Econintersect: The Kent State event of 2011 has been documented on film. GEI News has found several internet sites that have tried to display the video we have presented here (after the continuation break. The other sites have images like the one shown:
GEI News has the missing video after the continuation break.
The video was shot by Raleigh Latham with other angle scenes shot by others and editing by Here is what he wrote at Vimeo.com:
The moment leading up to the shooting, Olsen was standing completely still. He was then hit in the head with a tear gas canister, which is potentially fatal.
Also, no rocks or bottles were thrown before Olsen was shot, contrary to Police statements.
Two angles of footage confirm this.
Olsen’s condition has improved. The first report on Thursday came from Business Insider (5:22 am Oct. 27, 2011):
A protester in Oakland, Scott Olsen, was hit in the head by a police projectile in the confrontation two days ago. Olsen, an Iraq-war veteran, is in critical condition in the hospital and may die of his injuries.
The following video [GEI Ed. note: video shown above] was sent to us by the aunt of the man who shot the footage, Raleigh Latham. Latham filmed Tuesday’s action throughout the course of the day and stood on the front lines with protesters when they confronted police.
Scott Olsen is seen here on the right, moments before he suffered his head injury and those who rushed to his aid were assaulted by police.
Scott Olsen remains in critical condition. Officials at Highland Hospital in Oakland are refusing comment on Olsen’s condition at this time and the media is being instructed to call back at 8:30 PDT. We will update his condition then.
By late afternoon it appeared that Olsen was out of danger. From the Huffington Post:
Scott Olsen, the 24-year-old Iraq War veteran and Occupy activist suffering from a head injury after being hit with a police projectile in Oakland, has had his condition upgraded to fair and is now breathing on his own.
His roommate, Keith Shannon, who is also an Iraq War veteran, first reported the progress in an email. Olsen will still need surgery, Shannon wrote. “The neurosurgeons have decided he needs surgery to relieve the pressure on his brain and it will happen in a day or two,” Shannon added. “Scott’s parents should be arriving at the hospital any moment now.”
Olsen remains sedated.
According to the San Francisco Chronicle, Olsen had served two tours in Iraq and was discharged in 2010 after four years of enlistment. He has been working as a software systems administrator at OPSWAT, Inc. in San Francisco. In the evenings he attended Occupy San Fransisco meetings.
“He’d leave work, head there, sleep there and go to work the next day,” Shannon said. “We were really against the fact that the banks and corporations were not held accountable for what they did.”
When Olsen heard that protesters at Occupy Oakland were asking for support, he took BART to Oakland and joined in the protest, Shannon said.
The amount of force used by police in Oakland is being questioned. From the Washington Post:
Following the violent clashes that broke out between police and Occupy Oakland protesters last night, some have started to questions the level of force used. In a statement, police said they fired canisters of tear gas and bean bag rounds at protesters, but denied they used flashbangs or rubber bullets.
Protesters say police are lying about their use of force, posting photos of welts on Twitter to prove rubber bullets were used, and slow-motion videos of the clashes on YouTube they say shows that police used flashbangs.
Below, Jen Lasher tweeted a photo of a welt she says was caused by a rubber bullet:
The Washington Post article contains a number of photos of canisters and bean bags protesters claim to have recovered from the scene. The WP article also has a video which is represented to show police using flashbangs. The video also shows, in playback isolation, the police throwing a gas/smoke/other canister at protesters attempting to aid Scott Olsen after he fell wounded.
It appears that 15 +/- bystanders rushed to aid Scott Olsen and after they were all kneeling on the pavement around him, an explosive canister of some sort was thrown by a policeman and landed next the good samaritans.
Sources: Business Insider, Washington Post, Vimeo.com and San Francisco Chronicle