#atlanta forest defenders

[noneedtofearorhope]

A diverse coalition of organizations and individuals have coalesced in an attempt to prevent the destruction of the forest on a variety of grounds—environmental advocacy, racial justice, police and prison abolition, indigenous rights, and the preservation of urban green space. Resistance to the project has taken a variety of shapes, from lawsuits and lobbying to construction of barricades, sabotage, claims of tree spiking and occupation of the forest. Even a children’s group has gotten involved in the campaign.

Environmental organizations, such as the South River Forest Coalition, have opposed both the police facility and the Blackhall swap, arguing against the loss of green space, the destruction of forested land in the midst of climate change, and the impact on water quality and wildlife. The group Save the Old Atlanta Prison Farm has proposed an alternate vision for the forest, which includes a dog park, community gardens, sports fields and a nature preserve.

Those who oppose the expansion of police power have also come out against the Atlanta Police Foundation’s project, placing it within the lineage of the expansion of the “prison-industrial complex.”  Such critics claim that the training facility will further expand police militarization in the aftermath of nationwide calls in the summer of 2020 and beyond to defund and even abolish policing infrastructure.

The proposed police training facility is slated to include a “mock village” with a “gas station/bank, bar/nightclub, school, residential homes, apartments…park/splash pad” and “training warehouse” for training in police tactics.

The plans have raised concerns that one thing the facility is intended to do is train officers to put down urban insurrections such as those that occurred in the wake of the murder of George Floyd in 2020.

[kiyohiroo]

I made a fundraiser on Bonfire in memory of Tortuiguita. Proceeds benefit the Atlanta Solidarity Fund.

Bella Ciao❤️

[reasoningdaily]

POLITICO: Kemp declares state of emergency in Georgia over 'Cop City' protests

Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp on Thursday declared a state of emergency following violent protests in Atlanta against the construction of a police training facility and the killing by authorities of an environmental protester said to have shot a state trooper.

The state of emergency, which authorizes the use of up to 1,000 National Guard troops to respond to incidents of civil unrest, will last until Feb. 9, barring an extension by the governor.

Protesters oppose the construction of the Atlantic Public Safety Center, dubbed “Cop City,” in Dekalb County’s South River Forest. The movement gained national attention last week when a protester was fatally shot during a SWAT raid of the “Defend the Atlanta Forest” group encampment.

Police allege that Manuel “Tortuguita” Teran, 26, shot first, although activists who were present during the raid dispute authorities’ version of events. According to the Georgia Bureau of Investigations, the officers involved were not wearing body cameras at the time of the shooting.

Teran’s death sparked global protests against police violence, as activists held vigils from Akron, Ohio, to Kurdistan. Atlanta protests turned violent Saturday, with protesters throwing rocks at the skyscraper that houses the Atlanta Police Foundation and setting fire to a police cruiser.

In his State of the State address on Wednesday, Kemp decried the protesters as “out-of-state rioters” who “tried to bring violence to the streets of our capital city.” He said it was “just the latest example of why here in Georgia, we’ll always back the blue.”

Kemp called out the National Guard to guard the state Capitol, the governor’s mansion and other public facilities during the Black Lives Matter protests in 2020 and kept them mobilized and providing security at the Capitol well into 2021.

Since the summer of 2021, Defend the Atlanta Forest protesters have engaged in extended tree-sits, rallies, and other forms of resistance against the development of over 380 acres of forest land to build a mock city and tactical training ground for police.

Standoffs between protesters and police have escalated recently, with protesters throwing Molotov cocktails at officers and police employing tear gas and rubber bullets to remove protesters from treehouse encampments. Since December, a dozen protesters have been charged with domestic terrorism under a state law that can carry up to a 35-year prison term.

Activists argue that the construction of the training complex would exacerbate police violence against the predominantly Black and brown communities in the county and perpetuate environmental racism due to chemical runoff from weapons testing.

[prole-log]

[kropotkindersurprise]

March 5, 2023 - Hundreds of forest defenders chased away police from a security post in Weelaunee Forest at the construction site of Cop City. The activists burned security and construction equipment and destroyed infrastructure. Thirty-five people were arrested by police, you can donate to the Atlanta Solidarity Fund to help them out. [video]/[video]/[video]

[edwordsmyth]

Manuel "Tortuguita" Teran, murdered yesterday (January 18) by police in Atlanta for protecting Weelaunee Forest from being destroyed and converted into the country's largest militarized police training center.

[nunjournal]

per Atlanta Community Press Collective, Tortuguita was killed by police while seated and with their hands up. I know there have been some posts circulating about this already, but please keep it going. Atlanta Police Foundation’s narrative has and probably will continue to dominate the narrative because mainstream news orgs have just been parroting police press releases (as they do).

[noneedtofearorhope]

We smashed windows at Consolidated Engineering Laboratories in Oakland, an Atlas company, cause smashing is fun, engineers suck, and they smashed our camp in Atlanta. Feel free to complete our work (534 23rd Ave) or copy-paste on your local engineering office (all engineers are bastards!) We didn't need a reason, but the hydra of industrial society has many heads and construction firm Atlas is one. They own Long Engineering, a familiar face in the attack on the Atlanta forest. They want to build a "cop city' to train pigs to put down urban insurrections, and erect souless soundstages to make shitty movies. They've buddied up with the FBI and a clusterfuck of police agencies to unsuccessfully drive forest defenders out of the woods. We hope they don't succeed, but our eternal hostility remains. Let's see how long these monuments to liberal society stand.  

[darkarches]

Help protect Weelaunee Forest and stop the construction of cop city!

There was a conference last night for the Stop Cop City week of solidarity coming up February 19th-26th.

The main takeaway is that if people are interested in taking action, the best thing to do would be to target the construction company that the police have contracted, the funders of the project, and the insurance company insuring the project. The cops are the ones who want cop city built, but they can't do it without the groups mentioned above.

The construction company is Brasfield and Gorrie. My understanding is the company itself probably won't turn a huge profit from the project and is mostly doing it to strengthen relations with the police. If we can show them they will lose money from this project they may pull out. One way to show them how unprofitable this venture would be for them is to make it harder for them to complete other projects they're working on. One suggestion from the conference is that those who live near construction projects being done by Brasfield and Gorrie could try to obstruct progress on these projects to show there will be repercussions if they don't pull out of cop city.

The main funders of the project are big banks and corporations. I've included a link at the bottom with more details but some of the groups funding this are Wells Fargo, Bank of America, Target, Home Depot, and Chik-fil-a. The Atlanta Police Foundation is also helping fund and support the project. Below I've linked a map that shows the locations of these funders and offices of members of the Atlanta Police Foundation.

The insurance company signed onto the cop city project is AXA. At the conference last night it was emphasized that AXA is the main target we want to go after during the upcoming week of solidarity. The destruction of the forest cannot continue without an insurance company covering them. I did a quick google search and was able to find several AXA offices near me. Like with Brasfield and Gorrie, if we put the pressure on AXA they will hopefully realize this project is simply not worth it and pull out.

This is a list of targets which includes a map of where these targets are located throughout the US. There is also a list of actions that people can take, but be creative.

Nobody wants cop city except the police and corporations. Let's help save the Weelaunee Forest!

[reasoningdaily]

The New York Times: Gov. Kemp Authorizes National Guard to Intervene in Atlanta Protests

Jan. 27, 2023Updated 3:32 p.m. ET

Gov. Brian Kemp of Georgia has issued an emergency order activating up to 1,000 Georgia National Guard troops to “subdue riot and unlawful assembly” that may break out over a public safety training facility — dubbed “Cop City” by detractors — that has been proposed in Atlanta.

The governor’s move on Thursday follows more than a week of unrest in Atlanta over the officer-involved shooting death of Manuel Teran, 26, a demonstrator who had been living in the forested site of the planned training campus to protest police militarization and protect the trees.

The authorities claim that Teran fired a gun at a state trooper during a “clearing operation” in the woods before being killed by the police. The Georgia Bureau of Investigation has said that no body camera footage of the encounter is available.

Teran’s death brought an already tense feud between law enforcement and opponents of the project to a head, prompting vigils and marches in Atlanta and across the country.

Some of the protests in Atlanta have taken a turn for the destructive, with activists smashing windows and setting fire to police cruisers. So far, 19 activists have been arrested and charged with “domestic terrorism” in connection with protests.

The expected release on Friday of video images of a traffic stop in Memphis that led to the fatal beating of Tyre Nichols by police officers may further inflame tensions in Georgia.

The Atlanta Police Department said in a statement that its personnel were “closely monitoring the events in Memphis, and are prepared to support peaceful protests in our city.”

“We understand and share in the outrage surrounding the death of Tyre Nichols,” the department added. “Police officers are expected to conduct themselves in a compassionate, competent, and constitutional manner and these officers failed Tyre, their communities and their profession.”

Mr. Kemp’s executive order is set to expire on Feb. 9.

[prole-log]

"Not One Inch" -- new work from NO Bonzo against Cop City in Atlanta. Here is a high res pdf.

[jonasgoonface]

Our comrade Victor was snatched out of atlanta, and is approaching his 6th month of incarceration. First in DeKalb County, now in the Stewart Detention Center. Here's his site

[yesiwillyes]

so fucked and scary..obvs this is a shitty news source but i encourage people to look around on their own. atlanta community press collective is a great source of info... but literally they're doing multi-agency raids on people's homes. busting down their doors at 6am and stealing their phones and laptops and journals, whatever. promising more arrests to come. and andre dickens has the nerve to say that "arson" is not the way to have your voice heard, you need to take legal routes etc etc when literally he and his people did everything in their power to suppress the petition for the referendum that more than a quarter of atlantans signed. like really, there are "legal" routes? it's so heartbreaking and scary to think of anyone having to sit in jail rn let alone someone dragged from their home this morning. donate to the atlanta solidarity fund if you can. and let's all take a moment to imagine anyone we might know who's in jail rn happy and free and with their friends again

[radicalgraff]

"Avenge Tort"

Graffiti on the police headquarters in Providence, Rhode Island in response to the murder of Manuel Teran aka Tort, an Atlanta Forest defender who was shot and killed by cops on Wednesday.

The Atlanta city council plans to clear the forest to build a massive police training facility dubbed "Cop City".