Radical Blogs.org

Sean Bell Civil Disobedience Actions: Protest At One Police Plaza

Posted by
May 7, 2008

Joseph Guzman outside One Police Plaza, just before his arrest
(Photo: Thomas Good / NLN)

NEW YORK — Civil Disobedience actions shut down the Brooklyn, Manhattan and Queensboro Bridges today during rush hour. The protests were called by Reverend Al Sharpton and his National Action Network as part of a campaign to force a Department of Justice investigation of the Sean Bell shooting case. The NYPD reported over 200 protesters were arrested, including Sean Bell’s widow, Nicole Paultre Bell, Sharpton, and shooting survivors Joseph Guzman and Trent Benefield. After his release from police custody Sharpton told reporters, “Today the Sean Bell Movement was born.”

The following photographs were taken at the One Police Plaza protest - one of several sites where civil disobedience stopped traffic. Protesters - including Sharpton, Bell, Guzman and Benefield - held a rally outside police headquarters in lower Manhattan. Leaving the rally, the demonstrators knelt in prayer on Park Row at the foot of the Brooklyn Bridge — where they were arrested for blocking traffic . (Click on any image to see the entire gallery).

Bell family attorney Sanford Rubenstein joins the protest at “1PP”
(Photo: Thomas Good / NLN)