Working on this new server in php7...
imc indymedia

Los Angeles Indymedia : Activist News

white themeblack themered themetheme help
About Us Contact Us Calendar Publish RSS
Features
• latest news
• best of news
• syndication
• commentary


KILLRADIO

VozMob

ABCF LA

A-Infos Radio

Indymedia On Air

Dope-X-Resistance-LA List

LAAMN List




IMC Network:

Original Cities

www.indymedia.org africa: ambazonia canarias estrecho / madiaq kenya nigeria south africa canada: hamilton london, ontario maritimes montreal ontario ottawa quebec thunder bay vancouver victoria windsor winnipeg east asia: burma jakarta japan korea manila qc europe: abruzzo alacant andorra antwerpen armenia athens austria barcelona belarus belgium belgrade bristol brussels bulgaria calabria croatia cyprus emilia-romagna estrecho / madiaq euskal herria galiza germany grenoble hungary ireland istanbul italy la plana liege liguria lille linksunten lombardia london madrid malta marseille nantes napoli netherlands nice northern england norway oost-vlaanderen paris/ÃŽle-de-france patras piemonte poland portugal roma romania russia saint-petersburg scotland sverige switzerland thessaloniki torun toscana toulouse ukraine united kingdom valencia latin america: argentina bolivia chiapas chile chile sur cmi brasil colombia ecuador mexico peru puerto rico qollasuyu rosario santiago tijuana uruguay valparaiso venezuela venezuela oceania: adelaide aotearoa brisbane burma darwin jakarta manila melbourne perth qc sydney south asia: india mumbai united states: arizona arkansas asheville atlanta austin baltimore big muddy binghamton boston buffalo charlottesville chicago cleveland colorado columbus dc hawaii houston hudson mohawk kansas city la madison maine miami michigan milwaukee minneapolis/st. paul new hampshire new jersey new mexico new orleans north carolina north texas nyc oklahoma philadelphia pittsburgh portland richmond rochester rogue valley saint louis san diego san francisco san francisco bay area santa barbara santa cruz, ca sarasota seattle tampa bay tennessee urbana-champaign vermont western mass worcester west asia: armenia beirut israel palestine process: fbi/legal updates mailing lists process & imc docs tech volunteer projects: print radio satellite tv video regions: oceania united states topics: biotech

Surviving Cities

www.indymedia.org africa: canada: quebec east asia: japan europe: athens barcelona belgium bristol brussels cyprus germany grenoble ireland istanbul lille linksunten nantes netherlands norway portugal united kingdom latin america: argentina cmi brasil rosario oceania: aotearoa united states: austin big muddy binghamton boston chicago columbus la michigan nyc portland rochester saint louis san diego san francisco bay area santa cruz, ca tennessee urbana-champaign worcester west asia: palestine process: fbi/legal updates process & imc docs projects: radio satellite tv
printable version - js reader version - view hidden posts - tags and related articles

Occupy Activist Recalls Police Brutality, Medical Neglect

by Mark Gabrish Conlan/Zenger's Newsmagazine Wednesday, Jan. 04, 2012 at 5:40 AM
mgconlan@earthlink.net (619) 688-1886 P. O. Box 50134, San Diego, CA 92165

At the annual holiday fundraiser of the San Diego Alliance for Marriage Equality (S.A.M.E.) December 9, activist and police brutality victim Michelle "Jersey" Deutsch recalled not only being Maced by police but being the victim of prejudicial treatment at the hospital once the doctors and nurses treating her learned that she was an Occupy San Diego activist who had been attacked by police at the occupation site.

Occupy Activist Reca...
deutsch.a.jpg, image/jpeg, 600x800

Occupy Activist Recalls Being Maced by Police
Michelle “Jersey” Deutsch Tells Story at S.A.M.E. Fundraiser

by MARK GABRISH CONLAN

Copyright © 2011 by Mark Gabrish Conlan for Zenger’s Newsmagazine • All rights reserved

The San Diego Alliance for Marriage Equality (S.A.M.E.) held its second annual fundraiser Friday, December 9 at the Bamboo Lounge sushi bar in Hillcrest, with a full program of entertainers and a short speech by Michelle “Jersey” Deutsch of Canvass for a Cause and Occupy San Diego. Deutsch was arrested and sprayed with chemical Mace in Civic Center Plaza by San Diego police on October 14, a week after Occupy San Diego started occupying the plaza, and S.A.M.E. decided to give half the fundraiser’s proceeds to Deutsch to pay for her medical bills from the attack.

The other half went to the defense fund for the Equality 9, nine S.A.M.E. members and supporters who were arrested at the San Diego County Clerk’s office August 19, 2010 to protest the county’s continued refusal to give same-sex couples marriage licenses despite a federal judge’s ruling that Proposition 8, which banned legal recognition of same-sex marriages in California, is unconstitutional.

“LGBT [Queer] grassroots groups like Canvass for a Cause and S.A.M.E. should not be overshadowed by $40 million corporate-sponsored campaigns, but we are,” Deutsch told the people who attended the fundraiser. “In 38 states Transgender people can still be fired from their jobs for being Trans, and in 29 states Gay people can be fired from their jobs for being Gay. … We don’t have marriage rights in California. In several states across the country, we don’t have adoption rights and hospital visitation rights. … As individuals, we’re denied housing, employment benefits, employment in general. This is a summary of the reasons why groups like Canvass for a Cause and S.A.M.E. need to be involved in the Occupation.”

Deutsch faulted not only anti-Queer groups but less radical Queer organizations who are themselves funded by major corporations. “We don’t have $10,000 coming from Target,” she said. “In fact, we’re trying to sue them. So we do want to protest down there [at Civic Center Plaza and wherever else Occupy stages demonstrations]. We are protesting down there. We cannot depend on a lot of the groups that fought with us [against] Prop. 8, because a lot of those groups are corporate-sponsored.”

According to Deutsch, the incident that led the police to attack her began when she and her friends at Occupy, including S.A.M.E. president Cecile Veillard (one of the Equality 9), witnessed police attacking other Occupiers in an attempt to clear out the tents members of Occupy had set up in the plaza. “We were peacefully protesting,” she said. “I could look to my left and right and see people’s arms being twisted … [The police] were kicking people in the groins and grabbing people by the backs of their hands, and pulling people to the ground so they could choke them.”

Deutsch said that there were news cameras from two local TV stations, the NBC and Fox affiliates, and therefore a lot of the police assaults on Occupiers took place low to the ground so the cameras couldn’t photograph them. So she started yelling “Brutality!” at the camera operators, trying to get their attention so they would photograph what she was seeing. “I saw my friends getting the crap beat out of them next to me,” Deutsch said. “And there’s nothing you can do. You can’t fight back against the police. None of us did that. None of us put our arms up against them.”

According to Deutsch, the police Maced her to shut her up and keep her from directing the camera operators toward the assaults on her friends. “I was Maced really close to my face, like within three inches of my face, for a good five seconds at least,” she recalled. “It was so close to my face that you really can’t catch it on camera, because the officer was bigger than me.” After the attack, she said, “I was literally blinded for about two hours. I was laying on the ground, everybody else was still protesting, and I couldn’t see anything.”

Deutsch said she returned home a few hours later, only she still felt symptoms from being Maced — complicated by her chronic asthma, since the Mace had triggered an asthma attack. “I woke up in the middle of the night with a bloody nose,” she said. Her partner Lauren and Megan, a nurse who lives next door, convinced Deutsch to go to the emergency room at Scripps Hospital — where her ordeal continued.

The doctors and nurses at Scripps, Deutsch said, “were being really nice and treating me really well until they said, ‘What do you mean, you got Maced?’ The second they heard I had been Maced by the police, they were not very helpful. It really turned around how the doctors and nurses were treating me, to the point where we called our neighbor, nurse Megan, and we said, ‘What should we do? They’re not treating me right. What should they actually be doing?’ And she helped us tell them what I needed.”

Local singer-songwriter Joshua Napier performed one of his intense, powerful sets, including the Jefferson Airplane’s “White Rabbit” and several of his politically themed originals. The program also featured the debut performance by the San Diego People’s Revolutionary Choir, which included three members of the Equality 9 — Cecile Veillard, Sean Bohac and Chuck Stemke — singing classic working people’s songs, including one called “We’re Bound for San Diego” that comes from the 1912 Free Speech Fight. This was a year-long action staged by the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), the radical anarchist union nicknamed the “Wobblies,” who set up soapboxes in San Diego’s traditional free speech zone at Fifth and E Streets downtown and were met with police-sanctioned violence and a city ordinance prohibiting free speech in the area.

Set to the melody of “The Wearing of the Green” — itself an old song of the Irish revolutionary struggle against British colonialism — “We’re Bound for San Diego” was published by the IWW and used as a recruiting tool to bring members and supporters to San Diego. Those who attempted to answer the call were met by vigilante groups on the outskirts of town, where they were beaten and sometimes killed. In the context of the S.A.M.E. event, the last line of the song — “We’ll whip old San Diego if it takes 100 years” (“if it takes us 20 years” in the original published lyric) — seemed almost unbearably ironic given the way the police had treated Deutsch and other Occupy protesters.
Report this post as:
Share on: Twitter, Facebook, Google+

add your comments


© 2000-2018 Los Angeles Independent Media Center. Unless otherwise stated by the author, all content is free for non-commercial reuse, reprint, and rebroadcast, on the net and elsewhere. Opinions are those of the contributors and are not necessarily endorsed by the Los Angeles Independent Media Center. Running sf-active v0.9.4 Disclaimer | Privacy