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Politically Charged: Officials create âfictional gang to punish Phoenix protesters
Posted: 5:45 PM, Feb 04, 2021
Updated: 2021-02-07 17:17:44-05
Amy Kaper promises she is not a gang member.
The 29-year-old graduate student does not run drugs, traffic guns, or work in any organized crime ring.
But, she did protest police violence last year.
For that, the Maricopa County Attorneyâs Office and the Phoenix Police Department are aggressively prosecuting Kaper â and a group of 17 other defendants, including three minors â for being part of a criminal street gang following an October 17 protest in downtown Phoenix.
In fact, officers and prosecutors allege the group is as dangerous â and in some ways more dangerous â than notorious gangs like the Crips, Bloods, and Hells Angels.
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The same day police officer Derek Chauvin killed George Floyd in Minneapolis, Department of Public Safety Trooper George Cervantes shot and killed Dion Johnson in Phoenix. In the weeks that followed, protesters in Phoenix and other Arizona cities joined those across the United States to demand the abolition of the system that killed the two men. Arizona has one of the highest rates of police violence nationwide; in 2018, Phoenix police fired their guns at more people than officers in any other department in the nation. Now, the movements to counter that violence are gaining in numbers so much so, they played a significant role in mobilizing voters, activists say, and helped turn the sta