Hello everybody: The Orange County Register has posted an interesting article about the arrest of Coyotl Tezcalipoca, an Orange County activist, at last Tuesday's meeting of the Costa Mesa City Council (see below). I witnessed the whole thing. In fact, I unsuccessfully tried to prevent the Costa Mesa Police from arresting Coyotl by getting Captain Ron Smith to have his men back off of him. Coyotl was being surrounded by cops, and when he didn't move away from the podium fast enough for them, they pushed him hard, forcefully dragging him out the door with a policeman's arm around his neck, I tried to follow them out the door to see what else they were going do to him. But another cop grabbed my right arm and briefly detained me. When I froze, he released me. I was not arrested or injured. But Coyotl ended up getting bruised quite a bit. I viewed some of the raw video footage taken of the arrest by a Spanish language televison network, and some of the clips appear to show him being kicked by a cop while on the ground.
Costa Mesa police have filed three misdemeanor criminal charges against Coyotl. One for resisting arrest and two for violating municipal ordinances that regulate conduct during public meetings. Several people have alleged to me that Costa Mesa Mayor Allan Mansoor basically cut off Coyotl before his time to speak was up. Although this appears to be the case, it needs further research. The whole thing about him plotting to disrupt the meeting is complete garbage. Asking people to stand up silently during a meeting of any public body while public comments are in session is a wholly legitimate form of free speech and expression that is protected by the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Many people can attest to the fact that similar actions like the kind that Coyotl engaged in have occurred at previous meetings of the Costa Mesa City Council without incident. I even participated in them. What Mayor Mansoor did to Coyotl, in my opinion, was illegal and unconstitutional. The arrest was wholly unneccesary and the force the cops used to take him into custody was excessive. The lead staff attorney for the Orange County Chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union contacted me yesterday and told me they are conducting a full investigation into this matter to determine if they will intervene. In the meanwhile, Coyotl is in need of legal representation. If anybody knows of a good attorney that would be interested in handling his case, please don't hesitate to contact me. I'll pass on any references to him. Stay tuned for further developments. Sincerely, Duane J. Roberts [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.ocregister.com/ocregister/news/local/article_932123.php Thursday, January 5, 2006 Arrested activist vows to continue protest By BRIAN MARTINEZ The Orange County Register COSTA MESA A man forcefully arrested at a City Council meeting this week said Wednesday that he and other members of the activist group Tonantzin Collective will continue their protest. "I was treated unfairly, but I can still walk," said Coyotl Tezcalipoca, 24. "We'll definitely" stay the course, he said. The activists are demanding that Costa Mesa drop its efforts to give certain police officials the power to enforce immigration law a role usually left to federal authorities. Mayor Allan Mansoor on Wednesday defended his actions at Tuesday's council meeting, saying he was only trying to maintain order. The incident started when Tezcalipoca asked his supporters in the crowd to stand, Mansoor told him not to do that, and Tezcalipoca urged them to do it anyway. Earlier, Mansoor did not appear to oppose Jim Gilchrist's request for members of the Minuteman Project - a group that advocates strict immigration-law enforcement - to stand up. But an interview with Mansoor and a review of the meeting's video recording revealed that he started to tell the Minutemen to stop standing and then cut his sentence short when they sat down quickly. After Tezcalipoca did not heed Mansoor's order, the mayor told him he could no longer speak. He didn't stop speaking, so police officers asked him to leave. He refused. When they tried to escort him outside, he resisted, so they dragged him. "We really didn't want to arrest him, because that never makes the situation better," Police Chief John Hensley said. Tezcalipoca, also known as Benito Acosta, was booked on suspicion of disrupting an assembly and obstructing an arresting officer, and released just after midnight. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Copyright 2005 The Orange County Register | Privacy policy | User agreement __________________________________________ Yahoo! DSL Something to write home about. Just $16.99/mo. or less. dsl.yahoo.com ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor --------------------~--> Clean water saves lives. 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