Phillie Cops Conditioned (read: Brainwashed) for GOP Protesters --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Today's news has the Phillie cops painted as sharks, and SOMEONE is pooring blood in the water. Sounds like the cops are buying into their new Nazi Power. WHO is pulling their strings, and why?
We've all read enough EO's/PDD's to know the Clinton administration is mandating the militarization of law enforcement, from federal storm troopers all the way down to our neighborhood cops.
Because no one here is stupid enough to take these three Phillie police articles appearing today as a coincidence, I task you RMN Agents with posting potential objectives for the police at the GOP convention in lieu of the current rabidity documented in this media blitz.
Specifically, I wanna know what Gore has up his sleeve for the GOP convention.
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http://www.usatoday.com/news/digest/nd1.htm
Philadelphia cops disciplined over T-shirts
PHILADELPHIA -- A narcotics officer who hired a company to make T-shirts joking about the videotaped arrest of a carjacking suspect will be disciplined along with two police captains, The Philadelphia Inquirer reports Friday. Police Commissioner John Timoney plans to move narcotics officer Kenyatta Lee to a desk job. The captains will be transferred to the night shift because they failed to stop the T-shirt sales. ''Welcome, America'' was printed on the back of the shirts in bright blue, 2-inch-high letters. A black-and-white picture shows a swarm of officers surrounding and beating Jones. On front of the shirts is an image of a badge that refers to the Philadelphia Police Department and the upcoming Republican National Convention.
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OFFICIALS RAID ‘PUPPET THEATER’ AHEAD OF GOP CONVENTION PROTESTS... DRUDGE
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/htx/nm/20000721/pl/convention_protests_dc_3.html
Philadelphia Closes RNC Protest Venue
By David Morgan
PHILADELPHIA (Reuters) - With the Republican National Convention barely a week away, tensions between the city and protest organizers escalated on Friday when building safety inspectors closed one of the protesters' downtown meeting venues.
Activists also claimed to find electronic listening devices in a group home, hours after city police admitted they had been keeping protest organizers under surveillance for weeks.
``We're outraged, we're angry and we're going to talk about it. But we're not panicking,'' said Julie Davids, a member of the Philadelphia Direct Action Group, a coalition planning civil disobedience protests for the July 31 to Aug. 3 convention.
Members of the Spiral Q Puppet Theater said inspectors from the city Department of Licenses and Inspections showed up at their premises with police around 1 p.m. EDT and ordered them to close because of potential fire hazards.
Activists from two local groups, the Kensington Welfare Rights Union and Asian-Americans United, were using the theater as a venue for making puppets and banners for a protest march set to take place on opening day of the convention, organizers said.
There was no immediate comment from city officials and no arrests were reported.
Meanwhile, the American Civil Liberties Union said it was looking into claims that listening devices were found after a burglary at an activist group home in West Philadelphia, where unidentified men had earlier been seen photographing residents.
ACLU legal director Stefan Presser said he would find out if a court had ordered audio surveillance. ``If not, I will take this matter and put it before a federal judge,'' he told reporters.
Tens of thousands of demonstrators, representing causes ranging from environmental protection and AIDS research to women's rights and social justice, are due in Philadelphia next weekend for what organizers say could be the largest protests seen at a U.S. political convention.
But Philadelphia officials worry that protest violence could hamper the city's ability to showcase its economic and cultural renaissance after decades of decline.
City police on Friday admitted that they have been keeping protest organizers under surveillance by photographing activists as they arrived for planning sessions in another part of the city. A half-dozen such incidents have been reported.
``We were watching. We were making surveillance efforts. It's just prudent preparations for anything,'' said Officer David Yarnell, a department spokesman. ``There are people who may do more than exercise their First Amendment rights.''
The raid on the puppet theater took place as protest leaders met with senior city officials, including the deputy commissioner in charge of policing the convention, to ask that out-of-town demonstrators be allowed to camp out in city parks.
Theater members said city inspectors complained of potential fire hazards posed by a propane tank, an extension cord that ran between two floors and the lack of an on-site fire safety system.
But organizers condemned the shutdown as a preemptive strike by city authorities intended to dissuade demonstrators from plans to disrupt the Republican convention.
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Philadelphia police admit surveillance of protesters
http://news.excite.com/news/r/000721/09/campaign-convention-protests
Updated 9:59 AM ET July 21, 2000
By David Morgan
PHILADELPHIA, (Reuters) - City police admitted Friday that they have kept the organizers of protests for the Republican National Convention under surveillance by photographing activists as they arrived for planning sessions.
"We were watching. We were making surveillance efforts. It's just prudent preparations for anything," said Officer David Yarnell, a department spokesman.
Claims of surveillance surfaced late last month after two men in plainclothes were seen photographing members of a group called the R2K committee as they arrived for a downtown meeting near the Pennsylvania Convention Center.
The committee consists of activists who plan to take part in civil disobedience protests aimed at disrupting the convention, which runs July 31 to Aug. 3.
Protest organizers have since reported half a dozen similar incidents, saying the two men have refused to answer questions when confronted.
Police initially declined to comment on the claims, suggesting privately that surveillance could be the work of the FBI or other law enforcement agencies.
"This is outrageous," said Mike Morrill, leading organizer of UNITY 2000, a mass rally planned for the eve of the four-day Republican fete.
Organizers also suspect that police have infiltrated some of their meetings.
Meanwhile, the American Civil Liberties Union advised organizers that it was legal for police and government agencies to take photographs in public. The surveillance also did not violate a 1987 court settlement banning city police from using infiltration tactics.
Tens of thousands of demonstrators, representing causes ranging from environmental protection and AIDS research to women's rights and social justice, are due in Philadelphia this month for what organizers say could be the largest protests seen at a U.S. political convention.
City police said they were keeping an eye out for extremists who have been blamed for violence during protests at the World Trade Organization meeting in Seattle last year and the World Bank meetings in Washington in April.
"There are people who may do more than exercise their First Amendment rights," Yarnell said.
The Philadelphia Inquirer, which first reported the police admission on Friday, said police acknowledged involvement only after the newspaper informed them that the registration of a car driven by the two men had been traced to the police department.
