Police "After Action Review", Miami FTAA demonstrations

[G_j]

This is hard to read for anyone aware of what really happened in Miami. It's enough to make one ill..

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/7874639.htm
Posted on Wed, Feb. 04, 2004

FTAA After Action Review

INTRODUCTION

During the week of November 17 ? 21, 2003, the City of Miami Police Department spearheaded a multi-agency law enforcement effort designed to provide security for the Free Trade Area of the Americas Summit (FTAA) and, at the same time, provide ample opportunity for protestors to express their opinions regarding the creation of the FTAA. This undertaking is recognized as the largest collaborative law enforcement operation in the history of Florida and perhaps in the country. Although there are certainly areas where lessons can be learned for the future, the FTAA operation was an overall success with Summit meetings proceeding without disruption and thousands of lawful protestors exercising their right to free speech.

The security plan for the FTAA involved the participation of 25 Local law enforcement agencies, 7 State agencies and 7 Federal agencies. Planning, training and coordination are formidable tasks in any large law enforcement operation, however, the addition of each additional agency greatly complicates the mission. Law enforcement agencies with different rank structures, uniforms, training and protocols must put aside their organizational independence and come together to operate as a single entity. Some 40 different law enforcement agencies bring with them some 40 different chiefs or directors. However, in coordinating a massive, single event, all of these accomplished, independent leaders would be required to submit to a single plan and a single command. It was a tall order and perhaps one without precedent in American law enforcement.
As the primary law enforcement entity in the host City, the City of Miami Police Department assumed a primary leadership role in the FTAA law enforcement operation. This role made sense for many reasons. The vast majority of FTAA events were scheduled within the City of Miami.

The host locales for the Summit meetings and for housing the representatives from the 34 participating nations were the Intercontinental and Hyatt Hotels in downtown Miami. The protest groups had indicated their intentions to protest in the vicinity of the FTAA meetings, specifically on and around Biscayne Boulevard and in the Bayfront Amphitheater adjacent to the Intercontinental property. The Miami Police Department has the permanent presence and the greatest familiarity with the downtown area most affected by the FTAA. The residents and businesses of the City that comprise the core constituency of the Miami Police Department were the same folks being asked to compromise their routines and convenience during the FTAA week. It made perfect sense that the City of Miami Police Department should assume the primary leadership role in the FTAA security operation.
...more...

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compare this to these accounts:

www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/7538538.htm
Judge: I saw police commit felonies

A judge who said he witnessed some of the anti-free trade protests complains in open court about how police handled the demonstrations.


A judge presiding over the cases of free trade protesters said in court that he saw ''no less than 20 felonies committed by police officers'' during the November demonstrations, adding to a chorus of complaints about police conduct.

Judge Richard Margolius, 60, made the remarks in open court last week, saying he was taken aback by what he witnessed while attending the protests.

''Pretty disgraceful what I saw with my own eyes. And I have always supported the police during my entire career,'' he said, according to a court transcript. ``This was a real eye-opener. A disgrace for the community.´´

In the transcript, he also said he may have to remove himself from any additional cases involving arrests made during the Free Trade Area of the Americas summit.

''I probably would have been arrested myself if it had not been for a police officer who recognized me,''
...more..
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http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/1219-08.htm
Reuters
FTAA Protests: Amnesty Says Miami Police May Have Broken UN Laws
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The abuses in Miami have prompted strong response from Amnesty International and the ACLU, the Steelworkers and AFL, the Sierra Club, and a broad coalition of labor, antiwar, direct action, global justice, civil liberties and community groups.
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****Personal Voices: Hope and Fear in Miami (a must read!)
David Solnit, AlterNet
A veteran activist finds much to fear, but also bits of hope, after being jailed in Miami.
http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=17342
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St. Petersburg Times: Miami Crowd Control Would Do Tyrant Proud
http://www.commondreams.org/views03/1130-07.htm
Miami police Chief John Timoney must be mighty proud of the social order he maintained during the Free Trade Area of the Americas summit a couple of weeks ago in Miami - sort of the way Saddam Hussein was proud of quieting dissension in his country.
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Arresting The Future
Tom Hayden, AlterNet
Even as FTAA protestors and trade ministers poured out of town in droves, the city's Robo-Cops continued to demonstrate the 'Miami model' of suppression -- with pepper spray, rubber bullets and drawn weapons.
http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=17246
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Information Control:
The 'Miami Model' used during the anti-FTAA protests represents a new police strategy whose aim is to control not just the streets, but also the story told by the media.
http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=17293
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Starhawk's Miami Journals,
www.starhawk.org/activism/activism-writings/miami_journals.html
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This is a link to all of the Miami Herald coverage..
 http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/special_packages/ftaa /
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photos of 'projectiles'
http://www.hulla-balloo.com/ftaapics/projectiles

[Terwilliger]

1. The militarized response to people of good conscience will only grow

as the article you posted informed us about all the folks who were charged over protesting at SOA/WHISC. It's only going to get worse.

[G_j]

3. is it just me

or do most of these Gestapo actions go beneath the "progressive" radar?
Do you have to be a "radical" to pay attention to the police state?

[G_j]

4. a wild eyed radical kick..

[htuttle]

2. The harder they push on us...

...the more people they piss off. There's nothing that radicalizes someone quite like a police billy club to the head.