#occupycal

[haverfordsocialjustice-blog]

Facing some of the steepest budget cuts and tuition hikes in the country, thousands college students across California staged a mass walkout on Wednesday and set up camp to form the latest Occupy site. But unlike many others around the country, who have only started to get involved in the protests, California students are continuing a movement they've been pursuing for two years.

[haverfordsocialjustice-blog]

Police violent at UC-Berkeley during Occupy Cal in 2011. On Monday, the Berkeley Academic Senate will vote on a resolution expressing “no confidence” in their chancellor, Robert Birgeneau, because of police violence against Occupy Cal campus activists there on November 9. The chancellor’s defense of police conduct was particularly outrageous: “It is unfortunate that some protesters chose to obstruct the police by linking arms,” he declared the day after the police confrontation. “This is not non-violent civil disobedience.”

[occupycali]

Officers who pepper-sprayed students no longer UCD employed

(UC Davis police Lt. John Pike pepper-sprays Occupy UC Davis protesters on Nov. 18 on the campus Quad. Pike, who was on paid leave for eight months, is no longer employed by the university, campus officials said Wedneday. Wayne Tilcock/Enterprise file photo)

"The UC Davis police lieutenant who became the target of a worldwide outcry, John Pike, and a second officer who doused Occupy UC Davis protesters with pepper spray, Alexander Lee, are no longer employed by the university.

In response to repeated Enterprise inquiries about Pike’s job status, UCD spokeswoman Claudia Morain said Pike was no longer an officer as of Wednesday. She declined to say if Pike was fired or resigned, citing state law and university policies protecting the confidentiality of personnel decisions.

Pike, whose annual salary was $121,680, remained on paid leave for eight months after the Nov. 18 incident. He will receive no other payout from the university, Morain said. He remains entitled to retirement benefits.

The employment of the second suspended officer, who earned $57,060 per year, ended July 11, Morain said. The university has not revealed his identity, pending the outcome of an ongoing court case. The Enterprise has named Lee based on still photographs, video and university documents.

The Enterprise was unable to reach Pike for comment." Read More: The Davis Enterprise | Cory Golden

[rogueish]

Also on fashion and Occupy, the UCB police review board report includes this gem:

Some of the protestors wore backpacks to protect themselves.

[rogueish]

Speaking of baton thrusts

This paragraph seems particularly revealing:

A number of UCPD regulations also govern the specific use of batons. As a threshold matter, “[o]nly impact weapons issued or authorized by the Department may be carried,” and published departmental regulations do not authorize the use of 36-inch straight batons, but designate the 26-inch baton as the appropriate “crowd control impact weapon.” In fact, UCPD changed from the 26-inch baton to the 36-inch baton in 2011. UCPD officers were trained for the change in early June 2011. General Order F-6 has not yet been updated to reflect this.

So we have here a clear violation of written campus policies, but the only problem the review board notices is that the policies have not yet been re-written to retroactively make this not a violation.

[rogueish]

It isn’t even that some people think it’s okay to do so, in other words; it’s that when some people think its fine and some people don’t, the end result is: the police will do whatever they want. If they want to grab a non-resisting protester by her hair and throw her to the ground — this time, next time, every time — they will.

The Review Board's report opens with the strange claim that "there is no obvious standard against which to judge these actions." This is used to introduce the notion of "campus norms," which the report suggests involve a greater respect for free speech than legal requirements or written policies. In fact, I don't think there's a single point in the report where "each committee member’s own understanding and interpretation" of campus norms leads to an unambiguous criticism of the police or administration. "Campus norms," that is, turns out to be the name of the lack of standards which allows the board to refuse to judge the administration.

[rogueish]

Some members of the committee do not think that pulling protestors by their hair is consistent with campus norms.

It's kind of fascinating to imagine the context and mindset in which someone would write this sentence in the middle of a bureaucratic report, without stopping and thinking, "is something wrong here?"

[itsapunnyworld-blog]

I've posted up new footage from Occupy the Farm on Youtube. This is a pretty cool speech I filmed by the Vice President of United Native Americans, Quanah Parker Brightman during a post-raid convergence on May 9th, 2012. About 100 or so protestors marched from the North Berkeley BART station to the Gill Tract in response to the UC sending police officers shut down some of the gates on the Tract. Enjoy!