Accounts of Police Violating Civil Rights of Students in Watsonville on 3/27

by students

Tue, Mar 28, 2006 5:34PM

On Monday, March 27th, 2006, high school students went on strike to protest against HR 4437. In Watsonville, police responded by violating the civil rights of students, including detaining students at 2:00pm for "walking out of school" even though their school, Renaissance High School, had gotten out at 1:15pm. Another student at Renaissance was arrested after refusing to get on a bus. She was already out of school and did not walkout. (Audio is 18 minutes and 30 seconds)

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Officer Mike Ridgway is the High School Outreach Officer for the Watsonville Police Department. This means that Officer Ridgway is the cop in Watsonville that is paid to enter classrooms and speak to students about the police and staying safe in the community.

After Officer Ridgway learned that the students he was detaining for walking out of school had actually been dismissed from school 45 minutes earlier, he responded by saying that most of the students were probably on probation and that, "these kids are fucking assholes."

Here's a photo of Officer Mike Ridgway
http://www.indybay.org/uploads/ridgway_3-25-06.jpg

Listen to the whole audio for much more information!!!

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