Liberty Square is free! Thanks to the awesome work of our legal allies at the National Lawyers Guild (NLG) and the New York Civil Liberties Union (NYCLU) the NYPD, AKA Bloomberg’s Army, was forced to take down their barricades around Liberty Square. Since the eviction the park was fortressed off with barricades like a prison with two checkpoints at the North and South sides. Having the barricades gone was awesome. The People’s Library set up shop again. We had an awesome meal together (sorry no video of that because I was eating!) and had an awesome General Assembly. It was an awesome night. Lots of hugs and love despite repeated attempts by the NYPD to stir something up.
Later that night some folks lay in the park and the NYPD arrested them. Not sure what the total numbers were at this point. But, yes, American citizens were arrested for laying down in a public park. Some were also arrested for sitting. Apparently when you sit in a park, the Terrorists win.
Great. I was there on Monday, after my trial for an OWS mass arrest got delayed, hanging out in the barricaded park with a few others, talking to people a bit as they went by, reminding them that OWS is still here, even if it’s not in the park as much as it used to be.
What are you charged with? Were you released on OR or are you on bail?
I was arrested a while ago, they gave us desk appearance tickets, so we came back for an arraignment, then our trial on January 9, and then they delayed the trial to April. It was the first mass arrest, back on September 24, and now they’re “consolidating” the cases so that we’ll be tried as a few separate groups rather than individuals. I wish my case had been dismissed, like some of them were, but I’m still hopeful I’ll win and the arrest was illegal, I think.
Is NLG defending you? They’re really savvy about this kind of thing.
Yeah, they’re great.
When I was helping organize big anti- Iraq war protests in LA, NLG did a lot of the heavy negotiating with the city and LAPD on permits, etc. Unsung heroes of the movement(s).