Riot Police Destroy Occupy Oakland Encampment… Again
November 14th, 2011
It began with an anonymous email to the Occupation warning of an imminent crackdown from the Oakland Police. An unrelated shooting in downtown Oakland four days ago would be used as an excuse for the city to forcefully and permanently destroy the tent city. Occupants weren’t about to roll over, so they braced themselves for a stand-off with police similar to the October 25th Raid. The call went out at 3:40am, just like before, but this time more than 500 protesters flooded the intersection of Broadway and 14th Street, the same site where police shot Marine Veteran Scott Olsen with a tear gas canister in the face just three weeks ago. This time protesters came prepared, passing out vinegar drenched rags for protection from tear gas.
Between 50 to 75 Occupants remained in the camp after a couple hundred riot police from 12 different departments surrounded the plaza and a police helicopter announced over loud speaker that they had one last chance to leave. But they remained. Compare that to the October raid when 500 riot police from 17 departments were dispatched and we can see that the city is losing ground.
At 6:00am the police moved in making only 32 arrests in all, including 14 who had been holding an all night interfaith prayer vigil. There were 75 arrests in October. Police declared the plaza a “crime scene” and cleared out the media as they tore down the tent city. There were no reported injuries. By 6:30 the police began to withdraw having completely cleared the plaza with the exception of one Occupant who’d climbed up the sycamore tree in the center of the plaza with a gas mask who evaded capture for several hours.
The plaza was barricaded and downtown streets blocked off. The city again asked local businesses to remain closed temporarily. Oakland Mayor Jean Quan reported that the raid cost Oakland roughly half a million dollars, and police planned to patrol the plaza around the clock until further notice, costing $1000 per officer per day. Occupants are not the least bit dissuaded. Lauren Smith, 29 said, “They’re not going to be able to keep the area clear. They don’t have the resources.”
Many Occupants have relocated to smaller sites on the edge of downtown. Snow Park reportedly has about 20 tents now, and some Occupants are staying in sleeping bags in front of the Veterans Memorial Building.
The Occupation has called another emergency assembly today at 4pm at the Oakland Public Library to discuss strategies to re-take the plaza. After the October raid the emergency assembly resulted in an all day march through the streets of Oakland, eventually confronting police back at the plaza. The police violence that followed only encouraged more support for the Occupation and they re-took the plaza the next day. The “General Strike” on November 2nd that shut down the Oakland Port was, in part, a response to that raid. There’s no telling what the response will be to this raid, but Occupants are confident they will retake the plaza and multiply their numbers. Evie McKnight called it, “an ever-expanding group effort.” It seems like one of the strategies being discussed for the near future is to begin occupying foreclosed properties and reclaiming them. So it’s going to get more interesting.
The first unintended consequence occurred at 2:00am, before the raid even began. Civil rights attorney Dan Siegal, Mayor Jean Quan’s legal advisor, announced that his resignation calling the raid, “tragically unnecessary.” He said, “I support Occupy Oakland, not the 1% and it’s government facilitators” and added that Oakland had become, “the most hostile city to the Occupy Movement.”
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