Veterans and Police Officers Support “Occupy Wall Street”

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Veterans and Police Officers Support “Occupy Wall Street” Protesters

Posted on October 24, 2011 by WashingtonsBlog

Veterans and Police Officers Launch New Groups to Support “Occupy Wall Street” Protesters

Marine Sergeant Shamar Thomas stood up to the New York Police Department to protect protesters.

That act of courage and honor has inspired a new group called OccupyMARINES.

OccupyMARINES claims to be lining up veterans from all over the country to support the protesters.

Another new group – Occupy Police – uses the mottos:

• Police in Support of the 99%

and

• We are the 99% Protecting 100%”

An October 21st posting at OccupyPolice.org states:

We are in open Solidarity with Occupy Wall Street and all Occupy movements across the nation. We’re starting off Day 1 with a mass e-mail to all police departments throughout the US. We want them to know that they ARE part of the 99% and to get involved with the movement. We openly support positive communication between Police/People and we encourage you to do the same.”

By way of background, there were unconfirmed reports last month that 100 New York Police officers boycotted in solidarity with the Wall Street protesters.

And Raw Story reports today in a story entitled, “New York cops defy order to arrest hundreds of ‘Occupy Albany’ protesters”:

Occupy Albany protesters in New York’s capital city received an unexpected ally over the week: The state and local authorities.

According to the Albany Times Union, New York state troopers and Albany police did not adhere to a curfew crackdown on protesters urged by Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) and Albany mayor Gerald Jennings.

Mass arrests seemed to be in the cards once Jennings directed officers to enforce the curfew on roughly 700 protesters occupying the city owned park. But as state police joined the local cops, moved past the property line dividing city and state land.

With protesters acting peacefully, local and state police agreed that low level arrests could cause a riot, so they decided instead to defy Cuomo and Jennings.

“We don’t have those resources, and these people were not causing trouble,” a state official said. “The bottom line is the police know policing, not the governor and not the mayor.”