BK/NY – Tuesday, November 8th – Letter-writing for Ramsey Orta

WHAT: Political Prisoner Letter-Writing Dinner
WHEN: 7pm sharp, Tuesday, November 8th, 2016
WHERE: The Base – 1302 Myrtle Avenue Brooklyn, New York 11221 (directions below)
NOTE: The Base is on the ground floor, is wheelchair accessible, and has a gender neutral toilet.
COST: Free

As the laziest form of “politics” is finally drawing near its end for another four years and your racist aunts and uncles stop pretending to think about the world outside their tiny bubble and go back to filling up your social media feed with cat memes and candy crush invites, you are invited to come support political prisoners and prisoners of war against the white supremacist State with us this Tuesday.

This week we are writing to local newly incarcerated Copwatcher and anti-police activist Ramsey Orta.  Cops targeting and murdering people in an effort to decimate communities of color is a practice as old as the institution of police itself.  It is not new.  However, now that technology has progressed and more people have video recording devices in their pockets ready to film in an instant, some cops are being caught in the act and documented.

In July 2014 Ramsey was in front of a corner store on Staten Island when vicious murdering pig David Pantaleo wrapped his arm around Eric Garner’s neck and squeezed until his final breath.  Having dealt with police before Ramsey had the forethought to grab his camera phone and start recording. He captured the final moments of Eric Garner’s life, in which he uttered the now infamous phrase and rallying cry,  “I can’t breathe.”  Ramsey released the video, which instantly went viral and inspired folks to hit the streets across the country against the police. Given the State’s goals of maintaining white supremacy it should come as no surprise that the only person who both walked away from the scene of Eric Garner’s death alive and faced any real consequences handed down by the State is Ramsey.  Since the uploading of the video, Ramsey has been harassed non-stop by the NYPD and was arrested numerous times.  On one occasion when the police were targeting and arresting him, they even pulled out their phones and said “You filmed us, now we are filming you.”  One of these charges stuck and Ramsey surrendered himself to begin a four year sentence on October 3rd.

For more information, visit ramseyorta.info

If you are unable to attend, please take the time to write Ramsey a card or letter:
Ramsey Orta #16-A-4200
Downstate Correctional Facility
121 Red Schoolhouse Road
Fishkill, New York 10309

The deal, as always, is that you come bringing only yourself (and your friends and comrades), and we provide you with a delicious vegan meal, information about the prisoners as well as all of the letter-writing materials and prisoner-letter-writing info you could ever want to use in one evening. In return, you write a thoughtful letter to a political prisoner or prisoner of war of your choosing or, better yet, keep up a long-term correspondence. We’ll also provide some brief updates and pass around birthday cards for the PP/POWs whose birthdays fall in the next two weeks thanks to the PP/POW Birthday Calendar.

Directions:
Getting to The Base is simple:
From the M Train:
Central Avenue Stop: Walk east on Myrtle Avenue (away from Hart Street, toward Cedar Street). We’re about two blocks down on the south side of the street.

Knickerbocker Avenue Stop: Walk west on Myrtle Avenue (away from Harman Street, toward Himrod Street). We’re about three blocks down on the south side of the street.

From the L Train:
DeKalb Avenue Stop: Walk south on Stockholm Street (away from Wyckoff Avenue, toward Irving Avenue). We’re about four blocks down, at the intersection of Stockholm Street and Myrtle Avenue.

From the J Train:
Myrtle Avenue Stop: Transfer to the M train and follow the above directions.