The simple truth is you can be arrested and jailed in this country for peacefully
expressing your political views. It happened in downtown Cincinnati
last fall, witnessed by hundreds of people -- and city council
is doing nothing about it.Complaints about racial profiling
by Cincinnati Police officers have generated council hearings
and a new city ordinance designed to forbid the practice, even
though officials insist the problem hasn't been well documented
and is hard to quantify. But political profiling seems to have
drawn no outrage from council, even though videotapes and court
records raise serious questions about police conduct during
protests against the TransAtlantic
Business Dialogue (TABD) Nov. 16-18.
The first pamphlet about the Cincinnati protests, This Is What a Police State Looks Like, is now in print. The first poem, "Red November, Black November," has entered the anti-globalization pantheon. The first lawsuits have been filed. Now get ready for the sequel: Days of Action, coming April 16-20.
If globalization of the economy once seemed too theoretical an issue to get worked up about, the Cincinnati Police Division unwittingly helped the protesters prove their point. Opponents of so-called "free trade" say it gives corporations too much power, reducing government to a tool of big business. As if to illustrate that very message, Cincinnati Police made a massive display of force, effectively shutting down the protests to clear Cincinnati's streets for the TABD executives meeting here.
The next batch of demonstrations likely will be smaller and quieter. But after what happened here last year, globalization should seem all the more local.
If you don't believe police agencies serve the interests of corporations, abusing the rights of citizens when necessary, you need only look at the many videotapes shot downtown last fall.
Three days in November
N16 is what the protesters called their three days of marches, teach-ins and rallies, taking the name from the first day of events, Nov. 16, 2000.
The first day of N16 brought two arrests after two brothers unfurled a banner during intermission at a Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra concert attended by TABD executives. The second day of protests put an estimated 500 people on the streets, banging drums and shouting anti-corporate slogans, and four people were arrested.
The third day of N16 was comparatively subdued, but the police were angry about the previous day's events. Police officials have admitted the department deliberately pursued a more aggressive stance as a result. Forty-seven people were arrested that day, most of them on charges of disorderly conduct and failure to disperse.
As the cases have proceeded through the Hamilton County courts, a stark picture has developed: Every protester who pleaded not guilty has won in court -- every single one.
Fourteen protesters pleaded not guilty. Of those 14, five won acquittal at trial. The other nine had charges against them dismissed.
"Most of the arrests from N16 were made on Saturday (Nov. 18)," says John Meinken, a legal observer during the protests. "The footage and reports of civil disobedience -- moving police barricades, dragging garbage cans into the streets, etc. -- were all from Friday. My understanding is that the police did not want a repeat of Friday's problems, so they decided to take a harder stance on Saturday. Unfortunately, since no one was breaking the law on Saturday, their solution wound up targeting innocent people for abuse and arrest."
Attorney Robert Newman has filed lawsuits in U.S. District Court on behalf of Ethan "Zeke" Spier, who was acquitted of disorderly conduct; Caleb Bennett, arrested on a charge of assault on a police horse but later dismissed; and Steve Steel, against whom a charge of disorderly conduct was also dismissed.
"A lot of people were just arrested willy-nilly," Newman says. "They were pulled out of the line. It's done to frighten people from protesting and get them off the street. Just the get-up of the police is frightening, but when they start acting like mad Martians, it's a problem. They've hurt people."
Bennett, for example, spent five days in jail. Steel was locked up for two days.
"I've seen the videos of the encounter on Eighth Street," Newman says. "Police just went up and took people off the sidewalk and threw them on the street. It's not a pretty picture, and it's not the way you expect cops to behave."
The only convictions resulting from arrests during N16 have been on pleas of no contest. But now even those convictions are being called into question.
A group of 19 women pled no contest after what some described as coercion by the public defender's office. Four of the women have asked the Ohio First District Court of Appeals to let them withdraw their pleas and take the charges against them to trial.
The women contend Public Defender Lou Strigari told them that all of them had to agree to a plea bargain -- pleading no contest, paying a fine and then being released -- or none would be allowed to take the deal.
"The public defender definitely should not have tried to put everybody in the same soup," says Newman, who is handling the appeals. "He's obligated to represent people individually. His job is not to clear the docket for the court."
Strigari says he didn't pressure any of the protesters to accept the plea deal.
"We didn't force anybody," Strigari says. "Nobody twisted any arms or broke any bones or killed anybody. We told people, 'You can get this over with and go home.' That's the spiel I gave that day."
Molly Lyons, a legal observer during N16, says police made indiscriminate arrests.
"They just swept the streets," Lyons says. "People were pulled out of the crowd. People were maced without reason. People were hit without reason. Everyone who went to court and fought it won. Nobody was found guilty except through a no-contest plea."
City Councilman Jim Tarbell says violence during anti-globalization protests in Seattle in 1999 put the Cincinnati Police Division on alert.
"It doesn't excuse officers taking advantage or abusing their authority," Tarbell says, "but it does help explain it."
The acquittals and dismissals of so many charges seem to indicate police didn't exercise enough restraint and tolerance for dissent, according to Tarbell.
"No, probably not," he says. "But I think that was part of the strategy. I'm at a loss as to whether that was the best thing to do or not."
City Manager John Shirey seems to suggest the arrest of so many protesters, with the charges thrown out later, was by design. He says it's not unusual for charges to be dismissed in these kinds of cases.
"So it doesn't surprise me that those charges were dismissed," Shirey says.
Newman says he does not understand police behavior, especially barricading Fountain Square and searching everyone who wanted to attend a legal rally Nov. 18.
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Photo By Jymi Bolden
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Steve Schumacher directs volunteers making protest
signs for Days of Action, April 16 through 20.
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"What concerns a lot of people is the searching of everybody before they could go on Fountain Square," he says. "For the life of me I can't see how this is permissible under the Constitution."
Newman says he anticipates more lawsuits on behalf of protesters. The American Civil Liberties Union of Ohio also is collecting information about police conduct during N16.
"Yes, there are going to be more filed," Newman says. "At least one or two more are in the works."
City council should take a more active interest in what police officers did during N16, according to Newman. If any of these lawsuits are decided in the protesters' favor, the city of Cincinnati could be on the hook for cash settlements, much like the city of Seattle was in the wake of the 1999 World Trade Organization protests there.
"It would be nice if council were to simply look at the videotapes that were taken by the protesters," he says. "I doubt they will, and that's why people are frustrated."
Show me yours; I won't show you mine
It was for events such as N16 that God made video cameras. The videotape of Bennett's arrest, for example, clearly shows he didn't touch the horse that police charged him with assaulting. Other videotapes capture officers using chemical spray and arresting protesters on Eighth Street who showed no signs of violence or resistance to orders.
But protesters weren't the only people taking photographs, and neither were the media. Police officers taped and photographed many of the marchers and participants in N16 rallies.
In fact, police officers still are trying to gather information. Last month, the police division asked CityBeat for unpublished photos and videotapes in its possession. The newspaper refused the request, which the department said it also made to other media outlets.
But the police division has been less than forthcoming with information in its possession. Police Chief Thomas Streicher has declined numerous CityBeat requests for interviews since November.
The police division has repeatedly promised to release an "after-action report" on its handling of N16. But almost five months later, the report still isn't finished, according to police spokesmen.
CityBeat has repeatedly requested information on the number of officers assigned to N16, the amount of police payroll expenses and the costs for equipment and training. Police spokesmen say the information isn't yet available.
Shortly after the demonstrations, Lt. Ray Ruberg said officers found no weapons in any of their searches or on any of the 52 people arrested in connection with the protests. But police later said they found ball bearings at the site of three broken windows downtown.
Capt. Vincent Demasi, who was in charge of the police deployment during N16, said those broken windows and the discovery of Christmas ornaments filled with paint led to a criminal investigation that was the legal basis for the searches conducted on Fountain Square Nov. 18 ("Failure to Communicate," Dec. 14-20, 2000). But when CityBeat asked to see the ornaments this week, Ruberg said police did not keep them -- even though the ornaments are supposed to be evidence in a criminal investigation.
Now a bill has disappeared, too. After the protests, the city of Cincinnati sent Steve Schumacher, spokesman for the Coalition for a Humane Economy (CHE), a bill for $16,000 for police services during N16. Never mind that police claim information on costs isn't yet available. To Schumacher, the bill was nothing more than harassment.
After he complained, the city dropped the bill.
"The city sent us a bill for $16,000 and then three months later said the bill's canceled," Schumacher says. "That's another kind of chilling impact, to financially discourage dissent."
Some of the information that has been released by police raises more questions than it answers. The Use of Force reports, for example, include no mention of an officer picking up and forcibly moving a CityBeat reporter accompanying protesters on Third Street or an officer striking a CityBeat photographer with a baton during a rally at Union Terminal. The Use of Force reports identify a single officer, Lt. James Whalen, as using chemical spray three times on Nov. 17. One Use of Force report shows Keith Fangman, president of the Queen City Chapter of the Fraternal Order of Police, using chemical spray on protesters.
Mayor Charlie Luken wasted no time deciding how police performed. Two days after the demonstrations, he wrote in praise of the officers. Of course, Luken's vantage point was limited: He based his conclusions on what he saw on television.
"Over the weekend, I watched on cable television as the Cincinnati Police Division dealt with protesters in connection with the TABD," Luken wrote. "The restraint and professionalism the police exhibited needs the highest commendation."
City Councilman Pat DeWine says he, too, relied on television for his perspective.
"I'm sure the police response wasn't perfect, but I'm not ready to criticize it either," DeWine says.
It's important to remember what didn't happen during N16. Despite the intimidating chants of some protesters -- "Capitalism? No thanks! We'll burn down your fucking banks!" -- no one was injured, at least by demonstrators. Numerous protesters and several journalists, however, sustained blows from police batons, were shoved or threatened by officers or were subject to chemical spray.
If protesters had been intent on property damage, or worse, downtown offered plenty of free missiles. Chunks of concrete and other construction debris were readily available downtown during the demonstrations. But N16 was a peaceful event, thanks to careful planning by CHE and the inspiration of its leaders, Schumacher and Sister Alice Gerdeman.
N16 was not unique. Protests against corporate globalization have occurred in Seattle, Philadelphia, Prague, New Delhi and other cities around the world. Each time protesters turn out, police forcibly quash the demonstrations, according to Gerdeman.
"If what happened here in Cincinnati was only in Cincinnati, I wouldn't be so concerned," she says. "But it's a global phenomenon. People are afraid of dissent. The fear is almost palpable."
Schumacher says the effort to stop protests is almost as unsettling as the issue that takes them to the streets.
"Part of my concern is dissent becoming identified somehow as along some spectrum related to terrorism," he says. "It's a very dangerous trend that security people become so afraid of citizens voicing their opinions that their paramount concern is stopping any potential for conflict. We need debate and discussion and conflict that takes place in a democratic fashion. Dissent should be encouraged rather than quashed."
On the march again
When President Bush goes to Quebec on April 20 for the summit meeting on the Free Trade Agreement of the Americas (FTAA), he will be greeted by vigorous protests. The FTAA would essentially extend throughout the Western Hemisphere the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) -- the deregulation of business between the United States and Mexico -- in keeping with the "free trade" TABD proposes between the United States and Europe.
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Photo By Jymi Bolden
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"It's a very dangerous trend that security people
become so afraid of citizens voicing their opinions,"
says steve Schumacher, center, with Heather Zoller,
left; and Sister Alice Gerdeman.
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Savvy protesters have already slipped into Canada, which has mounted an unprecedented security operation at the U.S. border in an attempt to keep demonstrations under control. Police have announced they will build a fence more than two miles long in downtown Quebec to isolate protesters from FTAA participants.
But Quebec isn't the only city that will host protests during the FTAA talks. So will many cities across the United States, including Cincinnati. CHE, the coalition that organized N16, has issued a call to action for April 16-20.
FTAA is every bit as pernicious as TABD, according to CHE spokesman Heather Zoller, a teacher at the University of Cincinnati.
"FTAA has the potential to take away democratic rights," Zoller says. "It empowers a corporation to sue governments if their regulations would affect economic health. We know, based on NAFTA, there are going to be problems. I think Bush is going to push this through by saying the economy is in trouble."
The very structure of trade negotiations -- by TABD, FTAA and the World Trade Organization -- violates essential democratic principles, Gerdeman says, because citizens are left out of the debate.
"It's so hard to get a dialogue about what a good economy would look like," she says. "We should be dealing in the open and above-board, rather the policies being devised that people can only react against. All along the way there should be an opportunity for input, so it's something thought out and it's a trade agreement to help everybody."
CHE representatives will meet with Congressmen Steve Chabot (R-Cincinnati), Rob Portman (R-Cincinnati) and Ken Lucas (D-Covington) to discuss FTAA.
"We want to ask them to do everything they can to find out what's in these agreements and to follow the process to get the information out," Schumacher says.
CHE, Refuse & Resist, the Cincinnati Zapatista Coalition and the International Socialist Organization plan a series of educational activities April 16-20 to highlight the dangers globalization poses to the environment, workers and consumers (see box for details).
"We want the Week of Actions to complement events in Quebec," Zoller says. "We don't want to detract from that. These actions are largely symbolic."
A teach-in, a picket on Tax Day and street theater are the mainstays of the Week of Actions. But at least one march is also on the agenda, and a picket at the John Weld Peck Federal Building is under consideration.
Whatever its aims, the police crackdown on N16 hasn't discouraged CHE. In fact, the opposite occurred. The success of N16 has encouraged CHE to continue its campaign against corporate globalization.
"One of the impacts of the November activities was to continue the coalition," Schumacher says. "The commitment had been to continue through November 2000. Over the winter, we decided to continue. People came from far away to join the activities in Cincinnati -- Alabama, England, Texas. It became clear there are like-minded people in the world."
Despite the arrests and use of force by police, protests against TABD energized progressives in Cincinnati, Gerdeman says.
"We're not the activist center of the world," she says. "Everybody involved in the TABD realized this is long-term. It just keeps on moving along, so we have to, too."
One unexpected benefit of confrontations between protesters and police last year is closer cooperation with other groups in Cincinnati, according to Zoller. The event that led to the most arrests during N16, a march against police brutality, caught the attention of African Americans, who were in the minority during the protests.
"We would like to be more diverse, more representative of Cincinnati," Zoller says. "I think that event will help us. We've heard from representatives of Black United Front: 'We've seen you. You're for action.' "
Whatever form that action takes -- large-scale street protests, as during N16, or quieter, smaller educational events, such as the plans for Days of Action -- police behavior last fall taught CHE an important lesson, according to Zoller. Telling the public about the dangers of globalization is only part of the mission now, she says.
"A lesson learned for this group," she says, "is we will always have to talk about free speech."
Caroline Crispino, Maria Rogers and Doug Trapp contributed to this story.
