by Idriss Stelley Foundation [http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2011/08/06/18687063.php]:
THE LATEST TARGET OF SFPD WAVE OF TERROR AGAINST POOR, BLACK & BOWN COMRADES, IS KILO G. PERRY, BAYVIEW FREEDOM FIGHTER, PEACEMAKER & EDUCATOR, DISABLED SINGLE BLACK FATHER OF A 3yr. BABY BOY... EXPONENTIAL "MANAGED MAYHEM"
Ever since the July 16, 2011' killing of Kenneth Wade Harding Jr., 19 yr, African American Youth, on the corner of 3rd & Oakdale in district 10 by the SFPD Bayview Thugs in Blue, our Poor, Black & Brown Bayview community has been threatened, harassed and terrorized by the police, more than ever before.
THE DEADLY WEB WEAVED BY THE POWERS THAT BE - "MANAGED MAYHEM" - TIGHTENS ITS CHOKEHOLD ON SF BAYVIEW HUNTERS POINT'
* Henry Taylor, direct eye witness of Kenneth' killing at close range ,who never saw a gun in the victim's hand, has been arrested, then released, as Cops or DA could not charge him with any crime.
* Black POWER Youth Debray Carpenter, AKA "Fly Benzo", 22, one of the spearheaders of Justice 4 Kenneth Harding Jr, was arrested last Sunday by 9 Bayview cops after he spoke eloquently about environmental racism, police state oppression and its relation to Kenneth' death, COnnecting The Dots.
Fly Benzo was released 3 days later after the community "phone blasted" the SF DA, demanding his release and dropping all bogus charges against Fly (that included assault on an "executive" officer and threatening general order, due to Comrade Fly reflecting the Voice of the People, at last week's Town Hall meeting at the SF Bayview Opera House around the shooting of Harding, - when Chief Greg Duhr was booed right off the stage by our outraged community - (Fly talked about demands of shutting down the T_lightrail Muni Transit, given that Kenneth Harding was chased on foot, shot and killed, immediately after evading a $2 Muni fare, left to die like an animal, alone, choking on his own blood, held at assault rifles until he stopped moving...)
Whenever we talk BOYCOTT or disrupting transit, historically, KKKorporate Hell breaks lose....
And the Police , that serves and protects the wealthy and corporate interests, in the tradition of the "Slave Carchers" cracks down on "dissident" Voice with brutal force.
* Gentle "TipToe", an African American Brother with severe cerebral palsy, was recently, brutally assaulted by Bayview PD.
* Also brutalized was "little Skip".
* So was frail African American Elder Charles "Chuck" Nolan, who suffers from longstanding severe asthma and COPD, merely for standing within the perimeter of last week's October 22 Coalition against Police Brutality action at the very corner where Kenneth met his untimely death. SFPD detained Brother Chuck, then brought him to San Francisco General Hospital, as he started experiencing breathing grave difficulties. Chuck was released to the street that night, no charges stuck...
* "Bo", loved by our community, was also assaulted by SFPD. "Bo" had a seizure, and Bayview Police who brutaized him, mockingly stated: "BO, you faking !"
COMRADE KILO G. PERRY DARES TO FILM POLICE BRUTALITY -
The latest target of SFPD wave of terror is Brother Kilo G. AKA Keith Perry, 57, single father of a 3yr. babyboy, "Angel".
Kilo G. also suffers from a painful neurological disability, for the past seven years, that affects his right arm and hand, causing him excrutiating pain when unknowing people shake his hand... Kilo can only type with one finger.
Peacemaker Comrade Kilo G. is a respected videographer, producer of "Cameras Not Guns", who as part of his worthy endeavors has been catching police/community interactions on tape.
Police have been taking pictures of him on the street, and tries to intimidate him into silence: "Hey Kilo G., we got ya on your Facebook"
Last Sunday, it culminated with Police PEPPER SPRAYING Kilo G. for merely filming them !!
Amazi, who works with Kevin Epps (author of movie "Straight Outta Hunters Point", and Channel 29 Lynn Daniels were direct eye witnesses of this outrageous occurence.
Bayview Captain Paul Chignel asked Kilo if he wanted an ambulance, and Kilo was taken to SFGH for treatment, then released.
But 2 days ago, 2 cops accosted and served served Kilo G. with a Temporary Restraining Order, alleging harassment of Office Julia Angalet, for "sexual threat & assault!" (stemming from saying the F...t word at her: "You gay, Get up off here with that F...t Sh...", said the watching crowd, words reiterated by Kilo G. ...Would anyone calling her a Pig on that day justify a TRO under allegation of animal cruelty, a la Michael Vick??)
Officer Williams, who handed out the Temporary TRO proof of service to Brother Kilo G., told him: "If we see you anywhere near 3rd and Oakdale, we will personally arrest you. You are going to jail!".
(Little Angel was with his father at the time as always, and Kilo asked them not to make such threats in front of his little boy, of whom Kilo is the sole caretaker)
Link to Temporary TRO against Kilo: [http://webaccess.sftc.org/Scripts/Magic94/mgrqispi94.dll?APPNAME=IJS&PRGNAME=ROA22&ARGUMENTS=-ACCH11572427]
[http://webaccess.sftc.org/minds_asp_pdf/Viewer/DownLoadDocument.asp?PGCNT=0&ALL=Y]
CCH-11-572427
JULIA ANGALET VS. KEITH PERRY
Cause of Action: CIVIL HARASSMENT
Aug-04-2011 7:04 pm PST
"I'M ON IT", CONTENDS D10 BLACK SUPERVISOR MALIA COHEN, ELECTED IN NOVEMBER 2010....
Kilo has called his District 10 Supervisor Malia Cohen about the pepper spraying incident, she stated: "I'm on it".
Sgt Dean Hall was also contacted by Kilo, and the good man contended: "I'm gonna handle it".
But their protracted silence remains deafening...
So Kilo G. filed a complaint with the OCC (SF Office of Citizens Complaints)...
The OCC , whose director of Joyce Hicks, only sustains 3% of complaints against SFPD misconduct per fiscal year... but filing with OCC is a mandatory step before the matter would be taken to Internal Affairs and to the SF Police Commission, on which, out of 7 commissioners, the People only have ONE fierce alliy, Civil Rights Atty Petra DeJesus (and director of Asian Law Caucus Angela Chan, on a restricted anount of issues...) Petra is the sole Commissioner who opposes a Taser International contract for SFPD !
PACK THE SUPERIOR COURT ROOM ON AUGUST 12!!
Comrade Kilo G.'s TRO hearing is scheduled Friday Aug. 12, at 9 am, room #514 , SF Superior Court, 400 McAllister, corner of Polk Street.
If the ruling judge choses to believe the PO_Lice, a 3yr TRO may be issued against Kilo, barring him from his OWN NEIGHBORHOOD and family members' residences in the perimeter of the TRO, and preventing him to be anywhere near Officer Angalet's patrol car... (If she comes at him for the next 3 years, Kilo would be ipso facto in VIOLATION of his Civil Harassment Stay Away Order and taken to jai, who would then take care fo his baby Angel ?? The Children Home Society.... Entry door to Foster care INjustice)
Police continues to accost Kilo G. on the streets ,repeatedly asking him if he is on parole or probation, when a simple check from patrol cars computer system would turn up a clean record in their correctional database, within seconds...
"I PAID MY DEBT TO SOCIETY!"
Kilo, who agreed to interview with us two days ago at Idriss Stelley Foundation office, has "paid his debt to society" as he puts it, and has stayed out of the correctional system for the past 16 years, educating our Youth and empoverished communities on Non-violence, alternatives to illicit activities, survival and sustainability.
Which is not to the liking of the Powers That Be, who shamelessly continue to expedit what was elegantly labeled as the "SF Negro Removal", AKA the Gentrification Matrix set in motion over 2 decades ago.
From 19% African Americans demographics in the 70s in San Francisco, Blacks now have plummeted down to a scary 6.05% in our city this year; through blythe, police oppression, foreclosures, substandard public education through busing our Black kids out of their neighborhoods, and then some. (in Bayview, the sole healthcare facility for the indigent polulation is South East Healthcare Center on Keith Avenue, with ARMED COPS in the waiting room.... Very healing.)
PLEASE PACK UP the Court Room on the 12th !
Black & Brown, Disabled, Elders,Youth and Families, Whites, APIS, Native Americans, people of all faith and creed, everyone who cares about the fate of the Oppressed in SF !
If Comrades Kilo G., Fly Benzo, Henry Taylor, Willie Ratcliff, Jameel Patterson, and so many activists and Peacemakers at Ground Zero have the courage to speak up and bear witness FOR US ALL, YOU can too!
Freedom Fighter and Peacemaker, videographer Comrade Kilo G. Perry can be contacted through email at: [g.styleent [at] yahoo.com] or through his Facebook homepage at: [http://facebook.com/kilo.perry]
Please join us on Idriss Stelley Foundation Facebook, direct services for Survivors of Police Misconduct and Grieving Families of Loved Ones killed by law enforcement, Bilingual Spanish hotline 415-595-8251, attys referrals, counseling & support groups, help with organizing press confrences, rallies & Protests, office at the Redstone Building, Suite #209, 2940 16th Sr, (corner of Capp Street, half a block from 16th St. BART Station, MUNI lines # 14, 14L, 22, 33 , 49, please call us for an confidential intake appointment, we are wheelchair accessible.
Grow the Voice of the PEOPLE and Be Counted !
[http://www.facebook.com/?ref=home#!/groups/116337228453342]
PeaceMaker Kilo G., surrounded by kids he mentors and protects!
"CAMERAS NOT GUNS"
2011-09-03 "Kenneth Harding police murder aftermath: Victory for Kilo G; The messengers – community-controlled media-makers – refuse to be destroyed"
by Malaika H. Kambon [http://sfbayview.com/2011/kenneth-harding-police-murder-aftermath-victory-for-kilo-g/]:
Malaika H. Kambon is a freelance writer and photojournalist, owner of People’s Eye Photography and a master’s degree candidate in Interdisciplinary Studies at San Francisco State University. She can be reached at kambonrb@pacbell.net.
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Kilo G. Perry is an Afrikan man and a man of his word. He is such a trusted man of his word that he has been dubbed “the voice of Bayview Hunters Point” by poor Black and Brown people of San Francisco. Comrade Kilo G is the producer of Cameras Not Guns, a youth educator and peacemaker, and a single father of a 3-year-old baby boy.
Recently, in keeping with the theme of Cameras Not Guns, Kilo G began filming a painful new project. Since July 16, 2011, he has been filming much of the aftermath of the SFPD murder of 19-year-old Kenneth Harding, a young Black man. Since the shooting of Harding on Third and Oakdale – in broad daylight, for lack of a transfer proving purchase of a $2 train ticket – community outrage has exploded.
When asked to describe Kilo G’s determination to see this project through, the Idriss Stelley Foundation said of Kilo G’s work: “As part of his crucial endeavor to find the truth, Kilo G has been interviewing direct witnesses of Harding’s killing, who contend they never saw a gun in Harding’s hand. Witnesses such as Henry Taylor, who was arrested by SFPD to silence him, then released because no charges against Taylor could stick.”
In the same fashion, and for the nearly the same reasons, Debray Carpenter – better known as Fly Benzo – was arrested the week following Harding’s murder and released days later. All charges were dropped. Apparently, asking questions, seeking answers, speaking out and videography are crimes and are therefore punishable by arrest.
Accordingly, attempts were made to silence Kilo G as well. He was accused of harassing a police officer. Perry, who is neither on parole nor probation and has not committed any crime, was ordered to appear in court to answer to charges of civil harassment against a police officer, bringing the total to at least three Black men arrested for conducting an independent community-sanctioned investigation into the murder of Kenneth Harding.
And again, recent history repeated itself. On Aug. 12, in a hearing scheduled for 9 a.m. in the San Francisco Superior Court, an order to show cause for civil harassment filed by SFPD Officer Julia Angalet against Keith “Kilo G” Perry was vacated and all charges filed against him were dropped. SFPD Officer Julia Angalet, oddly enough, was a no show at her own show.
The mere fact of a concerted and concerned presence of people with Kilo G for this court hearing rattled the powers that be enough that they detailed a sheriff’s officer – Officer Mendoza – to take our pictures, increase the number of officers in the hallway outside of the courtroom, detail officers to follow us to the elevator and block off the adjoining hallways that we passed through. In addition, they had both a sheriff’s department officer and a jump-suited Homeland Security highway patrol officer, armed with both a pistol and a Taser X-26, watching us while we stood outside.
And prior to court, Cpl. Castellanos of the San Francisco Sheriff’s Department saw fit to inform Kilo G to “meet me at five when I get off. I get off work at 5 p.m.”
Considering the present air of community hostility toward a global police force that kills with impunity, what would be the purpose of Castellanos saying something like that if he wasn’t intending, as a representative of the SFPD, to escalate an already tense situation to a lethal state? In this reporter’s estimation, those comments can be construed as a direct threat to yet another Afrikan man’s life – particularly since they had nothing whatsoever to do with the court case, were uttered specifically to Kilo G while he was alone in the hallway outside of court, and when the officer realized that his comments had been overheard, he was denying that he’d said anything at all!
What does this mean? Well, somebody’s lying and somebody’s got something to hide. And guess what? It isn’t Kilo G and it isn’t the predominantly Afrikan Bayview Hunters Point community.
Kenneth Harding’s murder at the hands of the SFPD has sent shock ripples around the world, adding to the already daunting statistics of young Afrikans being murdered by police, while globally the corporate media ignores incidents, buries them in silence and disseminates misinformation or attempts to cover the murders up.
Witness the fact that London, England, burned earlier this month because of just this kind of murder – that of Mark Duggan, a young unarmed Black man. Cities across the world raged at the murder of Oscar Grant III as Oakland, Calif., lit up like a torch. New York erupted at the murders of 10-year-old Clifford Glover, Sean Bell and Amadou Diallo. Detroit is still smoldering after the savage murder of 7-year-old Aiyana Jones, killed while sleeping on the couch in her own home. And let us not forget about elderly Alberta Spruill, who was literally frightened to death in New York City after police, in a “mistaken raid,” tossed a concussion grenade into her home. And the list goes on.
In the San Francisco Bay area, between 1966 and 2011, the murders of innocent people by police include but are not limited to the following people of color, disability and or transient, homeless persons:
* Matthew Johnson, 16 – killed after running from a joy ride in a stolen car, sparking the Hunters Point riots.
* Tony Groshe, 13 – mentally challenged youth, killed while playing with a water pistol in Potrero Hill.
* Aaron Williams – killed in the Western Addition, aka the Fillmore.
* Mark Garcia – died of a heart attack in the Mission District after being robbed by unknown assailants, then pepper sprayed and hogtied by SFPD, the very persons he cried out to for help.
* Bruce Seward – shot and killed for being naked on a bench outside a BART station.
* Idriss Stelley – an honor student shot 48 times by nine SFPD officers inside San Francisco’s Metreon Theater.
* Gustavus Rugley – shot 36 times as he sat in his car at Alemany and Ocean by the SFPD gang task force.
* Vinh Bui – a Bayview resident shot and killed while “holding a metal object.”
* Randall Dunkin – a disabled man shot while sitting in his wheelchair.
* Oscar Grant III, 22 – tortured, called racial epithets and shot to death at point blank range by BART police.
* Raheim Brown, 20 – shot and killed by Oakland Unified School District police.
* Charles Hill – homeless transient man beaten and shot to death by BART police.
* Kenneth Harding, 19 – shot for lack of a transfer proving he’d paid the $2 train fare.
And the corporate media continues to cover up what the Black and Brown communities have always recognized as an epidemic of stolen lives and police brutality that has gone on for centuries and continues unabated.
Speaking at a community meeting immediately after the killing of Kenneth Harding, where SFPD Chief Greg Suhr was shouted down, a longtime Bayview resident made a telling and critical statement quoted by the October 22nd Coalition: “A boy gets gunned down. We don’t know if there was a gun there, but we know that for 40 damn years, people have been getting gunned down in this community. People are angrier now than they were when they walked in the door. We’re a community that’s truly in pain, that’s truly frustrated and really needs some respect.”
This isn’t about just one bad cop in a barrel. This is about systemic violence played out with impunity to terrorize and to destroy communities. And the attempt to placate the community with articles such as the one published on the back pages of the Mercury News on Aug. 12, 2011, entitled, “Oakland police draw guns without cause too often, federal report finds,” failed its task miserably, for it comes a little too little and a lot too late and it fails to recognize the community’s need to control what happens within itself.
The Black Panther Party for Self-Defense advocated community control as opposed to police occupations and was successful in building such controls until it was decimated by J. Edgar Hoover and his infamous “counter-intelligence” program, COINTELPRO.
Kenneth Harding was murdered in broad daylight. Oscar Grant III photographed his killer, as did thousands of witnesses. But they are both still very dead and their killers are known and walking the earth free.
And now that neither the corporate media pundits nor their lies, nor the various police departments and their legally sanctioned killers have a foot to stand on – as their cities burn to the ground on international television – they want to make matters worse by publishing useless federal reports admitting wrongdoing on the one hand, while attempting to shoot the messengers of the people with the other hand? What’s wrong with this picture?
People like videographer Kilo G, like the Black-owned San Francisco Bay View newspaper – who had a bullet come through their window and their entire website hacked in attempts to put them out of business – and like the most famous of our peoples’ voices, internationally acclaimed journalist Mumia Abu-Jamal, who fights for his life on death row, while everyone from the feds to the courts to the Fraternal Order of Police of Pennsylvania try to silence his voice and crush his life and spirit – are media outlets that are unstinting in their search for and reporting of the facts.
We the people deserve to know the truth. And we must protect what we have: our people’s media, our truth tellers. For it is a sad fact of life that freedom of the press is not the sacred cow it is purported to be, because it only exists to serve corporate-political interests. And stilted political interests have turned it into a free-for-all of corruption.
In a world gone mad, embedded journalists go to wars that are instigated by whomever has the most money and report back to an ostrich-like North American populace that war is all about guts and glory and fighting the good fight for truth, justice and the American way. And the populace believes this until Superman comes home in a body bag, with varying portions of his or her anatomy missing – the corpse not being the only thing that’s covered up.
The system will even kill its own for prime public relations ratings and a percentage. Witness the Pat Tillman story, for example. He was a professional football player with the Arizona Cardinals indoctrinated to fight the good fight against the “War on Terror” after 9/11. Tillman gave up fame and fortune – a $3.5 million football contract with the Cardinals and a $9 million contract with the St. Louis Rams – to die for his country and protect it from the so-called evil terrorists who had their sights set on stealing U.S. freedoms.
He joined the Army Rangers and his Army Rangers killed him, blamed it on the Afghans, gave him a posthumous Silver Star, covered up his death and fueled the U.S. war machine for two years, using him like a tool as the U.S. poster-boy, who, at 27 years old, died a national hero.
The Army of course didn’t bother to tell anyone that they’d suppressed the true findings of the coroner: Pat Tillman was assassinated from 10 yards away with an M-16, the shots being small and perfectly placed. Tillman was also listed as “an agnostic, probably an atheist” and was arranging through a friend to meet with noted anti-war historian Noam Chomsky after his tour of duty in Iraq had ended.
Tillman’s father publicly and in writing told the army to go fuck itself after the cover-up became known through the diligence of the Tillman family; and the Army then tried to reduce it to “a few typographical errors” in the information that the family was officially given as the cause of their loved one’s death.
So, significant parts of the populace now realize that cover-ups are real. And also that in-bed-with-the-State-Department journalists lie. And finally, that there is a record of history’s most prominent figures that direct substantial sums of money to perpetuate unstinting violence against those who hunt down truth. Vicious dictators and colored puppets in positions of power, political and corporate pundits, media moguls, prison and military industrial complex players et al. are some of the figures that come to mind.
Whether they be governmental, vigilante or members of that ol’ boys club called “the corporate media,” there is incontrovertible documentation that the powers that be have, do and will continue to act to silence those who air the corporate dirty laundry. Impunity is the coin they use, no matter the size of the truth being told and no matter the age, gender and or national origin of the teller.
Cover-up is the stick they wield even when their messiness spirals out of control. Then they make a movie out of it or a PR show, whichever will benefit – read, profit – them the most.
So when the poor, the dispossessed, the downtrodden, the marginalized stand up and scream foul and then prove it and then fight back, the monster of suppression rears its ugly head and tries hard to put the genie back in the bottle by any and every means necessary, however foul.
First they go into denial, when everything turns into a gun.
The wallet, transfer or medicine you reach for, the compact you use to powder your nose, magically transform into guns. The guns, whether they are invisible, visible or planted, are definitely presumed to be in your possession. Then you are killed. Witness the countless “regime” change murders: Fred Hampton, George Jackson, El Hajj Malik El Shabazz, Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Samora Machel, Amilcar Cabral, Toussaint L’Ouverture and Jean-Jacques Dessalines, to name but a few.
Next, they colonize the information.
The poetry you speak, the rap music lyrics you spit, the documentation that says you were not where they said you were and that you are not who they say that they’re looking for magically transform into that planted, non-existent gun or that gun of “mistaken identity.”
Then you are imprisoned, exiled and or killed. Geronimo ji Jaga was a prime example of this tactic, as were Tupac Amaru Shakur, Anita Spruill, Assata Olugbala Shakur and many of the men and women who remain political prisoners and or prisoners of war from roughly 40 years ago to this day – or who died locked up – as well as those souls who are locked away and have no one and are unnamed except to their communities and friends.
Lastly, they criminalize your every movement and your very existence.
The deeds you do that help, encourage, uplift and empower get twisted and destroyed and turned into that “threat to national security” gun. Then you are disappeared. Lovinsky Pierre-Antoine and the Black Panther Party are prime examples of victims of this. And when all else fails, obliteration by treaty promises unkept, gentrification, starvation and death by guns of assimilation are sure to follow.
But what happens when those of us who speak power to truth consistently, loudly, unfailingly and in various and creative ways take on the monster in the belly of the beast and beat him at his own game? What happens when the proverbial rabbit has the pen and or the gun and takes out the beast? What happens when one of us – “we the people” – or one of the people’s favorite sons or daughters stops the war, throws a wrench in the machine, refuses to disappear and lives to tell it and to keep fighting?
What happens when the power of the people wins many small battles on the road to winning the war and overturning the machine? That’s when the world changes. The madness stops. The bullets, bombs and burning crosses cease to be. We the people are winning.
We are doing this with very little in the way of material resources. This upsets the moguls of the state, who seemingly cannot breathe unless they have billions of dollars of someone else’s money – ours – at their beck and call, 24/7.
But the daily stock market crashes of 2011 are an indication that Babylon is crumbling to its wilted knees because it has squandered the rich bounty that it has systematically stolen from us and from our motherlands and from the planet Earth.
So, shooting the messenger has become a national pastime amongst the moneyed rich and connected. But the messengers are refusing to be destroyed. The messengers, like Kilo G, Mumia Abu-Jamal, Ruchell Magee, the San Francisco Bay View and so many others, are carrying on and passing the torch. The power that these brave and consistent souls wield in the road to victory, like the weapon that it is, is the power of the people.
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Ever the videographer, Kilo G Perry films Officer Mendoza leading a contingent of well-armed sheriff’s deputies in the courthouse taking pictures of Kilo’s supporters and following, blocking and containing them in a futile intimidation effort. – Photo: Malaika Kambon
Kilo G Perry, his family and supporters celebrate on Aug. 12 the dropping of charges against him, part of a police harassment campaign against Hunters Point activists since SFPD murdered Kenneth Harding. From left are Rebecca Ruiz-Lichter, Jeremy Miller, Elvira Pollard, Ben Allen, Kilo G Perry with his son and daughter, Remigio Fraga, Mesha Irizarry, Tracey Bell-Borden, Fly Benzo, Kim Rohrbach and Frank of SF ANSWER. – Photo: Malaika Kambon
Learning the charges against Kilo G had been dropped, jubilation erupted from his supporters: Jeremy Miller, Frank of SF ANSWER, Ben Allen, Kilo’s daughter, Tracey Bell-Borden, Mesha Irizarry and Kilo. – Photo: Malaika Kambon
2011-08-09 "SFPD tightens its chokehold on Bayview Hunters Point since killing Kenneth Harding"
by mesha Monge-Irizarry, Idriss Stelley Foundation [http://sfbayview.com/2011/sfpd-tightens-its-chokehold-on-bayview-hunters-point-since-killing-kenneth-harding/]:
Pack the courtroom for Kilo G’s TRO hearing on Friday, Aug. 12, 9 a.m., Room 514, SF Superior Court, 400 McAllister at Polk – come at 8:30 for the press conference
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The latest target of a San Francisco police wave of terror is Kilo G. Perry, videographer, freedom fighter, peacemaker and educator and the disabled single father of a 3-year-old boy. Ever since the July 16 killing of Kenneth Wade Harding Jr., 19, at Third and Oakdale by the SFPD thugs in blue, our Bayview Hunters Point community has been threatened, harassed and terrorized by the police more than in recent memory – some say more than in 45 years since the September 1966 rebellion following the police killing of Matthew Johnson, 17, when police sharpshooters and National Guard tanks filled Third Street.
No tanks so far, but a “surge” of police reassigned to patrol BVHP since Kenny’s death take aim daily at anyone they think might incite a community response, especially residents who speak out publicly. Henry Taylor, the first reported target, was arrested just prior to the July 20 meeting at the Bayview Opera House called by Police Chief Greg Suhr, then released without charge the next day.
Jailed after speaking to the press -
Henry, a direct eyewitness to the killing, had been widely quoted disputing the police version of the killing – that Kenny had a gun and fired at the police before they fired at him. According to Huffington Post, “Eyewitnesses … [told] ABC7 News they didn’t see any shots being fired at the officers.
“‘I just seen shots going forward,’ said resident Henry Taylor. ‘I didn’t see shots coming backwards.’”
Strangely, that quote is now missing from the ABC7 story cited as its source by Huffington Post [http://abclocal.go.com/kgo/story?section=news/local/san_francisco&id=8255383#&cmp=fb-kgo-article-8255383]. It’s been wiped clean from the San Francisco Examiner, too, which had also cited ABC7 as the source.
Debray Carpenter, better known in the community as Fly Benzo, 22, also widely quoted in the first mainstream media stories on the killing, was arrested after the meeting at the Opera House, where the outraged crowd booed Chief Suhr off the stage. The San Francisco Chronicle reported [http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/07/20/MNON1KD52F.DTL]: “Carpenter said he was disappointed by the forum.
“‘I feel like it went nowhere – our questions were left unanswered,’ he said. ‘We need to shut down the T line until we get answers to our demands – no police on trains, free trains or no trains at all. We’ll make sure there are no trains at all if that’s the way they want it.’”
One of the spearheaders of the struggle for justice for Kenneth Harding, Benzo referred to Muni’s Third Street light rail line because Kenny had just stepped off a T-train when two officers asked to see his transfer as proof he’d paid his $2 fare. He ran from them, and they opened fire. Residents of more upscale neighborhoods say that armed police never conduct fare inspections there.
Whenever we talk about boycotting or disrupting transit, all hell breaks loose. The police, who serve and protect the wealthy and corporate interests in the tradition of the slave catchers, crack down on “dissident” voices with brutal force.
Benzo, arrested by nine cops, was released from jail several days later after the community “phone blasted” the DA’s Office demanding his release and dismissal of all charges. One of those charges reportedly was assault on an executive officer, evidently referring to the tough questions Benzo threw at Chief Suhr before Suhr admitted defeat and left the Opera House, saying, according to the Chronicle, “They shouted me down.”
Police terrorism in the town square -
On the block where Kenneth Harding was accosted and shot by SFPD is Mendell Plaza, which serves as a town square for Bayview Hunters Point at its main intersection. A farmers’ market used to be held there, events take place often and people congregate there every day. When police harass or attack someone there in broad daylight and in view of dozens of people, they must be intending to intimidate and terrorize the community.
The peaceful, congenial spirit of the plaza has been broken repeatedly since Kenny was killed. Gentle “TipToe,” a brother with severe cerebral palsy, was brutally assaulted by the police. So were “Little Skip” and “Bo” – all of them well known and liked in the community. Bo had a seizure, and the cops who brutalized him mocked him: “Bo, you’re faking!”
Frail elder Charles “Chuck” Nolan, who suffers from longstanding severe asthma and COPD (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease), was attacked last Saturday, July 30, merely for standing with about 75 people listening to speakers at a rally to protest the killing of Kenneth Harding organized by the October 22 Coalition against Police Brutality. Chuck and Henry Taylor were the only Blacks in the audience.
Police, perhaps fearing Chuck might speak to the crowd, grabbed him, threw him to the ground and handcuffed him as he struggled to breathe. His cruel arrest was caught on video [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GoucwrvCtfE] from "Rap Status" [http://www.youtube.com/user/RapStatus].
Officers took Chuck to San Francisco General Hospital, then released him to the street that night without charge.
Kilo G. Perry pepper sprayed for daring to film police brutality -
It was community videographer Keith G. Perry, 57, better known as Kilo, who recorded Chuck Nolan’s arrest. Now he has become the target of police retaliation. Brother Kilo, the single father of a 3-year-old boy named Angel, has suffered for the past seven years from a painful neurological disability that affects his right arm and hand, causing him excruciating pain when unknowing people shake his hand. Kilo can only type with one finger.
A community peacemaker and producer of “Cameras Not Guns,” Kilo G. has been catching police-community interactions on video. And the police in turn have been taking pictures of him on the street, trying to intimidate him, yelling, “Hey, Kilo G., we got ya on your Facebook.”
Last Sunday, July 31, the day after the rally, the sparring culminated with police pepper spraying Kilo G. merely for filming them! Amazi, who works with Kevin Epps, the critically acclaimed filmmaker of “Straight Outta Hunters Point” and “The Black Rock,” and Lynn Daniels of Channel 29 were among the crowd witnessing this outrageous attack.
SFPD Capt. Paul Chignell, who heads the Bayview precinct station, was there. He asked Kilo if he wanted an ambulance, and Kilo was taken to San Francisco General for treatment, then released.
A few days later, two cops served Kilo G. with a temporary restraining order. They said that Kilo, as he was being pepper-sprayed, had sexually threatened and assaulted Officer Julia Angalet when he echoed the angry crowd saying, “Get up off here with that faggot shit!” I wonder, if he’d called her a pig, would they be alleging animal cruelty.
Officer Williams, who served Kilo with the TRO, told him: “If we see you anywhere near Third and Oakdale [the corner where, on July 16, Kenneth Harding lay unattended, struggling for life in a pool of his own blood, as police trained their guns on him] we will personally arrest you. You are going to jail!”
As usual, 3-year-old Angel was with his father at the time, and Kilo asked the officers not to make such threats in front of his little boy. Kilo is his sole caretaker.
To see the temporary restraining order against Kilo, click here [http://webaccess.sftc.org/minds_asp_pdf/mainpage.asp?Web_Server=webaccess.sftc.org&MINDS_Server=ntimagex&Category=C&DocID=03287406].
‘I’m on it,’ pledge District 10 Supervisor Malia Cohen and Sgt. Hall -
Kilo called District 10 Supervisor Malia Cohen, who represents Bayview Hunters Point, about the pepper spraying incident. “I’m on it,” she told him.
Sgt. Dean Hall of the Bayview police station was also contacted by Kilo. “I’m gonna handle it,” he pledged. But their protracted silence remains deafening.
So Kilo G. filed a complaint with the San Francisco Office of Citizens Complaints. Under Director Joyce Hicks, the OCC has been sustaining only 3 percent of the complaints filed against SFPD. But filing with OCC is a mandatory step before the matter can be taken to Internal Affairs and to the Police Commission, on which, out of seven commissioners, the people have only one fierce ally, civil rights attorney Petra DeJesus. Angela Chan, director of Asian Law Caucus, is helpful on some issues. Petra is the sole commissioner, for example, who opposes a contract with Taser International to arm SFPD officers with tasers.
Pack the courtroom on Aug. 12 -
Comrade Kilo G.’s TRO hearing is scheduled for Friday, Aug. 12, 9 a.m., in Room 514, San Francisco Superior Court, 400 McAllister, at Polk Street. If the judge chooses to believe the police, a three-year restraining order could be issued against Kilo, barring him from being anywhere near Officer Angalet, the Bayview police station or her patrol car. If she comes at him in the next three years, Kilo could be found in violation of his restraining order and face a fine of up to $1,000 and up to a year in jail. Who would then take care of his baby, Angel?
Police continue to accost Kilo G. on the streets, repeatedly asking him if he is on parole or probation, when a simple check from a patrol car’s computer system would turn up a clean record in their database within seconds.
So please come out to support Brother Kilo on Aug. 12. If he and Fly Benzo and Henry Taylor can find the courage to speak up and bear witness for us all, you can too!
Typical of the critical role Kilo plays in the community and the high esteem he’s held in is this message posted by a young woman yesterday on his Facebook wall urging everyone to attend his hearing: “Where is the freedom to view whatever he chooses to view? No one says a word when media is out there. I pray Mr. Perry pleads not guilty, takes it all the way.
“He is a necessity out there in them streets. Nobody else is gonna tell the truth. At least he has a camera. But that’s OK. After this, we need to help this brother invest in a wide or long view lens or something so he can do like media do and sit a half block away and see everything like he’z right there.
Kilo G. Perry is a necessity out there in them streets. Nobody else is gonna tell the truth. Please go speak up for this brother.
“Please go speak up for this brother. Make sure u use a low tone and choose your words carefully. Remember you’re on their ground! Play the game.”
‘I paid my debt to society’ -
Kilo, who agreed to interview with us at the Idriss Stelley Foundation office, has “paid his debt to society,” as he puts it and has stayed out of the correctional system for the past 16 years, educating youth on non-violence, alternatives to illicit activities, survival and sustainability.
Sustaining the Black community in San Francisco is not to the liking of the powers that be, who shamelessly expedite “Negro removal,” the gentrification process set in motion decades ago. From a high of 13.4 percent of San Francisco’s population in 1970, Blacks have now plummeted to 6 percent or less – the most rapid decline in the Black population of any city in the country.
Kilo G. Perry can be contacted through email at g.styleent@yahoo.com or through Facebook at http://facebook.com/kilo.perry/.
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Kilo G. Perry uses videography and social media to educate, organize and advocate for the youth of Bayview Hunters Point.
The militant mood – reflected here by Fly Benzo and Kilo – at the press conference two days after the killing of Kenneth Harding no doubt contributed to the SFPD crackdown on neighborhood “dissidents.” – Photo: Malaika Kambon
Henry Taylor greets a friend at Mendell Plaza following the July 18 press conference organized by the Idriss Stelley Foundation for the community to express their outrage at the police killing of Kenneth Harding. – Photo: Malaika Kambon
Kilo G. (Keith) Perry and his little son Angel Perry enjoy a sunny day last October in Mendell Plaza, the “town square” in Bayview Hunters Point on Third Street between Oakdale and Palou.
Kilo and his grown son, Antoine Perry, better known as Gotti (black T-shirt), both community videographers, along with the Bay View, covered the July 18 press conference from the community’s point of view, balancing the coverage by the mainstream media, who were there in great abundance. – Photo: Malaika Kambon
Also present in great abundance at the July 18 press conference were the cops. Since the police killing of Kenneth Harding two days earlier, SFPD has sent a “surge” of police to patrol, pepper spray, beat and harass the residents in hopes of silencing any criticism and preventing any attempt at rebellion. – Photo: Malaika Kambon
Kilo and his sons Gotti and Angel starred in the 2009 movie, “The Grind,” produced as a community cinema project by BAYCAT, Bayview Hunters Point Center for Arts and Technology. Watch the trailer and learn more about the film at www.baycat.org/thegrind/.
2010-08-11 "3rd & Palou w/ Kilo G, Skip N Da Undagod"
from "It's Really Real TV" by FLY Benzo aka. FLY Bentley [http://www.youtube.com/user/TryntaGetIt], originally posted at [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mXjVUSB2yd0]:
Fly Benzo of "It's Really Real TV" takes you to 3rd N Palou, Hunters Point, SF, CA "N to ALL you Niggas That Don't Like Me... Tell It To Yo BITCH!"
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