Protesters warn: DNC lawsuits a'comin'

As if you didn't know. Susan Greene in the Post:

They call it the Activists' Retirement Plan. Cities have paid protesters millions of dollars after using overly aggressive, unconstitutional police tactics to handle mass demonstrations.

Denver insists it won't happen here.

"The city's working to create a positive environment for people to express themselves," City Attorney David Fine said of the Democratic National Convention in August. "Our intention is for a week that doesn't result in claims against the city."

Aim high.

Some activists aren't so sure.

"Any time you get a bunch of law enforcement people with a $50 million security budget and new toys, they're going to find a threat. They'll manufacture one if they need to. And we'll all be paying for it later," warns Paul Bame, a software engineer from Fort Collins.

Pure R!68 logic. And these guys are pros:

Bame's activism led him in 2002 to protest the World Bank and International Monetary Fund. He was walking on a Washington, D.C., sidewalk with a question mark painted on his face when police rounded him up, then locked him away for 30 hours. He sued for civil rights breaches and won $13,000 of that city's $1.6 million settlement with protesters.

A year later, police plucked Bame off a Miami sidewalk before a protest against a free-trade summit. For his six hours in jail, he settled for $20,000.

Laura Ripple, a Grand Junction property manager [sic], endured pepper spray, a strip search and an ankle injury while being arrested in Miami that same week. She settled for $52,500.

Though the payouts helped, both say they hardly compensated for their troubles, even after the charges against them were dropped.

"The money isn't enough to make up for the fact that I no longer feel safe about voicing my opinion," said Ripple, who plans to stay clear of protests around the DNC this summer because she is pregnant.

No matter how often you've seen it, the self-righteousness is mind-boggling.

That may be the city's desired effect [to ban pregnant women from protesting?] as it gears up to dispatch 2,500 officers in late August. The $50 million that Denver has snagged in federal security funding is twice the sum it estimated it needed and nearly double what Boston spent for the 2004 DNC.

The city is mum about how it will spend $18 million budgeted for new equipment such as rubber bullets, Tasers, batons and percussion grenades.

Though Denver covers lawsuits against its own cops, it's spending $1.4 million for a $10 million policy on officers from other cities working the event.

Denver also has three law firms approved for $83,000 in contracts to represent it in cases involving the convention.

More protester logic:

"They're acknowledging ahead of time that they're going to do things that will injure people and offend civil liberties," said Ripple, who won a $250 settlement for more than two days jailed in a Manhattan pier during the 2004 GOP convention.

Fifty-two thousand bucks for a sprained ankle and pepper spray in Miami, $250 for two days in jail in New York. Cheap bastards.

Fine said Denver 2008 shouldn't be compared to New York 2004, when 1,800 people were arrested and charged. Rather, he says, comparison should be to the DNC in Boston a month earlier, when police made only a handful of arrests.

"The city will treat people with respect and dignity, and expect respect and dignity to be returned," he said.

How nice.

At Fine's comments, B.C. Killmon howled with laughter, asking how equipping police with $18 million in riot gear amounts to "respect" for protesters.

"That's a joke," said the retired pilot, who won $240,000 after having spent seven hours at age 71 with his hands cuffed behind his back in Miami.

"There's a war going on, the economy's down the hole and there's a lot of pent-up frustrations coming into this convention. Every city says it won't happen here. God knows where things may go in Denver."

God knows.

Update: How's this: Ooooooohhhhh, my ankle!

Update II: Slapstick Politics has another good example of protesters' "we're peaceful but the pigs want violence" meme from the Democrats' state convention in the Springs yesterday.

Update III: Yeah, "Ooooh, my ankle" is too wimpy. How about this:

Everyone’s out of jail. I just spoke to one of the American Indian men who participated in the final protest. When they locked down, the police rushed in and immediately started a beat-down. One of the female pigs grabbed him by the testicles and started yanking on him. Another got him by his braid, cranked it up in his fist, and was jerking his head around. Then they laid into them with their nightsticks, destroying one of the men’s faces. When they were arrested, the pigs ground the cuffs on and left them cuffed in the holding cells; their hands were swollen and turning purple by the time they were released. It was a fucking bloodbath, but they’re all out of jail at least.

Naw, nobody would believe it.