Fight Back! News | Lawsuit against police violence at Republican National Convention to go forward
Motion will be made to subpoena ‘Karen Sullivan’ – undercover FBI infiltrator in Twin Cities in anti-war movement
By Staff | March 4, 2011 | © 2011 Fight Back! News
Minneapolis, MN – At a March 4 press conference outside the Federal Building, lawyers who filed the first lawsuit resulting from police violence at the 2008 Republican National Convention announced their plan to move forward with litigation in the case of Mick Kelly. In a widely publicized incident, police, standing only feet away, shot Kelly in his stomach with a high velocity marking projectile at the demonstration organized by the Anti-War Committee on the fourth day of the RNC, September 4, 2008.
Mick Kelly, one of the main organizers of the massive march and rally on the first day of the Republican National Convention, earlier prevailed in a separate lawsuit against the city of St. Paul after his arrest for leafleting at a June 2008 Obama rally. He is also one of the Twin Cities anti-war and international solidarity activists whose home was raided by the FBI on September 24, 2010.
Law enforcement agencies failed to reveal the presence of an undercover infiltrator during the discovery process of Kelly’s 2008 RNC lawsuit. The existence of an undercover law enforcement officer who was active for two years in RNC protest organizations was first revealed in the course of communications between lawyers representing activists whose homes were raided by the FBI September 24, 2010 and Chicago Assistant U.S. Attorney Brandon Fox. The infiltrator, who went by the name “Karen Sullivan,” remained active in the Twin Cites peace movement until the September 24 raids, when she vanished.
Lawyers will ask the judge presiding over the case to reopen the discovery process and will move to subpoena “Karen Sullivan.”
The lawsuit is being pursued by attorneys Ted Dooley and Peter Nickitas, members of the National Lawyers Guild. Ted Dooley was one of the speakers at the press conference.
Dooley states, “By law, we should have been given all information about this ‘Sullivan’ character. She was present, and planning, at meetings prior to the RNC protests. And she was near at hand when Mick Kelly was shot at the September 4 anti-war demonstration. Kelly has an absolute right to discover what she knew, and when she knew it!”
Jess Sundin, one of the main organizers of the protest at the RNC and a leader of the Twin Cities-based Anti-War Committee states, “There is a pattern of repression against anti war activists before, during and after the Republican National Convention. They sent in police agents to spy and used violence on protestors at the RNC. To top it off, they continued their spying and raided our homes and office on September 24, 2010. Many of us who organized the march at the RNC have received summons to appear in front of a Chicago Grand Jury. This is wrong and we are pushing back.”
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