OPD, Law Enforcement Used Excessive Force At Oscar Grant Protests
NLG Decries Police Tactics, Assaults on Peaceful Protesters
Oakland—Despite claims by Oakland Police (OPD) and city officials that law enforcement used restraint during last Thursday’s protests following the Johannes Mehserle verdict, details emerging paint a very different picture. Police used excessive force against a largely peaceful protest, violently attacking a number of people. Police arrested many demonstrators who had done nothing wrong, and then held them in jail through the night and in some cases through the weekend and beyond.
NLG Criticizes Mehserle Verdict As Gross Injustice
Calls On Law Enforcement to Respect Civil Liberties As Community Reacts
For Immediate Release July 8, 2010
Oakland—The San Francisco Bay Area Chapter of the National Lawyers Guild (NLGSF) condemns the involuntary manslaughter verdict in the criminal case against former BART police officer Johannes Mehserle. The trial judge, Robert Perry, acted inappropriately by allowing irrelevant information about the victim, Oscar Grant, before the jury.
Summer 2010 Newsletter: 50 Years Since HUAC Protests
By NLGSF Board Member Matthew Rinaldi
May 1960. The culture of McCarthyism lived on, the Cold War continued. The House Un-American Activities Committee (“HUAC”) came to town, scheduling hearings in San Francisco to ferret out communist influence in the schools, the local media and the labor unions.
The hearings were held on the second floor of S.F. City Hall. Over 30 “unfriendly” witnesses, suspected of being reds or “red” dupes, were subpoenaed to testify. HUAC issued 150 “white passes” allowing the bearer and a guest to attend the “public” hearings. Since the hearing room could only seat 200, the many hundreds of students and activists who came to see HUAC in action were left in the hallway, blocked behind a wooden barrier near the Rotunda steps.
NLG Attorney Released from Rwandan Jail
Update: Peter Erlinder Released on Medical Bail
Find the latest information on our national site.
June 16 Press Release: California Lawyers Demand Immediate Release of American Attorney Imprisoned in Rwanda
California lawyers and activists are joining others from around the world calling for the release of Minnesota attorney and law professor Peter Erlinder from the central prison in Kigali, Rwanda. Erlinder was arrested late last month shortly after arriving in Rwanda to join the defense team of Rwandan presidential candidate Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza. Professor Erlinder is a well known human rights lawyer and professor of law at William Mitchell College of Law in St. Paul Minnesota. He has also served as president of the National Lawyers Guild (NLG) and remains active on the organization’s international committee.
Immigration Policy, In Arizona and At Home
Originally published in the San Francisco Bay Guardian
By Angela Chan
Mayor Gavin Newsom and City Attorney Dennis Herrera have publicly opposed the anti-immigrant bill, SB 1070 in Arizona. A diverse coalition of civil rights organizations – including the Arab Resource & Organizing Center, Asian Law Caucus, Bernal Heights Neighborhood Center, Central American Resource Center, Community United Against Violence, Equal Justice Society, La Raza Centro Legal, National Lawyers Guild San Francisco Bay Area Chapter, POWER, and Pride at Work SF — applauds both city officials for taking a strong stand against the Arizona bill. At the same time, we urge Newsom and Herrera to firmly and unequivocally support the implementation of a local policy that protects the due process rights of immigrant youth in San Francisco.
As with SB 1070 in Arizona, the mayor’s policy of requiring juvenile probation officers to report young people to federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) before they receive due process has opened the door to racial profiling and torn many innocent youth from their families.