The Creeping Police State

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The Creeping Police State

 

by Charles Shaw

from Newtopia Magazine

 

February 01, 2005

 

When viewed as a whole, the post 9/11 'security state' seems less

about protecting us from terrorism, and more about population control

and quelling dissent.

 

In May of 2004 in Chicago, the home of May Molina, a long time

anti-police brutality and misconduct activist was raided by the

Chicago Police. Although Molina had no history of involvement with

drugs or drug dealing, the officers present claimed to have found 80

bags of heroin in her room and that of her son, Michael Ortiz. Both

were taken into custody, and sometime within the next 28 hours Molina

died. The coroners report claimed to have found bags of heroin lodged

in her esophagus, and the presence of heroin in her system.

 

Three strange things stand out in this case. The first, as previously

mentioned, was that Molina was an activist. People's Weekly reported,

" [Molina] worked with Families of the Wrongfully Convicted and Comite

Exijimos Justicia (the " We Demand Justice Committee " ), which have for

several years accused the Chicago police, particularly the homicide

squad detectives at the Grand and Central police station on Chicago's

northwest side, of framing Latino and other young people. Molina was

dedicated to this cause partly because her own son, Salvador Ortiz, is

serving a 47-year sentence for a murder she and the committee said he

did not commit. "

 

This is the same Illinois system that was so corrupt that former

Governor George Ryan put a moratorium on the death penalty and

commuted all the death sentences of those who were currently

imprisoned on death row. A Federal investigation of this corruption

under former Commissioner John Burge (while Chicago Mayor Richard M.

Daley was Attorney General) is currently underway.

 

The second strange thing was that the alleged heroin turned out to be

candle wax. Chicago IndyMedia reports, " On the day of May Molina's

death, police leaked to the press that 80 bags of heroin were found in

their apartment. On June 16, Michael Ortiz [Molina's son] was released

by a judge who said none of the samples tested positive for any

narcotics. Police now claim they mistook candle-making supplies for

drugs. " The 22 days in which Ortiz was held in custody over the

possession of this wax caused him to miss his mother's funeral.

 

The third strange thing about her death was that, according to the

Medical Examiner, the bags of heroin were found in her esophagus, not

in her stomach, some 28 hours after she was purportedly to have

ingested them. It was explained that the esophagus is an involuntary

reflux muscle, and things either go up or they go down. The only

circumstances under which objects would get lodged inside the

esophagus is if they are inserted there post-mortem.

 

Molina had serious health problems. Andy Thayer of Chicago Indymedia,

reporting just after her death, wrote, " Molina had multiple medical

problems, including diabetes and high blood pressure, and was largely

confined to a wheelchair. Her attorney, Jerry Bishop, visited her at

the Belmont and Western police station and said she appeared to be in

poor physical condition. 'I told them, you really need to get this

woman to Cermak [Hospital],' said Bishop. " Molina's relatives also

tried unsuccessfully to deliver her medications to her while she was

in custody.

 

Family and fellow activists claim that Molina died from not receiving

her medication, and the police, in an effort to cover it up and

support their heroin charge, forced the bags of heroin down her throat

after she had been found dead. Although there have been demands for a

Federal investigation into Molina's death, to date no investigation

has been launched.

 

The Chicago Police have a long history of this type of behavior. In

1970 Black Panther leader Fred Hampton was shot by police in his bed

while he slept in his apartment on the West Side. In the wake of

Nixon's policy of infiltrating and disrupting political and anti-war

organizations, named COINTELPRO, which hit Chicago harder than most

cities, the same police force made such a regular practice of beating

up, harassing, and incarcerating hippies, radicals, and activists that

the well is still poisoned some thirty-five years later and little

trust exists between the two sides.

 

In the late 90's the Chicago Police had a strange habit of shooting

unarmed Black motorists. In a September 1999 report titled, United

States of America: Race, Rights, and Brutality, Amnesty International

reports, " In June 1999, LaTanya Haggerty, a 19-year-old passenger in a

car pulled over by Chicago police after a short chase, was shot dead

when officers mistook the cell-phone in her hand for a gun…a day after

the Haggerty shooting, Chicago police officers shot dead Robert Russ,

a former college football player, after he refused to get out of his

car after a pursuit. He was shot when an officer smashed the car

window and pointed his gun directly into the car…Both Haggerty and

Russ were black. "

 

These individual, egregious abuses of authority are localized examples

of a pervading culture of lawlessness and fascism sweeping our

enforcement culture throughout the nation. Using terrorism and drugs

as a pretext, our government has steadily abrogated our civil

liberties to the point that both the Bill of Rights and the Posse

Comitatus Act forbidding the domestic deployment of combat troops on

the population, have been rendered obsolete.

 

Consider more evidence.

 

In November 2002 the Trans-Atlantic Business Dialogue, a sub-committee

of the G8, met in Chicago. 5000 riot police and an arsenal of

surveillance equipment are mobilized to contain 500 peaceful

demonstrators.

 

On March 19th, 2003 the US invaded Iraq. Thousands of demonstrators

converge on downtown Chicago at the site of the historic Water Tower

for a march through the city. The Chicago Police trap demonstrators on

a side street adjacent to Lake Shore Drive in preparation for mass

arrests, even though the march was peaceful and without incident. To

escape arrest, demonstrators are forced onto Lake Shore Drive during

rush hour. In the ensuing melee, over 900 people are arrested and

processed through the system.

 

In September of 2003, at a meeting of the IMF and World Bank in

Washington D.C. more than 600 activists and innocent bystanders were

pre-emptively arrested at D.C.'s Freedom Park and herded onto city

buses where some sat for as long as 10 hours before they were taken

into the Blue Plains detention center gymnasium, handcuffed

wrist-to-ankle and left for the night. Police learned from leaflets

and websites that anti-globalization groups planned acts of

non-violent civil disobedience. In echoes of Minority Report, people

who had committed no crime were detained for crimes they were

allegedly going to commit in the future. Following the filing of a

class action suit, D.C. police have since admitted fault and the city

must now pay out damages to each detainee.

 

In November of 2003 at the Miami summit for the Free Trade Area of the

Americas, the Miami Police, under orders from Chief John Timony,

viciously attacked 10,000 non-violent and non-destructive activists,

union workers, community groups, and migrant workers for three days

using mace, pepper spray, tear gas, Tazer guns, batons and shields,

concussion grenades, beanbag guns, and rubber bullets. There were mass

arrests, and many were injured, some severely. Timony's assault on

citizen demonstrators was funded by $8.5 million from the $87 billion

Iraq spending bill. (see film)

 

In June of 2004 the G8 summit was held on Sea Island Georgia, 10 miles

off the Georgia coast. Despite the remote location, the Departments of

Justice and Homeland Security, and the Governor of Georgia, designated

this summit a " State of Emergency/National Security Event " allowing

for increased police and national guard presence, increased federal

funding for security, and a temporary declaration of what amounted to

martial law. San Francisco Indymedia reported, " This so called 'state

of emergency' would allow the police in the entire state to break up,

any and all 'gatherings of people' to protest any event… In

correlation with this 'state of emergency' the commander of the police

forces has ordered a: 'shoot to kill' order, that will pertain to all

individuals that the police themselves feel are 'threatening' the

lives of 'world leaders' that will be gathering for the event. This

order will only go into effect if the governor is capable of issuing a

'state of emergency' " .

 

 

 

The Democratic National Convention in Boston, July 2004.

In July of 2004, at the Democratic National Convention in Boston,

another " National Security Event " , thousands of riot police, secret

service, FBI, and armed National Guard roamed the city all week in

squad cars, helicopters, motorcycles and bikes, and on horseback,

while others stood watch over a fortified concentration camp lined

with razor wire for protestors they called the " Free Speech " zone.

U.S. District Judge Douglas P. Woodlock called the conditions " an

affront to free expression " and a " festering boil " . On the last day of

the convention, after receiving complaints from restaurant owners near

the Fleet Center that demonstrators were affecting their lunch

business, the Boston Police instigated an incident which allowed

hundreds of riot police to move in and clear the area.

 

Boston Police instigate a riot as a pretext to clear demonstrators

from the area in front of the convention center.

At the Republican National Convention in New York City, more than

40,000 police joined armed troops, FBI, Coast Guard, and Secret

Service in the largest coordinated urban police deployment in our

nation's history. Demonstrators were denied the use of Central Park.

Thousands, many innocent bystanders, were swept up into mass-arrests

in just a few days span. The Republican National Committee leased an

empty bus depot along the West Side Highway, which they converted into

a concentration camp-style detention center dubbed " Guantanamo on the

Hudson " . Detainees were eventually processed through the New York City

criminal justice system and held for as long as 50 and 60 hours in

deplorable and unsafe conditions without seeing a judge or lawyer

until the New York Supreme Court ordered their release. As with Miami

and Washington D.C., in the aftermath, dozens of class action suits

have been filed against the city.

 

In preparation for the January 20th , 2005 Presidential Inauguration,

in what is supposed to be a " celebration " of Bush's " mandate " from the

2004 " election " , Salon.com reports there will be 6,000 police (up from

4,000) and 2,500 combat troops in security roles (down from 4,000) in

Washington DC the week of the Inauguration. In their daily briefing on

January 13, 2005, FEMA (Federal Emergency & Management Agency)

reports, " Inauguration Protests Planned and Expected " , and goes on to

state, " The demonstrators are likely to employ a mix of tactics in

order to draw attention to themselves and their cause and to disrupt

the events…Protest organizers, some of whom expressed outrage at the

multimillion-dollar price tag for the inauguration, said they worried

that heightened security will stifle dissent "

 

Are their concerns baseless? The evidence points clearly towards " no " .

 

Freedom of expression and dissent are under assault across the nation.

In his ongoing series, " The New McCarthyism " , Progressive Editor

Matthew Rothschild chronicles the abrogation of Civil Liberties

experienced by everyday citizens across the nation. In the case of

high school senior John Sachs who attended a Bush campaign rally

wearing a pin that read " Bush-Cheney '04: Leave No Billionaire

Behind " , a Bush staffer pulled Sachs aside and told him, " know if you

protest that it won't be me taking you out. It will be a sniper. "

Artists have their homes raided by the FBI for painting Bush in an

unflattering light, and non-violent peace activists, including Quakers

and nuns, are put on domestic " no-fly " lists for protesting the School

of the Americas, a government funded institute which trains foreign

soldiers, many of whom become " death squads " , such as the Contra army

in Nicaragua and El Salvador.

 

" The term 'terrorism' is taking on the same kind of characteristics as

the term 'communism' did in the 1950s " said ACLU president Nadine

Strossen. " It stops people in their tracks, and they're willing to

give up their freedoms. People are too quickly panicked. They are too

willing to give up their rights and to scapegoat people, especially

immigrants and people who criticize the war. "

 

Famed civil rights lawyer William Kunstler, quoting Clarence Darrow in

his closing arguments for the Chicago Seven trial in 1970 said:

 

" When a truth comes upon the earth, or a great idea necessary for

mankind is born, where does it come from? Not from the police force,

or the prosecuting attorneys, or the judges, or the lawyers, or the

doctors. Not there. It comes from the despised and the outcasts, and

it comes perhaps from the jails and prisons. It comes from the men who

have dared to be rebels and think their thoughts, and their faith has

been the faith of rebels.

 

What do you suppose would have happened to the working men except for

these rebels all the way down through history? Think of the complacent

cowardly people who never raise their voices against the powers that

be. If there had been only these, you gentlemen of the jury would be

hewers of wood and drawers of water. You gentlemen would have been

slaves. You gentlemen owe whatever you have and whatever you hope to

these brave rebels who dared to think, and dared to speak, and dared

to act. "

 

Dare.

 

-Charles Shaw

Berkeley, January 2005

 

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