Atlanta – The single mother Priscilla Grim lost her job. The aspiring writer Julia Dupuis frequently looks at the bedroom roof, numb. Geography and Environmental Studies researcher, Hannah Kass, is concerned about her career perspectives after her pH.D. program.
The three are among 61 accused accused by the Republican Attorney of Georgia, Chris Carr to participate in a Organized crime conspiracy To stop the construction of a police and firefighters training center, on the outskirts of Atlanta, which critics pejoratively call “Cop City”.
His cases are standing, 20 months after being accused of the Law of Organizations influenced and corrupt from Georgia, or Rico, which is probably the greatest case of excess criminal demand ever presented against protesters in the history of the United States, experts say.
The trial for five of the defendants would begin last year, but is bogged down in procedural matters. The judge supervised the case later moved to another court. A new judge has established a status hearing for Wednesday.
The delays have left people in Limbo, facing positions that have been at 20 years after bars for what they maintain was the legitimate protest, not domestic terrorism. The case has also suppressed a movement that brought together hundreds of activists to protect a wooded land patch that was finally razed for the recently completed project of $ 118 million and 85 acres (34 hectares).
The authorities say that the project is very necessary to replace obsolete facilities and boost the morale of the officers. The opponents say it will be a training field for a militarized police force and its construction has worsened environmental damage in a poor and black-negra area.
The scaled protests after the 2023 fatal shooting by Manuel Esteban Paez will have known as turtlethat camped near the site when the authorities launched a compensation operation. The authorities said they killed Tortuguita, 26, after the activist shot and wounded a soldier from inside a tent.
TO Autopsy commissioned with the family He concluded that Tortuguita was killed with his hands in the air, but a prosecutor discovered that the use of the officers’s force was ” objectively reasonable. “
Chris Timmons, a former Georgia prosecutor who has handled numerous cases of rich, said it is understandable that such a large case would take a long time to be scheduled. But Timmons said he is surprised that prosecutors do not seem to be pressed aggressively for a trial date.
“Cases age like milk, not like wine,” said Timmons. “The more time we go, the memories fade, the witnesses are not available. If it were in the place of prosecutors, I would like this case to try as soon as possible.”
The Office of the Attorney General did not respond to requests for comments.
Michael Mears, professor at the John Marshall Law Faculty of Atlanta who studies Rico’s cases, said prosecutors “lock themselves accusing so many people at the same time instead of pursuing leadership.”
The decision of prosecutors last year to LAVER OF THE MINERO LAVER CARGARS Against three of the alleged leaders of the movement there was a sign of the weakness of the case. And with the movement that has vanished from public consciousness, there is less political appetite for taking energetic measures against protesters, he said.
“Prosecutors cannot simply get away from him, but I think you will probably see that a slow death dies,” Mears said, predicting that the charges would be slowly dismissed.
That is a cold comfort for those who say their lives are waiting.
“I think most of our lives are completely frozen one way or another,” said Dupuis, 26, who lives in Massachusetts.
Dupuis was accused of serious crime of intimidation of an officer in 2023 for distributing flyers against the police near the house of one of the soldiers who killed Tortuguita, a friend of Dupuis. The soldier called the authorities after learning of the Flyers, who called him “murderer”, were placed in the mailboxes of their neighbors.
Now forbidden in Georgia, Dupuis struggles to find the motivation to complete independent writing projects that pay their rental of $ 650.
“There are many things that I want to do, many hopes and dreams that I feel that they are a little stuck,” said Dupuis, who dreams of joining the creative writing scene of New York City.
But, above all, Dupuis loses the activist community that once prospered in the South River forest.
“The charges have moved me away from my community and the people I love so much. That is what I’ve been yearning every day: return with my people,” Dupuis said.
Grim, 51, is tired of waiting and recently requested a quick trial. It is not clear if your motion will be granted, since the rapid deadline for a long time passed.
“We are going to end this,” Grim said. “If you think you have something in me, let’s do it, which does not.”
Grim, who lives in New York City, is one of the many defendants of “Cop City” that they publish on social networks to obtain financial support to help pay food and rent. Health insurance is out of discussion, despite chronic knee pain for a previous accident.
In addition to the hundreds of dollars that the donors you do not know each month, the shady funds together through independent work for activists -oriented causes and focuses on helping your daughter overcome the university.
“It has never cost me a lot to find a job,” said Grim, who previously had marketing work. “I do it very well until the final interview and then everyone becomes ghost with me. I think it’s because they look at my name.”
The prosecutors say that Grim were among a multitude of activists dressed in black in March 2023, which left a music festival, walked through the forest and exceeded the construction site, set fire to the withdrawal officers before returning before returning to combine with those attending the festival.
Grim said he was in his store, after having woken up from a nap, when the officers arrived at the festival and began to arrest. Grim said he started running before falling due to his knee injury.
“I heard men shout at me,” Grim said, describing what led her to run. “That scares as a woman. They didn’t say they were police or anything.”
However, the authorities said Grim ran by detecting the officers and tried to hide.
After his arrest, Grim lost a marketing contract by email with Fordham University, which had been about to give him a full -time post.
“People know me, and when they hear that I am a ‘domestic terrorist’, they are like, ‘What? No! What? Said Grim.
On May 12, 2022, a group of protesters met at the Atlanta suburbs outside the Brasfield offices AND Gorrie, the main contractor of the training center. Some activated fireworks when others broke windows and “trees, not police” painted by spray, causing estimated damage of $ 30,000, authorities said.
Kass, 32, attended the protest, but said he never destroyed anything and that he was participating in a research method called “participating observation”, which involves immersing himself in the community that is being studied.
“I was there as scholar and activist,” said Kass, Ph.D. Candidate of the University of Wisconsin-Madison who studies land struggles and teaches environmental social sciences to university students.
The authorities arrested it for charges of damage to criminal property and terrorist threats serious crimes, saying that surveillance videos shows that it helped activate Roman candles.
Kass underwent a university disciplinary audience, but said the school has supported her. He is concerned that potential employers may not be so understanding.
Like many of his encodes, Kass rejected the guilt agreement of prosecutors in their reading positions that would have included complying three years in prison.
“I have absolutely nothing to declare yourself guilty,” he said. “I should have every right to protest and believe what I want to believe and associate with the political trends I want to associate.”
