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Fire Walk With Me

(38,893 posts)
Sat Sep 8, 2012, 12:09 AM Sep 2012

Fifteen Occupy Homes Minnesota organizers face up to two years in jail

“The Chief of Police Stepped On Me and Then He Charged Me With Rioting”: Activists Face Jail Time for Defending Homes

Fifteen Occupy Homes Minnesota organizers face up to two years in jail for peacefully linking arms outside a house when the police came to enforce a foreclosure.

http://www.alternet.org/chief-police-stepped-me-and-then-he-charged-me-rioting-activists-face-jail-time-defending-homes

The police came at four in the morning with a battering ram to the Cruz home in Minneapolis, Minnesota. And that was only one of the five eviction attempts required to finally claim the home for the banks.

“After we had been peacefully occupying this house for over a month without any incidents, then they come in with a battering ram and blame us for disturbing the peace,” said Nick Espinosa, one of the organizers with Occupy Homes Minnesota, which has taken the lead in saving local families from being put out on the street.

The battering ram was just adding insult to injury—the Cruz family was being evicted through no fault of their own, because PNC bank had made a mistake in processing their payments. The Occupy Homes crew moved into the house to try and defend it while the sheriff's department came once and then twice to evict.

(More at the link.)

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Fifteen Occupy Homes Minnesota organizers face up to two years in jail (Original Post) Fire Walk With Me Sep 2012 OP
The police state is alive and well. Disgusting. n/t DLevine Sep 2012 #1
Funny coincidence tama Sep 2012 #2
Bullshit trumped up charges intended to intimidate. limpyhobbler Sep 2012 #3
 

tama

(9,137 posts)
2. Funny coincidence
Sat Sep 8, 2012, 06:50 AM
Sep 2012

I was just checking out Cheri Honkala (got interested because she has Finnish surname):


Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter David Zucchino chronicled Cheri Honkala and the Poor People's Economic Human Rights Campaign for six months during 1996 in his book The Myth of the Welfare Queen which include Cheri organizing 70 homeless families taking over an abandoned church, setting up another homeless encampment in an abandoned lot, and getting arrested and charged for attempting to set up a tent city in front of the Liberty Bell. Honkala faced over 10 years in prison, as local law enforcement claimed she assaulted officers, however video footage later abosolved her of any crime.

http://www.jillstein.org/cheri_honkala

Occupy homes has long history there.
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