Atlanta: Noise Demonstration Outside Detention Center

Submitted to It’s Going Down

On Wednesday night, a group of 30-40 people held a noise demonstration at Atlanta City Detention Center in solidarity with the ongoing prison rebellion at Holman Correctional Facility in Alabama.

Following a short speech at Troy Davis Park, the crowd took the streets and marched to the city jail with a banner reading: “END PRISON SLAVERY – ATTICA TO HOLMAN.”

Upon reaching the jail, demonstrators immediately rushed the steps and entered the facility. Loud drums and ‘fuck the police’ chants filled the ground floor while people banged on doors and windows. Jail staff scrambled to bring down corrections officers from upstairs, but were unable to disperse the crowd. Individual police officers were ridiculed by name, called “house n—as” and “traitors” and engaged in minor push-and-shove matches with demonstrators openly defying their orders.

Eventually, reinforcements from Atlanta Police Department showed up and attempted to form a perimeter around the building. Rather than being kettled, the crowd moved back into the street, chanting, banging drums and pans, and lighting off fireworks as inmates banged on windows, danced, cheered, and flicked their cell lights off and on in joyous call-and-response.

Energy was high throughout the night. After four hours of noise, the crowd dispersed without arrest.

This demonstration reflects the ongoing solidarities forged in streets during the last few months of struggle in Atlanta. Specifically, the success of this event was contingent on the relationships formed between anarchists, Street Groomers (a black nationalist gang unity organization), various friendships and affinities made throughout Black Lives Matter demonstrations, and the recently formed Atlanta chapter of the Incarcerated Workers Organizing Committee (IWOC). Although small in numbers, this demonstration served to strengthen these connections and reaffirm our collective strength. We will continue to organize together until we achieve full collective liberation.

“AN INJURY TO ONE IS AN INJURY TO ALL”
“FREE ALL POLITICAL PRISONERS”
“FREE ALL PRISONERS”