Forum Post: Occupy Houston arrests

http://www.chron.com/news/houston-texas/article/Occupy-Houston-protesters-arrested-downtown-2259821.php

Members of the Occupy Houston movement were arrested at Tranquility Park in downtown Houston late Tuesday night, the group said.

More than a dozen police officers came into the park about 11 p.m. and took several people into custody, said Mary Belcik, a group member.

Occupy Houston members said about 10 people were detained, with six or seven ultimately arrested.

Belcik said police told the group it was violating a City of Houston ordinance against structures in public parks.

A Houston Police Department spokesperson did not have an immediate response, but officials said they are looking into the case.

The group had placed a tarp above solar batteries for their computers to protect the equipment from rain, said Belcik. The tarp apparently violated the ordinance and the officers removed it.

Belcik, of Katy, said the officers came to the park and told the group they planned to take away the tarp. The group removed the batteries, replacing them with trash cans. When the officers took down the tarp they confiscated the cans, Belcik said.

During the altercation, the crowd taunted the officers, chanting "Shame!" and "Show me what democracy looks like," a video posted to the group's YouTube channel shows.

"My government has failed me. It slowly takes away my rights with promises of the greater good," Shaun Crump, an Iraq veteran among the arrested protesters, said in a prepared speech on the Occupy Houston website.

The people arrested were handcuffed and placed in squad cars, she added. The officers carried some of the people arrested away from the park.

Last month, eight protesters were arrested for staging a sit-in at the Mickey Leland Federal Building downtown.

About 46 group members were at the park early Wednesday morning. Some slept under blankets on the ground. A handful of others sat at tables beneath trees working on their computers and talking. They said the arrests would not deter them and they would remain at the park to bring attention to their cause.

"I'm out here for change," 21-year-old Belcik said.

"We're still going to be here for years because that's probably what it'll take," said Houstonian Mike Gleason.