Protests for Oscar Grant

7 Jan 2009

Jennifer reported earlier about the case of Oscar Grant–a man who was shot in the back by police out in Oakland, California. The incident was caught on video by quite a few citizen journalists, however, it seems all of those people except two had their phones/cameras confiscated by the police. The following video shows some of that video and is very disturbing:

Below the cut is further information on the case as well as protest times. Please circulate widely, especially to the people you know out in the Oakland area.

Justice Oscar Grant Protest
WEDNESDAY JANUARY 7, 2009
3-7pm
FRUITVALE BART STATION
OAKLAND, CA
JUSTICE FOR OSCAR GRANT PROTEST
For more info: evanshamar@gmail.com
(510) 750-2767

An Interview w/ Oakland Lawyer John Burris
The Oscar Grant BART Shooting & Police Terror in Oakland

By Davey D

You can hear the full interview on Breakdown FM by clicking the link below.. http://odeo. com/episodes/23838664-Police-Terror-in-oakland-Interview-w-John-Burris

By now everyone has seen the horrific video or videos of a Oakland BART Police Officer shooting an unarmed, Black man (Osacr Grant) while he lay facedown on the ground and was fully co-operating. The man who was killed execution style was the father of a 4 year old girl and was considered a peacemaker. In fact moments before he was shot he was pleading with his friends who were all cuffed up to calm down and be cooperative with police. Grant was seen begging the police officers who had pulled tasers out and pointed them at the heads of his friends, not to shoot.

For reasons unknown to us, the police officer pushed Grant to the ground. One officer kneeled on his neck while the other officer pulled out a gun and shot him point blank in the back. The bullet went through his back, hit the ground and bounced back up and pierced his lung, killing him. The police then ran around and terrified witnesses by taking away their cell phones and video cameras for ‘evidence’. The video which was shot by a witness named Ms Vargus and has been seen by everyone on news stations like KTVU was also going to be confiscated except her train started moving as police attempted to snatch away her camera. The cops obviously did not see the other video cameras buzzing away.

What went down this New Year’s morning is very disturbing sight and it has the entire city of Oakland on edge. Adding insult to industry is the refusal of BART police to acknowledge any wrong doing. The police chief Gary Gee says the tapes are inconclusive and he has thus far refused to even release the name of the police officer who is now on paid leave. We have also come to find out that the young men along with Oscar Grant were snatched off the train by BART police who did not know whether or not these young men were involved in any sort of altercation. In short, it could’ve been any one of us pulled off the train that night.

We sat down and spoke with famed attorney John Burris. He’s the man to talk to when it comes to police terrorism. He and the Grant family has filed a 25 million dollar lawsuit, but they also want the cop in question to be criminally charged.

Burris who has represented everyone from the late 2Pac Shakur to Dwayne Wiggins of Tony Toni Tone to Rodney King all victims of police brutality says this is the worse case of police terrorism he has ever witnessed. Burris who has also written a book called Black vs Blue which deals with Police brutality and minority communities gives us the full 4-1- 1 on a number of key topics.

We talk about the far reaching powers of the police unions and how they have stealthly gotten lots of laws passed that give them all sorts of rights that will make your head spin. For example, the officer who is accused of killing Oscar Grant has not been interviewed yet and won’t for a while. This means all the officers on the scene can sit back listen to all the evidence against them and then come up with a well thought out counter story. Their integrity is compromised but it makes no difference as far as the average person in the public is concerned. Make no mistake, these officers are probably hard at work digging up as much dirt on any or all of the individuals so that when they speak we won’t hear about Oscar Grant the father, but they will try to find something demeaning so that in the public’s mind the shooting is justified. In short they wanna make Grant a ‘low down thug nigger’ who needed to be shot. Watch for the spin starting with the posting of you tube videos by cop sympathizers planting those seeds, I already seen two with individuals who look and sound like us suggesting that perhaps Grant and his friends were causing trouble and thus made the job of the police difficult on an hectic New year’s Eve..

The officers have a huge right to privacy, so if we wanna have public hearings where we put a troublesome cop on blast, it has to be done in private. That’s just the tip of the iceberg Burris runs the entire scenrio down for us.

In this interview we talk about new laws citizens should pass. I would like to see cops have a three strikes law directed at them. I would also like to see special courts set up that deal with law enforcement and other public officials.. We talk about the feasibility of this..

I also speak with Burris about what sort of improvements have been made since he first came on the scene over 25 years ago.. Why are we still dealing with this sort of abuse after all the lawsuits?

We start off the interview with a short montage narrated by local Oakland rap artist D-Labrie. We start off talking about the history of police terrorism in Oakland including the killing of Black Panther Bobby Hutton, the brutality suffered by 2Pac Shakur and the horrific shooting of Gary King. The King case sounds remarkably similar to what happened to Oscar Grant and when you hear the pained remarks and testimonies from his family and friends who we interviewed the day after King was murdered by OPD it’s as troubling as the Grant video. They described the police shooting of their partner as an execution. The officer who murdered Gary King had shot 2 other people including an unarmed man in a wheel chair. So sadly what happened in Oakland the other night with the murder of Oscar Grant is not unusual-Black life is expandable in the eyes of the police. It don’t matter if we are throwing money at a video camera and flashing diamond encrusted grills or days away from sitting in the white house. What we witnessed the other night in Oakland is an occupying force raging war on the community.

You hear it when you listen ton the news footage and interviews from the past. from Bobby Hutton to 2Pac and beyond the scenario is all the same.

Anyway enough said listen to the interview and spread the word. help create awareness..

Again here’s the link to the interview with John Burris on Breakdown FM

http://odeo. com/episodes/23838664-Police-Terror-in-oakland-Interview-w-John-Burris

Justice Oscar Grant Protest
WEDNESDAY JANUARY 7, 2009
3-7pm
FRUITVALE BART STATION
OAKLAND, CA
JUSTICE FOR OSCAR GRANT PROTEST
For more info: evanshamar@gmail.com
(510) 750-2767

http://cbs5. com/local/oakland. BART. shooting. 2. 900634. htm

via

5 Responses to Protests for Oscar Grant

jack snyder

January 8th, 2009 at 4:35 pm

Were it not for the video recordings taken by the public this would have been another police blotter story. The cops made all attempts to confiscate any and all recording devices so as to manage not only the news and information but also the spin. So at the end of the day the Press would only have one story: BART’s and that of angry and pissed off riders who just happen to be mostly people of color. BART would have spent the rest of the week burying the news and while not burying the news editing it to fit it’s own spin. The police has drawn a solid blue wall to guard and protect it’s own and with the office of the DA it hopes that spin will prevail over the rule of law and reason.

If you are going to get busted by the cops you better have several reliable witnesses carrying video recorders that have not be confiscated by the cops.

jack_snyder25@yahoo.com

Melissa

January 9th, 2009 at 2:00 am

I think we should organize a boycott of BART for the same length of time it takes them to arrest the person they employed to murder Oscar Grant. I would suspect the revenue supports the salaries of the killers they employ. Why would we continue to pay their salary when they are killing innocent citizens? I also believe BART is a government agency so why would we continue to knowingly give money to the same people who are doing nothing to ensure this murderer is locked up.

justiceforoscar

January 9th, 2009 at 4:11 pm

Online organizing has been hampered. The local news station websites (KTVU for example)has disabled any blogging about the killing. If you search “Oscar Grant” online you see a confusing list of non-blogging websites. I have created a non-censored blog for anybody to leave opinions. The blog was created for the only purpose to express your opinions about the killing. Hopefully the blog is useful and gets lots of comments. Tell your family and friends about the blog. Let’s organize our thoughts!

Go to: http://justiceforoscar.blogspot.com/

S.Black

January 13th, 2009 at 2:37 pm

Justice should be given to Oscar and his family. If Oscar was the one doing the shooting of a BART officer, and his family was hiding him like Oakland PD is they also would be charged. Unfortunately Oscars life isn’t worth the same as a law inforcements life.

Ann Nomura

January 20th, 2009 at 12:13 am

Oakland: Politics, Pork and Justice

State Attorney General Jerry Brown Oakland’s got on the NPR about a week ago and made an appeal for Oaklander’s to stand down and let the system work (he assured us Oscar Grant’s family would get justice). Even white soccer mom’s like myself flipped off our radios and went home and looked up the time and date of the next rally. Jerry, put down the doobie! You lived in Oakland long enough to know what all those young people, and even us middle aged middle class moms know, the Alameda County District Attorney Tom Orloff wouldn’t know justice if it poked him in the eye. Now even if DA Orloff and his staff could recognize and deliver justice; they most certainly are not in the habit of giving it out to young black men who get murdered by the police.

District Attorney Tom Orloff has never successfully prosecuted police for violence against community members. “Off the record” everyone agrees that DA Orloff runs the most arrogant and incompetent government agencies in all of Alameda County and perhaps the State. In fact police and criminals are united in their low opinion of Mr. Orloff and his staff’s ability.

So how does Orloff survive and thrive, the old fashioned way he’s a seasoned bureaucrat a career preservationist. He sucks down a huge salary and doles out high paying county jobs every local politician’s sons, daughters, wives, cousins, uncles, mistresses and perhaps the odd pet. Pete Stark’s boy Jeffry “presides” over the Grand Jury, Orloff has employed Lockyer’s and Panetta’s kin as well. Judges may also impose on Orloff to employ their friends and family as well. Tom Orloff doesn’t deal in justice he deals in political influence; so no politician will ever call him to task for incompetence. We have no justice the DA runs a publicly funded employment agency to politicians and fat cat family members.

In 2006 the then Grand Jury Foreman, a retired Sheriff’s Deputy, Mr. Boyer rushed out a shamelessly biased negative report on the Alameda County Medical Center. The report was strikingly similar to the public criticisms made of the Medical Center by the then Sherriff Charlie Plummer. The report was so damaging so factually flawed that the entire Authority Board of the Medical Center signed a written rebuke to the report.

So, you say, why the press doesn’t look into this? The East Bay Express wrote whole articles about Dellum’s wife’s influence but a whole hen house of politician’s relatives doesn’t merit mention? And what about “Chip Johnson” the Don Perata’s mouthpiece at the San Francisco Chronicle, he’s all over the nepotism, corruption and incompetence at City Hall. Orloff makes ex-city manager Deborah Elderly look like a rank amateur but the silence is deafening, do they not know? Do they not care? What’s up? Well, actually the whole bag of snark with dates and data was provided to an East Bay Express reporter. The reporter told the source that the East Bay Express was “not comfortable” writing about the DA. Maybe Chip’s uncomfortable too, Chip doesn’t like to get too analytical about Oakland’s political machine or any of Don Perata’s friends or family.

So, what does this mean for Oscar Grant and Oakland? After years of uninterrupted pork and politics at the District Attorney’s office can Orloff and his staff do what they have never done before and give Oscar’s Grant’s family and Oakland what they want and need?

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Protests for Oscar Grant

5 Responses to Protests for Oscar Grant

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