I’ve given my account, my pictures, and my law partner’s live feed to the press and registered to speak at tomorrow’s special Dallas city council meeting regarding how the police handled the June 1 peaceful protest on the Margaret Hunt Hill Bridge. It is my observation that the police tactically turned a peaceful, rightful 1st Amendment protest into a potentially massive and dangerous conflict by herding the protestors onto that bridge, “kettling” us, and utilizing military equipment and tactics to enforce an unjustified goal-post shift (i.e., the curfew zone expansion without notice).

I get that the police were trying to make a point.

They made it.

It was the wrong one.

Here’s what happened.

My law partner and I ended up near the very front of the march kind of by accident. We were at the Frank Crowley Courthouse in Dallas, listening to the speeches from the back. When the peaceful march started, we were walking toward Dallas police headquarters. We got u-turned by the police, who simply blocked the path with cars, and during the u-turn we ended up pretty close to the front-line bullhorn. As we walked north on Riverfront Boulevard, officers were quiet as they blocked our path and corralled us up the bridge. I saw one officer load a smoke bomb into a launcher, just in case.

If anyone ever told us not to get on the bridge, I didn’t hear or see any indication of that. Instead, what I observed was a tactical point being made. There may have been a point when the police had a single squad car in the intersection (about 20 yards from the entrance ramp), and the march organizers directed the protesters to calmly/peacefully keep walking around and chant their message.

The police herded the crowd into a “kettling” trap on the bridge, sandwiching the crowd with a Roman military tactic characterized by the formation of large cordons of police officers who then move to contain a crowd within a limited area. As the protestors knelt, chanting “hands up, don’t shoot,” a combination of DPD, Texas Highway Patrol who came from as far as Amarillo, the Gang Unit, S.W.A.T., and the national guard advanced on the protesters. They sprayed pepper balls at people and rubber bullets on the ground between them. They launched smoke canisters into the crowd and along the lining of the bridge to push everyone back and obfuscate vision. They announced everyone was being arrested and flooded our eyes with lights. The advance came in waves, the shields and riot gear-laden law enforcement stepping over people, as their cohorts zip-tied the people they overtook – people who had lain on the grown en masse as instructed to help ensure violence didn’t erupt. Eventually, the layers of law enforcement forced a dog-pile of the remaining protesters that they then dragged folks from, zip-tied the lot, separated the young children to the side, and lined everybody up in two rows, separating the men and women, along the parapet. The smoke was acrid and burned our eyes and skin. The pepper balls and spray added to the irritation. People placed in residue burnt their legs.

But after word started sneaking out that Dallas council members, the DA, and County Judge Jenkins were getting us out of there, everyone’s demeanor changed – cops, protestors, the two sub-8 year olds detained away from the rest of the crowd – a kind of camaraderie formed and folks loosened up (but not the zip-ties). People cheered the folks who were being freed from zip-ties and walked to the paddy wagons we were told would transport us back to the courthouse steps for release. Conversations began without the same animus, and officers said they were acting to keep us safe from being hit by a car, or that we somehow were in the curfew zone now, etc. They said they want the officers from Minnesota arrested and sentenced, too, and that the Dallas cops believed they were employing safe tactics on that bridge Monday night. EMTs handled medical issues ranging from seizures to circulation cutoffs; everyone booed the national guard troops. Officers reported they didn’t know what was going on at various points, that they were aware of several plans but weren’t high enough on the ladder to know what they were. So, they were wingin’ it and following orders. Check.

DPD and the tactics employed against peaceful protesters on the Margaret Hunt Hill Bridge Monday night was ultimately overzealous and out of control, from a strategic standpoint. This is establishing an alarming emerging pattern of escalation and authoritarianism I’ve not seen here in my entire lifetime in Dallas. Even if I’m wrong, that’s how it felt to most of us who were on the bridge that night.

 

So what can we do if we strive for what’s right, but recognize there are steps to get there? 

We remember that we cannot let perfection become the enemy of progress. We can strongly advocate for each and every step, every stitch in the fabric, while never forgetting the image of the woven tapestry we’d like to herald the halls of humanity. Call or email your elected representatives. Call your senators, both state and federal. Participate in your local city council meetings and elections. We have to accept the reality with which we are presented, but we must always work to change it by taking over and changing the system from within, by “storming-the-gates” so to speak, or both.

For now, I prefer the first option, and so I urge you to call or write your representatives and urge them to push to end the 1033 Program (which allows the federal government to sell excess military equipment to municipal police). If we are being smart about it, some transfer provisions should remain intact for emergency situations (e.g., Hurricane Harvey support, bomb defusal, etc.), the federal government should not be selling tanks and other excess military equipment to local police departments. Local police departments are not military, should not seem like military, and the way they police HAS to change. It is a rhetorical fallacy to assume what they’re doing is the only way policing can be done.

The increased militarization of Mayberry has to end. The police have lost the people’s trust because the people see them as antagonistic to the community rather than a part of it. A large part of THAT is the fault of the 1033 Program. Ending it is a step in the right direction.

 

The bottom line.

What folks want isn’t war, a soldier on every corner, unrest in every community. No one longs for an endless night. What people seek is the stark godbeam of a better tomorrow. A seam of light, ‘cause it’s grey out. We don’t need ivory towers or rose-colored glasses; no empty rhetoric and false promises of returns to days-gone-by. We want the future back. So we need clear eyes, full hearts, and the courage and humility to be the first ones to take the right steps. Together we can make a better Texas. Call or email your representatives today.

-Adam M. Swartz, managing attorney, Swartz|Davidson Law

 

“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.” – Margaret Mead