Bloc Party: Prisoner Updates and Beyond

Bloc party here to give you several repression and political prisoner updates. Just a reminder, as New Year’s Eve gets closer, there is a call for noise demos across the US and the world. Here’s the call if you haven’t seen it:

This is a call for a raucous night of strong solidarity with those imprisoned by the state on one of the noisiest nights of the year. On New Year’s Eve gather your crew, collective, community, organization, or just yourself and come together to raise a racket and remind those on the inside that they are not alone.

Internationally, noise demonstrations outside of prisons are a way to remember those who are held captive by the state and a way to show solidarity with imprisoned comrades and loved ones. We come together to break the loneliness and isolation.

We know that prison is beyond reform and must be completely abolished. It is a mechanism of repression used by the state to maintain a social order rooted in white supremacy, patriarchy, and heteronormativity. To come together outside of the sites of repression is to also stand in defiance of what they represent.

The logic of the state and capital—of punishment and imprisonment, must be replaced by a rejection of oppression and exploitation. This call is one step in that direction.

Wherever you are, meet on New Year’s Eve at the prisons, jails, and detention centers, be loud in solidarity with those imprisoned and to push forward the idea of a world free from domination.

We send this call in solidarity with those defying state repression of large scale dissent: from the J20 defendants in Washington, DC to those in Hamburg facing trial following the G20, as well as those in the spaces between.

We want a world without walls and borders.

We will fight together until everyone is free!

Sent out a stack of holiday cards to political prisoners. pic.twitter.com/OtPN0a8VJD

— Omaha ABC (@OmahaABC) December 20, 2017

Here’s an update on Casey Brezik: 

Casey was recently transferred to a minimum security prison in Jefferson City, Missouri. This transfer has happened because Casey’s security classification has lowered and he is able to be in a lower security facility affording him slightly better communication and access to resources.

While the move has a positive note, Casey still needs our continued support. As a long-term anarchist prisoner, Casey has relied heavily on the outside movement to show support for him during his long sentence, and with alarming regularity we as a broader movement have not shown up for him as we should. With his sentence beginning to near a relative end we are pushing for a more concerted effort in showing support and solidarity for Casey.

Write!

As he adjusts to new surroundings Casey would love letters and notes from old and new friends alike. His new address is below…

Casey Brezik #1154765
Algoa Correctional Center
8501 No More Victims Road
Jefferson City, MO 65101

Donate!

Those supporting Casey have created a post-release fund for him with the understanding that our care does not end when he is released but simply takes on a different tone. Casey will face a multitude of challenges as a felon, a man of color and an anarchist once he is released. Ensuring that he has some economic ground to stand on will lessen one aspect of the direct difficulties of a post-release life. Please donate to Casey’s fund.

Please continue to check back to this site for new writings by Casey, requests for direct support and any other important updates.

Speaking of people moving, Jay Chase from the NATO 3 has a new address: 

Jay was moved last week to a different prison, Dixon Correctional, which is a medium security prison.
Please take a moment to write Jay and let him know he is in your thoughts.

Jared Chase M44710‬
‪Dixon Correctional Center‬
‪2600 North Brinton Avenue‬
‪Dixon, Illinois 61021‬

If you have the capacity, please check out his online book wishlist and buy him a book or two:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/registry/wishlist/1ZYU2MW7KDDON

More info here

New information has come out in regards to Red Fawn: 

From The Intercept: 

AS LAW ENFORCEMENT officers advanced in a U-shaped sweep line down North Dakota Highway 1806 last October, pushing back Dakota Access opponents from a camp in the pipeline’s path, two sheriff’s deputies broke formation to tackle a 37-year-old Oglala Sioux woman named Red Fawn Fallis. As Fallis struggled under the weight of her arresting officers, who were attempting to put her in handcuffs, three gunshots allegedly went off alongside her. According to the arrest affidavit, deputies lunged toward her left hand and wrested a gun away from her.

Well before that moment, Fallis had been caught in a sprawling intelligence operation that sought to disrupt and discredit opponents of the pipeline. The Intercept has learned that the legal owner of the gun Fallis is alleged to have fired was a paid FBI informant named Heath Harmon, a 46-year-old member of the Fort Berthold Reservation in western North Dakota. For at least two months, Harmon took part in the daily life of DAPL resistance camps and gained access to movement participants, even becoming Fallis’s romantic partner several weeks prior to the alleged shooting on October 27, 2016.

In an interview with agents from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives and the North Dakota Bureau of Criminal Investigation, a recording of which was obtained by The Intercept, Harmon reported that his work for the FBI involved monitoring the Standing Rock camps for evidence of “bomb-making materials, stuff like that.” Asked what he discovered, Harmon made no mention of protesters harboring dangerous weapons, but he acknowledged storing his own weapon in a trailer at the water protectors’ Rosebud Camp: the same .38 revolver Fallis is accused of firing.

Harmon spent the day of October 27 with Fallis and was nearby during her arrest. He continued to withhold his FBI affiliation from his then-girlfriend in phone conversations with her while she was being held at the Morton County jail in Mandan, North Dakota, records show. Investigators’ notes on those calls were distributed to the ATF, two local sheriff’s departments, and the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Bismarck, among others.

Federal prosecutors are charging Fallis with civil disorder, possession of a firearm by a convicted felon, and discharge of a firearm in relation to a felony crime of violence — perhaps the most serious charges levied against any water protector. If convicted of discharging the weapon, she faces a minimum of 10 years in prison and the possibility of a life sentence. She has pleaded not guilty.

Attorneys for Fallis argue their client was seized without probable cause while engaging in speech protected by the First Amendment, pointing to the account of one of her arresting officers that Fallis was shouting “water is life and you’re killing Mother Earth and stuff of that nature.” Drone footage appears to show her being tackled just minutes after arriving in the vicinity of the police line. In a hearing that concluded Monday, her lawyers challenged the admissibility of any property seized or statements Fallis made immediately after the incident, arguing they represent the products of an unconstitutional arrest. Defense attorneys declined to comment or make Fallis available for this story, citing her pending trial.

For more info on Red Fawn and how to write, go here.

In the J20 case, jurors are still in deliberation, but a motion has been launched to dismiss select charges as it alleges that the lead detective lied to the grand jury: 

According to The Real News: 

A motion filed in D.C. Superior Court last week claims that the lead detective in the case against 193 people arrested during protests of President Trump’s inauguration gave false testimony before a grand jury to secure charges against two of those people.

The motion claims that Greggory Pemberton, a detective with the Metropolitan Police Department and the treasurer of the Fraternal Order of Police union in D.C., told the grand jury that everyone who was “kettled” and arrested en masse on Jan. 20 “participated in the entire march,” including Jada Young and Sasha Hill, both of whom are scheduled to stand trial next month on three misdemeanor charges. But, the motion argues, this isn’t true—and so any charges brought by the grand jury on the basis of this testimony should be dismissed.

“It really undercuts the government’s whole theory of what people were doing there and caught up in the kettle,” said Scott Michelman, of the ACLU, which is pursuing a civil case against MPD based on the actions of individual officers and command that day.

More than 200 people were arrested by MPD officers during protests surrounding Trump’s inauguration in January. The government claims that, under the federal Riot Act, all of those people are responsible for several broken windows because by wearing black and being in the area they were part of a conspiracy to riot.

Michelman says that the motion shows that police and prosecutors “are guilty of overreach in terms of their willingness to ignore or not learn about the presence of individuals who showed up at  the end. And the fact that people were coming and going throughout the march. All of which suggests they just wanted to round up a group of people and they didn’t care who they were or what they had done.”

The motion contains portions of grand jury testimony obtained by Young and Hill’s lawyers after a recent proffer that reduced their charges acknowledged that the two women had not been present for many of the crimes with which they were charged. “Contrary to the specific allegations of the indictment, neither Ms. Young nor Ms. Hill traveled with the march (which the indictment alleges was dominated by black bloc) for 16 blocks over a course of 33 minutes. Moreover, they did not have multiple opportunities to leave the march, including two specifically alleged by the indictment,” Kristen Robinson wrote in an earlier motion seeking access to the testimony.

“The grand jury indicted Ms. Young and Ms. Hill on all of the charges in the incident, without differentiating them from other participants in the march, based on the false testimony of Detective Pemberton,” the motion reads. Pemberton, the motion alleges, “led the grand jury to believe that anyone arrested in the kettle had participated in the entire march.”

That’s it for now, be sure to stay up with J20 updates by following @Defend20 and @UR_Ninja.