I couldn't find the link to pulse to I've repritned the article here.
Tamir Nolley 6-2, 61b AN ENCOUNTER WITH THE MPD by Flo THE FACTS: On the evening of May 22nd, at approximetly 7:30, myself and two friends were riding our bicycles south on Bloomington Ave from 25th St; two of the bicyclists were riding abreast with the third following behind. A Minneapolis squad car approached from behind and instructed us over their loud speaker to ride single file. We complied. The squad slowly followed us for two blocks and then accelerated past, at which time we decided to forego the traffic of Bloomington for a quieter side street. We conitued south on 16th when the squad car appeared in front of us and proceeded past heading north. Upon passing us, the sqaud turned their direction so that they were once again approaching us from behind. At the point when they reached us, the officers ordered us over their loud speaker to stop riding and dismount our bikes. Being a bit ahead of the spot where my friends stopped, I turned my bike and rode back toward the officers. Upon arrival, I was approached by one of the officers who demanded my I.D. I explained that I had forgotten my identification at home and was ordered off my bike, with which I complied. I was then told to lie my bicycle on the ground, with which I also complied. The officer then instructed me to remove my backpack, to reach I responded,"Okay." and began to do so. At this point in time, the officer grabbed one of my backpack straps, began to wrench my body back and forth while screaming,"Are you going to cooperate? What are you hiding in this bag? Are you going to cooperate?", with me responding,"I will cooperate. Let me cooperate." The second officer approached, grabbed the second strap of my backpack and also began to wrench my body back and forth. The officers did not seem to be trying to remove my backpack but were only pushing my body to and fro and screaming at me, was I going to cooperate? My response being, over and over, I will cooperate, let me cooperate. Eventually the backpack became dislodged from my body, at which time the original officer to approach me began to pull me over my bicycle that lay situated between myself and him. In the way that the officer was located in relation to myself and my bicycle, the only place for me to step in compliance with him pulling me was onto my bicycle or onto his feet. After perhaps ten seconds of the officer screaming at me to cooperate, while pulling my body in a direction that I could not move, he moved a step back, allowing me to step over my bike. Once upon the same side of the bicycle as the officer, he proceeded to shove me towards the trunk of the squad car, while continuing to shout at me to cooperate, all the while me saying, "I will cooperate, let me cooperate". When the officer got me to the trunk of his car, he put my abdomen against the side of the car, spread my legs and began to search my body. I told him that I did not want him to touch my body and to please get a female officer there. The officer responded by smahing the side of my face onto the trunk of the sqaud, pinning my arms also to the trunk, spreading my legs even further and pressing his body completly up against my so that his groin pushed into my butt and screaming at me to cooperate. At this point the officer proceeded to search my body. After the search was completed, the officer put me into the back of the squad car. Throughout this entire scenerio, my two friends, who are both men, were never manhandled in this way. Also throughout this scenerio, my communication with the officer consisted of me repeadly stating that I was willing to cooperate, but never once was I actually allowed to do so. THE RANT: It is hard for me to accuratly convey through these written words the amazing show of misconduct, aggression and abuse of authority that I witnessed in my encounter with this police officer. The feeling of physical violation that I expirienced that night compares with nothing I've experienced before. With observing police conduct within my neighborhood and so many individuals being killed by the police in recent years, I am not naive in thinking the cops aren't out of control, but until the night of May 22nd, my first hand experience had never been so frightening. Although I doubt the effectivness of civilian review boards and civil liberty committees, I know that something needs to be done. These officers are coming into neighborhoods where they do not reside, to harrass the people who do live here, intimidate people for simply walking down the street, and using young women such as myself to assert their authority and boost their egos in a very disturbing and violent way. I understand that neighborhoods such as the Phillips have alot of problems with drugs and prostitution but to pack the area with out of control cops and criminilize the people fails to see the larger picture and deal with the situations of people being forced into situations by social constucts of class and race division. These are our neighborhoods, where we live, work, play, and these are our friends, kids, and oursleves that are having to deal with a steadily increasing show of force and misconduct by the police force. I honor police officers that are still out there in the sense of 'to serve and protect', but how many more unlawful arrests and "police-assisted suicides" do we have to endure before something begins to change. We have the right to feel safe in our home and neighborhoods, and if we cannot trust the ones who are supposedly out there to protect us from harm, what do we have? We have men with guns running the streets with the law on their side. I put a call out to you Mayor Rybak, you, who have choosen to take responsibility for this city. With that responsibility has come a police force that is headed more and more down that road of insanity. I ask you, what are you going to do about it? Because in my mind, it has nothing to do with politics or buying off a police chief, it's about the people of this city..the ones who trusted you to give you your job, the ones that are saying you care, the ones that are having to deal with these police on a daily basis while only trying to survive. On May 22nd, My body was violated, I was intimidated and used as an outlet for an abuse of authority for supposedly obstructing traffic because I was riding side by side with another bicyclist. In Minneapolis, it is legal for two bikers to ride abreast. I do not think that I am special in my experience or that it should happen to others and not me, I simply feel it is time for us to figure out how to brake down these dynamics of them controlling us. Through all of these societal conditionings, it is time for us to remember what it is to be empowered beings. It is time for us to remember how to provide for ourselves, grow our own food, protect our own neighborhoods from harm, and educate ourselves. We are the ones we've been waiting for, who else is there? *** Although I never had the opportunity to get the name of the officer, the badge numbers on the ticket I recieved are as follows: 0239/6765 __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? 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