[mobglob-discuss] Miami police state actions condemned

[Kimball Cariou]

This may interest some on the list....

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Miami 'police state' actions condemned

by Terrie Albano

People's Weekly World Newspaper, 11/26/03 09:02

MIAMI ­ Calling it a "military operation," Stop the Free Trade Area of the 
Americas organizers condemned the "unprecedented, unnecessary and 
unprovoked" police use of force here Nov. 20 against law-abiding, peaceful 
protesters.

Police in 21st century "robo-cop" gear attacked protesters with tear gas, 
stun guns and rubber bullets, creating terror and panic. Demonstrators 
suffered stinging eyes and throats, welts, bruises and bleeding.

Some 25,000 workers, students, environmentalists, religious activists, 
artists, farmers, immigrants and retirees had come from around the country 
and hemisphere, to voice opposition to the FTAA, the proposed hemispheric 
(except for Cuba) "free trade" agreement. The demonstrators say the FTAA 
would give too much power to corporations, sacrificing jobs, workers' 
rights, wages, the environment, agriculture, democracy and local community 
control throughout the Americas.

Participants were listening to post-march speeches at the Bayside 
amphitheater and relaxing on the street, some dancing in front of police 
lines, when the police, without warning, fired tear gas and rubber bullets 
at them. Thousands, including retirees, were forced to run for cover. Many 
were trapped by lines of advancing police.

Biscayne Boulevard, Miami's main downtown strip, looked like a war zone 
during the two-hour police riot. Demonstrators holed up at a nearby hotel 
watched the scene in horror. Police and embedded reporters wore gas masks 
while an armored personnel carrier patrolled the streets. Hundreds of 
people were trapped on one side of the street with nowhere to go. Those on 
the other side were forced to flee into nearby neighborhoods.

Thea Lee, the AFL-CIO's chief international economist, who stands just over 
five feet, told a press conference Nov. 21, that she had encountered a 
group of senior citizens trying to find their bus. They were trapped 
between two advancing police lines. "Our senior citizens were absolutely 
terrified, as was I," Lee said. She approached the police, identifying 
herself as an AFL-CIO staff member. "I was screamed at, yelled at and 
forced backwards," she said. After she begged them not to use tear gas, the 
police eventually retreated.

"We are ashamed of the city of Miami," Lee said.

Brandon Slattery, 22, part of the 50-member Young Communist 
League/Communist Party contingent, was forced to flee with others to nearby 
neighborhoods. "No one wanted to be in any confrontation. We were peaceful 
the whole time. But the police chased us, including with a tank, shooting 
rubber bullets at all of us. When people tried to exercise their rights, 
the police got more violent."

Over a two-day period, Nov. 20-21, over 250 people were arrested. Among 
them was 70-year-old airline pilot and union member Ben Killmon, from 
Florida, and several union presidents from other countries. Representatives 
from the hundreds of organizations involved in the protests called the 
police violence and arrests an attack on constitutional, democratic and 
human rights.

Lawyer Brenna Bell, of the Miami Activist Defense Collective, told a Nov. 
21 press conference here that the Miami police violence was "a microcosm 
for what is happening to protests around the country and world: 
ever-increasing repression of people who are just trying to get their voice 
and their ideas out."

As police helicopters hovered overhead, Bell predicted that the 
unprecedented violation of rights would trigger many civil lawsuits. "This 
is not over," she said.

"The mayor of Miami said this was a blueprint for Homeland Security," Bell 
said. "Well, I don't feel very secure." Later that day Bell and 60 others 
were arrested in a police sweep of a peaceful jailhouse solidarity 
demonstration.

Union leaders strongly rebuffed attempts to split the anti-FTAA coalition 
of labor unions and "affinity groups." AFL-CIO spokesperson Ron Judd told 
reporters, "The AFL-CIO stands in solidarity with the sisters and brothers 
at the [anti-FTAA] Welcome Center." The history of the labor movement, Judd 
said, is to "protect those that are under assault."

Citing "countless instances of humiliating repression in which the Miami 
police force disgraced itself," United Steelworkers of America President 
Leo Gerard has called for a congressional investigation into the "massive 
police state" unleashed against the protest, in part with federal funds.

"It is doubly condemnable that $9 million of federal funds designated for 
the reconstruction of Iraq were used toward this despicable purpose," 
Gerard said in a statement issued by the Steelworkers, "How can we hope to 
build democracy in Iraq while using massive force to dismantle it here at 
home?"

Gerard said Miami Police Chief John Timoney should be fired, and all 
charges against peaceful demonstrators should be dropped.

AFL-CIO organizers said they had negotiated with police for 3-1/2 months 
prior to the demonstration, and the police totally reneged on all 
agreements. "Clearly the police took orders from authorities in Miami and 
either reneged on agreements or it was total incompetence  ­ you pick it," 
Fred Azcarate, executive director of Jobs with Justice, told reporters.

The author can be reached at talbano at pww.org.








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