Mobilize to the Court & PACK THE HEARING
NEXT DATE: Wednesday, July 24, 2019 at 8:30 am
Lorenzo Patino Hall of Justice, Dept. 63, 651 – I St. Sacramento, CA 95814
Trial anticipated in early October 2019
Latest Developments: Mobilize to the Sacramento Superior Court on April 23 and demand that all charges be dropped against the Sacramento 3 anti-racist/anti-fascist protesters: Yvette Felarca, Mike Williams, and Porfirio Paz. At the evidentiary hearing for the Sacramento 3 last January, the District Attorney’s office presented anonymous Youtube video clips (which had been featured prominently in white supremacist online propaganda) as “factual” video evidence. The DA also relied on a single police officer witness who testified that he did not see any confrontation the defendants were allegedly involved in because he was on the roof of the Capitol building. Judge Bulware ruled that this was enough to maintain the witchhunt against the Sacramento 3, and that their case will proceed to trial. This is an utter travesty of justice. The truth is on our side, but that alone is not enough. To win, we have to assert our power through building a community-wide defense campaign for our civil rights activist leaders.
Background: On June 26, 2016 white supremacist supporters of Donald Trump came to the state capital in Sacramento armed with knives, homemade spears, and clubs. These fascist scum were affiliated with the violent Nazi organizations Traditionalist Workers Party and Golden State Skinheads. They stabbed and attempted to murder unarmed black, Latina/o, Asian, Arab, and white anti-racist and anti-fascist counter-protesters. The 133 police who were present on the ground stood by and did nothing protect the counter-protesters or to stop the Nazi assault. At least 7 anti-racists were hospitalized for stab wounds, head injuries, and fractured bones, with some requiring invasive surgery as a result of the Nazi attack. Thanks to the courage and determination of counter-protesters, violent white supremacists were not able to roam the streets of Sacramento attacking unsuspecting families or pedestrians, and their attack was shut down. But instead of arresting the racists, the police and District Attorney Anne Marie Schubert have scapegoated three anti-racist and anti-fascists fighters with fabricated felony and misdemeanor charges: Yvette Felarca, Mike Williams, and Porfirio Paz. We must mobilize to get their charges dropped now!
Right after the fascist assault, the police witchhunt against anti-fascists began immediately, with California Highway Patrol officers interrogating and harassing injured protesters in their hospital beds without pursuing charges against the Nazi’s who stabbed people. The police released unsubstantiated public statements blaming anti-fascist protesters within 24 hours, actively covering for the Nazi’s. Months later, after the election of Donald Trump, the police collusion with the fascists went into high gear. Over a year after the protest, in the summer of 2017 and only weeks before the murder of Heather Heyer in Charlottesville, DA Schubert officially joined the police collusion with the Nazi’s and charged Felarca, Williams, and Paz. Yvette Felarca is a prominent civil rights and immigrant rights leader with BAMN. Mike Williams and Porfirio Paz are active and recognized community organizers. One fascist has been charged.
The police and DA’s policy of allowing Nazi’s to get away with attempted murder in Sacramento and pursuing charges against the anti-racists who stood up to them set the stage for the lynch-mobs and murder in Charlottesville a year later. The blood of Heather Heyer is on the hands of the California Highway Patrol, the Sacramento Police, and DA Schubert.
The Sacramento 3 defendants have ample evidence of the police collusion with the Nazi’s. The police have the names and pictures of every white nationalist with their knives out on the capital grounds on the day of the protest, yet arrested none of them. Despite a mountain of paperwork they submit as evidence against the anti-racist defendants, they included not a single police report or any police video footage written or filmed on the day. The police dossiers written after the fact were authored by a single police officer who wasn’t even present on the ground at the protest. They reveal open political targeting of the anti-fascist counter protesters who were present. Stab victims were visited in their hospital beds by police who harassed them about those who opposed the white supremacists. The police showed little interest in pursuing an investigation of the fascists. Taped phone interviews conducted by the police reveal their willingness to cover for the Nazi’s and to pursue a witchhunt, especially targeting outspoken BAMN leader Yvette Felarca.
It is apparent to millions of people in the US and across the globe that Donald Trump is capable of creating a tyrannical authoritarian regime. Everyday brings a new example of Trump’s assault on democracy: kidnapping and ripping immigrant children from the arms of their parents, terrorizing immigrants and Muslims to enact a racial purge, empowering police to target and brutalize black and Latina/o communities, encouraging the rape and sexual assault of women and active discrimination of LGBTQ people, and obstructing justice, to name a few. In this situation, the groups that call themselves Nazi, KKK, and neo-Confederates are the equivalent to the fascists who followed Musollini in Italy and Hitler in Germany. Their Alt-Right counterparts share their same politics, but without the identifiable costumes. Thanks to Trump, white supremacists and fascists have been on the rise, becoming bolder and more dangerous. They back Trump because of, not in spite of, his racist and misogynistic attacks.
We are living in a period of the biggest threat to democracy that many people can remember. Stopping the growth of fascism is essential to protect our communities and defeating Trump. In Sacramento and the Bay Area, fascist and alt-right thugs have been shut down and defeated time and again through mobilizing mass militant direct action. The resistance movement to Trump is capable of forcing Trump to resign or be removed, as long as we maintain political independence from both the Democrats and Republicans and keep mobilizing in the streets. Defending our boldest fighters and leaders is essential to our victory.
