A member of the Chicago Police Department (identified as Osborn) is held back by a fellow officer while confronting Occupy Chicago livestreamer Keilah Becker during the solidarity march with Oakland on Sunday, January 29. (Photo: Timmy Caldwell, Creative Commons)
By Joe Macaré
Occupy movements marched and took part in solidarity actions across the United States on Sunday night, responding to the treatment of protesters by the Oakland Police Department the day before.
In Chicago, occupiers gathered at their original “HQ” at LaSalle and Jackson around 7 p.m. and set off on a fast-moving march initially around the Loop. In addition to some of the signs and banners regularly seen at Occupy Chicago actions, there were more hastily assembled signs professing support for Occupy Oakland and opposition to police violence. Likewise, the chants included “the Occupation stands with Oakland!” and even Bay Area lingo: “The system / Has got to die / Hella hella Occupy!”
The relatively low number of marchers (peaking at fewer than a hundred) enabled Occupy Chicago to make sudden changes of direction and lead an initially small Chicago Police Department (CPD) escort on quite the merry dance around the Loop. Occasionally the march drifted from the sidewalk into the street, although initially this only took place on sidestreets with no traffic.
Micah Philbrook, a member of OChi’s Press Committee, says the decision to move from sidewalk to street was spontaneous. He explains: “The tactic of taking the streets is often used to show the reactionary police where the real power lies: with the people.”
Philbrook says that the CPD were initially “unimpressed” but low key, “calmly asking us to get back on the sidewalk.” Relations with the police became tenser, however, after the marchers crossed north of the Chicago River, headed up the Magnificent Mile, and stopped single lanes of traffic on both Michigan Avenue and later State Street. According to Philbrook:
As the march progressed, clearly having no planned route or direction, and clearly not heeding their requests to leave the streets, [the police’s] aggressive behavior erupted. They began to forcefully push and shove peaceful protesters in an effort to get them off the street.
Another protester, Keilah Becker, says she was subjected to aggressive treatment by an Officer Osborn (spelling and rank unconfirmed). She described the incident:
The cop came up behind me, grabbed me by the arm and pushed me onto the sidewalk. I yelled at him, “You can’t touch me, get your hands off me,” to which he responded by pushing me onto a trashcan and starting to yell at me. I can’t remember what he was saying except that he told me, “Shut up, bitch!” I continued to tell him to get off me and that I didn’t do anything wrong. People surrounded him and were yelling “SHAME.” Another officer came up to him and told him to stop and grabbed him. He finally let go of me. I was streaming all of this.
A member of the OChi Social Media Committee, Becker regularly livestreams Occupy Chicago actions and General Assemblies. Arguably even more troubling than the incident in which she was allegedly shoved and subject to sexist verbal abuse is what happened after she asked for the officer in question’s badge number and name:
During this conversation, which I was streaming, a man … told Osborn “Leave her alone!” There was an altercation between the man (Anthony) and Osborn. Osborn shoved Anthony and proceeded to arrest him. I was streaming all of this and then my phone was taken from me. A woman officer grabbed my phone and turned off the stream. She deleted the footage and told me I could not record officers and that it was a class 4 felony.
Becker says she has the badge number of the officer and plans to make a complaint. She is specifically concerned with “bringing attention to the ridiculousness of that law”—the Illinois Eavesdropping Act, regarded as “the most restrictive in the country” and already challenged by the ACLU.
The CPD response may in part be due to details of local policing: By crossing the Chicago River, OChi moved from the 1st District under Commander Christopher J. Kennedy, to Commander Kenneth Angarone’s 18th District. Becker believes this may in part explain why the situation became more aggravated: “The cops wanted us out of the streets in this district.”
But the new level of tension between OChi and the CPD is a reflection of time as well as location. According to Occupy Chicago’s Bunny, a CPD officer asked her “What happened to you guys? You used to be so orderly.”
She posted the following to her @divebunny13 Twitter by way of response (compiled and stripped of hashtags by me, but otherwise intact). It amounts to a brief history of Occupy Chicago, as well as hinting at the future:
You know what happened? We were orderly and you still hassled us daily on the sidewalks. We were orderly and you still took our drums, our food carts, our supplies. We were orderly and you still arrested over 300 of us for trying to assert our rights to peacefully assemble. We were orderly and Mayor 1% still pushed through the Sit Down and Shut Up laws that further stripped our civil rights.
Being orderly has left us colder, hungrier, and angrier than before. So fuck being orderly. You can’t arrest an idea.
And apparently, it takes less than 100 of us to shut down Michigan Ave AND State Street. What are you gonna do when there are thousands?
You should have expected us.
I was a witness to all of this. The shoving, verbal abuse of the woman, needless arrest and MOST OF ALL the confiscation of the phone/deletion of the evidence were most definitely the most disturbing parts. It’s always interesting to see what the police do whenever they feel provoked… Many of the police tactics were illegal as well- it was almost a standoff of who can break the most rules until one force caves. But I suppose that is yet another good reason why these protests need to happen- to test power and show where it needs to be strengthened. The police are tripping over themselves still, while trying to find a way to deal with the occupiers. When will the government see that oppressive tactics do not work when coming to protestors? It’s only a matter of time i suppose…
I have never watched a livestream before, but I just happened to find that stream when I checked the occupychi.org website to see what’s been going on.
I saw the events transpire. There was no video when the cop had her pinned against the garbage can, because the camera was not facing him. However, the audio was quite clear when he called her a bitch. What disturbed me the most was the hatred in his voice.
A short while later, she decided to walk over to him and ask his name and badge number. Now, he was on camera defiantly saying his name and number. That’s when the one guy, I guess his name’s Anthony, not understanding what was happening, walked over and said “leave her alone”… any NORMAL cop would have ignored him while Keilah tells Anthony it’s okay. Instead, this thug cop slams the protester into the wall and onto the ground and arrests him. For what???? The cop and woman were just talking. This guy, Anthony, simply said “leave her alone” but he did not touch the officer or threaten the officer in any way. So, this thug cop is the one breaking the law and attacking a man on the street. That thug cop was about one brain cell away from the mentality of the infamous former cop who beat up the female bartender a few years ago. Cops are supposed to be trained to DIFFUSE situations, not incite them!
As soon as he slammed Anthony into the building, the live stream died because, as stated above, the female officer grabbed the camera and deleted. This is insane. Shame on CPD.
These “no filming” laws are sick. They are public servants and if they are doing their job correctly, they won’t have anything to worry about.
Aren’t there any archives of the live streams online????