We are co-sponsoring this great event along with Chicago Action Medical, National Lawyers Guild of Chicago, and Tilted Scales Legal Collective. Join us all on Sunday at 3:30pm for a great discussion of how we can collectively support people who are arrested for their political activity and the movements they are part of. We hope to see you there!

RSVP HERE!

More Info: Members of NLG Chicago, Chicago Action Medical, and Tilted Scales Collective will discuss ways of strengthening radical/revolutionary struggle and improving community self-defense when faced with criminal charges and the ravages of the prison-industrial complex. This event is inspired by the newly published book “A Tilted Guide to Being a Defendant,” written by Tilted Scales Collective to help radicals figure out how to handle serious criminal charges in ways that strengthen movements rather than allowing the state to use them to disrupt and destroy our movements.

Tilted Scales Collective wrote “A Tilted Guide to Being a Defendant” after noticing that the state is highly skilled in using criminal charges to neutralize, disrupt, and destroy radical/revolutionary social movements–-and that most defendants are ill-equipped to handle those charges in ways that advance their struggles. They reached out to around 100 people across the country, including current and former political prisoners/prisoners of war, to provide radicals with the best tools and insights for fighting criminal charges while continuing their struggles.

Participants:
Jude has been involved in anarchist legal support organizing and prisoner support since he joined a legal collective in Minneapolis prior to the 2008 RNC. Since then, he has been part of many legal support efforts ranging from local one-off direct actions to summits such as the RNC/DNC, NATO, and G20. He has also been involved in defense committees for numerous prisoners across the country. Jude helped form Tilted Scales Collective after an Anarchist Black Cross conference in 2012. In 2016, he took on the position of chair of the Mass Defense Committee with the National Lawyers Guild, through which he helps with legal support efforts at protests and uprisings across the country.

Brent Betterly was arrested and charged in connection with an elaborate conspiracy authored by the Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office during the 2012 NATO summit in Chicago. The case was later revealed to be a part of a larger effort by CPD to infiltrate and criminalize the anarchist community in Chicago. He was acquitted of several state-level terrorism charges and served three years of a six year prison sentence for possesion of incendiary devices, which were also revealed to have been manufactured and planted by CPD. Brent is an activist involved in organizing around antifascism and prisoner support work.

Members of Chicago Action Medical (CAM) will be present to discuss their work locally and at other actions and uprisings around the country. CAM is a group of volunteers who are trained in basic first aid and has been working in Chicago since 2002, providing medical support at direct actions for social change. Free grassrooots medical care at protests is a tradition going back centuries worldwide. CAM also frequently holds down jail support in Chicago. Read more about CAM’s work: https://chicagoactionmedical.org/.

Volunteers with NLG Chicago and Chicago Community Bond Fund will also share information about and reflections on our existing infrastructure for supporting movements in Chicago.

Unfortunately, this space is not wheelchair accessible as it has 22 steps leading up to the it. This space has gender-neutral restrooms.