Author: alboroto

Categories
Social control and repression

Gathering against the killing of Juan Pablo

Juan Pablo Torroija, an Argentinian squatter living in the town of Girona (Catalonia), was arrested last month. A few hours after the arrest he ended up in hospital, where he died. According to police, he hanged himself in his cell, but the beaten marks on his body and the fact there was no fracture on his neck prove we may be in front of a new case of police torture and assassination. A gathering has been called for August 9 to demand explanations and denounce the killing. Below is a statement by comrades from Girona:

Juan Pablo, from what we could reconstruct, was arrested on July 10 or 11 at night by a joint patrol of local police and Mossos d’Esquadra (Catalan police) at the Noon street of Girona, although we don’t know why. He is wildly beaten and taken to a police station in town, and enters hospital on July 11, in severe condition.

According to police statements, Juan Pablo had tried to hang himself at the police station. Police never informed of his arrest and the following hospitalization neither to any relative nor the phone numbers listed in his legal residence in Spain, which means that Juan Pablo stayed four days alone while being heavily injured.

The only person who managed to find out what had happened was a friend of Juan Pablo, that turned up at the Vista Alegre police station (Girona) where they told him that Juan Pablo Torroija was admitted to the intensive care unit of the Trueta hospital for an alleged suicide attempt in the cells of that same police station. This friend managed to see Juan Pablo at the hospital and has now explained that he was brutally beaten on the head, the ribs of his left side, on both arms, on the legs and with all the his neck full of marks, as if they were traumas. All the beaten parts were covered by a white tape as a way to hide the injuries. No doctor wanted to give any explanations about the events, and they only told him he had irreversible damage by asphyxia and they believed he would not survive.

Juan Pablo died a day later (July 14), alone. His body was taken to the Mémora funeral home and given to the Court No 1 of Girona. Neither his family nor the Argentine Consulate or, obviously, the public opinion, were informed of his arrest and death.

We denounce the number of big irregularities in the process that ended up with the death of Juan Pablo, the lack of communication by the judicial authorities, the statements made by Juan Pablo’s friends, who report a situation of persecution, harassment, detention and torture in the police station, the evident irregularities in the autopsy presented and and the speed they have managed to the have the case closed, with the intention of having to repatriate the body. And we demand explanations, responsabilities to be clarified and the end of police impunity and state terrorism.

Not everyone is here: Juan Pablo is missing!
The police tortures and murders!

Juan Pablo, assassinated in the police station of Girona
Stop police police immunity
One of us is touched, all of us are touched
Gathering – Thursday 9 at 20:00 in Vi square

For more information in English: The death of an Argentinian squatter

Source: barcelona.indymedia.org

Categories
Antifascism

Demonstration to remember Roger Albert, killed by neonazis in Barcelona in 2004

On August 15, 2004 our friend and comrade Roger was stabbed in the neck while he was defending his neighbourhood from a group of neonazis who had freely gone that afternoon around the neighbourhood assaulting many neighbours. Four months later, Roger died after waking up from a coma and fighting like a lion for his life. From him we keep his strength, his creativity, and of course, his determination.

THE REST IS JUST ANGER, ANGER, ANGER!

Demonstration – Wednesday 15th of August at 19:00 in Metro Fontana

Source: barcelona.indymedia.org

Categories
Prisons Social control and repression

Solidarity poster with Amadeu Casellas


Take off your hands from Amadeu’s life

“The struggle must go on and we people should not give up. Day after day struggle and going on no matter what happens. If you don’t give up you can win, if you give up you have already lost. It’s worth to keep on fighting” – Amadeu Casellas, 2010

FREEDOM FOR AMADEU

Amadeu Casellas was kidnapped inside the State’s prisons for 24 years, eight of them served illegaly as the State itself admitted. His stance of resistance and denunciation (tortures, prison corruption…) had a lot to do with it. After his release in march 2010, the nightmare comes back now two years later with the surrealistic orders he has received this month in order to serve a 3 years sentence. The State wasn’t satisfied enough with jailing our comrade for decades, and now wants to do so again. They want him captive, in silence and subordinated but we won’t let them play with his freedom once again. For the destruction of prisons!

SOLIDARITY IS STRONGER THAN THEIR CELLS

Source: barcelona.indymedia.org/media

Categories
Prisons Social control and repression

Amadeu Casellas faces jail once again

On July 2, Amadeu Casellas is notified to present himself to the court of Barcelona, and once there he is told to have 10 days to enter the Manresa prison in order to serve a 3 years sentence. An appeal is requested to deduct these 3 years from the 8 years that the “injustice” of the state owes him and that the state institutions themselves had recognized after a hard period of struggle.

After visiting the Penitentiary Surveillance court, the jail of Manresa and holding different meetings, in order to change this “illogical” situation, he is told his appeal cannot be “attended” as he hasn’t entered jail yet and has no “jail record”, while they promise him to fastly attend his situation once he is inside.

The shamelessness of telling a person to re-enter prison just to check his “jail record”, after jailing that person and kidnapping him for eight long years, can only come a sickening and avenging state.

Obviously, a dissatisfied Amadeu kept on fighting for his freedom, and after several meetings with the General Secretariat of Prisons of Catalonia, two years and eight months are deducted, but they are unable to overturn the order of entering jail and offer him a Third Degree status, which apparently allows inmates to spend eight hours of the day in freedom.

The following step was the court of Barcelona again, where the president cancelled the order given for July 12, although all the bureaucracy in different courts was still pending before being sure the sentence is completely overturned .

Now, Amadeu has been told again he has to enter prison on August 2. Unbelievable but true! If it wasn’t true, it could even look like some kind of sick joke, but it is the harsh reality of the bourgeois law, its extermination centers and its “calculation mistakes”, which required up to three hunger strikes for them to take the decision to start counting the years Amadeu had to actually serve.

We know that during August and early September it will be difficult to handle any issue related with the bourgeois legal bureaucracy, so in case he was finally jailed, Amadeu will be exposed to any kind of manipulation, provocation, set-up, etc. which will only make his release harder.

Now it’s the time to fight again against the beast, to fight with our best weapon: solidarity.

Amadeu Casellas Ramón is not alone, your freedom is ours, his struggle is ours. His choice has never been to be silent, neither ours.

FOR FREEDOM!

FOR SOLIDARITY!

FOR ANARCHY!

DOWN WITH THE PRISON WALLS!

Source: barcelona.indymedia.org

For those wishing to know about Amadeu Casellas past struggle: Amadeu Casellas is Free!!!

Categories
Social control and repression

Police attacks protesters in Tenerife, 2 arrested

Police attacked protesters yesterday in Tenerife. Here is the report provided by lahaine.org:

A gathering had been called yesterday morning in front of the Victor theatre in Tenerife, where the PP party was holding a congress. At around 10am police violently attacked protesters, leaving 5 people injured and arresting 2 others.

One of the detainees, a boy, was charged with offense against authority. He was physically assaulted both at the time of the arrest, with the cops’ knees over his head and several baton beatings, and inside the van as he was heading to the police station, when he was beaten again with the batons. He was also attacked at the entrance of the police station and inside the cell. It should be pointed out that the boy suffers from anxiety and due to the tension of the events, he asked for medical help: for two hours he was kept in a backyard near the police station, with an increasing anxiety attack because of the high temperatures that can be reached inside a police van. When arriving at the police station he was attacked once again and kept in the same cell than the other girl arrested. Since he had not received medical care yet, he continued asking for it until cops opened the door and attacked the boy again by kicking him and tightening even more the handcuffs. He was taken to hospital and when he came back he was put in solitary confinement. Many were the marks left on his body: bruises on his back, knee injuries, wounds in the wrists and mainly cheek swelling.

The other girl arrested was charged with civil disobedience. She was physically attacked at the time of arrest and while being transferred to the police station, when she received constant provocations and psychological abuse.

Categories
Speculation and squatting

Barrilonia squat in Barcelona is evicted

At 7am this morning, units of riot cops carried out the eviction of the CSO Barrilonia at Rambla del Raval in Barcelona. The town hall has alleged “building deficiences” in order to evict the squat, as the legal process had not reached the trial stage yet. No warning had been made in advance. A demonstration has been called for this afternoon at 7pm at Rambla del Raval.

Source: setmanaridirecta.info

Categories
Crisis Labour Social control and repression

Clashes and barricades in Madrid after anti-austerity protests [Updated with video]

Thousands of people, led by the yellow CCOO and UGT trade unions, marched yesterday in many cities around the Spanish state to protest against the new austerity measures imposed by the EU, IMF and ECB troika’s bailout memorandum. At the end of Madrid’s demonstration, hundreds of protesters gathered outside the Parliament building, where firemen made a cordon in front of riot police to prevent clashes from happening. Nonetheless, police hit protesters, arrested a firemen but failed to disperse the crowd, which was already exceeding the thousands.

Once firemen had left the place, cops managed to disperse the people by firing blanks and using batons. Suddenly, dozens of burning barricades were put up around the city’s centre, while cops kept chasing people in the surrounding streets. Clashes in the Lavapiés neighbourhood lasted until 2:00am. At least 15 people were arrested and 40 injured. One person was arrested in Barcelona for supposedly throwing bottles against cops.

Ed. note: we will not report neither promote protests by the state-owned trade unions CCOO and UGT, but we thought it was interesting enough to write about the clashes afterwards and how the unions’ controlled and monitored demonstrations were once again exceeded by the anger of many protesters.

Categories
Labour

Night battle between miners and cops in Bembibre

Clashes broke out yesterday between striking miners and cops near the town of Bembibre (Llión province). Late afternoon, miners blocked the A6 state highway, setting up barricades made of burning tires and knocking over several trucks. At 10:30pm, miners fired homemade rockets and shot rocks from slingshots at riot police, who had just arrived. Clashes lasted half an hour, and cops entered later the town in the search of miners. Three of them were arrested.

Source and images: leonoticias.com