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NY Times underestimates Oakland’s radicals
August 28, 2012
The New York Times published a piece called “Oakland, the Last Refuge of Radical America” that pretty much had everyone in Oakland scratching their heads and mouthing a collective WTF? Is Oakland the last refuge for radicalism where outsiders are invading the city? No, Oakland is a city where people are not shy about fighting for and demanding justice.
Shutting down Muni for Kenneth Harding and all victims of police terror
July 17, 2012
The police line was hard, boot to boot, helmet to helmet, unmoving, bringing the threat of death with each gaze. The opposing line was a circle and it was moving, with resistance. And strength and people power. We were mamaz, uncles, daddys, sisters and brothers in solidarity, and we won’t stop fighting, we won’t stop walking, we won’t stop speaking until this ongoing police murder of our babies is over. “Our children are being stalked and murdered in cold blood, and it cannot continue,” said Oscar Grant’s Uncle Bobby.
Youth of color: Watched and shot
May 25, 2012
Trayvon Martin and Mumia Abu-Jamal. One is dead. One languished on death row for 30 years. They are separated in age by a generation, separated by different locations and different life-histories, but their stories of being under surveillance, watched and shot, intersect strikingly with each other and with many other people.
On state violence, white male privilege and ‘Occupy’
November 13, 2011
I am not about to trust a “movement” that offers no critique of the role of state violence in upholding capitalist economic interests. I am not about to get arrested with some “white” guys whose interests are just their own, who only noticed injustice when they were the ones who got laid off, arrested, beat down or tased.
Kenneth Harding police murder aftermath: Victory for Kilo G
September 3, 2011
Kilo G. Perry is an Afrikan man and a man of his word. He is such a trusted man of his word that he has been dubbed “the voice of Bayview Hunters Point” by poor Black and Brown people of San Francisco. Comrade Kilo G is the producer of Cameras Not Guns, a youth educator and peacemaker, and a single father of a 3-year-old baby boy.
Why did SFPD shoot Randal Dunklin in his wheelchair?
January 29, 2011
As the police continue to shoot unarmed and mentally disabled people, including a man in a wheelchair, the community is speaking out against these incidents of excessive force. On Martin Luther King Day, Monday, Jan. 17, about 150 San Franciscans and Bay Area activists expressed their outrage with a march and rally in San Francisco.
Pam Africa: 100% death penalty abolition must include Mumia
October 10, 2010
Minister of Information JR speaks with Pam Africa about a secret memo signed by the U.S. members of the Steering Committee of the World Coalition Against the Death Penalty that can be summed up as “throwing Mumia under the bus.”
A repeat of Rodney King verdict?
July 8, 2010
“They’ve made Johannes Mehserle into a victim in this case and he’s nothing but a brutal killer,” said Aidge Patterson, leader of the LA Coalition for Justice for Oscar Grant. He believes a lack of media coverage of the first cop to be tried for murder in California was intended to quiet people down. “This is obviously one of the most historic cases in the entire country and it should be on every news station, but they’re good at keeping people ignorant.” Thank Minister of Information JR for convincing the Black press to cover the story.
Politics makes strange bedfellows
July 3, 2010
THE VERDICT is INVOLUNTARY MANSLAUGHTER. Justice for Oscar Grant says: ‘ All out to Broadway and 14th!’ And heed these wise words: ‘Requesting Activists and Citizens over 50 years old to show up at 14th street and Broadway. HANDS AROUND OUR YOUTH! We the older generation need to be present to protect our youth from possible police brutality. We must bear witness to our youths right to assemble and peacefully demonstrate. Let OPD know these are our children and deserve to be respected as full USA citizens with the right to peacefully demonstrate without police or outside interference. Come and protect our children.’
I call it murder
February 5, 2010
Cynthia McKinney sets the theme for Black Resistance to Police Terrorism Month, marked by five events in two weeks – four in Oakland, on Feb. 7, 17, 21 and 22, and one on Oscar Grant in Los Angeles, on Feb. 18, the eve of killer cop Mehserle’s Feb. 19 hearing – featuring your favorite speakers coming to Cali from around the country. And pack the courtroom Feb. 22, 8:30 a.m., 1225 Fallon, Oakland, for Minister of Information JR’s trial. Free JR!
Twenty-eight years falsely accused: an interview wit’ journalist, author and political prisoner Mumia Abu Jamal
December 9, 2009
Dec. 9 will mark the 28th year that former Black Panther and present day political prisoner and prolific journalist Mumia Abu Jamal has been locked up for the murder of a Philadelphia police officer, although the evidence points to his innocence. After nearly three decades, many of Mumia’s supporters around the planet believe that he is closer than ever to being assassinated by lethal injection on Pennsylvania’s death row. We are asking everyone who reads this piece to get involved in freeing this man.
Hands off Juanita Young!
November 19, 2009
Juanita Young is a grandmother who stands maybe 5 feet tall – she is legally blind and also suffers from bad asthma attacks. But that hasn’t stopped police officers from harassing her and her family at all hours of the night. “Though I have been diligently fighting against police brutality for nine years, this most recent string of attacks has left me shaken to the core,” writes Juanita Young. An all-night vigil has been called to protect her.
To kill or not to kill, be killed or not be killed: That is not our question!
April 22, 2009
Patrick Gonzalez and Tony Pirone, we promise you a rapid promotion! Johannes Mehserle, not to worry, Buddy! We’ll cover all your legal fees. We’ll get you out of that slump with flying colors and added stripes on your bloody sleeve!
Oakland’s civil war: the people vs. the police
March 25, 2009
The reason why so many people may have appeared gleeful at the killing by Lovelle Mixon of four Oakland cops is that the police have for so long looked at various communities as less than human.
Police 2, Oakland residents 4
March 24, 2009
On March 21, Lovelle Mixon, 26, was murdered by Oakland police after allegedly killing four of them on MacArthur Blvd off of 73rd Avenue in East Oakland. Listen to JR’s Block Report interview with his family – his mother, Athena, his wife, Amara, and her sister, Alicia – broadcast March 30 on KPFA’s Flashpoints at http://www.kpfa.org/archive/id/49609.
Three poems for Oscar Grant
March 15, 2009
Submit your creative expression – poem, photo, artwork, music, graffiti etc. – to the Oscar Grant Memorial Arts Project. Details follow the poems. Deadline is March 21
New NYPD data shows record number of stop-and-frisks in 12-month period
February 19, 2009
New data from the New York City Police Department shows the final total of stop-and-frisks for 2008 to be a record 531,159. Over 80 percent of them were of Black and Latino New Yorkers.
Oscar Grant – and YOU
February 10, 2009
Imagine this: If the roles were reversed, that is, if bystanders had footage of Grant shooting Mehserle, would the media be suggesting a defense for him? Would Grant have been free to roam, to leave the state a week later? Would he have made bail?
Bitter tears, the assassination of Oscar Grant: ‘BARTing while BLACK’
February 4, 2009
RIP Oscar Grant III. You, unarmed, pleading for your life as a young father, at the tender age of 22, while a rogue Bay Area Rapid Transit cop Tony Pirone punches you, then crushes your neck with his knee, shortly followed in his enthusiastic, racist, vicious rage by Officer Johannes Mehserle, who shoots you in the back, murdering you.
Oscar Grant, young father and peacemaker, executed by BART police
January 6, 2009
An Oakland BART police officer shot an unarmed Black man, Oscar Grant, while he lay face down on the ground and was fully cooperating. Protest Wednesday, Jan. 7, 3-7pm, Fruitvale BART, Oakland.