National Day of Protest Against Police Brutality October 22, 2009

October 22, 2009: National Day of Protest to Stop Police Brutality, Repression and the Criminalization of a Generation

12 Noon, Federal Plaza – Adams & Dearborn in the Chicago Loop

FIGHT BACK! WEAR BLACK!

OCTOBER 22ND is the day when people all over the country demand a STOP to police violence, repression, and the criminalization of a generation. In different cities and through different means of expression, we raise a resounding “NO” to these police raids, attacks on the youth and immigrants, and destroying of lives.

In Chicago we will be holding a march and rally at Federal Plaza at noon.

info call 773-368-2820
e-mail oct22.chicago2009 (at) yahoo.com
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October 22, 2009: National Day of Protest to Stop Police Brutality, Repression and the Criminalization of a Generation

We don’t want to live like this! We resist! On October 22nd, wear black! Join our protest and fight back! NO MORE STOLEN LIVES!

The year 2009 started off with at least six cases nationally of police killings and brutality on New Year’s Day. Oakland, California erupted in outrage over the killing of Oscar Grant, shot in the back while handcuffed, by Bart transit police, in front of many witnesses. That same day, Adolph Grimes fromNew Orleans was killed by 48 bullets while sitting in his car in front of his grandmother’s house. In a suburb of Houston , Robbie Tolan was shot in his own driveway (but survived), after protesting the way the cops roughed up his mother. Deaths at the hands of law enforcement officers were also reported fromLos Angeles, Grand Rapids, Sacramento, and Seattle.

In Memorial Day week (May 24 –30) law enforcement killed at least 23 people nationally in California, Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Illinois, Michigan, Mississippi, Montana, New Mexico, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Texas, Utah, and Washington.

In May, many watched in horror the Youtube video that captured Toledo, Ohio police beating and choking fourteen-year old Trevor Casey. There are numerous videos of police brutality, including the tasering of 37-year-old Audra Harmon while her children watched from the car, after she was stopped by anOnondaga County cop for allegedly talking on her cellphone. While arguing that tasers are “safe” and “humane”, police throughout the country have killed with tasers, and have gone so far as to taser pregnant women, 72-year old grandmothers and six year olds, and sodomize a handcuffed man with a taser.

Police brutality is as intense as ever throughout the nation, and resistance is even more important now when too many have bought into the illusions of a “post-racial society.” There are some who believe that because we have a black President in office that everything will be okay now, that we no longer need to struggle and protest. The racial profiling arrest of Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr. and the shooting death of off-duty black police officer Omar Edwards by fellow NYPD should have proven that false. This year, political prisoner Mumia Abu-Jamal’s appeal has been denied, as was parole for Leonard Peltier.

The truth is that we have never achieved anything without a fight. In August 2009, Juanita Young’s entire family was brutalized and arrested in a police raid. As Juanita (mother of Malcolm Ferguson, killed by NYPD in 2000) says,

“You can’t give in. They will try to make an example out of you, try to break your spirit. If you don’t resist and keep on fighting, they will be able to get away with what they’re trying to do to us.”

Immigrant families across the country are being torn apart. The expansion in July 2009 of 287(g) of the Illegal Immigration Law, empowering local law enforcement agencies to make immigration arrests, has resulted in an increase of racial profiling arrests (DWH, Driving While Hispanic.). ICE recently revealed that there were ten deaths of immigrants in their custody that were not previously reported, which makes the total number of detainees who have died under ICE custody up to 104 since 2003. There have also been many reports of physical and sexual abuse of inmates by prison staff in federal prisons and detention centers across the nation.

October 22nd is a powerful day for going up against this repression, because it brings together those directly under the gun of police violence with other sections of society not under the gun. It challenges the “divide and conquer” that keeps us apart, bringing people of different backgrounds to stand together to expose and oppose these outrages. October 22nd is the day when people all over the country demand a STOP to police violence, repression, and the criminalization of a generation. In different cities and through different means of expression, we raise a resounding "NO" to these police raids, attacks on the youth and immigrants, and destroying of lives.

In Chicago:

March and Rally - 12 Noon, Federal Plaza – Adams & Dearborn in the Chicago Loop

NO MORE STOLEN LIVES! FIGHT BACK! WEAR BLACK!

For more information call: 773-368-2820 email oct22.chicago2009@yahoo.com