A.C.L.U Defends Racine Ravers

Highly respected American civil rights organisation the ACLU are to take action over the recent police raid in Racine, Wisconsin, in which gun toting cops terrorised innocent ravers. During the assault cops pointed guns at DJs heads and lined all the revellers up against walls, before issuing all 445 people present with $968 fines, despite only finding drugs on just three individuals.

Following the raid on what had been a legitimate fund raising event for a local theatre, Detective Robert Purdy boasted to local newspapers, "Rave parties are not going to be part of our community and are not going to be tolerated," indicating the wider motive behind the attack.

This week city authorities also tried to divert attention away from the issue of the police tactics, by offering plea bargain arrangements reducing revellers' fines to $100 on condition they plead guilty to the charge of being inside a 'disorderly house.

"We simply don't have the capacity to try 445 cases," local DA Daniel Wright also told The Racine Journal Times." All in all, we believe this is a reasonable agreement."

The ACLU disagreed, however, after 250 of the 445 individuals contacted the civil liberties organisation.

"Today, the Legal Director of the ACLU of Wisconsin, Micabil Diaz, sent a demand letter to Daniel Wright, the City Attorney for Racine, and urged him to dismiss all charges against those cited for violating the city's disorderly house ordinance," the ACLU said in a statement issued this week.

"The letter details why the citations are flawed and requests that the city's attorney dismiss them "in the interest of resolving this matter quickly and avoiding a tremendous waste of public resources in pursuing these meritless actions."
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