Even those opposed to Critical Mass should be deeply disturbed about some police tactics at last Friday's ride. About 150 bicyclists were surrounded by police who blocked off adjoining intersections and arrested everyone inbetween. EVERYONE who was on Sacramento between Montgomery and Sansome at 8:30 PM was arrested, whether or not they had ridden with Critical Mass, blocked traffic, been belligerent, or run stoplights. All were handcuffed, fingerprinted, and taken to jail. No warning was ever given to disperse, yet all were charged with "failure to disperse". All bicycles were confiscated and according to the SFPD, will not be returned for at least a week (despite the District Attorney's warning that confiscation was probably not legal).
On Friday's ride, some Critical Mass riders had been belligerent. But no one has claimed that any of those arrested in the mass police sweep had done anything belligerent. The mayor wanted to show he could be tough on bike riders. So instead of doing the hard work of finding riders who had pounded on cars, blocked traffic, and run red lights, the police took the easy tactic of just surrounding a random group and making examples of them. They kept them in jail until after the last BART train left, and confiscated their bikes -- depriving many of them of their only means of transportation.
There is a long history of trying to punish an entire group for the perceived indiscretions of a few --Japanese relocation camps during WWII, lynchings in the South, nazi treatment of Jews and gays. Though the consequences to Critical Mass riders are far less severe than to these other groups, San Franciscans should be seriously concerned about police and legal tactics that seek to punish individuals for something that others who resemble them are perceived to have done.
Howard Besser, 7/30/97
(one of those caught in the mass arrest)
Adjunct Associate Professor
School of Information Management & Systems
102 South Hall
University of California
Berkeley, CA 94720-4600
tel: (510)643-7365
office: (510)642-1464
fax: (510)642-5814
howard@sims.berkeley.edu
http://www.sims.berkeley.edu/~howard/