One Summary of DC Police Tactics, S29

ONE SUMMARY OF DC POLICE TACTICS, S29 ANTICAPITALIST/ANARCHIST DEMO This is one summary of what happened this weekend at the anti-capitalist demo in Washington DC. It is not the only summary, and parts of it may be inaccurate as they are from my viewpoint only.

Around 1500 people gathered at a park 9AM September 29th in front of Union Station, Washington DC. MPDC Police Chief Charles Ramsey and Deputy Chief Terrance Gainer were also present and very accessible to corporate media, protesters and indymedia. Many undercover police were also present. Many corporate media teams were there from DC, national and international news agencies.

Chief Ramsey said, \"We\'re gonna let them march.\" He confirmed that the march was not permitted (the march did not have a legal permit with the city government), but that it was his idea that the protesters would be allowed to peacefully proceed with their march.

As the march was getting ready to start, police in riot gear began forming human walls around the protesters. The protesters were very peacefully assembled and had not even begun to leave the park. In a mass of confusion, protesters and indymedia began asking the police (and the chief, assistant chief, etc) what was happening and if the group would be allowed to march. Again, they confirmed that the march would be permitted, but that they were enforcing their own route out of the park. Many protesters disagreed with this, but eventually the momentum to leave the park took over and the group followed the police\'s lead.

As the march began, it became clear that the police were going to forcefully enforce the march route. Up to the last minute, the anti-capitalist march had not been made clear and DC Indymedia folks did not know what route would be taken. Chief Ramsey said, \"They want to go to the World Bank, we\'ll take them there.\" When asked why protesters could not decide their own route, Ramsey said that \"they don\'t know the way.\"

Although police were guiding the route with an intimidating presence, there were no real confrontations to this point. Ramsey and Gainey continued to march along with the protesters, leading the way while proudly carrying their nightsticks. This PR grab by Ramsey was short-lived. In the spirit of fun, the anti-capitalist protest had been very upbeat and positive. Many people were halfway joking with the Chief, and although the robocop legions were out in force, it wasn\'t anything we hadn\'t seen before. When a McDonald\'s truck drove by with a huge advertisement, protesters booed loudly and even some cops were seen laughing.

As the march proceeded, single-file riot police lines were on either side of the march. Police motorcycles and cars were in front and back. Then somehow the idea spread that the march should run, again in the spirit of fun, to move up past the lines of cops. Laughing and running, the march surged forward and the cops were left baffled. Eventually, even with all that heavy body armor, many of the cops were able to keep up with the march.

Shortly after this, I saw what I think was the first real confrontation. This may not be true, but this is what I saw near the front of the march. After the group stopped running, everyone was laughing and huffing and puffing and even the cops seemed kind of exasperated but vaguely amused. At this point, I saw four young people link arms, I think two of them were holding little shields made out of a plastic trashcan, and sort of run to the front of the march and try to slip past the line of cops. One of them stumbled on the way, and brought down the rest of them, even before they could make it to the police line.

The cops responded with extreme force, stormed the march, hitting people with nightsticks, and using pepper-spray. At this point, I even saw Chief Ramsey using his nightstick on protesters. Then police on motorcycles drove into the crowd, directly into protesters who were brought down by this, and then run over by the motorcycles. All while riot police on foot continued to hit people with nightsticks and use pepper spray.

Shortly after this, Chief Ramsey disappeared from the scene. He was no longer directly involved, and seemed to just go away. Order was restored and the march went on. Similar confrontations happened 3 to 4 more times on the way to the World Bank building. In the later confrontations, several people began to fight back, throwing things and using sticks, which were mostly ineffective given the substantial body armor of the riot police. The police clearly dominated the protesters with nightsticks, pepper spray and the tactic of driving into them with motorcycles.

The march proceeded to a park right outside the World Bank. The police pushed people into the park, and formed a human wall around the park. Some people were able to get out. I personally asked at least 10 police if people could get out and where, and all of them said that people were not being let out. No officials (ramsey, gainer) were around for questions. About 20 yards from the riot police human wall around the park at each sidewalk/entrypoint were 2-3 riot police who did not allow anyone to get any closer.

Many people were forcefully moved away from the enclosed park. One DC police officer shoved a couple people and yelled (verbatim): \"I dare you to defy me!\" I also saw an Associated Press cameraperson get thrown out of the park and forcefully held away from the park with others.

This stayed the same for probably 2 hours (although this may be totally inaccurate, i don\'t really remember). Protesters made the best of it, doing radical cheers, dancing, playing drums, talking, and trying to forget that they were being forcefully detained by hundreds of riot police.

At some point, it was made known that the police were going to march the group down H Street towards the IAC-organized rally going on elsewhere. Police marched everyone out of the park and down the street. Many people were beaten at this time. Police were using a maneuver where they hold their nightstick with two hands at either end of the stick, and at shoulder-height they thrust it forward while loudly grunting or shouting \"go\". This maneuver was often targeted at people, hitting them in the process. I watched my friend get hit three times suddenly, at which point he fell backwards and the cop moved in to hit him some more.

This was the method police used to move the march down H Street. I don\'t know if pepper spray was used here, although I did smell it strongly. All the while, Chief Ramsey had returned and continued marching down the street in front of this all.

At the IAC march, police tried several maneuvers, forming a line down sidewalks, but in the end they just formed another human barricade around a larger portion of the intersection, and allowed all of the protesters to move freely.

The police tactic was obvious: forcefully move the march through the city to the World Bank and force them to be isolated from the other march going on. Also, the number of riot police present allowed the police to provide an outer \"cover\" of cops which hid the beatings and use of motorcycles. Corporate media mainly stayed on the sidewalk, while on the street the police were attacking people. However, indymedia got video and pictures of this all.

The use of Chief Ramsey to walk in front of the march was a poor PR move on his part. For the most part, I did not see corporate media covering that he was there and the protesters didn\'t really think it made that much of a difference. And when police started attacking protesters, Chief Ramsey was nowhere to be found. His presence also offended many people. An African-American man I talked with said that Chief Ramsey had made eye contact with him and smiled. \"I just couldn\'t believe it, how can he be out here like this?\"

Another interesting note is that Assistant Chief Gainer put on a helmet that had a bunch of pepper spray in it. It severely affected him and he had to get his eyes flushed with water by another police officer. It was speculated that the helmet was \"spiked\" by other officers, whose dislike for Gainer is well-known after private DC police emails were made public.