PHILADELPHIA: NEW POLICE ATTACK ON MOVE LOOMS
By Betsey Piette
PhiladelphiaSeptember 19, 2002--Concern is mounting that police may use a custody case as the pretext to launch a new assault on a MOVE family home in West Philadelphia. Worried that police will try to remove a member's child as early as Sept. 21, 2002, the MOVE Organization and supporters are urging people to speak out now to prevent an attack.
The MOVE Organization, a Black-led radical group, has suffered several deadly police attacks over the last 30 years. For example, police attacked MOVE members in 1976 in retaliation for their struggle against police brutality in Philadelphia. The cops knocked a three-week-old baby, Life Africa, from his mother's arms, crushing his skull and killing him.
MOVE member Alberta Africa's battle to keep her son Zachary looked like it was resolved after nearly four years of court hearings. Family Court Judge Edward Rosenberg issued a decision giving her physical custody of her son and the father, John Gilbride, shared legal custody and supervised visits in the mother's home.
However, before the order was finalized, Judge Rosenberg retired.
The case was given to Judge Elizabeth Jackson, who recused herself without explanation. Then Judge Shelley Robbins New took over the case, and without even scheduling a review of Rosenberg's order, held a one-day trial and completely overturned the earlier decision.
She gave Gilbride custody of the child every other weekend and six days over Christmas.
MOVE believes police may attempt to carry out Judge New's ruling by forcibly removing Zachary from his home. They report that police have already come to the home once and have been harassing supporters for the past week.
What should have been a legal matter between estranged parents has turned into a pretext for another intervention by the repressive Philadelphia state apparatus against MOVE.
The history of police violence against MOVE shows that the movement must take the danger seriously.
In 1978, Philadelphia Police shot several rounds of bullets into a MOVE house in Powelton Village, causing the death of Officer James Ramp from "friendly fire." Afterward, nine MOVE members were framed and sentenced to between 30 and 90 years in prison--despite a judge's admission that he "hadn't the faintest idea" who really fired the fatal shot.
On May 13, 1985, police dropped a bomb on MOVE's Osage Avenue house, killing five children and six adults and burning down the surrounding homes in a Black neighborhood.
There has been a total local media whiteout of this story. MOVE is asking people to hang banners, posters and signs from their houses reading "May 13--Never Again."
A demonstration to defend MOVE is planned for Sept. 20. For more information, contact Friends of MOVE at (610) 499-0979 or (215) 760-4064 or email uprising1978@aol.com .
To protest the threats against MOVE, call Mayor John Street at (215) 686-3000; Judge Shelley Robbins New at (215) 683- 7056; and Judge Myrna Fields, President Judge of Family Court at (215) 686-7970.
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