The Formation of the CHOP

headads up before we start. This episode contains explicit language You'll also hear intense audio of confrontations between protesters and police, including the sound of flashbangs and other loud booming noises Previously on, we keep us safe.hots fired, more shots fired More shots f side, more shots sideide A protest becomes a crime scene. When you come in shooting, you get shot back. We can hear what happens next, the fatal shooting of Antonio. But we can't see it. I should have some answers. I should have some closure How did a protest for Back lives end up killing a black teenager. He wanted to join the protest against police brutality. This is a real life black movement that was going down in his lifetime The last time Antonio May' senror saw his son was in the early morning hours of june twenty third, twenty twenty Later that morning, Antonio Mays Junror was gone The only trace of him was a note into the handle of a fridge in the family's garage is that uh he was going to make me proud He said he was going to go a cop or something. Antonio Sr. filed a missing persons report right away. We put in a records request with the Los Angeles Police Department to see if we could get a copy And not only did we get back the report itself also got back the letter that Antonio Jr left for his dad. On the outside of the letter, it says Please read all the way through. I love you, dad. You raised a strong young man. I'm gonna to make you proud And this is what Antonio Jr. wrote in part Dear dad. I am leaving because with everything that is going on in the world I've been feeling this need to partake and stand up for our people My little sister is always on my mind. When I think about these things, the thought of anything happening to her brings me anxiety and stress. On top of the fact that you work all the time I can't help but worry about the possible things that could happen to you On this journey that I am taking, my goals are simple Become a better person, I know you could be proud of and someone my sister could look up to I hope you can forgive me for leaving but know that I am not running from home. I'm fighting for a cause One day, I want my sister to live in a world where her skin won't be the cause of any pain for her physically or emotionally I love the both of you dearly and with all my heart But I really do believe God is trying to tell me something So I'm trying my best to follow Pes. Also, don't get angry or upset with my decision, please I love you dearly, your son. So from this note We see ideealistic kid in southern California. who left home to make a mark on the world But there's something this letter doesn't explain Why did Antonio travel a thousand miles to a city where his dad says he'd never been? Why did Antonio go to Seattle At that time, protests were happening across the country Of course, it all started in Minneapolis, where George Floyd was murdered on may twenty fifth, twenty twenty Then it very quickly spread. Say his name Soon it got to Los Angeles, where Antonio lived Then the Bay Area, Portland, San Diego. There will be a revolution. There will be a change It's not going to be the same again. I promise you For a southern California kid with plenty of places to protest nearby Seattle doesn't seem like the go to choice But Seattle was different Seattle became a destination for protesters in a way that other cities didn't It was a place where police actually retreated and protesters claim a space of their own form their own community Seattle was different. because Seattle had chop Before Troop had a name Be four tents occupied eight city blocks in a police free zone It was a protest for racial justice As we looked into the question of how and why Antonio was killed We realize that the answer starts with a standoff between protesters and police that led to the creation of chop and set it on a trajectory that led to Antonio's death From NPR is embedded with KOW in the Seattle Times This is we keep us safe I'm Syidney Brownstone, and I'm Will James This is episode two I think we have to start by saying that protest is kind of a thing in Seattle Before daybreak, squads of police carrying duffle bags full of gear began moving into position for the WTO's opening ceremonies This is where the protests against the World Trade Organization went down in nineteen ninety nine Everywhere you looked, WTO delegates were trying to get to the convention center, and it was becoming obvious the protesters were succeeding in stopping them And then there are the big annual workers rights protests like Mayay where reporters are used to covering what we call smashy smashy There's usually a mainstream march rallies, families with kids And then at the margins There are a few more radical protesters who are breaking windows of corporations downtown There's even a song about it So while Seattle is the kind of town where protests are family activity We're also known for having an edgier side When the George Floyd protests arrived in Seattle, people in the streets smashed windows downtown as usual And then someone set a police car on fire You also had this wave of property damage in Chinatown among these smaller family run businesses as well That was an early indication that, okay, maybe this one is different piece of shit out of this guy. I don't really know how it started and now people are looting the store Anden there was the police response.. That first weekend, they were already breaking out the tear gas and blastballs at a scale we hadn't seen here since WTO more than twenty years before. . In one instance, when police pepper sprayed a crowd, they hit a seven year old. Someone videotaped the aftermath That got a lot of people paying attention because families were used to bringing out their kids to protests here safely This was a sign something had changed This was all happening about three weeks before Antonio would get to Seattle. These protests were unruly. They were confusing And everyone in Seattle was trying to make sense of what was happening on our streets. Starbucks is being looted. The SPD iss just being out maneured A lot of people started to tune into this one journalist He always seemed to be at the center of the action the tactic here is fucked up. They're putting the peaceful guys right here' taking all I think it was important to be able to give the protester's perspective was, you know what I'm saying? Omari Salisbury is the founder of Converge Media. It's a local news outlet he started to cover Seattle's historically black central district But once the protests kicked off, his live streams captured the most comprehensive view that we have into the events before and after Antonio arrived in Seattle. Omari partnered with us to help piece together what made Seattle so unique during the protests of twenty twenty He was on the front lines of one of the biggest confrontations in Seattle that summer Pink umbrella day The flashpoint is what we called it Pink umbrella scene around the world So here's how we get to pink umbrella day Over that first weekend, the protests grew from hundreds of people to thousands Four days after the protests started, protesters decided they were gonna march past the East precinct. The East precinct is about fourour blocks in front of us. That's the Seattle pololice precinct that covers the historically young, gay, activist heavy neighborhood of Capitol Hill and also the historically black neighborhood that Omari grew up in the central district. The energy of the protests had been converging here. But on this day When protesters march up Capitol Hill They find their path blocked by a line of police officers who had set up a barricade There's a barricade around the East precinct There's a barricade Plus officers Protesters didn't know why the police wouldn't let them march down the street But now we know that city leaders were afraid the crowd would burn down the precinct It had happened in Minneapolis Pice all around the country were getting warnings from the federal government that protesters might attack their buildings too Protestters didn't back off crowd swells Hundreds of protesters press up against the metal barricade They're chanting for police to let them march past. The front line of that protest for as far as we could see, and it was a long way. I couldn't see all the way back. Th is people in jeans and t shirts, man They didn't come for war or battle As they press on the barricade, it starts to bend On the other side are dozens of police and National Gard SWAT officers with gas masks and batons move to the front. What ex next is tear gas. Wh tear gas and possibly flashbangs someome of the protester posture changed as well They're like, Ohh, they're getting ready to mace us. Okay, the umbrellas are here. You see people put out the umbrellas to block the spray Israady Protestters use a tactic from Hong Kong where they would bring umbrellas to shield themselves from pepper spray. Let's just try to bring this down, guys. The protester in the front is holding a pink umbrella And she opens the umbrella, the cop grabs the umbrella So we see him grabbing an umbrella. And then they start going back and forth pulling over the umbrella. multiple protesters and multiple police wrestling over the pink umbrella. And man, that's where all hell started breaking loose. There's aay. There's a stray They The police started randomly spraying everybody in the crowd. The skin starts to burn This sh out I remember I got I got I got spray in the eye Get the fuck out my way. I got one eye. These are flash spays. This is a flash b It was overwhelming force. There wasn't any attempt by the SPD to any real kind of de escalation. Polleice stop Holy show shit Protesters were shocked by the level of force that they saw Seattle pololice said it was justified They released a statement saying they declared a riot because protesters threw rocks, bottles, and fireworks and also tried to break through the barricades These guys escalated the situation and then put out a release saying that protess started a riot. I'm like, well, shit, I got the receipts, buddy. Months later, Seattle's Office of Police acccountability only found evidence of one bottle being thrown They determined protesters didn't pose much of a threat In fact, the report said police violated their own policy by using pepper spray and other weapons to break up the crowd. decision police made to block off protesters at the East prerecinct It would set off a chain reaction The aftershocks were still being felt weeks later when Antonio arrived in Seattle The violence protesters faced on pink umbrella dayay. actually galvanized the movement protestters. They could just say, look at what police are doing to us Look at what police are doing right now. by showing up We are Eliciting a reaction from police that demonstrates our entire point And it becomes less about We are protesting police brutality nationally to We are protesting the Seattle pololice. M bud pink umbrella Day, protestters keep showing up For a full week, they try to march past the East precinct Past won't let them and keep tear gassing and pepper spraying the crowd And a kind of infrastructure, a protest infrastructure, hardens around the area There are mutual aid stations, volunteer medics, free food goggles for the tear gas and pepper spray Local businesses open up their restrooms to protesters. Like these guys are well fortified up here and him All of this was happening in a leaderless, decentralized way the same kind of organizing we've seen in a lot of left wing mass movements over the years But some leaders did emerge organically from the crowd The point of today was to stand together. R it. Rs Matter Some of these leaders would end up crossing paths with Antonio and show up at key moments in his time here But that's still weeks away at this point. People are not alone. The point is because realizes that we are stronger together David Lewis was someone who, I think most protesterors had never heard of before before twenty twenty I was Project manager at Lou Lemmon David's tall wears glasses, a newewsboy cap gives off a profisorial vibe Like Antonio, he grew up steeped in the story of black civil rights In fact, he is related to the victim of one of the most infamous cases of white mob violence in American history Emmet Till actually is my cousin. my grandmother andmmt Till sror would U spend the summers in a water hole in New Madrid My grandmother marched with Dr. King at Selma. Yeah, this has been my life And twenty twenty kind of transformed him into a protesor. I remember calling my mom and saying, Mom, I think I have to go out there She says, what are you going to do there? You know, what are your goals? What are you wanting to do? I said, I don't know. She said, Before you go out, you need to know who you're going to be in this space And he became kind of one of these breakout stars. L people just started paying attention to him and deferring to him because he was charismatic and seemed like he had a well thought out worldview. If we can leverage the access and the attention and the tension that we have created, not just in Seattle, but on a nationwide scale, we can make fundamental change. David Lewis kind of became the organizer to which other brereakout organizers we're drawn to And that was when I first met Rashila Chila Levittt was a local bartender And she brought this gift for connecting with people to the protests What us? What el do When she got in front of a crowd, she would be able to know, she would leverage and utilize her voice to be able to move people. st manal on David kind of looked at me and he was like, you're loud. I was like, yeah. She's not just loud, she's passionate. She's also recognizable At the time, she had these long locks so you could easily spot her out of a crowd. He handed me a megaphone and he was like, he was like, just keep doing what you're doing.. All of a sudden I was in this role that I wasn't expecting. And it just escalated from there. One thing that made Rashiah and David stand out early on was that they had strong convictions about how to protest effectively. We're not going to break windows. We're not going to vandalize. They wanted these protests to be disciplined We weren't here to just create chaos. We were here to protest police brutality People flooding into the streets that summer were showing up for all kinds of reasons. Not everyone was there for George Floyd The pandemic was raging Some people were just frustrated, scared, lonely. Bored And leaders like David and Rashilah were trying to harness that raw energy to achieve the movement's goals Protesters had three main demands police budget by at least fifty percent reinvest in social services and drop charges against protesters who had been arrested While more and more of the movement's energy was focused on the barricade outside the East precinct There were still marches going on elsewhere in the city We kind of got this idea in our heads of let's like let's just go all the way to the top. Like it's not even about the police chief anymore. like now we need to speak to the mayor. We were able to march seven thousand people exactly to where the mayor was. listen We have we have news cameras make sure that this message is seen across the world, across the nation loud and clear and it is not dyamic At this point, there's real movement in the protester's direction. Multiple city council members are showing up to stand with protesters against police We sat down and we said, we will not leave until Mayor Durkin comes out Mayor Jenny Durkin was a former federal prosecutor and elected as a pro business, moderate Democrat. Like a lot of big city mayors, she was trying to maintain order while still showing support for the protest movement and within about ten minutes The deputy mayor comes out and says, Mary Dunkan is here. She will see you now We want you to march We want you to raise your voices We want you to continue on Path of justice These new protest leaders who were regular people just a couple of days ago end up sitting face to face with Seattle's mayor After that meeting with the mayor, the support was palpable We had eyes and ears everywhere in every piece of the government. And if you were in SPD and you went to a grocery store, that grocer was messaging me Police It feels like the entire city is turning on them We are changing things. This is a start to a start and it needs to stay that way Everyone wondered, what would the police do next The moves they ended up making would lead directly to the creation of Chob and add to the climate of fear that would take over by the time Antonio arrived 's after the break. A week after pink umbrella dayay Protesters' worst fears materialized. It started with an incident on a day that came to be known as Bloody Sunday. There was a car that turned onto that street and I could hear people yelling on that corner And I'm like, Uh oh, and we're watching him. andm like, maybe it's an accident Danielle Mihan was an ICU nurse, volunteering as a protest medic. She was in the crowd when she saw a car driving up a side street straight toward the group protesting outside the East precinct And then he started to accelerate And I remember just thinking Oh my go, my friends are gonna die It looked like a car attack And then I heard a gunshot and I just froze for a second And then people started screaming for medics, and so I just took off running towards them again. gun A protester tried to stop the car as it came close to plowing into the crowd He reached into the driver's side window And the driver shot him in the arm Danielle arrived in time to help him. Someone gave me a knife and Id cut off his shirt and found the wound and found that there was no exit wound. I'm like, okay, he's gonna to be okay In the confusion, the driver got out of the car and managed to slip through the crowd to the police line to surrender himself S be thoseal g. It turns out that this driver was the brother of a police officer who was assigned to the east precinct. He told police he drove toward the crowd by accident and he fired in self defense. In the end, prosecutors said they only had enough evidence to charge him with reckless driving. But the way the driver was able to slip past police lines with a gun and walk into the precinct without resistance. to protestters to be a sign that this was a war. And it was clear which side the police were on Yeah so we want to keep this saf There is no reason for this to get escalated as it is Please return to the under and they take him into custody and that's just like Oh my god That's just started today All week, Tammy Floyd had been watching the standoff escalate She was a Seattle police lieutenant at the time and a top aide to the commander managing the police's response to the protests What is going to happen Tammy says she'd warned her boss that stopping the crowd from marching past the precinct could turn explosive between protesters and police. And now it was Bloody Sunday saw the most severe protesor injuries since the protests began There was a woman who was hitting the chest with a tear gas canister. They just hit her like they th right at her And she lost consciousness. Her heart stopped. I remember her eyes looked super bloodshot. She really wanted to go home. She wass like, I just want to go home. Then she stopped talking And She she's still laying down and I'm like, U she's not breathing. I don't have a pulse, so I started CPR and I'm like, holy shit. Luckily there were volunteer medics there to revive her. but She could have died We had nothing, we were not safe. We had no resources. It is a miracle that We were able to save her. Police also felt like their worst fears were coming true Two officers went to the hospital with injuries. By nightfall there was this Overwhelming kind of impending sense of doom I was receiving calls from Commanders. that were Tp The Crowd had swelled and they were not backing off There are Officers crying Breaking down There were Um leadeadership, command. And also breaking down convinced their tonight. They were going to die. We are going to be overrun The morning after Bloody Sunday, Tammy's boss was called into an emergency meeting with top city officials A lot of the mayor staff is there, deputy mayors Toma Haffee was an assistant police chief person responsible for overseeing the police's response to the protests. They say we can't continue with what we're doing. Just let the protesters march by. It was just so volatile at this point. and there was so much anger and angst The mayor's staff wanted him to open up the street They told police to plan on emptying the precinct of guns, ammo, and evidence protesters could break in But Tom couldn't shake his fear that protesters would burn down the whole precinct. We were getting information from our intelligence unit who were connected to various resources throughout the country and the FBI There's a likelihood that they would target other police facilities because of what happened in Minneapolis For a while, we weren't sure whether the FBI had passed along information about a specific threat to the East precinct But former mayayor Durkin told us they did She was briefed on this threat She said this in an email this spring but was unable to sit down for an in person interview with us am Mahafy says he came up with a plan to deal with the threat of a fire He was going to let the protesters march past the East precinct. wasn't just going to remove weapons and documents like the mayor's office wanted. He was going to remove the officers too. Protesters just walked past then pololice could just wait them out and go back to work in the precinct The protesestters attacked, tried to set the building on fire or break in Police would swoop in from outside and make arrests. And if the building did burn down At least there wouldn't be any officers to get trapped inside Temmy Floyd, who worked as Tom's aide, had been worrying for days that police leaders would abandon the East Pri say. And now to her, It was actually happening and sat in the watch commander office and sat down in a chair and just tea itred up, I had no words I had no words and You know, he looks at me and says, Ohh my God, they're going to give it up, aren't they? and I just shook my head Shook my head, Yes and just startarted crying. Cammy wondered Why did police fight so hard to defend the precinct if this was the outcome It was a complete collapse of your very mission, which was public safety For Tammy This was the decision that set the stage for chop in everything that came after It was that fork in the road that went one way instead of the other. and history. is what it is because of that You wouldn't have had three weeks or twenty three days of nightly mayhem. I think we wouldn't have had the shootings I think some people would be alive today Yeah, I feel and I believe it would have been very different I always bristle at the fact that we gave up a precinct It's like It's way more nuanced than that. And like I'm not trying to make excuses for it is like We had to make quick decisions that we werere going to be significantly impactful to the safety of Seattle police officers and the citizens in Seattle and the protesters. I still believe that the decision that I made, given the circumstances that we were faced was the right one A we talked with Tom Mahaffee and Tammy Floyd We asked Seattle Police about the department's conduct during the protests Why they set up the barricade and used crowd control weapons and protestters there Why they walked away from the precinct department declined to answer our questions Day after Bloody Sunday where Shiloh Levitt, one of the new protest leaders, Nices something feels off outside the East precinct Police have started to like thin out almost thought that they were Just doing like a shift change But by that evening, it's clear Something is happening This is the sce now Journalist Omari Salisbury is there. recording as usual. Seattle police are going to be abandoning in the East precinct. We're right here behind the barricade. And the police are now moving out The streeter is gonna open up. pololice are actually packing up They're leaving and It was that moment that we were like way This we won, this is a victory. like We did something First, for protesters and even some residents of the neighborhood This is a relief No more tear gas every night But now the question is What are the protesters going to do And there was a couple different like opposing moments and viewpoints and ideas. he were like, No, we should keep marching we do this in the third and And then other people were like, No, like if we leave, they're going to come back. and that kind of sparked this idea of We should stay This was the beginning of a protest encampment that would come to be known as the Capitol Hill Occupied Protest Chop. The Capitol Hill Organized Protest. The Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone. Surprisingly little is known about Chop. It became a national spectacle. and right wing media started calling it a takeover of part of Seattle. They planed a flag and they stole it, just like the Conquistador. protestters moved in to occupy roughly a six block area But protesters never set out to drive police away from the precincts They didn't set out to form an occupation. With all this negative attention manyany Seattlelites felt like they needed to correct the record and defend the protesterors Let's bring in the mayayor of Seattle now, Jenny, Durkin. welcome back, Ms Mayor. How long do you think Seattle in those few blocks looks like this I don't know, we could have a summer of love thousandousand miles away, Antonio May, sr and his son were talking about what was going on in Seattle. I talked to him about that precinct that was overran in Seattle And then they barricaded in their neighborhood, that was too me was like was there pented thing at that time That's never happened. I've never heard that happening. So I'm sharing this stuff with my son because history' happening right before our eyes Antonio May sr. had forbidden his son from joining the protests But about two weeks after chop was formed Antonio Jr left home to go see it for himself. I had I had, uh, no idea that he would Traveled at far. When we look back now at all these decisions in that first week of protest, Police deciding to block off the road and then use crowd control weapons pololice leaving their precinct prrotestters deciding to form an occupation It's hard not to wonder. What would have happened if even one of those decisions had been different Some protesters at the time had a bad feeling about staying. David Lewis was one of them What were your feelings about occupying those That was instantly a mistake That fundamental decision to stay there Occupy was Very question My suggestion was never to occupy If you stay in one spot, then your opposition who at this point, we knew SVD were nothing but opposition at this point can strategize against you o. Yeah, it's different Soon, protesters would face an existential threat to this brand new occupation It would inject fear into the encampment and shape the kind of protest Antonio would later step into Somebody over there ain'ten how to use a gun Take take the clip put the b in. That's on the next episode of We Keep U Safe If you want to look at evidence from this episode, like the letter Antonio wrote for his dad Visit npr. org slash chop. We're adding new evidence there each week We Keep us safe from NPRs embedded is a collaboration with the Seattle Times and KUOW The series is reported and written by me, Syidney Brownstone, David Gutman, and Will James This episode was edited by Luise Treas and Laura Grenias with support from Katie Simon This episode was produced by Dan Gurermma. Additional production support from DavVid Good Hurartts Our senior producer is Adelina Lanianis. Additional reporting by Omari Salisbury, who contributed his recordings to this project along with the live streamer Joey Weiser Research and factact checking by Dana Soliman and Mioko Wolf Jimmy Keeley mastered the episode Music by Audio Network, audio socket. Doty, Sound Ias, Rom Tin Ariib Louie, and Universal Music productroductions And a big thanks to our NPR plus supporters. Embedded is where we do ambitious, long form journalism at NPR, and NPR plus helps keep that work going Supporters also get to listen to every embedded episode early Find out more at plus. npr. org If you'd like to email the show, you can reach out at embedded at npr. org I'm Siddney Brownstone. I'm Will James. This is emmbedded from NBR Thanks for listening.