JOIN US FOR DEMONSTRATION AT THE D.A.S OFFICE

12th & Oak Street 
Friday, Nov. 19, 2010
4:00 pm

SHOW YOUR OUTRAGE AGAINST STATE TERROR AND POLICE LIES

On
Nov. 5, 2010, a rally was held in downtown Oakland to protest the
unjust sentencing of Johannes Mehserle. Mehserle was gifted the absurd
sentence of 7 months plus time served for an involuntary manslaughter
conviction, a shocking and disgusting decision on the part of the jury;
considering there is video clearly showing Mehserle’s actions to be
entirely voluntary and violent - Jan. 1st 2009. Based on this light
sentence from Judge Robert Perry (fyi - he’s the state’s go-to judge when the cops need to beat a case),
many in the crowd felt that an energized rally was not enough and
something more militant was in order. Thus, a large crowd of Oscar Grant
III supporters took to the streets to demonstrate just what we thought
about this state tyranny.

The
destination for our march was the scene of the murder, Fruitvale Bart
Station. At the beginning of the march, a handful of protesters
expressed their outrage in misguided ways. However, by chanting ‘F the
police, not the people, our march kept the focus on Justice For Oscar Grant.

The
police made it clear from the beginning that they were going to use
their overwhelming numbers to stop our march from reaching Fruitvale
Bart.  [This shocking show of force, where the police
admitted they outnumbered protesters 3 to 1, was not designed to keep
the people of Oakland safe. After all, which makes us feel more unsafe?
Marchers for Justice or police in charge of assault rifles and armored
vehicles?] Without question, this show of police-state force was designed to intimidate the people of Oakland not protect them.
And with several helicopters and hundreds of vehicles, police were able
to trap our march on 6th Ave. between 17th and 18th. After a half hour
of being denied our constitutional rights while entrapped between
hundreds of officers representing nine different police agencies, the
area was declared  a crime scene and 152 brothers and sisters were illegally arrested and taken to jail.

OPD lied that a protester took an officer’s firearm and pointed it at the police.  This lie was OPD’s pretext to illegally arrest 152 of the marchers.  Despite
numerous mainstream media outfits repeating OPD’s lies as justification
for mass arrest, police retracted the statement early Saturday morning (while at North County Jail 152 people sat incarcerated for this bullshit lie.)  The
police, with militarized weaponry and boldface lies, violated marchers
constitutional rights to assemble and speak against this blatant
miscarriage of justice. In response, we are demonstrating in front of
D.A. Nancy Omalley’s office, Friday Nov. 19, 2010 at 4pm, to demand that
all charges against the people be immediately dropped, and at the same
time we demand she appeal Judge Perry’s dropping of the gun enhancement
in the sentencing of Mehserle.