FTTP #10
For Life.
Not Survival.
Winter 2010-2011

“The tigers
of wrath
are wiser
than the
horses of
instruction”

contempt
$
does not
mean we are
jealous...

DISCONTENT
T.O.C

What is the point?
Pg. 2
Justice: A Dead Word
Pg. 4
Insanity is Only Appropriate
-A. Lunatic
Pg. 11

The Fine Print

Disclaimer:
Fire to the Prisons is for informational and educational purposes
only. This magazine in no way encourages or supports any illegal
behavior in any way, it looks only to provide a printed forum for
conversation and news.
We are reporting not inciting. The entirety of the content in this publication was found as public information, and later compiled or reorganized for this magazine. Nothing here is the original content of
those who may or may not be responsible for this literary project.

Take your mark, get ready, ablate:
3 positions against prison
-August O’Clairre
Pg. 18

The topics brought up in this magazine in no way reflect the perspectives of any specific person allegedly involved with this publication.
They also do not reflect the perspectives or outlooks of any individual
or group mentioned in or receiving this publication.

Chronology of Prisoner
Resistance
Pg. 25

Generalize Distribution:
This magazine is in NO-WAY a “for profit” publication nor is it in
any way a formal enterprise or business venture. We encourage the
re-distribution and re-printing of this magazine by anyone with resources to do so. PDFs of this magazine are also available for reading and printing on our website. We encourage any and all feedback.

Anti-G20 Resistance in Toronto
-Zig-Zag
Pg. 31
Oakland Disgraced. Tensions
Re-Ignite:
An interview with a Bay Area Resident
Pg. 37
Repression
Pg. 40
Barefoot Bandit
Pg. 57
Redundancy Equates Death
-Marat Reckham
Pg. 59
Discover More on your Own
Pg. 63

This magazine is free to people currently incarcerated by contacting
the prisoner support groups mentioned at the end of the “repression”
section. This magazine is pretty much free to everyone, except for
book stores and people buying this at for-profit literature events.
Dedication:
Special thanks to our proof-readers. Special thanks to those who provided the resources, space, and patience needed for this publication
to exist. Special thanks to all those who helped to produce the content
in this issue, both in writing and reality. Special thanks to the Big
Apple for your Nightlife. Without it we would never be able to go to
print.
Sending Solidarity and comfort to all those looking for something
else.
Agitating till the grave,
Fire to the Prisons:
www.firetotheprisons.com
firetotheprisons@gmail.com
c/o Shoelacetown ABC,
P.O. Box 8085, Paramus, NJ,
07652, USA

What is the
point?
FTTP #10//2.0

T

his technically is the tenth issue of Fire to
the Prisons. It’s a sign of defeat, really, to
have consistently published issue after issue. That’s because this publication is not
supposed to bolster our credentials in “the
scene,” pass time because our lives are too
boring, or launch us into a career in publishing. Our intentions with this magazine are to provide
a source of printed matter that will continue to recognize a
broader struggle against society as we know it. As an object
in and of itself, this magazine poses no threat to the system
we oppose. At the most it might give a police inspector a
paper cut. But we hope the words on these pages can -- at
the very least -- unify and stimulate multiple social tensions
in today’s world by connecting them on paper to a common
condition or enemy.
We look to remind readers that there is a very conscious
and active struggle going on every day and across the world
against the makeup of the modern era. Conflict with forces
that act as the visible body of institutions that determine society today is an everyday occurrence. Our goal is to both prevent these acts from becoming isolated by connecting them
to similar instances, and also provide an analysis of these
events that examines how society itself provokes them and
where there is potential for these actions to grow.

Neighborhoods battling the police, prisoners confronting
their guards, civilians robbing banks, indigenous communities disrupting colonization; our goal is to recognize that discontent is in no way an isolated feeling, it is as global as the
system that it is directed against.
Our readers are as anonymous as our writers. We have distributors and folks who consistently order each issue as it’s
announced, but we rarely get any feedback. Many of our
readers are anarchists, who in most cases write critiques that
appear to stem from associations they project on us with “soand-so” scene or political identity. This has been an issue for
us, and part of why we have been considering discontinuing
the publication.
The reason this issue is out is because of the unique emails
and letters we got after our last issue announced we were reconsidering continuing to print FTTP. In response, we got a
chance to hear from unique people who discovered our magazine independent of any scene. We received messages from
individuals recently released from prison, teenagers inside
mental institutions, struggling artists, bored youth, and many
anonymous messages from the states and around the world
mentioning the importance of our publication in their lives.

FTTP #10//What is the point?-Pg. 2

With our threat of discontinuing we also received
some constructive criticism. We chose to try and
prioritize content that is not as time sensitive. While
we will continue our "repression" and "prisoner resistance" news sections, because many of those who
may find them interesting or inspiring may not have
as easy access to that information or a computer, we
will try to focus on incidents of social revolt in a less
"news clip" sort of way. With doing this we intend
to provide a more in-depth analysis or description of
events. This will both allow us more time between
publications, and also help us to save some cash on
the extra pages. Yet, if you found our “revolt” and
“action” news especially exciting please check out
our “links” section at the back of this issue. Websites that are consistently updated with that sort of
news are specifically cited on the links page.
We always save the introduction for last when it
comes to articles we need to get done. Like we said
at the beginning of this, writing an introduction for a
new issue reminds us of our continued defeat as revolutionaries still living under the conditions we actively struggle against. This magazine will only continue as long as we continue to have to survive the
restrictions of the economy, government, and simply
the totality of society as we know it. Meaning that if

this magazine is coming out, society has remained
the same. It is incredibly sad to report on comrades
behind bars or communities enduring harsh repression. While also reminding us of our defeat, it is always good to be reminded of our small victories in
the everyday struggle against domination.
We will always hope that this issue will be our last,
because for this magazine to become obsolete, the
conditions we face everyday in the world today must
be destroyed.
We want to be an exception in the literary world. We
exist not to succeed as a commodity, novelty, or periodical, but as only an appendage of a larger body of
conflict and possibility.
We are not frightened of having these conversations.
The desire for drastic change and the desperation
to express that, is on the tip of all our tounges, its
simply a matter of biting down, overcoming the pain,
and seeing what comes out.

We are not
afraid to
have these
conversations.

FTTP #10//What is the point?-Pg. 3

Aiyana Jones’ Family
Aiyana Jones

Oscar Grant

Justice:
A Dead Word
“Our desire for
revenge will never be
satisfied in the halls
of justice, revenge
has to be taken in
the streets.”

Lovelle Mixon

“Ashley”

John T. Williams

W

e will never allow “justice” to ease
our pain, our contempt, or our need
for retaliation.

This word is the foundation of prison, the ease for our vengeance, and
the loss of our power. It is the word
of those trying to shift the conditions as opposed to truly
overcome them. It is the grin of disempowerment, and so
many of us can only stand it for so long.
Last night I was watching YouTube videos showing relatives
of murdered family members at trial jumping the barrier
wall and getting a swing at their offenders in the courtroom.
There is no follow up as to what happens in most of these
cases, but we assume that such behavior in the courtroom
carries a hefty prison term or fine. These people instinctually realize that justice will never quench their thirst for a real
sense of proper revenge. This display of complete disregard
for the order of justice is a symptom of a larger feeling of
disempowerment. One can only assume that however many
years in prison (Or if the lawyer is talented, days in a mental institution) could not surpass the knowledge that you did
everything in your own power to take things into your own
hands, without concern for “the law.”
It is awful to research, but everyday police repression is best
taught in the visual form. While searching for courtroom
fights, I was also looking for cases of police and neighborhood conflict. I watched for almost two hours something
called “hood fights”1, which better portrays everyday life
under the reign of justice than any civil rights or anti-police
“brutality” website does. In the video parents watch their
children get thrown against police cars and beaten over the
head, then the parents themselves get arrested for screaming at the officers or trying to save their loved ones from
further beating. In the next video police roll up undercover
and smashing out windows of cars stopped at red lights, then
beat those within distance of them that looked concerned or
shocked. In every precinct that the videos were filmed, everyone appeared to be a target, and onlookers were always
subject to arrest or beating. Considering the tax-free income
the police get, and the neighborhoods they say the footage
was from, we assume most arrested never were able to afford a proper lawsuit, and were probably just happy to not
get prison time.
1. Hood Fights is actually a DVD or VHS series of compiled footage of
fights in mostly poor and black neighborhoods in the US. It’s actually a
bit offensive considering its marketed as popcorn friendly entertainment.
It follows the “advertising” style of videos like Girls Gone Wild or other
commercials that come on late at night. The specific segment I referred to
appeared to be a video compilation of neighborhoods dealing with police. It
was a mixture of both police beatings and arrests, as well as individuals or
groups responding to police attacks.
	

What is justice though?
“Justice concerns itself with the proper ordering of
philosophy and people within a society.”
According to acclaimed Harvard university professor John
Rawls, “Justice is the first virtue of social institutions, as
truth is of systems of thought.”
Both definitions come from sources that in no way question
the legitimacy of justice.
We would define justice as an imposed social “morality” that
acts as a regulation over all of our relations with each other.
It is the rationalization of a mediated society, where roles,
consequences, and “common sense” are pre-determined by
institutions that systematically perpetuate with or without the
consent of the people in that society.
It acts as the representative of our torment or desire for revenge, with or without our say. It determines what our value
is, and how we are to earn it. It is the standard for our behavior, and our punishment for ever not reaching it. It is the
invisible regulation of a mediated society, and the appointed
rewards for some, and demise of others.
In more common everyday dialogue, justice is used most
when referring to the “baby-sitting” of the state. There is
the police to remind us of it, and prisons and courts to help
explain it to us. What is most important to understand about
this filthy word is that those of us without political or economic power will never be able to determine how justice is
both defined or brought out. Justice is inherently beyond
our reach, because it only exists in a society that measures
our reach. Justice is expropriated homes and savings for bail.
Justice is the quarter million a year salaries for the conversations of marketing executives, and the six dollar an hour
standard wage for the illegal immigrant cleaning the clogged
toilet before returning to the kitchen to do the dishes. It is the
heroism seen in the cowards known as the police, while they
beat and murder us into peace. It is what makes an unfair life
understood as fair, and simply something to never be trusted.
Some have spent much time compiling accounts of police repression in both the federal, political, and daily form. Intending to act as a voice that has no faith in justice. Its important
as a revolutionary voice to act as a resource providing examples of everyday struggle against the state. Considering
that justice is the foundation of the state’s existence, we are
going to provide some recent examples of individuals and
communities coping with the wrath of justice, and in some
cases, choosing to take its claims into their own hands.

FTTP #10//Justice-Pg. 5

“It’s So Cold in the D.”
On May 15th, 2010, a seven year old girl named Aiyana
Jones, was set on fire and shot by the Detroit police department’s “Special Response Tactical” unit. The officer who
shot Aiyana was Joseph Weekley2.
While shooting for the A&E reality show The First 48, Detroit police were conducting a raid at the two-family home
where Aiyana was sleeping. The raid was intended to arrest a man named Chauncey Owens for the alleged murder
of a 17-year-old boy in Detroit’s east side the night before.
Chauncey has yet to have been convicted, while on the other
hand it is completely confirmed that Joseph Weekley fired
the bullet that killed Aiyana, yet Joseph is home on paid suspension.
Chauncey was found after Aiyana was killed by police in a
separate apartment on the second floor. The original story
told by police was that before entering the house they threw a
flash grenade through the front window, and then after entering the house Mertilla Jones (Aiyana’s grandmother) tried to
grab the officer’s gun, in which it accidentally went off and
shot 7-year-old Aiyana in the neck.
Shortly after the murder made international news, lawyer
Geoffrey Fieger (Who also defended Jack Kevorkian.) began
holding press conferences.
The family’s story is different. The Jones family states that
police threw a flash grenade through the window (igniting Aiyana’s sleeping bag on fire), and began to open fire
through the front window immediately after throwing it and
before even entering.
What makes this situation also unique is that is was recorded
for a reality television show. The video not only supports the
story given by the Jones family, but it also exposes more details. The video shows that immediately after throwing the
flash grenade, and before entering the house, police officer
Weekley opened fire into the room Aiyana was sleeping in.
It also shows that within seconds, before any real dispute
could possibly have taken place inside the house, a police officer came out holding Aiyana’s dead body in one hand, and
then immediately starts wrapping her up, then throws her in
the back of the police car. The grandmother claims that officers immediately grabbed Aiyana before she could even grab
her, then walked back into the apartment and arrested her.
Days after the murder, a press conference was held by
2. Joseph “Weak” Weekley is a man best known for shooting and killing
a 7-year-old girl. He is, of course, a police officer. He was a 14 year old
veteran to his cause, and a star of The First 48. He is currently facing
another lawsuit for a raid in 2007 where he killed two dogs and held a gun
to children.

	 

Geoffrey Fieger announcing that he would represent the
Jones’ family in two lawsuits that were filed that day against
the Detroit police: one against the “unlawful” murder of Aiyana, and one for the “wrongful” arrest of Mertilla Jones.
Since then, the ground zero Mosque and upcoming mid-term
elections have flooded the media. Other then occasional updates from local Detroit news, it is very hard to find anything
about this case, mostly because it seems that coverage has
almost come to a halt.
After about 5 months of silence in the media, it was announced the first week of August that the FBI would also begin conducting an independent investigation into police officer Joseph Weekley shooting 7-year-old Aiyana Jones, but
not stop or disregard the state investigation. Neither local
nor federal police have communicated a deadline for the investigation, and typically while the investigation continues,
Aiyana grabs the attention of the news less and less.
That is where information ends.
What and when the outcome for Aiyana’s case will be brought
forth is not determined. Before writing this I even wrote the
email contact for the closest thing I saw to a support website
for the Jones’ family. It was a Facebook page called “She
Has a Name”. The page has 13,000 “fans” who we assume
are in support of the Jones family, but very little information
is on the page at all. We wrote asking for an update other then
what we already found out, and they quickly responded that
they have none, and really do not know when they will ever
get one. The case is stagnant, possibly because it’s the only
thing the police can do to prevent Detroit from exploding.
Faith in justice is the only thing keeping Detroit patient.
If the police were to have gone to the left apartment door instead of the right, and the bullet shot actually killed Chauncey
Owens instead of Aiyana and before the “appropriate” legal
process was carried through, would police practice ever have
come into question? Would justice have been served? If this
wasn’t a child, and the circumstances weren’t so unusual,
would it have been anything out of the ordinary enough to
provoke a real response? If you call the media attention a real
one at all anyway.
While Aiyana’s tragically young age makes her specific
death more noticeable, this is common police practice. Like
the frequently mentioned case of Oscar Grant, we only hear
about this murder because the police simply had no way to
cover it up.
In the last few months alone we can easily discover similar
stories of “justice”.

FTTP #10//Justice-Pg. 6

War Continues in
Washington

much the Washington police have been
in national news.

Washington has been an almost subtle
battleground between citizens and police. Fire to the Prisons had in issue
8 an in-depth description of Maurice
Clemmons and Christopher Monfort.
Maurice Clemmons was victim to local police harassment for almost his
whole life, until deciding that enough
was enough, and fear must be struck
into the hearts of police across Washington state, by shooting 4 cops in a
coffee shop. Christopher Monfort felt
the same in response to the police beating of a 15 year old girl caught on tape.
He shot an off-duty cop, and blew up 3
police cruisers.

On August 30th at 4:15pm police officer Ian Birk saw a Native-American
man named John T. Williams crossing
the street holding a 3 inch blade and a
piece of wood. According to the only
witness nearby the officer approached
John and from 9 to 10 feet away began
screaming at him to drop the knife. By
the third request, police officer Ian Birk
shot and killed John T. Williams by firing four gun shots into his body. John
was a wood carver and partially deaf.
He was using the knife he had to carve
wood, and he literally couldn’t actually hear the officer speaking. The officer claims that John was beginning to
lunge at him with the knife. This is a
knife that is legal to carry in the city of
Seattle, not that it seems to matter.

One Seattle native told us that becoming a police officer is not commonly
supported in Seattle the way it might be
in other parts of the country. He also
told me that this has a lot to do with
the aftermath of police conduct during
the 1999 Seattle WTO demonstrations.
Many police officers either had their
badges removed due to lawsuits, or
left the department due to sheer embarrassment. With little time the city had
to quickly import police replacements
who were comfortable to face a city
where many of its residents had a very
visible disdain for their position.
Maurice Clemmons and Christopher
Monfort are simply two rare accounts
of individuals standing up against justice. Both cases were almost incredibly hard to get information on, especially considering Maurice is dead and
Christopher is paralyzed and in custody
with little media help for his voice to
be heard. Both of their conditions were
due to police bullets shot before trial.
The civilian offensive on police equates
to only a mere fraction of police violence. When an individual or group has
had enough and chooses to attack the
police it is always international headlines, on the other hand the police offensive is everyday, and only on occasion, or in its most tragic form does it
ever grab the media’s attention. With
that said, it is interesting as to how

They also just before this had a controversy about police officer Shady Cobane and company stopping a random
Latino man on the sidewalk, throwing
him to the ground, and then stomping
his head in while also screaming “I’m
going to beat the Mexican piss out of
you.” The video was put on YouTube.
The officer offered his deepest apology
with a tearless weep. The Latino man
is happy to not be in jail. Not that it
matters, but we do want to point out
that this officer was never charged.
The first week of September left two
tasered to death by police in Seattle
alone.
The fifteen year old girl caught on tape
being beaten by police that provoked
the actions of Christopher Monfort
was not an isolated incident. Just this
last June, another young black girl was
caught on tape getting punched in the
face and further beaten for questioning
an officer ticketing her for jaywalking
near her school.
While these officers get paid suspension and wait for the headlines to die
down, relatives and residents sit patiently for justice to serve in its court.
Who needs to die next, or does it have

to be our kids or relatives that need to
get beaten and sent to jail for all of us to
wipe that stupid fucking look of shock
off our faces, the next time a Maurice
or Christopher choose to take things
into their own hands?

Philly
Philadelphia, like New York City, has
an incredibly notorious police department, that unless dropping bombs on
homes3, or shooting people 50 times4,
generally stays pretty clear of the national headlines. This could have
something to do with the fact that in
both of these cities, many police officers are not white, and it is hard to put a
racial spin on a lot of the police beating,
harassment, or murder that goes down.
But Askia Sabur got a beating by West
Philadelphia police that was caught on
video, and simply could not be ignored.
On September 10th, Askia was standing on a corner outside of what we think
was a Chinese food restaurant waiting
for his food. Police officers told him
to clear the corner, but he just finished
paying for his food. We can’t quite
figure out why the officers asked him
to move, but when asked to move he
told them he was waiting for his food,
where the officers then asked him for
his ID. When he went for his wallet, the
officers started to choke him. Askia,
with his cousin at the time, was then
thrown to the ground and piled on by
multiple officers. Someone was filming the incident from this point. Askia
sat on the ground and refused to tolerate the attack, but by refuse we mean he
sat there and did nothing, just repeated
over and over again, that he did nothing. He did not fight back but simply
refused to acknowledge the legitimacy
3. Referring to the 1985 raid on the “MOVE” organization’s house in Philly, when police dropped
a military-grade C-4 plastic explosive bomb on
the house with multiple people including children
inside. This is also resulted in 65 houses on the
block going up in flames.	 
4. Refers to Sean Bell, who was an unarmed man
shot 50 times in NYC in 2008 the night before
his wedding.

 

FTTP #10//Justice-Pg. 7

of the police claims, and sat there surrounded by on-lookers and got just
straight beaten!
It was an almost Ghandi-like beating,
where multiple officers held him down,
and one specific greasy fat one kept
billy clubbing him to the back, head,
arms, and face for doing nothing at all.
At certain points in the video, officers
pull a gun, pepper spray, or billy club
onto onlookers for their pleas to stop
beating him. Askia was eventually
tackled by 9 officers and hand cuffed.
He walked away with a broken arm, 5
staples in the back of his head, and a
charge for resisting arrest. We don’t
know what to expect from this case, the
officers explain that it was appropriate
conduct for insubordination, and that
nothing was done wrong. The issue for
most protesting the incident was that it
was really messed up, and that they saw
it happen on video. The police respond
that this is their job, and “people don’t
always walk away with a smile after we
arrest them”. But in this case there is
no racial aspect, so its hard to get the
edginess needed for “justice” to calm it
down.

Juvenile Detention
Counselor
It’s not just murder or beatings that captures the headlines. In New York City
a man named Tony Simmons, or “Tyson” to some, was recently given probation for raping and sexually assaulting three minors. Tony Simmons was a
juvenile justice counselor who worked
with youth facing juvenile detention
time. The three minors have chosen to
remain nameless due to a fear of Tony
finding them and hurting them again,
but one girl courageously revealed her
first name to the “Daily News” paper in
NYC and chose to speak out after his
recent sentencing.
In 2005 a girl named Ashley was attending juvenile court for allegedly filing a “fake police report”. Tony was
responsible for escorting her to the
courtroom the day of her trial. After ar-

riving early to court, Tony brought Ashley who was in handcuffs at the time to
the elevator, allegedly to go up to the
courtroom. While she was expecting to
go up, Tony pressed the basement button in the elevator and then held it in on
the floor while he proceeded to pull her
pants down and rape her with what the
Daily News describes as “practiced and
careful precision.”
When she was finally brought to the
courtroom’s floor, Tony released her
just after gesturing with a finger over
his mouth that she not say anything
about it. After being violated, the judge
sentenced Ashley to 12 months in juvenile detention.
Ashley’s stay in juvenile detention actually ended up exceeding two years for
“inappropriate” or “hostile” behavior.
We can imagine that being sentenced
to 12 months for “filing a fake police
report” after a 42 year old man who
works as a court appointed counselor
just raped you, could bring one to lash
out.
Over his decade as a juvenile justice
counselor Tony had no problems doing his job, until 2008 when he was
indicted on three counts of sexual assault. While even New York’s assistant
D.A. claims that the three cases were
most likely “just the tip of the iceberg”
for Tony, only two other girls came out
against him. One girl was a 15 year old
who said Tony sodomized her in the
locker room at a girl’s detention holding area. He did this behind a locker
that she claims he kept in there to store
condoms and cookies. The third case
was a 13 year old girl in 2000. She was
also raped in the same holding area.
Two years after the indictment Tony
pleaded guilty to all 3 accounts of sexual assault on minors. He was given
10 years of probation, and was legally
obliged to register as a sex offender.
Although this article made it into the
headlines of a few media outlets, there
is no update as to whether or not anyone is truly challenging the sentence.

Whether or not anyone is, it is quite
obvious why someone like Tony would
get the job he worked. It is also quite
obvious that Tony was probably responsible for multiple other rapes and
assaults on girls who were under his
“care”.
While weed possession in many parts
of the country could carry larger consequences than this, why did Tony, a servant of the law only receive probation
for such vile acts?
These are everyday tales that are only
unique in their ability to catch the headlines. In Los Angeles, a community
refused to rely on media hype or the
process of “justice,” and chose to communicate their frustrations collectively,
and directly.

Pico-Union, L.A., California
On September 5th, Los Angeles police
shot and killed in broad daylight a father of 3, and Guatemalan day laborer,
Manual Jamines. According to police,
Manual was shot because he lunged at
them with a knife after being stopped as
he was crossing the street. Since it was
mid-afternoon, hundreds witnessed
the shooting. All witnesses claim that
Manual had no knife, and in no way
posed a threat to the officer. But within 40 seconds of dialogue police shot
Manual twice, and he was lost forever.
In a neighborhood that is not foreign to
police murder or conflict, outrage by
witnesses and the neighborhood to this
specific shooting by the police clearly
marks the fact that the police are lying
through their teeth.
This happened in the Pico-Union
neighborhood of Los Angeles, which
was recognized as one of the most damaged neighborhoods after the Rodney
King riots of 1992. This neighborhood
is known for its tension with police; in
1999 the entire district was claiming a
common lawsuit against police abuse.
Roughly 50% of residents in the PicoUnion district of L.A are living there
illegally. Assuming police are aware
FTTP #10//Justice-Pg. 8

of this fact, it wouldn’t come as a surprise if they found this to be the perfect
neighborhood to test their guns and batons.
Police were forced to hold public meetings about the murder due to media
attention, they stuck to their story that
Manual, a man who probably tried to
avoid police confrontation as much as
possible considering his complicated
immigration status, lunged towards
the officer. Whether or not this was
the case, you could observe footage of
the audience having no interest in the
claims and excuses provided by “justice”. It was essential for people of the
Pico-Union to communicate a contempt
for the police in their neighborhood.
Knowing the police would most likely
get away with the murder of Manual,
hundreds of Pico-Union residents came
together to confront the police directly
in the streets. Over two nights, hundreds of legal and illegal immigrants
roamed the streets together before a
very L.A-style riot police force. Out of
the arrested, a few are now being held
by ICE and awaiting deportation. All
those involved faced further police repression either with batons, tear gas, or
rubber bullets.
The Pico-Union neighborhood clearly
recognizes that justice will never serve
them. LA was not in flames, but hundreds of community members came
together and threw bottles at police,
walked through the streets creating barriers of burning trash cans and newspaper boxes, attacked outsider cars,
degraded police and wealthy onlookers, and voiced their solidarity with a
murdered resident of their neighborhood. Enough was clearly enough, and
the risk of deportation did not match
the yearning for avenging the murder
of Manual.

Justice: A Dead Word
Our desire for revenge will never be
satisfied in the halls of justice, revenge
has to be taken in the streets. The idea
of justice is the rationale that allows the
police and courts to beat and imprison
us. It will never be able to heal our
wounds, because it is what originally
gave them to us. We see victories in
moments where we refuse to accept the
beatings, as well as the social order that
enforces justice. We see a potential for
a sense of empowerment among dominated people in the 1992 L.A riots after
Rodney King’s beating was caught on
camera. Or the 2008 Greek riots after
16 year old Alexis Gregoropoulos was
killed by police. Or the Oakland 2009
and on-going tension after Oscar Grant
was murdered by officer Johannes
Mehserle. Or in Cincinnati 2001 when
police officer Steven Roach killed 19
year old Timothy Thomas. In every
moment that we come together and discover that justice will only grant us defeat, and only the fiery manifestations
of our collective discontent for it will
ever give us any taste of true satisfaction.
Is the life of 7-year-old Aiyana Jones
only worthy of a lawsuit or suspension?
Could our feelings of disgust and shock
when we watched Oscar Grant being
shot from behind really ever be appeased by justice putting his killer behind bars longer?

have anything to do with what we understand as justice today. If any of the
police who killed or raped any of the
victims mentioned in this article received even life in prison, would we
feel comfortable going to sleep at night
knowing the spirits of lost friends and
loved ones were properly avenged?
Could those responsible for the everyday torment and abuse of law and order
ever really punish themselves to our
satisfaction?
By losing faith in “justice”, we restore
a faith in ourselves.
It’s important that we begin to come together and rid our communities of the
patience “justice” demands of us. It is
not one bad cop, not whether or not a
prison is up to code, or whether or not
a jury is non-bias, the issue is that an
entire social system pre-determines the
way we deal with each other, and even
it’s presence upon us.
Until the police are gone, until the
courts lose our respect, and until the
prisons are eliminated forever, we will
never be truly free and experiencing
our lives, on our terms. Until we move
away from the logic of justice, we will
continue to survive a society of punishment.
Until “justice” is cleared from our
plate of goals, the murderers will always win, and we will remain defeated.

Can justice really put a price to the
constant torment of surviving the system that determines/enforces it?
Most importantly, and in all of these
cases, how can we continue to ignore
the fact that in uniform or not, nice or
mean, guilty or innocent, justice will
only maintain the society we endure
everyday. The problem will never be
solved only systematically prolonged.
Knowing there is nothing we can do to
bring back those who have died before
the barrel of justice, what will quench
our thirst for “justice” per se will never
FTTP #10//Justice-Pg. 9

Oakland 2010
Greece 2008

Cincinnati 2001

L.A. Riots 1992

By losing faith
in “justice” we
restore faith in
ourselves.

Cincinnati 2001

Oakland 2009

Insanity Is Only
Appropriate
-A. Lunatic

Have you had trouble finding motivation to
get out of bed in the morning?
Have you ever felt contempt for authority
figures in your life?
Have you ever felt bored or dissatisfied?

I

f you answered yes to any of these questions, you
are very likely taught to believe that these feelings are symptoms of a “chemical imbalance” or
“disorder” that could very easily be medicated or
“worked through” with the “appropriate” help.

This understanding of our “discomforts” is taught
to us by the same institutions or fields that exist to determine what is and is not sane. It is also the same institutions
or fields of thought that exist as part of a larger system that
drives us to feel such discomforts in the first place.
This article was written to confront the institutions produced
to mediate common thought.

I strongly believe as someone considered part of the “insane”
that these are the results of surviving our current society and
the individualized environments we endure in the process.
Saying that, I want to search for solutions that don’t come
with prescriptions or bills, but carry a conscious desire to
transform one’s environment and confront a society that
forces us to accept these dissatisified feelings as normal or
inevitable.
It is not just the facilitation of therapy, analysis of a shrink,
or prescriptions of psychiatry that prevent us from fully connecting with our feelings of discontent, sadly many of us
who don’t have access to conventional “therapy” run to the
streets for a cheaper cure. Theres weed for anxiety, coke,
meth, or adderall for our motivation, heroin for our pain,
or mushrooms and acid for our reality. Drugs or alcohol are
certainly the easiest opportunities for that feeling of escape
we all long for, but using these substances in this way can
only fail our desires in the long run. Just like prescription
based drugs, when the effects wear off we are still there, in a
FTTP #10//Insanity-Pg. 11

place where we are bored, dissatisfied,
and not wanting to get out from under
the sheets in the morning. No challenge
has been posed by us against the discomforts we have with our environment, we have just even more intensely
deepened our sense of isolation (Not to
be confused with independence.) from
it.
There is also an entire world of “theray” out there. In prisons and juvenile
facilities, in schools and workplaces,
both court-ordered, and voluntary.
While most of us interested in gaining
control over our everyday lives would
actually appreciate people of similar
experiences coming together and discussing their shared frustrations, what
is different about “therapy” is the logic
of compromise, defeat, and self-blame
that is encouraged by these groups, specifically from the suggestions of those
moderating them.
We are taught shame for our mistakes
or discomforts, and either pitied or
ridiculed depending on the context.
Therapy also encourages us to lose our
faith or trust in friends or family, and
place all trust in the group, as if trust
is only something available in reserved,
legally protected, or mediated spaces.
The conclusions drawn in these discussions encourage a perspective that “I”
am wrong, or “I” am the issue. In some
cases, like Alcoholics or Narcotics
Anonymous, individuals are encouraged to go a step further by losing all
faith in oneself, and handing over one’s
personal power to “god” or a “higher
power” (god 2.0.)
Are the experiences leading us to a
point of feeling self-contempt or complete disempowerment really of our
own doing?
Does our shame really stem from our
own self-hatred or a morality beyond
our determination?
How is it that blaming ourselves makes
it easier to continue enduring the bore-

dom that awaits us once we have to return to the “reality” of our lives?
Is to find “sanity” in this world to give
up the desire to escape it?
Unless imprisoned I have no intention
of attending therapy before turning to a
friend, and while drinking or drugs can
certainly be a fun part of life, I choose
to answer my feelings of discomfort
by trying to understand what it is that
makes me uncomfortable.
What is it that we are all struggling so
hard to understand?
What is it that we are so desperately in
search of?
Why is it that we reach out for help
from those that suggest nothing more
than coping and compromising with the
wounds of our everyday lives?
Why is it that we are taught to believe
that the origins of our discomforts are
of our own doing, or easily solved with
mind-altering drugs?
Psychiatric or psychological therapy,
whether in dialogue or pill form, will
only continue to push us to become
more and more distracted from understanding the origins of our discomforts.
With refusing to compromise our sense
of dissatisfaction with the world around
us, I find it essential to stop blaming
ourselves. I refuse to accept responsibility for my misery, boredom, and contempt. I proudly “blame others.”
I am in no way suggesting that you
blame a specific person, but larger
forces beyond your control. By forces,
I mean social institutions that strip us
of a sense of control over our lives and
destiny, and turns us against ourselves
when we become uncomfortable with
the situation.
Boredom and depression stem from the
monotonous society that surrounds us.
Our common issues stem from the fact
that everyday, we spend hours trying to

survive capitalism. We have no choice
on the matter. Of course we don’t want
to be homeless, of course we want to
be able to help friends and family, and
of course we want to eat. But while we
may like our co-workers, most of us despise our bosses, and they are the ones
getting the profits of our labor. This is
one example of something that leads
us to not only feel bored or sad when
working, but also disempowered and
weak.
In my case, I also struggle with a lot
of anxiety regarding the police. I am
not a straight-laced type person, both in
my line of work and just simply how I
think. I am always anxious about being
arrested or confronted by the police.
This feeling of anxiety goes far enough
that I second guess trusting people I
meet, given that thousands of police
who I have nothing but contempt for
surround me every day. This fear prevents me from exploring my creativity,
being more ambitious with projects in
my life, or standing up to the things I
am against. The same feeling of weakness that comes with work is provoked
by the police. I hate them.
I hate what is inherent to their job: determining the possibilities of our lives
and protecting the stability of the same
society that forces me to work. I refuse to even talk to some of the people
I know that I don’t like, but I hate the
police unconditionally, and am told that
if I am stopped by them, I not only have
to probably talk to them, but I legally
have to show them respect. But does
this mean I’m a crazy paranoid person
with anger problems, or is it reasonable
to hate them and feel what I do as a result of their behavior?
It is not just work or the police that lead
me to this discomfort or sense of void.
These are just two specific parts of a
larger system that enforces the conditions that surround me.
I feel weak, small, and uncomfortable
with this world, but I refuse to accept
it, and in the process, I’m driven to what
FTTP #10//Insanity-Pg. 12

doctor’s call “insanity.” But these feelings I don’t thing are
specific to me, I am assuming and hoping that considering
we are part of the same world, others could possibly relate.
Psychology is not so different from the logic of police. If
you violate their expectations of your behavior or thinking
you are a “lunatic” to the psychologists, as you are a “criminal” to police.
I would like to call out to anyone who can actually take
something from this criticism of what I would call an institution that quite formally dominates thinking in society today.
I am trying to reach out to other “lunatics,” exhausted with
being exhausted.
At any moment though, one could snap. Occasionally we
will hear about someone who shot a bunch of police, or took
their boss hostage, or walked into the post office and shot a
bunch of people. These acts are usually brushed off as sheer
insanity, well if its not possible to connect them to some form
of terrorism or another. Its never pleasant to hear about some
of the more severe breakdowns of people who are simply fed
up. At the same time, it is important to understand why all of
a sudden someone would just come out and say (or violently
show) that they “can’t take it anymore!” In most cases these
individuals will have no concern for the consequences, and
will be shot by the police. Andres Raya(1) is one example of
this, and Lovelle Mixon(2) another. Sometimes the anxiety

is too much, or the torment is not worth living through any
longer. Being patient with our circumstances our whole lives
and finally realizing you are living in a society where you
have no control over them could carry some pretty drastic
feelings of rage.
Before you get to that point, I think one thing we all need to
understand is that we are not alone. The Wall Street Journal’s
numbers for psychiatric medication sales could certainly
provide evidence to that.
According to polls in 2009, anxiety and depression accounted for 9 of the 10 biggest reasons for prescribing psychiatric
drugs. ADHD and Bi-Polar disorder are the only other mental “illnesses” mentioned in the top 25 reasons for psychiatric
prescriptions according to health care statistic records. It’s
interesting that all of these “mental illnesses” are provoked
by one’s environment. It’s also interesting how much both
a mediated society and billion dollar industry rely on these
prescriptions.
It’s important to stop calling ourselves crazy. It’s important
that we stop apologizing.
Our feelings stem from a set of conditions that are beyond
any of our doing. By refusing to dismiss our “insanity”, we
are choosing to confront the norms and measures that determine sanity to begin with.

I feel weak and small, and
uncomfortable with this
world, but I refuse to accept
it, and in the process, I’m
driven to what doctor’s call
“insanity.”

FTTP #10//Insanity-Pg. 13

In the last few months alone, we have
seen multiple examples in the mainstream news of individuals lashing out
against what they see as the origins of
their discomfort.

One passenger on the plane put it properly when they said: “It’s something we
all fantasize about, but we have kids
and a mortgage or are just too chicken or sane - to go through with it.”

A less severe example of this was by
Jetblue employee Steven Slater. After arriving to the JFK airport in NYC
from Pittsburgh, Steve Slater got hit
in the head with a bag by an impatient
passenger on the flight afer arriving.
Steven asked the passenger to please
apologize, but not only did they refuse
to, they in response told him to “fuck
off.” Slater was appalled, and in quick
response, went to the back of Flight
1052 and announced
on the loud speaker: “To the fucking
asshole who told me to fuck off, it’s
been a great 28 years.” After the announcement he opened up a beer on the
flight, then walked to the emergency
exit, and left the flight down the emergency slide with one beer in his hand.
He actually made it all the way back to
his home in Queens, where he claims
to have slept with his boyfriend upon
finishing his catharsis.

Is it not interesting that the most consistent theme in mainstream news articles
is to question Steven’s sanity, while at
the same time, his behavior is envied
by workers across the world enough to
make him the host of his own reality
television show?

Shortly after, his house was raided by
Port Authority police, where he and his
boyfriend were arrested. He is now being charged with 2nd and 4th-degree
criminal mischief, 1st and 2nd-degree
reckless endangerment, and criminal
trespass in the 3rd degree. According
to the Queens D.A., if Slater is convicted he could face up to 7 years in
prison. It was interesting to see the media’s response to the events. While the
conservative or liberal media dismisses
his behavior due to his homosexuality
or alleged “insanity,” Steven has also
been made into a “working-class hero”
of sorts. Possibly in response to the
hardship of demonizing Slater because
so many people can relate or envy his
“criminal act,” Steve is now being offered a reality television show that records accounts of employees quitting
their jobs in sensational ways. This
very much recognizes the envy most of
us have for Steven.

Are we not all jealous of his awesome
meltdown at work? Do we ignore those
feelings by dismissing it as insane, or
do we maybe only stop ourselves from
doing the same thing due to a fear of the
bills not getting paid?
From Joe Stack(3) flying planes into
IRS buildings, to Christopher Monfort(4) blowing up Seattle police cruisers and killing a detective after witnessing the video of a 15 year old black girl
being beaten by two police in a cell, to
Robert Morales(5) shooting his parole
officer and proudly going to prison after the abuse and anxiety was too much;
there is a breaking point for our humanity, and it is different for all of us.
Of course these emotional breakdowns
aren’t always worthy of a reality television show. Sometimes folks freak out
and it’s simply not pretty. While we
don’t always support the way people do
this, we should try to understand why
someone would make such choices.
Recently a man named James J. Lee
occupied the Discovery Channel headquarters in Maryland. By occupy we
mean stormed the building armed and
took multiple hostages as a statement
against the channel, and as an opportunity to have his voice heard. On
Wednesday September 1st, 2010 at
around 1pm, James stormed the Discovery Channel headquarters strapped
with explosives, holding a hand gun,
and wearing a headset connected to a
speaker of sorts. He immediately took
three individuals hostage: a Discovery
channel marketing executive and pro-

ducer, and the headquarters’ security
guard. While 3 people were taken hostage, other employees hid in a nearby
closet to avoid James. The situation did
not last long though. Just four hours
after James entered the building, the
three hostages made a run for it. Once
they were out the SWAT team moved
in, and in an alleged “exchange” of gun
fire, killed James. James was known
by employees at the building for his
campaign against the company, and
his occasional visits to voice his protest against the channel. James was opposed to the channel’s firm advocacy
of science over nature. Before this
event he began a campaign against the
network called “savetheplanetprotest.
com.” As of writing this, the website is
still up somehow. His website just says
“my demands” at the top, and lists 11
demands against not just the Discovery
Channel but civilization as we know it
in its entirety.
For example, demand #4 writes:
“4. Civilization must be exposed for
the filth it is. That, and all its disgusting religious-cultural roots and greed.
Broadcast this message until the pollution in the planet is reversed and the
human population goes down!
This is your obligation. If you think
it isn’t, then get hell off the planet!
Breathe Oil! It is the moral obligation
of everyone living otherwise what good
are they??”
Demand #3 states:
“3. All programs promoting War and
the technology behind those must
cease. There is no sense in advertising weapons of mass-destruction anymore. Instead, talk about ways to disassemble civilization and concentrate
the message in finding SOLUTIONS
to solving global military mechanized
conflict. Again, solutions instead of just
repeating the same old wars with newer
weapons. Also, keep out the fraudulent peace movements. They are liars
and fakes and had no real intention of
ending the wars. ALL OF THEM ARE
FTTP #10//Insanity-Pg. 14

FAKE! On one hand, they claim they
want the wars to end, on the other, they
are demanding the human population
increase. World War II had 2 Billion
humans and after that war, the people
decided that tripling the population
would assure peace. WTF??? STUPIDITY! MORE HUMANS EQUALS
MORE WAR!”
We can’t relate to the very obvious misanthropic tendencies James’ politics
seem to stem from, and are a bit disgusted and confused by his 5th demand
regarding immigration(6), but we want
to understand where he could possibly
be coming from.
Of course the Discovery Channel is one
of thousands of institutions in society
that encourage the continuance of human industry over the earth and animals, and furthers the perspective that
sees both the earth and non-human species as objects or commodities. While
the Discovery Channel is just one thing
promoting this morality, it was clearly
something Lee witnessed in his daily
life as a key perpetrator promoting this
outlook.
Whether or not we agree with all of his
demands or tactics, we have to point
out his intentions and frustrations.
James’ clearly had a contempt for humanity, but in response to human society as we know it. This was also motivated by a deep-seeded appreciation he
had for animals and the environment,
and a contempt for human domination
over both.
It isn’t hard to relate. Would it surprise
anyone if someone walked into FOX
news or CNN and did the same thing?
Both witnessing a channel that 24
hours a day degrades the only life that
comforts you, and also knowing that
millions of other people are watching
this, could lead someone to go a little
“crazy.”

Stories of the “insane”
going “crazy” appear to
happen every day.
There’s also Miguel Balderos, a 52 year
old homeless man in Santa Cruz, CA,
who is currently in jail facing arson
charges for setting a 50,000 dollar fire
against the city’s attorney office after
they passed a bill banning all public
camping in the city. Miguel claimed
the arson, and has said that his reason
for it was the obvious attack on the Santa Cruz homeless population posed by
the new bill. Apparently being homeless was not a hardship enough, as the
city of Santa Cruz thought it was important to almost formally criminalize
homelessness completely. It seems that
Miguel just couldn’t take it anymore.
Michael John Fenter is now serving ten
years for robbing banks in Seattle, San
Francisco, Sacramento, and Tacoma,
WA.
He was arrested at his last attempted
bank robbery in Tacoma a few blocks
from the bank. He successfully stole
86,200 dollars before being arrested.
He claimed to be a struggling farmer
who was expropriating money from
banks to give to fellow poor people.
Sounds crazy right? But does it not also
sound a bit understandable?
Casey Brezik of Raytown, Missouri
was another one of the “crazies.” He is
being charged for “attempted murder
with a deadly weapon” against the dean
of his community college. He actually
thought he attacked the governor who
was supposed to speak at his school
that day, and was disappointed when
during interrogation police told him it
was not the governor. Following the
attack, the police claimed Casey was
on “drugs” (marijuana), and multiple
folks at the school referred to him as
crazy. Casey has a prior charge for spitting in the face of a police officer at a
G-20 demonstration, and for drug possession in 2007. He is called a “paranoid schizophrenic” usually before it’s
mentioned that he has an “Anarchy”

tattoo on his arm. Casey was in and out
of mental institutions a few years back
according to certain sources.
While killing one politician will definately not destroy the state in its entirety, and we can’t help but feel a bit
awkward that he didn’t take the time to
check and see who he was stabbing, but
one could understand why he might do
this. If you are disgusted enough with
the state of things to spit in the face of
an officer at one of the most patrolled
events in the world, would one not expect the individual to escalate the statement against someone with even more
power? It’s important to not dismiss
Casey, but to understand why he would
do something like this. Is he paranoid,
or exhausted with the fear that is inherent to authority? Was his behavior an
alter-personality, or was it a manifestation of rage over those with political
power over his life?
I boldly state that an act that defies
normalcy can not be dismissed due to
claims of it being “insane”.
What is similar in all of these incidents
of “insanity” is a consistent inability to
hold back emotion once someone has
had enough with what is driving their
frustration. What is also similar here is
the response by the mainstream to completely dismiss the individuals committing these acts due to “insanity.”
We recommend that we begin to look at
our discomforts whether it be depression, anxiety, boredom, or any of the
other feelings that come with the reality
of our everyday lives. We recommend
trying to look at the origins of our feelings, and understand on a larger level
why so much of our humanity shares
these feelings, and constantly struggles
to overcome them using delegated
methods that help us to form absolutely
no real bond over them. It’s important
that we learn from the breakdowns of
others who are unique in how they express their sense of rage or dissatisfaction.

FTTP #10//Insanity-Pg. 15

We as a lost humanity suffer many of
the same wounds in our minds and
hearts. These accounts of “insanity” are not intended to encourage
necessarily the same behavior, but
to help understand the world around
us, to understand the parts we like
and don’t like, and understand how
to begin confronting what keeps us
“down” without becoming another
suicide statistic or police kill.
It’s time to stop feeling through the
mediums provided to us by society,
whether that be a paid person who
listens, or a prescription to wellbutrin (common anti-depressant).
On the other hand it is time to start
feeling all of our feelings, and not
blame ourselves for having them.
Our sensitivities to the limitations
we experience everyday can only remain petty for so long. At any mo-

ment normalcy could be shattered
with the deviancy of something new.
Sometimes this is beautiful, sometimes this is ugly. What is essential
is that we start to question the methods delegated to us to cope with our
emotions, avoid the distractions, and
begin to come together to understand how it is we plan to push over
the “imbalance”.

END NOTES:
1)Andres Raya was a 19 year old
Marine made famous after killing
one officer and wounding another
on January 9th, 2005 in Ceres, CA.
Andres Raya was a trained marine
of Mexican descent who was sent to
fight Iraqis in Fallujah. He returned
to the States in September of 2004,
where he communicated to family
and other soldiers at Camp Pendle-

ton that he was tired of killing innocent civilians.
On January 9th Andres went to a
local convenient store in his hometown and shot a gun in the air, almost demanding that the clerk call
the police. As soon as police arrived
he strategically opened fired on the
both of them like the trained marine
he was. One of the police who arrived was actually a police officer
Andres knew and was tormented by
his whole life. He actually managed
to escape that same night. Shortly
after, a police stakeout found where
Andres was hiding, and following
a 3 hour shootout (literally) between Andres and dozens of street
and SWAT police officers, Andres
was killed after being shot eighteen times. Andres was seen as distraught when coming back from the
war by family and friends.

“On the other
hand it is time to
start feeling all
of our feelings,
and not blame
ourselves for
having them.”

FTTP #10//Insanity-Pg. 16

Shortly before the shootout, Andres also broke into a local
school and tore up some American flags and wrote “fuck
Bush” with the stripes.
News of what happened holds trauma and emotional imbalance responsible for Andres’ lash out at local symbols of authority, but some would say that he may very well have seen
similarities between the patrolling and abuse of Iraqi civilians and police in his own town.
2)Lovelle Mixon was a 26 year old man from Oakland, CA
who was killed after a shootout that left him and 4 police
officers dead. A warrant was out for Lovelle, but the police
who pulled him over for a basic traffic violation did not know
who they were about to fuck with. In response, Lovelle proceeded to fire, and killed four police officers before being
shot to death by multiple others. This shooting came shortly
after a video tape showed a man named Oscar Grant getting
shot in the back and killed by Oakland police. While authorities saw this as a tragedy, many locals saw it as a harsh
reality of tension between police and Oakland residents.

4)Christopher Monfort is mentioned in our “Justice” article
this issue, and “When the Tables are Turned” in issue eight.
5)Robert Morales shot but did not kill his Brooklyn parole
officer after claiming that he put him under constant stress
and anxiety. What was different about Robert is that he refused to denounce what he did. He told media that it was
worth it, and he’s sad that his parole officer is not dead. The
full story can be read in issue 9 of Fire to the Prisons.
6) Lee’s fifth demand stated that national borders must be
permanently shut to prevent North America from becoming
overpopulated. This specific demand we not only see as offensive, but also in conflict with the rest of James’ logic. Nations, as well as the governments that regulate them are part
of the same logic behind civilization as we know it. Mediation of bordered lands on such a mass level could only be
possible with the equipment, resources, or society that produce the industries that plunder nature.

Media worked with the police to help demonize Lovelle,
calling him insane and a criminal, but local groups and organizations struggled to voice themselves against such claims,
communicating that under the Oakland police, such an act is
completely understandable.
3)Joe Stack was a software consultant in Austin, TX. On
February 18th, 2008 he burnt his $230,000 dollar home
down, and flew a small jet he owned into an IRS building
in Austin. In 1998, Joe declared bankruptcy after the IRS
audited Joe for not filing a tax return, leading to a $126,000
fine, as well as his wife coincidentally leaving him a year later. In 2004, Joe started his own software company that was
later suspended for not properly filing a state tax recently
added to his company by new IRS measures. The day Joe
died he posted a suicide note that included a manifesto stating his reasons for the attack.
While you would typically expect the media to demonize
someone for something that resembles “terrorism” so much,
it was interesting to see the lack of ability even mainstream
media had to do so. CNN and FOX news had to hold group
debates over Joe’s sanity. Considering the harsh economic
times, and Joe’s obvious reasoning (capitalism) communicated by his manifesto, many responded to his desperate attack
as something understandable, or motivated by an everyday
struggle that many others are beginning to have intensified
during these more “harsh economic times”. Whether or not
we agree with Joe, burning your house before flying a plane
into an IRS building so they couldn’t even get your assets
easily shows that his contempt for business as usual under
capitalism was very obviously targeted and stemming from
real life experiences, as opposed to a voice in his head.

“blame
others.”

Take your mark, get
ready, ablate:
3 positions against prison

August O’Clairre

1.

There are no political prisoners,
only prisoners of war.
"I am not a crook." -- Richard M. Nixon
Between the realm of criminality and that of the political
there is a wide chasm. Politicians make the law, criminals
break it. In this context, the idea of the political prisoner
emerges as a contradiction in terms. In fact, the contradiction is so fundamental that it forms the basis for many appeals for the liberation of political prisoners. The argument
is made that political prisoners are a special class of prisoner
who are not criminals at all, but people who engaged in legal
political action.
This is one understanding of a political class of prisoners-they have not infringed upon the law, but rather the law has
been wielded against them in order to prevent their political activity. The reason political prisoners exist is because

revolutionaries are a threat to the law as it exists, and the law
imprisons them out of its own self-interest. This understanding is most applicable to prisoners who are clearly innocent-Leonard Peltier, Mumia Abu Jamal; in the United States, the
list is not long.
But while the image of innocence is appealing to those who
love the law, and although the air of innocence is routinely
deployed in campaigns to defend comrades who have committed crimes, this notion of innocence makes no stab at the
law which decides innocence and guilt. The law not only
acts in its own defense, it also ensures that revolutionaries
commit crime. So revolutionaries outline a theory of illegal
morality--in order to change the law, one must break the law.
Criminality, then, is not an inherent desire of the revolutionary, but a condition placed upon her by the state. Political
prisoners are not only composed of the innocent, but also of
people who broke the law for the "right" reasons. They are
prisoners of war. Defined in this way, the list of prisoners
of war remains small--one hundred prisoners in the United
States, give or take. One half of one hundredth of one percent of the incarcerated population.
The categorization of political prisoners as revolutionaries
who have committed moral crimes does not appeal to those
FTTP #10//3 Positions Against Prisons- Pg.18

who love the law, but it resonates with
individuals who take sides in a war to
change the law. The demand for the
release of a prisoner of war cannot be
based on innocence, and so it is based
on amnesty. Amnesty is the process of
releasing of prisoners who have been
taken hostage during a war between
states, after the war has ended. It is remarkable how easily the practice of amnesty can be translated to prisoners of
a war within a state, particularly when
the prisoners considered themselves
a different nation or sought through
revolution to establish a new government. Although the revolutionary war
is a civil war, it is fought between two
states--one established, and the other in
attempted uprising.

"Al Sharpton... You're... a little more
political, and that just means you’re a
little more unhuman, than us humans.
Ha!" -- 'Lil Wayne

Political conflict is always fought between states that are either existent or
revolutionary. A conflict in which the
insurgents are not a government-in-rising themselves--if we can imagine such
a conflict--would not be called political
conflict, but social war. Social war is
the expanded form of class war; class
no longer marks the limits of social
struggle, if it ever did.

Politics is the discourse of power. Perspectives and tactics vary widely, but
it is the same discourse that contains
them. The political individual, then, is
a person with a plan for society. Plans
and programmes may threaten the existing power form, but they are not a serious threat to power itself. In the event
of social upheaval, the politicos can be
counted upon for a platform, leadership, and ultimately the restoration or
maintenance of state and capital. When
the existing politicians are unpopular,
different ones are on hand, and if the
social upheaval is radical enough, there
will be some radical politicians who
become well-positioned for a grasp at
power as the vanguard or representative of the people. From the perspective of the social order--which is to say,
not the specific forms of power that
come in and out of dominance, but of
power itself--the revolutionary politician is a last line of defense, a fail-safe
in upheavals that would otherwise be
most devastating.

Amnesty is an inherently defeatist position to take, one that is contingent upon
surrender. In order for prisoners of war
to be released, the war must be over,
the prisoners no longer combatants, and
they must be released into a climate of
social peace, a peace their comrades
will maintain.
The approaches of innocence and amnesty shouldn't draw a knee-jerk criticism, but rather should be placed in the
context of the politics from which they
are derived--a politics that appeals to
those who love the law, and a politics of
war between different forms of government. Without passing judgment on the
former approaches, let us say that they
fit their positions, and then consider our
own position. Specifically, we should
look again at the distinction between
political conflict and social war.

'Lil Wayne said it best--to be political is
to be a little unhuman. That is nothing
to be particularly ashamed of, for it is a
pervasive condition in society. Capitalism makes us all unhuman, to be a man
is to be a little unhuman, to be a woman
is to be a little unhuman, to be white, to
be a worker, to be a homosexual. The
social order is constructed so that we
each have our place, our roles, identities. These are political formations.
It is a political formation that the anarchist exists as an identity and, therefore, as a tiny segment of society.

Discourse. A bomb is placed at a building of the Federal Bureau of Investigations, but its blast does not speak for
itself, because its engineers also crafted
a message and sent it to the media outlets, denouncing the evils of the agency
and making demands. As an action,
one might say, nothing could be more
radical than a bombing; yet the action

remains within the context of a negotiation with power. Indeed, the political
dialogue between parties that makes up
the social order could hardly exist without some fringe groups planting bombs,
so close are negotiation and violence to
its heart. The fringe group does not
have access to the political spectacle
enough to proliferate its messages that
way, and so it makes a spectacle of itself. It is unable to stand within the
halls where formal negotiation takes
place and routine violence is deployed,
so it deploys spectacular violence as
informal negotiation. Its demands may
be wildly improbable and far too radical for the platforms of government,
and yet it has "made its voice heard."
The tactics we employ, from discussion
to bombing, are irrelevant compared to
a question of what they aim towards-the restructuring of power or its dissolution?
On the one hand, there is the question of power and how it ought to be
structured and maintained, and on the
other there is the question of whether it
ought to be structured and maintained
at all. Political individuals engage in
the former question--the discourse of
power and political struggle. Everyone
is involved in the latter question--the
discourse of Biopower and social war.
Biopower is the intersection of power
with our bodies, resulting in their subjugation, management, and control. Its
discourse, then, is not of the kind heard
in the halls of Congress, but that between ourselves and police, politicians,
activists, managers, lawyers, judges.
Also in the spaces between our bodies, our bodies and machines, our bodies and the school, hospital, prison and
workplace.
"All prisoners are political." - Various
There exists a third definition of political prisoners. As the movement for
prison abolition has grown on the Left,
there has been a tendency to radically
expand the bounds of who are designated as political prisoners. And a radical
new phrasing has been inscribed in the

FTTP #10//3 Positions Against Prisons- Pg.19

pages of the Leftist Bible: "All prisoners are political." It is a kind gesture,
but only because it is made by people
for whom the label 'political' is a compliment. Perhaps we should have first
asked the prisoners if they wanted to be
political. What, and stop saying 'bitch'?
What word could be more degrading
than 'political' to apply to people without their consent?
This tendency seems to overlook that
the original reason for describing some
prisoners as political was to illuminate
our bonds of affinity--to identify prisoners of a war that we are fighting on
the same side of. There are Nazis behind those walls. Let them free, certainly--the better to crack their skulls-but surely we can express our desires
without expressing solidarity with our
enemies.
"Any movement that does not support
their political internees ... is a sham
movement"
-Ojore N. Lutalo,
anarchist and former prisoner
And now we come to the crux of it.
The recognition that prison is bad for
our friends, the disgust and anger we
feel at the incarceration of people we
care about, is the grounding for any
desire to do away with prisons entirely.
Underlying the various classifications

of "political" prisoners is an urge that
is human and natural--the urge to support our imprisoned comrades, as well
as the recognition that they are often
treated more harshly by the state because of their position in war. We have
no shit to sling at solidarity, only at the
hordes who have wrung that word dry
of every drop of meaning it once had,
and at the idea that this practice is inherently radical.
In fact, solidarity has nothing to do with
what side one is on, and everything to
do with the understanding that one is on
a side--that is, at war. For anyone who
comes to life as in a state of war, there
is nothing more natural than to support their comrades in prison. While
some anarchists are regrettably devoid
of a practice of solidarity with their
imprisoned comrades, that serves as a
reasonable indication of their position
toward war as well as friendship. Either they witness no war, or they do not
see themselves in it, or they do not see
prisoners as their comrades. So it goes.
There are many prisoners of war, and
their nations have their backs as a matter of course. From the POW/MIA
flags one sees flying at veterans' posts
across this nation, to the revolutionary solidarity with prisoners of the
Irish Republican Army, to the Cuban
Five freedom campaign, to the prison

support networks of the Nazis and the
mafia, everyone supports their family,
their nation, their army.
Some of us, however, are fighting a different kind of war. One in which we are
not fighting for a nation, an ideology, or
political power, but in a struggle to destroy all of those. A war that is qualitatively distinct. The only war that could
not only free our own prisoners of war,
but destroy the prisons.
In the war against all that, we do not
perceive criminality as the infringement of just law, nor as a necessary
and just means to revolution. Crime
is anti-political desire, our engagement
in rediscovering our bodies and living
energy. Insurrection will never be the
political activity of revolutionaries, for
it is the criminal activity of becoming
human.

2.

There is no prison,
only imprisonment.

"Disneyland is there to conceal the fact that it is the 'real'
country, all of 'real America', which is Disneyland (just as
prisons are there to conceal the fact that it is the social in its
entirety, in its banal omnipresence, which is carceral)."
-Jean Baudrillard
"Is it surprising that prisons resemble factories, schools,
barracks, hospitals, which all resemble prisons?"
-Foucault, Discipline and Punish
Prison is not a discrete place; its force and logic are distributed across the metropolis. Put another way, there is a place
that is prison, and then there is a tendency, a way of managing life, that is prison. The place and the tendency are not
two, but one. Macrocosm, microcosm. To speak of prisons
as if they were separate from the rest of society is to equivocate. What we call prisons are a node in the prison-metropolis that are indicative of how the metropolis functions as a
whole, and without which the rest could not function. Prison
is a totality--something that one cannot escape from, but only
shift positions within.
One's position in society corresponds to vastly different degrees of freedom. There is the difference between being in
prison or being free. Differences in probation and parole
status, differences in citizenship and documentation, social
class, gender, race. Meanwhile inside the prison there are
power relationships between inmates, guards and other authorities, there are hierarchies of every sort, and there is the
"prison within the prison"--solitary confinement, the hole.
No matter where one is located in free society, with some
rare exceptions made for the powerful, one exists under the
threat of prison. Prison is a Judgment Day which, like the
trumpet of the archangel, could be sounded at any time, but
feels nearest during acts of sin. We are controlled through
the existence of prisons because we are not in them. With the
threat of incarceration comes a sense of the precarity of one's
freedom, which can invoke the desire to carpe diem. And so
the escaped convict lives wildly in freedom while her risk
of imprisonment is highest; and so the prisoner with a life
sentence feels he has nothing left to lose. But the majority
occupy a space that is neither the heaven of being on the lam
nor the hell of being condemned, but a pale grey limbo in
which the desire for somebody to do something is constantly
felt and constantly deferred. This is the total incarceration of
the population.
The mechanisms of prison creep across the metropolis.
Through architecture, psychology, and technological force,
prison has perfected the control of movement, the management of time, the neutralization of threats, the universalization of surveillance, the separation of public and private space, the breaking up of life into a series of functions
deemed essential--sleep, consumption of food, physical ex-

ercise, work, religious practice. These have become familiar
to 'free' individuals. We do not need to rely on experts and
research, for we know prison all too well.
After a recent prison riot, the experts published a study declaring the prison food was the cause. We know that it is not
food, but hunger that causes prison riots.
There are other names for the pervasive condition of incarceration. Capitalism: a system of social relationships through
which life is reproduced into deadness, or non-life. On the
physical level it produces commodities from living beings
and the earth; temporally, it turns life into labor ("Capital is
dead labor" - Karl Marx); on the level of relationship it creates the spectacle from the 'unity-of-life' ("The spectacle in
its generality is a concrete inversion of life; and, as such, the
autonomous movement of non-life." - Guy Debord). Politics: the discourse of power that makes us less than human.
Politics, prison, and capital: agents in the production of
deadness.

3.

Prison cannot be abolished,
only destroyed.
"Burn, baby, burn"
-Rioters in Warkworth Canada shouting as their former prison went up in flames
Without resorting to prophecy, it is arguable that the state
could abolish prisons in a way that would not only continue
its existence but restore its health.
Let it not be said that what follows is a critique of abolition as
reformist; the thrust is something altogether different. Here
is what can be said of the old dichotomy between reform
and revolution. In place of the claim that reform prevents
revolution, it would be more accurate to propose that there
is normality, and then there are cracks that appear across its
surface. In each insurrection we know of, the so-called revolutionaries did as much to contain, police, squash, or seek to
lead the insurrection as any reformist. That is not to say that
individuals who desire insurrection cannot open spaces of
insurrection, but that in the process, we must confront 'revolutionaries' along with 'reformists'.

FTTP #10//3 Positions Against Prisons- Pg. 21

It is said, "shit happens"; well, reform
happens. Let us be clear: if the state
offers the abolition of prisons, or the
release of a few thousand prisoners, no
one is going to lock himself back up
in his cell. To do so would be stupid.
We'll take what we can get. Shorter
sentences, longer chains, food that almost resembles food. Lovely. Only a
fool would reject reforms.
But we would reject prisons. We do
not intend to spend our lives asking for
things from the ones who took everything from us. It is not only against the
interest of our jailers, it is not even in
their power to give us what we want,
because we want our lives back. We
will get what we can take. Only a fool
would accept reformism.
The social order changes things as it
sees fit. Free a few thousand prisoners to reduce the overcrowding that
can lead to riots. Build a new jail. The
budget is tight, though, and it is expensive to maintain prisons. There will
be a focus on rehabilitation and restoration more than punishment; meanwhile, prisoners will be transferred to
privately-owned facilities, because the
government can pay a corporation less
per head than they do to run their own
prisons, while the prison owners still
turn a profit. Certain substances will
be decriminalized. The sentencing for
ghetto drugs will remain harsher than
for their white suburban forms. These
are games to them. They are playing
with our lives, moving us around like
pieces on a chess board. They carefully
consider every move, not because they
care, but because they want to win the
game.
One and a half centuries ago, slavery
was abolished by the United States
government. This followed an enormous social struggle over abolition-wars were fought between pro-slavery
elements and abolitionist elements.
There were slave revolts and armed
uprisings. The government intervened.
And the Thirteenth Amendment ever-

so-neatly includes a loophole allowing
for the enslavement of prisoners ("except as a punishment for crime whereof
the party shall have been duly convicted"). Moreover, the economic system
of chattel slavery was replaced with indentured servitude and industrial wage
labor--which the Northern capitalists
were struggling to proliferate. So today, we have slavery, although slavery
has been abolished. The structures of
society that required slaves have remained intact. And in one hundred
years, prisons may be abolished, but we
will still have prisons as long as capitalism remains intact.
So if we learn a lesson from this, we
should not struggle for another Emancipation Proclamation, for abolition
granted by the state. Many abolitionists would deny that that is what their
struggle aims for; others would openly
admit it is--they say, "I am not an anarchist, but an abolitionist." The repetition of old gestures is executed with
precision.
"Even if prisons were transformed from
human storerooms into luxury hotels,
even if the prisoners of all prisons are
satisfied with 'reduced sentences,' even
if the everyday beatings of prisoners
are replaced by sly agreements and assimilated by correctional policies in accordance with the 'human rights' model, even if the 'white cells' turn 'pink,'
and heroin gives way to methadone
we will remain forever enemies of any
structure that denies us our freedom."
-- anonymous
The argument has been made that
prison cannot be abolished without the
abolition of the entire system of law,
production, control, and so forth. If
we define prison in its totality, the argument stands not only as true but as
a truism, since prison includes all of
those. But the abolition movement defines the prison as if it was a blot on the
perfect society, a cancerous tumor that
could be cut away. We seem to come
together on the common urge to do

away with prisons, but in actuality the
foundation is being laid for a betrayal.
If to abolitionists prison is only a place,
then prisons can indeed be abolished
separately from the rest, like slavery, at
least in name.
If the abolition movement succeeds we
may see a world without prisons, in
which we are still locked up. Imprisonment will have changed form, changed
name; like slavery, we will say that it
does not exist anymore, but control
must be established nevertheless. How
could this be managed? Social control
would be deployed through advancements in surveillance, policing and
architecture--essentially, the mechanisms of the prison diffused through
all sectors of the metropolis--while the
prison population would be drastically
reduced by decriminalizing certain
crimes and instituting alternative sentencing. People who had spent the last
ten or twenty years behind bars would
be released into the streets, only to find
that the world outside appears and feels
more like prison than it used to. Eerily, George Orwell's 1984 describes a
society without prisons--that is to say, a
society existing as a single large prison.
And yet, even the subjugated population has its outliers. The main character of Orwell's narrative is arrested,
and instead of imprisonment he faces
a process of politicization. So it must
be with the 'abolition' of prison. As the
general population comes under greater
control and decriminalization, overseen
by nicer police and friendlier government bodies that facilitate a restorative
justice process between parties, there
will still be a sector of humanity who
make war on society and refuse to participate in systems of social control.
When populations of sex workers,
people of color, and drug users are decriminalized, with assault and property
crimes managed through restorative
justice, the true criminals would come
out in starker contrast--the outlaws,
the rebels, the pirates. They must be
dealt with. So prison can be abolished

FTTP #10//3 Positions Against Prisons- Pg. 22

in such a way that the troublemakers are still
locked away in an institution that isn't called
prison, or undergo 'treatment' and are reintegrated into society, while the rest of us live in a
different kind of prison.

“Let us seek
the feeling
of a prisoner
taking a
sledgehammer
to her cell.”

The "prison abolition movement" that is
viewed as a radical social movement today, is
set to become the establishment of tomorrow,
to the extent that the Left is able mobilize its
forces more effectively than the Right and if
such changes are in the interest of maintaining or increasing production and social control. The project is already under way, from
the house arrest and ankle GPS monitor to the
Breathalyzer in the automobile, to the decriminalization of marijuana in some states and that
drug's establishment in legitimate markets, to
the reductions in prison populations under the
stress of budget shortfalls and prison riots. The
abolitionist argument, "look how the prison
population has grown in the past thirty or forty
years" has already become obsolete as states
begin to cut back their prison populations to
balance their budgets. It is one thing to resist
the growth of prisons; it is another to desire
their destruction even while they are shrinking.
Abolition is framed, like all social movements,
by quantitative goals--capacity building, prison
reduction campaigns, and the abolition of prison as achievable in so many years. Campaign
goals include decreased sentences, early release
programs, decriminalization, alternative justice
models. Steps in the right direction. Small
changes that reduce total prison populations.
The logic is that we can numerically reduce
prisons out of existence, or on the flip side, that
we can numerically build a movement that is
large and efficient enough to abolish them.
The same quantity-driven movement would
claim that the destruction of a prison by fire
is not effective. The prisoners will be transferred, the dormitories rebuilt, there will still
be prisons. Instead of creating concrete solidarity through outside revolt, activists would
willingly use the prisoners' riots as a means to
an end. They say, see, this riot shows that the
prisons are overcrowded and we demand some
inmates be released early. It is unfortunate that
such a thing had to happen, they reason, but it
is worth getting our message into the media,
because that will get us closer to our goals,
which we know are in the prisoners' and society's best interests.

They are right that there will still be prisons.
But for what reasons do prisons persist? Is it
because prisoners set fire to them, or because
insurrection is not sufficiently generalized?
The prisons are being destroyed, right now.
Prisoners around the world are taking every
available opportunity to make holes and set
fires, to sabotage cameras and take guards hostage. Of course there is also stillness, inertia,
falling-into-line, but beneath the sound of feet
falling in rhythm are the odd sounds of scratching of a knife, the turning of pages, and the
tinkering of wire against an electrical socket;
following that, the distinct sound of an electrical spark is heard, and the scent of something
burning wafts through the air...
It is not enough--and what's more, it is not a joyful approach--to gradually empty the prisons of
the prisoners through new social programs and
campaigns, letting their shells stand hollow.
The silhouettes of empty prisons would stand
as reminders of a grave mistake, but we would
never be free. Let us seek the feeling of a prisoner taking a sledgehammer to her cell.
There is a story that comes from the occupation of the abandoned Alcatraz prison island
by the Indians of All Tribes between 1969 and
1971. We do not know where this story came
from or if it 'really' happened, only that it has
taken root in our minds. According to the legend, one of the people involved in the occupation had been imprisoned at Alcaltraz in his
earlier years. When he arrived on the island,
he searched through the prison for some time
and eventually came to the cell in which he'd
been locked up. Taking up a sledgehammer, the
man destroyed the walls of the cell, block by
cement block. It was hard work, and he was
many years in age, and by the time he was done
he was exhausted. He put down the sledgehammer and sank to the ground, with the ruins
of the old cage around him.

FTTP #10//3 Positions Against Prisons- Pg. 23

Chino, CA
State Prison
2009

Chino, CA
State Prison
2009

FTTP #10//3 Positions Against Prisons- Pg. 24

Chronology
of North
American
Prisoner
Resistance

N

aturally, the proliferation of the
prison has been
met with significant resistance
from those most
affected by it.
This may be best understood as a
simple conflict of interests: the interests of prisoners against the interests
of the prison itself, which does everything necessary to maintain their
confinement.
Riots, escapes, inmate fights, staff
assaults, refusal of orders, and disturbances of all kinds are some ways
in which the tension of this conflict
is manifested. Each time the prison
cannot proceed with routine operations it loses control of itself; each
time the prison loses control, its inhabitants are able to act outside of its
constraints, in accordance with their
own interests.

Note:
Every issue of
“FTTP” reports
on prisoner
resistance and
struggle.

“All actions which
impede prison’s aim of
social control can be
considered tangible
resistance.”

The reports
always stem
back to the last
issue. In this
case, our last
issue came out
in May.
Sadly due to
space, we have
to prioritize
reports on
resistance in the
United States,
Mexico, and
Canada.

All actions which impede prison’s
aim of social control can be considered tangible resistance.
With only media reports as our sources, it is impossible to document every
single case. While reading this list it
is important to keep in mind that the
inmate is always living in resistance
to prison, regardless of whether or
not a newspaper article is published
about it.
The actions reported here are only
to serve as examples of those who even up against the grandeur of the
prison and its near-insurmountable
walls – manage to act out despite the
dismal reality of the situation.

15 April – Akron, Ohio –

An inmate at Summit County's Community Based Correctional Facility tried unsuccessfully to escape via an air duct. As
paperwork was being prepared, staff members went to retrieve
the inmate and escort him to the deputy. The inmate, however,
refused to cooperate and climbed into the drop ceiling, ignoring commands to come out. The inmate remained crawling
around in the air ducts until he was located and apprehended
by the Akron Fire Department.

16 April – LaPorte, Indiana –

An Indiana State Prison inmate walked away from a prison
road crew at the Summit Farm Operation.

18 April – East Meadow, New York –

Three Nassau County Jail guards were injured in a scuffle.
Injuries included a sprained ankle, hyper extended knee and
cuts and bruises. One officer was also treated for respiratory
problems.

19 April – Saint Louis, Missouri -

Just after being taken to the St. Louis Justice Center, a soon to
be inmate slipped out of their cuffs and took off through the
north door after it was opened by departing employees.
FTTP #10//Prisoner Resistance-Pg. 26

20 April – Cranston, Rhode Island –

A 60 year old corrections officer was punched in the face and
knocked unconscious by an inmate at the Adult Correctional
Instituion.

24 April – Burlington, North Carolina -

A Dan River Prison Work Farm inmate scaled the exterior
fence and ran off.

12 May – Mason, Tennessee –

Approximately 35 West Tennessee Detention Facility inmates refused to enter their cells and began destroying furniture. The facility is run by the Nashville-based Corrections
Corporation of America, which operates 65 facilities in 20
states.

13 May – Truth or Consequences,
New Mexico – An inmate managed to escape from the

25 April – Saskatoon, Saskatchewan,
Sierra County Detention Center by slamming a door on a
Canada – A Saskatoon Correctional Centre inmate ran detention officer while being transported between buildings

away from corrections workers while they were taking out
the facility's garbage.

and running off.

26 April – Columbia, South Carolina –

Several fights broke out between numerous inmates at the
United States Penitentiary's outdoor recreation area.

An inmate on work assignment from the Campbell Pre-Release Center walked off.

28 April – Castaic, California –

Two Pitchess Detention Center inmates escaped while working at a kitchen loading dock.

30 April – Hogden, Oklahoma –

An inmate walked away from the Jim E. Hamilton Correctional Center.

2 May – Mitchellville, Iowa –

An inmate at the Correctional Institute for Women kicked
and punched two correctional officers and spat on a third
who tried to restrain her.

3 May – Headingley, Manitoba, Canada –

All nine inmates in the segregated Block 10 at Headingley
Correctional Centre rioted for several hours and smashed all
the furniture ultimately causing $26,000 in damages.

16 May – Victorville, California –

17 May – Rogers, Arkansas –

A Benton County Juvenile Jail inmate almost immediately
began choking the corrections officer after he was released
from his seat belt and then started banging the officer's head
into the security cage of the vehicle they were riding in. The
juvenile, still in handcuffs and ankle restraints, then ran off
into a field only to be caught by a good citizen.

18 May – Scottsboro, Alabama –

An inmate who was given a two day leave from the Scottsboro City Jail to take care of personal business failed to return.

19 May – Cumming, Georgia –

A Forsyth Jail inmate climbed up through a hole in the roof
between some wire and got on top of the roof. Jumping from
there, they made their escape on foot.

21 May – Wichita, Kansas –

5 May – Los Angeles, California –

Four Metropolitan Detention Center guards were injured as
they tried to intervene in an inmate disturbance. Two of them
were hospitalized.

A Sedgwick County Jail inmate set fire to the transport van
they were being transferred in and tried to escape after being removed from the burning vehicle. The van sustained an
estimated $25,000 in damages.

7 May – Lawton, Oklahoma –

22 May – Morristown, Tennessee –

An attack at the Lawton Correctional Facility sent a prison
guard to the hospital. An inmate at the facility, run by the
GEO Group, packed a blanket or pillowcase with rocks and
hit the officer over the head with it.

Three inmates assaulted a Hamblen County Jail officer in an
escape attempt. They then fought three more who came to
the aid of the first before being subdued.

11 May – Lake Wales, Florida –

A Polk County Jail inmate escaped from their work crew.

An inmate receiving medical treatment at the Lake Wales
Hospital told the detention deputy on duty he had to use the
bathroom. As he left the room he hit the deputy over the head
and overpowered him. His hospital gown was torn off in the
process and he escaped wearing only his socks and ankle
shackles.

24 May – Livingston, Texas –

25 May – Versailles, Kentucky –

For the second time in a month, an inmate escaped from the
Woodford County Jail.

FTTP #10//Prisoner Resistance-Pg. 27

26 May – Merced, California –

16 June – Fairfield, California –

Two John Latorraca Correctional Facility inmates attacked a
guard over food portions.

Two inmates escaped the Fout Springs Youth Facility.

28 May – Coquille, Oregon –

An inmate working with a crew from the Shutter Creek Correctional at the Coquille Masonic Cemetary walked away.

An inmate being transferred from court was able to escape
from the transport van by breaking out the rivets on the inmate cage, unlocking the door and jumping out.

29 May – Cuernavaca, Morelos, Mexico –

18 June – Lovelady, Texas –

A prison warden arriving to work was kidnapped by armed
gunmen. The body was found later that day, dismembered
and scattered about the city in four locations.

30 May – Albuquerque, New Mexico –

A 16 year old inmate at the Youth Diagnostic and Development Center punched a guard in the face. The staff claims the
facility is too dangerous and they are afraid to go to work.

3 June – Charleston, West Virginia –

An inmate assaulted correctional officers by kicking at them
when they tried to stop him from spitting at them.

6 June – Lexington, Kentucky –

Five Fayette County Detention Center inmates refused to enter their cells after a basketball game. Covering their faces
with shirts and armed with phones, batteries and a shower
door, they taunted officials in riot gear and fought them as
they tried to restore order.

7 June – Walla Walla, Washington –

A Washington State Penitentiary corrections officer was
stabbed in the neck with a sharpened toothbrush.

17 June – Portsmouth, Virginia –

A Eastham State Prison guard sustained serious facial injuries when an inmate attacked him with a homemade knife.
The knife was 2.5 inches long and was fashioned from three
razor blades attached to a pen casing.

19 June – Springfield, Missouri –

Two Greene County Jail officers were injured in a scuffle
with an uncooperative inmate. Besides pain from punches
to the faces and heads of the officers, one of them suffered a
broken ankle.

20 June – Laurel, Maryland –

Many of the inmates at the New Beginnings Youth Correctional Facility refused to enter their cells and fought off the
corrections officers who tried to regain control. Several staff
members were injured including the shift supervisor, who
suffered a broken jaw. The inmates also managed to steal the
electronic master key. When response units from the Metropolitan Police Department and other local agencies responded to the incident, they found some of the youths wandering
through the facility at will while others climbed to the roofs
of two “living units.”

24 June – Meridian, Mississippi –

8 June – Juárez, Chihuahua, Mexico –
Inmates rioted at the Cereso Prison.

An inmate escaped from the Simpson County Community
Work Center.

9 June – Headingley, Mantioba, Canada –

25 June – Cassville, Missouri –

Approximately 25 Headingley Correctional Centre inmates
refused to enter their cells and barricaded themselves in the
common room for more than 10 hours.

13 June – Junction, Texas –

An inmate stole a Kimble County Jail truck and drove off.

14 June – Mazatlán, Sinaloa, Mexico –
A prison riot left 3 officers wounded.

15 June – Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, Canada –

Approximately 17 Central Nova Scotia Correctional Facility
inmates rioted when corrections officers tried to put the facility on lockdown. The masked inmates refused to leave the
day room in the west unit and covered security cameras and
broke sprinklers, windows and recreation equipment for two
hours until guards were able to restore order.

An inmate managed to escape the Barry County Jail by scaling the perimeter fence. He climbed on the shoulder's of
another inmate above security cameras and used a camera
bracket to get up on the chain link fence. From there, he pried
at the chain link, which is affixed by heavy duty clamps, until
they created a small hole through which he crawled out.

26 June – Modesto, California –

An inmate escaped from the Stanislaus County Honor Farm
during a fire. The two deputies watched the inmate scale the
fence, but could not pursue as they had 86 other inmates to
evacuate.

27 June – Warner Robins, Georgia –

A Houston County Jail inmate threw a cleaning agent that
contained bleach into the eyes of two correctional officers.
FTTP #10//Prisoner Resistance-Pg. 28

30 June – Troy, Alabama –

21 July – Montreal, Quebec, Canada –

3 July – Youngstown, Ohio –

28 July – Stony Mountain, Manitoba,
Canada – 20 Stony Mountain Penitentiary inmates re-

An inmate lit a roll of toilet paper on fire, filling the Troy City
Jail with smoke: forcing an evacuation and causing smoke
damage.

An Ohio State Penitentiary inmate's hunger strike began over
demands for medical care.

4 July – Rock Forest, Quebec, Canada –

Three inmates housed at the Val-du-Lac building of the Estrie Youth Centre refused to return to their cells after curfew.
Armed with wooden bats, they began hitting things and yelling for other inmates to come out and join them.

8 July – Fort Madison, Iowa –

An Iowa State Penitentiary corrections officer suffered facial
abrasions after an inmate assault.

10 July – Corcoran, California –

Inmates at Facility-A of the Corcoran State Prison California Substance Abuse Treatment Facility refused to eat their
meals or perform their kitchen, clerical and janitorial duties
as part of a hunger strike and work stoppage in response to a
lockdown imposed on the unit.

11 July – Concord, New Hampshire –

Approximately 30 inmates at the State Prison for Men went
on a hunger strike over the temperature of their cells after the
prison confiscated their fans just before a heatwave.

13 July – Philadelphia, Pennsylvania –

A Youth Study Center inmate escaped from the radiology
center where they were taken for x-rays.

15 July – Kincheloe, Michigan –

Three Kinross Correctional Facility inmates overpowered a
truck driver at a food service delivery loading dock and tried
to escape by driving through the double chain link fence. The
truck made it about 100 yards past the fence when one inmate took off running and was fatally shot by a guard.

18 July – Augusta, Georgia –

A Charles B. Webster Dentention Center inmate cut a hole in
the fence near the recreation yard and escaped.

19 July – Pikeville, Tennessee –

For the second time in two weeks, the same inmate had escaped from the Bledsoe County Jail.

A fight between inmates escalated at the Quebec Detention
Centre when authorities tried to intervene. More than 14 inmates rioted and set fire to mattresses and clothes.

fused to be locked into their cells and instead barricaded
themselves inside the unit and destroyed prison property.
A spokesman was quoted as saying, “negotiations were attempted, but the inmates refused to communicate.”

30 July – Franklin, Wisconsin –

A Milwaukee County Correctional Facility corrections officer was attacked by an inmate.

1 August – Eureka, California –

Two correctional officers at the Humboldt County Juvenile
Hall were hospitalized after being assaulted by an inmate.
The attack occurred as the two officers entered the inmates
cell. Once the cell door was open, the inmate gouged the eyes
of one officer and knocked the other to the ground, kicking
and stomping him in the face numerous times.

2 August – Jacksonville, Florida –

In an escape attempt from the Pre-Trial Detention Facility,
four inmates jumped a corrections officer and took his taser.
The inmates took control of the room and tried to let other
inmates out by pushing buttons on the control panel. Unfortunately, more correctional officers arrived on the scene and
regained control.

4 August – Doylestown, Pennsylvania –

An inmate ran out of the Men's Community Center while
waiting to take a urine test.

6 August – Montgomery, Alabama –

A city jail inmate caused more than $9,000 in damages at
the Montgomery Municipal Court building while awaiting a
court appearance. The inmate damaged a bathroom sink and
the adjoining pipes, causing water damage in the Montgomery Police Department's supply and evidence rooms.

8 August – Atlanta, Georgia –

A Fulton County Jail inmate stabbed a corrections officer in
the back with a homemade knife. When the officer tried to
subdue the inmate, another inmate jumped in and tried to
stop him.

20 July – Saint Johns, Newfoundland,
Canada – An inmate used a television set as a weapon
and assaulted four guards at Her Majesty's Penitentiary.

FTTP #10//Prisoner Resistance-Pg. 29

12 August – Fort Leavenworth, Kansas –

Four inmates assaulted a corrections officer at the U.S. Disciplinary Barracks and took his keys. They locked the officer
in the shower area and used the keys to open the cells of 10
additional prisoners where they enjoyed the 24 cell tier for
three hours before staff was able to regain control.

16 August – Lancaster, Ohio –

Fairfield County Jail inmates rioted over movement restrictions within the facility. The inmates set mattresses on fire
and “threw things.”

19 August – Davenport, Iowa –

A Scott County Jail corrections officer was beat over the
head with a chair.

21 August – Spokane, Washington –

20 to 30 Spokane County Jail inmates flooded their cells in a
coordinated effort.

22 August – Sterling, Colorado –

An inmate who has escaped Colorado law enforcement four
times in the past, made the first successful escape in the history of the Sterling Correctional Facility, which is the largest
prison facility in Colorado.

17 September – Michigan City, Indiana –

A Indiana State Prison inmate assaulted a corrections officer
and took another hostage. Unfortunately, the situation was
resolved peacefully.

18 September – Jacksonville, Florida –

A Duval County Jail inmate grabbed a security guard's gun
and beat him with it at the hospital where they were receiving
medical care.

25 September – Hamilton, Montana –

A Ravalli County Detention Center inmate beat a corrections
officer with a 14 inch long wooden cribbage board.

28 September – Newport, Oregon –

Six of the twelve inmates in a cell block escaped by burning
out a third story plexiglass window.

1 October – Santa Barbara, California –

A Santa Barbara County Jail inmate punched a corrections
officer in the face, knocking him to the ground, and then
stomped on him.

23 August – Castaic, California –

For two hours nearly 200 inmates from six barracks threw
rocks at deputies and armed themselves with shanks.

1 September – Monterey, California –

166 inmates at the Monterey County jail went on hunger
strike after the jail administration decreased their allotment
of soap from four bars a week to one.

6 September – Santa Clarita, California –

An inmate tried to escape Los Angeles County Jail by climbing into the ceiling of jail interview room while waiting for
burglary victims to provide an identification. Unfortunately,
authorities discovered a “chalky powder on the floor” from
where the inmates had removed and replaced the ceiling tiles
and they were found.

“Passing
the time...”

9 September – Kingman, Arizona –

Inmates in Mohave County Jail's C Pod caused severe water
damage by breaking off sprinkler heads.

10 September - Reynosa, Tamaulipas,
Mexico – 85 inmates used ladders to scale the state prison's 20 foot tall walls and then disappeared.

FTTP #10//Prisoner Resistance-Pg. 30

Report on
Anti-G20
Resistance in
Toronto
-By Zig-Zag

Introduction

F

rom June 25-27, 2010, Canada hosted both
the G8 and G20 Summits. The G8 Summit
was held on June 25 in Huntsville, Ontario,
a small rural community. The G20 Summit
was held in downtown Toronto from June
26-27. The security operation, involving
some 19,000 security personnel (10,000
cops, 4,000 military, and 5,000 security guards), was billed
as the largest in Canadian history (costing approximately $1
billion). Just a day prior to the G8 Summit, an earthquake
struck nearby while a ‘freak’ tornado tore through another
region in southern Ontario. The G20 Summit itself opened
and closed with torrential storms.
After nearly a week of ‘peaceful’ and heavily policed protests, Saturday, June 26, saw widespread property destruction and the arson of four Toronto police cars in downtown
streets, including two in the financial district. In response to
this humiliation, police went on a rampage later that evening
and throughout the next day, violently attacking passive protesters, journalists, and bystanders. By the evening of Monday June 28, some 900 people had been arrested.

The final total of arrests would be nearly 1,100—the largest
mass arrests in Canadian history.
Some detractors of resistance, including conspiracy theorists
and reformsits, claim the militant attacks were “allowed” to
happen, or were the work of agent provocateurs. The reality
is that a few hundred militants were able to outmanuever an
army of riot cops and carry out extensive property destruction.
The damage inflicted, even with thousands of riot cops in the
streets, and the arson of four police cars in particular, shows
the vulnerability of the “all-powerful” state and its repressive
apparatus. That some dared to challenge this illusion and literally smash it to pieces appears impossible to those already
defeated in their hearts and minds.
The austerity measures agreed upon by the G20, with its focus on reducing deficits by 2013, amidst worsening socioeconomic conditions, ensures that not only will millions of
people experience even greater poverty and oppression, but
that the state will increasingly resort to violent repression to
counter the inevitable social conflict that will arise.
FTTP #10//G20 Resistance Report-Pg. 31

Organizing
Most of the grassroots organizing was
carried out by the Toronto Community Mobilization Network (TCMN),
comprised largely of groups in the city
including No One Is Illegal (NOII),
Ontario Coalition Against Poverty
(OCAP), and many others. SOAR
was also a member of TCMN but was
made up of cities and towns across
Southern Ontario (including KitchenerWaterloo, Guelph, London, Hamilton,
etc.). Another organizing group which
was not a member of the TCMN was
the Anti-Capitalist Convergence 2010
from Montreal (CLAC in its French
acrnoym), which helped organized hundreds to travel to Toronto from Quebec.

Days of Action, June 25-27
The DOAs were preceeded by daily
rallies focused on certain themes (community justice, healthcare, environment, Indigenous), beginning Monday
June 21. Beginning with two hundred
at the first one, the rallies grew each
day. The Indigenous rally on June 25
was the largest, with over 1,000.
With the exception of the Indigenous
day, each rally saw large police deployments and attempts at intimidation, harassment, and arrests. The size of the
Indigenous rally, along with organizers
close collaboration with police prior to
and during the protest, as well as the
public profile of Indigenous struggles,
led to a less confrontational police approach.

Friday, June 25
The slogan for this DOA was “Justice
for Our Communities,” billed as a community action with a rally/march, block
party and tent city. It began at Allan
Garden Park in downtown Toronto at
12 noon. A police cordon of bike cops
and uniformed officers was established
around the park. At this time hundreds
of protesters were arriving by the hour
on buses from towns and cities in Ontario and Quebec.

Initially, police stopped each person arriving and searched them. Bags were
checked and any banners or flag poles,
as well as protective gear (i.e., goggles), was being seized. In at least two
cases, groups began challenging the
searches as they attempted to enter the
park. One group’s refusal (SOS from
Kitchener-Waterloo and Guelph) attracted a large mob of reporters, while
in another members of No One Is Illegal (NOII) broke through the police
lines instead of being searched. Shortly
after these incidents, police stopped
searching people.
This was the biggest rally to date,
with several thousand people, perhaps
3,000-4,000 or more. There was a wide
variety of groups and movements, including unions, students, seniors, communists, anarchists, Indigenous people,
Haiti solidarity, Ontario Coalition
Against Poverty (OCAP, one of the rally’s organizing groups), NOII, TCMN,
etc. While there were numerous people
wearing masks of some kind (bandanas, etc.) there was a small Black Bloc
of approximately 50 persons.
This was not only the largest but also
the best organized of the protests to
date. Good food was served at the rally
point in the park. Organizers had a big
loud sound system, and a speaker explained the significance of the park, the
plan for the day, etc.
When we moved into the street, the
size of the march took some time to
form up. Because they wanted to promote these issues, women and disabled
persons formed the front of the march.
Unlike the previous day’s peaceful
parades, the June 25 protest had a far
more radical vibe. There was also a lot
more police, who once again acted aggressively towards protesters (unlike
the previous day).
By the time we reached the downtown
core, police had put on their riot helmets. Just past Yonge and College
streets, police made an arrest. They
bunched together and deployed their
batons, punching and striking some

protesters. The bike cops grouped up
and raised their front tires up to use in
a defensive position. Some bike cops
left their bikes on the side of the street
as they rushed in to aid their comrades;
these were knocked over and jumped
on, while others had their tires slashed.
After days of pigs power-tripping on
us, it was good to see some fear among
their ranks and to feel our collective
power.
We marched around for a while longer in a more or less symbolic effort
to reach an undisclosed park or facility
near the security perimeter. We eventually were blocked by lines of riot cops
and horses (where at one point a police
truck had its tires slashed), and returned
to the park where we originally started.
There a large party was held and scores
of tents pitched as a temporary ‘tent village’ (it was ended in the morning).

Saturday, June 26
The big labour/NGO parade was set to
begin at 1PM at Queen’s Park, located
near College and University Ave. It
was entitled “People First—We Deserve Better.” There are reports of from
20,000-40,000 persons participating.
The route of the march, worked out in
coordination with police, was to proceed south down University Ave. to
Queen St., then west to Spadina Ave.,
north to College, then east to Queen’s
Park (a big circle). It would approach
no more than six blocks from the security fence and then turn back.
A ‘break-away’ contingent had been organized by the Southern Ontario Anarchist Resistance (SOAR) entitled “Get
Off the Fence,” billed as a “militant and
confrontational” action to march to the
security fence.
At Queen and Spadina, the Get Off the
Fence contingent stopped while the
main parade continued on. At this time
there were 1,200 or so in the breakaway
group. After a short period of inactivity, the militant bloc reversed direc-

FTTP #10//G20 Resistance Report-Pg. 32

tion and began heading east on Queen.
One of the first targets was a police car
with a cop trapped inside it. Other cops
ran in to rescue the officer, then withdrew. This vehicle was then completely
smashed up, as was another. One of
them was also set on fire (and another
would be later in the afternoon). Following this, property destruction began
to occur all along Queen St. At Bay St.,
the rally turned south, towards the security fence.
At Bay and King St. (now one block
from the fence) a massive window
complex of a Bank of Montreal was
attacked, starting first with a hammer
thrown through the air that stuck into
the pane, like a hatchet thrown into
a wall (but splintering the glass). A
black-clad fighter ran up and pulled it
out, ready to use it again.
At the intersection, two police cars
were abandoned by retreating pigs. One
immediately had its windows smashed
out. This attack seemed to slow the
march, as most stopped to observe
the destruction. There was now a gap
between the forward section that had
passed through the cars in the intersection, and a much larger group still on
the other side.
Then another police car roared towards
the intersection of Bay and King, with
four cops jumping out and running towards the mob. They quickly fled, however. The second abandoned car then
had its windows smashed out, while the
first one was now engulfed in flames.
Shortly after, the second cop car was
torched as well.
We began running east on King and then
turned north at the next intersection, on
Yonge Street, the main consumer strip
for which Toronto is renowned. Now
many more windows were smashed—
every bank (including Toronto Dominion, CIBC, Bank of Montreal, etc.), an
Adidas store, Bell Canada, a jewellery
store, a leather shop, a porn theatre, Pizza Pizza, Starbucks, a McDonalds, surveillance cameras. Inside some stores,
staff and customers ran to find cover as

glass shards sprayed in. I heard someone yelling “There’s workers in there,”
while others were telling staff to get
away from windows that were going to
be smashed.
People used sticks, stones and bricks
found on the street, chairs, construction
signage, anything that could be used to
smash windows. When a window was
broken with an object, others would run
up and retrieve it to use again on another window. Some people used golf
balls, but these were mostly ineffective
and bounced wildly back into the bloc,
with some calling for others to stop using them.
As the bloc proceeded north on Yonge,
people became bolder and began stepping into the smashed storefronts, removing furniture and looting another
Bell Canada outlet of cell phones. An
American Apparel shop was attacked
and its mannequins taken out, dismembered and used as projectiles. At
College and Yonge another Starbucks,
Second Cup and CIBC bank were
smashed. As we passed the Toronto
Police Headquarters, rocks and bricks
were thrown at the riot cops deployed
out in front of it (the only cops we saw
since leaving Bay and King Streets). At
least one window was smashed, but the
mob didn’t linger too long here.
As we marched west on College Street
and neared Queen’s Park (where the
big parade had originally started) a
police rental mini-van was found at
the intersection and smashed up, while
across the street a platoon of riot cops
advanced, their gunners moving up to
counter anyone who approached them.
They shot several ‘muzzle blasts’ that
sprayed a large cloud of smoke (talc
with tear gas) and a small ‘wafer’-like
projectile.
At this point the Black Bloc dispersed,
forming a circle inside which members
removed their black clothing and protective gear, including shin pads, knee
and elbow pads, etc. Some protesters
began mingling in the park as more riot
cops arrived. At this time there were

only a few dozen stragglers in various
groups in the park, leftovers from the
People First parade, as well as numerous media.
Shortly after the cops encircled the people left at Queen’s Park and assaulted
them with fists, kicks, batons, and pepper spray, before forcing them to disperse. The park had been the officially
designated ‘free speech zone.’
Since all the transit was closed, I was
unable to go back to the apartment I was
staying at and wanted to avoid walking
through the downtown core. As I approached Spadina Ave. and Queen St.,
I saw a plume of black smoke billowing up into the sky and a large crowd
gathered. The first police car was still
burning.
By this time, a large crowd of mostly
citizen bystanders had gathered at Spadina Ave. and Queen St. to watch the
first burning cop car. Just as I arrived,
the OPP riot squad was marching in to
secure the ‘scene’. They formed lines
on either side of the two damaged vehicles while firefighters extinguished the
one on fire. After a firefighter vehicle
was escorted out through the crowd by
the riot cops, they formed a line and
began advancing, forcing people back
onto Spadina. This aggravated the people and created a crowd control situation where before there wasn’t one.
Some bottles were thrown at the cops,
who advanced to clear the intersection
and then began pushing the crowd further down Queen St.
After an hour of this, the OPP retreated
and left the area, marching out as they
had come in, in columns of two. The
crowd surged back across Spadina and
into the block where the damaged cars
were. Then the second police car was
set on fire to cheers from the crowd
(most of whom weren’t protesters). After fifteen minutes of the cop car burning, the OPP returned. Then more cops,
including horse-mounted pigs and buses of RCMP and Newfoundland Constabulary arrived, all dressed in full riot
gear (a truly national effort).

FTTP #10//G20 Resistance Report-Pg. 33

The police repeated their earlier actions, pushing the crowds
back and then charging. A horse charge was used to chase
down an ‘agitator’ and escort him back for arrest. The horse
charge terrified the citizens caught up in it, and most ran
wildly at any advance made by the riot cops (even though
they would only charge 20 feet or so, then stop to reform
their line).
At one point, a person suggested the crowd sing ‘Oh Canada’
(the national anthem), as if the spirit of patriotism would
endear them to the line of riot cops facing them. Another
walked to the front and sat on the street, with his back to
the cops, and persuaded others to join him. As soon as they
finished singing the anthem, the riot cops charge, trampling
several.

Sunday, June 27
The day began with a raid at the University of Toronto,
where some seventy people from Quebec were staying. Police claimed to have found discarded black clothing, gear,
and weapons in the grounds around the building (including
bricks and rocks). Some 50 people were arrested.
At around 10AM a jail solidarity rally gathered at a park near
the temporary prison on Eastern Avenue. By this time several
hundred people had been arrested. Police were out in force
for this rally, and only after negotiations were the protesters
allowed to walk to the jail.
After the protest arrived at the temporary jail, riot cops were
deployed and snatch squads began grabbing people from
among the crowd, throwing them into their rented min-vans.
Violent assaults were carried out in many of these arrests,
and an ARWEN was fired into the crowd several times (muzzle blasts with tear gas).
At 3:30PM, police stopped a bus with Quebec license plates.
They detained fifty people and arrested ten. A bomb squad
was also called in during the search of the bus. Throughout
the day, police also continued to board transit vehicles in the
downtown area searching for anyone wearing black or who
appeared to be a protester.
In the late afternoon, police surrounded the convergence
space located off of Queen St. (but quite a distance from the
downtown area). Scores of mostly bike cops kept a crowd
back, although it was unclear what their intentions were. After an hour and a half or so they departed, having arrested
several people during that time. Many feared they would raid
the space, and perhaps this was their plan. But by then another crowd control situation was developing further east on
Queen St.
In the downtown area, again near Queen and Spadina, and

the area where the two cop cars had been arsoned on Saturday, riot cops confronted another crowd at around 6PM (a
rally that had begun around 5PM). By 7PM they ‘kettled’ a
crowd of 200 or so by blocking the front with vehicles, then
moving in on the sides and rear with platoons of riot cops.
A torrential rain then began, just as the G20 Summit ended
(and as it had began, prompting some conspiracy theorists
to assert that the government was ‘seeding’ clouds to cause
them to rain!).
No one was permitted to leave the kettle, and cops began
searching and arresting anyone wearing black clothing or
with a black back pack, people they recognized from previous day’s protests, etc. Snatch squads were used to grab
people. Although there were some who had attended protests, there were also many bystander citizens, residents, and
journalists in the crowd.
The heavy downpour lasted for the duration of the kettle and
drenched everyone. People were wet and cold and would be
held for over three hours, most being arrested and loaded
onto buses. Among those who experienced this were reporters for the National Post and CTV News. Police would later
claim they had seen evidence of Black Bloc tactics in the
crowd, including some wearing masks (although none were
dressed in all-black clothing).
By the end of the night, some 900 people had been arrested
during Saturday and Sunday, the largest mass arrests in Canadian history. The total would eventually be some 1,100 arrests. Police had acquired an old movie studio to use as a
temporary prison facility, located in east Toronto, where the
prisoners were taken and processed.
Beginning Sunday afternoon, prisoners were released, some
without shoes and others without their belongings (including
cameras). All described having been held in cold, cramped,
wire cages, some overcrowded, with toilets having no doors.
Some cells were contaminated with pepper spray (and vomit). Many women reported threats of rape and sexual harassment, while others were forced to strip-search in front of
male pigs. Prisoners were threatened with further violence,
and some who resisted arrest were reportedly kept zip-tied
for up to ten hours.

The Black Bloc Actions
There is no question the Black Bloc and militant attacks
‘stole the thunder’ from both the liberal reformists as well
as the G20 Summit itself. As an act of ‘armed propaganda’ it
was highly successful, with widespread media coverage and
public attention focused on militant resistance. Even if many
citizens aren’t aware of what the G20 is or its policies, they
know there is determined resistance against it. They also now
have an example of successful militant attacks in the face
FTTP #10//G20 Resistance Report-Pg. 34

of a massive security operation, in the
downtown financial district of the largest city in Canada.
Despite the usual condemnations regarding ‘mindless violence’, the overwhelming majority of attacks were
against state or corporate targets. Many
journalists noted that property destruction was limited almost exclusively to
banks and corporations. Despite Toronto police chief Blair’s assertions
of ‘mindless’ destruction, it was obvious that the attacks were targeted and
avoided violence against persons (even
against police for the most part):
“On Queen Street West, the scene of
burning police cars Saturday, merchants surveyed the damage yesterday
and noted there was method to the madness of rioters. They targeted the icons
of consumerism and financing.
“The list of battered stores in the strip
between University and Spadina includes Starbucks, Foot Locker, Nike
and Gap. Every bank branch along the
strip also had windows smashed.
“Independent shop owners were
spared—at least by the rioters. These
merchants instead complained of a
sharp drop in business due to the G20
security lockdown.”
(“Cat and mouse game,” Metro (Toronto), June 28, 2010)
“We were spared... I do have a feeling
that all these places were targeted. I
think because we’re an independent
business, they left us alone.”
(Glen Cameron, manager of Sunrise
Records, quoted in “It was a mess,
there was glass everywhere,” Katherine
Laidlaw, National Post, June 28, 2010)
“For the most part, their targets are
specific and symbolic: As the crowd
tore across Queen St., they hammered
police cruisers, attacked banks and
other corporate companies. Yet they left
a record store, a local tavern and an independent hardware shop untouched.”

(“Behind the Black Bloc,” by Jesse
McLean, Toronto Star, June 27, 2010)

Rather, what Mike Webster sees are
‘very thoughtful people’...

Despite the overall demonization of the
Black Bloc, there is also a significant
appreciation of their audacity and effectiveness among the general population:

“The vast majority of people in that
crowd are not bad people,’ Webster told
the Georgia Straight in a phone interview... ‘They’ve got the same values
that most of the rest of us have. If they
didn’t, they’d be in jail, locked up in jail
for murder.’

“‘They’re very organized—it’s almost
like a cat-and-mouse game,’ one observer said. They are picking the few
weaknesses they can find in the cops
and targeting them and then quickly
dispersing so they don’t get caught.”
(“Organized anarchy,” Toronto Sun,
June 27, 2010)
“After bringing in thousands of reinforcements, police still managed to be
outwitted and outrun by a determined
group of anarchists bent on destruction.”
(“Police burned by protesters,” by Michelle Shephard, Toronto Star, Sunday
June 27, 2010)
The mystique of the Black Bloc, itself
a powerful propaganda image, was
strengthened by media accounts of the
‘mysterious,’ ‘sinister’ and ‘elusive’
militants, with headlines such as “Violent protesters who never were,” “Cat
and mouse game,” “In black and running wild,” all of which described the
tactics of the Black Bloc and its intent.
Most of these reports contained a surprisingly good understanding of the
tactics and intention of the Black Bloc,
noting its origin in West Germany during the 1980s and its subsequent emergence in North America at the Seattle
anti-WTO mobilization in 1999.
One of the more interesting media reports of the Black Bloc was published
in Vancouver’s Georgia Straight:
“Neither thugs nor criminals lurk behind the masks of black bloc protesters,
a renowned police psychologist suggests.

“A BC-based crisis-management expert who has consulted with the RCMP,
the FBI, and many other police forces
inside and outside of Canada, Webster
went as far as arguing that black bloc
activists aren’t much different from
‘well-socialized young individuals’
who go off to fight a war believing it’s
an honourable thing to do.”
(“Anarchist actions have complicated motives,” Carlito Pablo, Georgia
Straight, July 1-8, 2010)

Damages
The total amount of damages inflicted
during the Toronto G20 Summit has
yet to be determined. It is surely over
a million dollars. According to Tim Byrne, manager of Stadia Industries Ltd.,
his company alone had replaced about
$750,000 in broken windows by Sunday night (June 27). Each police vehicle was reported to cost $30,000, and
with four utterly destroyed by arson
would total some $120,000. Along with
this numerous other police vehicles had
windows smashed and tires slashed.
There was also extensive graffiti on
buildings, including “Fuck the Rich,”
“Bomb the Banks,” “Fuck the Police,”
etc.

Legal Fallout
The majority of those arrested were released by June 28, with only 320 or so
being charged. Some of these charges
include the arson of the cop cars, assault police, carrying weapons, mischief, etc. Those that remained in jail
were primarily the 18 or so ‘ringleaders’ charged with multiple counts of

FTTP #10//G20 Resistance Report-Pg. 35

‘conspiracy to commit mischief over $5,000.’ In the
Canadian Criminal Code, mischief is a vague and allinclusive charge for any damage to property. Despite
its trivial sounding title, mischief over $5,000 carries a
maximum 10 year sentence (if it is an indictable offense,
if it is a summary charge the maximum sentence is 2
years in jail). Conspiracy charges for indictable offenses
(such as mischief) have the same sentences.
Most of those charged with conspiracy were members
of SOAR. Alex Hundert and Leah Henderson, among
the last to remain in jail of the conspiracy charges, were
released on July 19. Eric Rankin, also charged with conspiracy, was not released until September and spent three
months in prison after being repeatedly denied bail. The
bail conditions of many defendants include provisions
that many of them live with their parents, not to have
contact with other defendants, not to participate in protests, not to use cell phones or internet, etc. On Sept.
18, Alex Hundert was re-arrested by police, who accused
him of violating his bail conditions after speaking at a
public forum earlier that night.
A couple of weeks after the protests, Toronto police began publishing ‘wanted’ posters with photos of people
participating in the protests. Many were identified in this
manner and/or turned themselves in. Additional arrests
occurred through August and into September, primarily
in Ontario but also in Quebec. One of those later identifed
through photographic evidence was Kelly Pflug-Black
of Guelph, charged with five counts of causing mischief
over $5,000. As one of the few charged for actual Black
Bloc actions, police have elevated her charges to ‘hate

crimes’ in an effort to punish her. The most recent arrest
occurred September 29 when a member of the Chilean
Women’s Coordinating Committee (Mapuche women
from Chile) was charged with conspiracy.
On August 23, 2010, some 306 defendants appeared in a
mass court appearance in Toronto. 104 had their charges
dropped, while some 33 others plea bargained for diversion (in which there is no criminal record and a fine is
paid). The remainder, approximately 235 (including the
18 or so facing more serious conspiracy charges) still
await court dates and trials.

Further Information on Ways to Help:
Toronto Community Mobilization Network
www.g20.torontomobilize.org/support
Toronto Movement Defence Committee:
http://movementdefence.org

FTTP NOTE:
This article originally appeared in a pamphlet called
“Fire and Flames.” It was edited by the author for
this magazine.
Additional writing by the author can be read at:
www.warriorpublications.com

“...black bloc
activists aren’t
much different
from ‘wellsocialized young
individuals’ who
go off to fight a
war believing it’s
an honourable
thing to do.”

Oakland Disgraced.
Tensions Re-Ignite:
An interview regarding
recent events in the Bay.

Interview Key:
FTTP: Fire to the Prisons
BAR: Bay Area Resident
FTTP: The murder of Oscar Grant by Bart (Bay Area Rapid Transit) police officer Johannes Mehserle in Oakland, CA,
is something we have reported on multiple times in this publication, could you provide a brief description of the background of these events for new readers?

BAR: On January 1st, 2009. Oscar Grant, a young black
man from nearby Hayward, California, was detained by transit police officer Johannes Mehserle. As Grant was laying
on his back, prone and unarmed, Mehserle shot him once
in the back, killing him. The murder set off weeks of occasional rioting and demonstrations in the SF Bay Area. On
January 8th, 2009 over 120 people were arrested in downtown Oakland after participating in hours of rioting. All of
these charges were eventually dropped. With the “Oakland
Rebellion” having forced the government’s hands, Johannes
Mehserle was eventually arrested and charged with the murder of Oscar Grant.

FTTP: Since our last issue, Johannes’ trial that was moved
to a “less bias” L.A county court, was concluded, leaving Johannes with an almost “711 robbery” equivalent conviction
for shooting a young black man in his back while he was on
his stomach on the ground. Could you describe some of the
responses by frustrated Bay Area communities that followed
these events?
BAR: People were pissed, and disgusted, and large numbers
of Bay Area residents understood this verdict as the blatant
racism that it was. Large segments of the Bay Area populations felt that there needed to be some kind of response if he
wasn’t convicted of murder – given how incontrovertible the
murder was. But, as the question below indicates, the City
of Oakland, in conjunction with the police departments and
sectors of the non-profit industrial complex which the police
essentially deputized, ran an extraordinarily effective campaign in the weeks leading up to the verdict – attempting
to split the anti-police violence movement along race lines:
“White” or “professional” anarchists from “outside the community” would riot in the event of a verdict of manslaughter
FTTP #10//Oakland Disgraced-Pg. 37

or lower. Tip lines were established to
report on “anarchist activities” and the
local media featured daily stories about
military-style staging operations at the
Port of Oakland, National Guard units
on standby, etc. This was reminiscent
of Iraq/Afghanistan war “psychological operations”, and I think it was farily
effective in keeping people home. I
don’t think that the lessons from this
have been fully integrated.
But, of course, nothing could truly stop
the popular outrage once the involuntary manslaughter verdict was announced. A crowd of close to a 1000
people gathered downtown, and despite
speaker after speaker parroting the nonprofits’ line about outside agitators,
and the importance of a “peaceful”
response, as night fell and the police
began to move upon the crowd, spontaneous looting and smashing and graffiti
began very quickly, first with the looting of Footlocker –fitteds and running
shoes and t-shirts flying through the air
– and graffiti like “involuntary property
destruction” appearing on the walls.
Police were unable to do anything at
first, due to the numbers, even though
they had the crowd effectively kettled.
As people broke out of the kettle, rioting moved northward up Broadway
and Telegraph where, as some media
outlets reported, close to 100 business
were targeted. Despite the media’s
typical focus on the very few “small
businesses” – a sushi bar (gentrification outpost) and a pawnshop (predatory instrument) – walking through the
district the next day, one could see that
the targeted were, for the most part,
corporate stores, banks and commercial
real-estate. One report says that as the
crowd moved up the street smashing
and burning, voices would cry out, “not
that one, that’s a mom and pop.”. Displays were dragged out of store windows and burned in the streets; burning dumpsters were used as barricades;
Whole Foods was nearly looted.
Police departments from all over the
Greater Bay Area were called in to
quell the rioting, and the numbers were

overwhelmingly on the side of police.
Reports indicate that different police
and sheriff’s departments would slowly
secure intersection after intersection
where there were reports of rioting
– they would pull up in the cars and
line-up on two corners. But the crowd
moved faster than this response. (On
one building the words “cops are slow”
appeared in red paint). What eventually
ended it, apparently, was the combination of surveillance teams and snatch
squads which would first identify and
then grab individuals who were wearing distinctive clothing. Reports indicate that this was very effective in
scattering the rioters, and things were
largely over before midnight, even as
long lines of hundreds of police cars
from neighboring counties were still
driving into the city center.
Almost immediately, even before things
had really developed, local newspapers
and TV outlets began running stories
with headlines blaming the rioting on
“white anarchists,” below which there
would be a picture of largely black and
brown youth. The cognitive dissonance
was unbelievable, and this script continued playing the next day, and the
day after that, with the District Attorney even talking about suing “outside
agitators” for damages and issuing “restraining orders” to keep them out of
Oakland – as if the fact that the people
lived in Berkeley or San Francisco (all
served by BART) made one bit of difference. But of course, once the scores
of people arrested began appearing
for their arraignments the Justice system revealed that, despite blaming the
whole thing on “white anarchists”, they
would continue with the racist, differential treatment of black and brown
people, repeatedly denying bail for
people on probation or parole (usually non-white) who had been swept
up during the riots. Many people are
still facing charges, and some remain
in jail. Photographs were used – in often ridiculous ways – to arrest people
after the fact, further emphasizing the
importance of practical solidarity in the
form of helping people to conceal their

identities, stopping photographers, etc.
Dozens of people were arrested on
the 8th, although most have had their
charges dropped as of late. To our great
misfortune, several people were convicted of parole violations and sentenced in single-year terms in county
jail. It is expected that they will serve
6-8 months of their actual term. One
older man, Art Jackson, was wrongfully arrested later that night under the
pretense of possession of stolen property that he supposedly looted earlier that
day from Foot Locker. After spending
45 days in county jail, he was bonded
out of jail by the magnificent and hardworking anarchists of the Oakland 100
Support Committee.
Many people are still facing charges,
ranging from misdemeanor charges
of “Remaining at the Scene of a Riot”
to more serious felony arson charges.
Any monetary donations are appreciated and should be directed through the
Oakland 100 Support Committee, who
are working directly with the defendants and their lawyers.
For information on donating as well
as up to date legal information please
check their website at
www.supporttheoakland100.
wordpress.com
Or you could aso join the
Oakland100 Facebook page.

FTTP: Police murder, especially of

young black men is obviously not an
isolated incident. With that said, do
you feel that if the shooting was not
caught on camera, Oscar Grant’s murder would have gone unnoticed?

BAR: Unfortunately, yes. It is the role

of the police to control, intimidate, suppress, and murder, and especially young
people of color. This should come as no
news to any aware person. The police,
even in a supposedly “progressive”
area like the San Francisco Bay Area,
kill and injure young black and brown
people on a regular basis. Even since

FTTP #10//Oakland Disgraced-Pg. 38

the Oakland Rebellion occurred and the Justice
for Oscar Grant movement swelled, the police
have continued to murder people in Oakland with
near impunity. 10 days after the rioting in response to the Mehserle verdict, on July 17, 2010,
Oakland and BART police officers shot and killed
Fred Collins right outside the very same BART
station in which Oscar Grant was murdered. Copwatching, both formally as a group or informally
as a dispersed practice is a key way to track police
violence and should be widely encouraged, practiced, and disseminated.

FTTP: When reading reports from leftist orga-

nizations or mainstream media sources about the
rioting and unrest that came both after Oscar’s
original murder, and Johannes’ recent conviction, it appears that there is a trend of blaming
“outside agitators”. We continue to see activists
and police using the same rhetoric to almost deliberately disempower the community response
to Oscar’s death and weaken tensions between
people and police in the area. What do you think
the intentions behind these allegations are? Also
how do you feel about the similarities in rhetoric
and approach shared by Leftists NGOs and police
spokespeople?

BAR: The intentions behind the rhetoric of “out-

side agitators” was clearly to divide the movement. Local Non-Profits such as Youth Uprising
(who received a $1.5 million dollar grant from the
City of Oakland) directly colluded with The City
of Oakland, the Mayors Office, and the Oakland
Police Department to try and deflate the movement for Oscar Grant by dividing it along race and
geographic lines, implying that “white anarchists
from Berkeley and San Francisco” were behind
the rioting. This paternalistic line of argument
is an exact copy of the type of rhetoric directed
against the civil rights movements by southern
law enforcement when they stated that white,
outside agitators were brainwashing their “good
southern Negroes”. Fortunately, this propaganda
was not able to completely quash the movement
and steal people’s anger, though its damaging effects do continue to be felt in Oakland, being a
possible reason why a more sustained urban rebellion never took hold after Mehserle’s paltry
conviction. Radicals in other areas should take
note of this fact and mercilessly critique any activity of the Non-Profit Industrial Complex.

“The actions of the
living is the only thing
that will maintain the
memories of those
who died.”

FTTP #10//Oakland Disgraced-Pg. 39

REPRESSION
News on the
obstacles
before
revolt.

Solidarity
Supporting
eachother.
Learning
from eachother.
Standing
strong together.

This section is reserved
for updates and news clips
regarding state repression
of individuals or communities in active revolt
against society as we
know it.
Due to space issues we
have chosen to prioritize
mostly cases that have
happened or are on-going
in North America.
Although we have a few
international articles, we
apologize for missing
others that we would have
liked to include here.
Struggle is a constant
occurrence. It’s indispensable that we stay informed
of what others are going
through as a result of their
opposition to our common
conditions. This is what
allows our communities
in revolt to set a precedent
for one another: that when
times are tough, and the
state is on the offensive,
no one will ever have to
endure it alone.

Prisoner Letters
Being Closely
Monitored by the FBI

Eric McDavid’s
Appeal Denied

After having filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request, Eric McDavid’s
support group has come across a troubling
-- if not surprising -- revelation: The FBI has
been keeping track of who has been writing
Eric. The support group has sorted through
hundreds of pages documenting Eric’s correspondence with people around the world,
and has found that not only have those people been placed on lists, but the FBI has sent
out alerts to the nearest field offices to those
who have been writing Eric.

Dear friends,
It is with heavy hearts that we write to tell
you that Tuesday, September 21st, the 9th
circuit court denied Eric’s appeal of his conviction and sentencing. Given all that has
happened these past 4+ years, this news isn’t
shocking so much as it is maddening and
upsetting. The state has, from the beginning,
used dirty tricks and lies to hold Eric captive. As many have said, they wished to make
an example of him...

The alerts included language warning the
FBI in other cities of a “possible environmental/animal rights extremist” or “a possible anarchist extremist” in their community. Later reports also included a statement
which read, in part: “this information has
been determined to be of such a nature that
some follow-up as to the possibility of criminal activity is warranted...” Eric’s support
group wants to make clear however, that
“We are not sharing this information to raise
alarm or spread fear. We have every intention of continuing to write political prisoners, and we urge others to do the same. That
said, we hope to expose the FBI’s politically
motivated investigations and, unlike the FBI,
we believe people have a right to know when
they have been spied on.”
If you wish to see the documents for yourself, visit: supporteric.org
FTTP Note:
When writing prisoners, when getting a
phone (Metro PCS, Boost, or no contract
phones?), or when using your fucking facebook (Maybe famous Spanish celebrities
as your name), Unless you have to, there
should be no reason for ever identifying
yourself with your real name, Although now
it has been proven that the state acts the way
we worry about, when writing a comrade in
prison it should be assumed that the state is
going to use that as an opportunity to gain
more information on the movement the individual is being imprisoned for.

From Sacramento Prisoner Support:

And in that, at least, they have been successful. But not in the way that they might
have wished. Because for us, Eric has been
a constant example of strength, courage and
integrity. Of staying the course, even when
the deck is totally stacked against him. And
of not losing one’s Self in the midst of potentially crushing adversity. This is a very difficult time for Eric and his loved ones. Please
send Eric a note of support to let him know
he is not forgotten. For more info on how to
write Eric, you can visit his website at:
www.supporteric.org
Yours,
Sacramento Prisoner Support
PS: Eric’s lawyer is pursuing a petition for
a rehearing. This is not quite the end of the
road as far as appeals are concerned. We
will keep you updated on any progress.
FTTP Note:
Eric is in jail for 20 years for a crime that
never took place. His case marks the dawn
of a new era of federal policing and premeditated “conspiracy” based arrests. Eric’s
situation is quite noticeably one of the most
harsh and frightening that we have had to
report on. Although he has been starved,
framed, betrayed, and imprisoned, Eric has
remained a committed member of a larger
movement, and his courage is something to
be admired.
Please find out more at:
www.supporteric.org
FTTP #10//Repression-Pg. 41

An update on the
Asheville 11
From Anonymous author:
This article was not written by any
member of the Asheville 11, and does
not necessarily reflect their views. It is
the position of the authors of this article that the 11 have not committed any
crimes.
We have found that conflict, whether its
immediate repercussions are for good
or ill, is always clarifying. No previous
lesson has taught us this so well as the
events of May 1st, 2010 in downtown
Asheville, NC. As the sun glinted off
the broken glass that littered the streets
of this mountain tourist town on the
morning of May 2nd, while the eleven
individuals rounded up haphazardly in
the streets after the torrent of vandalism
took place sat in jail waiting for their
first court appearance, lines of solidarity and betrayal were already being
drawn and darkened across anarchist
networks in the US. And so it happened
that this hard lesson was etched in our
hearts as former friends and comrades
responded with a resounding apathy:
“No, we do not support you, because

we do not support this kind of activity.”
Conversely, we found support in unexpected places – friends and comrades
came out of the woodwork to offer help
and solidarity, material and otherwise.
We found, delightfully, that we had
misjudged some of the people we now
know to be our comrades.
Our dreams are always haunted by the
spectre of state repression, but facing it
in waking life was a shock to our systems. To feel the terror of the outside
world bearing down in the pit of your
stomach, to see enemies real or imagined in a passing car, a security camera, a helicopter overhead, even in the
odd behavior of a friend... it was and
continues to be a deeply unpleasant experience. However, it valuably clarified
for us the role of repression in the revolutionary project, and, as importantly,
who is and isn’t capable of dealing with
it in a manner befitting a comrade. During the weeks following May Day, we
saw many of Asheville’s radicals, antiauthoritarians, anarchists, and fellow
travelers reveal their cowardice–when
forced to stare down the gun barrel that
is the power of the state, they fled, denounced us, did whatever they could to
save their skins.

We do not believe that methods
shouldn’t be questioned, or that in the
heat of struggle mistakes are not made.
On the contrary, we believe that one’s
practices should always be refined and
elaborated, questioned, and if necessary discarded. However, we understand that the price of revolutionary
practice is inevitably state repression.
Learning how to deal with it is an essential part of that practice... but being
disappointed by the reactions of our
friends shouldn’t be.
The dominant feeling around all of this,
however, is not sadness as much as it is
shame. We feel shame at our weakness-that we can’t protect our comrades, or
were deluded as to what was at stake.
We are ashamed of the weakness of
our milieu, and of its cowardice. We
are ashamed of not being able to mobilize the resources necessary to be a
force and stand up for ourselves. When
we tell international comrades about
our situation, they can barely believe
us--it’s simply inconceivable that one
would not support those accused of
vandalism. It is a fucking shame to see
anarchists cry over broken glass.

FTTP #10//Repression-Pg. 42

In this bitter taste of shame we have found a new resolve:
we shall not be so weak again.

The situation
After weeks of constant news coverage and internet diatribes from outraged citizens, the scandal gradually died
down and most of the participants in Asheville’s downtown tourist economy resumed normalcy—a quiet, inoffensive hum of exchanging money for sweat and tears,
and things less tangible than those. While service workers
busy themselves trying to please yuppies in restaurants and
cafes, tourists from Florida comment about how “unique”
Asheville is, with all of its artists and local shops. They
speculate about buying a second home. Meanwhile the
defendants wait, holding their breath, anxious to find out
what the future holds for them.
The 11 are each being charged with ten misdemeanors and
three felonies and are facing a potential total of five years
of jail time. They are accused of $20,000 worth of property damage, and their combined bail totaled $715,000.
Their case has been highly politicized. Tried by the media in the court of public opinion, the 11 were repeatedly
referred to in the news as anarchists and vandals before
they were even bailed out of jail, based only on specious
internet searches and the desire to find someone guilty for
so many tourists’ discomfort.
Supporting these arrestees is as delicate and difficult as
holding water in your hand. There is no coherent body
represented by the title we’ve been using, “the Asheville
11” – their only common thread is being embroiled in the
same ludicrous legal situation. As such, there is also no
explicit group running their support campaign. Anything
that has been done on their behalf – raising money, tabling
events , sending postcards to the District Attorney – has
been from the initiative of individuals. The defendants can
only do what defendants can do—wait for their trials, hold
fast, hope for the future, love their friends. Our role as
comrades, friends–as anarchists–is to imagine what else
can be done and act accordingly.
Today we wait anxiously for the next movements of the
justice system’s bureaucratic machinery. It is hard to say
for certain at this point what we can expect. All we can
say is this: the cruelty of the state has not yet destroyed us.
We have decided not to die.
FTTP Note:
The Picture at the top of this article on the prior page was
a flyer found online at amoryresistencia.blogspot.com

Watch What You Say
Connecticut police say they arrested a man at a management
company after he mentioned the shooting rampage across the
state that killed nine people and said he understood the killer's
mind set. Fifty-eight-year-old Francis Laskowski of Derby
was charged with breach of peace Wednesday after making
the comments while working at Fusco Management Co. in
New Haven.
Nine people died in the shooting Tuesday at Hartford Distributors in Manchester, including gunman Omar Thornton. Thornton told police in a 911 call that he wanted to avenge racial
discrimination, allegations that company officials denied.
Laskowski told The Associated Press on Friday that his comments were blown out of proportion. He says his arrest was
"ridiculous" and he didn't make any threats. Laskowski posted
bail and is due in New Haven Superior Court on Tuesday.

Another NYPD Cop Gets Away
With Being A Cop
A former New York police officer accused of covering up after
he shoved a Critical Mass protester from his bike – an incident
that was caught on video and viewed by millions of people
on YouTube – has walked free from court. Earlier this year,
Patrick Pogan was cleared of assault and harassment after he
claimed he acted in self defence. However, he was convicted
of falsifying police records. On his return to New York State
Supreme Court in Manhattan for sentencing yesterday, he
faced up to four years in prison. But Justice Maxwell Wiley
handed him a conditional discharge and released him without
punishment. Representatives of the counter-revolutionary or
issue based group Critical Mass (a “movement” that tries to
radicalize the idea of a more prominent and sanctioned urban
bike culture) movement assured the public that in spite of this,
they would continue to cooperate with the police as usual.
Note:
We included this article simply because the video was so intense. We recommend watching it to understand why we would
report on just another cop “getting away with murder”. While
the group Critical Mass is well known by revolutionaries
around the world as a group that usurps revolutionary energies and transform them into single issued based “political”
angst, it is interesting to see how even if you are practicing
“free speech” or “exercising your rights”, the state is always
entitled to revoke them from you.
View the video of the bicyclist attacked on YouTube at:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=oUkiyBVytRQ

FTTP #10//Repression-Pg. 43

Support David Japenga

A Statement from Friends of David:
David Japenga is a 23 year old Anarchist living in Pittsburgh who was convicted on August 25th, 2010 of Felony Criminal Mischief and 4 Misdemeanors for attacking
banks and capitalist institutions during the 2009 G-20 in
Pittsburgh, PA. His $15,000 bond was revoked upon conviction and he was remanded into the custody of the Allegheny County Jail until his November 26th, 2010 Court
date where the judge will "then" impose sentencing. Ever
since the time of his initial arrest approximately one year
ago he has been locked down on house arrest.
The state hates when people get out of line and we love it.
And since his conviction, there have been a number of actions in support of our friend and comrade that we would
like to take a minute and put up a shout out to those who
came and made it successful.
Immediately after his sentencing around 40 people visited the jail with flares, rocks, drums, a ghetto blaster and
screams in support of him and all those taken captive by
the state.
A week later when the judge denied without hearing his
motion for reconsideration of judgement another demo occurred at the jail with around 35 people. This time shooting fireworks at the jail, throwing rocks, banging on drums
and guard rails, while inmates flickered their lights in support.

The Anarchist Black Cross Pittsburgh organized three letter writings days in support of David.
A Communique was read over "What's Really Good Radio" and the show was dedicated to him.
The 2010 G20 Legal Reportback covering the recent arrests in Toronto was also dedicated to David.
Graffiti expressing solidarity was painted on the Polytechnic School in Athens, Greece.
Continued support for David is needed.
Letters, books, puzzles can be mailed to him:
David Japenga 153760
950 Second Avenue
Pittsburgh, PA 15219
More information:
Facebook.com/SupportDavidJapenga
abcpittsburgh@riseup.net
For the destruction of jails and in solidarity with all those
who attack the system,
-Some pissed off friends of David.
FTTP #10//Repression-Pg. 44

Marilyn
1971

“A chilly sunday morning
burns into brightness
the sun’s relentless radiance
restrained
by a breeze
surely touched by the sea
I lie on dry
not-knowing-if-it-is-yet-time-to-die
grass
looking up through
anti-helicopter wires
punctuated by garish orange globes
against the chalked crystal sky
a glider appears
above restricted air space
without raising alarm
a silver breath
looping beyond confinement
a being
unseeable
hangs down
face to Earth
I wave
an illegal spatial contact
immured defiance”
-Marilyn Buck// October 1991

Marilyn Buck,
Committed Revolutionary,
Passes Away
From the NYC Anarchist Black Cross:
We in the New York City chapter of the Anarchist Black Cross Federation are
deeply saddened to write that August 3, 2010 marked an incredible loss for our
communities with the death of Marilyn Buck, who for decades has stood as
an inspiration to radicals and revolutionaries for her militant struggle against
the imperialism and racism of the US government. Known for her role in the
liberation of Assata Shakur, Marilyn had been involved in liberation struggles
for many years (some of which is mentioned below), an involvement that continued through her 25 years of imprisonment.
In the spirit of the way in which Marilyn lived her life, never giving up her dedication to the struggles of oppressed peoples, it is important that we increase
our efforts to free Marilyn’s comrades who remain behind bars for participating in the same struggles. It must be remembered that her death came at the
hands of the state, and we cannot sit by idly while the government continues
to kill our comrades.
While nothing will be able to fill the space left by Marilyn, our only hope is
that the continued work of our movements will do justice to her memory.
In Solidarity,
The Anarchist Black Cross Federation, NYC Chapter

FTTP #10//Repression-Pg. 45

More about Marilyn:

“Autographia“

In the ‘60s Marilyn participated
in protests against racism and the
Vietnam war. In 1967 she became
part of Students for a Democratic
Society. Marilyn became part of a
radical filmmaking and propaganda
collective, showing the films as an
organizing aid at community meetings, high school groups, workers’
committees and in the streets. She
also participated in international
solidarity groups supporting the
Vietnamese, Palestinians and the
Iranian struggle against the Shah.
She worked in solidarity with Native Americans, Mexicano and
Black liberation struggles.

Post-war 1947
born on the white
side of the tracks
Texas segregation
civil rights preacher’s child
fled Texas with honor’s diploma
for UC Berkeley and free speech
though I did not know then
that’s why I left

As a direct result of all of this activity, she became a target of COINTELPRO. In 1973, she was arrested and convicted of buying two
boxes of bullets. Accused of being
a member of the BLA [Black Liberation Army], she was sentenced
to 10 years, the longest sentence
ever given for such an offense at
the time. In 1977 she was granted
a furlough and never returned,
joining the revolutionary clandestine movement. In 1985 she was
captured and faced four separate
court trials. She was charged with
conspiracy to support and free PP/
POWs [political prisoners and prisoners of war] and to support the
New Afrikan Independence struggle through expropriations. In 1988
she was indicted for conspiracy to
protest and alter government policies through use of violence against
government and military buildings
and received an additional 10 years
for conspiracy to bomb the Capitol.
“I keep taking shapes
congenial or not
depends
on circumstance”
-Marilyn Buck//Oct. 2002

Vietnam war 1965
what war
are you fighting for
make love not war
college books tossed into a trunk in
some room
I’ve never seen since
fires of internationalism called me
a girl
to enlist
in the anti-war
war against Amerikka
my own women’s liberation on the line
war in Amerikka
war against the warmakers
white-skinned haters
capitalist consumers of human
lives
following the tradition
Nat Turner John Brown
Wobblies subversives
resistance in the belly of the beast

Marilyn
1988

clandestine war 1973
captured by the killers
spirit killers nationkillers
a political prisoner
enemy of the state
terrorist and traitor
white woman dangerous
to white Amerika
condemned to years
and years of absence
a lifetime
warmakers
wait for its prisoners to die
or go crazy
or simply wither away into insignificance
I rest, a grain of sand
significant on the beach head that
meets the sea
to face the storm
I wage resistance
to stay alive
I learn to search out freedom in the
breath
my cells send out dendrites
to absorb the world and its offerings
I offer back
poems
and occasional grains of sand
mixed into clay and fired
into sturdiness
-Marilyn Buck//Autumn 1999

Marilyn
1998

FTTP #10//Repression-Pg. 46

Update on
Daniel
McGowan
From Daniel:
‘After three years in prison
and hundreds (thousands,
even) of letters mailed out,
I have gotten to the point
where there is little to write
about. Prison life is remarkably static—so unchanging
in its daily routine—that
news resonates here in a pronounced way. The early part
of April brought some major
announcements that will profoundly affect my life here in
the Bureau of Prison’s Communication
Management
Unit (CMU). Finally, my
friends will be saved from the
endless litany of letters about
what TV shows I watch,
Prison drama, my workouts
and books I have read that
week!...
On March 30th, the Center
for Constitutional Rights
(CCR) filed suit on my behalf against the BoP regarding this unit (Aref v. Holder,
D.C. Circuit)....Just one week
after the lawsuit was filed, the

Bureau of Prisons released
proposed rules for the CMU,
opening a 60-day comment
period for the public (BoP
Docket # 1148-P, Communication Management Units).
The unfortunate part of this
proposal is that they represent a huge reduction in communication for prisoners. The
new rules would set the following standards:
1) Only one phone call per
month (to immediate family).
2) Only one hour, non-contact, visit per month (with
immediate family).
3) Only one, 3 page letter, to
and from a single recipient
per week. ‘
These regulations, if passed,
would greatly diminish Daniel’s quality of life, and so it
is important that these issues
be made very public, and
not hidden behind typical
bureaucratic red tape. This
battle is just a small part of
the larger struggle against
prisons, so it’s important for
everyone to find ways to be
involved.
Stay updated at:
http://www.supportdaniel.org

Charges Against
Belgrade Anarchists Dropped
In August of 2009, the Greek embassy in Belgrade was firebombed, in solidarity with Greek anarchists who at the time
were bringing the Greek state to near-collapse. In the wake
of the attack, 6 prominant anarchists were arrested, in spite
of the lack of evidence tying them to the firebombing.
In a welcomed good turn of events, the Belgrade High
Court acquitted them, because the prosecution’s charge
could not be proven. "The basis for acquittal is the legal,
not political. It is not proven that the accused committed the
crime," said the judge Dragomir Gerasimovic.
Some of those arrested had this to say:
"The trial has confirmed what we already knew, that this
country kidnapped us for political reasons and kept us in
jail for 6 months. For total of six of us we have been in
prison more than 1,000 days," said Tadej Kurepa.
"They showed us now 'we can keep you 6 months without
any evidence', which is seen in court, the only thing they
were not allowed to do because it is so clear that there are
no grounds. They didn't dare at the end to condemn us, but
they did what they wanted - they kept us 6 months in jail
with no contact with friends. What they didn't achieve is to
break our organization," said Trivunac.

Pie-thrower
Facing Serious Charges
Ahlam Mohsen, a 22-year-old student at Michigan State
University, is facing years in prison after throwing a pie in
the face of Senator Carl Levin, the chairman of the Armed
Services Committee, at a press conference he was giving.
As another protestor finished reading a statement implicating the senator in war crimes, Mohsen threw an apple pie
at the senator. She reportedly told the Big Rapids Pioneer
newspaper that she wanted to “send a message that liberals
and Democrats are just as implicated in the violence of war
as the Republicans.”

Daniel
Mcgowan

Shortly after the incident, Mohsen was arrested by police
and taken to Mecosta County Jail, where she awaits arraignment on felony charges of assault and stalking. Kantar was
arrested Aug. 18 for his involvement in the incident and
is also facing felony charges of stalking, but was released
Aug. 20 on a $10,000 bond. Mohsen remains in custody.
FTTP #10//Repression-Pg. 47

Post-mortem for
RBC Branch in Ottawa

Three arrested in
connection with
Royal Bank of Canada
Arson Attack
In response to the Vancouver olympics and the continuing
destruction of the ‘tar sands’ portion of Alberta, a group
of militants firebombed a branch of the Royal Bank of
Canada, which had been bankrolling both projects. The
blast, which occurred at 3:30 a.m. on May 18 in the RBC
branch in the Glebe neighbourhood of Ottawa, was first
reported as a suspicious fire. But a day later, a video of
the bank-front erupting into flames appeared on a local
website, posted by an activist group calling itself FFFCOttawa. The video of the firebombing, filmed from across
the street, appeared with a statement of protest against
RBC, which the group said was a strong sponsor of the
2010 Vancouver Olympics that had taken place on “stolen indigenous land.” The bank suffered about $500,000
in damage, he said, far more than originally reported. The
branch is still closed.

In response, cops arrested 3 ottowa men, and charged
them with the following: Roger Clement, of Ottawa,
charged with arson causing damage, possession of incendiary material, using explosives with intent to cause
property damage, and mischief; Mathew Morgan-Brown,
of Ottawa, charged with arson, arson causing damage,
possession of incendiary material, using explosives with
intent to cause property damage, and mischief; Claude
Haridge, of Ottawa, charged with arson, careless storage
and handling of ammunition, and mischief.
The case is still developing, and questions about support can be directed to:
ottawamovementdefense@gmail.com
Past news reports and most likely future updates as
well can be read on the following web site:
www.ottawa.indymedia.org

FTTP #10//Repression-Pg. 48

Repression in
Russia and Belarus
In recent weeks, the Russian and Belarussian states
have been ramping up efforts to round up anarchists
and other radicals, in connection to a number of
acts of resistance. Those acts of resistance include
a huge campaign, led by anarchists and antifascists,
against the destruction of forests in Khimki, Russia; an attack against a government controlled union
building; an attack against a Russian embassy in
solidarity with those arrested in the Khimki campaign; and an attack against a bank. The last three
of those actions took place in Belarus.

Ice: Immigrations and
Customs Enforcement

ICE in Practice
Working quickly and quietly, the
US government has been waging a constant war against undocumented people under the
auspices of the Immigration and
Customs Enforcement agency, or
ICE. Running into homes usually under cover of darkness, ICE
will grab as many so-called ‘illegal immigrants’ as possible, and
leave their neighbors wondering
what happened. What happens to
those rounded up? Usually they
are taken to detention centers,
like the T. Don Hutto Residential Center in Texas, a detention
center where it has recently come
to light that at least one of the
guards had been sexually abusing
the detainees in the women-only
facility.
Three women that were interviewed told detectives that they
were inappropriately touched
outside of their clothing. Two of
the three victims said they were
unlawfully restrained. The two

charges of unlawful restraint occurred when Mr. Dunn took the
victims to the above location
against their will. One victim told
officers she thought she would be
either “killed or violated.”
These charges are not unique to
this one guard or detention center. The ACLU has listed a number of other sexual abuse cases in
other locations in the gulag-like
detention system. It should be
clear, however, that we are not in
favor of reforming these institutions. The only way to prevent
futher abuses from occurring is
through the complete destruction
of the detention system and all
other prisons.

For the past 3 years, many Russians have been involved in a movement to stop the construction of a
highway that would destroy much of the forest in
Khimki, an area near Moscow. On July 28, 2010,
more than two hundred young antifascists and anarchists carried out a spontaneous demonstration outside the town administration building in Khimki, a
suburb of Moscow. They demonstrated in defence
of the Khimki Forest, which was at that time in
the process of being cut down for the needs of big
business. The demonstration, during which several
windows were broken, received a great deal of public attention. The police responded with a wave of
repressions.
The day after the demonstration, two well-known
social activists, Alexei Gaskarov and Maxim Solopov, were arrested. They are now threatened with
up to seven years in prison for disorderly conduct,
although there is no evidence of their complicity in
illegal activities.
The repression in Belarus has come as a result of a
molotov cocktail attack on the Russian embassy in
Minsk, done in solidarity with the Khimki arrestees,
as well as other militant actions. So far, 11 people
have been arrested, many of them anarchists, and
the police in Belarus have the ability to hold them
for a number of months without pressing charges.
Information on how to support the Khimki arrestees
can be found at www.khimkibattle.org.
For information on supporting those affected by
the Belarussian repression, email:
minsksolidarity@riseup.net

FTTP #10//Repression-Pg. 49

Update on Rod Coronado
Rod Coronado is well known throughout anarchist circles
for his uncompromising militancy in defense of the natural
world. Rod helped to sink half the Icelandic whaling fleet,
has freed thousands of mink, attacked research facilities that
torture animals, has helped to sabotage mountain lion hunts,
and continues to be an advocate for revolutionary change. As
a result of his unwavering commitment, Rod has been sentenced to prison a number of times, most recently for demonstrating how to construct a ‘destructive device’ at a talk he
gave. Since 2005, he has been on ‘supervised release’, which
is similar to federal parole, for his actions is disrupting mountain lion hunts.

Regarding repression
of those acting for the
liberation of non-human
species from domination

Alex Hall Moved

On August 3, 2010, Rod Coronado was sentenced to four
months in federal prison for allegedly violating the terms
of his probation, i.e., for “associating” with Earth First!
cofounder and former Greenpeace U.S.A. Director Mike
Roselle, by accepting his “friendship” on Facebook, and for
accessing an unauthorized computer outside his home. Unfortunately, upon his release, a new 3 year term of supervised
release will begin.

Alex Hall, who was convicted of liberating mink from one
farm and attempting to liberate more mink from a second
farm, has now been moved from a local jail to a federal prison.
On Monday, September 13, 2010, Scott DeMuth pled guilty
to one count of misdemeanor conspiracy to commit animal
This is his new address;
enterprise terrorism under the Animal Enterprise Protection
make sure to write him to show support.
Act for his role in the April 29, 2006 ALF raid on Lakeside
Alex Hall
Ferrets, Inc., in Howard Lake, Minnesota. The plea was to
15908-081
a lesser included charge of the second superseding indictFCI Englewood
ment (available here: http://davenportgrandjury.files.wordFederal Correctional Institution
press.com/2010/02/10-0413second-superceding-indictment.
9595 West Quincy Avenue
pdf) for an action causing less than $10,000 in damage, and
Littleton, CO 80123 USA
carries a maximum of six months in prison and a period of
supervised release. As a condition of Scott’s plea, the governHe has been told he will be released to a halfway house in De- ment has agreed to ask for a sentence of the full six months
cember. Meanwhile, the BOP has decided his co-defendant, in prison, but not to ask for the imposition of any fine. This is
William Viehl, will be released in September.
NOT a cooperating plea agreement; Scott has not been asked
to testify against anyone else, nor would he do so. Though the
action in question was committed in a different federal district and, according to Judge Jarvey, lacked any connection to
the Southern District of Iowa, Scott also agreed to waive his
The FBI reportedly visited a former east coast activist to- right to contest the venue in which it was prosecuted. Scott’s
wards the end of August 2010, inquiring about an animal sentencing has been scheduled for December 15, 2010, with
rights activist in Utah. The questioning appears to be related a surrender date likely to be set for early 2011. In the meanto the recent raid of an activist house in Salt Lake City.
time, the government raised no objection to his continued release, and agreed to the removal of his electronic monitoring,
stating that he “poses no flight risk.”

Regarding Scott and Carrie

FBI visit

Another FBI Visit

An activist in Minneapolis was approached by two FBI agents The plea agreement is available at:
at a gas station August 16th. The report does not specify www.davenportgrandjury.files.wordpress.com/2010/02/09what the agents were investigating, or what information was 13plea-agreement.pdf	
sought. The person refused to speak to them, and drove away.
FTTP #10//Repression-Pg. 50

Scott

Though Scott has accepted responsibility for the Lakeside Ferrets
raid, we fundamentally disagree
with the government’s position
that such acts of liberation warrant
punishment, and we do not believe
that the resolution of this case is a
simple matter of guilt versus innocence. Despite the nominal right to
a jury trial in US courts, the legal
system functions in a manner that
deprives defendants of just options.
As happened with Scott, people
are routinely threatened with overblown charges and disproportionate sentencing should they exercise
their right to a trial in order to coerce guilty pleas. Prosecutors often
take things a step further, ensnaring the friends and family of the
accused. In this case, Assistant US
Attorney Cliff Cronk subpoenaed
Carrie Feldman and Sonja Silvernail to testify at Scott’s trial. Both
Carrie and Sonja decided that they
would refuse to testify, meaning
that they would almost certainly
have been held in contempt of court
and could have been incarcerated
for months or even years (there is
no maximum sentence for criminal
contempt). Thus, the risks associated with Scott going to trial included

Carrie

not only his own possible conviction and imprisonment, but also that
of two friends and comrades.
We also think it is important to remind everyone of the way this case
began, as it reveals much more
about the system than does the resolution. In August of 2008, a multiagency investigation into anti-RNC
protest activity in the Twin Cities
culminated in raids, arrests and conspiracy charges against eight anarchist organizers. As Special Agent
Maureen Mazzola testified to on
the stand in Scott’s pre-trial hearing, the FBI used the pretext of this
raid as a fishing expedition, searching Scott’s room for anything linking him to “criminal activities” that
fell well outside of the scope of the
search warrant being executed. In
this process, Mazzola came across a
journal that she mistakenly believed
linked him to the 2004 ALF raid at
the University of Iowa. FBI agents
later reviewed this and other seized
materials, including his computer,
and we believe that at some point in
the year after the RNC, they began
communicating with US Attorney’s
offices throughout the Midwest in
hopes that the items taken would

lead to some sort of prosecution.
Apparently, the only office that bit
was Cronk’s, and he began a zealous effort to inject new life into the
case around the 2004 UI raid. In the
fall of 2009, he subpoenaed Carrie
and Scott to a federal grand jury, offering them immunity in exchange
for their testimony. They refused to
cooperate and were jailed in Iowa
on civil contempt, where Carrie
stayed for four months before being released with no real explanation. On the other hand, after only
a few days in jail Scott was indicted
for conspiracy to commit “animal
enterprise terrorism” and accused
of having some involvement in the
2004 UI raid. Likely due to the fact
that Scott was not guilty of this, the
original indictment (and, later, the
first superseding indictment) failed
to establish what Scott was actually
alleged to have done to conspire.
Cronk deftly avoided dealing with
the problem by issuing superseding indictments each time Scott’s
attorneys filed motions to dismiss,
rendering the arguments moot. But
at some point in all of this, Cronk
became aware of evidence linking
Scott to the 2006 Lakeside Ferrets
FTTP #10//Repression-Pg. 51

raid, and in the second superseding
indictment, he tacked this action on
to the alleged conspiracy, hoping that
Scott’s involvement in it could be
used to finally convict someone for
the UI raid. In the end, Cronk has had
to settle for a guilty plea to a lesser
offense, one that occurred outside of
his district and which had no connection to the case he wanted to build.
The raid on the University of Iowa
remains unsolved, and it is clearer
than ever that the case Cronk originally brought against Scott was abusive, vindictive and lacking in any
factual basis.
In an era where “fighting terrorism”
is the justification of choice for all
manner of racist, xenophobic and
COINTELPRO-type assaults on
marginalized communities, the reality we face as radicals is that we are
all terrorists in the eyes of the state.
Evidence linking Scott to the Lakeside Ferrets raid had apparently existed for several years, but the fact
that this wasn’t important enough
for the government to pursue until
four years later demonstrates how
little his misdemeanor activity in and
of itself really mattered at all. The
more significant truth in this case is
that the state criminalizes political
dissent and targets individuals and
communities because of their political beliefs and associations, with a
single-minded dedication to locking
people up and little concern for the
truth. And in their dedication to destroying any movement that threatens their hegemony, law enforcement
and prosecutors collaborate in throwing mountains of shit at the wall just
to see what sticks. The mere fact of
Scott’s vocal support for radical actions and ideas made him a target of
the FBI several years ago, and he was
swept up in a case that he had nothing
to do with simply because he lived in
a house with other anarchists, who
themselves have been singled out by
the state for their politics.

While we’re of course glad that Scott
is no longer facing the possibility of
three years in prison, those of us who
have supported him throughout this
process find little cause for celebration at this moment. Nonetheless, we
support Scott in his decision, we urge
others to do the same, and we are
proud to stand in solidarity with him
and all those who take radical action
in defense of animals and against
systems of exploitation.
Although the courtroom portion of
Scott’s ordeal is almost over, his
struggle is not. He still faces large
legal expenses, for which we need
to raise another $5000 as quickly as
possible. And there will be additional
support needed for his commissary
when he’s taken into custody in January.
We ask all (who are able) to help
us meet this need. Donations can
be made online at:
www.davenportgrandjury.wordpress.
com
Checks or money orders can be
made out to Coldsnap Legal
Collective with “EWOK!” in the
memo line and sent to:
EWOK! c/o Coldsnap,
P.O. Box 50514, Minneapolis, MN
55405.
Lastly, we would like to say thank
you to everyone who has shown support for Scott, Carrie, and Sonja over
the months since the initial subpoenas. We hope that the work done on
this case so far has contributed positively to our movement’s ability to
deal with state repression, and that as
we face situations such as this in the
future, we continue to come together
and build stronger communities of
resistance.

Jordan Holliday
A Utah animal rights activist who resisted a federal grand jury is now facing
even more prison time than those he was
brought to testify against.
Jordan Halliday, who was the founder of
a local animal rights group, The Animal
Defense League of Salt Lake City, was
brought before the federal grand jury under suspicions he might know information regarding recent underground animal
liberation activity. He refused to talk and
was placed in federal custody for nearly 4
months under civil contempt of court, to
try and compel him to testify.
Alex Hall and William Viehl were both
indicted, convicted and sentenced to 24
months and 21 months respectively for
their roles in releasing mink from a South
Jordan, Utah mink farm.
Upon being released Halliday was
charged with federal criminal contempt
of court.
Halliday is the first dissident in decades
(with only 2 other radicals prior in the
1970’s) to be charged with criminal
contempt after already serving time for
civil contempt for the same act of recalcitrance, and faces a maximum penalty of 2
years for this latest charge.
The government has openly stated that
Halliday is not a suspect in the Animal
Liberation case, yet he is still facing even
more time than those who were convicted.
His sentencing is set for November 3rd,
2010.
For more information go to:
supportjordan.com

In solidarity,
the Scott & Carrie
Support Committee (SCSC)

FTTP #10//Repression-Pg. 52

Noah Weiss

Charges dropped
in Denmark
In late 2009, 100,000 people converged on Copehenagen, Denmark to protests the COP15 summit.
COP15 was meant to bring industrialists and politicians from around the world together to create policies that would allow production to go unchecked
while shifting the burden of climate change to those
‘less developed’ countries. In a way similar to the
WTO and other multinational summits, COP15
sought to make decisions that will end up negatively
impacting everyone but the rich, without any kind of
transparency or accountability. The protestors sought
to shut down this charade.
In the street battles that ensued, the police arrested
over 2000 people, but dropped the charges against
almost all of them. Noah Weiss (an american) and
Natasha Verco, however, were charged with ‘organizing illegal activities’ and took the charges to trial.
Unsuprisingly, these charges were found to be without merit, and both Weiss and Verco were found not
guilty. Two more people, Tannie and Stine, will be
going to court in October for the same charges, and
will hopefully be acquitted as well.
For more information, contact the people at:
climatecollective.org

29 Arrested in
Olympia

Support Alfredo
and Christos

Back in April, a group of people
in Olympia took to the streets
in reaction to yet another murder at the hands of the police.
The group was militant, and
proceeded to throw bottles and
rocks at buildings, break windows, spray-paint the slogan
‘kill cops’ in a number of places
and drag trash containers into
the streets. The group eventually
came into direct confrontation
with the cops, and 29 people
were arrested.

The date for the trial of Alfredo
M. Bonanno and Christos Stratigopoulos, arrested on October
1st, 2009 in Greece on charges
of robbery, has been set for
November 22, 2010.

Two of those arrested have
faced more serious repression.
Margaret Belknap, 23 was convicted of ‘third-degree felony
assault on a police officer’, and
sentenced to a month in jail, but
could be out in as little as 15
days with good time. During the
trial, jurors heard evidence that
Belknap kicked Olympia Police
Officer Chuck Gassett in the
groin and knee as she was being
arrested. Belknap testified that
she did not intentionally kick
or strike any officers. She said
she might have had inadvertent
physical contact with an officer. Gassett testified at trial that
Belknap “was making direct
eye contact with me when she
was kicking.”

E.mail:
edizionianarchismo@gmail.
com.

Paul French was also convicted
of felony assault on an officer,
and was given a sentence of 3
months. He is having difficulty
raising money for his commissary, and so donations are greatly appreciated. To send funds,
just mail him a postal money
order.

Christos Stratigopoulos
Filakes Solomou 3-5
18110 - Korydallos
Athens (Greece)

He can be written at:
Paul Joseph French C/O
Thurston County Corrections
2000 Lakeridge Drive SW
Olympia, WA 98502

The current account for contributions to support the two comrades in detention is as follows:
Mail:
A. Medeot, CP 3431, 34128
Trieste, Italy.

Postal account:
No. 23852353, payable to
A. Medeot - c.p. 3431 - Trieste,
Italy, stating “subscription for
arrests in Greece”.
Paypal money to them for
their legal difficulties via:
angry_sysiphus@yahoo.com
(Specify in subject that it is for
them)
To write to the comrades:
Alfredo Maria Bonanno
Filakes Solomou 3-5
18110 - Korydallos
Athens (Greece)

Or visit:
aftertrikala.blogspot.com
Note:
This case has been mentioned
multiple times in FTTP since it
originally began. Please take
the time to either visit their support website, or cite prior issues
to understand the history behind
this case.

Solidarity with Chilean
Prisoners in London

Raids and Repression
in Recent Chile
Over the past few years a series of bombings has rocked the
Chilean city of Santiago. It became clear that the attacks
were the works of an insurrectionary segment of the anarchist movement in chile. Over 100 attacks in the past few
years have targeted banks, multi national corporations, embassies, police stations, and government offices in Santiago
and throughout the chilean state. These attacks combined
with an equally tenacious above ground movement including
squatted social centers , occupations, and mass rioting during popular demonstrations have in the past years given the
chilean anarchist movement notoriety both within chile and
internationally.
The struggle of the indigenous Mapuche people has also
added to the escalation of conflict within the Chilean state.
Recently a group of imprisoned Mapuche political prisoners
took part in a hunger strike that lasted 90 days. In this context
of increasing social conflict in Chile the right wing politician and millionaire Sebastian Piñera was elected president,
promising to bring a law and order agenda to Chile. Though
his repression of social movements follows in the tradition
of the outgoing Socialist administration, repression in Chile
has peaked, and the hammer of the state has fallen on the
anarchists of Chile.
Early in the morning of Saturday, August 14, agents of the
Chilean state took part in a coordinated multi city operation,
raiding the self-organized social centre Jonny Cariqueo and
the squatted social center and library Sacco and Vanzetti in
Santiago, permanently vacating the latter. Several private
residences were also raided, and 14 comrades taken into custody, with charges of illicit association and placing bombs.

These raids are the work of the new State’s Attorney Alejandro Pena, who has summoned the specter of an international
anarchy terrorist conspiracy. The media has seized on the
sensationalized raids, and court appearances of the arrested
comrades and continue to parrot the government line about
anarchist terror cells, and “anarchist centers of power” aka
infoshops and social centers. Chilean authorities have allegedly been working with the German Intelligence Service in
an attempt to find an Italian anarchist Chilean police believe
is responsible for sending money to chilean anarchists to buy
bomb making materials. The persecution of the chilean anarchist movement has become an international affair.
This new wave of repression has reached astonishing levels.
Supporters of the accused conspirators were arrested for the
mere act of distributing fliers outside of a metro station, the
court where the anarchist prisoners were brought for their
first appearance was surrounded by police. A security perimeter including water cannons, and armored cars. While 6 of
the comrades arrested on August 14th have been released on
bail due to lack of evidence, the state’s attempt to frame the
remaining 8 continue. Those in jail continue to release communiques speaking of their determination to make it through
this ordeal and their solidarity with the Mapuche hunger
strikers. There have been reports that some of the prisoners have been beaten by guards who have declared “In this
prison the cops are in control!”, in response to these aggressions an arson attack was carried out on a Police precinct.
The communique read:
This was an act of vengeance
Last week we received news that our comrades incarcerated
for the ‘Bombing Case’ were arbitrarily transferred to Penal 1 in Santiago, about their hunger strike and how they
got punished for it for a month, about the battering that our
FTTP #10//Repression-Pg. 54

friend, comrade and brother ‘Grandpa’ Camilo received, that’s why we
decided to arm ourselves with home
made materials to begin our revenge.
“In this jail, the cops rule” that’s what
the prison guard who beat up our comrade said…today we respond: “In jail
and in the streets, anyone can rule, is
just about having conviction and will
power”.
Mr. Guard, fucking despicable jailers:
YOU CAN’T TOUCH ANARCHIST
POLITICAL PRISONERS. Learn this
very well, we will not accept another
aggression, not towards our comrades
kidnapped by the state nor the people
who visit them in jail.
And to you, State Attorney Alejandro
Peña, stop fucking around, you know
very well that anarchists DON’T HAVE
LEADERS, so having, AN ILLICIT ASSOCIATION IS IMPOSSIBLE. Therefore Chilean Law Enforcement…you
have been warned.
END THE ANTI TERRORIST LAW
FREEDOM TO THE ACCUSED OF
THE “BOMBING CASE”
As the International media is drawn
to the spectacle of 33 miners being
rescued from the depths of a cave in
the Chilean desert and the nation celebrates in an orgy of patriotism, it is
important for us to act in international
solidarity with our comrades held hostage by the chilean state. Sabotage,
attacks and solidarity demonstrations
have already taken place throughout
the world. Our solidarity will be as international as their attempts to repress
us.
They can try but they can never extinguish our fire.
Free the A14 prisoners!
Visit these web sites for english
translations of updates on this case:
www.thisisourjob.wordpress.com
or
www.sysiphus-angrynewsfrom
aroundtheworld.blogspot.com

Tag

Free Hert!
On September 7th, 2010 Ian Debeer
was sentenced to 1-3 years in a state
penitentiary for the crime of writing
graffiti. He plead guilty to 73 counts
of "Criminal Mischief" and 1 count of
"Possession of an Instrument of Crime
with intent to employ it criminally".
For which, after his prison term, he
will serve 2-5 years probation and be
required to pay $46,000 in restitution.
In the words of HERT's support crew:
"Pittsburgh has been home to some
of the worlds most talented writers.
They have made our streets burst with
energy and subtly re-arrange the landscape into an urban canvass. They scale
bridges, buildings, and police cars to

"get up," shattering the notion of what
was once thought impossible They are
an inspiration to those who yearn for
a different world. In this glory they
have also been vilified and banished
as notorious outlaws by politicians and
cops. Repression has taken a number
of forms and comes from many outlets, including the state, media, and
so called "community" organizations.
Seemingly they have banded together
to be a continual element of cruelty in
the writers life. As with all rebellion,
repression is inevitable. "
Write to HERT at :
Ian DeBeer JS3127
SCI Camp Hill
P.O. Box 200
Camp Hill, PA 17001

RNC8 Update (Most Likely Our Final One)
After two years of harassment, intimidation, and financial sabotage to the 8 individuals arrested for allegedly conspiring to riot at the 2008 Republican National
Convention in St. Paul, MN, the case has more or less come to an end. At first we
heard that they were facing 8-10 years in jail for conspiracy charges based on an
event that the 8 were arrested for before actually happening. There is a very long
and in-depth press release from the eight’s support group describing the outcome
of the case and highlighting the experiences and struggles they have had to endure
since the beginning. But unfortunately due to a lack of space, we can really only
describe the legal outcome of the event.
FTTP #10//Repression-Pg. 55

None of the eight are cooperating, and only one of the eight
are serving any jail time. The
legal outcome is as follows.
Erik Oseland was sentenced to
91 days in a prison “workhouse”
and a $100 fine for pleading
guilty to “conspiracy to throw
news paper boxes in the street”.
You can write Eric at:
Erik Oseland
Ramsey County Correctional
Facility
297 Century Ave S.
Maplewood, MN 55119
To find out more on Eric you
can write or visit:
exitpanopticon@yahoo.com
supporterik.wordpress.com
The other seven’s charges
were as follows:
Max Specktor and Rob Czernik
pled guilty to gross misdemeanor Conspiracy to Riot. Both
were sentenced to 100 hours
of community service over ten
months, a $200 fine, and 1 year
probation.
Garrett Fitzgerald and Nathanael Secor pled guilty to gross
misdemeanor Conspiracy to
Damage Property. They were
also sentenced to the same community hours and fine, but given
two years probation.
Luce Guillen-Givins, Monica
Bicking, and Eryn Trimmer had
all the charges dropped a few
weeks earlier then the others.
Please learn more about the
history and outcome of this
case by visiting their support
website:
www. rnc8.org

Briana Waters Released on Bail
From Earth First! News:
The 9th Circuit Cout of Appeals reversed the conviction of Briana Waters on September
14th, 2010, based on their findings that her conviction was improper because important
rulings by the trial court deprived her of a fair trial.
After serving 2 and a half years, she was released from prison today, October 14, 2010,
pending a re-trial.
She is ecstatic about being reunited with her daughter, Kalliope.
To stay up to date on Briana’s case visit:
www. supportbriana.org

Stay up to date:

Break the Chains
www.breakthechains.info
Denver Anarchist Black Cross
denverabc.wordpress.com

Anti-Prison Groups:

These projects provide free literature and
support for people currently incarcerated
or facing jail time. The postal information
is provided so that prisoners without access to the internet will be able to get in
contact and request support. We apologize for only including projects based in
the United States; we only have so much
space. Those who distribute this magazine
for free into prisons are specified with a
“+” sign next to the name.
Shoelacetown ABC +
Prison distributor for this magazine.
P.O BOX 8085, Paramus, NJ, 07652,
Central Georgia ABC +
P.O Box 610, Roberta, GA 31078
New York City ABC +
P.O Box 110034, Brooklyn, NY, 11211
Houston ABC
P.O Box 667614, Houston, TX
77266-7614
Modesto Anarcho +
PO Box 3027, Modesto, CA, 95353
Unchained Books +
PO Box 784, Fort Collins, CO 80522
unchainedbooks@riseup.net
unchainedbooks.wordpress.com
Boston ABC +
PO Box 230182, Boston, MA 02123
BostonABC@riseup.net
Pittsburgh ABC +
PO Box 9272, Pittsburgh, PA 15224

Legal Information
+ Security Tips
Security, Privacy, and
Anonymity
www.security.resist.ca
Civil Liberties Defense Center
www.cldc.org
Midnight Special Law
Collective
www.midnightspecial.net

Prisoner Address
Lists

Denver ABC Prisoner Database
http://denverabc.wordpress.com/
political-prisoners-database
Spirit of Freedom
http://www.spiritoffreedom.org.uk/addresses.html

FTTP #10//Repression-Pg. 56

The Barefoot Bandit:
Colton Harris Moore

C

olton Harris-Moore is a young alleged
genius and thief from Washington State
who has already become a folk hero. He
escaped from jail, evaded sheriffs, the
Royal Canadian Mounted Police, and
the FBI, for two years and two months.
He is only 19 and suspected to have stolen numerous airplanes, cars, and boats essentially playing
as one reporter put it “Grand theft auto: the reality version”
until being caught on July 11th in the Bahamas. The same
reporter stated “Hell yeah this looks like the birth of an outlaw legend.”
Born into a working class family and raised in a mobile home
on Camano Island he ran into trouble with the law at an early
age. He was caught after breaking into his middle school
with friends and was given the nickname Klepto Colt by his
schoolmates. Soon he skipped out on a court date and lived
on the lam in the woods of Camano Island. Artfully using
survival skills (which he is considered to be a natural in) and
breaking into empty vacation homes. These homes he used
as a way to obtain supplies, credit cards, and the occasional
shower. Colt was eventually apprehended and spent a year
in a maximum-security juvenile prison only to escape upon
being transferred to a lower security lock up. Since then he
lived on the run in the northwest.
Police allege Harris-Moore is responsible for more than 100
burglaries in Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Indiana, Canada,
and the Bahamas. He ordered, with stolen credit cards, night

vision goggles, bear mace, and important flight manuals as
well as other supplies, which he then returned to pick up in
empty houses. Having no experience flying, Colt allegedly
stole a $500,000 Cessna and flew 300 miles crash landing on
an Indian reservation walking away unharmed. His mother
later stated “I hope to hell he stole those planes. I’d be so
proud. But next time I want him to wear a parachute.”
Even among the cops that were chasing him he is legendary for his ability to escape and evade. On July 17, 2008 he
lost the police on Camano Island by leaping from a stolen
Mercedes and running into the woods. In one run in with
the cops Harris-Moore kicked off his shoes to better evade
police chasing him through the forest. Earning the nickname
some of his fans call him “the barefoot burglar.” Supposedly
he also broke into a sheriff’s vehicle and stole an assault rifle. Cops on numerous occasions say Colt “vaporized” “vanished” and “ran like lightning.” On September 13, 2009, Orcas deputies identified Colton and in hot pursuit claimed “We
could hear him laughing.” Colt ran through a churchyard and
eventually circled around to a dock where he stole a boat and
rode off into the sunrise. Escaping to Point Roberts, on the
mainland. On another occasion of pursuit police mobilized
two counties’ worth of SWAT in armored personnel carriers, canine units, a sheriff’s helicopter, and a Department
of Homeland Security Blackhawk helicopter, only to have
Colton once again disappear into the woods. Still another incident led to the police finding one of Harris-Moore’s camps
in the woods including his dog. This prompted Colt to leave
a letter for his mother, stating “Cops wanna play huh!? Well
FTTP #10//Barefoot Bandit-Pg. 57

its no lil game....It’s war! & tell them that.” Sadly Colton
was caught in the Bahamas in true outlaw fashion after a boat
chase where the police had to shoot out the engine.
Perhaps the most interesting aspect of the ballad of Colton
Harris-Moore is the popular support he has garnered. One
fan even made lucid statements about his support on network
TV, proclaiming “He could either learn how to fly from the
internet and go on a crime spree or go get a job at McDonalds. I think he made a good decision.” There are support
websites, t-shirts, stickers, and tens of thousands of members in his facebook
fan club. One support
t-shirt says “fly Colton
fly” below a stencil of
his face, another proclaims “momma tried,
momma tried” and yet
another has an image
of billy club wielding
cop chasing a running
Colton with the word
“owned” stamped on
top of the cop. The residents of the Washington islands that are his
stomping ground seem
divided. Some cheered
him on stating roughly
that during hard economic times why not
support a working class
kid who steals from
the islands’ vacation
homes of Seattle’s millionaires. Another proclaimed “I’m glad he’s
sticking it to the cops.”
Other locals wanted to
help the powers that
be by forming a search
party to catch him. Although he has always
had the full support of
his mother who, when
he was still on the run,
even wanted to buy him
a bullet proof vest saying “I don’t care if he wants it or not.
I’m getting him one and he’s going to wear it. Sometimes a
mother has to put her foot down.”
Although the acts of individual rebels like Harris-Moore obviously aren’t enough to spark the social uprising many of us
want, they are nonetheless inspirational. No matter the lack
of revolutionary aims, in fact little is known about Coltons
idea’s, the widespread support for such brazen acts against

the current order should help quiet the critique of those who
say that in the U.S. the time is not ripe for class conflict and
confrontation with the state. Besides, his actions themselves
and the extensive approval so many people have of them
should in the very least embolden our own projects.

Support Colt
Feel free to write to Colt because as his mother Pam Kohler
has said “Now, there’s not a break-in or a theft in the entire
Northwest that the media or law enforcement doesn’t rush to
pin on Colt...
Colt will have to fight
for his freedom against
the full force of the legal system.”
Write Colt at:
Colton HarrisMoore
#83421-004
FDC SeaTac
PO Box 13900
Seattle, WA 98198
Also visit Colt’s Fan
Page at:
coltonharrismoore
fanclub.com
To learn more about
Colt and others like
him you can visit:
amiableoutlaws.
wordpress.com

“Well it’s no lil game....

It’s war!”
FTTP #10//Barefoot Bandit-Pg. 58

Redundancy
Equates
Death
-Marat Rackham

F

or revolutionary struggles, redundancy
equates death. To avoid such an outcome,
participants in struggle must pay the utmost
attention to communicability and personal
rituals. For a brief reflection, participants in
the 2008 St. Paul riot stated that they were
using the event “as a springboard… to manifest such conflict outside of the context of mass mobilizations.” Participants declared that the goal was to “purposefully disrupt the chain of messaging that is embodied in the
protest-media-audience script… Their message was a code
hidden within their form, pressed against the media itself…
having neither deeds to be represented, only representations
themselves to be corrupted.”

to a certain degree we have witnessed the continuation of,
what can only be described as a perpetual image; an identity;
a representation in itself.

In short, this declaration marked a compelling juncture
against revolutionary redundancy in the United States. Preceding discussions were commensurating and there were attempts at addressing revolutionary form and means of communicability. The student occupations, Pandamonium, the
expansion of covert affinity-based actions, etc., could all be
viewed in this vein. Furthermore, the dissemination of contemporary and neglected discourse has generated greater
conversation. However, these actions and discussions have
not managed to expand beyond the milieu, and unfortunately,

Maybe it would help if I began with a story.

These suggestions are hardly new in any sense, but I think it
may be a good time for reflection. A recent article declared
that, “Our theory is as impotent as our action.” I want to
question, amongst other things, the accuracy of this statement. In doing so, I will argue that the current impasse is
not really due to impotence, at least not specifically, but is
rather rooted in a lack of communicability, and what may be
called our rituals of refusal. Without addressing these notions
I think we may keep chasing our tails in the dark, and hopefully a greater discussion will ensue.

Earlier this year, at the NYC anarchist book fair people
were passing out flyers for a “Take Back the Night March.”
There was, noticeably, a bit less excitement about this action
in comparison to the Catastrophe action the previous year;
however, I decided I might as well go check it out regardless. That night I met up with a friend I hadn’t seen in quite
some time, and I ended up arriving a bit late to the action.
While practically running out of the subway station I heard
FTTP #10//Redundancy Equates Death-Pg. 59

the familiar sound of glass shattering,
and immediately got that euphoric feeling that had been absent for quite some
time.
I looked up the street and saw the familiar black clad milieu marching in
the distance. But there was something
a little different this time. The normal
jubilant ambiance was noticeably absent. Instead of donning the mask, that
has become all too familiar as well, I
decided, for the first time in my life, to
actually sit back and observe. As the
black mass neared closer the first thing
I noticed was a somewhat flaccid “Take
Back the Night” chant. The chant was
then obscured by the familiar sound of
glass shattering; but at second glance I
noticed that it was a cheap car that had
just been attacked. Throughout the action, I noticed that onlookers couldn’t
make heads or tails of what they were
witnessing. A young group of guys
walking by, laughing, exclaimed to me,
“These white people are crazy,” with
obvious confusion about what they
were witnessing.
The march, then turned a corner, and
focused attention on attacking, exclusively, parked cars. There were a few
heroes following the march, threatening violence, and a lot of baffled uppermiddle class people who, obviously,
had no idea what they were seeing either. Within minutes, sirens could be
heard approaching, and the “ninjas” as
they were described on local blogs, disappeared into the night.
I write this, not as a condemnation of
the participants or even as a critique in
the typical sense. What I find interesting in this affair was the communicability of the action, and what I believe is
the larger issues at hand. I should also
note that it may not be fair to single
out this particular action, because one
could assume that there have been dozens of other actions that have had a lot
of similar effects and outcomes.
As previously noted, participants in the
2008 St. Paul action stated that they
wanted to use that action as a spring-

board to manifest conflict outside of
mass mobilizations. Since then, we
have seen numerous actions outside of
mass mobilizations; some clearly with
greater success than others. I think the
“Take Back the Night” march could be
viewed in this vein. There was, obviously, no mass mobilization present,
and the participants, marched against
capitalism, patriarchy, and the violence
that enforces gender designations. So,
in effect, there were clearly actions
growing outside of the mass mobilization model. (There, as stated, have been
a multitude of other actions one could
also discuss from different parts of the
country, which were very compelling.)
But what was communicated? The
communiqué said they were “not asking for rights,” they were “demanding something entirely else.” They
marched “to refuse the violence that
continues to force us to be housewives
and fuck-toys and mothers and daddy’s
girls, to refuse to understand women’s
oppression in the private sphere as a
simple cultural or ideological matter.”
So the question is: was this communicated through the action or the form?
I think the answer is a resounding no.
The communiqué states that during the
action a woman asked one of the participants why they are taking such action. Upon getting what could only be
assumed was an inadequate answer to
the questioner, the woman responded,
“Just get drunk and get laid – deal with
it.” While this probably wouldn’t have
been a typical answer to an action dealing with gender violence, it is illustrative of a problem. As an onlooker myself, if I hadn’t known beforehand what
the action was about, I would have been
utterly clueless.
Gilles Dauvé wrote “No act is sufficient
in itself, nor is its meaning so obvious
that it would require no expression at
all.” The notion of the act and its communicability is of utmost importance.
Through the act one shapes the social
terrain into desired or obnoxious forms;
which are never predetermined. But, as
has been stressed time and time again,
what matters here is resonance. For

resonance there needs to be comprehension of what Dauvé defines as “the
nature of the change,” and what I have
defined as the rituals of [our] refusal.
Resonance can be rather easily observed. The reproduction of actions
is one example. In Greece, during the
December insurrection, much has been
made of the fact that people outside of
the milieu began to appropriate actions
that were previously the domain of the
anarchists. In describing the Greek situation one participant in the insurrection
stated:
“It is only in the past few years that we
have succeeded in expanding beyond
the limitations of the anti-police strategy that had characterized our efforts
for 25 years. According to that strategy,
we attack the police, they arrest people,
and we do solidarity actions, over and
over again. It took us 25 years to escape from this routine. Of course, the
anti-police attacks and fights continue,
and the prisoner solidarity movement is
stronger than ever, but the anti-social
element inside the anarchist movement
is under conscious self-control and we
can speak, care, and act for the benefit
of the whole society now, using actions
and plans that can be comprehended
much more clearly by at least a part of
the society.
Many actions, like the attacks on supermarkets and the free distribution of stolen products to the people, became very
popular and well-accepted. The attacks
on banks, especially now following
the economic crisis, are well-accepted
also, and the attacks on police stations
have been adapted and utilized by highschool students around the country.”
I quote this in length not to state that
it is “correct” or “wrong,” but rather to
demonstrate that there are differences
and similarities. What is clear is that
there is resonance. People in Greece
know why attacks are occurring, and
students are adapting the same actions.
That is a far cry from our situation. But,
as stated, it took 25 years for this to occur, and the description of the previous

FTTP #10//Redundancy Equates Death-Pg. 60

routine seems remarkably similar to the American formula.
Attack, arrest, solidarity. The description of the past few
years in Greece is apt as well.
“Over the past few years, anarchists have created a network
of communities, groups, organizations, squats, and social
centers in almost all the major cities in Greece. Many don’t
like each other, as there exist many significant differences
among the groups and individuals. This helps the movement,
though, as the movement now can cover a great variety of
subjects. Many different kinds of people find their comrades
in different anarchist movements and, all together, push each
other—in a positive, if antagonistic, way—to communicate
with society. This communication includes creating neighborhood assemblies, participating in social struggles, and
planning actions that have a meaning for the general society.”
This also is rather familiar. There are many anarchist tendencies in the states today, which are extremely antagonistic to
each other. However, this antagonism has not led to anarchists pushing each other to communicate, rather it has led
to internal squabbles that have not gone anywhere, and are
actually unknown to the vast majority of people. If our discussions are unknown to people who occupy our daily lives
outside of the milieu, and our actions generate essentially
stares of confusion from bystanders, with no discernible
explanation from the participants in revolt, than we should
expect a complete lack of resonance outside of the minority.
Returning back to the “Take Back the Night” march, our rituals of refusal must be addressed as well. In this action, and
many others, while abandoning the context of mass mobilizations and representative mediation, one could argue that
the milieu has sustained the same rituals and social form. The
communiqué coupled with the action enforces this argument.
It states that Take Back the Night has its roots in widespread
social unrest in Italy. The communiqué defines the Italian action as follows:
“In 1976, a seventeen-year-old was gang-raped in Rome. A
year later, when her case went to trial, she was gang-raped
again by the same men: and this time, her whole body was
slashed with razors in an attempt to keep her silent. Within
hours, fifteen thousand women mobilized, uniformly dressed
like the sex workers common to the district; “NO MORE
MOTHERS, WIVES AND DAUGHTERS: LET’S DESTROY
THE FAMILIES!” was the cry heard in the street. They came
just short of burning the neighborhood to the ground.”
The original action was in response to an obscenity, but the
picture painted in the action is profound and effective. In response to widespread rape, and a specific rape case, women
dressed in a specific way to express solidarity and commonality. One could imagine, as an onlooker the message was
conveyed clearly – breaking the normal chains of social

mediation, and still unambiguous. In comparison, during
the 2010 march, we see a group donning the characteristic
black mask with black clothing, with little to or no clarification about the action to, what could have been, supportive
observers; and the result was utter confusion for onlookers.
The clearest expression of the action was the communiqué
released on anarchist sites; not in the streets of the neighborhood and adjacent neighborhoods of the action.
In effect, the same rituals from the mass mobilizations have
been repackaged into different social arenas. Hence, we have
entered a period of revolutionary redundant activity, and as
should be reiterated, this specific march should hardly be the
scapegoat. We can see this from the Asheville action to New
York’s Catastrophe, even though these were all clearly well
meaning attempts at upheaval. So the question remains: why
have our rituals remained enveloped in the same unsatisfactory form?
I suspect that the problem lies in familiarity, self-policing,
and to a degree, subcultural socialization. Anarchists have
become comfortable with conventional modes of attack.
Nothing could be more detrimental. In actuality, creative
actions should be an area where anarchists excel. A brief
glimpse at the striking banners, the poetic communiqués,
imaginative street defense equipment, bloc tactics, and creative street parties demonstrates that anarchists have a remarkable capacity for innovative creative capabilities and
organizational forms. It just seems at this current juncture
there is a deficiency.
If there is one element of the mass mobilization/protest script
that I have always found impressive is the, albeit, brief transformation of the social terrain. Often, with remarkable agility, anti-authoritarians manage to set up a diverse array of
infrastructure, elaborate forms of differing affinity groups
and actions, and a dizzying assortment of forms of artistic
expression. In essence, the cities are transformed very briefly, and then drift back into “normalization.” But if such an
atmosphere can, so often, be created for mass mobilizations,
with such creativity, why do we find such difficulty in altering the model, and importing creativity we have all displayed
elsewhere into different forms, and in fairly more important
social terrains?
Our rituals of refusal from the mass mobilization mode are
still hanging over our heads. Until we look at our ingrained
rituals of refusal, of resistance, and our lack of communicability to others outside of the milieu we are going to keep
marching in circles. Since our form remains almost identical to previous modes, and our actions are done without any
genuine social engagement, then we will continue to be unable to generalize revolt. We must reach for the day when
an action is taken and onlookers don’t question but already
understand.
FTTP #10//Redundancy Equates Death-Pg. 61

Black Bloc
Rioters at the
Toronto G20

Rioters after
L.A. Lakers
Big Win

FTTP #10//Redundancy Equates Death-Pg. 62

Links:
Discover
more on
your Own.

Books
Anything Can Happen
By Fredy Perlman

Web Sites:

These web sites have all
helped us to stay up to
date with insurrectionary
struggles and resistance
across the world.

At Daggers Drawn
Available from Eberhardt Press. LIBCOM
libcom.org
The Theory of the Bloom
By the Invisible Committee
Social War in Greece
Society of the Spectacle
By Guy Debord
The Coming Insurrection
By The Invisible Committee
Grassroots Political
Militants
From “Mute” Magazine

greeceriots.blogspot.com
Our War:
Insurrectionary News
from South America
ourwar.org
Whenua Fenua Enua
Vanua:
Anti-Colonialism
uriohau.blogspot.com
‘Til It Breaks:
Denver Social War
itbreaks.wordpress.com

Bite Back:
Defense of animals.
directaction.info
NAELFPO:
Defense of the earth.
elfpressoffice.org
Intercontinental Cry:
Indigenous struggle
intercontinentalcry.org
Survival International :
For Tribal Peoples
survivalinternational.org
The Anarchist Library
theanarchistlibrary.org
Modesto Anarcho:
modestoanarcho.org

This is Our Job
“Insurrectionary
missives from the
Spanish-speaking
world.”
thisisourjob.wordpress.
com
Bash Back News:
“Not Gay as in happy.
But queer as in fuck
you”.
bashbacknews.
wordpress.com
325:
Insurgent News + Print
325.nostate.net
Social Rupture
socialrupture.blogspot.
com

Fires Never
Extinguished
firesneverextinguished.
blogspot.com
FTTP #10//Links-Pg. 63

Whoever you vote for government wins. Whatever you purchase capitalism
wins. There is a world of possibility that opens up when we seriously confront
the world of restriction that surrounds us now. Coming to terms with this reality is a good start, but until we begin to grasp the totality of what controls
our everyday lives, we will remain lost and confused in the dust of domination.
We are not interested in working with or as part of the system, only against it.

THE
ISSUES
ARE
NOT
THE
ISSUE
With this we will only see potential in strategies that act in defiance with the
methods of change suggested to us and condoned by the politics of the same
system we are trying to destroy and overcome. Our actions must surpass all
laws, show no mercy, and generalize as awesomely as the global order we
are fighting so violently against. We won’t find warmth in this cold world until
those of us discontent with our conditions set it in flames. Until we are questioning and challenging everything that makes up this system, and act accordingly with such realizations, we are questioning and doing nothing at all!

Contempt
Contrary to popular belief:

can also
carry our
ambitions.

We already know that
we own everything—
the task is to exclude
the intrusions of
capital and power.

“Insurrection will never
be the political activity
of revolutionaries, for it
is the criminal activity of
becoming human.”