[http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/12/28/BACL1MHR7O.DTL]
A fenced-off triangle of land that became the new Occupy Oakland encampment was being dismantled by police Wednesday night after the property owner urged authorities to remove the squatters.
The 15 tents, makeshift kitchen and a bathroom on the city's industrial west side got the same treatment as other recent encampments - it was taken down almost as soon as it went up.
Since police dismantled Occupy Oakland's original tent city outside City Hall on Nov. 14, protesters fed up with economic inequality and corporate greed have sought to set up a new base for the cause and a new encampment for homeless people who gravitated to the movement.
Late last month, protesters tore down a fence around a vacant lot in the Uptown neighborhood before being ordered to leave. A few days later, a lot in West Oakland was occupied, then cleared out after the owner objected.
The new encampment, behind a chain-link fence topped by barbed wire, was first occupied last Thursday and named "Zion Cypress Triangle," according to Occupy protesters.
The site, bounded by Peralta Street, Mandela Parkway and 20th Street, was going to be a drug- and alcohol-free "winter camp" and "safe haven" for homeless people and activists, according to a camp organizer who identified himself as Christopher M.
It didn't work out that way.
Oakland police moved in shortly after 5 p.m. and began clearing out the campers and dismantling the tents and other facilities. Three protesters left voluntarily, 14 others were cited for trespassing and one demonstrator was arrested after failing to produce valid identification, police said.
"The property owner requested that Oakland police go in and remove the protesters from the property," Oakland police spokeswoman Johnna Watson said. "That's what we are doing."
Brian Collins, one of the partners who bought the property in 2006, said he learned of the encampment Wednesday and took "the appropriate steps to ask them to leave peacefully."
"Typically, we would ask them to leave first," Watson said. "In the past, they have left without any incidents."
The sweep means another move for Alex Thompson, 28. The homeless woman said she had moved from one Occupy camp to another since October, when she and her mother were evicted from an Oakland residential motel after a dispute with the owner.
Thompson said she had no income of any kind, or even identification, and did not want to seek help at a homeless shelter. She said she was happy to be the "camp dog-sitter."
"I'm not ready to go indoors," she said. "If I get tied to one place for too long, I don't do anything. At least out here I'm doing something."
A protester marks Occupy Oakland's new camp just hours before police moved in and dismantled it. Photo: Paul Chinn / The Chronicle
Alex Thompson entertains Yoda, a fellow camper's dog, at the new Occupy Oakland encampment at 20th Street and Mandela Parkway in Oakland, Calif. on Wednesday, Dec. 28, 2011. About 16 tents have been pitched in the previously vacant lot but that number is expected to grow in the coming days. Photo: Paul Chinn / The Chronicle
Alex Thompson, a homeless woman who has lived at several Occupy camps, was among those evicted from the latest site. Photo: Paul Chinn / The Chronicle
Campers prepare a lunch in the kitchen at a new Occupy Oakland encampment at 20th Street and Mandela Parkway in Oakland, Calif. on Wednesday, Dec. 28, 2011. About 16 tents have been pitched in the previously vacant lot but that number is expected to grow in the coming days. Photo: Paul Chinn / The Chronicle
More than a dozen tents have been pitched at the new Occupy Oakland encampment at 20th Street and Mandela Parkway in Oakland, Calif. on Wednesday, Dec. 28, 2011. Photo: Paul Chinn / The Chronicle
Campers Julion Lewis-Tatman (left) and Ben carry a trash bag of debris collected from the new Occupy Oakland encampment at 20th Street and Mandela Parkway in Oakland, Calif. on Wednesday, Dec. 28, 2011. About 16 tents have been pitched in the previously vacant lot but that number is expected to grow in the coming days. Photo: Paul Chinn / The Chronicle
More than a dozen tents have been pitched at the new Occupy Oakland encampment at 20th Street and Mandela Parkway in Oakland, Calif. on Wednesday, Dec. 28, 2011. Photo: Paul Chinn / The Chronicle
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