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Crime, criminalization and gun control: Oakland leads the way in crime hysteria
March 8, 2013
Oakland may seem like a local anomaly with its big increase in homicides in 2011-12 and the anti-crime hysteria which now engulfs it. But Oakland is just a prime example of the intertwining of crime and criminalization under capitalism, in which the ruling class divides working people one from another and targets particular groups for victimization.
Justice for Kevin Clark! Stop racist police brutality!
February 18, 2013
With a banner reading “From the Mission District to the whole Bay Area – Stop Racist Police Brutality,” over 300 community members rallied against the most recent case of police violence in San Francisco. The event was prompted by a video that became widespread showing 18-year-old City College student Kevin Clark being brutalized by two San Francisco police officers.
SFPD can’t stop and frisk, so they turn to ‘hunting’ and ‘wolf packing’
January 27, 2013
It’s a damn shame to see this sort of abuse of power, especially when you consider Mayor Lee, who was largely applauded for being the City’s first Asian-American mayor, was a long-time civil rights attorney. I guess we shouldn’t be surprised, as many traditional civil rights organizations and leaders have turned the concept upside down.
Was Oakland police consultant William Bratton involved in the failed Venezuela coup? And if he was, should Oaklanders be concerned?
January 23, 2013
Hundreds of Oakland residents turned out to voice their opinions about the City Council hiring William Bratton as a $250,000 a year consultant to help bring down an escalating crime rate. They accuse him of instituting “stop and frisk,” a program that they say is the blue print for racial profiling. Bratton’s background suggests there may be a lot more to be concerned about than stop and frisk.
No Bratton-style policing in Oakland: Unraveling the fraying edges of zero tolerance
January 22, 2013
Hundreds turned out for Oakland City Council’s Public Safety Committee meeting on Jan. 15, 2013, to oppose paying $250,000 to bring “supercop” William Bratton and his “stop and frisk” and other zero tolerance police policies to Oakland. The bid for Bratton’s consult seems to be simply Oakland throwing good money after bad.
Stop the supercop! All out to Oakland City Hall Tuesday!
January 14, 2013
Oakland’s mayor, chief of police, and city manager announced their intentions to contract with William Bratton as a consultant to the Oakland Police Department. Oakland has become the epicenter of anti-brutality campaigns, so those who want the brutality to continue are bringing in their big guns. Join the Justice for Alan Blueford Coalition and allies on Tuesday, Jan. 15, to tell the Oakland City Council that we reject Bill Bratton and his racist, fascist policies. Meet up at 5:00 for a rally with the meeting at 5:30.
Tears of sorrow and rage: Oakland PD, the Black Panthers and Alan Blueford
November 30, 2012
For decades, the Oakland Police Department has been the focus of fear. For a brief time, the Black Panther Party put a crimp into their strut. But the Black Panther Party is no more, and the repression has come surging back. The family of Alan Blueford continue to organize resistance to this campaign of repression. You can join that campaign at justice4alanblueford.org.
Sleeping on the street
November 29, 2012
Reporting and supporting as a revolutionary poverty journalist, I have done multiple stories on the increasing criminalization suffered by houseless peoples in the U.S. As a daughter raised in a houseless family, I was personally cited, arrested and eventually incarcerated for the act of being houseless and living in the car with my mama.
Murdered by police for being Black and poor
November 29, 2012
From the Mission District in San Francisco, to West, North and now East Oakland, several neighborhoods in LA, young Black and Brown men, convening, talking, laughing, being young, are viewed as “dangerous,” “suspect” or criminal. Laws like the gang injunction are instituted and applied, and eventually we are completely wiped away like we were never there.
Look who’s punishing violent cops now!
October 25, 2012
On Oct. 12, Oakland Police Chief Howard Jordan announced that 44 of his officers would face some manner of punishment for their abuse of Occupy protesters last year. Some have hailed this decision as a sign that the Oakland Police Department is finally going to start holding its officers accountable. A look at the recent decisions by Jordan and the OPD, however, dispels any such hope.
Houseless homeowners: Will San Francisco declare them illegal?
September 21, 2012
Residents of the Sunset district of San Francisco voiced support for a racist, classist, anti-poor people measure which would make it doubly illegal to park RVs and campers where houseless people sleep on the streets in the Sunset. To speak back to this legislation, call the San Francisco Board of Supervisors to oppose ‘Large Vehicle Parking Restrictions,’ Item 120142 on their agenda for Tuesday, Sept. 25.
NFL cash and community
August 26, 2012
The San Francisco Bay View newspaper and LaHitz Sports are starting a “Great Kids in the Bay View” writing contest. Each contestant will write about his or her favorite 49er (offensive and defensive players) to win tickets to a game and get their photo in the paper with the players.
Alan Blueford would have graduated in June
August 10, 2012
Eighteen-year-old high school senior and Oakland resident Alan Blueford was shot to death by police on May 6 under curious circumstances. The coroner’s report, showing Blueford never shot at the officer, was finally released after the July 19 press conference Alan’s parents were forced to organize.
Bringing stop and frisk to SF?
August 6, 2012
Mayor Ed Lee is considering a New York City-style stop-and-frisk policy, where police search anyone they consider “suspicious.” Lee, the first Chinese American mayor of San Francisco, said, “I will be tagged – as the minority mayor of this city – for racial profiling.” He’s right – and that tag is entirely justified.
Pan African delegation petitions ICC to prosecute NATO war crimes
July 17, 2012
The Pan African Solidarity Hague Committee delivered a petition to the chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, in The Hague, Netherlands, on June 18. The petition demands that the ICC prosecute the U.S., Britain, France, Italy, Canada and NATO for war crimes and crimes against humanity.
Remembering Kenneth Harding: No stop ‘n Frisco!
July 11, 2012
When Kenneth Harding, 19, couldn’t show police a Muni transfer to prove he’d paid his $2 fare on July 16, 2011, he ran, they shot him in the back and for an agonizing half hour, instead of trying to save his life, they trained their guns on Kenneth and the crowd while the young man slowly bled to death and the crowd screamed in horror. Knowing that the police murder of Kenneth Harding was the outcome of the routine, though unofficial, police practice of stopping and frisking young men of color, why would San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee, a former civil rights attorney, consider importing New York City’s disastrous stop-and-frisk policy?
The mass incarceration of the Black community: an interview with Michelle Alexander, author of ‘The New Jim Crow’
April 4, 2012
Professor Michelle Alexander’s new book “The New Jim Crow” is a monumental, well researched piece of work that presents documented facts in down to earth English about the mass incarceration of Black people within the United States’ national concentration camp system. At one point in “The New Jim Crow,” Professor Alexander presents evidence that more Black people are enslaved behind bars today than were enslaved on the plantations in 1850, before the Emancipation Proclamation was signed.
Is Britain burning with racism and economic inequality?
September 1, 2011
For days, the world witnessed the flames of discontent and disenchantment engulfing the urban streets of England in the aftermath of the shooting death of 29-year-old Mark Duggan by the Metropolitan Police Service on Aug. 4.
Michelle Alexander on California’s ‘cruel and unusual’ prisons
June 14, 2011
On May 23, the U.S. Supreme Court handed down a 5-4 decision ordering California to release tens of thousands of inmates from its overcrowded prisons on the grounds that their living conditions – including lethally inadequate healthcare – were so intolerable as to be “cruel and unusual punishment.”
Anti-police brutality coalition convenes tribunal, plans for political action
January 14, 2011
The People’s Tribunal Against Police Brutality and Misconduct will be convened on Saturday, Jan. 15, 11 a.m., in North Philadelphia amidst a whirlwind of public debate, legal battles and community protest sparked by the upsurge in police brutality there and across the country.