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Protesters port workers hurt by police { April 8 2003 } Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)
http://www.sacbee.com/24hour/special_reports/iraq/bee/story/6418928p-7371157c.htmlhttp://www.sacbee.com/24hour/special_reports/iraq/bee/story/6418928p-7371157c.html
Protesters, port workers hurt by Oakland police
By Herbert A. Sample -- Bee San Francisco Bureau
Last Updated 4:50 a.m. PDT Tuesday, April 8, 2003
OAKLAND -- Almost 30 anti-war activists were arrested at the Port of Oakland early Monday morning during a demonstration in which police fired non-lethal projectiles to disperse the crowd, injuring several protesters and bystanders.
The protest, sponsored by a group called Direct Action to Stop the War, led to shutdowns of up to two hours at two of 10 terminals at the sprawling port facility. By late morning, however, all terminals were open and operating normally.
The non-lethal devices -- small beanbags, "stingballs" and dowels -- were discharged when officers were pelted by rocks and steel bolts, said Patrick Haw, Oakland's deputy police chief in charge of field operations.
"Some people in the crowd, in addition to blocking traffic (and) blocking trucks, started throwing rocks at the police officers," Haw said in an interview, adding that officers saw a few protesters carrying slingshots. "We're not going to tolerate anybody attacking our officers."
But demonstrators, which police said numbered 600 to 700, said they did nothing to justify the action.
"For the police to pretend that there was provocation for them to attack, that's an outright lie," said Patrick Reinsborough, a Direct Action organizer.
Nancy Nadel, an Oakland councilwoman, said one of her aides who monitored the protest saw nothing thrown at police.
"He saw a peaceful demonstration," said Nadel, who was not at the protest. The aide told her that police issued a dispersal order, but two minutes later started shooting the non-lethal devices while protesters were retreating.
"They had no place to move to and were being shot with wooden pellets at face level," Nadel added.
Clarence Thomas, a member of the executive board of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union, Local 1, said longshoremen were gathered near one of the terminal gates waiting to go to work, about 100 yards from the police.
Thomas, who was not there, said the longshoremen later told him that police then moved toward them and shot projectiles.
"Police fired at our members and at the demonstrators indiscriminately," Thomas said.
Of the nine longshoremen who were injured, five had to seek treatment at a hospital, he added.
A few hours after the incidents, a half-dozen protesters displayed welts, bruises and scratches where they said they had been hit with projectiles fired by police. Gathered at a nearby BART station, some displayed the wooden dowels, about the size of a spool of sewing thread.
"No one was doing anything threatening," said Scott Fleming, 29, an Oakland lawyer who had three bruises on his back and one on a leg. "They just leveled their guns and started firing."
Another demonstrator, Scott Bohning, said he was walking to the port to join the demonstration when he was met by protesters who were leaving the area at the insistence of police.
"I happened to turn to see where the police were. That's when I got hit in the nose with the wooden thing," said Bohning, 43, of Richmond, whose nose was bloodied.
"I came just to picket," he added. "I didn't intend to break the law. ... I thought we were allowed to picket and protest. But apparently we're not."
Haw said that while police are trained to aim the wooden dowels so they ricochet and strike the legs of demonstrators, the projectiles can accidentally hit higher on the body. Stingballs are fired above the heads of protesters, where they break into rubber pellets. Beanballs are small weighted objects that also can produce a bruise.
Haw added that he and another ranking officer made the decision to use the devices.
The protest was aimed at American President Lines, which anti-war activists accuse of shipping weapons to the U.S. military in Iraq, and Stevedoring Services of America, which recently won a contract from the federal government to manage the Iraqi port of Umm Qasr.
A handful of APL workers and longshoremen waiting to go to work were caught in the line of fire when the projectiles were fired. Nine longshoremen were hit by the projectiles, said John Castanho, secretary-treasurer of ILWU Local 10.
In other demonstrations, nine anti-war protesters were arrested without resistance as they blocked the entrance to the federal building in downtown Sacramento. They were cited and released. Arrests were also made at the Concord Naval Weapons Station and in San Francisco for blocking an off-ramp from Interstate 280.
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