Dozens of community members gathered on July 14 to hold a vigil for justice for Trayvon Martin at San Jose City Hall. The group decided to march to the federal building and circle around the downtown to get their message out, and San Jose Police exerted pressure on marchers to move onto the sidewalk. For much of the march, individuals were chanting, "no justice, no peace, no racist police."
Other march chants included: "Long Live Trayvon," "Trayvon lives," "Trayvon is never gone," "No justice, no peace, we're taking over the streets," "Long live Oscar Grant," "No justice, no peace, no racist police," "Being black is not a crime," "Trayvon is never gone," "Racist cops, racist laws, it all starts at city hall."
About halfway through the march, approximately eight San Jose Police Department patrol vehicles began to follow the demonstrators, ordering individuals to stay on the sidewalk or they would be cited. When marchers returned to City Hall, officers strapped on large clubs to their belts.
Community members in Santa Cruz commemorated Juneteenth this year with a large march from Louden Nelson Center to Santa Cruz City Hall, where speakers were heard. Reverend Deborah L. Johnson of Inner Light Ministries started off the speeches with a history of the Juneteenth holiday. Other speakers included Valentin Lopez, Chairman of the Amah Mutsun Tribal Band.
The original Mission Santa Cruz adobe and the replica mission were both spray painted during a demonstration organized on June 10 in Santa Cruz in support of the abolition of police. The phrase "Fuck Your Citizenship" was painted on the Neary-Rodriguez Adobe, and the phrase "Maldita Cruz" was spray painted on two structures. The word maldita means "damned" or "cursed" in Spanish. Additionally, the word "genocide" was painted on the state park plaque, and the mission bell located in Mission Plaza Park was removed. Mission bells were installed across the state to memorialize the California missions. The bell displayed in Mission Plaza Park was donated by the Santa Cruz Woman's Club in 1998. In 2019, local indigenous leaders lead a successful campaign to remove the mission bell at UC Santa Cruz. They stated in a news release that the California mission system was a place where their ancestors were "enslaved, whipped, raped, ...
After being stopped by officers with the Santa Cruz Police Department in Downtown Santa Cruz over the summer, photographer Craig Burton explained in a video interview that he was taking a picture of a child in public and that his subsequent detainment by the SCPD was a case of racial profiling. Burton was clear in stating that his stop by the local police was unwarranted and that they should have known that he was not a predator. Though the authorities did not apologize to him or treat him politely, he didn't blame them, they were just doing their job he said. Burton instead focused on liberals in California, in general, as the source of the problem, stating that, "people act like they are really liberal, but they are not really liberal." He later added, "As you can see, this is Santa Barbara now." When officers Winston and Warren arrived in their patrol vehicle and first caught up to him that day on Locust Street, Burton said he was told by them to sit...
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