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As Unlawful Arrests Continue, St. Paul Feels Like a City Under Siege for Some Residents
Liliana Segura
AlterNet
Tuesday, Sept 3, 2008
Sitting outside the Black Dog cafe in lower St. Paul late Tuesday morning, a lanky kid in dreadlocks and a black Bob Marley T-shirt stopped, asked me for a light, and sat down next to me. It was drizzly and gray, and eerily quiet. The night before, nearly 300 people had been arrested by Minnesota police in a sweeping display of brute force. Among them were journalist Amy Goodman and two Democracy Now! producers, both of whom were physically assaulted. With helicopters overheard and the National Guard out, it felt like a city under siege.
I asked the guy if he lived in St. Paul. “Yeah.” It turned out he lives next door, in the building where I’ve been staying, an artist’s co-op on Broadway Street. I was about to ask him what he thought about the scene here when he sort of laughed and said, “Yeah, you know — I was just arrested.”
At around 9:45 that morning, John, 20, was walking home from the bank a few blocks away when he spotted what he thought was a police riot club — a ubiquitous weapon on the streets here. “It was right off of West 7th Street in, like, a planter; I checked it out but it ended up being a broomstick.” He put it down and kept walking, when suddenly he was surrounded by police officers — “three squad for sure, maybe four” — one of whom was a woman. “She was like, ‘Get on your stomach or I’m gonna tase you!’” He asked them what he had done, but they wouldn’t say. Instead, they asked him leading questions about other people they’d just arrested. “They said, ’so, who was in the white van you were associated with?” “I was like, white van? I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
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John said he hasn’t done any anti-war organizing — “I’d like to” — but since the arrival of the RNC and the protesters against it, he has been checking out the scene around town. “Yesterday I was just cruising around. I was in the Funk the War march — they had this huge Gandhi statue and a globe …” But despite the mostly peaceful protests, when it comes to security, “it’s been crazy.” He showed me videos he’d taken on his phone while he skated around, lines of cops in riot gear — “There was a bunch of people getting maced over there” — and shots of the buses and unmarked minivans the police have used to detain people and take them away.
I asked him if he had been read his rights. “No, they didn’t read me my Miranda rights at all. … They cuffed me, and when I complained to one one guy about the cuffs being too tight, he was like, ‘Oh yeah? Well, let me tighten that up for you.’”
While he kept asking why they were arresting him, John did not resist — “I was really cooperative; I didn’t want to be held” — but he did remember something he had been given at one of the marches. “Finally I pulled this out,” he said, showing me a slip of paper that read, “ACLU Important Contact Information.” “Yeah, you should hold onto that,” one of the cops told him.
“They held me right down over there,” he said, pointing north. “It’s, like, the St. Paul police station.” They confiscated and searched his belongings but forgot his cell phone in his pocket. “They put me in a cell that had snot and blood all over the wall,” he told me, pulling out his phone and showing me footage of the stained white walls. He was given no phone call.
John was held there for about 15 minutes before they had him talk to anyone; two plainclothes investigators interrogated him, asking him what he knew about the demonstrations against the RNC, some of which have led to rioting and destruction of property. “They tried to get me to admit to some involvement … but I told them that I’ve just met people and been to peaceful marches.” Before leading him back to his cell, they gave him a 612 number to call. “They asked me to report anything I knew.”
Googling the number later led me to a FBI homepage, Minneapolis division.
After he was questioned, John was put back in his cell. He was never told how long they might hold him. “They didn’t even tell me what I was being detained for until they opened the door.” I asked him what. “Like, suspicion of planting something … anything that could be used as a weapon, I guess.” There was no documentation.
As we were talking, we saw a caravan of unmarked vans led by a police car pull a U-turn in the middle of the intersection at the corner. One of the cars turned on its siren and they sped off.
By then, a group of neighbors were hanging out near us. John greeted them and said, “I was just arrested.” How was it? “Awesome,” he laughed. “Best day of my life.”
“So, you were picking up sticks?” one guy joked, “What were you thinking?”
“I thought I was free!” John laughed.
I asked him what he was up to now. He said he wanted to go to a concert taking place at the Capitol. Dead Prez was scheduled to perform. At the station, he said, “They told me if I got picked up again that I would probably be locked up for the remainder of the RNC. … They were like, ‘You probably shouldn’t go outside, because if the same cops see you they’re not gonna be happy.’”
He was dropped off across the street by one of the officers. (”He was nice enough to give me a ride back, so that was cool.”)
I asked him if he would be relieved when the RNC was over. “Yeah, most definitely. I wasn’t looking forward to it coming. … I feel like I’ve been profiled since day one.” Plus, it’s been slow at the Italian restaurant where he works. “At first, at my work, they were like, yeah, this is a good opportunity to get some good business, but instead we’re closing early … because most of (the RNC delegates) have rented out places and they get free drinks; they don’t really care about supporting local businesses since they don’t live here. They don’t give a shit.”
A woman who also lives in the building next door sat down next to us. “I have to say,” she said, “this city I live in has so much egg on its face. I’m embarrassed to say I live here. It’s just tragic.”
“The vibe’s like they came in and took over our whole city,” John said. “It’s like we don’t have rights. Like we don’t even live here.”
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23 Responses to “As Unlawful Arrests Continue, St. Paul Feels Like a City Under Siege for Some Residents”
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September 3rd, 2008 at 1:48 pm
Poor guy should be a hell of a lot madder. They are picking on everyone over there and he should sue.
September 3rd, 2008 at 2:49 pm
Police often stop people and sometimes arrest them for just for being somewhere.
Once I was walking about a block from my house when a policeman stopped me and questioned me about a brown pcikup truck parked nearby. I hadn’t gone anywhere near the truck, and I told him that I hadn’t even noticed that the truck was there. He acted like he didn’t believe what I said about not noticing the truck, which made him become even more suspicious about me. I was very polite, and I was probably lucky to get away from him.
What I wanted to say to him, but didn’t say, which was probably smart, was “Dude, the brown truck is something that interests you, not me. You’re totally focused on it, and that’s why you can’t understand why a pedestrian passer-by wouldn’t even notice it. I didn’t notice the brown truck because I’m not out looking for brown trucks the way that you are.”
My point being that a person could get stopped, busted, or killed over something that the cops are obsessed with, that the average person may not even notice.
September 3rd, 2008 at 3:12 pm
Here in Israel we can get you anything you want — girls, boys, any age. What happens to them after you take them home is your business.
September 3rd, 2008 at 4:51 pm
this is not america, the very same hippies who protested and raised hell in the 60’s are the very ones running the country and destroying the very constitution that allowed them to act up in their heyday.
September 3rd, 2008 at 4:58 pm
America is being run by Zionists, so it is looking like Zionist Israel.
Pretty Simple.
Zionism is a crime against whatever human it touches.
Wake Up.
September 3rd, 2008 at 5:36 pm
It not the hippies from the 60s who are doing this, it is the young people who were members of the “Young Republicans” who were part of the establishment.
September 3rd, 2008 at 6:26 pm
When all of you protestors are ready to show up at a protest with baseball bats, masks and your own can of mace then I’ll join your protest. But I’ll be damned if I’m gonna get maced, beat, charged and jailed by the cops over expressing my freedom of speech. A Storm Is Coming . . . Are You Ready?
September 3rd, 2008 at 6:30 pm
These people are nothing more than big bullies for the rich. I hate bullies, they are all cowards, pushing around unarmed people with all their riot gear. They make me sick.
September 3rd, 2008 at 7:11 pm
the home of the free lmfao, hasn’t been true since america become a country. everyone just spouts off and you americans are just stupid enough to believe everything u here. It has taken all this time for a small percentage of the population to be come a ware of what the government does. someone should have just killed bush insted of blow ing the towers.
September 3rd, 2008 at 7:18 pm
AmeriKa fuck ya!
…And that’s America with a K.
September 3rd, 2008 at 9:40 pm
Police State USUKrael. So sorry to leave you this, young people. The forces for evil are so great; and just wait until we invade Iran for Israel, probably very soon.
September 3rd, 2008 at 9:50 pm
@ N8:
60’s hippies now running the USA? Fat chance. I wish. As Michael Hansen stated, “It not the hippies from the 60s who are doing this, it is the young people who were members of the “Young Republicans” who were part of the establishment.”
As someone who actually was a 60’s hippie, I can tell you that we were NEVER more than a minority. Most of the people who tell you that they were 60’s hippies were no such thing. Simply smoking dope in your dorm room doesn’t qualify.
After Kent State many of us were ready to take up arms against the government, but we didn’t have the numbers on our side, and we knew it.
@ Blood-Trail . . . Helena, MT:
I’m guessing that it will take a Kent State type event, maybe several of them, to get things going. That’s cool; let the Feds draw ‘first blood’, and then go for their jugular.
As for me, I’m not going to go to any open confrontation against men armed with guns, where our side is armed only with baseball bats, masks, and cans of mace. I’ll be in a concealed position at their rear. Pop, pop, pop, and watch them drop.
September 3rd, 2008 at 10:15 pm
Another thing: after the shooting starts, every individual member of the cops and the Feds is going to be forced to choose between going to work or staying at home to protect their families, because there will be people who follow them home to see where they live, and it will no longer be safe for their families to be left at home alone.
September 3rd, 2008 at 10:22 pm
Also: if the cops, the Feds, and the military start going door-to-door confiscating people’s guns, that won’t stop us from finding out where they live; in fact it will just encourage us. You don’t need a gun to burn down a house.
September 3rd, 2008 at 11:31 pm
“Oh, yeah, I like that ‘concealed position somewhere at the rear or maybe somewhere near, Pop, pop, pop, yeah, watch them drop.”
Resist the NWO
September 3rd, 2008 at 11:41 pm
How dare commoners go outside when the royals are about? DOn’t you pathetic slaves know your boot licking role?
September 3rd, 2008 at 11:46 pm
The trick to getting away with that shyte
is to not get too greedy;
just do one or two at a time,
then exit, stage right.
September 3rd, 2008 at 11:55 pm
Shame on those cops. They are pawns, goons, of the new world order. Shame on them and on the FBI!! How can people sit in their comfy arm chairs and do nothing?! If we liberty, we MUST DO something!! Join Prison Planet. Join Campaign for Liberty. Get informed. Know the Bill of Rights. Know YOUR rights. Don’t let this country down the tubes. As long as mainstream America is too complacent, too distracted, too ignorant, too cynical, and too brainwashed to join the fight for freedom, tyrrany is inevitable. Rise UP people!
September 4th, 2008 at 12:58 am
For all you beautiful young people out there, I am asking you to think before you act! From the sounds of these comments posted here you may be encouraged and even tempted to commit violence. Don’t do it whatever you do. Its a trap. There are better ways, less violent ways to commit what has come to be known as conscientious ‘civil disobedience’. Never ever give your power away through senseless violence. That is just plain stupid and idiotic.
I would encourage all of you to maintain your dignity. Please don’t waste it on wannbe Robocops! It ain’t worth it. We need to take our country back with courage and bravery through the political system worthy of the founders and all those who gave their lives and risk for our inheritance.
That means we take responsibility for smartening up! It means you shut off the damned propaganda TV and make time to really read our Constitution, Bill of Rights, and Declaration of Independence! Study it. Get a copy of Thomas Pain’s, ‘Common Sense’, Jefferson, Adams, Washington,etc. Re-read the founding fathers.
You will be amazed how refreshing it is to read their words. Its as though they are speaking into the future directly to us, right now as we live on the brink of absolute tyranny. I guarantee it will give you goosebumps! Their words I find very heartening, inspiring, and strengthening because once you understand what they left us, it will empower us and we need not allow fear to paralyse us right now. To give you an example of how powerful their intent was the first United States seal had words that said, ‘Rebellion to Tyrants is Obedience to God’. Awesome.
But keep in mind the biblical, “Vengeance is mine sayeth the Lord” This seal is not about vengeance, its about vigilance and self-defence against the enemies of our sacred documents, the Constitution, Bill of Rights and the Declaration of Independence. It was a kind of curse to those who would dare to abuse our sacred documents. They will have hell to pay! And so be it. But every citizen wears the mantle of responsibility to uphold and defend these documents against enemies foreign and domestic giving their lives if need be.
Our country was never meant to be an empire, nor do we have kings or emperors. Our country has never, since the American Revolution, been on such a dark brink of absolute invasion by tyranny.
From August 31st to Sept.3rd, the Ron Paul r3volution did something so amazing and meaningful. 15,000 passionate and tenacious defenders of our Constitution from all over the United States sacrificed their time and expense to come to Minneapolis to celebrate and seek empowering inspiration from such tremendous speakers and to celebrate our beginning of a movement the likes of which we have never seen before. History was made this past week.
Our revolution will continue until people wake up and join us. Dare to transform your fears into meaningful acts of perhaps becoming a Statesman/woman. Anyway, that’s what we’re doing. We will not be at peace until we ‘Restore the Republic’ and that cannot happen if some hotheads want to do senseless, stupid violence!
Because we know that would be the trademark of an ‘agents provocateur’. Save your violence for defence should the time come for such an act.
September 4th, 2008 at 1:58 am
And some americans still believe you don’t live in a police state!
September 4th, 2008 at 2:24 am
organise, I say, organise well. Speak to people, don’t ring them, writing is safer. Orghanise to throw off this gauntlet of anti libertarian laws created by the neocons to tear democracy in half and install a dictatorship of the powerfull vested interests.
The Leviathan is alive and well and its eating up the world.
September 4th, 2008 at 3:31 am
And:
In spite of the emphasis of the principle of Ahimsa, or nonviolence, in the Hindu, Buddhist, and Jain traditions and in Indian culture, the most famous and widely read of the Hindu scriptures, the “Bhagavad Gita,” is essentially one long argument in favor of karma yoga, or self-realization through action, in which the Supreme Being, Krishna, persuades his disciple Arjuna to fight in a fratricidal civil war that Arjuna would prefer to avoid and sit out. The main point of the “Bhagavad Gita” is that the difficult responsibilities of life should not be shirked, and one should not regard an ascetic withdrawal from worldly activities and actions to be the moral high ground — certainly not in all circumstances and situations.
There are many Christian advocates of strictly nonviolent protest whose role model is Jesus, and they should be reminded that according to the Bible, Jesus armed Himself with a scourge to drive the moneychangers from the Temple.
September 4th, 2008 at 2:22 pm
@Right On
Thank you very much for your thoughtful words and historic accounts. These are all important considerations that will test each and every one of us American citizens now and in all the days ahead.
Those are very powerful excerpts from Mr. Jefferson and teachings of the Bhagavad Gita. We live in a duality where most important considerations are based on a ‘double edged sword’ so to speak. In other words it can work for us or against us. Each individual must decide for his or herself.
When push comes to shove, each of us may be ‘called’ to act from the essence of our own conscience. No one is ‘qualified’ to force another to make what they may feel is the ‘right action’.
Many religious fundamentalists of all stripes make this dogmatic mistake and forget that each of us are imbued and empowered by our own conscience or soul through our own concept of a universal creator. Consent is always required for anything involving the destiny of a human being.
There are many degrees of violation of this everywhere today and in the past. Our ’secular’ sacred documents drawn by the founders were the templates to create ‘heaven on earth’ where protection of the ‘whole human being’ and their destiny ‘to pursue happiness’ are to be guaranteed and sovereign against those who would disregard such premises. These are ’secular’ or universal documents so as to allow for all the numerous concepts of spiritual beliefs. This is still a truly novel construct in our world today.
Yes it is true that a ’strong defense’ was part of our dutiful vigilance. Perhaps new and ingenious ways may bloom that may provide us citizens with appropriate ‘defense’ against their tasers and rubber bullets. That said, however, provocative violence from citizens toward these military police may also prove a futile waste of energy and even lives.
Dissent and conscientious objection is and always will be at the very essence of what is a ‘patriot’ considering the risk of life and limb involved in such defense of our Declaration and Laws.
The naming of a violent, unconstitutional law such as the Patriot Act does not make it ‘patriotic’, nor does calling the Military Commissions Act make this represent the essence of our true ‘American Military’. These are outright perversions of our national/individual sovereignty.
The Ron Paul revolution seems to be made up of many stripes of people who feel we must TRY with all our resources, to take back our country, firstly, through the bicameral system through education and leadership.
If for some reason this may not be possible, then………well, we will see what happens. But first let us try to arm ourselves with knowledge, experience, and wisdom to penetrate the masses through persuasion and competition for the highest dream of the people.