community-based, non-corporate, participatory media
Getu's Trial: Its Over!
by Dan Kyle
Sunday, Dec. 22, 2002 at 9:37 AM
daniel_kyle@hotmail.com
The DA's office finally agrees that Getu Towalde, an Ethiopian immigrant, is not a terrorist. The DA also admits that grassroots pressure led to the prosecuter easing up on the initial trumped-up charges.
Ten months ago, Getu Berhanu Towalde was arrested at the Greyhound station in Pittsburgh. His brutalized face and uncommon name were broadcast citywide under the foreboding title �Possible Terrorist�. He was on his way to the Allegheny County Jail, and possibly Guantanamo Bay.
A legal immigrant from Ethiopia, Getu was beaten by the police and arrested after other passengers complained he was �acting suspicious�. According to Getu, he was trying to make friends during the lonely wait before departure. The arresting officer never identified himself and failed to produce a badge before taking him to the ground, disarming Getu of his perceived instrument of destruction: a pen.
The FBI refused to charge him, but Pittsburgh Police went forward with charges of making terroristic threats, causing and risking a catastrophe, and simple and aggravated assault. He was then jailed in the Mental Health pod of the Allegheny county jail and given 8 pills a day, without any attempt at justification. Possibly most disturbing of all, he was the third innocent minority arrested in Pittsburgh in the three months following the September 11th tragedy without any supporting evidence.
Today, Getu has a job. Yes, his name and face are still recognizable in Pittsburgh. He is known as a victim of race-based injustice, who has gathered countless friends in this city with his positive outlook and winning smile. Joe Heckyl from the prison society and Bob Sampson of East Liberty Presbyterian Church testified as a character witness on his trial date. On December 12th, the DA�s office finally agreed to drop all felonious charges, admitting he is not a terrorist. He plead guilty to three misdemeanors: disorderly conduct, harassment, and resisting arrest.
The result: eighteen months of probation. No fine. No additional jail time. No joining countless others rotting away in a concentration camp in violation of international law. Another result: nationally published progressive magazines have used his case as a living, breathing example that the witch-hunt for Middle Easterners has gone too far.
Organizers of the Free Getu Coalition call this a success story. Organizer Saleh Wasiruddin said of the campaign: �We showed that through spreading the word about what�s going on, and getting others to spread the word, we can bring support to our side not just at the grassroots level, but also even within the judicial system. The Allegheny County Public Defender�s office gave each of their lawyers a letter telling them how to fight the denial of Behavior Clinic exams Getu was subjected to.�
On December 5th, a fundraiser for Getu�s legal fees became an anti-racism concert and speak-out. The show featured folk, rock, rap, and jazz performers and several speakers who have been victimized by racism at work, in airports, and on the streets. Anti-racism organizer Pete Shell rallied those in attendance: �The DA�s office admitted the mobilization and letters (over 400) sent to their office led them to offer a favorable plea bargain. Without the mobilization, Getu may still be in jail today.� But is Getu happy with the outcome?
�Not exactly happy,� he laughed, clearly relieved the ordeal is finally over, �but happy for the judgment. That judge (Zatola), he did a good thing.� He is disappointed about probation partially because he still misses his life in Washington DC. Paperwork needs to be filed for him to leave the state. When you mention the Thomas Merton Center, however, his optimism and smile returns: �I really appreciate what the Thomas Merton Center is doing, not just for me, but for justice. They are changing the world in good ways.�
�I learned how people react to movements, how people get active around issues.� He said, looking back on the incident that exemplifies the Bush administration�s darkest intentions, �and I learned the police aren�t always right, that�s the bad side of what I learned.�
Organizers of the Free Getu Coalition remain focused on challenging the system that so badly mistreated Getu. "People often get frustrated and discouraged when they write letters and go to demonstrations, and don't see any direct results of their activism.� Pete Shell recently said, �Getu's case reminds us that activism and public pressure does pay off --not all the time but certainly in this case. Recently, several African-Americans have been killed by the police or housing authority officers in Pittsburgh. Let's keep in mind the important contribution that our activism can make as we struggle for justice for the victims of police brutality and against a war in Iraq." Sadly, there is no shortage of cases to take up.
Monty Clay, a featherweight champion boxer and full time jitney driver from Rankin was brutalized while unarmed by police from Braddock, Edgewood, and Swissvale on January 19th, 2002. Despite the fact Monty was not charged nor arrested for any misconduct that evening, his injuries were so severe he was unable to box for seven months. This has been devastating to the career of the two-time "Golden Gloves" champion of Pennsylvania, who was picked at the time to be a likely qualifier for the 2004 Olympic games. Ever since Monty filed charges against the police boroughs involved, police have not let him alone, harassing him and pulling him over every chance they can.
As embarrassing as Monty�s story is, the mysterious death of the Hill District�s Bernard Rogers is equally troublesome. Shot and killed while unarmed by the Pittsburgh Housing Authority, Rogers, just 26 years old, was reportedly just one month away from his degree from Duffs Business School. Recently, forensics investigators concluded that Rogers was shot in the back. This contrasts what the police officer origionally claimed: that Rogers was shot in a struggle for the officers firearm. Questions surround all these cases. Luckily, there are dedicated activists afoot who prioritize racial justice.
For more information, check out http://www.freegetu.org or http://www.zi-activism.net. Also, click http://www.thomasmertoncenter.org for more opportunities to help victims of race-based injustice.
congrat's
by Tragic
Monday, Dec. 30, 2002 at 9:09 AM
Congrat's to everyone who worked on the campaign. Not a complete victory, but a nice shot in the arm for justice.
well written article
by Quinten
Wednesday, Jan. 01, 2003 at 3:44 PM
quinten@andrew.cmu.edu
I appreciate the well-written content. Quality over quantity is the right choice.
Not to Get Into Semantics...
by BFAB
Tuesday, Jan. 07, 2003 at 2:46 AM
...but I bristle at the use of the word "legal" to qualify immigrant. It's a particularly divisive word to use, denoting that there are "illegal" immigrants - presumably here because they are criminals.
This is simply not the case. The U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service has for years set up unfair rules regarding immigration status - for instance, considering any Cuban defector who reaches dry land "legal" while any Haitian (including those who are facing political persecution) "illegal." The INS is also innately classist in who it allows to enter.
Most organizations have adopted "documented" and "undocumented" as less divisive and more accurate terms for the differences between those who immigrate with the blessing of the INS and those who do not and/or cannot do so. Here in New York, it's one of those wedge issues that over and over saps the power of the movement against the detentions. So this not a matter of political correctness, but downright correctness and actual lives.
entitled
by saleh
Wednesday, Jan. 08, 2003 at 11:36 PM
info@zi-activism.net
comments on comments, and comments:
- some people have been saying it's not a complete victory because he didn't get away with no charges. I got involved with his case because of two things:
- his rights were taken away in jail and in terms of due process (e.g. having a lawyer) and by the police beating him up
- he was being called a terrorist and charged as one, and that was being used by the mainstream media to increase hysteria ("Another Threat")
the result of activism?
- we got him out of jail (no ore solitary confinement, no more drugs, etc.) and got him to see a lawyer and away from the cops, so we got him his due process rights and right-not-to-be-tortured back
- we got the mainstream media to say this is not quite the case of a terrorist being caught, and to stop portraying his as a terrorist and part of a larger-than-life menace
- more importantly, we got the person-in-the-street to see all of this
I call that a complete victory. I'm not saying that we did good so don't say it's not a complete victory - I'm saying something stronger than that: it is a complete victory in terms of the two problems that the activism was working on. I agree that resisting arrest, disorderly conduct, etc. should not be a crime - the place to fight that is not in activism that's trying to get someone their right not to be locked away in jail without seeing a lawyer or right not to be called a terrorist. The place to fight that is a more general campaign on law and the police and prosecution system. A victory in that campaign would be no resisting arrest charges or no disorderly conduct charges - we never said he wasn't disorderly, we said his due process/human rights were being taken away and he was wrongly being called a terrorist: that's what we worked on, that's what we on on, therefore it's a complete victory. Anyone who says otherwise has some mistaken ideas of what we did.
I'd also like to point out that as an activist working on the case I think the focus on letters being a road to victory by itself is an inaccurate portrayal of the character of the campaign (not Dan's fault, people who weren't working on the case as much seem to be spreading that idea the most). The letters were the by-products of what we did, not the content of what we did. When we tabled at neighborhoods and at mass events, the point was not to get letters. It was to talk to people and change their minds, of which one of the concrete results was getting them to write to the DA. and be brave enough to put their name and address on it Much more importantly, in my opinion, we also recruited people to become active and table other places, in turn changing more peoples' minds and recruiting them to be activists.
--> so the victory came about by hitting the streets and changing people minds and getting them to be involved, of which one of the concrete results was getting a lot of letters that showed the volume of all the other work. The letters weren't a piece of paper to the DA asking him to drop charges or explain his actions, but a mark that people were changing their minds about hysteria and were getting active in changing other people's minds (i.e. getting active on the issue). That is the point I think an activist would appreciate, spreading ideas and getting others to be involved, and I think the Coalition's work is useful in talking about that, not about the letters themselves.
To the person who bristles at "illegal" immigrant: there are a number of questions that we (Zi) got asked as were doing the work of forming the coalition. Some of them were material to the case, and those we dealt with in detail in print. Some of those were ancillary, though no less important politically. If we said "documented immigrant" many of the people we were talking to would not have known what we meant, and would still want to know if he was "legal" or "illegal". Our job was to point out that it doesn't make a difference whether he was or not as his rights were being taken away, and then once we do that job then we could talk (verbally, not in print, as the verbal part is when we've done the first part of the job) about the politics of immigration.
If there was a way to say "documented immigrant" in a way that people who aren't activists would know what we meant, we would use it, and please feel free to suggest the alternative - but our first job was to convince people against hysteria, there are others whose campaigns' first job is to educate people about immigrants. We can educate people about immigrants too, but we gotta get the message across that's material to the case first.
I wish we could have allowed for thought in our literature on the nature of immigration, but we don't know of the vocab ("documented" just doesn't cut it from my experience) and need to focus our precious energy on crafting the message about the material elements of what we're fighting.
Another part of the case that hasn't really been covered in either the mainstream media or sub-meainstream media or alternative media has been Zi's work in doing the ground work for the case before the coalition was formed. I'm putting that out there so that people know that there's a lot more involved, if they want to know more they should talk to some of the people who were working on the case from the very beginning.
I saw on another thread that someone said indymedia should do more stories on this case (back when there's wasn't much on the case on the site). I'm not sure how many of you know it but Indymedia was actually ahead of the Post-Gazette, City Paper, and Pulp in this game - you guys got the first story on Getu. The only thing is that that story still hasn't been published, nor has the video that was taken with it. This is not an organizational criticism as much as a correction of a mistaken idea - you guys know best what's going on in terms of what can be done, but I don't want you to think that the problem has been that Indymedia didn't work on doing the story. Getu was interviewed by Indymedia before anyone else - the problem was in getting the story out, not doing the story.
Thanks and a hearty endorsement to everyone working on alternative media - Saleh
re: entitled
by saleh
Thursday, Jan. 09, 2003 at 9:20 AM
info@zi-activism.net
hey - in that last note I wasn't criticizing Dan's article at all, but the general message that I keep coming across about the campaign. Some of the comments on Dan's story were related to that general message and so I wrote on the general message rather than any particular comment or part of Dan's article, even tho I referred to specific comments and parts of Dan's article to say what I wanted to say. (the exception of course is to the person who had a point about documented immigrants)
in retrospect the tone might have been rougher than anything warrented on the site. if i was into mass journalism more I would have written an article with those points, which would be more productive, but as I'm more focused on other work at the expense of mass journalism I only bring the points up in public when someone alludes to them.
writer
by Dan Kyle
Friday, Jan. 10, 2003 at 9:58 AM
Wow, seems like people have been taking advantage of Indypgh a lot more lately! Mad props to the tech people who keep it running smoothly and whoever created that sweet graphic of Getu.
I wanted to add that if I could change anything about the article today, I would:
1. Highlight the hard work Zi did in this case, especially in the beginning, when Getu was still a stranger to the activist community. This is not spoken of much, but Saleh placed an amazing amount of time and faith into this case. So much, he invited Getu to live with him for the past 8 months. Without the dedicated activists of Zi, there would have been no coalition. I was so impressed with Zi, I now go to weekly meetings.
2. I would have liked to address the fact the FBI is no longer laying low in the Pittsburgh area. The "investigation" of local residents even has the for-profit media enraged. For our out-of-town readership, the latest article in the City Paper is a great continuation of Getu's situation. The article is featured at this hyperlink:
http://www.pghcitypaper.com/archives/covarch/cov03/cv010803.html
Again, thanks for taking interest!
re: writer
by saleh
Friday, Jan. 10, 2003 at 10:11 AM
info@zi-activism.net
just a pointer on the original Zi work:
when Zi first started this work it was a sub-group in Zi of 4 people, who all worked very hard but I'm the only one willing to be public so only my name has gone out. This makes it seem like I did all the work, which is never the case in Zi - usually one or two people go public and they have support from a handful who want to stay private. There was another Canadian activist who served as the phone contact to Getu - he's moved back to Canada. There were two other activists in the original sub-group, one of whom has moved out of state.
As the project took off 3 more people joined the sub-group - one of them worked just as hard as I did on the case and now works in the prison system. Another one played a key role as well, and unfortunately she's in a job where it can't be known that she's an activist. The 7th member of the group is a Pitt law student.
When the project was ready to be launched publicly into a coalition the rest of the people in Zi (not just the sub-group of 7) helped. U can see part of this in the on-line minutes that are up on the web page - the minutes are in slight code but you can tell which project is the getu case.
Remember folks: just because we see a name and face doesn't mean as activists we don't realize that there's a whole group supporting the work that person is representing. Because of the situation today not everyone has crossed the line yet of being public about the activism they do.
Saleh
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