Challenging a Militarized Police State in the U.S.
Challenging a Militarized Police State in the U.S.
Escrito por Kent Paterson | 7 / May / 2014
When the Albuquerque Police Department (APD) and other law enforcement agencies cracked down on protestors March 30, 2014, the city’s finest rolled out a military-style force.
Chanting “No Justice, No Peace,” the revved-up marchers were protesting the March 16 shooting death of homeless camper James Boyd, a man with mental health problems, and more than a dozen other men since 2010, many of whom also reportedly suffered from mental illness.
As the evening progressed, the police reacted in front of the University of New Mexico (UNM). Equipped with gas masks, body armor, batons and automatic rifles, they deployed officers on horseback, a SWAT Team and a pair of armored vehicles. After confronting shouting protestors, the APD released tear gas, which seeped into campus dormitories.
March 30 wasn’t the first time that local cops forcibly broke up a militant if largely peaceful demonstration. In October 2011, police dismantled the local manifestation of Occupy Wall Street, while in March 2003, APD cops mounted on horseback charged at anti-Iraq war protestors and fired tear gas that drifted across a UNM-area neighborhood and into homes.
While such police actions in New Mexico and the United States are nothing new, the country’s law enforcement apparatus keeps sharpening its technological edge and finessing force deployment capabilities.
More:
http://www.cipamericas.org/archives/11967
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