Tuesday, December 6, 2011
#OccupyNOLA legal team files for injunction to stop eviction, camp is raided anyway [Updated]
Posted by Charles Maldonado @ChMaldonado on Tue, Dec 6, 2011 at 7:44 AM
Update at 6:40 p.m.: Occupy New Orleans has a hearing on the restraining order tomorrow morning before U.S. District Court Judge Jay Zainey. In the meantime, the City Attorney's Office has told the legal team that Duncan Plaza will not be evicted tonight.
[Update 2 at 7 a.m.] And I guess that wasn't true. Police raided the encampment at 4 a.m., so, technically, it wasn't last night.
Officers combed through the encampment repeatedly reading a warning, "you are in violation of the law" and "this is a move-out warning." Reading from a script, they gave protesters 30 minutes to leave.Many protesters left voluntarily, taking their belongings with them. About a dozen people remained to the end, but eventually left. One man refused and was arrested.
Press conference video is available at WWL. City officials estimate that about 150 people were in the park when police moved in.
Media reports and protesters I've spoken to from the site are saying that only only one person was arrested. Rene Merino of the Occupy New Orleans legal team will be sending pictures. I'll be at the court hearing today.
I just got this news from Occupy New Orleans lawyer Miles Swanson. The legal team representing the protest has filed a federal lawsuit against the city, along with a request for a temporary restraining order seeking to halt any police-enforced eviction. Swanson says that the City Attorney's Office has been served with the complaint, but it hasn't yet been signed by a judge. Mayor Mitch Landrieu is able to order a forced eviction until it is.
Here are the first two pages of the complaint:
(Continued after the jump)
Download the rest of it: Occupy.NOLA.Complaint_Full_FINAL.pdf
And the motion for the temporary restraining order: OccupyNOLA.MotionTRO.pdf
And the memorandum in support: OccupyNOLAMemo_in_Support.pdf
