Savage Pigwatch: Chicago's Pigs Frame-up P.O.C.C. Chairman Fred Hampton, Jr.

The Chicago Pigs are at it again!

A Prisoner of Conscience Committee (P.O.C.C.) press release submitted to The Block Report details the 7 July frame-up and arrest of Chairman Fred Hampton, Jr. for 'trespassing' in a public park.

The release states that after the Chicago Park district's South Region Park Supervisor Marvin "Toby" Tolbert attempted to deny a coalition of youth girl dance groups, ranging in age from 4-16, from dancing in the public park, Hampton was arrested, captured by the Pigs, detained, charged, given a court date of 21 August, and released.

The Chicago Pigs' arrest of Hampton occurs within a much wider context of harrassment and intimidation against the P.O.C.C. Last March, we at Savage Justice reported on the Pigs' relentless campaign to prevent the naming of a street after the slain Black Freedom Fighter Fred Hampton, the charismatic leader of the Black Panthers who Chicago's Pigs excuted while he slept in 1969.

As the fight for the street sign came before City Hall, we reported on the 4 March pre-emptive arrest of P.O.C.C. Minister of Information JR Valrey during the meeting on obviously trumped-up charges that he assaulted a Congressman.

The reason for the Pigs' actions and behavior towards the Fred Hampton street sign campaign - and its extension to Hampton's recent arrest - is self-evident and obvious. In an interview with The Block Report, M1 of the revolutionary hip-hop group dead prez discussed with JR Valrey why the Pigs have taken such an interest in this case as well as its relevance to all revolutionaries:

JR: Why are the police and in particular the Fraternal Order of Police coming out so hard against the people’s proposal to name a portion of West Monroe in Chicago to Chairman Fred Hampton Way, which is the same block where, on Dec. 4, 1969, Chairman Fred Hampton Sr. and Defense Capt. Mark Clark of the Illinois Chapter of the Black Panther Party were assassinated by government agents?

M1: First of all I would like to say that it is a very strategic move on behalf of the December 4th Committee, the POCC and the legacy of Chairman Fred Hampton Sr. in the city of Chicago to put forward that this action should happen on behalf of Chairman Fred Hampton Sr. What it would do is raise the stakes, up the ante, open and expose the contradictions in whose interest lies according to where the Daley machine and the ruling class’s interest is right now.

So when you saw the action happen, you seen the lights get turned on, and you seen people who were in bed wit’ certain parts of imperialism, put their bid in as to where they are. Aldermen run to the side of the state wit’ “No, it shouldn’t happen,” police officers runnin’ to the side of the people: “Yes, it should happen.” I really just say that what you are seeing is an exposition here, and even people like Conrad Worrill, and where he stands in the game: coming out wit’ positions that are somewhat antagonistic to ... what actually happened.

I think that it is important, and that is the reason why the contradiction is heightened to the point where it is now: everyday coverage on the mainstream bourgeois news and everything. It’s because of that. That's the main reason.

M1 is right - the campaign for the Fred Hampton street sign in Chicago and the storm of opposition the move generated has exposed many of the systems' contradictions. And that exposure explains precisely why Hampton and others in the P.O.C.C. are now targetted so nakedly and so vigorously by the Pigs'.

The wicked and savage backlash the move has generated demonstrates why we must continue to follow this story and stand in solidarity with those captured and framed-up because of it.