The six citizens arrested during the preemptive police raids prior to the Republican National Convention are all being held in the Ramsey County jail, without charge, under “probable cause holds.” Authorities have 36 hours to charge them or let them go. Because it’s a holiday weekend, they can be held until Wednesday afternoon. Which is probably the point of this entire exercise—get them off the streets so they can’t exercise their First Amendment rights and keep them from encouraging others to do the same. Here’s a clue: anarchists don’t have or follow leaders, so that’s just another entire level on which the preemptive police action is wrong.
Probable cause holds are generally used to detain suspects while additional evidence is gathered. The problem in this case is that the results of the underlying search warrants are pitifully weak, at best, indicating that the warrants should never have been issued. With at least one member of each of the Saint Paul and Minneapolis city councils crying foul, one would assume that there will be some sort of investigation surrounding the issuing of the warrants, the evidence—or lack thereof—upon which they were based, and perhaps even the judge(s) who issued them.
What’s especially disturbing in Minnesota is that probable cause holds can be issued by law enforcement without judicial or even prosecutorial oversight. That means they can—and almost certainly will—be used indiscriminately.
The National Lawyers Guild is asking for a judicial review of the current cases and has filed an emergency motion to stop the seizure of documentation tools (cell phones, cameras, computers, etc.). While the 2006 Military Commissions Act removes habeas corpus for aliens, it remains the rule of law for US citizens.
As Molly Priesmeyer reports for The Minnesota Independent, National Lawyers Guild representative Bruce Nestor says the purpose of the preemptive raids was to stop legal protest activity. Nestor notes that Ramsey County Sheriff Bob Fletcher has acknowledged an ongoing investigation of the RNC Welcoming Committee (all of the detainees are members of this group) and if there’s any evidence of conspiracy to riot, Fletcher should be compelled to produce it.
Meanwhile, Coldsnap Legal Collective is reporting (via Twitter) that nine people in the Veterans’ Memorial March, including an elderly nun, have been arrested near the Landmark Center in Saint Paul after climbing over a fence.
Update: Sunday, 31 August 2008 04:23PM CDT: Glenn Greenwald posits (and has photos to verify) that the US federal government is behind these preemptive police actions:
“Back in May, Marcy Wheeler presciently noted that the Minneapolis Joint Terrorist Task Force—an inter-agency group of federal, state and local law enforcement led by the FBI—was actively recruiting Minneapolis residents to serve as plants, to infiltrate ‘vegan groups’ and other left-wing activist groups and report back to the Task Force about what they were doing. There seems to be little doubt that it was this domestic spying by the Federal Government that led to the excessive and truly despicable home assaults by the police yesterday.”
Update: Sunday, 31 August 2008 09:52PM CDT: The Minnesota Independent has video of the press conference of National Lawyers Guild representative Gena Berglund after having appeared before Hennepin County District Judge Mark Wernick asking for injunctive relief prohibiting police from seizing journalistic tools used by those here to document the activities surrounding the Republican National Convention. “Democracy depends,” Berglund told those attending, “on the ability of citizens to document what happens to people on the street.” Judge Wernick’s response was that his calendar was full of probable cause and bail hearings and that he doesn’t have time to rule on this issue. Wernick is probably most widely known in the Twin Cities as the “photo-cop judge” for striking down the use of “red-light cameras” in Minneapolis which automatically photograph the license plates of cars running red lights.
Update: Monday, 1 September 2008 10:43AM CDT: is tweeting that riot police are gathering at Grand & Snelling (just up my street). Macalester College is located at that intersection, and college administration assured the students that police presence would be minimal and peaceful march would be permitted. Apparently not. The students have been prevented from marching.
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