April 2008

Issue 7, Volume 5

What started as a peaceful protest on the campus of Binghamton University, turned into a fight between protestors and the police in March 18.

At about 1130 AM, students from Experimental Media Organization, Veterans for Peace, and students and townspeople against the War in Iraq, met in front of he Library to protest the war. After doing chants and gaining a crowd of about 50 students, the protest moved around campus ending outside the New Union by the food court.

At about 12:30, the students leading the protest decided to march to the Army recruiting center, located At University Plaza. Protestors began to embark on the one mile walk form campus to the recruiting center by walking down Vestal Parkway. The normally bustling road was brought to a standstill as students took up two lanes of traffic while marching.

Following the students where four cop cars representing Vestal town Police and University police. As the students marched down the parkway they began to yell “Our Country Our Streets.” They also chanted “No Blood for Oil,” “We Want Peace Now” and “No justice no peace, Fuck the police!” Many students where holding signs that called for the end to the occupation in both Iraq and in Palestine. Other students held up signs stating “End the War” and “No to Torture.”

As the students reached Plaza Drive, the road that leads to the entrance of University Plaza, the police demanded that students get out of the road. As students began to move into the shoulder of the road, a Vestal Town Police car came up next two multiple students walking in the road in an attempt to move them out of the road. Some accounts of the story claim that at least one protestor was hit when the police car turned the corner in an attempt to keep the protestors off the road. After this action by the police, the officer came out of the car and attempted to arrest one student. As this occurred At least one other student attempted to prevent one of their fellow protestors form being arrested.

In response to this action, the police grabbed and arrested one more student, and began to pepper spray the arrested individuals as well as the crowd. As the police were arresting students, other cops pushed the crowd of students back. As the video shows, the police pushed at least one student to the ground. At this time Dan Johnson, a graduate student in the History department, was pushed and then arrested by the police. However the police did not just arrest a nonviolent protestor, they threw him to the ground, throwing his face into a pile of rocks. Johnson was then patted down and put into a police car where he sat, with his face swelling up to the point that his eyes where closed, for over a half hour without any medical attention.

As order was restored, police from different localities began to arrive. By the end of the standoff there were close to 60 police officers representing Vestal police Department, Binghamton City police Department, Port Greene police department, Johnson City police department, University police, the Broome county sheriff and New York state Troopers.

By Tuesday night, word of the arrests and the protest had spread all over campus. By 11:00 that night, the SA had called for an emergency meeting to discuss the situation that had occurred. With talks of sanctions against EMO/SAC a heated atmosphere was evident at the meeting. Nearly fifty students, professors and townspeople showed up to support and discuss what had occurred the previous day. Many members from EMO/SAC and BPI stated that the march of campus was not part of their earlier Anti War protest but, rather individuals as acting on their own free will. Other protestors stated that they had known that the event was not sanctioned by a SA charted group when they left campus to protest at the army recruiting station. Student reaction to the incident was mixed.

Many of the students that where involved in the protest felt that the police action was to extreme. One student, Basheer Bergus, a member of EMO/SAC was pepper sprayed in the face and later arrested while trying to pour water in his eyes. While in the county sheriff’s custody, Bergus called for an ambulance to assist him due to the amount of pepper spray in his eyes and mouth. Bergus stated, “I felt like I was going to die.” Bergus sat on police custody, chained to a wall for nearly 4 hours until he was let on his own recognizance. After Bergus spoke at the meeting he received a standing ovation from the gallery that lasted for nearly a minute. Another student, David Bittner, stated that he was arrested while trying to protect fellow protestors.

One student, Robert Menje, stood up to state that “what happened was against what the university stands for” and continued to state that “I don’t want my TA’s to be attacking cops because I feel like they might be attacking me while I’m in class.”

Other comments where more supportive of the protestors. One comment from Laura Hill, a Graduate student in the History Department, asked for the SA to make a statement to not accept unnecessary or excessive force against it’s students. One unnamed member of the community also spoke “thanking the students for exercising their free speech and their right to assemble.” He also stated that it was “refreshing to see young people still care about preserving democracy by exercising their civil duties, and it makes me proud to have Binghamton University in this area to show that people still care.”

At the end of the night, the SA voted to pass a resolution that would condemn whoever was found responsible. The resolution did little to actually punish anyone or any group. Many students in their testimony felt that the idea of a resolution was hasty due to the fact that the facts where not all apparent at that time.