The suit was filed when no one would meet with ACLU to work out guidelines for protests. Nor do they mention that, under the consent decree, the entire area adjacent to the Convention Center (plus, probably, all nearby parks and playgrounds, which had been closed to everyone) are now open, to allow ten demonstrators at a time to directly confront Board of Governors as and if they enter there - if Board members, that is, don't enter from the back or from a rooftop helicopter or by teleportation or by tunneling in.
Suggests also that local authorities and FBI and secret service (who have been here for weeks) feel that they have adequately isolated and neutralized any existing threat of violence against property.
So next year maybe meet on a Murdoch-owned satellite?
Ralph Johansen
Posted Tuesday, May 1, 2001 - 10:24:45 PM HST Updated Tuesday, May 1, 2001 - 10:24:45 PM HST
Police confident of no violence during ADB conference
State, city officials agree to ease restrictions to meet court decree
By Nelson Daranciang Star-Bulletin
Honolulu police are so confident there will be no violent confrontations with protesters during the Asian Development Bank meeting next week that they are inviting the media to scrutinize their officers during the protests.
“So if you see something happening and there’s some dialogue between one of our commanders and demonstrators, please come over there and jam your cameras right in our face because that’s exactly what we want,” Assistant Police Chief Boisse Correa told members of the media at a press conference today.
The optimistic outlook was apparently shared by city and state officials who agreed to ease restrictions for protesters in a consent decree issued today by the U.S. District Court.
The agreement between ADBwatch, an umbrella group of protesters, and the state and city, was in response to the group’s request for a federal restraining order against the restrictions, which they said would violate their free speech rights.
The group will withdraw its motion for the restraining order, and a hearing scheduled for tomorrow will be canceled, said Brent White, legal director for the American Civil Liberties Union of Hawaii.
The ADB holds its annual meeting May 7-11 at the convention center.
The decree will allow the protest group to hold a march on May 9 without obtaining general liability insurance.