About the arrestees, the condemned and the locked-in of November and February in Toulouse. Call for solidarity.
There is currently an international solidarity campaign against the conviction of a single November demonstrator (https://www.facebook.co /pas.de.prison.pour.gaetan ). It seems important to us to sum up the verdicts and bring forward our point of view about the situation. And call widely for solidarity for all.
The November demonstrations started with the death of a young man (Rémi Fraisse, on October 25th). Around Testet (area of the environmental resistance camp) there were people saying that one day or another the wild, legal and determined action from the state forces will make things end up badly. For many, the emotion was strong, because we could have been in his place. But the identification with the victim was not the same when some days earlier, in the center of Toulouse, a cop killed a young man during a robbery.
Demonstrations started from Sunday, October 25th but the repression had to wait until November 1st.
We counted :
1st of November, 16 arrests ;
8th of November, 21 arrests ;
22th of November, 18 arrests ;
21th of February, 13 arrests.
verdicts sum up :
6 persons in prison (4 are still in)
47 months of imprisonment
34 months of suspended sentence
860 hours of community service
5000€ fine
10 450€ of damages for the cops
2 400€ for the cop’s lawyers
45 500€ of damages for the store front
68 persons in total were arrested during these demos. Some of them were released without charges. Without counting the repression against the ZAD (Area to Defend, an environmental resistance camp in the forests) and against the demonstration in Tarn (region where the Sivens ZAD is) counting itself 41 arrestees.
We refuse to see this as a new and uncommon repression. We have seen the militarization of the police, their constant presence in the popular districts, the use of special forces and aggression ending up with injured and dead people. This is not an excess or an accident. This is the logic of the law enforcement. We believe we have to organize solidarity and arm our defense, in order to face the difficulties put upon us in our struggle by the justice system, by the police and by its weapons. We have to make the link between the repression of the everyday small crime/illegal actions and the repression against our struggles. We have to get rid of the idea that the police is doing a good job except when it represses us. The police, the justice, the prison are tools which make the rollback of social achievements possible.
We keep sending money to people in jail every month ; in general we help people accused in this kind of cases. This is a hard task for us so we call for a wide solidarity. You can help up by sending money. To do so, send an email at : caj31@riseup.net
The Toulouse Self Defense Legal Aid Fund
aka
Caisse d’Autodéfense Juridique de Toulouse