Pasadena BLM Protesters Meet Without a March Friday

For the first time in more than six weeks, Black Lives Matter Pasadena members and supporters met without the usual march through Pasadena.

Following weeks in May and June which saw numerous boisterous but peaceful demonstrations, the group began holding protest meetings at Pasadena Police Department headquarters across from City Hall, before leading marches out into local neighborhoods, including Northwest Pasadena and more often, Old Pasadena.

BLM Pasadena organizer Jasmine Abdullah Richards—hobbled by a right ankle injury she said was caused by “too much marching”—told the group, “If you’re here to be an ally, we don’t want you. We want accomplices, not allies.”

Richards also told the group gathered in the Police headquarters plaza that BLM Pasadena will “target people in leadership positions to get our message across.”

Acknowledging the relatively small crowd, Richards told them, “I’m tired. We’re all tired. But how do we keep the momentum going? We’re going to have to be strategic. The whole world is watching.”

Protesters also distributed a list of demands for Pasadena Mayor Terry Tornek that Richards and others said would be formally presented to the mayor at a City Council meeting soon.

Among the nine demands from the group are the defunding and demilitarization of the Pasadena Police, and a partnership with the Pasadena City Council to develop a reparations policy based on an agreement passed this year in Chicago to provide “financial, mental health, educational and other resources to those who have been brutalized by the police.”

The demands also call for the election of a community police oversight board, an investment in social programs for youth and young adults, and the prosecution of police officers involved in the death of Reginald J.R. Thomas while in police custody in 2018.

The group of demonstrators, which eventually numbered close to 100, arrived with signs and placards, prepared to march, and seemed surprised when the meeting ended after 90 minutes.

But they also shared their experiences.

One speaker who identified himself only as “Eric H,” talked about being in Hollywood last week on his birthday, and being afraid to enter a bar, afraid that he might become drunk and “eventually shot by the police like Rayshard Brooks” in Atlanta, who was shot by police during an arrest.

Following the meeting, the group dispersed peacefully after a group chant of 70s Black Liberation Army member Assata Shakur’s “It is our duty to fight for freedom” chant.