FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Eric Laursen, (212) 679-5822
December 8, 2003
NO NYPD VIOLENCE AT THE REPUBLICAN CONVENTION!
PRESS CONFERENCE AND RALLY AGAINST POLICE USE OF MILITARY WEAPONS AND TACTICS AGAINST NON-VIOLENT DEMONSTRATIONS
What: Rally and press conference against police violence
When: Wednesday, Dec. 10, noon
Where: One Police Plaza (NYPD Headquarters), Chambers and Centre Streets, Manhattan
NEW YORK - The New York-based Campaign to Demilitarize the Police (CDP) will gather near One Police Plaza on Wednesday
in the first of a series of public events to protest growing police use of military-style weapons and tactics at
demonstrations. The Republican National Convention, to be held in New York Aug. 30-Sept. 2, 2004, is expected to draw
tens of thousands of activists outraged at Bush Administration policies. CDP members are concerned that the New York
Police Department are preparing to greet them with the same brutal and illegal violence the Miami police recently used
against activists at the anti-Free Trade Area of the Americas protests.
"The militarization of law enforcement is tied to state efforts to repress and suppress protest," says author and CDP
founding member Frank Morales. "We can no longer sit idly by and allow the increasing repression of protest in America."
Speakers at Wednesday's press conference will include leading civil rights attorney Norman Siegel and medics who treated
police victims at the Miami FTAA protests.
DON'T LET MIAMI 2003 BECOME NEW YORK 2004!
The Campaign to Demilitarize the Police is demanding:
* Full disclosure and civilian representation in NYPD planning for the RNC 2004.
* No NYPD use of chemical weapons such as tear gas and CS gas - outlawed as weapons of war under the Geneva Convention.
* No NYPD firing of wooden pellets and rubber bullets, which can cause serious and lasting injury at close range.
* An end to antagonistic NYPD use of interlocking metal barricades, preventing people from reaching demonstration sites
by providing false information, unwarranted searches, seizures and destruction of personal property, aggressive mounted
police attacks, and denial of freedom of movement - all of which serve to spread panic and anger among demonstrators.
* An end to harmful and invasive surveillance of protesters - including monitoring of telephone and computer activity,
facial recognition scanning, etc. - under the guise of the so called "war on terrorism." An end to harassment and
preemptive arrests.
The CDP has compiled a fact sheet on the growing pattern of police scaremongering and violence against activists who
take to the streets in the U.S., from the Seattle WTO protests to the present. Please contact us at (212) 969-8045 or at
the Website above for a copy.
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THE CAMPAIGN TO DEMILITARIZE THE POLICE
http://demilitarizethepolice.netfirms.com