TONY PIRONE IS FIRED!!!
From IndyBay:
“Tony Pirone, the BART cop who, along with his partner BART cop Marysol Domenici, physically and verbally abused Oscar Grant and his friends on the Fruitvale BART platform on January 1st, 2009 — setting up and escalating the situation that Johannes Mehserle walked into just minutes before he shot Oscar Grant in the back — has finally been fired by BART.
Exactly two weeks after the largest demonstration for justice for Oscar Grant in over a year took to the BART system’s underground stations in San Francisco — demanding that Tony Pirone be fired by BART and tried for his crimes by the Alameda County DA — BART has finally fired racist and violent BART cop Tony Pirone.”
*****
This has to be counted as a major political victory and certainly a great step in the direction of police accountability. Pirone’s lawyer is already claiming that the firing is “political” – which is supposed to mean 1) that only urban African-Americans actually want it to happen (and really there’s a sort of connotation that it’s a kind of petulant and irrational demand) and 2) that it has no warrant given what occurred on the platform. I think we should say “DAMN STRAIGHT!” to the idea that the firing is “political.” First, fuck all their ridiculous stereotypes about who’s allowed to fight for Justice for Oscar Grant. They’ve tried every racist trick in their OLD-ASS book to divide the movement on race and class lines. Here’s the fact: this is a movement across race and class lines and it represents a serious alliance between radicals of a BUNCH of different stripes and WE’RE WINNING. Secondly, are you CRAZY? If Pirone’s lawyer is so sure Pirone’s totally “innocent” (as innocent as a cop can be anyway), why not let him stand trial? They know he doesn’t stand a chance – he’s a homicidal racist and there’s video to prove it. What scares the hell out of them is that Mehserle could actually be convicted. If we keep pushing, HE WILL BE CONVICTED.
Anyway, it’s not everything. But, it’s certainly something.
