denver

Denver: Peace and Justice for Gaza New Year's Eve

 

Yesterday evening a group of conscience-driven souls gathered in a glowing room inside a Unitarian Church on 14th and Lafayette in Denver, Colorado, to hear a dark and passionate reading and to send support, solidarity, and prayers to the people undergoing the ongoing blockade of Gaza, Palestine, by the Israeli government, and in continued protest of Israeli war crimes during the siege of Gaza nearly a year ago, which a United Nations commissioned report by Richard Goldstone, the South African jurist in recent headlines, documents in detail.

The indoor vigil and march to the capitol, under the title Peace and Justice for Gaza, December 31, 2009, was organized by the Social Action Counsel of First Unitarian Society of Denver in concert with the many marches, demonstrations and vigils held around the world this week on the one-year anniversary of the siege, and drawing pressure-building attention to the ongoing blockade, described by the Goldstone report as "collective punishment."

The pamphlet handed out at the indoor vigil, which included the program for the evening's activity, in recognition of the violence of denying medication and food to civilians as a form of 'collective punishment' condemned the blockade and siege as one in the same.

"The law is clear. The conscience of humankind is shocked. Yet, the siege of Gaza continues. It is time for us to take action!"

The words used are those of the global call to action for human rights and justice for Gaza, taken from the Gaza Freedom March pledge, circulated online by International Solidarity Movement (ISM): palsolidarity.org

Gangs and Insurrection // on the occasion of the mass arrests in Denver

Last week the Denver Police Department made a mass arrest of 34 black youth and it seems like nobody has blinked an eye.

The 34 suspects were rounded up because, according to the cops, they are suspects in a series of downtown muggings.

Last we heard, 30 of those individuals have been charged with things like assault and robbery--many of them felony charges. The police did not make it clear how they identified and rounded up the suspects, but "most of [them] told police they were associated with either the Rollin' 60s Crips gang or the Black Gangster Disciples gang." The police keep dossiers on gang members; apparently they used their lists to round up individuals, throw them in jail, and begin interrogations.

All this ought to raise some kind of resistance from radicals who are also tracked by the police.

Anarchists, especially, should take notice when this shit goes down, cause we're in gangs ourselves. It's true. All it takes is a crew of folks who have each others' backs to be a gang. Our forms of social organization are atypical, and they are our greatest strength.

Appeal alleges Harassment, Intimidation and Torture by Denver police in '05 Arrest

It seems that the only thing Cecil Bynum and the police agree about is that after he was arrested for a small amount of 'crack' cocaine on Colfax Avenue in Denver (in January of '05) his thumb had to be amputated.

Bynum, now 40 years old and serving a 24-year sentence as a habitual offendor, was a passenger in a car pulled over by Denver police, who arrested him on an outstanding warrant for failure to appear in court on a summons for trespassing. Police allege that during the course of that arrest, Bynum gagged while trying to swallow a piece of "crack" cocaine that resulted in his being sentenced to 24 years in prison. They deny any knowledge of, or responsibility for, the fact that 2 days later his thumb, badly mutilated and by then seriously infected with staph, had to be amputated.

Predictably perhaps, Bynum, whose case is now on appeal, tells a different story. According to Bynum, who was last released from prison in 2004 and has an extensive record of drug-related offenses, police had had seized his ID and social security card after detaining him in early 2004 as a suspected drug dealer. Despite the fact that no drugs were found on Bynum, who insists he was working as a day laborer through a temporary service at the time, police refused to return his identification. As a result, Bynum says that the same officer who seized his ID and social security card then singled him out for harassment, intimidation and persecution, citing him no less than 3 subsequent occasions for "trespassing" for not having his ID after he was stopped and searched. When Bynum attempted to retrieve his ID from police however, he alleges that he was told the documents were the subject of a "personal hold" placed on them by Officer Heart, the same officer responsible for both confiscating the documents, and for repeatedly citing Bynum for not having them.

Denver Anarchist Black Cross Statement on the Democratic HQ Incident

On August 24th, eleven windows at the Colorado Democratic Party Headquarters were purposefully broken. The media quickly took up the story, but only within a narrow framework that couldn’t explain the incident. As members of the Denver Anarchist Black Cross, we would like to offer a practical analysis of why someone might take such action against the Democratic Party.

The first question asked by the media, understandably, was why this was done. Unfortunately, the question was framed as all political questions are framed in our society—right or left? Whoever smashed the windows could either be a “Republican thug” attempting to intimidate the Democrats, or a Democrat provocateur trying to soil the image of the Republicans.

To frame the issue in the same old Democrat/Republican binary is to once again assume that those are our only options. This framework dismisses or simplifies the experiences of the vast majority of people. People have diverse understandings of the world, and unique desires and goals that do not fit perfectly into political party boxes. In the end, the framework failed as the suspect was identified as an anarchist, a “fan of no party.”

The political system was not the only binary imposed by the media coverage of the incident. Blog, radio, and newspaper reports all grappled to identify the gender of the arrested suspect when reports from the police came into conflict with communication from the individual’s friends. In the confusion, some reports claimed there had been two different people arrested. The media eventually reported that the arrestee is transgender.

Immigrant Taxi Drivers Form Co-Op in Denver

Immigrant Taxi Drivers Form Co-Op in Denver

by Clayton Dewey
Saturday, July 11, 2009 at 8:37pm

Denver cab drivers have successfully broken the stranglehold three major taxi companies in Denver had on the market by forming their own worker cooperative, Union Taxi.

Three Denver banks attacked

On the night of Monday, July 13th, we attacked three separate Wells Fargo banks in Denver. At each location we smashed out their windows and at one we broke through the glass door, entered through it, and smashed up the ATM inside.

Save Our Schools!

Apr 6 2009 11:00 am

Rally with students to save higher education!
Monday April 6
11 am
West Steps of the Capitol

The Colorado State Legislature's Joint Budget Committee has voted on
and recommended a measure that would cut higher education funding by
50% as well as allowing institutions to have massive tuition hikes.
This not only shows the state's lack of regard for higher education,

April 11--National Day of Action Against Bank Bailouts--Boulder and Denver Actions

Apr 11 2009

On Saturday, April 11 there will be rallies in Boulder and Denver protesting the latest plan for bailing out Wall Street banks. The plan will cost the taxpayers at least $1 trillion. Everyone is invited to come out to send the message to our politicians in Washington D.C. to "Bail Out Main Street, Not Wall Street".

Unconventional Denver Is Having An Open Meeting

Unconventional Denver, one of two anarchist/anti-authoritarian groups that organized against the Democratic National Convention this summer is once again revving up their organizing efforts in our community. The Unconventional Action Network was formed to help organize against last summer's political conventions and like the successes they saw then, there is a possibility of more.

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