Report from peace marshal at protest after killing of #RayshardBrooks in Atlanta.
"There's a lot to unpack from yesterday but I'll keep it to myself or do it offline because I'm not going to center myself or my experiences. However I do want to talk about one thing that 1/13
"There's a lot to unpack from yesterday but I'll keep it to myself or do it offline because I'm not going to center myself or my experiences. However I do want to talk about one thing that 1/13
I saw because it's important that you know. I went down to the protest at University & Pryor to offer support & work with a group of clergy friends of mine whose mission it is to de-escalate situations and serve as "front line protestors" (i.e. standing between police 2/13
& protestors). APD was on the streets and a large presence of GA State Patrol was on the interstate. At one point in the afternoon, the protestors decide to "take the interstate" & the organizers & the group I am with do our best to talk them out of it. 3/13
I'm assuming it's because of the vests we wore the GSP let us cross the barrier. My back is to the officers as I'm talking to the protestors. One officer behind me trying to rile up one protestor in particular. He's got maybe a dozen zip ties ready & 4/13
hooked to his belt. Every time I get him calmed down, the officer starts talking again. He's calling the protestor "boy" and saying "this is just ignorant" using language he knows will rile him up. 5/13
I literally put my hand on the officer to push him back (I was 100% sure I was about to go to jail for that. I'm also aware of the white privilege involved in thinking you can put your hand on an officer & survive the experience) The officer tells me 6/13
"we're just talking, we're just talking" and I say "bullshit, you are deliberately escalating a situation." Two of the clergy members see what is happening and talk to the officer. I find his superior who moves him to a different spot on the line. 7/13
Several moments later, the situation is defused and the protestors move back down to the intersection. A little later, maybe five protestors run up the hill again. They are coming back down when the *same officer* crosses the barrier and yells "get back down there" 8/13
(to the people who were already getting back down there). One protestor turns to say something to the officer and the officer puts his hand on his gun. The protestor puts his hands in the air. The officer is yelling at him "get back down there" 9/13
with his hand on his gun and the protestor won't put his hands down & turn around because there is a police officer with his hand on his gun & he will not/can not turn his back on that. Myself, a clergy member, & several others are a little over halfway up the 10/13
hill trying to persuade the officer to take his hand off his gun After several incredibly tense minutes of watching this officer escalate a situation, two other GSP officers pull him back. The young man walks down the hill. I'm convinced that he not only wanted to 11/13
arrest someone. He wanted to smash them to the ground. He at no point that I witnessed attempted to de-escalate a situation but the opposite. Even after clergy members and organizers repeatedly talked to this officer's supervisors about his behavior, 12/13
he was not removed from the line. It's not just the "one bad apple" it's the whole orchard that allows corruption." And this, my friends is what we are talking about. 13/13
