After a legal observer was arrested during the Brelo verdict protests last June, the Ohio Chapter of the National Lawyers Guild is warning that no one is “arrest proof” during the Republican National Convention next week.
Attorney Jacqueline Greene told newsnet5.com that she was working as a legal observer on E. 4th Street the night that 70 people were arrested and many were charged with “failure to disperse.”
Greene said she was standing about 15 feet from a man who was being arrested when she called to him to ask his name.
“I wanted to find out his name so I could send someone into jail to visit him,” said Greene, who is a Co-Coordinator of the Ohio Chapter of the NLG.
But Greene said she was completely shocked when an officer then told her she was under arrest.
“They just grabbed my arms, yanked them behind my back and said you’re under arrest,” she explained. “I wasn’t given any order to stop doing what I was doing or to move back.”
Greene was detained for 16 hours but was eventually cleared of any wrong doing and was never charged.
She said she never thought she would be swept up as a bystander.
“But that’s what people need to understand,” she said. “That you can be downtown you might not be a protestor you might be just taking down the street and there’s still the possibility that you could end up arrested.”
For the RNC, The Ohio Chapter of the National Lawyers Guild is providing a jail support hotline to aid in the event of arrests.
The NLG says anyone who is planning on spending time in the event zone or in the vicinity of rallies or protests should consider writing the number 1(216)505-0654 on their arms because phones and wallets are often confiscated.
More information can be found at the Ohio NLG website.
