There are various news accounts of what is actually taking place in Wisconsin. Here's a first person account from Michael Donnelly that describes a scene where police officers have refused to enforce orders given by a governor that appears to be corrupt and perhaps more and more cornered as the days go on. On a side note, I also heard a report that the Governor has ordered the windows in the Wisconsin Capitol building to welded shut!

This is from a Facebook Note (source):

Last night, I witnessed the most powerful event I have ever seen first hand.  

At the time, the subtlety of it was such that several members of the national press I talked to believed there was no story there.  I could not disagree with them more.  

Several days ago the Governor's office put out a press release stating that the Wisconsin State Capitol Building would be closed Sunday at four p.m. and that everyone inside would have to leave.  The building had been occupied for nearly two weeks preceding that.  

On Sunday morning, members of the TAA and other unions met to work out their strategy for the afternoon.  The core of their plan was to remain peaceful but refuse to leave.  At four, many of the people who were in the Capitol left, but hundreds stayed.  The police present - and there were a lot of them - told the people on the ground floor that they had to move up to the first floor.  Most did, but a handful politely refused.  

And then nothing happened.  

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http://www.scribd.com/andrew_hendricks_2

Finally, I jumped in the Scribd website with both feet.

I uploaded a few documents which are core to the John J Towery case, and put them into three folders for easier browsing and some context.  The links are surprisingly Facebook friendly, too.  I already had 26 reads of the main Towery document (which is short and not that interesting) within the first 10 hours of its publication.  That's a little weird, so it probably indicates some automated scraping program tuned to his name.  Most of the other entries were nowhere near that many reads.  Anyway, we shall see.

So far I have to admit, long .pdf documents are hard to serve any better or quicker anywhere else on the web.  I can't easily share my photo collections of documents, though - so I will probably have to work on getting them OCR'd into .pdf form. 

 

 

Hello everyone, I'm a former police officer with the Olympia Police Department. I understand that the city is in the midst of addressing the issue of police oversight. I have personally dealt with Drew Hendricks over the years on this very subject, and currently I'm researching it in a way to hopefully have a very innovative concept on police oversight. Have you given thought to provisions that will afford greater protection for police practitioners under oversight, yet balancing those needs with community expectations when it comes to police services. I'd like to hear from you on the issue of police oversight. I can be located at FredMeyer's Plaza Starbucks in the City of Lacey.

Ron Nesbitt Sr. 

Reflections On Anti-Police March (This is written by a participant, not an observer) The police hold sway in this country with violence. When they are not angrily brandishing their weapons, they are calmly brandishing the threat of jail or fines. The police appear to be good-natured and respectful people because some of them are. But even the best of them will quickly become a violent attacker if given the command. The worst of them are always violent, aggressive, bigoted and homicidal and require no command to be these things. We live under their control, just as any subjected people live under a ruler. The war was won long ago, and we have never known a world without police. So much time has passed that we no longer see the occupying force for what it is. It is taken for granted that we must have police. Because we must have police, we can never exist without them. The police and their violence are considered to be normal. Their violence is not violence. The police forcefully fill a hole in all of our lives: they maintain order. But it is not our order. It is the order of the rulers. We have all lost the ability to think without them. Because of the this, the police are the first barrier to any free society. Not only do the police have to be overcome, but they must never be emulated. Whereas the police patrol the streets, isolated in their cruisers, we live on our streets, know the people on our streets, and would never allow anything to happen those people.

While downtown last night I noticed some unusual police activity. What must have been about a dozen squad cars, mostly Washington State Patrol, but a couple Oly PD as well, zoomed past on 4th Avenue at high speed, each about 1 or 2 minutes or so apart. None of them had emergency lights on.

I wonder if anyone knows what was going on with that. Would that new scanner be informative about this situation?

Peace,
Berd

The Olympia, WA police department scanner feed is now streaming online at http://wacomputing.com. The site went live tonight, so go and show your support! http://wacomputing.com

Series I, if you missed it. If you don't know what this series is supposed to be about, give that post a read first.

All photos posted in the default 'medium' size: link to access other sizes provided. Click the post title to read the whole post.

Small print: All photos posted are from my Flickr account and were taken by me. All rights reserved and all that noise.


Series II - Photo I - Any Tagger Worth a Damn... [Link]



Found in an alleyway.

Downtown Olympia, WA

A tribute to the fallen Lakewood police officers

A benefit for the families

On Saturday, December 19th 2009 the Lacey, WA Forza coffee company will be hosting a benefit/tribute event for the fallen Lakewood police officers and their families. This event was put together by Olympia, WA musician Paul Mauer in cooperation with the giving owners of Forza coffee company. He’s bringing fellow musician friends together for an evening of music featuring Seattle, WA musician Ryan Perrey of “Elise in Furs”, Seattle, WA singer songwriter Christina Cramer, the band Lower Lights Burning out of Olympia, WA and himself. The evening starts at 6:00pm. The event is free and open to all ages. Donations will be taken by Forza coffee company on site the night of the event. Come join us with your hearts, ears, and support as we give our own brand of thanks through our music in this season of giving and love. See you there!

Links to the musicians websites:

Paul Mauer – www.euphoria-tea.com & www.myspace.com/paulmauermusic

Ryan Perrey/Elise in furs – www.myspace.com/ryanperrey

Christina Cramer – www.myspace.com/christinacramermusic

He was not a hero by any measure, and this fact no one would dispute. He was a rapist and a killer tormented by hallucinated demons. He believed himself to be the messiah sent from on high, and expected to be recognized soon as the savior. Whatever in the final days led him to target the police vanished with him on a cool night in Seattle. His is the rare case in which it is nearly impossible to imagine even a mother’s love, or a sister’s.

For better than a day this wounded man desperately clutched the body that had committed brutal crimes against his fellow human beings. How had his own life been revalued when the savagery was committed? The physical test he endured in the aftermath of the attack demonstrated without question his irrational will to live. What life could be granted to a man who had committed this treachery? Clearly the disease had spread into every corner of his being.

Listening to the local radio broadcasts on Sunday morning this week informed me of the startling event. Four area police officers had been killed in an ambush style shooting at a coffee shop in Lakewood Washington, south of Tacoma. The area is a tangle of highway off ramps, outdated traffic signals, strip malls and asphalt. There are two major military bases there in the vicinity, and mingled with it all are people, dodging traffic and making a living. Unlike Olympia to the south and Tacoma to the north, the area around Lakewood is not known for its culture. There is a lurking sense of sadness and despair, squandered possibility and dead earth paved over without regard or inspiration. It is one thing to look out over land that has been humanized by inspired, thoughtful and creative people; architecture and community have a way of mitigating the destruction that precede them. But many parts of this country have been humanized in the name of commerce and access, and the people who live there are forced to do so around it. They are expected to live without culture save what appears on their television’s screen, or what they gather from the shelves of the cinder block gas stations on nearly every corner. The officers killed are by all reports dedicated professionals with families and friends who love them. Contrary to the experiences of many, I have almost always been treated with kindness and respect and professionalism by the police officers I have encountered. I learned early in my life that there are simple things one can do to stay on their good side, and I have many times walked away from situations that would have resulted in arrest for others. There is no doubt that my background and behavior have allowed me to relate to authority figures in a way that legitimizes me in their eyes, and protects me from their shallower inclinations.