---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: Sandwichman <[email protected]> Date: Wed, Oct 26, 2011 at 4:17 PM Subject: Iraq veteran in critical condition after getting hit with police projectile during Occupy Oakland demonstration To: PEN-L list <[email protected]>
OAKLAND -- A 24-year old Marine Corps corporal and Iraqi war veteran remains in critical condition at Highland Hospital Wednesday night with head wounds and brain swelling after he was hit in the head with a police projectile during protests in downtown Oakland late Tuesday night. Scott Thomas Olsen, 24, of Onalaska, Wisc., was admitted to Highland late Tuesday after he was hit on the head above his right eye during clashes with police. "It's absolutely unconscionable that our citizens are going overseas to protect other citizens just to come back and have our own police hurt them," said Joshua Shepherd, a six-year Navy veteran and friend of Olsen's. Fellow protesters brought him in after he failed to respond to basic questions. Doctors at the hospital soon found that Olsen was suffering from brain swelling and placed him under immediate supervision. "He survived two tours in Iraq," said Adele Carpenter, a friend of Olsen's and a member of the Civilian Soldier Alliance. "This struggle has high stakes, I really respect the fact that Scott was standing up for what he believes in. He's really passionate about social justice causes." Olsen appears to be the first serious injury nationwide of the Occupy Wall Street movement that has spread to virtually every major American city -- and several smaller ones -- as millions of people continue to express their rage and disappointment with the country's banking, regulatory and healt care systems. Olsen, a systems analyst at a San Francisco IT firm called OPSWAT, had camped out for several nights at San Francisco's occupation before moving to Oakland a few days ago. Olsen was just one of several hundred angry protesters who swarmed through Oakland's downtown area, a grid of darkened and otherwise lonely streets, well into the morning hours on Wednesday repeatedly clashing with riot police. In some cases, protesters threw bottles, and tipped over garbage cans and Dumpsters. Oakland police said two of its officers were injured when a protester doused them with cans of blue and pink paint. Protesters lambasted the police response as "heavy handed" and criticized the use of projectiles such as rubber bullets and the rubber concussion dowels that struck Olsen. "He was shot by the people who were supposed to protect him," said Keith Shannon, 24, Olsen's Daly City roommate and former Marine Corps colleague. "It shows what lengths the government will go to to suppress opposing points of view." Olsen did two tours of duty in Iraq, once to the Iraqi-Syrian border city of Al Qaim from August 2006 to May 2007, and once to Haditha, in 2008. Both cities were hotbeds of Al Qaeda and insurgent activity. In November 2005, Haditha was the site of a large-scale massacre of 24 men, women and children in which several U.S. Marines were charged with wrongdoing. All of the Marines were eventually acquitted. In 2010, the Marines issued Olsen with an "administrative discharge." Maj. Shawn Haney, U.S. Marine spokesman based in Quantico, Va., declined to discuss Olsen's discharge, but said his departure could have been for anything from a medical condition to a punitive measure. One protester, who asked that he be identified only by the initial V, said Olsen's wounds were proof that police were aiming too high when shooting projectiles. "People were getting hit hard and high up. It was a little bit too brutal. I think it is terrible what happened to him. They were way too aggressive." Another young man, a 30-year Old Irish national named Seamus, lay writhing on the ground sobbing Wednesday afternoon clutching a grapefruit sized bruise above his left hip. He said he and Olsen had been together when Olsen was shot. Seamus said his bruise was the result of a police projectile. Other protesters gathered around Seamus and showed off small rubber buckshot pellets they claimed the police had fired at them. Olsen's parents planned on flying out to Oakland Thursday to see their son. Highland Hospital administrators said Olsen remained in critical condition, with no change in his status since his admission Tuesday night. But friends and acquaintances said hospital officials told them Olsen had suffered a skull fracture and was at risk of brain damage. At least one of Olsen's bosses at OPSWAT visited him in the hospital on Wednesday. "It's horrible what happened to him," said a young man named Jason who said he was a friend of Olsens. "We want people to come out and protest peacefully. "Don't go down to (the police) tactics" he added, referring to tear gas and rubber bullets. "It makes you want to come out here and stand your ground." -- Sandwichman -- Sandwichman
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