May 9, 2023 • 65 mins
Police repression intensifies as people march to the Atlanta Police Foundation. Over the weekend the cops raid a secondary encampment, and a memorial for Tortuguita is held in the Weelaunee Forest.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:07):
Welcome back to it could happen here. I'm Garrison Davis.
This is episode four of my mini series and detailing
the March twenty twenty three week of action to stop
cop City in Atlanta, Georgia. This episode, we'll be hearing
from a lot of new people as we close out
the day to day coverage of this week of action.
(00:29):
One of the last big organized rallies was on Thursday
night and it was put on by Community Movement Builders
and other black led groups from Atlanta.
Speaker 2 (00:39):
The big event Thursday night was a six o'clock rally
that met at the Martin Luther King National Historic Site.
Speaker 3 (00:45):
There was police stationed at King Center.
Speaker 1 (00:47):
Before anyone got there, we saw like dozens and dozens
of police cars going by.
Speaker 2 (00:52):
All around the site are various quick response forces and
riot cops ready to.
Speaker 1 (01:00):
Move in large police response in the area already, as
has been expected for the past few days, multiple Sandy
Springs police buses were driving by. There was multiple unmarked
white vans full of officers. The areas crawling with police
cars and now there's a small detail of officers across
the street from the people gathering here in the park.
Speaker 2 (01:23):
We are currently surrounded on every side by groups of
police officers in riodgear. The crowd started off like actually
fairly decently sized, maybe like fifty people, and then continued
as well as the speeches progressed to I would say
like two hundred two hundred fifty, maybe even a little
bit more. They were passing out signs, so like anyone
(01:44):
who came, like they had a sign ready for you.
Andre Dickins is a sellout of course, as a very
popular one. There were stop Coop City like banners that
people could like hold atl of Verse twelve, like you know,
just a bunch of like really clever sort of protest
slogan and things that people get behind. The makeup of
the crowd was definitely leaned like far less like white
(02:05):
anarchists than certainly the accusations of this movement, I think,
more representative of the movement as a whole, Like it
was a mix of a bunch of different people. I
would say, like it probably accurately reflected Atlanta demographics.
Speaker 3 (02:20):
Defend the forest.
Speaker 1 (02:21):
As signs and banners are being handed out throughout the crowd,
other people are passing around the jail support number and
jail support contact information.
Speaker 3 (02:29):
People are starting to get ready, so.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
It meets it at six o'clock and for about an
hour and a half we listened to a series of
speeches as the crowd begins to swell.
Speaker 4 (02:39):
So we are here in solidarity together today to make
it clearer to the mayor that he's not gonna keep
lying on our names.
Speaker 5 (02:46):
They'll literally be building.
Speaker 4 (02:48):
The most of Atlanta just how to repress my life.
Speaker 5 (02:52):
They kill me, and we find it ridiculous, We find
it disgusting.
Speaker 4 (02:58):
We find it embarrassing that our Mayor Andre Diggins with
xes now to say that.
Speaker 6 (03:03):
Black people want to be killed by the police, that
black people walk crop city.
Speaker 4 (03:09):
The mayor must have forgotten that our ancestors were literally
fighting abolition since they were brutally brought to this country.
They were fighting for freedom, fighting the original police right,
the slave patrols that captured black bodies to take them
back to their white masters. He's talking to the same
(03:30):
black people whose elders were fighting here in the same
streets in the sixties and the seventies to stop police
occupation of our communities. That's right. Resistance to police, resistance
to stay violence is literally in our blood as black people.
Speaker 5 (03:46):
It is in our DNA.
Speaker 4 (03:48):
They're lying on our name because they want money from
the same white corporations that are funding Cop City, Home Depot,
Chick fil A, Coca Cola, Norfolk, Southern At and T.
Speaker 5 (04:03):
Costs enterprises who.
Speaker 4 (04:04):
All say AJC and this is a fight that we
will win, that.
Speaker 5 (04:09):
We are committed to winning. And so when we talk about.
Speaker 4 (04:12):
Winning, it's important to say, what do we mean when
we say that we'll win.
Speaker 5 (04:16):
We mean no Cop City anywhere, not in.
Speaker 4 (04:22):
South Atlanta, not in the cab not in North Atlanta, nowhere.
When we say that we will win, we are meaning
that this fight does not stop with Cop City. This
is a fight for the liberation of all oppressed people
here and abroad.
Speaker 7 (04:37):
That's right.
Speaker 4 (04:38):
And that why is disgusting that the mayor and that
these corporations will talk about outside agitators.
Speaker 5 (04:45):
Okay.
Speaker 4 (04:46):
The reason that there are people coming from all over
the world to support.
Speaker 5 (04:50):
This fight is because this is a fight that affects
all of us, That's right.
Speaker 4 (04:54):
The Atlanta Police Foundation admitted that of the cops being
trained at that facility will not be in Georgia. Okay,
So when people come from Tennessee, from New York, from California,
it's because they know that their local police might learn
how to kill them better.
Speaker 5 (05:11):
Here, that's right.
Speaker 4 (05:13):
And when people come from abroad, they know that currently
the Atlanta.
Speaker 5 (05:17):
Police Department trains with the Israeli police.
Speaker 4 (05:20):
So the same techniques being used to brutalize black people
are being used to practice genocide on the Palestinian people.
And the same tactics being used to practice genocide on
the Palestinian people.
Speaker 5 (05:32):
Are being used to brutalize black people right here.
Speaker 4 (05:35):
So when people come from all over the world to
say stop cop City, they're not outside agitators.
Speaker 5 (05:40):
They're standing in solidarity with us, because this is the fight,
that's all.
Speaker 1 (05:47):
As the rain picked up, Tortillita's mother, Belquise Taran, spoke
next on the part.
Speaker 6 (05:54):
Is the friend that I called them.
Speaker 8 (05:56):
I caned them to come here to suppernt us.
Speaker 9 (06:00):
All the people from different religions come.
Speaker 6 (06:04):
Here and help us.
Speaker 5 (06:06):
This is a matter of the earth. We're talking about
earth that.
Speaker 10 (06:13):
Is dying right, that needs our love, That earth needs
our attention, and we are we have conscious we know
that this is not right.
Speaker 5 (06:28):
Don't go by yourself when we.
Speaker 8 (06:31):
Go to activities and stay together, don't go outside by yourself.
Don't we need to make understand that this is the
right thing to do.
Speaker 5 (06:43):
We are the correct people.
Speaker 9 (06:46):
We are right because we are driving by love, by
carry by concerns, and we.
Speaker 4 (06:56):
Love all the I love you.
Speaker 5 (07:01):
We're like dude.
Speaker 1 (07:04):
A speaker from Black Votes Matter addressed to the crowd next,
starting off by talking about the importance of mass action.
Speaker 11 (07:12):
I just want to explain something because sometimes people get confused,
they get it twisted.
Speaker 6 (07:15):
They say, oh, y'all, look, black vote.
Speaker 9 (07:17):
It's better.
Speaker 5 (07:17):
All y'all do is talk about voting.
Speaker 11 (07:19):
Be clear, we understand that the way that we get
to liberation is not going to come just through a vote.
That's never been how it's worked for our people in
this country. Sister Harry didn't get a chance to vote
for liberations.
Speaker 6 (07:31):
She didn't get a chance to vote to take our
people off the plantation and right.
Speaker 5 (07:36):
So we are very clear that what we have.
Speaker 12 (07:38):
Got to be.
Speaker 11 (07:39):
In fact, we just celebrated, commemorated the anniversary of Selma
and the Marks of Montgomery. But be clear, the people
of Selma didn't vote for our Voting Rights Act. They
had to fight for it, they had.
Speaker 6 (07:49):
To march for it.
Speaker 11 (07:50):
In some cases, they bled for it. They had to
resist for it, they had to take to the streets
for it. It's a that tradition that we are out
here today. I believe, I believe in the power of
the vote, but house to believe in the power of
mass action.
Speaker 1 (08:07):
He then talked about the intersection of cop City and
efforts to further restrict the democratic process in Georgia.
Speaker 11 (08:14):
The same corporations that are that are funding cop City
are the same ones that are funding the bonus questions,
the same ones. We've did our whole campaign a couple
of years ago when Georgia says that bonus prission bill,
and we called out Home Depot and Coca Cola and
tell them many of the other corporations that give money
(08:36):
to the people, that are that are taken away our.
Speaker 5 (08:39):
Rights to vote.
Speaker 11 (08:40):
And then if you don't have a government that reflects
the people, then what do you need. You need a
police force to enforce the fact that you don't.
Speaker 5 (08:47):
Have a government that reflects the people.
Speaker 11 (08:50):
And so our message from Mary Dickens, our message for
the city council is that.
Speaker 5 (08:55):
If you don't respond.
Speaker 6 (08:56):
To the people, you are blott you.
Speaker 11 (09:03):
We've got that power, We've got the power to make
that happen.
Speaker 1 (09:08):
Students from the Atlanta University Center consortium of four black
colleges in Atlanta, were some of the last people to
give speeches before the march.
Speaker 13 (09:17):
We have attempted to reform our police force, add de
el escalation training, add civil rights history training, and give
more money to our police, but we continue to see
black bodies across social media platforms, television, and other media
platforms being displayed being murdered. The victims have received no justice.
And when we say no justice, what do we say?
Speaker 11 (09:38):
No justice, no justice, no justice.
Speaker 4 (09:45):
The building of the Atlanta Public Training Center is an
insult and an act of the utmost disrespect from our
city leaders.
Speaker 5 (09:53):
We have a duty to fight for the change that
we seek.
Speaker 4 (09:56):
As an active member of this community, I refuse to
sit by and be idle and just let things happen.
Speaker 14 (10:04):
This city has been my home ever since I was born.
Speaker 6 (10:08):
I've been to various events here.
Speaker 11 (10:10):
I have seen the sights and have lived through some
of the most important events right here in this city.
Speaker 14 (10:15):
This is my home. This is your home, This is
our home. This is the home of black excellence. This
is the home of doctor Martin Luther King, Junior. This
is the home of John Lewis. This is the home
of Joseph Evelyn and Joseph E.
Speaker 6 (10:33):
Lowie.
Speaker 11 (10:34):
This is the home of civil rights. This is the
home of ct Gillion. This is the home of great
blackness itself. This is the home of every single black
person here in America. This city, this house, this place
of black excellence, says no to Cop City.
Speaker 15 (10:57):
My Afro pessimist friends and revolution there is both agree
we are at war. The police in the city have
said as much loudly with their words and their actions.
It feels obvious to me that we need warriors weapons,
and I know that that fact may give some of
us trepidation. But I want to assure you that we
(11:19):
need so much more than soldiers to win this fight.
Whatever it is that you do, whatever skill you bring,
I just ask that you make it a weapon.
Speaker 6 (11:28):
If we are ever.
Speaker 15 (11:29):
Going to experience democracy, we need your tools to be
repurposed in this fight against Cop City. If you're a
writer like me, child, that pat better look like a
threat to Cop City. If you do mutual aid, caring
for community ain't gonna get any easier. Please show us
(11:50):
the way. If you're an artist, where are my artists at.
Speaker 6 (11:57):
You got a lot of them out here.
Speaker 15 (12:00):
Let every painting reveal the truth, including the joy and
freedom that abolition calls us to. Let us make songs
that inspire revolution. If you're a healer, get ready, we
need you.
Speaker 6 (12:16):
Much will be lost in this struggle. Let us not forget.
Speaker 15 (12:21):
If you're a teacher, well, we got a lot to
learn about this war we're fighting and how police practice
urban warfare. If you're a lawyer, guide us when they
say that any fighter is a criminal. If you're a
digital organizer, and keep your finger on the pulse and
tell our stories.
Speaker 6 (12:38):
Far and wide.
Speaker 15 (12:40):
And if you're a community organizer, we need to tend
to our relationships, not just use them. We need real
solidarity which goes beyond unity. We need pluralism, making space
for many strategies to coexist. And ultimately, we need to
practice democracy. If we plan to build one cop city
(13:01):
is the police and the establishment of preparing for domestic
war right here in the city of Atlanta's that's right.
Any further training of the police is training against our existence.
That shit cannot be built, and well.
Speaker 12 (13:20):
That be built.
Speaker 15 (13:23):
We all must fight for the democracy we've never seen before.
Speaker 6 (13:28):
What are you willing to do?
Speaker 12 (13:29):
Thank you?
Speaker 1 (13:33):
So after about an hour of speeches, people are now
foundly getting ready to move. They announced on the loudspeaker
where we are going. We are marching to the Atlanta
Police Foundation headquarters on Peachtree, the same location that had
the front windows broken on the protest following the killing
of Torti Ghita that Saturday. So people leave, they stick
(13:54):
onto the sidewalk because there's cops staring at them, and
cops have definitely had had had indicated that if if
people step on to the street, they would be arrested.
The length of the march is stretching for about two
or three city blocks, just because you know, trying to
(14:15):
cram three hundred people onto a sidewalk makes that stretch
out really long. But the cops have been pretty pretty
adamant that if anyone steps onto the street, they're going
to get arrested. That is a banner being carried across
that says what you water grows, fund our future, stop
cop City, defend the forest. People with the stop cop
(14:39):
City signs in the Coca Cola font signs that read
Atlanta versus Cop City, No Cop City on stolen Land
the Thursday march definitely had the most amount of signs
out of all of the individual marches or actions that
I want to both small handheld signs and also signs
(15:01):
with really tall handles to hold up above the crowd.
All right, people are being led into the street now
after walking, after walking on the hidewalk for a decent while,
people have now taken to the street.
Speaker 3 (15:20):
Along the path of the march.
Speaker 1 (15:21):
The projector was set up projecting like stop coop City
slogans onto the side of a building, almost like really
really good graphic design.
Speaker 2 (15:28):
Visuals is definitely a strength of the movement.
Speaker 1 (15:31):
There's this police riot helmet that has a tree growing
underneath it and breaking apart of the helmet that says
trees give life, police take it. We got a police
riot line set up a few blocks ahead of the
people marching on the street right next to the building
with these with the stop cop City stuff projected onto
the side. Rather than let the police do an escalatory
(15:53):
show of violence, people opted to move back onto the
sidewalk to continue the march uninhibited. People see to be
moving closer back onto the sidewalk as they're staring down
this riot line and police are now heading back inside.
They're white rent a bush little vans that they've been
staging their riot cops out of, and they're driving off.
(16:16):
People are now in downtown Atlanta outside of the Georgia
Pacific Center. We have like twelve regular police cars, the
two two white vans full of riot cops, and lots
of them cops is staged in places I cannot currently see.
All right, we're marching north along Peachtree Street, heading heading
(16:42):
to the Atlanta Police Foundation. Got the two the two
bus Max rented buses full full of riot cops right beside,
right beside the march. Cops really out of itant about
not letting anybody march in the street. It's funny because
a few days ago they wouldn't let people on the
sidewalk either. Most of the cops that are surrounding the
(17:03):
march right now are still in their vehicles, at least
from this current vantage point. I was opposed to the
non violent direct active march. I was opposed to the
nonviolent direct action marches and actions that have happened launching
out of Woodward Park the past week, in which the
police just tailed and surrounded the march on foot. I
(17:23):
think this march is just slightly I think this march
is just slightly too big to use that tactic, so
they're surrounding them with vehicles instead. As the march arrived
at the Atlanta Police Foundation, the hundreds of protesters crammed
onto the sidewalk were greeted by armed APD officers. Riot
police are standing in front of the boarded up Atlanta
(17:45):
Police Foundation headquarters at one nine to one Peach Tree.
There is a large, large crowd in front of these
relatively small amount of officers standing in front of the
boarded up doors. A few dozen cops, some armed with
aar fifteen's, a lot of cops stationed outside the APF headquarters,
and even more stationed inside the APF headquarters. Police blokes
(18:09):
off traffic in the on this section of Peachtree Street,
at least basically sandwiching everybody in. They they could have
mass arrested, as I'm sure they wanted to.
Speaker 2 (18:19):
Yeah, the police were ready to mass rest the entire time.
Speaker 3 (18:24):
This is this is kind of a wild sight.
Speaker 1 (18:25):
We have hundreds of people staring down about three dozen
officers from the Atlanta Police Department on their fifteen's. Obviously
all of their handguns from hundreds of hundreds of people
holding signs, staring down the police. You can you can
feel the kind of you can feel the temperature.
Speaker 3 (18:45):
Rising a little bit here. The cops look very nervous
as one.
Speaker 1 (18:48):
Hundreds of people who are chanting at them, and I'm
not very happy are facing them down. They're so they're
so close together, we're they're just sandwiched in. This is
such a tense situation right now. No one in the
crowd has any visible weapons of any kind. Of course,
they're holding big signs. Cops have some zipcuffs ready, cops
(19:10):
have all their guns ready. I was able to see
inside the building via a small slit in the plywood.
There were tons of riot cops inside with shields, and
all the cops on the inside of the building had
gas masks strapped to their leg. At least one riot
cop on the other side of the door was wearing
a unique armored suit, not like the regular police suits
(19:33):
with riot armor like on the outside, This armored padding
was built into the clothing. He had these massive, bulky
leg pants with armor on the insides of them and
like a massive riot helmet. He was one of those
cops who doesn't need a riot shield because his body
is the riot shield. It was very weird, But for
(19:54):
those first few minutes, it was a very high stress
situation in front of the APF building. It felt like
neither the crowd nor the police knew exactly what was
about to go down as a few hundred angry protesters
were pushed up against a line of armed police. But
as time went on, you got the impression that this
crowd was probably not going to initiate conflict with the police,
(20:17):
and I feel like some of the moods maybe.
Speaker 3 (20:19):
Kind of died down.
Speaker 1 (20:20):
Cops are trying to kind of move around the crowd
a bit.
Speaker 3 (20:23):
There's cops being stationed to.
Speaker 1 (20:25):
The north, to the south, to behind the crowd on
the other side of the street. This could go so
many ways right now, This could end in so many
different scenarios. But people have not initiating anything other than
standing on the sidewalk and chanting and giving speeches. If
you look, there's a small section of the IPF building
(20:47):
where there's still a tiny, tiny sliver of glass by
one of the doors, and you can see lots of
cops stationed inside with riot shields. But I do not
believe this crowd's going to be busting done any doors.
Camu Franklin, the founder of Community Movement Builders, was the
last person to speak in front of the Atlanta Police Foundation.
Speaker 6 (21:09):
Really, no cop City.
Speaker 16 (21:11):
It's nothing but a strategy for over policing our communities.
We know that top city is nothing but a strategy
to stop our movements.
Speaker 6 (21:22):
And what movements are those?
Speaker 16 (21:23):
The movements against police followings and terrorism in our community.
It is in twenty twenty one that they introduced this
idea to stop, to put cop city out here to
stop our movements. When people were talking about the fund
the police abolish the police, find alternament is the public safety, they.
Speaker 6 (21:43):
Said, hell no, we.
Speaker 16 (21:45):
Want more police, and they put that idea out there,
and the movement was born to stop cop City. This
mo when is two years old, and it doesn't look
like it's going to stop.
Speaker 1 (21:57):
To me. By the end, you got this a sense
that this march did exactly what it wanted to. There
were three hundred people standing like a foot away from
two dozen cops, staring them down, giving speeches, chanting. If
people wanted to, other things could have happened. This rally
could have resulted in many ways. Many of them probably
(22:17):
very ugly and carrying a very high cost.
Speaker 6 (22:21):
The reason we.
Speaker 16 (22:21):
Did a march like this today was to say to
all the nice saves.
Speaker 6 (22:27):
Black folks don't want.
Speaker 16 (22:29):
Cop citycause people.
Speaker 6 (22:31):
Don't want cop City.
Speaker 16 (22:33):
White folks don't want cop City. At lanteds don't want
cop City. Folks from outside Atlanta don't want cop City.
Speaker 6 (22:42):
Nobody in the United States wants cop City. The honest
Citians don't work cops City in America don't want cop City.
No mean in this world don't we work cop City.
We wanted to make sure that we came.
Speaker 16 (22:59):
In safety and we leave in safety.
Speaker 6 (23:04):
We wanted to make sure that we don't.
Speaker 16 (23:06):
Have any more political prisoners today.
Speaker 6 (23:10):
That we wanted this to be.
Speaker 16 (23:11):
A march about our unity and our safety in numbers,
and as we wrap up today, that's what we want.
Speaker 6 (23:19):
It's not like we gotta give them an excuse.
Speaker 16 (23:22):
When you're around the cop the same way when you're
around the wild animal, what.
Speaker 6 (23:26):
Do you gotta do.
Speaker 16 (23:27):
You gotta be cautious, you gotta be careful, you gotta
move a certain way, you gotta know which way to
go because you're looking to protect your safety and right
now I'm looking to protect our safety. So as we
depart here today, we are departing in unity.
Speaker 6 (23:46):
We are departing together.
Speaker 16 (23:49):
We are gonna walk back in close quarters together where
our cars work. If you're going to Martyr, you're gonna
walk close together with other people as you go to
Marta if you need a fan and pick you up
if you can't take barter to blotch this way by
depriv So we want you to be safe, secure, because
(24:13):
you want to be out here.
Speaker 6 (24:14):
Again the fight couch Sick.
Speaker 1 (24:19):
There was this sense that the people there wanted to
show that if they wanted to do things, they could have,
but they knew that this was not This was not
the right time nor.
Speaker 3 (24:29):
The right place.
Speaker 2 (24:30):
Restraint and understanding of what like practice I would say
in that situation is.
Speaker 1 (24:36):
And I mean in the speeches that happened beforehand, there
was people from community movement builders, from Black Votes Matter,
a whole bunch of other black led groups in the city.
And similarly, like like like what happened at the Clergy event,
there was not a single whiff of condemnation of militant tactics,
of of of property, destruction, of actions that people take.
(24:56):
This they people there who gay speeches recognize that such
tactics were a staple of the civil rights movement. Early
Saturday morning, I woke up to news that police had
begun another raid, but instead of raiding the Wallani Forest,
(25:20):
the police were searching the ten acre property of the
Lakewood Environmental Arts Foundation or LEAF, a local nonprofit that
was offering safe haven for people during the Week of Action.
All right, So the Atlant police have executed a warrant
on the LEAF meetup spot in southeast Atlanta that people
have been using as a welcome center, as like a
(25:41):
medic station, just another spot to hang out. It was
set up after the raid Sunday night, and it is
now Saturday morning. The police have executed this warrant to
search parisis ID everyone who's there.
Speaker 3 (25:55):
We got a group of people. It's being able to
leave right now.
Speaker 1 (25:59):
There has been a prison transport vehicle called in and
cops have like blocked off intersections around the area. No
one's allowed to get close. People are not allowed to
return to their cars. People are not allowed to return
to the private property. Since Sunday night, the land was
being used as a medic hub and provided a secondary
place to camp for those who didn't feel safe staying
(26:19):
in the forest. During their raid Saturday morning, police detained
at least twenty two people and refused to show anyone
the search warrant. And yeah, the group that got released
is just walking up now.
Speaker 3 (26:32):
Maybe like two dozen people have been able to walk up.
Speaker 15 (26:35):
Ya.
Speaker 17 (26:36):
We just bat through their police lines and we're gonna, yeah,
huddle up and get to a safe place. We were
woken up by helicopters. There had been helicopters doing rounds
all evening and I don't even know what time. Seven something,
(26:59):
we heard loud speakers saying that they had a warrant
to search the property private property.
Speaker 6 (27:08):
And.
Speaker 17 (27:12):
That was very disorienting. Obviously I was in the middle
of sleeping. We came out with our hands open, our
hands up. We had more than twenty guns pointed at us.
Some people have their fingers on triggers. Certainly they were
screaming at me. And as I was waking up, we
(27:33):
came through the line. They said that they had a
warrant to search the property. We know that Homeland Security
was one of the departments that was arrested. That was
part of the arrest crew or extraction crew or whatever.
It's very traumatic. Obviously it's freezing. This is the coldest
day this week, and so we are, you know, worried
(27:56):
about people's health because people are cold. They detained us,
they took identification. It was yeah, extremely violent situation, but
everyone here was really taking care of each other and remaining.
Speaker 1 (28:11):
Prom to address the raid, activists scheduled a press conference
for later that day after a youth rally to defend
the forest was to take place in East Village. And
I think you can hear said youths in the background,
so excuse their joyous young screams.
Speaker 18 (28:28):
We thought that it was important for us to not
only amplify the wonderful children's march that happened here today,
the community in East Atlanta, this community where they are
proposing to build cop City, came out this morning overwhelmingly
to say that they don't want cop City. So we
had parents, we had children, we had other neighbors and
(28:49):
community stakeholders who gathered right here in Brownwood Park today
at East Atlanta to say that we are East Atlanta
and cop City is not a part of what we
imagine and envision for this community.
Speaker 5 (29:01):
Also this morning, unfortunately, there is.
Speaker 18 (29:04):
A place that was held as a commune for campers
who wanted to stand in solidarity during this week of action.
Speaker 5 (29:12):
The place is called LEIF l EAF.
Speaker 18 (29:15):
That is, the Lakewood Environmental Arts Foundation, a nonprofit organization
that's dedicated to combating food insecurity here within the city
of Atlanta, offered up their space to be used for
people who did not feel safe camping in the forest
because of the over aggression of police there and they
(29:36):
wanted to stand in solidarity with this Week of Action,
so LEIF offered up their space for those people to
camp safely. Unfortunately, this morning, a gang of police officers
descended upon that sacred space.
Speaker 1 (29:51):
During the raid, up to forty officers swarmed the property,
ransacking the infrastructure set up at the Leaf Encampment site.
Cops slashed aparts two medical supply tents, disrupting metical operations,
broke windows of a camper van parked on the site,
and ripped apart a greenhouse. Police took pictures of the
people detained at Leaf and collected their ideas, but after
(30:14):
being held for several hours, the police let all but
one person go free. To quote an article by Candice
Burned in Truth Out, quote one person was arrested for
an outstanding parking ticket, demonstrating the state's desperation to snatch
up anyone associated with the Stop Cop City movement.
Speaker 7 (30:33):
Good afternoon, everybody.
Speaker 3 (30:35):
My name is Marlon Kautz.
Speaker 7 (30:36):
I'm an organizer with the Atlanta Solidarity Fund, where civil
liberties and anti repression organization that exists to make sure
that people who participate in social movements have the right
to protest and don't suffer from repression. So the reason
I'm here is because, as we've all heard previously, there
(30:57):
was an internet of political repression. Early this morning, police
executed a search warrant and performed a raid against the
Lakewood Environmental Arts Foundation, which is a community space in Lakewood,
Atlanta that exists primarily to serve artists and musicians. It's
clear that it was part of a political strategy to
(31:20):
repress and intimidate protesters who are associated with the Stop
Pop City movement movement to defend the forests. This is
very concerning, especially when taken in context. Of course, it's
very likely that police are going to report that this
was part of a routine investigation, a law enforcement.
Speaker 3 (31:42):
Matter that they had every right to conduct.
Speaker 7 (31:44):
The other thing that police are likely to claim is
that they made an arrest on scene, and our understanding
is that they did make an arrest due to somebody
who was there having an old traffic to get from
a long time ago. So it's an important to clarify
that the arrest was because of a traffic ticket, not
(32:05):
because of any alleged crimes related to the movement or
any other serious criminal activity. So it's important that we
understand this raid as part of a series of ongoing
abuses of the legal process to harass and intimidate political
throw testers. They were unable to demonstrate any criminal activity
during their raid on the Lakewood Environmental Arts Foundation, but
(32:29):
they're continuing to abuse.
Speaker 3 (32:33):
Every justification that they.
Speaker 7 (32:34):
Can to raid spaces, to make arrests.
Speaker 3 (32:40):
And to hold people in jail.
Speaker 18 (32:42):
So before the police come out and say we raided
this place where all of these outside aggressors were and
we picked up some violent offenders, we want you to
know that our brothers and sisters who were standing with
us in solidarity just saying hey, we want a camp here,
since we don't feel safe camping in the people's park
(33:03):
that's been overrun with police repression and aggression.
Speaker 5 (33:07):
They raided that place.
Speaker 18 (33:09):
They snatched people up, some people were sleeping, They took
pictures of people, they took their IDs, and they searched
and searched, found nothing else, never produced a warrant, and
only one person was arrested because of an outstanding parking ticket.
Speaker 1 (33:27):
About a week after the raid, the Guardian obtained evidence
of the search warrant. The warrant stated that there was
probable cause for believing that evidence of quote conspiracy to
commit to domestic terrorism unquote could be found at the
Lakewood location listed in the warrant where objects officers sought,
(33:47):
which included quote, cameras, radios, boxes of nails, lighters, tents,
camping equipment, spray paint, black clothing, and literature related to
defend the forest. These were the materials tied to domestic terrorism.
As the week progressed, there were an increasing number of
(34:09):
reports of police tailing people coming and going from a
March's and especially the actions downtown. Basically, officers would follow
people suspected of participating in the movement, pull them over,
try to id anyone within the vehicles, and then issue
some nonsense traffic citation. This continued on Thursday after the
(34:30):
Community Movement Builders march, as people were heading home from
the public park, police stocked a few individuals and pulled
over multiple vehicles. A van carrying one of the speakers
was targeted, as well as two other cars that were
pulled over as they were leaving the protest. Marlin from
the Atlanta Solidarity Fund talked about the various ways police
(34:52):
had been using their power to intimidate activists and suppress protest.
Speaker 7 (34:57):
Our organization has gotten many report sort of pretext stops
of political protesters or people who are suspected of being
political protesters because of bumper stickers on their car or
the state that their license plate is from. We've gotten
reports of people being stop and frisked simply because they're
(35:18):
profiled as looking like political activists. And of course we've
seen dozens of protesters or suspected protesters arrested and charged
with domestic terrorism simply because they were found at a
music festival that's associated with the Stop Cop City movement.
And so we can see that every step of the way,
(35:40):
police and prosecutors are abusing the legal process to intimidate
and discourage this movement.
Speaker 2 (35:46):
Throughout this time, police have been watching or monitoring one
of the off site locations in the forest. They've parked
in front of this site and kept up surveillance on it,
and then leading all the way up into Friday, there
was a journalist pulled over leaving the final non violent
direct action from Wodriff Park. They were pulled over with
(36:08):
two other people in the car and detained briefly, ostensibly
to continue to identify and connect people.
Speaker 1 (36:18):
A big part of the story for this week of
action is the excess of the police response to quite
typical acts of quote unquote nonviolent protest, the sort that
the government and even the police loved to claim that
they actually protect. With every single action downtown this week,
virtually no laws were being broken, not even any civil disobedience.
(36:40):
People were handing out flyers, marching on sidewalks giving out letters,
and the police's response was to deploy SWAT, to mobilize
hundreds of officers to shut down multiple city blocks, to
carry ar fifteens as they tail crowds of a few
dozen people just walking on the sidewalk and yelling at
people if they accidentally miss this step off the curb
and threaten violent arrest. This was the sort of extremely
(37:04):
aggressive response to people doing protest quote unquote the right way.
Speaker 2 (37:09):
We should highlight that. That is the apparent goal of
these protests was to show that even when they are
doing things the right way, this is how the state
reacts to dissent.
Speaker 1 (37:20):
It reacts in this militarized fashion where you like it's
it's I think a big part of what's happened in
these types of protests that have happened the past week
is demonstrating why people are campaigning to stop Cop City
because the sheer amount of resources that the police already
have in the city to be deploying hundreds and hundreds
(37:40):
of officers every single day to respond to people handing
out flyers, it's like to respond to people who are
walking on the sidewalks. They have this massive amount of resources.
They're using tear gas in the woods, they're using paper balls,
they're using flash bangs, they're they're having multiple different swat
teams follow around people handing out pamphlets. The level of
(38:02):
police militarization in Atlanta is already at this extremely high point,
and Cop City is only going to intensify that, and
that is the reason they want to build Cop City.
It's for this type of urban counterinsurgency training to quell
civil unrest and to quell protest.
Speaker 18 (38:21):
On Thursday night, we held a very peaceful and successful
march in downtown Atlanta, starting at the King Center.
Speaker 5 (38:28):
We had someone.
Speaker 18 (38:30):
Who was stopped by the police and asked if he
was picking up protesters, taken out of the vehicle, handcuffed
for no reason. They couldn't find a reason to detain
him any longer, so they had to let him go.
But Atlanta, this is why we're standing against cop City,
because if cop City is built, you can guarantee that
you won't even be able to go to the grocery
(38:52):
store without being harassed by the police for no reason
at all.
Speaker 1 (38:56):
When I spoke with Matthew Johnson, he brought up a
similar point with.
Speaker 12 (39:01):
The resources that the police had to respond in the
way that they did. The assertion that they need more
training in a militarized facility or they need more resources
is crazy because you had them literally outnumbering protesters and
kettling them. And we have credible sources that say that
(39:25):
there were swat forces who had instructed the officers to
arrest nonviolent protesters, and there were actually police officers that
refused to take that order, which I think is another
fascinating dynamic that is worth exploring and understanding more. But
(39:45):
just with the resources that they had to try to
shut down protesters, harass folks, constantly ticket and pull over
people that they saw, you know, creating like a logistical
framework for the week of action is nuts, and they're
making our point for us. On Friday, the word came
(40:08):
out that Tortugita had bullet holes through both of their
palms and that they were more than likely sitting cross
leg with their hands up when they were shot by police.
And now we are supposed to be convinced that these
people that lied about this killed somebody that was absolutely
(40:30):
no threat to them. On the same grounds that they're
trying to build this police training facility, we're supposed to
believe that this is going to make them less violent
towards people, like as you're building a militarized police training
facility and like people that try to convince themselves that
these is going to be a place where people are
also being taught de escalation tactics while like everything around
(40:54):
that is militarized. It's like if you had somebody build
a water park and you're like, oh, yeah, I'm just
trying to stay dry. I don't want to get splash
or anything like that. And it's like, oh no, no, no,
don't worries. We have a food court right in the
middle of it, and it's great, you're really just coming
there for the food court, so don't worry about it.
And then like you go there and then you get splashed.
(41:20):
What were you expecting? Like, that's obviously not what that
facility's for because all the infrastructure around it is made
to be a water park or a militarized police training facility.
So don't be surprised when maybe they might have one
de escalation program and like you know where the food
court would be, and then somebody gets killed, right, because
(41:40):
they're actually building the infrastructure for killing. So that's where
we're at.
Speaker 1 (41:45):
This week of action has shown a lot about how
the police are operating post the twenty twenty Uprising, how
they will respond to people exercising their First Amendment right,
and the indiscriminate way that police will respond to any
active protests. One of the main takeaways from this week
is that their response to protest is deployed against people
(42:07):
without target or focus. They care very little if you
are breaking a window or if you're marching on the sidewalk,
They're still gonna send the SWAT team. Police are acting
as if they are entirely incapable of differentiating between acts
of descent. Toward the end of the week, I sat
down and talked with an unnamed forest defender to get
(42:29):
their thoughts on the week of action. For security reasons,
we did a vocal replacement.
Speaker 19 (42:34):
The police presence has been pretty unprecedented. I haven't seen
shit like that here since twenty twenty, not downtown at least.
I mean shit, I don't think we had seen gas
in Atlanta in a minute, and then they gassed the forest.
It'd been a while, but yeah, I mean they're punching out,
especially like Tuesday, they were putting a one hundred and
fifty two hundred cops the entirety of downtown. I mean
multi jurisdictional task forces deployed multiple different Atlanta APD SWAT
(42:58):
teams between like regular APD SWAT and APEX, which is
like the Drug and Gang Interdiction Unit. I mean a
fucking whole drone unit GSP. Some weird unmarked cars that
I won't speculate on helicopters all that shit. You know,
the type of police response you would expect to see
in like a dystopian, fucking police state. For some people
handing out flyers that just say this is bad for
(43:18):
the environment, doesn't matter how milk toast or not, and
like I shouldn't say milk toast, like that's not a
bad thing. We need people to go hand out flyers.
We need to inform people as far as what this
is to get people involved, but like as non violent
as you can get, and still they're going to treat
you like your fucking al Qaeda, you know, and it
puts you in a weird position because then it's like, okay, cool,
if you're going to treat us the exact same for
(43:39):
being nonviolent, why not do crime? If the police response
to an assault on an outpost that drove the police
out and burned five things down, the police response to
fifteen people handing out flyers downtown are going to be
about the same, then why not take more militant radical action.
Speaker 1 (43:54):
The twenty three people arrested on Sunday, March fifth, we're
not arrested as anyone was torching a whipment. They were
not arrested at the power line cut. It was people
who were attending a music festival. Arrests were not widely
targeted against people who police knew were engaged in property destruction.
They were targeted against anyone the cops could grab. Same
(44:15):
was the case at the January twenty first action, where
people were marching downtown the Saturday after Tortugita was killed.
The only people arrested and subsequently charged with domestic terrorism
was anyone the police could get their hands on. Officers
went after people who were carrying banners the entire duration
of the march. It was not targeted against people who
(44:37):
were engaged in militant action. Among all this talk of
police repression and multiple raids, it's easy to overlook that
throughout the week people still sought opportunities for finding joy
(44:59):
and resistance, because most people wouldn't dedicate years of their
life to this if it was just miserable battles with
police the whole time.
Speaker 2 (45:09):
I think one thing that's been lost in all of this, too,
is all of the lighthearted events that have continued to
go on through the week, and like the joy of
the movement that was represented in the Bouncy Castle rip.
Speaker 1 (45:21):
But that joy is continuing in the woods, like people
still continue to camp in the woods. People are still
having dinner in the woods. People are still having camp fires,
people are still talking the woods. It is still a
place that people are gathering at and are enjoying each other.
Is company in now are enjoying the woods in It
is a place that the morale has never been fully crushed.
Speaker 2 (45:41):
The morale has never been fully crushed, And like the
participatory acts of the Week of Action are continuing, like
none of that has been quashed.
Speaker 1 (45:53):
An example of the joyful, continuous resistance during the Week
of Action can be found at the youth rally that
happened on Saturday the eleventh. All right, so I'm at
the youth rally Saturday, after the warrant was served on
the meetup spot in southeast Atlanta. There's around two hundred
people marching through East Village in Atlanta. Pretty pretty joyous
(46:15):
group here actually, and they're actually like on the streets.
Speaker 3 (46:18):
This is the first time we've had a large march.
Speaker 1 (46:19):
Like this take to the streets because every action that
was in downtown or midten Atlanta was just so heavily
surveilled by police who were not letting anyone get near
the street at all. But there's no police here. They
were busy doing the search warrant. So this group is
actually is actually able to take to the streets. It's
like everyone kind of in this area of Atlanta is
(46:42):
pretty pretty pro pro this little protest here. There's like
workers from the little shops and stores nodding along.
Speaker 2 (46:51):
Fulten County Share has just walked by the march like
on there, just you know, off shift workout routine, wearing
Fulden County gear.
Speaker 3 (46:58):
That's pretty funny.
Speaker 1 (47:00):
People dancing in the streets, Families walking with their kids
through the streets all right, walking around the park that
the youth rally started at, and the press conference about
the raid this morning just ended at there's as you
can probably hear kids playing in the park.
Speaker 3 (47:19):
People are handing out food.
Speaker 1 (47:20):
It's a massive, massive amount of food just in the
middle of the park with levels table set up. Overall,
this is kind of one of the more joyous events
that we've had since the initial Saturday rally at Gresham Park,
just with the amount of food, the amount of kids
just running around and playing, all of all the information
tables that are handing out literature and giving you know,
(47:42):
making connections with people. Yeah, when I was down here
in January, the mood was very somber. The mood was
very grim like coming to the vigil when there was
the destroyed remains of the gazebo, the torn up parking lot,
all of the trees in there still within their like
winter state, with all of the leaves gone. Everything was
(48:02):
very kind of barren. And the first thing I noticed
on Saturday as we were marching is like there's new
life springing in the woods. There's this invigorated sense of
the almost assurance of victory that people are carrying with
them as they take action.
Speaker 3 (48:18):
And I think that.
Speaker 1 (48:19):
Really does change what the action you take is. And
that does change the types of results that people will see,
is if they go at this with the idea that
we are going to win this.
Speaker 2 (48:29):
And I think that that is kind of why the
non violent direct actions have become like that have moved
to the floor. Right when you think that you're going
to lose, and you have nothing to lose, you engage
in these incredibly radical actions because what else are you
going to do? Yeah, and then when you have this
belief that no, we can win, we just have to
(48:50):
find that pathway.
Speaker 1 (48:51):
And that is a part of the diversity of tactics
is using both of those and almost every ecological movement
that's been successful has demonstrated that the pathway to success
is often paved with a diversity of tactics, with people
doing nonviolent action at noon, which will pull a massive
militarized police response as people are doing regular ass shit.
(49:12):
And then a part of diversity of tactics is also
people leaving a music festival to go torch a bulldozer
at both Both of those things are a diversity of tactics.
Now I stand by most of that statement. However, issues
can arise when there is a ticking clock and during
the time spent looking for this pathway, the enemy meanwhile
(49:34):
is making steady progress. Issues may also arise when a
large diversity of tactics is shoved under just one roof.
I had a lot of conversations with movement participants regarding
the direct action that happened on Sunday night and how
it cast a shadow of repression over the whole week
(49:55):
of action. To synthesize the many conversations, in general, most
people thought that what physically happened was good. The actual
actions at the North Gate were successful and justified. But
there are other things on the periphery of that action
that make it slightly more complicated.
Speaker 12 (50:16):
And now we can have lots of questions about tactics
and cost benefit analysis about that action, which I did
not think it would be wise, especially being so visible
for me to have to be anywhere near on that day.
We can have questions about that, But what was for
certain was that the way in which the police responded
(50:37):
was absurd and predictably so. Now with the destruction that
I saw, et cetera cost them less than a million
dollars and maybe like two weeks actually of construction that
they were pushed back max. These are like max numbers.
Was that worth twenty three people being arrested and quaching
what could have been a larger Aki patient and wider
(51:01):
participation and wider buying in the movement. Instead, by the
time we got to Monday, the clergy was having to
do clean up rather than like cast division of what
the world could be. And so these are tradeoffs right
where even though we have to be very clear about
what a diversity of tactics means, and also a separation
(51:24):
of time and space. So I mean, we can't just
look at a diversity of tactics and everybody does what
they want as if they're operating in a sylo but
rather we give space for one another to do different
things that may work, respectful of the fact that some
of our actions may affect one another.
Speaker 1 (51:45):
In the lead up to the Week of Action, night
time sabotage actions decreased around Atlanta in favor of these
big public demos during daylight. That seems to result in
more people getting arrested. And what the results of Sunday's
action happening in such close proximity to the festival and
the encampments is that the people at the festival and
(52:08):
in the woods who did not consent to participating in
a high profile direct action got disproportionately hit with the
immediate repression from police. A lot of the people who
were arrested were completely unaware of the actions that took
place at the North Gate. Even if those actions were
one hundred percent justified in the end, it still creates
(52:30):
a dynamic with an unequal distribution of police violence. Now, obviously,
the woods are an inherently dangerous place to be, and
people are not responsible for actions that police choose to take.
But there are still considerations to be had regarding the
proximity of space and time when engaging in more risky actions,
(52:52):
and how the consequences of those actions may affect people
who did not consent to participating in actions at other locations,
especially when people are lulled into a false sense of
safety by claiming that police have never cracked down hard
in the forest during previous weeks of action.
Speaker 19 (53:12):
Yeah, in terms of the actions done Sunday, in reference
to a group of people assaulting a like police position,
driving them out with force, and then burning their shit,
that was all good and we should not denounce that
or step away from it. It only harms the movement
to back away from radical action and act like there
are definitions of good or bad protesters, because eventually the
logical conclusion of that is snitching, and that only furthers
(53:35):
like the GBI's motivations to tear the movement apart. What
went wrong Sunday is as a result of two things.
It's one that the police used indiscriminate violence when people
beat them. They were beaten, they got angry, and they
were beaten because they got their shit rocked by like fireworks,
and then they use in discriminate violence against people who
they knew were on the side of like where the
(53:55):
events were that weren't where all the militants were coming
back from. They didn't want to go up against those
people because they're cowards. And second, because of how big
the movement's gotten over the past two years, the strategy
of the Weeks of Action has stagnated. It's made it
so work, so compact in a singular week that when
you have all of the diversity of tactics that exist
within Defend the Atlanta Forest and stop Coop City, those
(54:17):
tactics with how big everything is now, they start to
step on each other's toes. They can hurt each other
sometimes because yeah, not everyone who was at the RC
field was like ready for the consequences of like a
militant radical action like that. And that doesn't mean that
the action wasn't good or justified, because the action was
wildly successful. There were no arrests made at that action.
There were a rest made when the police got angry
(54:38):
and used indiscriminate violence because they were pissed off and
they wanted.
Speaker 1 (54:41):
To riot, so they retaliated at a music festival that
was happening nearby.
Speaker 19 (54:46):
Yes, and that's the fault of nobody but the police.
That's not the fault of the people who went and
assaulted that outpost. That's only the fault of the police,
and really the fault of a bad long term strategy
of too heavily compacting factors of you know, being just
like a week and where making it so this movement
where people can take radical action, it feels so limited
to just inside the forest because that puts people in
(55:08):
harms way, and that put people in harms way, including
the people who you know, went and did the thing
on Sunday. But no, it would be wrong as the
movement to like balk out a radical action like that.
Radical action like that is such a big part of
why this movement has been as successful as it has been.
It's a huge part of why the police didn't do
like a full sweep or a larger sweep or a
series of raids in the following days because they were
(55:30):
afraid that those three hundred to four hundred people who
hit that out posts were lying and waiting in the
forest ready to attack them. Because they were afraid of
militant radical action.
Speaker 1 (55:38):
On Thursday, when I was in front of the APF building,
I could like hear some of the supervisors and coordinators
talking about being scared of ambushes or like being scared
of splinter groups, like being staged to attack officers. It's
it's bizarre how fearful they are. Of the types of
people who are opposing the cop City project, They're.
Speaker 19 (56:00):
The most afraid of the people who are willing to
go do physical violence to them, and not even physical violence,
but people who are just willing to throw a rock
at them or like a firework. Once they realize that
they haven't paralyzed somebody with fear, once they realize that
they have not made you so afraid of taking action,
they become such cowards.
Speaker 1 (56:18):
In the aftermath of the police killing forest defender Tortigita,
law enforcement agencies tried to claim that Tortigita shot at
them first, leaving one officer injured, but recently released findings
from multiple autopsies have cast more doubt on the state's
version of events. On the afternoon of Friday, March tenth,
(56:39):
towards the end of the week of Action, the family
of Tortighita released the findings of an independent autopsy done
by former GBI Chief Medical Examiner doctor Chris Sperry. The
results suggested that Tortighito was sitting cross legged with their
hands in front of their face when shot and bullet
exit wounds through the palms of both of their hands.
(57:01):
The family ordered autopsy also did not find any evidence
of gunshot residue from a GSR test kit, and then
a month later, Decab County released the results of their
official autopsy, which found at least fifty seven bullet wounds
across Tortigita's body and according to this autopsy, torte did
(57:21):
not have any gunpowder residue on its hands. Then, a
few days later, via a public records request, the Atlanta
Community Press Collective received the gunshot residue test kit from
the Georgia Bureau of Investigation's crime Lab. The document contained
the names of six Georgia State Patrol SWAT members who
shot and killed Tortigita, Bryland L. Myers, Jerry A. Parrish,
(57:47):
Jonathan Salceda, Jonathan Mark lamb Ronaldo Kegel, and Royce Zaw,
with Zaw being the subject of a lawsuit after he
shot a protester in the face with a les lethal
during the George Floyd protests in May of twenty twenty.
The document also included the results of the GBI's crime
(58:07):
lab report, claiming that they found quote the presence of
more than five particles characteristic of gunshot primer residue unquote
from a test kit, with the report also stating quote,
it should be noted that it is possible for a
victim of gunshot wounds to have GSR present on their
hands unquote, considering that among the more than fifty seven
(58:31):
gunshot wounds were entrance and exit wounds on Torteghita's hands,
which could be cause for gunshot residue if the crime
lab findings are genuine. The findings do not point to
any specific interpretation of events, as it's not unusual to
find primer residue on the hands of a victim following
the path of a bullet. Plus, coupled with the ever
(58:51):
changing story from the GBI, on the ground, chatter from
APD officers claiming that George State Patrol quote fucked their
own officer up unquote, as well as reports from forced
defenders from the day of the shooting, there is indication
that Georgia State Patrol most likely suffered from so called
friendly fire, with many people believing that the killing of
(59:12):
Tortighita was essentially an execution.
Speaker 3 (59:16):
Instant.
Speaker 1 (59:17):
Reports obtained via public records requests also revealed that GSP
fired a quote unquote, a Leslie thul pepperball gun at
Tortighita's tent as SWAT initially approached, once again contradicting the
claims made by GBI officials in the months since the killing.
As the week came to a close on Sunday, March eleventh,
(59:40):
a memorial service for Tortighita was held in the Malani Forest,
where Towrt's family spread their ashes in the forest it
died to protect. I attended the Sunday morning memorial. The
sky opened up and poured down rain in South Atlanta
throughout the whole morning of people gathered in Wallaanne People's
(01:00:01):
Park to light candles under a canopy and hear from
Tort's family. Then, led by Tortighita's mother, we walked through
the forest to the site of the shooting, where a
banner hung that read quote on this ground, GSP assassinated
forest defender Comrade friend lover Tortigita unquote, family and friends
(01:00:26):
spread Tortigita's ashes throughout the woods along the path to
quote Candice Burned in truth Out. In contrast to its
tumultuous start, Sunday's vigil and ceremony provided a somber and
heartfelt close to the fifth week of Action. I met
up with Matthew Johnson after the memorial to discuss the
(01:00:49):
week of Action, and we briefly touched on the memorial
in the forest.
Speaker 12 (01:00:54):
I think that we have to hold space for very
o grief. We lost a friend, and at the same time,
just two days ago, on a Friday, what we always
knew to be true was found to clearly be true.
Torte Ghita was murdered and we have to bear the
(01:01:17):
BRender of that pain. And all the people in power
lied and even gave their condolences to a state trooper
that seemed as if he was shot by a state
trooper and did not say a mumbling word to even
acknowledge our friend's existence and the value of their life.
(01:01:39):
And this morning was beautiful. I had been able to
meet bilkis Uh Toti Ghita's mother previously, and as she
really does have a beautiful spirit. I really grown appreciation
for that family, and just to see just how large
(01:01:59):
these gatherings were like throughout the week, even in spite
of the hoopla and the opening weekend, it was very encouraging.
But in a lot of ways, Tortigita has become the
face of this movement because they really did light up
(01:02:20):
wherever they were. One thing that's gotten me through I'm
just thinking about when you would just see them sometimes
let me just give you the biggest, like cheesiest smile,
like out of nowhere.
Speaker 1 (01:02:32):
I just.
Speaker 12 (01:02:34):
And like that like got me through the first week
after their passing. Yeah, but I've grown a great appreciation
for that family because in so many ways, Tortigita is
their hero, And just to learn how consistent they were
(01:02:56):
as like such a welcoming and loving and caring person
just meant so much. I mean to know that this
wasn't something new that they had stumbled upon. They had
lived this whole life of caring and making space for others.
Speaker 1 (01:03:10):
Some of Towart's friends have raised concerns that a side
effect of Toward unwittingly becoming the face of the movement
is that the details around their death have eclipsed some
of what they died fighting for. In doing so, stripping
toward of their individuality and removing their own agency, to
turn them into this perfect liberal, friendly avatar of the
(01:03:33):
movement to simply be used as a political tool and
add to a list of demands.
Speaker 19 (01:03:40):
There's a thing that's been happening more and more recently
that I've been bothered by, which is when organizations, specifically
more liberal organizations, are invoking towards name actions, they're misgendering
the hell out of them, and it's alienating a lot
of people. And I understand that Sunday's action alienated a
lot of liberal orgs. This is a problem with the
Week of Action type stress, with the diversity of tactics
(01:04:03):
all being forced under one roof. But we cannot stand
to alienate each other. And it's really frustrating and really
angering to see this really beautiful soul be flattened into
just a murder that these liberals want them to be,
stripping them of so much of their life and what
was a revolutionary life and a revolutionary death into just martyrdom,
by taking away their identity and who they were and
making them nothing more than someone who was murdered when
(01:04:26):
they were someone who is living such a full and
beautiful life until the day they died, and this movement
will tear itself apart if we do not accept the
fullness of towards life, what it stood for, and what
they live for. This movement has always been built on
a lot of trans people in the woods fucking the
cops up, and if we alienate those people were fucked,
there's no winning and we can't lose. We don't have
(01:04:46):
a choice about this anymore. We have to win by
any means necessary.
Speaker 1 (01:04:50):
That will wrap up our day to day coverage of
the entire week of Action, but much has happened in
the intervening two months, so in the next time episode
we'll cover where the movement is now, discuss the future
of the fight to stop Copcity, and offer a more
critical retrospective on the fifth week of Action. See You
(01:05:11):
on the other Side. Music Festival audio courtesy of Unicorn
Riot It Could Happen here as a production of cool
Zone Media.
Speaker 11 (01:05:22):
For more podcasts from cool Zone Media, visit our website
coolzonemedia dot com, or check us out on the iHeartRadio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever.
Speaker 7 (01:05:29):
You listen to podcasts you can find sources for It
could happen here. Updated monthly at coolzonemedia dot com slash sources.
Thanks for listening,
Welcome back to it could happen here. I'm Garrison Davis.
This is episode four of my mini series and detailing
the March twenty twenty three week of action to stop
cop City in Atlanta, Georgia. This episode, we'll be hearing
from a lot of new people as we close out
the day to day coverage of this week of action.
(00:29):
One of the last big organized rallies was on Thursday
night and it was put on by Community Movement Builders
and other black led groups from Atlanta.
Speaker 2 (00:39):
The big event Thursday night was a six o'clock rally
that met at the Martin Luther King National Historic Site.
Speaker 3 (00:45):
There was police stationed at King Center.
Speaker 1 (00:47):
Before anyone got there, we saw like dozens and dozens
of police cars going by.
Speaker 2 (00:52):
All around the site are various quick response forces and
riot cops ready to.
Speaker 1 (01:00):
Move in large police response in the area already, as
has been expected for the past few days, multiple Sandy
Springs police buses were driving by. There was multiple unmarked
white vans full of officers. The areas crawling with police
cars and now there's a small detail of officers across
the street from the people gathering here in the park.
Speaker 2 (01:23):
We are currently surrounded on every side by groups of
police officers in riodgear. The crowd started off like actually
fairly decently sized, maybe like fifty people, and then continued
as well as the speeches progressed to I would say
like two hundred two hundred fifty, maybe even a little
bit more. They were passing out signs, so like anyone
(01:44):
who came, like they had a sign ready for you.
Andre Dickins is a sellout of course, as a very
popular one. There were stop Coop City like banners that
people could like hold atl of Verse twelve, like you know,
just a bunch of like really clever sort of protest
slogan and things that people get behind. The makeup of
the crowd was definitely leaned like far less like white
(02:05):
anarchists than certainly the accusations of this movement, I think,
more representative of the movement as a whole, Like it
was a mix of a bunch of different people. I
would say, like it probably accurately reflected Atlanta demographics.
Speaker 3 (02:20):
Defend the forest.
Speaker 1 (02:21):
As signs and banners are being handed out throughout the crowd,
other people are passing around the jail support number and
jail support contact information.
Speaker 3 (02:29):
People are starting to get ready, so.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
It meets it at six o'clock and for about an
hour and a half we listened to a series of
speeches as the crowd begins to swell.
Speaker 4 (02:39):
So we are here in solidarity together today to make
it clearer to the mayor that he's not gonna keep
lying on our names.
Speaker 5 (02:46):
They'll literally be building.
Speaker 4 (02:48):
The most of Atlanta just how to repress my life.
Speaker 5 (02:52):
They kill me, and we find it ridiculous, We find
it disgusting.
Speaker 4 (02:58):
We find it embarrassing that our Mayor Andre Diggins with
xes now to say that.
Speaker 6 (03:03):
Black people want to be killed by the police, that
black people walk crop city.
Speaker 4 (03:09):
The mayor must have forgotten that our ancestors were literally
fighting abolition since they were brutally brought to this country.
They were fighting for freedom, fighting the original police right,
the slave patrols that captured black bodies to take them
back to their white masters. He's talking to the same
(03:30):
black people whose elders were fighting here in the same
streets in the sixties and the seventies to stop police
occupation of our communities. That's right. Resistance to police, resistance
to stay violence is literally in our blood as black people.
Speaker 5 (03:46):
It is in our DNA.
Speaker 4 (03:48):
They're lying on our name because they want money from
the same white corporations that are funding Cop City, Home Depot,
Chick fil A, Coca Cola, Norfolk, Southern At and T.
Speaker 5 (04:03):
Costs enterprises who.
Speaker 4 (04:04):
All say AJC and this is a fight that we
will win, that.
Speaker 5 (04:09):
We are committed to winning. And so when we talk about.
Speaker 4 (04:12):
Winning, it's important to say, what do we mean when
we say that we'll win.
Speaker 5 (04:16):
We mean no Cop City anywhere, not in.
Speaker 4 (04:22):
South Atlanta, not in the cab not in North Atlanta, nowhere.
When we say that we will win, we are meaning
that this fight does not stop with Cop City. This
is a fight for the liberation of all oppressed people
here and abroad.
Speaker 7 (04:37):
That's right.
Speaker 4 (04:38):
And that why is disgusting that the mayor and that
these corporations will talk about outside agitators.
Speaker 5 (04:45):
Okay.
Speaker 4 (04:46):
The reason that there are people coming from all over
the world to support.
Speaker 5 (04:50):
This fight is because this is a fight that affects
all of us, That's right.
Speaker 4 (04:54):
The Atlanta Police Foundation admitted that of the cops being
trained at that facility will not be in Georgia. Okay,
So when people come from Tennessee, from New York, from California,
it's because they know that their local police might learn
how to kill them better.
Speaker 5 (05:11):
Here, that's right.
Speaker 4 (05:13):
And when people come from abroad, they know that currently
the Atlanta.
Speaker 5 (05:17):
Police Department trains with the Israeli police.
Speaker 4 (05:20):
So the same techniques being used to brutalize black people
are being used to practice genocide on the Palestinian people.
And the same tactics being used to practice genocide on
the Palestinian people.
Speaker 5 (05:32):
Are being used to brutalize black people right here.
Speaker 4 (05:35):
So when people come from all over the world to
say stop cop City, they're not outside agitators.
Speaker 5 (05:40):
They're standing in solidarity with us, because this is the fight,
that's all.
Speaker 1 (05:47):
As the rain picked up, Tortillita's mother, Belquise Taran, spoke
next on the part.
Speaker 6 (05:54):
Is the friend that I called them.
Speaker 8 (05:56):
I caned them to come here to suppernt us.
Speaker 9 (06:00):
All the people from different religions come.
Speaker 6 (06:04):
Here and help us.
Speaker 5 (06:06):
This is a matter of the earth. We're talking about
earth that.
Speaker 10 (06:13):
Is dying right, that needs our love, That earth needs
our attention, and we are we have conscious we know
that this is not right.
Speaker 5 (06:28):
Don't go by yourself when we.
Speaker 8 (06:31):
Go to activities and stay together, don't go outside by yourself.
Don't we need to make understand that this is the
right thing to do.
Speaker 5 (06:43):
We are the correct people.
Speaker 9 (06:46):
We are right because we are driving by love, by
carry by concerns, and we.
Speaker 4 (06:56):
Love all the I love you.
Speaker 5 (07:01):
We're like dude.
Speaker 1 (07:04):
A speaker from Black Votes Matter addressed to the crowd next,
starting off by talking about the importance of mass action.
Speaker 11 (07:12):
I just want to explain something because sometimes people get confused,
they get it twisted.
Speaker 6 (07:15):
They say, oh, y'all, look, black vote.
Speaker 9 (07:17):
It's better.
Speaker 5 (07:17):
All y'all do is talk about voting.
Speaker 11 (07:19):
Be clear, we understand that the way that we get
to liberation is not going to come just through a vote.
That's never been how it's worked for our people in
this country. Sister Harry didn't get a chance to vote
for liberations.
Speaker 6 (07:31):
She didn't get a chance to vote to take our
people off the plantation and right.
Speaker 5 (07:36):
So we are very clear that what we have.
Speaker 12 (07:38):
Got to be.
Speaker 11 (07:39):
In fact, we just celebrated, commemorated the anniversary of Selma
and the Marks of Montgomery. But be clear, the people
of Selma didn't vote for our Voting Rights Act. They
had to fight for it, they had.
Speaker 6 (07:49):
To march for it.
Speaker 11 (07:50):
In some cases, they bled for it. They had to
resist for it, they had to take to the streets
for it. It's a that tradition that we are out
here today. I believe, I believe in the power of
the vote, but house to believe in the power of
mass action.
Speaker 1 (08:07):
He then talked about the intersection of cop City and
efforts to further restrict the democratic process in Georgia.
Speaker 11 (08:14):
The same corporations that are that are funding cop City
are the same ones that are funding the bonus questions,
the same ones. We've did our whole campaign a couple
of years ago when Georgia says that bonus prission bill,
and we called out Home Depot and Coca Cola and
tell them many of the other corporations that give money
(08:36):
to the people, that are that are taken away our.
Speaker 5 (08:39):
Rights to vote.
Speaker 11 (08:40):
And then if you don't have a government that reflects
the people, then what do you need. You need a
police force to enforce the fact that you don't.
Speaker 5 (08:47):
Have a government that reflects the people.
Speaker 11 (08:50):
And so our message from Mary Dickens, our message for
the city council is that.
Speaker 5 (08:55):
If you don't respond.
Speaker 6 (08:56):
To the people, you are blott you.
Speaker 11 (09:03):
We've got that power, We've got the power to make
that happen.
Speaker 1 (09:08):
Students from the Atlanta University Center consortium of four black
colleges in Atlanta, were some of the last people to
give speeches before the march.
Speaker 13 (09:17):
We have attempted to reform our police force, add de
el escalation training, add civil rights history training, and give
more money to our police, but we continue to see
black bodies across social media platforms, television, and other media
platforms being displayed being murdered. The victims have received no justice.
And when we say no justice, what do we say?
Speaker 11 (09:38):
No justice, no justice, no justice.
Speaker 4 (09:45):
The building of the Atlanta Public Training Center is an
insult and an act of the utmost disrespect from our
city leaders.
Speaker 5 (09:53):
We have a duty to fight for the change that
we seek.
Speaker 4 (09:56):
As an active member of this community, I refuse to
sit by and be idle and just let things happen.
Speaker 14 (10:04):
This city has been my home ever since I was born.
Speaker 6 (10:08):
I've been to various events here.
Speaker 11 (10:10):
I have seen the sights and have lived through some
of the most important events right here in this city.
Speaker 14 (10:15):
This is my home. This is your home, This is
our home. This is the home of black excellence. This
is the home of doctor Martin Luther King, Junior. This
is the home of John Lewis. This is the home
of Joseph Evelyn and Joseph E.
Speaker 6 (10:33):
Lowie.
Speaker 11 (10:34):
This is the home of civil rights. This is the
home of ct Gillion. This is the home of great
blackness itself. This is the home of every single black
person here in America. This city, this house, this place
of black excellence, says no to Cop City.
Speaker 15 (10:57):
My Afro pessimist friends and revolution there is both agree
we are at war. The police in the city have
said as much loudly with their words and their actions.
It feels obvious to me that we need warriors weapons,
and I know that that fact may give some of
us trepidation. But I want to assure you that we
(11:19):
need so much more than soldiers to win this fight.
Whatever it is that you do, whatever skill you bring,
I just ask that you make it a weapon.
Speaker 6 (11:28):
If we are ever.
Speaker 15 (11:29):
Going to experience democracy, we need your tools to be
repurposed in this fight against Cop City. If you're a
writer like me, child, that pat better look like a
threat to Cop City. If you do mutual aid, caring
for community ain't gonna get any easier. Please show us
(11:50):
the way. If you're an artist, where are my artists at.
Speaker 6 (11:57):
You got a lot of them out here.
Speaker 15 (12:00):
Let every painting reveal the truth, including the joy and
freedom that abolition calls us to. Let us make songs
that inspire revolution. If you're a healer, get ready, we
need you.
Speaker 6 (12:16):
Much will be lost in this struggle. Let us not forget.
Speaker 15 (12:21):
If you're a teacher, well, we got a lot to
learn about this war we're fighting and how police practice
urban warfare. If you're a lawyer, guide us when they
say that any fighter is a criminal. If you're a
digital organizer, and keep your finger on the pulse and
tell our stories.
Speaker 6 (12:38):
Far and wide.
Speaker 15 (12:40):
And if you're a community organizer, we need to tend
to our relationships, not just use them. We need real
solidarity which goes beyond unity. We need pluralism, making space
for many strategies to coexist. And ultimately, we need to
practice democracy. If we plan to build one cop city
(13:01):
is the police and the establishment of preparing for domestic
war right here in the city of Atlanta's that's right.
Any further training of the police is training against our existence.
That shit cannot be built, and well.
Speaker 12 (13:20):
That be built.
Speaker 15 (13:23):
We all must fight for the democracy we've never seen before.
Speaker 6 (13:28):
What are you willing to do?
Speaker 12 (13:29):
Thank you?
Speaker 1 (13:33):
So after about an hour of speeches, people are now
foundly getting ready to move. They announced on the loudspeaker
where we are going. We are marching to the Atlanta
Police Foundation headquarters on Peachtree, the same location that had
the front windows broken on the protest following the killing
of Torti Ghita that Saturday. So people leave, they stick
(13:54):
onto the sidewalk because there's cops staring at them, and
cops have definitely had had had indicated that if if
people step on to the street, they would be arrested.
The length of the march is stretching for about two
or three city blocks, just because you know, trying to
(14:15):
cram three hundred people onto a sidewalk makes that stretch
out really long. But the cops have been pretty pretty
adamant that if anyone steps onto the street, they're going
to get arrested. That is a banner being carried across
that says what you water grows, fund our future, stop
cop City, defend the forest. People with the stop cop
(14:39):
City signs in the Coca Cola font signs that read
Atlanta versus Cop City, No Cop City on stolen Land
the Thursday march definitely had the most amount of signs
out of all of the individual marches or actions that
I want to both small handheld signs and also signs
(15:01):
with really tall handles to hold up above the crowd.
All right, people are being led into the street now
after walking, after walking on the hidewalk for a decent while,
people have now taken to the street.
Speaker 3 (15:20):
Along the path of the march.
Speaker 1 (15:21):
The projector was set up projecting like stop coop City
slogans onto the side of a building, almost like really
really good graphic design.
Speaker 2 (15:28):
Visuals is definitely a strength of the movement.
Speaker 1 (15:31):
There's this police riot helmet that has a tree growing
underneath it and breaking apart of the helmet that says
trees give life, police take it. We got a police
riot line set up a few blocks ahead of the
people marching on the street right next to the building
with these with the stop cop City stuff projected onto
the side. Rather than let the police do an escalatory
(15:53):
show of violence, people opted to move back onto the
sidewalk to continue the march uninhibited. People see to be
moving closer back onto the sidewalk as they're staring down
this riot line and police are now heading back inside.
They're white rent a bush little vans that they've been
staging their riot cops out of, and they're driving off.
(16:16):
People are now in downtown Atlanta outside of the Georgia
Pacific Center. We have like twelve regular police cars, the
two two white vans full of riot cops, and lots
of them cops is staged in places I cannot currently see.
All right, we're marching north along Peachtree Street, heading heading
(16:42):
to the Atlanta Police Foundation. Got the two the two
bus Max rented buses full full of riot cops right beside,
right beside the march. Cops really out of itant about
not letting anybody march in the street. It's funny because
a few days ago they wouldn't let people on the
sidewalk either. Most of the cops that are surrounding the
(17:03):
march right now are still in their vehicles, at least
from this current vantage point. I was opposed to the
non violent direct active march. I was opposed to the
nonviolent direct action marches and actions that have happened launching
out of Woodward Park the past week, in which the
police just tailed and surrounded the march on foot. I
(17:23):
think this march is just slightly I think this march
is just slightly too big to use that tactic, so
they're surrounding them with vehicles instead. As the march arrived
at the Atlanta Police Foundation, the hundreds of protesters crammed
onto the sidewalk were greeted by armed APD officers. Riot
police are standing in front of the boarded up Atlanta
(17:45):
Police Foundation headquarters at one nine to one Peach Tree.
There is a large, large crowd in front of these
relatively small amount of officers standing in front of the
boarded up doors. A few dozen cops, some armed with
aar fifteen's, a lot of cops stationed outside the APF headquarters,
and even more stationed inside the APF headquarters. Police blokes
(18:09):
off traffic in the on this section of Peachtree Street,
at least basically sandwiching everybody in. They they could have
mass arrested, as I'm sure they wanted to.
Speaker 2 (18:19):
Yeah, the police were ready to mass rest the entire time.
Speaker 3 (18:24):
This is this is kind of a wild sight.
Speaker 1 (18:25):
We have hundreds of people staring down about three dozen
officers from the Atlanta Police Department on their fifteen's. Obviously
all of their handguns from hundreds of hundreds of people
holding signs, staring down the police. You can you can
feel the kind of you can feel the temperature.
Speaker 3 (18:45):
Rising a little bit here. The cops look very nervous
as one.
Speaker 1 (18:48):
Hundreds of people who are chanting at them, and I'm
not very happy are facing them down. They're so they're
so close together, we're they're just sandwiched in. This is
such a tense situation right now. No one in the
crowd has any visible weapons of any kind. Of course,
they're holding big signs. Cops have some zipcuffs ready, cops
(19:10):
have all their guns ready. I was able to see
inside the building via a small slit in the plywood.
There were tons of riot cops inside with shields, and
all the cops on the inside of the building had
gas masks strapped to their leg. At least one riot
cop on the other side of the door was wearing
a unique armored suit, not like the regular police suits
(19:33):
with riot armor like on the outside, This armored padding
was built into the clothing. He had these massive, bulky
leg pants with armor on the insides of them and
like a massive riot helmet. He was one of those
cops who doesn't need a riot shield because his body
is the riot shield. It was very weird, But for
(19:54):
those first few minutes, it was a very high stress
situation in front of the APF building. It felt like
neither the crowd nor the police knew exactly what was
about to go down as a few hundred angry protesters
were pushed up against a line of armed police. But
as time went on, you got the impression that this
crowd was probably not going to initiate conflict with the police,
(20:17):
and I feel like some of the moods maybe.
Speaker 3 (20:19):
Kind of died down.
Speaker 1 (20:20):
Cops are trying to kind of move around the crowd
a bit.
Speaker 3 (20:23):
There's cops being stationed to.
Speaker 1 (20:25):
The north, to the south, to behind the crowd on
the other side of the street. This could go so
many ways right now, This could end in so many
different scenarios. But people have not initiating anything other than
standing on the sidewalk and chanting and giving speeches. If
you look, there's a small section of the IPF building
(20:47):
where there's still a tiny, tiny sliver of glass by
one of the doors, and you can see lots of
cops stationed inside with riot shields. But I do not
believe this crowd's going to be busting done any doors.
Camu Franklin, the founder of Community Movement Builders, was the
last person to speak in front of the Atlanta Police Foundation.
Speaker 6 (21:09):
Really, no cop City.
Speaker 16 (21:11):
It's nothing but a strategy for over policing our communities.
We know that top city is nothing but a strategy
to stop our movements.
Speaker 6 (21:22):
And what movements are those?
Speaker 16 (21:23):
The movements against police followings and terrorism in our community.
It is in twenty twenty one that they introduced this
idea to stop, to put cop city out here to
stop our movements. When people were talking about the fund
the police abolish the police, find alternament is the public safety, they.
Speaker 6 (21:43):
Said, hell no, we.
Speaker 16 (21:45):
Want more police, and they put that idea out there,
and the movement was born to stop cop City. This
mo when is two years old, and it doesn't look
like it's going to stop.
Speaker 1 (21:57):
To me. By the end, you got this a sense
that this march did exactly what it wanted to. There
were three hundred people standing like a foot away from
two dozen cops, staring them down, giving speeches, chanting. If
people wanted to, other things could have happened. This rally
could have resulted in many ways. Many of them probably
(22:17):
very ugly and carrying a very high cost.
Speaker 6 (22:21):
The reason we.
Speaker 16 (22:21):
Did a march like this today was to say to
all the nice saves.
Speaker 6 (22:27):
Black folks don't want.
Speaker 16 (22:29):
Cop citycause people.
Speaker 6 (22:31):
Don't want cop City.
Speaker 16 (22:33):
White folks don't want cop City. At lanteds don't want
cop City. Folks from outside Atlanta don't want cop City.
Speaker 6 (22:42):
Nobody in the United States wants cop City. The honest
Citians don't work cops City in America don't want cop City.
No mean in this world don't we work cop City.
We wanted to make sure that we came.
Speaker 16 (22:59):
In safety and we leave in safety.
Speaker 6 (23:04):
We wanted to make sure that we don't.
Speaker 16 (23:06):
Have any more political prisoners today.
Speaker 6 (23:10):
That we wanted this to be.
Speaker 16 (23:11):
A march about our unity and our safety in numbers,
and as we wrap up today, that's what we want.
Speaker 6 (23:19):
It's not like we gotta give them an excuse.
Speaker 16 (23:22):
When you're around the cop the same way when you're
around the wild animal, what.
Speaker 6 (23:26):
Do you gotta do.
Speaker 16 (23:27):
You gotta be cautious, you gotta be careful, you gotta
move a certain way, you gotta know which way to
go because you're looking to protect your safety and right
now I'm looking to protect our safety. So as we
depart here today, we are departing in unity.
Speaker 6 (23:46):
We are departing together.
Speaker 16 (23:49):
We are gonna walk back in close quarters together where
our cars work. If you're going to Martyr, you're gonna
walk close together with other people as you go to
Marta if you need a fan and pick you up
if you can't take barter to blotch this way by
depriv So we want you to be safe, secure, because
(24:13):
you want to be out here.
Speaker 6 (24:14):
Again the fight couch Sick.
Speaker 1 (24:19):
There was this sense that the people there wanted to
show that if they wanted to do things, they could have,
but they knew that this was not This was not
the right time nor.
Speaker 3 (24:29):
The right place.
Speaker 2 (24:30):
Restraint and understanding of what like practice I would say
in that situation is.
Speaker 1 (24:36):
And I mean in the speeches that happened beforehand, there
was people from community movement builders, from Black Votes Matter,
a whole bunch of other black led groups in the city.
And similarly, like like like what happened at the Clergy event,
there was not a single whiff of condemnation of militant tactics,
of of of property, destruction, of actions that people take.
(24:56):
This they people there who gay speeches recognize that such
tactics were a staple of the civil rights movement. Early
Saturday morning, I woke up to news that police had
begun another raid, but instead of raiding the Wallani Forest,
(25:20):
the police were searching the ten acre property of the
Lakewood Environmental Arts Foundation or LEAF, a local nonprofit that
was offering safe haven for people during the Week of Action.
All right, So the Atlant police have executed a warrant
on the LEAF meetup spot in southeast Atlanta that people
have been using as a welcome center, as like a
(25:41):
medic station, just another spot to hang out. It was
set up after the raid Sunday night, and it is
now Saturday morning. The police have executed this warrant to
search parisis ID everyone who's there.
Speaker 3 (25:55):
We got a group of people. It's being able to
leave right now.
Speaker 1 (25:59):
There has been a prison transport vehicle called in and
cops have like blocked off intersections around the area. No
one's allowed to get close. People are not allowed to
return to their cars. People are not allowed to return
to the private property. Since Sunday night, the land was
being used as a medic hub and provided a secondary
place to camp for those who didn't feel safe staying
(26:19):
in the forest. During their raid Saturday morning, police detained
at least twenty two people and refused to show anyone
the search warrant. And yeah, the group that got released
is just walking up now.
Speaker 3 (26:32):
Maybe like two dozen people have been able to walk up.
Speaker 15 (26:35):
Ya.
Speaker 17 (26:36):
We just bat through their police lines and we're gonna, yeah,
huddle up and get to a safe place. We were
woken up by helicopters. There had been helicopters doing rounds
all evening and I don't even know what time. Seven something,
(26:59):
we heard loud speakers saying that they had a warrant
to search the property private property.
Speaker 6 (27:08):
And.
Speaker 17 (27:12):
That was very disorienting. Obviously I was in the middle
of sleeping. We came out with our hands open, our
hands up. We had more than twenty guns pointed at us.
Some people have their fingers on triggers. Certainly they were
screaming at me. And as I was waking up, we
(27:33):
came through the line. They said that they had a
warrant to search the property. We know that Homeland Security
was one of the departments that was arrested. That was
part of the arrest crew or extraction crew or whatever.
It's very traumatic. Obviously it's freezing. This is the coldest
day this week, and so we are, you know, worried
(27:56):
about people's health because people are cold. They detained us,
they took identification. It was yeah, extremely violent situation, but
everyone here was really taking care of each other and remaining.
Speaker 1 (28:11):
Prom to address the raid, activists scheduled a press conference
for later that day after a youth rally to defend
the forest was to take place in East Village. And
I think you can hear said youths in the background,
so excuse their joyous young screams.
Speaker 18 (28:28):
We thought that it was important for us to not
only amplify the wonderful children's march that happened here today,
the community in East Atlanta, this community where they are
proposing to build cop City, came out this morning overwhelmingly
to say that they don't want cop City. So we
had parents, we had children, we had other neighbors and
(28:49):
community stakeholders who gathered right here in Brownwood Park today
at East Atlanta to say that we are East Atlanta
and cop City is not a part of what we
imagine and envision for this community.
Speaker 5 (29:01):
Also this morning, unfortunately, there is.
Speaker 18 (29:04):
A place that was held as a commune for campers
who wanted to stand in solidarity during this week of action.
Speaker 5 (29:12):
The place is called LEIF l EAF.
Speaker 18 (29:15):
That is, the Lakewood Environmental Arts Foundation, a nonprofit organization
that's dedicated to combating food insecurity here within the city
of Atlanta, offered up their space to be used for
people who did not feel safe camping in the forest
because of the over aggression of police there and they
(29:36):
wanted to stand in solidarity with this Week of Action,
so LEIF offered up their space for those people to
camp safely. Unfortunately, this morning, a gang of police officers
descended upon that sacred space.
Speaker 1 (29:51):
During the raid, up to forty officers swarmed the property,
ransacking the infrastructure set up at the Leaf Encampment site.
Cops slashed aparts two medical supply tents, disrupting metical operations,
broke windows of a camper van parked on the site,
and ripped apart a greenhouse. Police took pictures of the
people detained at Leaf and collected their ideas, but after
(30:14):
being held for several hours, the police let all but
one person go free. To quote an article by Candice
Burned in Truth Out, quote one person was arrested for
an outstanding parking ticket, demonstrating the state's desperation to snatch
up anyone associated with the Stop Cop City movement.
Speaker 7 (30:33):
Good afternoon, everybody.
Speaker 3 (30:35):
My name is Marlon Kautz.
Speaker 7 (30:36):
I'm an organizer with the Atlanta Solidarity Fund, where civil
liberties and anti repression organization that exists to make sure
that people who participate in social movements have the right
to protest and don't suffer from repression. So the reason
I'm here is because, as we've all heard previously, there
(30:57):
was an internet of political repression. Early this morning, police
executed a search warrant and performed a raid against the
Lakewood Environmental Arts Foundation, which is a community space in Lakewood,
Atlanta that exists primarily to serve artists and musicians. It's
clear that it was part of a political strategy to
(31:20):
repress and intimidate protesters who are associated with the Stop
Pop City movement movement to defend the forests. This is
very concerning, especially when taken in context. Of course, it's
very likely that police are going to report that this
was part of a routine investigation, a law enforcement.
Speaker 3 (31:42):
Matter that they had every right to conduct.
Speaker 7 (31:44):
The other thing that police are likely to claim is
that they made an arrest on scene, and our understanding
is that they did make an arrest due to somebody
who was there having an old traffic to get from
a long time ago. So it's an important to clarify
that the arrest was because of a traffic ticket, not
(32:05):
because of any alleged crimes related to the movement or
any other serious criminal activity. So it's important that we
understand this raid as part of a series of ongoing
abuses of the legal process to harass and intimidate political
throw testers. They were unable to demonstrate any criminal activity
during their raid on the Lakewood Environmental Arts Foundation, but
(32:29):
they're continuing to abuse.
Speaker 3 (32:33):
Every justification that they.
Speaker 7 (32:34):
Can to raid spaces, to make arrests.
Speaker 3 (32:40):
And to hold people in jail.
Speaker 18 (32:42):
So before the police come out and say we raided
this place where all of these outside aggressors were and
we picked up some violent offenders, we want you to
know that our brothers and sisters who were standing with
us in solidarity just saying hey, we want a camp here,
since we don't feel safe camping in the people's park
(33:03):
that's been overrun with police repression and aggression.
Speaker 5 (33:07):
They raided that place.
Speaker 18 (33:09):
They snatched people up, some people were sleeping, They took
pictures of people, they took their IDs, and they searched
and searched, found nothing else, never produced a warrant, and
only one person was arrested because of an outstanding parking ticket.
Speaker 1 (33:27):
About a week after the raid, the Guardian obtained evidence
of the search warrant. The warrant stated that there was
probable cause for believing that evidence of quote conspiracy to
commit to domestic terrorism unquote could be found at the
Lakewood location listed in the warrant where objects officers sought,
(33:47):
which included quote, cameras, radios, boxes of nails, lighters, tents,
camping equipment, spray paint, black clothing, and literature related to
defend the forest. These were the materials tied to domestic terrorism.
As the week progressed, there were an increasing number of
(34:09):
reports of police tailing people coming and going from a
March's and especially the actions downtown. Basically, officers would follow
people suspected of participating in the movement, pull them over,
try to id anyone within the vehicles, and then issue
some nonsense traffic citation. This continued on Thursday after the
(34:30):
Community Movement Builders march, as people were heading home from
the public park, police stocked a few individuals and pulled
over multiple vehicles. A van carrying one of the speakers
was targeted, as well as two other cars that were
pulled over as they were leaving the protest. Marlin from
the Atlanta Solidarity Fund talked about the various ways police
(34:52):
had been using their power to intimidate activists and suppress protest.
Speaker 7 (34:57):
Our organization has gotten many report sort of pretext stops
of political protesters or people who are suspected of being
political protesters because of bumper stickers on their car or
the state that their license plate is from. We've gotten
reports of people being stop and frisked simply because they're
(35:18):
profiled as looking like political activists. And of course we've
seen dozens of protesters or suspected protesters arrested and charged
with domestic terrorism simply because they were found at a
music festival that's associated with the Stop Cop City movement.
And so we can see that every step of the way,
(35:40):
police and prosecutors are abusing the legal process to intimidate
and discourage this movement.
Speaker 2 (35:46):
Throughout this time, police have been watching or monitoring one
of the off site locations in the forest. They've parked
in front of this site and kept up surveillance on it,
and then leading all the way up into Friday, there
was a journalist pulled over leaving the final non violent
direct action from Wodriff Park. They were pulled over with
(36:08):
two other people in the car and detained briefly, ostensibly
to continue to identify and connect people.
Speaker 1 (36:18):
A big part of the story for this week of
action is the excess of the police response to quite
typical acts of quote unquote nonviolent protest, the sort that
the government and even the police loved to claim that
they actually protect. With every single action downtown this week,
virtually no laws were being broken, not even any civil disobedience.
(36:40):
People were handing out flyers, marching on sidewalks giving out letters,
and the police's response was to deploy SWAT, to mobilize
hundreds of officers to shut down multiple city blocks, to
carry ar fifteens as they tail crowds of a few
dozen people just walking on the sidewalk and yelling at
people if they accidentally miss this step off the curb
and threaten violent arrest. This was the sort of extremely
(37:04):
aggressive response to people doing protest quote unquote the right way.
Speaker 2 (37:09):
We should highlight that. That is the apparent goal of
these protests was to show that even when they are
doing things the right way, this is how the state
reacts to dissent.
Speaker 1 (37:20):
It reacts in this militarized fashion where you like it's
it's I think a big part of what's happened in
these types of protests that have happened the past week
is demonstrating why people are campaigning to stop Cop City
because the sheer amount of resources that the police already
have in the city to be deploying hundreds and hundreds
(37:40):
of officers every single day to respond to people handing
out flyers, it's like to respond to people who are
walking on the sidewalks. They have this massive amount of resources.
They're using tear gas in the woods, they're using paper balls,
they're using flash bangs, they're they're having multiple different swat
teams follow around people handing out pamphlets. The level of
(38:02):
police militarization in Atlanta is already at this extremely high point,
and Cop City is only going to intensify that, and
that is the reason they want to build Cop City.
It's for this type of urban counterinsurgency training to quell
civil unrest and to quell protest.
Speaker 18 (38:21):
On Thursday night, we held a very peaceful and successful
march in downtown Atlanta, starting at the King Center.
Speaker 5 (38:28):
We had someone.
Speaker 18 (38:30):
Who was stopped by the police and asked if he
was picking up protesters, taken out of the vehicle, handcuffed
for no reason. They couldn't find a reason to detain
him any longer, so they had to let him go.
But Atlanta, this is why we're standing against cop City,
because if cop City is built, you can guarantee that
you won't even be able to go to the grocery
(38:52):
store without being harassed by the police for no reason
at all.
Speaker 1 (38:56):
When I spoke with Matthew Johnson, he brought up a
similar point with.
Speaker 12 (39:01):
The resources that the police had to respond in the
way that they did. The assertion that they need more
training in a militarized facility or they need more resources
is crazy because you had them literally outnumbering protesters and
kettling them. And we have credible sources that say that
(39:25):
there were swat forces who had instructed the officers to
arrest nonviolent protesters, and there were actually police officers that
refused to take that order, which I think is another
fascinating dynamic that is worth exploring and understanding more. But
(39:45):
just with the resources that they had to try to
shut down protesters, harass folks, constantly ticket and pull over
people that they saw, you know, creating like a logistical
framework for the week of action is nuts, and they're
making our point for us. On Friday, the word came
(40:08):
out that Tortugita had bullet holes through both of their
palms and that they were more than likely sitting cross
leg with their hands up when they were shot by police.
And now we are supposed to be convinced that these
people that lied about this killed somebody that was absolutely
(40:30):
no threat to them. On the same grounds that they're
trying to build this police training facility, we're supposed to
believe that this is going to make them less violent
towards people, like as you're building a militarized police training
facility and like people that try to convince themselves that
these is going to be a place where people are
also being taught de escalation tactics while like everything around
(40:54):
that is militarized. It's like if you had somebody build
a water park and you're like, oh, yeah, I'm just
trying to stay dry. I don't want to get splash
or anything like that. And it's like, oh no, no, no,
don't worries. We have a food court right in the
middle of it, and it's great, you're really just coming
there for the food court, so don't worry about it.
And then like you go there and then you get splashed.
(41:20):
What were you expecting? Like, that's obviously not what that
facility's for because all the infrastructure around it is made
to be a water park or a militarized police training facility.
So don't be surprised when maybe they might have one
de escalation program and like you know where the food
court would be, and then somebody gets killed, right, because
(41:40):
they're actually building the infrastructure for killing. So that's where
we're at.
Speaker 1 (41:45):
This week of action has shown a lot about how
the police are operating post the twenty twenty Uprising, how
they will respond to people exercising their First Amendment right,
and the indiscriminate way that police will respond to any
active protests. One of the main takeaways from this week
is that their response to protest is deployed against people
(42:07):
without target or focus. They care very little if you
are breaking a window or if you're marching on the sidewalk,
They're still gonna send the SWAT team. Police are acting
as if they are entirely incapable of differentiating between acts
of descent. Toward the end of the week, I sat
down and talked with an unnamed forest defender to get
(42:29):
their thoughts on the week of action. For security reasons,
we did a vocal replacement.
Speaker 19 (42:34):
The police presence has been pretty unprecedented. I haven't seen
shit like that here since twenty twenty, not downtown at least.
I mean shit, I don't think we had seen gas
in Atlanta in a minute, and then they gassed the forest.
It'd been a while, but yeah, I mean they're punching out,
especially like Tuesday, they were putting a one hundred and
fifty two hundred cops the entirety of downtown. I mean
multi jurisdictional task forces deployed multiple different Atlanta APD SWAT
(42:58):
teams between like regular APD SWAT and APEX, which is
like the Drug and Gang Interdiction Unit. I mean a
fucking whole drone unit GSP. Some weird unmarked cars that
I won't speculate on helicopters all that shit. You know,
the type of police response you would expect to see
in like a dystopian, fucking police state. For some people
handing out flyers that just say this is bad for
(43:18):
the environment, doesn't matter how milk toast or not, and
like I shouldn't say milk toast, like that's not a
bad thing. We need people to go hand out flyers.
We need to inform people as far as what this
is to get people involved, but like as non violent
as you can get, and still they're going to treat
you like your fucking al Qaeda, you know, and it
puts you in a weird position because then it's like, okay, cool,
if you're going to treat us the exact same for
(43:39):
being nonviolent, why not do crime? If the police response
to an assault on an outpost that drove the police
out and burned five things down, the police response to
fifteen people handing out flyers downtown are going to be
about the same, then why not take more militant radical action.
Speaker 1 (43:54):
The twenty three people arrested on Sunday, March fifth, we're
not arrested as anyone was torching a whipment. They were
not arrested at the power line cut. It was people
who were attending a music festival. Arrests were not widely
targeted against people who police knew were engaged in property destruction.
They were targeted against anyone the cops could grab. Same
(44:15):
was the case at the January twenty first action, where
people were marching downtown the Saturday after Tortugita was killed.
The only people arrested and subsequently charged with domestic terrorism
was anyone the police could get their hands on. Officers
went after people who were carrying banners the entire duration
of the march. It was not targeted against people who
(44:37):
were engaged in militant action. Among all this talk of
police repression and multiple raids, it's easy to overlook that
throughout the week people still sought opportunities for finding joy
(44:59):
and resistance, because most people wouldn't dedicate years of their
life to this if it was just miserable battles with
police the whole time.
Speaker 2 (45:09):
I think one thing that's been lost in all of this, too,
is all of the lighthearted events that have continued to
go on through the week, and like the joy of
the movement that was represented in the Bouncy Castle rip.
Speaker 1 (45:21):
But that joy is continuing in the woods, like people
still continue to camp in the woods. People are still
having dinner in the woods. People are still having camp fires,
people are still talking the woods. It is still a
place that people are gathering at and are enjoying each other.
Is company in now are enjoying the woods in It
is a place that the morale has never been fully crushed.
Speaker 2 (45:41):
The morale has never been fully crushed, And like the
participatory acts of the Week of Action are continuing, like
none of that has been quashed.
Speaker 1 (45:53):
An example of the joyful, continuous resistance during the Week
of Action can be found at the youth rally that
happened on Saturday the eleventh. All right, so I'm at
the youth rally Saturday, after the warrant was served on
the meetup spot in southeast Atlanta. There's around two hundred
people marching through East Village in Atlanta. Pretty pretty joyous
(46:15):
group here actually, and they're actually like on the streets.
Speaker 3 (46:18):
This is the first time we've had a large march.
Speaker 1 (46:19):
Like this take to the streets because every action that
was in downtown or midten Atlanta was just so heavily
surveilled by police who were not letting anyone get near
the street at all. But there's no police here. They
were busy doing the search warrant. So this group is
actually is actually able to take to the streets. It's
like everyone kind of in this area of Atlanta is
(46:42):
pretty pretty pro pro this little protest here. There's like
workers from the little shops and stores nodding along.
Speaker 2 (46:51):
Fulten County Share has just walked by the march like
on there, just you know, off shift workout routine, wearing
Fulden County gear.
Speaker 3 (46:58):
That's pretty funny.
Speaker 1 (47:00):
People dancing in the streets, Families walking with their kids
through the streets all right, walking around the park that
the youth rally started at, and the press conference about
the raid this morning just ended at there's as you
can probably hear kids playing in the park.
Speaker 3 (47:19):
People are handing out food.
Speaker 1 (47:20):
It's a massive, massive amount of food just in the
middle of the park with levels table set up. Overall,
this is kind of one of the more joyous events
that we've had since the initial Saturday rally at Gresham Park,
just with the amount of food, the amount of kids
just running around and playing, all of all the information
tables that are handing out literature and giving you know,
(47:42):
making connections with people. Yeah, when I was down here
in January, the mood was very somber. The mood was
very grim like coming to the vigil when there was
the destroyed remains of the gazebo, the torn up parking lot,
all of the trees in there still within their like
winter state, with all of the leaves gone. Everything was
(48:02):
very kind of barren. And the first thing I noticed
on Saturday as we were marching is like there's new
life springing in the woods. There's this invigorated sense of
the almost assurance of victory that people are carrying with
them as they take action.
Speaker 3 (48:18):
And I think that.
Speaker 1 (48:19):
Really does change what the action you take is. And
that does change the types of results that people will see,
is if they go at this with the idea that
we are going to win this.
Speaker 2 (48:29):
And I think that that is kind of why the
non violent direct actions have become like that have moved
to the floor. Right when you think that you're going
to lose, and you have nothing to lose, you engage
in these incredibly radical actions because what else are you
going to do? Yeah, and then when you have this
belief that no, we can win, we just have to
(48:50):
find that pathway.
Speaker 1 (48:51):
And that is a part of the diversity of tactics
is using both of those and almost every ecological movement
that's been successful has demonstrated that the pathway to success
is often paved with a diversity of tactics, with people
doing nonviolent action at noon, which will pull a massive
militarized police response as people are doing regular ass shit.
(49:12):
And then a part of diversity of tactics is also
people leaving a music festival to go torch a bulldozer
at both Both of those things are a diversity of tactics.
Now I stand by most of that statement. However, issues
can arise when there is a ticking clock and during
the time spent looking for this pathway, the enemy meanwhile
(49:34):
is making steady progress. Issues may also arise when a
large diversity of tactics is shoved under just one roof.
I had a lot of conversations with movement participants regarding
the direct action that happened on Sunday night and how
it cast a shadow of repression over the whole week
(49:55):
of action. To synthesize the many conversations, in general, most
people thought that what physically happened was good. The actual
actions at the North Gate were successful and justified. But
there are other things on the periphery of that action
that make it slightly more complicated.
Speaker 12 (50:16):
And now we can have lots of questions about tactics
and cost benefit analysis about that action, which I did
not think it would be wise, especially being so visible
for me to have to be anywhere near on that day.
We can have questions about that, But what was for
certain was that the way in which the police responded
(50:37):
was absurd and predictably so. Now with the destruction that
I saw, et cetera cost them less than a million
dollars and maybe like two weeks actually of construction that
they were pushed back max. These are like max numbers.
Was that worth twenty three people being arrested and quaching
what could have been a larger Aki patient and wider
(51:01):
participation and wider buying in the movement. Instead, by the
time we got to Monday, the clergy was having to
do clean up rather than like cast division of what
the world could be. And so these are tradeoffs right
where even though we have to be very clear about
what a diversity of tactics means, and also a separation
(51:24):
of time and space. So I mean, we can't just
look at a diversity of tactics and everybody does what
they want as if they're operating in a sylo but
rather we give space for one another to do different
things that may work, respectful of the fact that some
of our actions may affect one another.
Speaker 1 (51:45):
In the lead up to the Week of Action, night
time sabotage actions decreased around Atlanta in favor of these
big public demos during daylight. That seems to result in
more people getting arrested. And what the results of Sunday's
action happening in such close proximity to the festival and
the encampments is that the people at the festival and
(52:08):
in the woods who did not consent to participating in
a high profile direct action got disproportionately hit with the
immediate repression from police. A lot of the people who
were arrested were completely unaware of the actions that took
place at the North Gate. Even if those actions were
one hundred percent justified in the end, it still creates
(52:30):
a dynamic with an unequal distribution of police violence. Now, obviously,
the woods are an inherently dangerous place to be, and
people are not responsible for actions that police choose to take.
But there are still considerations to be had regarding the
proximity of space and time when engaging in more risky actions,
(52:52):
and how the consequences of those actions may affect people
who did not consent to participating in actions at other locations,
especially when people are lulled into a false sense of
safety by claiming that police have never cracked down hard
in the forest during previous weeks of action.
Speaker 19 (53:12):
Yeah, in terms of the actions done Sunday, in reference
to a group of people assaulting a like police position,
driving them out with force, and then burning their shit,
that was all good and we should not denounce that
or step away from it. It only harms the movement
to back away from radical action and act like there
are definitions of good or bad protesters, because eventually the
logical conclusion of that is snitching, and that only furthers
(53:35):
like the GBI's motivations to tear the movement apart. What
went wrong Sunday is as a result of two things.
It's one that the police used indiscriminate violence when people
beat them. They were beaten, they got angry, and they
were beaten because they got their shit rocked by like fireworks,
and then they use in discriminate violence against people who
they knew were on the side of like where the
(53:55):
events were that weren't where all the militants were coming
back from. They didn't want to go up against those
people because they're cowards. And second, because of how big
the movement's gotten over the past two years, the strategy
of the Weeks of Action has stagnated. It's made it
so work, so compact in a singular week that when
you have all of the diversity of tactics that exist
within Defend the Atlanta Forest and stop Coop City, those
(54:17):
tactics with how big everything is now, they start to
step on each other's toes. They can hurt each other
sometimes because yeah, not everyone who was at the RC
field was like ready for the consequences of like a
militant radical action like that. And that doesn't mean that
the action wasn't good or justified, because the action was
wildly successful. There were no arrests made at that action.
There were a rest made when the police got angry
(54:38):
and used indiscriminate violence because they were pissed off and
they wanted.
Speaker 1 (54:41):
To riot, so they retaliated at a music festival that
was happening nearby.
Speaker 19 (54:46):
Yes, and that's the fault of nobody but the police.
That's not the fault of the people who went and
assaulted that outpost. That's only the fault of the police,
and really the fault of a bad long term strategy
of too heavily compacting factors of you know, being just
like a week and where making it so this movement
where people can take radical action, it feels so limited
to just inside the forest because that puts people in
(55:08):
harms way, and that put people in harms way, including
the people who you know, went and did the thing
on Sunday. But no, it would be wrong as the
movement to like balk out a radical action like that.
Radical action like that is such a big part of
why this movement has been as successful as it has been.
It's a huge part of why the police didn't do
like a full sweep or a larger sweep or a
series of raids in the following days because they were
(55:30):
afraid that those three hundred to four hundred people who
hit that out posts were lying and waiting in the
forest ready to attack them. Because they were afraid of
militant radical action.
Speaker 1 (55:38):
On Thursday, when I was in front of the APF building,
I could like hear some of the supervisors and coordinators
talking about being scared of ambushes or like being scared
of splinter groups, like being staged to attack officers. It's
it's bizarre how fearful they are. Of the types of
people who are opposing the cop City project, They're.
Speaker 19 (56:00):
The most afraid of the people who are willing to
go do physical violence to them, and not even physical violence,
but people who are just willing to throw a rock
at them or like a firework. Once they realize that
they haven't paralyzed somebody with fear, once they realize that
they have not made you so afraid of taking action,
they become such cowards.
Speaker 1 (56:18):
In the aftermath of the police killing forest defender Tortigita,
law enforcement agencies tried to claim that Tortigita shot at
them first, leaving one officer injured, but recently released findings
from multiple autopsies have cast more doubt on the state's
version of events. On the afternoon of Friday, March tenth,
(56:39):
towards the end of the week of Action, the family
of Tortighita released the findings of an independent autopsy done
by former GBI Chief Medical Examiner doctor Chris Sperry. The
results suggested that Tortighito was sitting cross legged with their
hands in front of their face when shot and bullet
exit wounds through the palms of both of their hands.
(57:01):
The family ordered autopsy also did not find any evidence
of gunshot residue from a GSR test kit, and then
a month later, Decab County released the results of their
official autopsy, which found at least fifty seven bullet wounds
across Tortigita's body and according to this autopsy, torte did
(57:21):
not have any gunpowder residue on its hands. Then, a
few days later, via a public records request, the Atlanta
Community Press Collective received the gunshot residue test kit from
the Georgia Bureau of Investigation's crime Lab. The document contained
the names of six Georgia State Patrol SWAT members who
shot and killed Tortigita, Bryland L. Myers, Jerry A. Parrish,
(57:47):
Jonathan Salceda, Jonathan Mark lamb Ronaldo Kegel, and Royce Zaw,
with Zaw being the subject of a lawsuit after he
shot a protester in the face with a les lethal
during the George Floyd protests in May of twenty twenty.
The document also included the results of the GBI's crime
(58:07):
lab report, claiming that they found quote the presence of
more than five particles characteristic of gunshot primer residue unquote
from a test kit, with the report also stating quote,
it should be noted that it is possible for a
victim of gunshot wounds to have GSR present on their
hands unquote, considering that among the more than fifty seven
(58:31):
gunshot wounds were entrance and exit wounds on Torteghita's hands,
which could be cause for gunshot residue if the crime
lab findings are genuine. The findings do not point to
any specific interpretation of events, as it's not unusual to
find primer residue on the hands of a victim following
the path of a bullet. Plus, coupled with the ever
(58:51):
changing story from the GBI, on the ground, chatter from
APD officers claiming that George State Patrol quote fucked their
own officer up unquote, as well as reports from forced
defenders from the day of the shooting, there is indication
that Georgia State Patrol most likely suffered from so called
friendly fire, with many people believing that the killing of
(59:12):
Tortighita was essentially an execution.
Speaker 3 (59:16):
Instant.
Speaker 1 (59:17):
Reports obtained via public records requests also revealed that GSP
fired a quote unquote, a Leslie thul pepperball gun at
Tortighita's tent as SWAT initially approached, once again contradicting the
claims made by GBI officials in the months since the killing.
As the week came to a close on Sunday, March eleventh,
(59:40):
a memorial service for Tortighita was held in the Malani Forest,
where Towrt's family spread their ashes in the forest it
died to protect. I attended the Sunday morning memorial. The
sky opened up and poured down rain in South Atlanta
throughout the whole morning of people gathered in Wallaanne People's
(01:00:01):
Park to light candles under a canopy and hear from
Tort's family. Then, led by Tortighita's mother, we walked through
the forest to the site of the shooting, where a
banner hung that read quote on this ground, GSP assassinated
forest defender Comrade friend lover Tortigita unquote, family and friends
(01:00:26):
spread Tortigita's ashes throughout the woods along the path to
quote Candice Burned in truth Out. In contrast to its
tumultuous start, Sunday's vigil and ceremony provided a somber and
heartfelt close to the fifth week of Action. I met
up with Matthew Johnson after the memorial to discuss the
(01:00:49):
week of Action, and we briefly touched on the memorial
in the forest.
Speaker 12 (01:00:54):
I think that we have to hold space for very
o grief. We lost a friend, and at the same time,
just two days ago, on a Friday, what we always
knew to be true was found to clearly be true.
Torte Ghita was murdered and we have to bear the
(01:01:17):
BRender of that pain. And all the people in power
lied and even gave their condolences to a state trooper
that seemed as if he was shot by a state
trooper and did not say a mumbling word to even
acknowledge our friend's existence and the value of their life.
(01:01:39):
And this morning was beautiful. I had been able to
meet bilkis Uh Toti Ghita's mother previously, and as she
really does have a beautiful spirit. I really grown appreciation
for that family, and just to see just how large
(01:01:59):
these gatherings were like throughout the week, even in spite
of the hoopla and the opening weekend, it was very encouraging.
But in a lot of ways, Tortigita has become the
face of this movement because they really did light up
(01:02:20):
wherever they were. One thing that's gotten me through I'm
just thinking about when you would just see them sometimes
let me just give you the biggest, like cheesiest smile,
like out of nowhere.
Speaker 1 (01:02:32):
I just.
Speaker 12 (01:02:34):
And like that like got me through the first week
after their passing. Yeah, but I've grown a great appreciation
for that family because in so many ways, Tortigita is
their hero, And just to learn how consistent they were
(01:02:56):
as like such a welcoming and loving and caring person
just meant so much. I mean to know that this
wasn't something new that they had stumbled upon. They had
lived this whole life of caring and making space for others.
Speaker 1 (01:03:10):
Some of Towart's friends have raised concerns that a side
effect of Toward unwittingly becoming the face of the movement
is that the details around their death have eclipsed some
of what they died fighting for. In doing so, stripping
toward of their individuality and removing their own agency, to
turn them into this perfect liberal, friendly avatar of the
(01:03:33):
movement to simply be used as a political tool and
add to a list of demands.
Speaker 19 (01:03:40):
There's a thing that's been happening more and more recently
that I've been bothered by, which is when organizations, specifically
more liberal organizations, are invoking towards name actions, they're misgendering
the hell out of them, and it's alienating a lot
of people. And I understand that Sunday's action alienated a
lot of liberal orgs. This is a problem with the
Week of Action type stress, with the diversity of tactics
(01:04:03):
all being forced under one roof. But we cannot stand
to alienate each other. And it's really frustrating and really
angering to see this really beautiful soul be flattened into
just a murder that these liberals want them to be,
stripping them of so much of their life and what
was a revolutionary life and a revolutionary death into just martyrdom,
by taking away their identity and who they were and
making them nothing more than someone who was murdered when
(01:04:26):
they were someone who is living such a full and
beautiful life until the day they died, and this movement
will tear itself apart if we do not accept the
fullness of towards life, what it stood for, and what
they live for. This movement has always been built on
a lot of trans people in the woods fucking the
cops up, and if we alienate those people were fucked,
there's no winning and we can't lose. We don't have
(01:04:46):
a choice about this anymore. We have to win by
any means necessary.
Speaker 1 (01:04:50):
That will wrap up our day to day coverage of
the entire week of Action, but much has happened in
the intervening two months, so in the next time episode
we'll cover where the movement is now, discuss the future
of the fight to stop Copcity, and offer a more
critical retrospective on the fifth week of Action. See You
(01:05:11):
on the other Side. Music Festival audio courtesy of Unicorn
Riot It Could Happen here as a production of cool
Zone Media.
Speaker 11 (01:05:22):
For more podcasts from cool Zone Media, visit our website
coolzonemedia dot com, or check us out on the iHeartRadio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever.
Speaker 7 (01:05:29):
You listen to podcasts you can find sources for It
could happen here. Updated monthly at coolzonemedia dot com slash sources.
Thanks for listening,
It Could Happen Here News
Hosts And Creators
Robert Evans
Garrison Davis
James Stout
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