Humboldt County Sheriff Officers shot and killed Robert Garth in the morning of Saturday August 7, 2010. CopWatchers and friends of the Garth family went to Blue Lake, after learning of the shooting. We took lots of video and photos. We want here to share what we learned, in brief.
First this: As we write this post (Saturday night, August 7, 2010), we anticipate two things. The first is that the media (i.e. Thadues Greenson of the Times-Standard who was in Blue Lake) will parrot, stating as fact, the police story. That's what the media ALWAYS does.
Posted by copwatch | Thu, 07/29/2010 - 11:20pm story
Redwood Curtain CopWatch just received a call about a young man who was murdered by a Mendocino Sheriff's Officer. This is a quick alert- more will come later regarding the truth of what happened, and possibly urgings to you to support the family and get the truth out.
Posted by copwatch | Mon, 07/19/2010 - 7:58pm event
Details soon.
If you are interested in organizing for August 9th [Cotton Day] or in hanging up and handing out fliers for August 9th, please call Redwood Curtain CopWatch at (707) 633-4493.
Francisco Moran, a 45 year old man was shot and killed by police [Modesto Police Department officers Joseph Lamantia, Robert Laxton] in North East Modesto on early Monday morning [Sept. 6, 2010], as officers responded to a civil dispute at his home. In the newspaper on Tuesday, police claimed that Moran was "belligerent" and "intoxicated," and after being tasered, came at police with a knife that was taken from his pants. This forced them to shoot Moran dead. Seems like we've heard this story before haven't we?
In 2003, police shot and killed Eustolio Aguilar, after they claimed he was reaching for a gun. After he was dead, it turned out he was reaching for a cell phone.
*Warning: the following article contains news mostly taken from mainstream sources. Apologies if any of the statements contained below misrepresent John T. Williams life in any way.
In the last week alone, 5 people were killed in “officer-involved” shootings in the Puget Sound region. On August 31, John T. Williams became the first of this last string of killings by police. John Williams, age 50, was a native man from the Dididaht, Nuu Chan Nulth nation on the west coast of Vancouver Island. He was shot four times in the chest by Seattle police officer Ian D. Birk, age 27.
Posted by copwatch | Sat, 09/11/2010 - 9:06pm story
Mariano is my husband. He is the father of my 1 year old son, who celebrated his 1st birthday 4 days before his father was brutally and wrongfully killed. We have been together for 2 1/2 years and he is the gentlest, kindest, most peaceful and loving man I have ever known. I believe that what Sheriffs reports are saying is a bunch of lies. I dont understand how this happened. I have many doubts in my mind and mostly my heart around everything that has to do with my husband's killing. He was shot probably 8 or more times, in the legs, the stomach, his leg and arm were broken and to finish him off I guess, they shot him in the back, but not straight on, sideways, the bullet severed his spinal column and broke his back. I already have an excellent lawyer and I have just arrived back in the states after a two week stay in Mexico. I helped return him to the land where he was born to bury his lifeless body. A wish he had expressed to me a year before. This can't keep on like this. People being killed because they are here yes, illegally, but most are here to work and to try and make a life for themselves and their families.
Click HERE to see the STOLEN LIVES report from M. Gloria Hernandez of Fresno. The key to the acronyms used in the list are at the bottom of the document.
My name is Anna Renee White. I am 25 years old. I am from Willits, Ca. and currently a full time college student at Humboldt State University. When I am not busy working, in classes or doing homework- you would usually find me at the beach with my pit mix Tonka. He was my best friend. Recently my best friend was unfairly taken away from me.
On July 27, 2010 the local Mendocino county law enforcement agencies came to my parents home in Willits to serve a search warrant and question my parents about an acquaintance of theirs. They obtained the search warrant because a criminal they had been surveillancing for a couple of months stopped by my parent’s home frequently to have my dad fix his vehicles. My father is
Posted by copwatch | Sat, 07/17/2010 - 11:49am story
The manslaughter verdict returned against former BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit) cop, Johannes Mehserle, for the videotaped murder of Oscar Grant, sent hundreds of protesters back into the hot streets of Oakland, California, Grant's hometown.
The corporate media scratched its collective head, essentially asking 'Why protest when the guy was convicted?"
The protesters knew, however, that the court system bent heaven and earth to return the lightest verdict possible; involuntary manslaughter' and that Mehserle faces a possible sentence of probation to a maximum of 4 years in prison.
They knew that Mehserle got a non black jury, hundreds of miles from Oakland.
They knew that each of those hundreds could've been Oscar Grant, unarmed, shot to death on tape and the same thing would've happened.
By JEREMY HAY THE PRESS DEMOCRAT Published: Monday, July 5, 2010 at 5:32 p.m.
The Sonoma County Sheriff's deputy who shot and killed a man last month in Santa Rosa has been involved in three of the 11 officer-involved shootings that the sheriff's office has recorded this decade.
Sgt. Mark Fuston, who on June 1 killed Albert Mike Leday Jr., 49, after a high speed chase, was one of two deputies who fatally shot a Windsor woman in 2000 after she pointed a toy gun at them. In 2003, he shot and injured a fleeing gang member.
Posted by copwatch | Thu, 06/24/2010 - 2:59pm story
l spoke to Daniel (tasered man)'s Mom. She said when the cops arrived Daniel was outside, calm at the time... The cops said something and Daniel said "Leave me alone," and backed away from the cops saying "Leave me alone, I am scared."
Posted by copwatch | Wed, 06/23/2010 - 5:43pm story
Lenda, Please encourage the family to request an independent autopsy and for the body to be PRESERVED.
When the system tells a grieving family that they have 'this' many days to cremate or bury, the grieving family usually does it quick and has to rally together the money to pay for it. PLEASE tell them that they are entitled, if they request and notice the coroner, to an independent forensics testing (not sure how to pay for it, but it would be a forensic pathologist that the family chooses) and that should halt the "destruction" of Daniel's body.
Also, they should work on not allowing the body to be destroyed so that if or when they sue , there is a body to examine. OFTEN, the coroner's reports (including toxicology) do NOT match up with 1) the injuries that parents have seen on their dead children's bodies and 2) the substances that persons had in them prior to death (i.e. nicotine, marijuana)
Posted by copwatch | Wed, 06/23/2010 - 3:25pm story
Del Norte man dies in Taser incident
The Times-Standard June 23, 2010 1:15:10 AM PDT
A Del Norte County man who assaulted two sheriff's deputies [we can always count on the Times Standard to be the immediately decided judge and jury for an execution by cop] Tuesday morning died after he was shot with a Taser and began having trouble breathing, the Del Norte County Sheriff's Office reported.
Posted by copwatch | Thu, 06/10/2010 - 2:32am story
Aiyana Jones case, attorney says Video shows police fired into Detroit home By Corey Williams and Ed White The Associated Press May 18, 2010
DETROIT -- Police who carried out a raid on a family home that left a 7-year-old girl dead over the weekend were accompanied by a camera crew for a reality television show, and an attorney says video of the siege contradicts the police account of what happened. Geoffrey Fieger, an attorney for the family of young Aiyana Jones, said he has seen three or four minutes of video of the raid, although he declined to say whether it was shot by the crew for the A&E series "The First 48," which has been shadowing Detroit homicide detectives for months.
Police have said officers threw a flash grenade through the first-floor window of the two-family home, and that an officer's gun discharged, killing the girl, during a struggle or after colliding with the girl's grandmother inside the home. But Fieger said the video shows an officer lobbing the