Latest Breaking News

Judi Lynn

(160,530 posts) Sat Jun 6, 2020, 06:17 AM Jun 2020

'Kettling' of Peaceful Protesters Shows Aggressive Shift by N.Y. Police

Source: New York Times

Ali Watkins 10 hrs ago

It was about 8:45 p.m. in Brooklyn on Wednesday, 45 minutes past the city’s curfew, when a peaceful protest march encountered a line of riot police, near Cadman Plaza.

Hundreds of demonstrators stood there for 10 minutes, chanting, arms raised, until their leaders decided to turn the group around and leave the area.

What they had not seen was that riot police had flooded the plaza behind them, engaging in a law enforcement tactic called kettling, which involves encircling protesters so that they have no way to exit from a park, city block or other public space, and then charging them and making arrests.

For the next 20 minutes in Downtown Brooklyn, officers swinging batons turned a demonstration that had been largely peaceful into a scene of chaos.

Read more: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/kettling-of-peaceful-protesters-shows-aggressive-shift-by-ny-police/ar-BB15678t?li=BBnb7Kz

What Is Kettling?
This controversial police tactic is appearing in cities across the United States.

BY COLIN GROUNDWATER

June 5, 2020

On Tuesday evening, as a large group of peaceful protesters marched over the Manhattan Bridge, members of the New York Police Department parked on opposite ends of the span, trapping 5,000 people over the water for nearly an hour. The night before, in Dallas, police officers corralled protesters on the Margaret Hunt Hill Bridge before arresting 674 of them (they were released later that night, with ‘at-large charges’ for ‘blocking traffic’). That same night in Washington, D.C., police officers drove protesters into a crowded intersection of Swann and 15th NW with teargas. All over the country this week, police officers have surrounded protesters—and then refused to let them leave.

This tactic is called kettling, a word you might have seen popping up in social media posts from and about the protests. The term evokes a boiling tea kettle, but it actually comes from a German military term referring to an army that’s completely surrounded by a much larger force. “Kettling is a law enforcement tactic specifically applied when the police have chosen to criminalize existence in public spaces,” says Blake Strode, Executive Director of ArchCity Defenders, a legal advocacy group that has handled kettling cases in St. Louis. “So separate and apart from who is caught in them and how people are impacted, which is all true and well-stated, it is also fundamentally about police dictating whom is allowed to be where and when.”

Ostensibly a form of riot control, kettling occurs when police officers block off streets and push people into confined areas, like a city block or a bridge. While protest and riot management traditionally focuses on dispersing crowds, kettling is all about containment. When you’re kettled, you have no access to bathrooms, very little space, and no place to go. Critically, no one gets to leave until the police say so. “Basically, it’s a pressure cooker without a valve,” said civil rights attorney Javad Khazaeli, ArchCity Defenders’ co-counsel on kettling cases.

In theory, the technique allows police officers to slowly release small groups out the kettle as a way of defusing tension. In practice, however, it’s deeply problematic. “You’re interfering with people’s right and ability to do what the first amendment protects, which is to go out in the street and tell the government what you think,” says Jonathan Smith, Executive Director of the Washington Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights and Urban Affairs. “It also punishes the innocent for the misconduct of the few. That is also constitutionally infirm. To seize somebody, under the fourth amendment, you need to have a basis for doing so.” But when kettling happens, large swathes of people are grouped together indiscriminately.

More:
https://www.gq.com/story/what-is-kettling

~ ~ ~

Live Protest Updates: Cops Kettle Protesters Then Begin Aggressively Arresting Them At Bronx March
BY ELIZABETH KIM, CHRISTOPHER ROBBINS, BEN YAKAS, JAKE OFFENHARTZ, GWYNNE HOGAN, WNYCAND NICK PINTO
JUNE 4, 2020 10:10 P.M. • 419 COMMENTS • 10 PHOTOS

11 p.m. After more tense standoffs with police, most of the protesters have begun to disperse around the city. "[Cops] whacked a few people, mostly shoving," reporter Nick Pinto said of the scene near Fort Greene around 10:30 p.m. Thursday night. Police officers kettled protesters onto Washington Avenue at one point; he was also hit by an officer and thrown into a pile of trash. "It looked for a long minute like there was going to be a bloodbath, then cops struck a deal to let everyone out 20 at a time."

Link to tweet

Public Advocate Jumaane Williams and Council Member Brad Lander were both at the scene, and were able to negotiate with cops to allow people to leave. "We were marching with the protesters," said Williams. "They were in the street, being nonviolent for a few hours. It was beautiful to see...then all of a sudden we saw a massive crowd of cops come in [with] forceful aggression."

"At first, it was really scary," Lander added, saying cops came out from both sides very aggressively. "An inspector that we know said, 'Is there a way we can do this without arresting folks?' And we said there is—let folks march. Yes it's after curfew, and yes we're in the street, but it is worth letting people express themselves. After a pretty intense standoff, they said okay. By the time they said okay, the marchers themselves said, 'let's keep it peaceful tonight, let's go home and come back tomorrow.'"

More:
https://gothamist.com/news/live-protest-updates-june-4