Protests demand prosecute cops who shot Breonna Taylor, Elijah McClain
https://themilitant.com/2020/07/11/protests-demand-prosecute-cops-who-shot-breonna-taylor-elijah-mcclain/
BY BRIAN WILLIAMS
Vol. 84/No. 28
July 20, 2020
June 27 protest in Mississauga, Ontario, Canada, against the cop killing
of Ejaz Choudry.
MILITANT/AURÉLIE MCBREARTY
June 27 protest in Mississauga, Ontario, Canada, against the cop killing
of Ejaz Choudry.
Following widespread protests worldwide by hundreds of thousands of
working people after Minneapolis cops killed George Floyd, demonstrators
against police brutality continue taking to the streets. The number and
size of these actions are smaller than over past weeks, but families who
have had loved ones killed gained renewed confidence to press forward
the struggle to get the cops responsible prosecuted.
The family of Breonna Taylor, shot dead in her apartment March 13 by
cops with a “no-knock warrant,” have made the fight to get the cops
charged for her killing a prominent part of demonstrations around the
country.
As a result of the determination of working people and youth to join
protest actions, the cover-up of the cop killing of Elijah McClain last
August in Aurora, Colorado, is now coming apart. McClain, 23, was
walking home from a convenience store when three cops stopped him after
receiving a complaint about a young Black man acting “suspicious.”
McClain was wearing a mask and waving his arms, which he routinely did
outside because he had anemia — a blood condition — and became cold easily.
According to a police body camera, McClain tells the officers, “I am
going home. … Leave me alone.” But instead they handcuff him and put him
in a chokehold. He repeatedly tells them, “I just can’t breathe.” They
have him injected with ketamine, a powerful sedative, at a dose high
enough to put down a 220-pound person. McClain weighed 140 pounds. He
suffered cardiac arrest on the way to a hospital.
The killing was promptly swept under the rug, with District Attorney
Dave Young announcing that no criminal charges would be filed. The
police department upheld the officers’ actions as “consistent with
training.”
Thousands demonstrated against the killing in Aurora June 27. Musicians
traveled from all over the U.S. for a violin-concert vigil in a park
near the Aurora Municipal Center. McClain, a violin player himself,
often played for animals at local shelters. Police using pepper spray
and batons tried to break up the gathering that evening.
Similar solidarity violin vigils were organized in Washington Square
Park in New York City June 29, in Maplewood, New Jersey, July 4 attended
by more than 100 people, and elsewhere.
Cops fired for mocking killing
Photos showing three Aurora cops mocking the killing of McClain over
eight months ago were released July 3. Showing utter contempt for the
lives of those they claim to serve and protect, the cops pretended to
put chokeholds on each other near a memorial for the slain young man.
Above, protest in Aurora, Colorado, July 3 against cop killing of Elijah
McClain last August. Below, June 27 action included musicians who came
to Aurora for violin vigil to honor McClain, who himself played violin,
often making music for animals in local shelters. As police formed a
line to confront protesters and deployed pepper spray, violinists kept
playing music.
ABOVE, MILITANT/KAREN RAY; BELOW, REUTERS/KEVIN MOHATT
Above, protest in Aurora, Colorado, July 3 against cop killing of Elijah
McClain last August. Below, June 27 action included musicians who came
to Aurora for violin vigil to honor McClain, who himself played violin,
often making music for animals in local shelters. As police formed a
line to confront protesters and deployed pepper spray, violinists kept
playing music.
One of them, Jaron Jones, resigned shortly before the photos were
released. In an effort to quell growing outrage, the police chief then
fired the other two, Erica Marrero and Kyle Dittrich. Another cop who
was involved in killing McClain, Jason Rosenblatt, was terminated for
replying “ha, ha” after receiving copies of the photos by text messaging.
Hundreds of demonstrators marched from the McClain memorial to the
Aurora police station July 3. McClain “did nothing wrong,” Pamela
Howard, one of the protesters, told the Denver Post. “I wish we would
have done this a long time ago.”
Since the killing, McClain’s family has fought for the prosecution of
the officers involved.
Dozens of protesters took to the streets July 5 after cops in Phoenix
killed James Garcia the previous day as he sat in a parked car.
Four cops, with weapons drawn, surrounded the stationary vehicle in a
driveway of a friend Garcia was visiting. One cop shouted, “Hey, stop
f—— moving. I will f—— shoot you,” a video by a bystander shows. The
cops told Garcia to get out. He refused, so they shot and killed him.
The cops say they were responding to a complaint about a man suspected
of an aggravated assault the week before. A second action to protest the
killing was held July 6.
Killing of Ejaz Choudry
In Mississauga, Ontario, hundreds of people rallied at the headquarters
of the Peel Regional Police June 27 to protest the cop killing of
62-year-old Ejaz Choudry a week earlier.
“It’s been seven days and those officers are still out there,” Khizar
Shahzad, a nephew of Choudry, told the protesters, saying pressure needs
to be put on authorities to “do something about it.”
The rally was organized by the National Council of Canadian Muslims.
Mustafa Farooq, chief executive officer of the group, called for an end
to police brutality so that we have “no more names” that we have to say
of people beaten or killed by the cops.
“Unions need to get involved in these kinds of fights,” school teacher
Felipe Pareja told the Militant at the rally. “We’re more powerful as we
act together.”
According to his family, Choudry, who suffered from schizophrenia, was
having a mental health crisis when police barged into his apartment for
a “wellness check” and shot him. Choudry, a father of four, was
originally from Pakistan.
Fighting for authorities to indict cops responsible for these killings
helps educate millions about the real role of police under capitalist
rule. The breadth of recent protests also provides a powerful example of
the capacities of working people to stand up to the brutality the cops
unleash.
At the same time that several of these fights are drawing increased
attention, Democratic Party politicians and middle-class radicals
prominent at many protests perpetuate the illusion that the brutality
cops inflict on working people can be brought to an end by various
reforms and by voting Democrats into office. They call for “defunding”
or “abolishing ” the police. When the cops are under fire liberals
always offer ways to “improve” their conduct. But cops are an integral
part of an inherently brutal social system based on the exploitation of
working people.
As long as capitalism exists, the bosses and their government will use
the police to mete out punishment to protect the profits, property and
power of the ruling class.
In Seattle in early June, middle-class radicals took over a six-block
area that included a police precinct building — with acquiescence of
city authorities. They renamed the area CHOP — the Capital Hill
Occupation Protest — proclaimed it a “no cop co-op” and appointed their
own armed thugs to do the policing. Their actions had nothing to do with
the steps the working class will take in the course of deepening mass
struggles to defend ourselves from the cops’ assaults on our picket
lines in a disciplined way, led by proven fighters from our own ranks.
Inevitably the CHOP led to disaster. Over nine days two Black teenagers
were shot and killed in the occupied area and others were wounded. No
one has been charged with the killings.
“This doesn’t look like a protest to me no more,” Horace Lorenzo
Anderson, whose son was shot to death there, told the media.
After three weeks, Mayor Jenny Durkan changed her stance and ordered the
cops to move in and dismantle the occupation.
As long as the capitalist social system exists, calls to abolish the
police take working people away from eradicating the root of the
problem. Large numbers of working people prefer some kind of police
presence hoping it will deter criminal gangs operating in the
neighborhoods where our families live, at the same time that growing
numbers are also determined to join fights against cop brutality.
The road forward is to end the social system that breeds cop brutality
by organizing working people in their millions to take political power.
Workers and farmers in Cuba showed that this is possible through the
socialist revolution they made in 1959 and have defended ever since.
Front Page Articles
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Protests demand prosecute cops who shot Breonna Taylor, Elijah McClain
Socialist Workers Party candidates get hearing in Bath, Boston, Albany
Feature Articles
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Ukraine miners march on gov’t, demand back wages
Asarco miners end strike, look to continue to fight
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25, 50 and 75 years ago
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Richard Dawkins
“The total amount of suffering per year in the natural world is beyond all
decent contemplation. During the minute that it takes me to compose this
sentence, thousands of animals are being eaten alive, many others are running
for their lives, whimpering with fear, others are slowly being devoured from
within by rasping parasites, thousands of all kinds are dying of starvation,
thirst, and disease. It must be so. If there ever is a time of plenty, this
very fact will automatically lead to an increase in the population until the
natural state of starvation and misery is restored. In a universe of electrons
and selfish genes, blind physical forces and genetic replication, some people
are going to get hurt, other people are going to get lucky, and you won't find
any rhyme or reason in it, nor any justice. The universe that we observe has
precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no
purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but pitiless indifference.”
― Richard Dawkins, River Out of Eden: A Darwinian View of Life