Expand / Collapse search
☰

Are 'extreme methods' justified in Atlanta public safety facility protests?

By and FOX 5 Atlanta Digital Team
Published  March 7, 2023 10:30pm EST
Downtown
FOX 5 Atlanta

Activist says "extreme methods' from protesters is response to police brutality

FOX 5 spoke with a leader from one of the groups protesting the incoming public safety training center that many refer to as 'Cop City'. He shared insight on the movement from his perspective.

ATLANTA - Dozens of people gathered near Woodruff Park Tuesday. It's the same location where a January riot broke out during a protest against the approved Atlanta Public Safety Training Center. Organizers at Tuesday's protest said their goal was to expose supporters of the Atlanta Police Foundation.

One activist told FOX 5 that the movement against the training center is large and diverse. He admitted some use extreme methods, but he said it's all a response to what he called police brutality.

"There are protesters who are engaging in civil disobedience and direct action—and yes—some of those protesters tactics may from the outside look extreme," activist Kamau Franklin told FOX 5.

Franklin heads Community Movement Builders, one of the groups opposing what they refer to as ‘Cop City’.

Atlanta Police Chief Darin Schierbaum admitted many of the protesters participating in this week of events against the training facility have been largely peaceful, and that's exactly how their message gets targeted and perverted by what he calls ‘agitators’.

SUPPORTERS AND RESISTERS OF ATLANTA PUBLIC SAFETY TRAINING CENTER SOUND OFF AT PUBLIC MEETING

"Events that are shown to be peaceful and to be publicized as peaceful are being used by individuals as cover to launch illegal and criminal attacks," he said during his presentation at an Atlanta City Council meeting held Monday.

Chief Schierbaum said there is footage of those ‘agitators’ who left a peaceful music festival, changed into all-black clothing and began attacking police with rocks and make-shift explosives.

'Violent agitators' at Atlanta Public Safety Training Center caught on camera

Atlanta Police release this video which shows a group of people leaving a local music festival, change into all-black clothing, and overrun the construction site of the future Atlanta Public Safety Training Center.

"Does your movement have the responsibility to call out people who are behaving in ways they should not be?" FOX 5 reporter Christopher King asked Franklin.

"I think the movement has the responsibility to discuss tactics and strategies for moving the movement forward," Franklin responded, "We’ve had people thrown to the ground, beat up – all of this is coming from the policing side – the state side."

In the meantime, nearly two dozen people who were arrested at the protest Schierbaum described are now behind bars on charges of domestic terrorism. All but two of them were not Georgia residents. All but one of them were denied bond by a magistrate judge during their first court appearance Tuesday.