WP: IMF Arrests Improper, Police Found (DC police WRONG!!)

[diamond14]

IMF Arrests Improper, Police Found
Ramsey Memo Acknowledges Protesters Weren't Warned

By Carol D. Leonnig
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, September 13, 2003; Page B02


An internal police investigation into the roundup of protesters and bystanders at a downtown Washington park last September found that all 400 people were wrongfully arrested.

The report revealed significant contradictions between what top city officials have said publicly about the controversial Sept. 27, 2002, arrests at Pershing Park and what they knew privately about the tightly held investigative findings.

In a confidential memo to Mayor Anthony A. Williams in March, D.C. Police Chief Charles H. Ramsey acknowledged that his assistant chief ordered arrests of everyone in the police-cordoned park -- without giving an order for protesters to disperse -- and that police had blocked people who wished to leave.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A3237-2003Sep12.html

[Feanorcurufinwe]

1. The police abused their power? What a shock

[diamond14]

2. in the same WP edition, a STRONG editorial FOR the protestors

special thanks to all the hard-working lawyers and legal professionals who often volunteer here in DC to protect OUR rights to question OUR government....keep fighting....this is a VICTORY for real Patriots....
__________________________

It Takes a Judge

Saturday, September 13, 2003; Page A20

-snips-

IT SHOULD NOT have fallen to U.S. District Judge Emmet G. Sullivan to instruct Mayor Anthony A. Williams to do his job. But apparently that is what it takes to get the mayor to step up to the problem the D.C. police created a year ago when they wrongfully arrested as many as 400 people during demonstrations downtown at Pershing Park. The judge's admonition to Mr. Williams occurred during a hearing on four lawsuits filed by many of the people caught up in the mass arrests. As of midweek, the city's chief executive still had not released a copy of a Jan. 25 police department report that found the arrests violated general police orders. The judge, who ordered the city to deliver a copy of the report to him and all lawyers in the case, asked the city's attorney, "Why shouldn't the public know what you concluded in your investigation?" Spurred by that question, the mayor agreed to send the judge a copy and released the report yesterday. But without the court's intervention, the public would still be in the dark about official police wrongdoing.

And it's time for Mr. Williams to tell the public what action he is taking to ensure that the D.C. police department remains where it belongs -- on the correct side of the Constitution.


http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A3555-2003Sep12.html

[Oilwellian]

11. Sullivan's a good judge

He's also the judge that Cheney is challenging regarding the Energy Policy papers. Sullivan continually rules against him and has him up against a wall. We owe him a debt of gratitude for his persistent rulings adhering to the Constitution and rule of law.

[loudnclear]

3. This verdict could only happen in DC

And we all know why!! Would never happen in NYC, Protland, or LA eventhough there was more brutality in those places.

[diamond14]

5. no, this verdict can happen anywhere where WE THE PEOPLE

demand that OUR police act in accordance with the United States Constitution. WE must demand it, never give up our rights in any part of America...WE must fight for our rights....

BOOT bush* in 2004
http://www.democrats.org

Re-Defeat bush* in 2004
http://www.democrats.com

[peterh]

4. Someone should check phone records…

That Asst. Chief probably got a phone call from DeLay’s office….that’s definitely his MO of late

[indepat]

6. And maybe someone should thoroughly review the Asst. Chief's

entire public stewardship. Was this action the antithesis of his usual modus operandi or just another example thereof?

[indepat]

7. Thank God there are still a few Federal judges driven by the law rather

than ideology, but their numbers are rapidly shrinking.

[E_Zapata]

8. Isn't this the jurisdiction where Bush wanted to put ESTRADA

on the appellate court.

If Estrada were sitting on the appellate court, the police would know to appeal this case. And we know the decision that would be made.

Many thanks to the filibusterers.

[Judi Lynn]

9. Don't know how I missed hearing about this the first time

Thank you so much for posting this article.

It's a marvel this didn't get more publicity than it did originally. I'm certain media were encouraged to fuggedabouddit.

Can you imagine Presidents Carter or Clinton creating a climate in which something like this would ever be considered?

[durutti]

10. I Was One of Those Arrested

I spent 18 hours in a hot, filthy, overcrowded bus. Everyone's hands were bound behind their backs until someone started passing around a fingernail clipper that we used to get them off. We were only given granola bars to eat and some lukewarm water to drink, while the cops drank Gatorade.

Then I got to sleep for four hours on the floor of a hot, overcrowded, filthy jail cell. I had to pay $100 to get out. I was stuck in a bad section of DC at 3:00 a.m., with no idea how to get back to the church at which I was staying.

One of the things that I kept thinking about was the fact that if this miscarriage of justice had happened in Cuba or Iran, there would be an outcry.

[Judi Lynn]

12. You can be sure of that, duritti. Our propaganda people

like Otto Reich, as he worked in his "Office of Public Diplomacy" for Ronald Reagan, or any of his successors would have spread this story around the world, planting it in newspapers everywhere.

Glad you got through it, but damned sorry to learn it happened. I can only imagine what any of you could have been thinking during this extended illegal ordeal.

Hope you get an official apology, but consider the source, right?

[diamond14]

14. thank you, durutti...for coming to DC & STANDING UP for America

your service to OUR Nation will always be appreciated by us Patriots...

what has happened is certainly a miscarriage of justice...my hope is that all who were subjected to this, and all who know about it will work hard to stop bush* and his minions....

it takes a lot of people working very hard to change this insanity...at DU, we should majorly support those who are able and willing to STAND UP.....

thank you, durutti...may you NEVER be subjected again to such horrors.....it's time to BOOT bush*....your lesson to us is how very very fragile our constitutional rights really are....that we must all fight to keep those constitutional rights....and you must have someone looking after you...since you got out of DC jail alive, and through DC at 03 AM....lots of people don't make it, luckily you did...

(p.s.....thanks to the Democrats for defeating potential judge Estrada....)....

[NYC]

15. Thank you

for being a good citizen, and for your report.

[zbdent]

13. You know, I like my town, Richfield Ohio.

300, 400, plus whatever protesters.

Republican leaning area.

No arrests.

Of course, there's newer and newer housing coming in, all in the 250K+ area. Maybe that will get more Repuke types in, unfortunately.