I’ve been working on a story for almost a week (one I originally thought would only take a couple of days to fully research and write), and it directly dovetails with what I can only refer to as–without question–the most stunning and relevant, U.S. militarized-police-state story I’ve ever read. The Guardian’s Spencer Ackerman details the inevitable—for those of us that have been paying attention—gut-wrenching and instantaneously seminal story that is now breaking over at that newspaper’s website.
Welcome to the "real, new normal!" (Which, as far as U.S. people of color are concerned, isn't all that much different from "the old normal." When you read my next piece, you'll understand, this isn't an exaggeration.) It was just a matter of time. (WARNING: Like so many other, recent reports about our militarized and deadly police state—but, perhaps turning it all up a notch, this morning--this story’s going to stay with you like a really bad nightmare.) Read it and weep for our country…again…
The disappeared: Chicago police detain Americans at abuse-laden 'black site'
• Exclusive: Secret interrogation facility reveals aspects of war on terror in US
• ‘They disappeared us’: protester details 17-hour shackling without basic rights
• Accounts describe police brutality, missing 15-year-old and one man’s death
Spencer Ackerman in Chicago
The Guardian
Tuesday 24 February 2015 10.33 EST
The Chicago police department operates an off-the-books interrogation compound, rendering Americans unable to be found by family or attorneys while locked inside what lawyers say is the domestic equivalent of a CIA black site.
The facility, a nondescript warehouse on Chicago’s west side known as Homan Square, has long been the scene of secretive work by special police units. Interviews with local attorneys and one protester who spent the better part of a day shackled in Homan Square describe operations that deny access to basic constitutional rights.
Alleged police practices at Homan Square, according to those familiar with the facility who spoke out to the Guardian after its investigation into Chicago police abuse, include:
• Keeping arrestees out of official booking databases.
• Beating by police, resulting in head wounds.
• Shackling for prolonged periods.
• Denying attorneys access to the “secure” facility.
• Holding people without legal counsel for between 12 and 24 hours, including people as young as 15.
At least one man was found unresponsive in a Homan Square “interview room” and later pronounced dead.
Brian Jacob Church, a protester known as one of the “Nato Three”, was held and questioned at Homan Square in 2012 following a police raid. Officers restrained Church for the better part of a day, denying him access to an attorney, before sending him to a nearby police station to be booked and charged.
“Homan Square is definitely an unusual place,” Church told the Guardian on Friday. “It brings to mind the interrogation facilities they use in the Middle East. The CIA calls them black sites. It’s a domestic black site. When you go in, no one knows what’s happened to you.”
The secretive warehouse is the latest example of Chicago police practices that echo the much-criticized detention abuses of the US war on terrorism. While those abuses impacted people overseas, Homan Square – said to house military-style vehicles, interrogation cells and even a cage – trains its focus on Americans, most often poor, black and brown…
It's like our country's own, private
Abu Ghraib Prison.
The "war on terror" really has come home to roost.
Then again, as far too many U.S. people of color will attest, there are many police departments throughout America that should be considered "black sites."
Wake up, people!
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(Checkout Kossack Steven D's post on this story, published about 30 minutes prior to my own. Frankly, as far as I'm concerned, there can't be enough Daily Kos diaries published about this ever-expanding travesty!)
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h/t to Kossack ericlewis0, in the comments:
Maddow covered part of this big time last night
The Chicago P.D. officer that was sent to Gitmo to carry out torture on a specific inmate there. Turns out he was using many similar methods when still on the force in Illinois. Rachel interviewed Spencer Ackerman during the segment.
Here's
THE LINK.
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An h/t to Kossack Shaun King, who's provided the community with a video, courtesy of The Guardian, featuring a former "guest" at Homan Street, and it's available in his diary at THIS LINK. Shaun's published a series of posts on this obviously-still-developing story.
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10:42 AM PT: It's been brought to my attention that the Homan Square building is, technically, a special operations police station. This reminds me of the "perfectly legal" claims frequently bandied about in the comments by the leaders of our surveillance state, and even here among a handful of Kossacks. All I have to say in response to that is this: BULLSHIT! Lubyanka was also KGB headquarters, and Guantanamo is a U.S. armed forces base.
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