By Manny Fernandez
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, November 27, 2004; Page B01
A standoff between police and protesters who staged a sit-in at a former homeless shelter in Southwest Washington ended yesterday with the arrests of seven people.
Activists with the group Mayday DC had occupied the former Randall Shelter at I and Half streets SW since Wednesday night, unofficially "reopening" it to the homeless. Since then, about 40 people had received housing, food and other necessities such as aspirin, said the protesters, who demanded that the city keep the building open as a shelter.
"The city government's policies seem to be to sweep the homeless out of sight," Jamie Loughner, 40, said yesterday afternoon as she stood inside the squat red-brick building and poked her head out a metal door's small broken window, before police moved in. Behind her were green cots and a table loaded with soda bottles and orange juice cartons, while above her activists sat on the roof near a spray-painted sheet reading, "Shelter Here! Now! Forever!"
Loughner was one of seven activists inside the building when police officers started making arrests about 5 p.m., said Kristan Markey, a spokesman for the group. Markey said that officers went up to the roof in a cherry picker and arrested the seven one by one.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A15440-2004Nov26.htmlGee, how nice of the city to wait until the day after Thankgiving to do this. Their compassion knows no bounds.