Tweet
I asked Remington Alessi, one of the Gulf Port 7, to share his experience being arrested at the Port of Houston on December 12, 2011 and its continuing aftermath. For more on the anniversary of the Gulf Port Action, see yesterday’s post by Kit O’Connell. -MyFDL Editor
December 12, 2011: Police surround the Gulf Port 7 as they blockade the main entrance to the Port of Houston.
A year ago, I was arrested and put in jail, shivering, coughing, and frightened, and worried that I would miss a statistics exam. It’s funny to think about, because the past year has rushed by so quickly that I didn’t even realize it had been a full year until I logged onto Facebook and read a fellow occupier’s post.
Looking back, it’s been a wild ride. Since that time, I’ve run for sheriff to bring light to police abuses, played corporate tax dodge-ball in the headquarters of a corporate tax cheat, traveled to Baltimore as a Green Party delegate, registered countless people to vote in unlikely places, and participated with wonderful movements like the Tar Sands Blockade and the Peaceful Streets Project. I’ve had the privilege of meeting too many wonderful people to name and I’ve done all of this with the prospect of a felony charge hanging over my head.
In the meantime, my life has been peppered with purposeless court appearances that seem only to fulfill the function of reminding me (as though I could forget) that I may soon join the ranks of the most hated group in our society, felons. One of the things you don’t typically see or hear about is that people have to show up roughly once a month to simply appear in a courtroom, sign a paper, and leave. If you’re late or don’t show up, even though nothing important is actually happening, they issue a warrant for your arrest, revoke your bond, etc. If this weren’t so trying, I might get some amusement from the confused looks on professors’ faces when I tell them why I’ve missed the occasional class, since the enthusiastic student who always sits in the front row doesn’t “look like” a felon (not that felons really can ever be identified by looks, but I’ll save that discussion for another time).
As our trial date looms, I still have faith that somewhere, somehow, there is still a bit of hope that the absurd system of justice that allows police to manufacture PVC pipe devices in order to charge nonviolent protesters with felonies will come through in the end. Sadly, I know that even if my greatest personal hopes are realized, my friends and I will be the exceptions to the rule, as the oxymoron that is criminal justice will likely trudge on in its race warfare and class warfare, imprisoning shoplifters while white collar criminals remain comically underrepresented in prison populations.
Remington Alessi is one of seven activists who faces felony charges from their use of lock-boxes at 2011's Gulf Port Action.
When I was released from the Harris County Jail on the evening of December 14, 2011, I came out with bronchitis and pleurisy (you know, the stuff that killed Charlemagne). I felt broken. Somewhere between being berated by the guards, sleeping on concrete in the basement of a jail that was originally a cold storage warehouse in one thin layer of clothing, and knowing that my lovely and supporting wife Valerie was at home scared stiff with me unable to comfort her, there was something inside of me that died.
The next day, I turned into a puddle of tears in the school clinic’s office, unable to control my own sobbing. I stayed strong for my wife when I got home but, with ten dollars in my pocket, I was told that I needed to pay twenty-five dollars for my prescription. I just didn’t have the strength in me to hold myself together any more. I try to look back and have a sense of humor about all this, but very few people prior to me writing this know how damaged I was by this entire experience. It took a while for me to recover, and I never could have done it without my lovely Valerie, who was there to hold me when I woke up in tears from nightmares about the jail.
Throughout all of this, I still managed to make the dean’s list that semester and this semester I have straight A’s. I’ll be starting graduate school next fall and I hope that, after everything that has happened, I might find a nice place to work that cares more about the PhD behind my name than the felony.
I know that I stood up for something and I will hold my head high.
Blockade photo by Kit O’Connell, all rights reserved. Portrait of Remington from Remington for Sheriff.
11 Comments
Thank you for your courage, and for telling a bit of your story, Remington Alessi. I remember watching the livestream, and was as horrified as others about the big red tent.
Yes, justice for the common person has fled, and sadly will get worse for a while longer. This situation cannot stand, of course, and the fascists are too stupid to know that they can’t stem the tide forever.
Keep healing; nice about your school success. ;o)
Thanks for sharing your story, Remington. And for not letting them break you for good; we need you!
I haven’t kept up with what has been happening in Texas, but here in California, many of the protestors who have been charged with felonies have had those charges dismissed. I hope you have the NLG or somebody on your side and I wish you the best of luck. Please keep us posted.
Thanks for this update, Remington. Best to you and your family in all this. Solidarity.
Carol, if the felony charges were dismissed in California, it would defy logic of they aren’t also dismissed in the Houston case where undercover police agents responsible for procuring the “criminal instruments” have been exposed.
Yes, that tent was terrifying for me as a spectator there. We’re going to talk a little more about what went on under it in the next installment in this series.
The original judge tried to get the charges dropped, then they were brought back to her court by a grand jury. Even though she seems hostile to the state’s case, she won’t be hearing it next year as she is retiring. Austin Police Department actually asked the Houston DA to drop the case so they wouldn’t have to reveal more undercover officers identities and release their files, and Houston refused.
And since then, the same charge ‘use of a criminal instrument’ has spread through East Texas — it’s been used at the Tar Sands Blockade as well!
I’m glad to hear it, Kit OConnell, even if the reporting is horrific, we need to hear it, of course. Our imaginations can also be worse than what is happening, or did happen.
Moving story, thanks so much for sharing, this has got to stop.
Solidarity, Remington. I too am facing charges and don’t know how long my sentence will be. Jail can be a terrible experience.
Our police are under a DoJ investigation b/c of the high number of police who have killed citizens in the last 2 years. I attended my first meeting of the police review board tonight and heard from our DA that ours is not the only police force that has not found probable cause to charge any police, it is rare across the US. She says this as if that is a good thing, rather than that our country cannot find any reason to prosecute the police for killing. Which means that you can get away with murder if you are a cop. I know, who could have guessed?
I wish you the best in the resolution of these charges. Thank you for telling this story.
The police weren’t violent under the tents — as I said earlier this week, the use of the tent was more an act of physical violence. But there are some interesting details in terms of whether Austin police warned Houston police about the lockboxes.
Remington Alessi, please know that you are a hero to me. I watched the protestors of the late 60s & early 70s on tv, too young to participate or be of any help, but old enough to know that they were fighting for a better world. You and others like you will own the future and bring about that world and I intend to live to see it. Hold your head up high because you stood up for a better future and you have made a difference. I can’t help but think of this lyric from the musical Avenue Q – “When you help others, you can’t help helping yourself.” Thank you.