23 face terrorism charges after protest
ATLANTA — More than 20 people from around the country faced domestic terrorism charges Monday after dozens in black masks attacked the site of a police training center under construction in a wooded area outside Atlanta where one protester was killed in January.
The site has become the flashpoint of ongoing conflict between authorities and left-leaning protesters who have been drawn together, joining forces to protest a variety of causes. Among them: People against the militarization of police, others who aim to protect the environment and some who oppose corporations they see as helping fund the project through donations to a police foundation.
Flaming bottles and rocks were thrown at officers during a protest Sunday at “Cop City,” where 26-year-old environmental activist Manuel Esteban Paez Teran, known as “Tortuguita,” was shot to death by officers during a raid at a protest camp in January. Police have said Tortuguita attacked them, a version other activists have questioned.
Almost all of the 23 people arrested are from across the United States, while one is from Canada and another from France, police said Monday.
Like many protesters, Tortuguita was dedicated to preserving the environment, friends and family said, ideals that clashed with Atlanta’s hopes of building a $90 million Atlanta Public Safety Training Center meant to increase preparedness and morale after George Floyd’s death in 2020.
Now, authorities and young people are embroiled in a clash that appears to have little to do with other high-profile conflicts.
Protesters who oppose what detractors call “Cop City” run the gamut from more traditional environmental environmentalists to young, self-styled anarchists seeking clashes with what they see as an unjust society.
Defend the Atlanta Forest, a social media site used by members of the movement, said Monday on Twitter that those arrested were not violent agitators “but peaceful concert-goers who were nowhere near the demonstration.” A representative of a public relations firm involved in the group’s events said it could not immediately comment.
After Tortuguita was killed, demonstrations spread to downtown Atlanta. A police cruiser was set ablaze, rocks were thrown and fireworks were launched at a skyscraper that houses the Atlanta Police Foundation. Windows were shattered. The governor declared a state of emergency.
On Sunday, Atlanta police Chief Darin Schierbaum said at a midnight news conference that pieces of construction equipment were set on fire in what he called “a coordinated attack” at the site of the Atlanta Public Safety Training Center in DeKalb County.
Surveillance video released by police shows a piece of heavy equipment in flames. It was among several destroyed pieces of construction gear, police said.
Protesters also threw rocks, bricks, Molotov cocktails and fireworks at police, officials said. In addition, demonstrators tried to blind officers by shining green lasers into their eyes and used tires and debris to block a road, the Georgia Department of Public Safety said Monday.
Officers used nonlethal enforcement methods to disperse the crowd and make arrests, Schierbaum said, causing “some minor discomfort.”
Along with classrooms and administrative buildings, the training center would include a shooting range, a driving course to practice chases and a “burn building” for firefighters to work on putting out fires. A “mock village” featuring a fake home, convenience store and nightclub would also be built for rehearsing raids.
Opponents have said the site would be used to practice “urban warfare” and that the 85-acre training center would require cutting so many trees that it would be environmentally damaging.
Many activists also oppose spending millions on a police facility that would be surrounded by poor neighborhoods in a city with one of the nation’s highest degrees of inequality.