New York: Action Against the Rapist Pigs of the NYPD

From Anarchist News

Justice is Revenge...

On May 26th, NYPD officers Moreno and Mata were acquitted of raping a woman in her East Village apartment. The cops in this city have a long history of acting with total impunity while unleashing their brutality: rape, torture, and murder on the city all without any serious response from the rest of us. We are not naive enough to believe in the "justice" system that the police are a part of, and furthermore, we were not surprised that Moreno and Mata were acquitted despite overwhelming evidence of their guilt. We, however, were and still are filled with rage.

Inspired by both the rowdy end to Friday's protest of the acquittals, which saw hundreds facing off against the police, briefly blocking the entrance to the Brooklyn bridge, and repeatedly pushing back police attempts to corral protesters onto the sidewalk; we are also extremely encouraged by anti-police actions in Seattle, Oakland, and Denver, and we decided it was time to push back.

Saturday night we converged on the intersection of Bowery and Houston street in Manhattan. The intersection was blocked and held for 15 minutes, fireworks were set off, and hundreds of fliers were thrown into the air while anti-police chants were screamed into the night and dozens more leaflets were distributed to motorists and passersby. Traffic came to a stop as Saturday night revelers gathered to observe the sight of masked people holding a major intersection. Posters bearing photos of Moreno and Mata with "NYPD Rapists" emblazoned on them were simultaneously wheat-pasted on walls throughout the area. Eventually, feeling that our point was made clear, we headed north up Bowery taking the entire street. At this point trash cans and other debris were thrown into the street. A garbage can was also sent through a plate glass window of a Chase Bank before the crowd quickly dispersed into the night. We encountered no police response to our actions and suffered no arrests.

This small, yet successful, action was only a beginning. We have had enough of police terror in this city, the tide is turning.

This action is dedicated, in total solidarity, to Amelia Nicol, currently in jail in Denver, Colorado facing trumped up charges for taking a stand against police terror.

Below is the full text of the flier distributed last night:

Moreno and Mata: Pigs Let Out of Their Sties

We hate to say, that unfortunately, we're not surprised...

After the rape and torture of Abner Louima; the years Officer Wilfredo Rosario spent soliciting sexual favors with the threat of arrest; the sexual attacks made by Officer Frank Wright; the sodomy of Michael Mineo on a Brooklyn subway platform; the mutilated corpses of young women appearing on the shores of Long Island being linked to current and former cops; as well as the countless incidents of police brutality that don't make it to the front pages; one can easily recognize a long history of violence, sexual and otherwise, clearly attributed to New York State's police departments. With this graphic record allowed to speak for itself, the sexual assault committed by Officers Kenneth Moreno and Franklin Mata is nothing less than the pitiful behavior that we have come to expect from the NYPD.

In societies such as ours, the most striking expression of the forces of power and domination are the uniformed police on every corner. To uphold their authority, police are allowed exceptional recourse to violence, and earning a badge, in many instances, means acquiring an open license to rape whomever one pleases. The prevalence of sexual violence by police should not be understood in terms of sex, but is instead, a violent and coercive act motivated by the urge for power and domination. It is only in extreme cases, when police violence exceeds the threshold deemed tolerable by public and legal standards, the Blue Shied is then quickly brandished to absolve all culpability. The swift hand of “justice” at best, confines the police to a sentence of cushy deskwork or a paid exile in their suburban homes. More often, they are simply let out of their sties and back into the streets to reconvene their terror. It need be said: that these observations are not appeals for a fair trial by judge and jury, but rather to implicate the judicial system’s role in this broader cycle of State-institutionalized repression, which was constituted by violence, and can only function by perpetuating it. And while the acquittal of Moreno and Mata left many of us with a stinging sensation from a public slap in the face, an adequate condemnation of their actions must also extend to the entire police, judicial and prison system.

It is true that the State and its servile police uphold the patriarchy, which is decisively shaped by other forms of domination. In this contradictory society, where the property relation unquestionably rules, women are deemed both public and private property. In relation to their fathers and husbands, women are still thought of as possessions. Thus the police, designated solely to guard the rights of property, half-heartedly defend the well-being of women, not as living human beings, but in the same way they would protect a proprietor’s car, house, or any other inanimate and purchasable item. If on the other hand, a woman is thought to have no discernible "owner," then she is considered to be an unclaimed object readily available for use or plunder. With this in mind, we point to the innumerable instances, in which women, most often poor and/or working-class, report having been raped, and the police sardonically reply with the question: "What were you doing walking around in a neighborhood like that, alone?"

The very same State, that condones, justifies, and aptly promotes rape, is given the chance to secure another reprehensible victory, when its said critics fall prey to a limited political vision and confront it with a single issue campaign. We feel the need to reprimand the false opposition, in their various manifestations, for again proving to be astonishingly inept in recent days. On the one hand, we are obliged to mention the noticeable absence of the various anti-police brutality organizations and consider this a clear indication that they have joined the other side. On the other hand, we censure many of the feminist groups in New York City, who talk a big game, always reassuring their comfortable existence within their tiny and insignificant activist circles, yet seem quite happy to give their silent consent to the police's activity by doing little to nothing in response. To reduce the conduct and subsequent acquittals of Moreno and Mata exclusively to a question of violence against women, or to a question about police violence, leads us to a dead-end, always missing our target, which left unscathed, wins again by default.

When more than half the population of living, breathing human beings is inexorably regarded as things, no amount of legislative reform or conclusive judicial rulings can cure the symptoms afflicting an ailing society. In our present situation, we can therefore only rely on popular justice. A justice, in which, there is no room for judge, jury and trial; instead, there exist only the masses and their enemies with no mediating body in between. Furthermore, the masses, when they perceive somebody to be an enemy, and when they decide to punish this enemy, they do not rely on an abstract universal idea of justice, the farce passed off in a court of law, they rely only on their own experience, that of the injuries they have suffered, that of the way in which they have been wronged, in which they have been oppressed; and finally, their decision is not an authoritative one, that is, they are not backed up by a State apparatus which has the power to enforce their decisions, they purely and simply carry them out.

We vehemently cite Stonewall in 1969, Los Angeles in 1992, Cincinnati in 2001, and Oakland in 2009. For justice to finally become a substantive it requires that it take the form of an angry mob; aroused and incensed in the middle of New York City, carrying with it an unmatched fury as it stampedes down city blocks, to then finally descend upon One Police Plaza with a tremendous impact, unleashing a carnage comparable only to the devastating force of a natural disaster.

Justice is Revenge!

- May 28, 2011

Large Crowds Protest Rape Charge Acquittal Of NYPD Cops

From corporate media


NEW YORK -- A crowd of hundreds gathered outside the criminal court in lower Manhattan on Friday evening, [May 27], to protest the acquittal of New York City police officers Kenneth Moreno and Franklin Mata.

The protest was organized by a coalition of women's rights groups, including Permanent Wave and Feministing. The purpose of the demonstration, as stated on the Facebook page for the event, was to urge the New York Police Department to implement comprehensive sexual assault training for new officers, along with other preventative measures that will ensure similar incidents do not happen in the future.

The organizers are giving Police Commissioner Ray Kelly one week to respond to their demands.

"The NYPD are supposed to be stewards of safety, stewards of the law," Michelle Crentsil, a union leader who helped plan the protest, told HuffPost. "It's not just about this case, it's about the entire idea of rape and sexual assault not being taken seriously."

Lori Adelman, of the women's rights group Permanent Wave, said she posted the event on Facebook the day before. Within 24 hours, the page had over 1,500 attendees.

"New Yorkers deserve to feel safe, and this verdict clearly showed that we have no reason to feel safe in this city," Adelman said at the protest.

The officers were acquitted of the rape charges on Thursday, but were convicted of three counts of "official misconduct." They were fired from the force the same day.

Moreno, 43 years old, and Mata, 29, were called to help a drunken woman climb out of a taxi in 2008. The woman testified that she awoke to being raped by Moreno. Officer Mata was said to have stood guard during the incident.

Moreno was recorded assuring the woman that she "didn't have to worry about getting any diseases" because he "used a condom," but Moreno later claimed that he said that to get her to leave him alone.

Mata and Moreno will be sentenced by the State Supreme Court on June 28. They each face up to two years behind bars due to the official misconduct convictions. Had they been found guilty of rape, the pair could have been in jail for up to 25 years.

Two New York City Police Officers Acquitted of Rape

From corporate media.

A jury acquitted two New York police officers on Thursday of charges that they raped a drunken woman after helping her into her apartment while on patrol.

The woman had described snippets of a harrowing night in which the officers, called to help her because she was extremely intoxicated, instead abused her. They insisted no rape occurred, with one allowing only that he snuggled with her while she wore nothing but a bra.

The verdict brings to an end a criminal case that drew outrage across the city when the officers were indicted in 2009, and provides some measure of vindication for the officers, Kenneth Moreno and Franklin Mata.

The officers were convicted of three counts of official misconduct for entering the woman’s apartment, but the jury found them not guilty of all other charges, including burglary and falsifying business records. The Police Department said the officers were fired Thursday.

For Cyrus R. Vance Jr., the Manhattan district attorney, the verdict was an unsatisfying conclusion. The decision, after a trial that lasted almost two months, also comes at a critical juncture for an office that is navigating the biggest case of Mr. Vance’s brief tenure: the sexual-assault charges against Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the former managing director of the International Monetary Fund.

The jury’s decision also underscores the difficulty of obtaining favorable results for women who say they were sexually assaulted, and who often are subjected to scrutiny and skepticism that keep many of them from speaking out. In this case, defense lawyers pounced on the credibility of the woman because she was very drunk on the night in question and did not remember many details.

After the verdict, Officer Moreno said outside the courthouse that his accuser, who has a $57 million lawsuit pending against the city and the officers, was “mistaken and confused,” and that “she made the whole thing up.”

But the officer, who appeared tense and tight-faced, also said he was not angry.

“I’m glad it’s over,” he said. “It’s a lesson and a win.”

When a reporter asked Officer Moreno what he meant by lesson, his lawyer, Joseph Tacopina, interjected, saying, “Well, we’ll just leave it at that.”

Both officers could face up to a year in jail on each count when they are sentenced on June 28 before Justice Gregory Carro of State Supreme Court in Manhattan.

The case presented a formidable challenge for prosecutors: there was no DNA evidence suggesting that either officer had committed a sexual act.

The jurors, who reached their verdict on their seventh day of deliberations, left the courthouse without commenting, and most reached for comment later declined to do so.

One juror, Richard Schimenti, said there was not enough evidence to prove that a rape had occurred.

“I did think that they might have had sex, but that doesn’t mean that they did have sex,” he said. “There is nothing to substantiate this. There’s no DNA, there’s no proof in any way that they had sex.”

Mr. Schimenti said he believed the prosecution was hampered by the accuser’s memory loss.

“It was very hard to make a leap to charge people with rape when the principal person in the trial didn’t remember so many things,” he said.

As the verdict was read, Officer Mata looked straight ahead, while Officer Moreno cast his eyes downward, placing his fingertips on his lips.

After the verdict was delivered, Officer Moreno’s mother, Aida Moreno-Ruiz, called a relative from her cellphone. “Hey, Freddy,” she said. “It’s over. It’s over. Not guilty.”

She said in an interview that she knew her son was “not capable of doing something so ugly.”

“Thank God it’s over and the truth came out,” she said.

Mr. Tacopina, who tried the case along with Chad Seigel and Officer Mata’s lawyer, Edward J. Mandery, called it one of his biggest victories.

“These guys were publicly presumed guilty more so than any other case I’ve been involved in,” Mr. Tacopina said in an interview. “These guys were called ‘rape cops’ before the trial even started.”

While many people thought a conviction would be a formality, Mr. Tacopina added, “I believed in this guy and we believed in these guys since Day 1.”

Nonetheless, the police commissioner, Raymond W. Kelly, said Thursday that the officers would be fired immediately. (They had been suspended with pay.)

“The guilty verdicts involved violations of the officers’ oaths of office and, as a result, warrant immediate termination,” Mr. Kelly said.

More than 35 witnesses testified at the trial, which was highlighted by combative, dramatic cross-examination between Coleen Balbert, an assistant district attorney, and the officers.

Prosecutors had accused Officer Mata, 29, of standing guard while Officer Moreno had sex with the woman. She was so sick that the officers should have called an ambulance, prosecutors said, while the defense argued that the woman, though drunk, was walking and talking.

After initially helping the woman into her apartment, the officers were captured by surveillance cameras as they re-entered the woman’s East Village building three times.

Officer Moreno, 43, testified that he was a recovering alcoholic and had developed a rapport with the woman that night, when she confided in him that her friends were angry at her because she drank too much. The two flirted, he sang Bon Jovi’s “Livin’ on a Prayer” to her and she actually came onto him, wearing nothing but a bra, he said. He testified that he kissed the woman on the forehead and snuggled with her in her bed, but insisted they did not have sex.

But the woman, now 29 and living in California, told a much different story of what happened on that night in December 2008.

The woman, who was drinking heavily at a Brooklyn bar to celebrate a job promotion, conceded that she had blacked out many details of the evening, although she insisted she did not have a drinking problem. Still, she testified to vivid memories of hearing police radios crackling and Velcro tearing open, of feeling her tights being rolled down, and then of being penetrated as she lay dazed, face down on her bed.

Susan Xenarios, director of the Crime Victims Treatment Center at St. Luke’s-Roosevelt Hospital Center, said she was unhappy but not surprised by the verdict. She said she felt that the jurors placed some responsibility for what happened on the woman, a common hurdle in rape cases.

“I know that these cases are so” complicated, said Ms. Xenarios, who has worked with rape victims for about four decades. “Because of her incapacitation, it just made everything so much more complicated.”

Pamphlet from Seattle: Against the Police and the Prison World They Maintain

From Puget Sound Anarchists
 
Download the imposed pdf for printing and readable pdf for computer reading.



Preface

The police—agents of social control and pacification, army of the rich, the long arm of law and order whose purpose is to instill fear and submission—are fundamentally enemies of any individual who wants to escape from predetermined roles and live a life of freedom and creative-destruction. Cops literally put people in cages; they also convince many to live in cages of their own, made out of fear. As such, an attack (quite different from a military operation) against the police is an essential part of the destruction of a world that is imposed upon us.

“... permanent conflictuality (a constant and effective struggle towards the aims that are decided upon, not sporadic occasional interventions); ... attack (the refusal of compromise, mediation or accommodation that questions the attack on the chosen objective).
 “As far as aims are concerned, these are decided upon and realized through attacks upon the repressive, military and productive structures, etc. The importance of permanent conflictuality and attack is fundamental.” - O.V., “Autonomous Base Nuclei”

It is beyond the scope of this introduction to delve any deeper into the historical context of the anti-police activity in early 2011 than a cursory review of the events of 2010 in the Pacific Northwest. The spring of that year saw an uprsurge in anti-police activity that was largely organized by anarchists in west coast cities, significantly inspired by the Greek insurrection in December 2008 and the periodic anti-police activity in Oakland California through 2009 and 2010 (the Oscar Grant Rebellions). The city of Portland saw several conflictual demonstrations and well-coordinated attacks on police property, while in Olympia, Tacoma, and Seattle a variety of activity from demonstrations, graffiti, wheatpasting, counter-informational leafletting, jail noise demos, and clandestine attacks contributed to the practice of permanent conflictuality that is an important wager in the insurrectional process when struggle is relatively isolated (as it has often been in the United States in recent memory). The motivation for a practice of permanent conflictuality is not based in the adherence to a program, however, but emerges rather from individuals’ own refusal to wait for a generalized struggle before attacking state and capitalist infrastructure.

In the fall of 2010, the police execution of John T. Williams sparked general outrage in Seattle. The public (re)emergence of anti-police struggle had certain limits from the beginning, as all specific struggles do, simultaneously with and in contradiction to their insurrectional potential. The pattern is far from unique and cannot be overstated. The movement was, from its birth, focused on one particular victim, one specific “bad cop” who had gone beyond “acceptable use of force,” and at the same time the particular instance illuminated a generalized rage toward the police and their social role that is ever-present and, if unleashed, is the very fuel of an insurrectional process that attacks and destroys the state and capitalism. The various leaders who organized the movement, despite their political differences, all sought throughout to contain and limit anti-police sentiment and prevent the generalization of the struggle, the expansion of analysis, and the diversification of tactics. It was in this emerging struggle, in spite of its limited scope, that certain anarchists in the Puget Sound positioned themselves to intervene and unleash a common rage——unwilling to ignore the struggle as reformist and wait for something more total, not satisfied to accept the limits out of deference to the “movement,” and not seeking to act as its vanguard element.

“Riots, uprisings and insurrections are not generally inspired by grand ideas, utopian dreams or total theoretical critiques of the social order. Often the spark that sets them off is quite banal: economic instability, bad working conditions, betrayal by those who claim to represent one’s rights, police brutality. These seemingly minor details spark revolt when rage combines with a distrust in both the ruling and oppositional institutions. This fact calls for anarchists to avoid an ideological purity that calls for participation only in total struggles. It also calls for the a keen theoretical development capable of immediately understanding specific situations in terms of the totality of domination, exploitation and alienation, and at the same time capable of making a practical application of this theory. This requires a willingness to constantly examine the developing realities around us, making connections that show the necessity for a revolutionary rupture, while at the same time singling out appropriate areas for intervention and appropriate targets for attack.” - Wolfi Landstreicher, “Autonomous Self-Organization and Anarchist Intervention”

The communiques that follow (everything from texts of leaflets distributed in the streets to call-outs for demonstrations, report-backs and summaries of mass actions, communiques from attacks on police property, and more) represent ideas and actions that mostly followed the general trajectory that we outlined above (of permanent conflictuality and anarchist intervention), while also expressing ideas on a variety of subjects from revenge and solidarity to counter-insurgency and methods of attack.

We believe that the events that are documented in this pamplet, far from having importance for what they accomplished, should act as a source of inspiration and also a reminder of the possibility to engage in struggle in every moment and in every place, no matter how pacified the struggle against state and capital may be——a constant wager not to be overlooked or dismissed. In other words, the events of January to March 2011 in the Pacific Northwest are exemplary within the trajectory of constant war, which is far from over and of which these events are but a tiny drop within a tsunami of rage and destruction against the world of law and order, of work and misery.

Seattle, WA
May, 2011