Emeryville Shellmound Protest 2006 - Police Harassment of Native Americans

Footage from the 2006 Emeryville Shellmound Protest including that evening's news story. When Native American protesters decided to walk away from their secluded "protest corner", the police tried to stop and intimidate the protesters. The walkers refused to stop. Video shot by Perry Matlock end edited by Mark Anquoe.

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California shellmounds are massive ancient structures built by Native Americans that were used as human burial sites. The Bay Street Mall in Emeryville, California was built on the ruins of a 3500 year old Ohlone Shellmound. The construction of the shopping mall was strongly opposed by the local Native American community, who wanted the sacred site to be left undisturbed.

Despite their opposition, the mall was built in 2001. During the mall's construction, hundreds of human remains were found and visibly removed as waste in front of protesters. Since that time, the Native American community in the San Francisco Bay Area has held annual protests on Black Friday ("The biggest shopping day of the year") to ask the non-Native community to boycott the shopping center that has permanently desecrated this unique and irreplaceable sacred Ohlone site.

The number of burials found [...] still remains a mystery.

"We did find a lot of intact burials," said Oakland archeologist Sally Salzman Morgan, who was hired by Emeryville to study the site. "Its too inflammatory to say how many there were. But most (burials) were disturbed."

Rosemary Cambra, tribal chair of the Muwekma Ohlone, calls the citys new, culturally-sensitive development the legally-permitted erasing of a culture. "Were still living in the world of politics of erasure," Cambra said. "Its just an old way of racism. Nothing has really changed for tribal groups in the Bay Area."

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PLEASE JOIN US THIS YEAR! 11am, Friday, November 27, 2009. Meet at Shellmound and Ohlone Way in Emeryville, CA. For more information visit http://www.aimwest.info

http://www.berkeleydaily.org/issue/2002-03-16/article/10766?headline=Emeryvil... http://www.sacred-sites.org/preservation/shell.html http://protectsacredsites.blogspot.com/2008/12/black-friday-brings-shellmound...

Category:

Nonprofits & Activism

Tags:

• shellmound
• ohlone
• emeryville
• bay
• street
• mall
• protest
• direct
• action
• police
• harassment
• aim
• american
• indian
• movement
• indigenous
• resistance

[Alton659]

soon we shall regain our land back. Hopefully. I hate when stuff like this happens.

[MiamiIndianTribe]

@stonewall97 How is that funny?

[stonewall97]

I hope they don't bury anybody on that land. Remember what happened in the movie Pet Cemetery. lol

Anyway that is messed up that the construction crew removed dead bodies from that land.

[asmoxbaby]

More Cowbell LMFAO

[gtwthnt]

uuuggghhh this crap makes me more than ashamed to be white

[REV0Kadavur]

Protest Glen Cove!

[getjustice]

those cops were assholes.The native americaNS OWN THE WHOLE NATION  AS I SEE IT!!

[handleydan]

I have my other resons, for not shopping wherever this is located.

If you build something atop of ANY berryal ground, some real strange s**t coud happen.

[vegan4lif]

i wouldnt shop there EVER!! that is jacked up!! how could they get away with building there.. those people better get the fuck outa that mall..if it were white people burial...never happen.. yes im white but i hate whites sometimes when they act ignorant and .....dont care about native americans. makes me SICK

[rw5791]

the city council votes to allow the mall to be built but most of the councilmembers is black,see.It's like one minority group trumps the other and it just ain't right.Emeryville sucks anyway,all those stupid stores.