I am writing to you as a resident of Steven's Square in Ward 6.
Today, the so-called "RNC 8"—charged with organizing direct action during the 2008 RNC—held a bike tour of the sites of the pre-RNC house raids in Minneapolis, before planning to cycle on to the sites of similar raids in St. Paul. The two parts of the day were organized to be split with a community lunch at the Walker Church. The participants were a wide range of people including local quakers, community activists, journalists, educators, etc.—basically a cross-section of your constituents.
At 3:00pm today (Saturday March 28th), there were 6 bike police, a police van*, a squad car, and a creepy-looking dark sedan stationed outside the Walker Church during the lunch. One arrest was already made of someone leaving the event earlier. The planned ride to St. Paul was cancelled because of this climate of intimidation.**
Nonetheless, the police deployed in great numbers on the Marshall St. Bridge, where the ride was scheduled to cross. And in St. Paul, several patrol cars were seen at the RNC raid sites that the ride had planned to visit.
My question to you is very simple: What exactly is going on in the Twin Cities these days, when the police believe it is acceptable to harass people peacefully gathering for political/community events and taking a casual bike ride around the cities of no more than a couple of dozen people?
Enough is enough. We are supposed to be living in a free society. It is the job of elected officials to guard those freedoms jealously. It is therefore totally unacceptable that police deploy in such large numbers for small events or—frankly—even at all, if no crime is being committed.
The job of the police is not to intimidate citizens, yet this is exactly what is going on these days. It is completely disgusting to see this in America. Something needs to be done.
The City Council needs to take action and send a clear message to stop such intimidation of the community.
Sincerely,
Nigel Parry
Minneapolis, MN 55404
FOOTNOTES
* Actually two police vans and an unmarked rental van.
**While there was a clear climate of intimidation, the ride was actually cancelled because the weather was chilly and a little too much lunch was eaten by some. :-) The St. Paul leg of the tour is planned to be held soon.
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