Will Civil Liberties Survive OWS Trial?
As an Occupy Wall Street activist goes to trial on charges of assaulting a police officer, author and lawyer Chase Madar asks what the rights to freedom of assembly, freedom of the press and freedom from warrantless search are worth in the United States today.
As an Occupy Wall Street activist goes to trial on charges of assaulting a police officer, author and lawyer Chase Madar asks what the rights to freedom of assembly, freedom of the press and freedom from warrantless search are worth in the United States today.
Madar writes at The Guardian:
Ask Cecily McMillan, a 25-year-old student and activist who was arrested two years ago during an Occupy Wall Street demonstration in Manhattan. Seized by police, she was beaten black and blue on her ribs and arms until she went into a seizure. When she felt her right breast grabbed from behind, McMillan instinctively threw an elbow, catching a cop under the eye, and that is why she is being prosecuted for assaulting a police officer, a class D felony with a possible seven-year prison term. Her trial began this week.
McMillan is one of over 700 protestors arrested in the course of Occupy Wall Street’s mass mobilization, which began with hopes of radical change and ended in an orgy of police misconduct. According to a scrupulously detailed report (pdf) issued by the NYU School of Law and Fordham Law School, the NYPD routinely wielded excessive force with batons, pepper spray, scooters and horses to crush the nascent movement. And then there were the arrests, often arbitrary, gratuitous and illegal, with most charges later dismissed. McMillan’s is the last Occupy case to be tried, and how the court rules will provide a clear window into whether public assembly stays a basic right or becomes a criminal activity.
Read more here.
— Posted by Alexander Reed Kelly.
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The Occupy Wall Street activist who two weeks ago was found guilty of assaulting a police officer as he led her out of a protest in Zuccotti Park was sentenced Monday.
Cecily McMillan could get up to seven years on her conviction of hitting a plainclothes policeman who grabbed her in Zuccotti Park. The persecution of the Occupy activist has become emblematic of the state's use of the courts to criminalize nonviolent dissent and try to crush new mass movements.The persecution of Occupy activist Cecily McMillan—facing up to seven years in prison—has become emblematic of the state's use of the courts to criminalize nonviolent dissent and try to crush new mass movements.
Occupy Wall Street organizer Cecily McMillan is paying with her time and body for our leaders' sins of unbridled power and extreme wealth.
The Occupy Wall Street organizer, whom Truthdig columnist Chris Hedges profiled last month, was convicted Monday on charges of "assaulting" an NYPD officer who grabbed her breast as he removed her from a protest. She faces up to seven years in prison.
Cecily McMillan—facing the possibility of seven years in prison for elbowing a plainclothes policeman in Zuccotti Park—is the latest victim of a cloaked offensive to destroy activist leaders.
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