It ain't just the DEA

Oakland SWAT raided a wharehouse in East Oakland last night and seized 2,500 Marijuana plants, 50 pounds of processed pot, $40,000 in cash, two suits of body armor, six guns and several boxes of ammunition. 11 people were arrested in connection to the raid.

Investigators had been monitoring the warehouse for a long time before Wednesday night's raid because of suspicious activity there, according to police.
-Inside Bay Area

The City of Oakland is not against marijuana growers, just the ones who aren't politically-connected enough to be officially sanctioned by City Hall....i.e. they wear hoodies.

Quan recall effort officially underway

Gene Hazzard, of the Oakland Black Caucus, filed an official notice of intent to circulate a recall petition against Mayor Jean Quan today .

"She has willfully ignored the City's most pressing issue: public safety," the filing states. "She ignored the call of Oakland residents to significantly increase the number of police officers and instead supported a regressive $11 million parcel tax."

Charles Pine, of the group Oakland Residents of Peaceful Neighborhoods, signed the petition and echoed the complaint, criticizing Quan for her vote in June 2010 to lay off 80 police officers. Quan was then on the City Council, which was facing tense police union negotiations and a huge budget deficit, and the layoffs won by a 5-3 vote of the council.
-Inside Bay Area

Interestingly, rumors are circulating around the Occupy Oakland camp about a raid early tomorrow morning.

Jerry Amaro's family wins $1.7 million settlement

Today, the Oakland City Council voted unanimously to approve a $1.7 million settlement to the wrongful death lawsuit filed by the family of Jerry Amaro, who was beaten to death by as many as five Oakland police officers in 2000.

Amaro, 36, died on April 21, 2000, from pneumonia caused by multiple rib fractures and a collapsed lung. He had told his mother and several other people that he had been beaten by police officers who arrested him during a drug sting on March 23, 2000. The police report of the arrest made no mention of use of force.

Amaro was jailed for five days and repeatedly complained of pain in his ribs, which jail officials noted. On April 18, Amaro saw a doctor who took X-rays that revealed five rib fractures and a collapsed lung. The doctor recommended that Amaro seek emergency medical treatment to drain fluid from his lung. Amaro did not seek further treatment and died in his friend's basement three days later.

Attorneys John Burris and Jim Chanin filed the federal wrongful death lawsuit on behalf of Amaro's mother, Geraldine Montoya, in March 2009, shortly after the details of the internal police investigation were leaked to the press.

Investigators found that Amaro had been "severely injured" during his arrest, and at least five officers had used "some form of physical prowess" on Amaro without noting the reason for such force or mentioning the use of force at all.

The report also concluded that the reporting officer falsified his supervisor's signature on the police report and the commanding officer, Lt. Edward Poulson, inappropriately met with the arresting officers before the interviews with Internal Affairs investigators.

The investigation also found that the officers were "derelict" in not seeking medical attention for Amaro.
-Inside Bay Area

Police brutality lawsuit in Jerry Amaro case can go forward

The US 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco has found that Oakland Police lied, mirepresented evidence, and stonewalled the investigation into the March 23, 2000 police killing of Jerry Amaro. The ruling will allow a police brutality lawsuit filed by Amaro's family in 2009 to go forward.

Amaro was arrested for allegedly trying to buy crack cocaine from the undercover officers, who were posing as dealers. He later told jail officials, inmates and relatives that officers had beaten him before booking him, an account that two witnesses on the scene later supported, the appeals court said.

One witness, who was also arrested that night, said officers had repeatedly kicked Amaro in the ribs, punched him in the face and kneed him in the back, the court noted. The witness said Amaro had been bleeding from the nose and mouth when he was put in a police car.

The jail officer recalled that Amaro had bruises to his face and had complained about his ribs, and Amaro's cellmate said he could barely get out of bed. Amaro was released five days later, showed his mother his bruises and told her he had been denied treatment, the court said.

On April 18, 2000, a doctor told him he had suffered five rib fractures and a collapsed lung and needed emergency treatment. He died three days later, having opted to stay with a friend rather than receive treatment.
-SF Gate

Murderer Mehserle is a free man

Oscar Grant is still dead.

OAKLAND -- Former BART police officer Johannes Mehserle was released from jail early Monday morning after serving just over 11 months of a two-year-prison term given to the 29-year-old after he was found guilty of involuntary manslaughter for killing Oscar Grant III.

Mehserle's release at 12:01 a.m. was confirmed by a Los Angeles County Men's Jail automated notification system which sent out alerts as soon as the former Napa resident was allowed to walk free.

Although Mehserle was sentenced to state prison for his conviction, he was never handed over to the California Department of Corrections because of safety concerns. Mehserle's attorney Michael Rains successfully argued to keep Mehserle in Los Angeles County jail where he was held in his own cell and apart from other inmates.

Mehserle also did not serve the entire two-year sentence given by Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Robert Perry because of credits he received for time served. Mehserle was put in jail immediately after a Los Angeles jury found him guilty of involuntary manslaughter on July 8, 2010.
-Inside Bay Area

Yesterday, a protest march and two large rallies were held in Oakland. People are upset at the lenient sentence, and the fact that Mehserle didn't even have to serve his entire sentence.
And now he gets to start a new life with the help of his connections through the brotherhood of racist cops.

Rains said Mehserle was hopeful to find a job in retail.
He's had retail type work for a long time and sales jobs,” Rains said. “He also has technical knowledge on computers."
"He's gotten a couple of offers," Mehserle's attorney told KTVU.
-KTVU

Murderer Mehserle ready to start a new life

Former BART police officer Johannes Mehserle, who murdered Oscar Grant in front a trainload of people on New Year’s Day in 2009, will walk the streets of California a free man sometime this month. It was originally reported that he would go before Judge Robert Perry (the man who helped him get a reduced sentence less than a year ago) today, but that hearing has been rescheduled for June 13.
Unfortunately, Oscar Grant is still dead, and unlike Mehserle, won’t have to go through the tragedy of having to rebuild his life with the help of well-connected colleagues that can get him a job in "either sales or business."

Due to the classification of being a non-violent felon, Mehserle could walk free in the next few weeks after serving less than one calendar year of his prison sentence.

In Oakland and in Los Angeles, where Mehserle’s trial took place and he is currently being held, reaction to the news of Mehserle’s classification was met with shock and anger among activists and observers of the case.

“I don’t know how much more violent you can get than killing someone!” said Tiah Starr, an organizer with the October 22nd Coalition against Police Brutality, one of the founding organizations of the Los Angeles Coalition for Justice for Oscar Grant.
“It’s insane that he only did a year in jail and Oscar Grant is dead … it just makes no sense to me,” said Starr.

Sheilagh Polk, a former Los Angeles resident who moved to Oakland four years ago, felt that the charge of involuntary manslaughter never should have been an option. “Mehserle … should have been convicted of second degree murder; he pulled out his gun, cocked it, pulled the trigger and executed an unarmed, young Black man with full confidence that he would get away with it. And he did,” she said.
Davey D, a journalist and 20-year resident of the Bay Area, felt that the non-violent designation was just one more indicator of the justice system’s failure to work for African Americans. “At the end of the day, this is just a repudiation of Black life,” he said. “That’s what this all boils down to – the verdict, the picking of the jury, the sentencing – this is all a refusal to acknowledge and see Black life as something that is valuable.”
-SF Bay View

The Big O

So apparently, the Oakland Coliseum has now become the "Overstock.com" stadium, and appropriately so.
Oakland is the future. We have historically lead the way in terms of political consciousness, sustainability, diversity, arts, culture, and food. When America was starting to think about rebelling, the Black Panthers and Hells Angels were already making headlines. When Bruce Lee wanted to bring China's secrets to the rest of the world, he did it in Oakland. When the NFL was forced to merge with the upstart AFL, an Oaklander was grinning the widest. When the world was in its greatest need for something fresh and new, it was Hammertime. When peak oil was rearing its ugly head, we gave the world scraper bikes.
Now, as the overinflated bubble of infinite growth/infinite consumption is bursting all over the world, we give professional sports Overstock.com:

Overstock.com Stadium is really not such a strange name: When the A's are playing, think of it as referring to the thousands of excess unused seats. For the Raiders, it hints at a surplus of empty promises -- nine years since a playoff berth.
The new title sponsor is an online liquidator that offers cut-rate prices on surplus inventories of furniture, clothing, baby supplies, luggage and almost anything but winning seasons.
-Inside Bay Area

Can't think of anything more forward-thinking than a company specializing in liquidating surplus inventories.

TV Reporters Robbed

The Middle East ain't got nothin on East Oakland.

Jobs programs in Oakland do what they can

Here's more on EOYDC:

Cops Lie

This is a very subtle case, but a good example nonetheless.
I’m not trying to say that police deserve to be shot, but if you hang out with drug dealers and buy or sell drugs on the streets, there does exist the chance that you might get shot.
You may have heard that in late August, another cop was shot in East Oakland.
Andrew Barrientos, who is believed to be a Union City gang member, shot Fremont Officer Todd Young, a member of a multi-agency drug and gang task force, on August 27. Officer Eric Tang, an Oakland police officer who was with Young when he was shot, was neither shot by, nor was he able to shoot or aprehend, the suspect.

Barrientos claims that the cops did not identify themselves. It is a known fact that they were not in uniform.
The official story is that they were “trying to serve an arrest warrant.” However, isn’t it more likely that they were trying to entrap Barrientos by purchasing drugs from him? If so, that wouldn’t make Barrientos innocent, or even a nice guy, but the bottom line is, the police are lying. What are they trying to hide with this lie? I doubt that the public would ultimately care about the difference between an undercover sting operation and two plainclothes officers legitimately serving an arrest warrant, but there are too many things that don’t add up here.

For instance, newspaper reports wove a tale about a “running gun battle” through the streets of Oakland. However, of the shots fired by Barrientos, the majority of the bullets ended up in a car he tried to hijack on Bancroft Ave, NOT on Auseon Ave where he was allegedly served the arrest warrant. In fact, the only published report of a bullet hitting a house occurred on 86th ave, NOT Auseon. This was most likely a bullet that was fired by Barrientos at one of the two cars he tried to hijack on Bancroft Ave. For those of you unfamiliar with the neighborhood, Auseon and 86th are parallel streets. Newspaper reports claim that that Barrientos was served the warrant on Auseon, then he fled up to Bancroft, being fired at and returning fire. However, most of the shell casings were on Bancroft, closer to 86th (where both carjacking attempts occurred). The physical evidence clearly blows holes in the "running gun battle with the cops" story.

Barrientos, who was caught two days later trying to cross the Mexico border, was wanted for pointing a gun at his girlfriend during an argument. Combined with his history as a gang member, he should have obviously been considered armed and dangerous. Is it believable that two plainclothes officers were serving him with an arrest warrant without visible backup? Is it possible that the officers were serving the warrant without their guns drawn? And even if so, how incompetent was Officer Tang that his partner got shot twice by a suspect who was allegedly running away, yet Tang could not shoot a 240 pound man who had just shot his partner twice? Remember, they were allegedly serving a warrant, so the altercation allegedly began at point blank range…after the two officers had allegedly identified themselves as cops. This is a classic case of the incompetence theory, yet something tells me that Officer Tang would not have drawn such an assignment if he weren’t somewhat competent as a police officer.
Eyewitness reports said multiple police cars were immediately on the scene within seconds after the shootout, but since Barrientos got away, it is safe to assume that they were not close enough. The obvious conclusion is that the backup officers were trying to remain hidden, which would be more consistent with an undercover sting operation than two officers serving a warrant. Police spokesmen have been very careful to not refer to the officers as “undercover.”

Interestingly, 70 of Young's fellow Fremont officers showed up at a recent court appearance for Barrientos in their uniforms, obviously to intimidate Barrientos. Maybe Officers Young and Tang should have been wearing theirs the day Young was shot too.

New Scraper Bike King Video

Even though I ride the anti-scraper bike, this is an excellent video, and I couldn't be more proud of T. He got a good head on his shoulders. Please check this out.

Scrapertown from California is a place. on Vimeo.

OPD Stonewalled Investigation into 2000 Murder of Jerry Amaro

Oakland police concocted false and "ridiculous" stories in an apparent cover-up of the police beating of East Oakland resident Jerry Amaro, who died less than a month after his 2000 arrest, a federal judge has ruled.
Amaro died in April 2000 of pneumonia, which was caused by broken ribs and a punctured lung suffered when he was kicked by Oakland Police Officers while under their custody. Amaro, a father of two, was in police custody because undercover police officers tried to sell him drugs.
The FBI had opened up an investigation into the matter because there was sufficient evidence that OPD had attempted to cover up the beating.

"I do not believe all Police are bad, but the ones that are create havoc in the community."
-Anita Wills

Racism in Oakland Parking Tickets

Oakland parking officers were ordered to avoid enforcing neighborhood parking violations in two of the city's wealthier neighborhoods but told to continue enforcing the same violations in the rest of the city.
In essence, the cash-strapped city sought to generate revenue off of poor people instead of rich people.

"It's not fair," said Shirnell Smith, 44, a parking officer for 22 years who has lived in Oakland for 24 years. Smith and the union representing parking officers said the policy has resulted in tickets being issued disproportionately to poor, black and Latino people.

See video here

BART doles out $1.5 million to family of Oscar Grant

BART is paying out a $1.5 million settlement to Oscar Grant's baby mama, who had filed a $50 million lawsuit filed against the transit agency after Grant was fatally shot in the back by former BART Officer Johannes Mehserle while he was handcuffed and in police custody on New Year's Day 2009.

"No matter what anyone's opinion of the case may be, the sad fact remains: this incident has left Tatiana without a father."
-BART board President James Fang

OPD pre-holiday drug sweeps

Coke don’t grow in the ghetto
Guns ain’t made in the hood


For Christmas this year, OPD wants to prosecute 100 Oaklanders for drug trafficking

"A lot of it is a fishing expedition," he said. "It starts with crummy little infractions: riding your bike on the sidewalk, or you have a dog without a leash, a taillight out, something like that. It lets us stop you and talk to you, and from there maybe we can find some probable cause, a way to legally find the drugs. A lot of people who don't know what police are doing see that and call it harassment."

Oh, we know they’re profiling. And it IS harassment.

Help from the several communities in which open-air drug markets operate is limited, Seder said. Many people say they won't help police for fear of becoming known as a snitch and facing violent retribution, he said.
"But if you're not going to stand up for the place you live in, what will you stand up for?" Seder said. “The neighborhood ends up being tacitly involved, in a sense, with the permissive attitude."

Cops want citizens to snitch, but cops don’t tolerate snitching amongst their own ranks. It’s probably the most sacrilegious thing a cop could do. Cops even refuse to admit their own mistakes, or admit the mistakes of their fellow cops. No one circles the wagons like cops do. No one. Their constant whining and complaining about citizens not snitching on each other is probably THE most hypocritical thing about cops.

Merry Christmas.

Healthy Food in the Hood

This is ultimately the problem:


So the answer is obviously localization, right?
But what if you live in the concrete jungle?
Watch food activist Bryant Terry talk about quasi-apartheid in the food system, and advocate for projects that address food insecurity in the “food deserts” of low-income communities.

So how do we start to achieve "Food Justice?"
In this clip, he joins forces with Jason Harvey of the Oakland Food Connection during an organic soul party.

Jason Harvey talks about a
Rooftop garden project in East Oakland.

And because “You can’t live on a corner store,” The People’s Grocery

If you made it through all of those, congratulations, here is your parting gift:
The Hood Diet