Month: August 2020

Victims’ Blood on Beaverton’s Hands

F.I. GoldhaberLeave a comment

People who live in smaller communities might think police violence and brutality are limited to the “Big City”. They read about Black people being murdered during traffic stops and erroneously believe it could never happen in their community because the cops in their cities and towns are neighbors, friends, families, etc.

But, in reality when cops leave or are removed from any police force (usually only for the most egregious transgression such as murder), they don’t stop being cops. Many went into the police academy straight out of the military and know no other way of life. Often they are racist bullies who don’t believe the laws they enforce apply to them. They aren’t suited for employment elsewhere.

So, they take a job as a cop in those smaller towns and cities. Because in most states they’re allowed to hide their personnel records – including any reports of or discipline resulting from beating, stalking, harassing, raping, and murdering people – the community they move into may have no knowledge of their criminal records.

In March 2004, Jason Sery, then a Portland Police Officer, shot and killed an unarmed 28-year-old Black man after pulling him over for allegedly failing to correctly signal a turn. Less than four years later, Sery was hired by the Beaverton Police Department where he is now a training officer.

When he hired Sery, then Beaverton Police Chief David Bishop said: “We completed an extensive background investigation before Officer Sery was hired. Based on the background investigation, we determined Officer Sery had been cleared.”

Police are always cleared “of any wrongdoing”. Sery was “cleared” despite multiple inconsistencies in his story about the traffic stop that led up to the shooting, despite the fact that the victim was tortured after he was shot, and despite the fact that Sery and his partner put handcuffs on a man who no longer had a pulse and did not render medical aid.

One of the reasons the grand jury found “insufficient evidence to hold anyone criminally liable”, was the fact that Sery successfully sued the city of Portland to prevent a public inquest before the grand jury met so the grand jury didn’t have access to all of the incriminating evidence against him.

That’s how the system works. Police are never held accountable for any crimes, “from the smallest infraction to flagrant disregard for human life and safety“.

Jason Sery lives in Beaverton and is active in a Beaverton Church. He’s been named “Officer of the Year.” Beaverton City Councilors Cate Arnold, Laura Mitchell, and Mark Fagin have all expressed their support for Jason Sery and are defending his position on the Beaverton Police Department, despite community demands for his removal and the fact that the state of Oregon finds his position as a training officer problematic.

HB 4207, which directs the Oregon Department of Public Safety Standards and Training to establish a public, statewide, online database of suspensions and revocations of certifications of police officers, was signed by the governor after 26 (of 30) members of the House of Representatives and 54 (of 60) Senators voted in favor of it.

HB 4207 specifically names Jason Sery as one of the reasons the bill is needed.

“Whereas Officer Jason Sery of the Portland Police Bureau shot and killed James Jahar Perez during a routine traffic stop over a missed turn signal; and

“Whereas Officer Sery resigned from the Portland Police Bureau and now works to train officers with the Beaverton Police Department; and

“Whereas abuses like this cause irreparable loss of public trust and confidence in the ability of law enforcement to be fair and unbiased …”

Even if you thought cops on smaller police force were “good guys”, that they’re your neighbors, friends, etc., remember it only takes one bad apple to spoil an entire barrel. And the fact that the BPD hired a murderer and put him in a position where he’s training other cops is one of the stated reason HB 4207 was passed by the Oregon Legislature.

Jason Sery is a murderer. His uniform/badge and his white skin protected him from prison. Now, he is training other Beaverton cops on how to get away with murder. Maybe not explicitly, but implicitly.

If Jason Sery is not removed from the BPD, the blood of his future victims (and there will be victims in the future, every cop you read about who has murdered a civilian and gotten away with it has other victims) will be on the hands of the Beaverton City Government. But it’s those victims, their families, and the other citizens of Beaverton who will pay the price.

Bioweaponizing a Pandemic

F.I. Goldhaber3 Comments

Portland Police (and federal gestapo) are bioweaponizing the pandemic, rioting, and radicalizing Portlanders.

First, police refuse to wear masks. Almost all the protesters do and they will ask anyone who shows up to protest without a mask to either put one on or leave. (If you see a group of “protesters” not wearing masks those would be the white supremacist groups who come down from Washington to support the cops.)

The cops often pull the protesters masks off to mace them, arrest them (taking them to a jail that employees also refuses to wear masks), etc.

The cops are also filling the streets with tear gas (a war crime if they were doing it in another country) which makes people cough and gasp for breath … during a pandemic.

Second, the only rioting that has taken place, the only people who make people scared to be living in Portland, are the out-of-control, violent, law-breaking bullies of the Portland Police Department (most of whom reside out of town and don’t have to live with the consequences of their illegal actions). They routinely violate state laws, city ordinances, their own policies, and court orders. This is all documented.

Don’t believe anything you read in the (controlled by out-of-town corporate interests) mainstream media about the Portland protests. They’re mostly reiterating lies perpetuated by the real criminals — the cops.

Third, the cops have done more to radicalize Portlanders who have either gone in person to see their criminal behavior or watched the videos produced by independent journalists risking injury, (illegal) arrest, permanent disability, and death to report what’s actually going on. People who used to talk about police reform or a “few bad apples” have come to understand that you can’t reform an institution that grew out of slave patrols, that there are no “good apples”, that we must abolish the police and start over.

Federal Troops “Removed” from Portland

F.I. Goldhaber2 Comments

I sent my monthly newsletter out this morning (you get kitty pics if you subscribe) and several recipients responded with questions along the lines of: were the Federal troops removed from Portland? Das Fuhrer (okay, that’s my moniker for him) is threatening to send them to my city and make things here much worse.

The answer is yes, no, and it doesn’t really matter.

Yes: the governor and the mayor made a big show of “negotiating” (Why would you “negotiate” with a dictator illegally using an armed force created under a piece of probably, but never-tested, unconstitutional legislation as his own, personal police?) to get the Feds “out” of Portland.

No: Although they haven’t come out and attacked protesters recently, we know at least 120 Feds are still stationed in the Portland area (although we don’t know precisely where) and they’re still kidnaping people off the streets in unmarked rental vehicle (boycott Enterprise).

It doesn’t really matter: Why? Because for five weeks before the Feds got here and ever since they “left”, the Portland Police have beaten, gassed, shot “less-than-lethal” bullets at protesters, and violently “arrested” them.

The only real differences is a) the Portland Police are required to “declare a riot” before they start shooting (something they never did before the temporary restraining order, something they do without any justification every since). Sometimes they remember to do so beforehand. Sometimes, like last night, they do it mid volley.

And b) the Feds seemed to have more tear gas to use, so they filled city streets, the parks, and nearby buildings with what was an horrific amount compared to what the cops use.

It should be noted, we do not know the long-term impact of being attacked with tear gas every night, although we do know that female-bodied persons have had their menstrual cycles screwed up.

Also, both the Feds and the cops are using expired munitions — protesters and reporters have found canisters with expiration dates that passed as long ago as 20 years ago — and we don’t know what the impact of those are, although we do know that expired CS gas produces cyanide gas, among other things.

We also do not know what the long-term environmental impact of prolonged tear gas exposure for trees, other plants, and the river will be.

But, every single thing the national media reported, and local elected officials berated, the Feds for doing, the local cops had been doing for weeks before the Feds got here and are still doing nightly, now. Haven’t heard a peep out of the elected officials (including the mayor, to whom the cops report, who made a big deal about showing up when the Feds were here and hasn’t been seen since). National media (and many of the white protesters) went home.

But the protests against police violence are still met with police brutality. (Again, it should be noted that on those few nights the police stay inside there is no violence. There is no riot, because the only rioting that’s been done in Portland has been police and Feds violently attacking protesters who are practicing their First Amendment right “to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”

But the reason the protesters took to the streets (some Black, Indigenous, and Latiné protesters as early as 72 days ago), the reasons there are hundreds, sometimes thousands, of them in the streets every night, haven’t changed. Police routinely lie, violate the law, and ignore court-ordered restrictions, their own policies, and the demands of elected officials to whom they allegedly report. I saw at least three restraining orders, specific orders from an elected official, and several state laws broken by police just last night. (And, that was only one night’s observation, this happens every time the police venture out into the street.)

Cops break the law and any attempts to restrict or reform them with impunity because they have “qualified immunity” and will never face any consequences and because their “union” aka, in this case, the Portland Police Association (a private organization the headquarters of which the police attacked protesters to “protect” last night), will get them their jobs and pay back. They can’t even be bothered to obey orders to wear masks and we know there are infected employees of the Portland Police and Multnomah County carceral system (we just don’t know how many). If you watch the protests you’ll see most of the protesters wearing face coverings. Almost none of the cops do (their riot face shields do not protect against virus transmission).

And, if you think this isn’t already happening in your city, you’re either consuming the wrong media or aren’t blessed with the brave, independent journalists who risk injury, death, and arrest every night to report the truth about what’s happening in the streets of Portland. Because every report you read from Portland that was not written by one of those local journalists, was at best inaccurate and at worst outright copaganda.

The media in this country are owned (yes, even your “local” newspaper and television stations, look it up) by megacorps who benefit from GOP tax cuts and who are part of the cabal behind the Astroturf movement to “reopen” the U.S. They slant stories to meet their own agendas. And they won’t pay for journalists to do actual reporting so they regurgitate the lies that fill self-serving police press releases.

Many of our local journalists are working for tips (portlandpresscorps.com points you to where they can be tipped, but also to their Twitter handles so you can see some of the reports/video they’re producing). Reports that originated from other so-called “local” media (the local television stations and the Oregonian, specifically) are suspect.

Although Portland features prominently, you can probably find at least one example of police brutality where you live on this Twitter thread.

The first weekend of nationwide protests against the police who murdered George Floyd, T. Greg Doucette, a #NeverTrump 2A conservative who is also an attorney, posted 10 links to police violence videos of the most brutal incidents captured during the first 36 hours. But people kept sending them to him. So he kept posting them. And numbering them. Currently, there are more than 800 separate (he groups video from the same incident under the same number) reports of police brutality posted from just the United States, just the people who know to send the videos to him, just the most violent and egregious occurrences.

And, if you’re foolish enough to come on my blog and make noises about protester violence, you and your comments will be blocked for disseminating false information. Vandalism, including graffiti and pulling down monuments to white supremacy, is not violence. Throwing a water bottle in the general direction of police, is not violence (although the video of the Fed pretending to be injured by one that didn’t hit him is hilarious).

“We came out here dressed in T-shirts and twirling Hula-Hoops and stuff, and they started gassing us, so we came back with respirators, and they started shooting us, so we came back with vests, and they started aiming for the
head, so we started wearing helmets, and now they call us terrorists. Who’s escalating this? It’s not us.” — Mac Smiff, Portland, Oregon

Shooting people in the head, beating them with batons, hitting them with tear gas canisters fired at close range, is violence. Throwing them to the ground and kneeling on their neck is violence (and yes, at the protests against police brutality inspired by a man strangled to death by a cop kneeling on his neck, cops are horrifically brutal and have knelt on peoples’ necks). Pulling people’s masks and goggles off to spray mace in their face is violence. Throwing people in jail overnight in the middle of a pandemic when correction officers refuse to obey the governor’s orders regarding sanitation, knowing the bogus charges are going to be tossed, is violence. Lasers do not “blind” people. “Less-than-lethal” bullets fired directly at peoples’ heads blind people and have cost more than one reporter an eye.

Cops lie. They’re trained to lie. They are legally allowed to lie under some circumstances. And they do so by default. On Monday night, the cops claimed someone threw a “glass bottle” and used it as an excuse to violently attack protesters. But half a dozen independent journalists were streaming. At least three of those journalists, knowing that the “bottle” would be used as an excuse, made a point of asking everyone if anyone had seen anything thrown at the cops before the cops attacked. The only thing that had been thrown at the cops was an inflated pink pig and the only thing that hit was their egos.

Again, this is just one specific example of the constant lies being told by police. Every night, I watch the video. And in the morning, I see the police chief and his minions (and the mayor) lie about what happened. Every .Single. Night

“In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act.” — George Orwell 1984