A Brooklyn Protester Pleads Guilty After His Twitter Posts Sink His Case
Source: NY Times
After more than a year of arguing in court papers that police officers had led hundreds of Occupy Wall Street marchers on to the roadway of the Brooklyn Bridge and then arrested 700 of them, a Brooklyn writers own Twitter postings showed that he had, in fact, heard warnings from the police to stay off the road.
They tried to stop us, absolutely did not want us on the motorway, the writer, Malcolm Harris, posted during the march on Oct. 1, 2011, according to passages read by a prosecutor in court. They tried to block and threaten arrest. We were too many and too loud. They backed up until they could put up barricades.
Those postings and others by Mr. Harris, 23, were described publicly for the first time on Wednesday in Criminal Court in Manhattan as Mr. Harris pleaded guilty to disorderly conduct.
Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/13/nyregion/malcolm-harris-pleads-guilty-over-2011-march.html?ref=nyregion&_r=0
As much as OWS is to be credited with being able to focus attention on the problems with the banking and financial system, it is to be blamed for frittering away its early success in large part by picking targets (such as the Brooklyn Bridge) that had nothing to do with Wall Street and that aggravated ordinary New York residents going about their day.
secondwind
(16,903 posts)probably to attract "attention" to the cause.
I remember stopping traffic on the Triboro Bridge in the early 70's, with a baby carriage.. We were protesting for daycare for toddlers, so women could go back to work.
Comrade_McKenzie
(2,526 posts)It's the American way.
rgbecker
(4,834 posts)Got my birth certificate, driver's license, Social Security Card, Medicare card, credit cards, AAA card, AARP card, Marriage License and all my degrees and diplomas. I'm all American and ready to go to the streets....or maybe stay home and watch TV.
JDPriestly
(57,936 posts)protestors heard the instruction to stay off the bridge. Having seen the video of it, I don't think that very many of them did. Those in the back do not seem to have heard. It was a huge crowd.
Also, on the video it looked like one of the police officers was actually leading the crowd onto the bridge.