Sanjukta Paul vs. LAPD in MacArthur Park

Ruchira Paul of the Accidental Blogger reports that her daughter, National Lawyers' Guild observer Sanjukta Paul, was beaten and shot from behind with a rubber bullet by LAPD officers while supervising the MacArthur Park immigration rally in Los Angeles.

I've been at protests with NLG observers and I have found them to be an invaluable resource. During the RNC, I was constantly on the lookout for their fluorescent green caps.

NLG protest observers are well-trained, disciplined, and tactically sophisticated. While on duty, they are unequivocally present as observers, and not demonstrators.

I can only imagine the ineptitude of the police response that would have culminated in an attack on one of their number.

Comments

[Bruce/Crablaw]

As a practicing attorney, I once considered joining the National Lawyers' Guild, but found their organization's report from their fact-finding mission to Pyongyang concerning North Korean justice a little much to take. Perhaps I was taking the narrow view. I do not have the cite presently but there's a .pdf of their visit to the DPRK on their website.

But I have also heard very good things about their demonstration observers as well as of their very early history as supporters for racial equality in the South as early as the 1930s and maybe earlier. Rapid recovery to the victim(s) of this police violence, of course.

[Invigilator]

That's not ineptitude, that's malevolence.

[soullite]

Yes, this is clearly outright malice. The police forces in this country have been brutalizing protesters for decades now, and every time the media leaps to their defense with assumptions of their honesty and apologetics for their actions. Until Policemen are tried and convicted for these acts, they will continue to ignore the law and their duty, and will continue to act as thugs for people with too much money and power. Demolishing police unions are an unfortunate, but required step. There is no Army Union. There is no Navy union. There is no union for airmen or marines. There should be no union for police either. They have proven their unions are about protecting criminals within their ranks, not about workers rights or fair wages.

[Lindsay Beyerstein]

I agree WRT the malevolence.

[Satan luvvs Repugs]

As a former angelino, let me tell you: LAPD is a bunch of fascists. There's a *reason* that they wear black: it goes so well with the little silver lightning bolts and deaths-heads.

Their tactics at protests are just the tip of the iceburg. Rampart division, for example.

Part of this is because LAPD is almost totally out of the control of the political establishment in LA, a remnant of city corruption issues nearly a hundred years ago. Elections won't fix the problem, it'll take a massive RICO suit for crimes committed "under color of law".

[B-Money]

Ah, another reference to Nazism. Are people really that ignorant that they compare the LAPD or the FBI or Bush to the Nazis? Do you even know what the Nazis did? Think about that, then rethink your comparisons of the LAPD to fascism and Nazism.

[zuzu]

They probably weigh the possibility of a civil rights suit later against what they want to accomplish now, which is hassling peaceful protestors.

[Stein]

The first comment at top is very interesting, because it touches on both the political and practical (but also political) work of the Guild. I would say a single writing by one particular working group should not be enough to deter a progressive attorney from joining the group. Bruce/Crablaw also states having heard good things about the NLG L.O.s, which is always nice to hear. As for the Guild's work in the South, and anti-racist work generally, a couple quick notes: The NLG was founded in 1937 as an intentionally multi-racial bar organization, at a time when the ABA was still segregated. A generation later, Guild lawyer (and later U.S. Representative from Detroit) George Crockett staffed the Guild office in Mississippi and, in June 1964, personally went looking for missing (murdered) civil rights martyrs Schwerner, Chaney, & Goodman. The Guild still lists "eliminate racism" as its first goal (among many).
Finally, yes, i agree with the posters who believe that the LAPD beating of a Guild Legal Observer was probably an intentional act to chill First-Amendment protected activity, rather than a mistake.

[Ruchira Paul]

The FBI will look into the affair.

[Alon Levy]

Will they really investigate the affair, or conduct a standard internal investigation with a predetermined exculpatory conclusion?

[Americahater]

Of course, the LAPD hasn't murdered 6 million+ people and they have never controlled Italy or Spain, therefore it would be totally inappropriate to compare them to the Nazis or Fascists. It is true that police power in this country has consistently (and almost exclusively*) been a weapon of the right wing, used to intimidate, beat, imprison (and only occasionally kill) their political opposition, from the earliest days of organized labor to the civil rights movement, the Viet Nam War and the Iraq war. So while I must admit that we are neither Germans, Italians nor Spaniards, part of me suspects that fascism didn't spring fully formed from the head of Franco, Mussolini or Hitler.

*I feel obligated to note the Florida police beating down Republican protesters during Bush v Gore.

[voxpop]

AmericanHater where did you gain this knowledge of police allegedly attacking REPUBLICANS in FLORIDA? Would you mind providing links or more info? Thank you.

[Americahater]

Sorry, I thought my sarcasm would be self-evident.

[Ruchira Paul]

The first salvo - beginning or the end of enquiry?