Convention cops

Charges will not be filed against 323 people who were arrested on the Marion Street and Cedar Street bridges during the fourth day of the Republican National Convention, the St. Paul city attorney’s office announced today. Local civil rights activists say the failure to press charges is the latest evidence that many RNC arrests were frivolous.

When an SUV rammed the Planned Parenthood office on Ford Parkway in St. Paul yesterday on the anniversary of Roe v. Wade, was the driver furthering terrorism in violation of Minnesota’s Patriot Act – a charge Ramsey County Attorney Susan Gaertner leveled against eight Republican National Convention (RNC) protesters? Dave Mindeman at the Minnesota Network for [...]

Nearly 800 people were arrested. Pepper spray, flash-bang grenades and tear gas were repeatedly used to disperse crowds. Store-front windows were smashed and vehicle tires slashed. If nothing else, the four days of the Republican National Convention certainly succeeded in bringing some excitement to normally sleepy streets of downtown St. Paul. Today, before a sometimes rambunctious crowd, a seven-member panel led by former U.S. Attorney Tom Heffelfinger and former Assistant U.S. Attorney Andy Luger presented an 82-page report on policing during the Republican National Convention to the St. Paul City Council.

All eyes are on the release this afternoon of the Heffelfinger-Luger report on law enforcement during the Republican National Convention that was commissioned by the City of St. Paul, where most of the RNC events, protests and policing took place. But at least three studies from outside of St. Paul are pending as well: an internal report by the Minneapolis Police Department (MPD), an outside review by a national police organization by invitation of the MPD, and a winter term research project by a team of students from Ohio’s Oberlin College.

Brandon Darby, a Texas activist who it turns out was working for the FBI as an informant from within groups that protested the 2008 Republican National Convention, pleads his case in the Pioneer Press today and in a statement he released earlier this week. He is “CHS1″ (Confidential Human Source 1) in an FBI affidavit [...]

The St. Paul City Attorney’s office has so far reviewed 241 potential criminal cases stemming from activities during the Republican National Convention. Nearly half of the reviews didn’t result in charges being filed owing to a lack of sufficient evidence. Of the remaining incidents, 48 have been resolved by either a guilty plea or payment of a fine, while 81 have been formally charged and are headed towards trial.

I was killing time on a back bench of an 8th floor Ramsey County courtroom Wednesday, waiting with about 50 others for something to happen (all the action in the RNC8 case that day took place behind closed doors, as it turned out), when a person with a familiar face took a seat in the next row. Could it be Coleen Rowley, famed FBI whistleblower, TIME magazine 2002 person of the year and the DFL Party’s 2006 candidate in Minnesota’s Second Congressional District? Indeed it was.

In a closed-door meeting with attorneys today, Ramsey County District Judge Salvador Rosas set a pre-trial hearing date of Jan. 26 for the eight activists known as the RNC8 who are charged with felony-level terrorism charges related the Republican National Convention in September. Prosecutors added three new charges over the weekend to the original count of conspiracy to riot in the second degree in furtherance of terrorism.

Trials beginning today for protesters at September’s Republican National Convention will themselves be protested in a variety of ways over the next few days. A new coalition called Community RNC Arrestee Support Structure  — or CRASS – plans to pack courtrooms with supporters and rally against St. Paul Mayor Chris Coleman today. CRASS has also called for [...]

Looking for a different way to say “Happy Holidays,” “Peace on Earth” or “Happy New Year”? How about sending your friends and loved ones greeting cards with photos from protests that show people carrying signs reading “War on Morons,” “Cure Erectile Dysfunction” and “One Nation Under Debt.” They’re “greeting cards for people who are pissed off” by Al Crespo, a photographer based in Miami who’s been covering protests across the country for a dozen years, but who may be best known for the legal case from the Democratic National Convention in Los Angeles that bears his name: Al Crespo v. City of Los Angeles. “I’m the guy that got shot in the head in 2000,” he says.