks and goggles.
Shon Kae, 30, of San Francisco said protesters have separated themselves into two group, one to defend the tent city, the other to protest as police move in.
Although the camp has dwindled in recent days from about 150 tents to 60 or 70, some protesters have defied repeated orders by Oakland police to leave.
Boots Riley, a longtime protester at the camp, said, “Whatever they do, they’re going to just make us keep going. They’re in a lose-lose situation. The camp is not going to go away.”
Others, like Andre Little, 38, an artist, said he would go to another city park tonight “but I’ll come back.”
Luke Glassy, 19, said he would be in the camp when police arrive. “I’m going to jail tonight. With pleasure,” he said.
Paul Bloom, 64, of San Francisco also said he was prepared to be arrested.
“It’s sad that the forces that be don’t know this is such a powerful movement,” Bloom said. “The movement will continue and will return.”
Rodrigo Gomez, 19, and Sage Conary, 19, have barricaded their tent with a couch and chairs.
But Ronald “Rasta” Jones had already abandoned his tent this morning. “We’re going to make the job easy for them. I can’t go to jail,” Jones said, adding however, “If they take over the camp, we’re going to reoccupy. Our objective is for them to keep spending money. We are not going to stop.”
BART has shut down the 12th Street City Center Station. No trains will stop at the station, the transit agency said.
Oakland city officials who work at City Hall and nearby buildings have been told to delay their arrival until 10 a.m.
Officers this morning came from throughout the Bay Area, including deputies from Alameda County and officers from along the Peninsula, including Burlingame, Foster City, Broadmoor, Daly City and Pacifica police. San Jose officers and Santa Clara sheriff’s deputies were among those in the plaza.
The tent city was the subject of a previous police raid at 5 a.m. Oct. 25. Mayor Jean Quan approved the raid but allowed protesters to rebuild. A peaceful march to the Port of Oakland on Nov. 2 devolved into rioting and the setting of fires later that evening just blocks from the camp, which first sprang up on Oct. 10.
On Sunday, officials issued their third eviction notice to the campers, who mostly ignored it.
Today’s police action prompted Quan’s legal advisor, Dan Siegel, to resign his position. He said the city should have worked harder to work with the campers.
Siegel said, “The city sent police to evict this camp, arrest people and potentially hurt them. Obviously, we’re not on the same page. It’s an amazing show of force to move tents from a public place.”
City officials also broadened the crackdown to three other parks where protesters have erected smaller, satellite camps: Snow Park, Jefferson Park and Lafayette Square, all in the greater downtown area.
Drug use and violence have increased at the camps, leaving downtown workers intimidated and business owners crippled economically, city officials said. On Thursday, a young man was shot and killed ust outside the main camp after a fight.
Police on Sunday identified the victim as Kayode Ola Foster, 25, of Oakland and said his family indicated he had recently been staying at the Occupy camp. No arrests have been made, but police said the suspect was also a “frequent resident” of the tent city.
The Oakland mayor’s legal adviser has resigned, and says support Occupy!
http://www.sott.net/articles/show/237627-Oakland-Mayor-s-Legal-Adviser-Resigns-Over-Raid-and-Says-Support-Occupy-Oakland-Not-the-1-and-its-Government-Facilitators-
Here is the AlterNet version of the story — somewhat more useful.
Thousands of Riot Cops Descend on Occupy Oakland, 32 Arrested
Police eviction proves definitively that previous hyper-militarized tactics were unnecessary excessive force.
At approximately 5 am, hundreds of police officers clad in heavy riot gear descended on the Occupy Oakland encampment at Frank Ogawa Plaza and proved definitively that the hyper-militarized crowd control tactics that brought so much national attention to the city in recent weeks were unnecessary uses of excessive force.
Several local police agencies contributed as many as 1,000 officers for the eviction, according to reports. They shut down a wide perimeter around the plaza and then moved up, block by block, in heavy lines, until the mass of protesters was pushed into the intersection of 14th and Broadway. Then, a large phalanx of riot police moved into the plaza itself, where they arrested 32 people who had chosen to remain in the camp in an act of civil disobedience.
At one point, police moved in and arrested about a dozen people huddled in a circle in silent prayer at the interfaith tent.
When I departed, police were tearing down tents and clearing the plaza. There were no reports of injuries, according to a National Lawyers Guild legal observer on the scene.
This was a striking departure from the tactics that Bay Area law enforcement agencies, working in cooperation with the Oakland Police Department, had employed on October 25th and the night of November 2nd. While police crowd control techniques are rarely pretty, people facing off with riot police as part of various occupations around the country probably don’t have a good sense of the force used during the first eviction of Occupy Oakland – and during subsequent protests the following night.
It’s the explosions and large volume of gunshots that made these actions excessive. The generous use of flash-bang grenades, tear gas and “less lethal” rounds deployed by police in heavy black body armor felt more like the opening scene to Saving Private Ryan than footage of, say, protests against the Vietnam War being broken up by helmeted police swinging batons. While the weapons deployed by police are designed not to kill or maim (if used properly), the visceral sensation of walking through streets dodging explosions and chemical agents while rounds crackle in the air creates an effect similar to that of actual combat – abject terror, disorientation and a sense of unease that lingers for days.
Those weapons do result in wounds – the tally for October 25 and November 2 was three broken hands, two head injuries (one of which, to Iraq war veteran Scott Olsen, was quite severe), a ruptured spleen and minor injuries too numerous to catalogue.
This morning, the police, buffeted by bad publicity resulting from two notably violent crack-downs on protesters, simply chose a different method by which to achieve the exact same goal. This time, they chose to follow the book – California’s Crowd Management and Civil Disobedience guidelines (PDF) state, “Only that force which is objectively reasonable may be used to arrest violators and restore order,” and, unlike on previous nights in the streets of Oakland, they did just that.
In another departure from past practices, they let the protesters protest. Whereas police issued a series of orders to disperse on the evening of October 25 – and then unleashed a barrage of non-lethal weapons when they did not comply – this time they simply let the crowd blow off steam. The police erected and manned barricades to keep protesters in the intersection, where they chanted for an hour or two before losing steam and dispersing, without violence and of their own accord.
What this morning’s eviction had in common with the one two weeks before is that the end-game is just as unclear. Protesters again promise to reclaim the plaza as soon as police leave. The Oakland City Council has reportedly entertained a proposal to hire private security guards to keep the plaza clear, but this is a cash-strapped city and one has to believe that the Occupiers’ resolve will outlast the city’s private security budget.
Meanwhile, the occupiers plan to “reconvene” at 4 pm at the main branch of the Oakland Public Library. It remains to be seen if the city’s smarter, less violent crowd control strategies will continue to prevail.
— By Joshua Holland | Sourced from 358
Posted at November 14, 2011, 9:11 am
Deservedly separate praise for the well-rendered photograph. It is especially poignant after today’s short-sighted police action in Oakland (and the immediately previous police action in Portland). Now we know what happened to Brontes, Steropes and Arges (who should lose the awful tie).
Thank you for posting this update. Dan Siegel’s action and quote really say it all. To use so much force in bad faith is an over-reaction originating in fear, rationalized by lies, setting a regrettable precedent. The right of the people to peaceably assemble…