A communique from the Villiers-le-Bel support committee regarding the upcoming trial, on charges of "police homicide attempt" The next 21st of June, it won't be summer time, it won't be the Fête de la Musique (1); it will be the start of the trial of our friends, of our brothers. Maka and three others from Villiers-le-Bel will have to face the accusation of having shot at the police during the riots of november 2007.

The scenario is already set: after the police media operation of february 2008 - 1500 cops with guns in town and hordes of journalists on their behalf, after the "exemplary punishment" demanded by Sarkozy, after the disproportionate sentencing of the rioters last spring (three years of prison for throwing rocks), it will be the trial of the "suburban cop-killer", meant to reconcile the government with the extreme-right voters and all the freaked out people this country can count. Of course, it will be overlooked that the only dead people were two kids: Lakhamy and Moushin, killed in a strange "accident" with a police car. We'll pretend to forget that the spokesman of the ministry of the interior didn't wait more than a few minutes to declare that the cops had nothing to do with their death. Of course, we'll deny the fact that it was the surge of hundreds of cops flooding in the neighborhood that launched the riot.
[Who writes the history again?]

Since someone "guilty" is needed to pretend-justify the vengeance of the State, there has to be a trial, an exemplary trial. In the absence of any evidence, it will be a trial of testimony, it will be the voice of cops and anonymous paid finks against the voice of the "youth" in front of a jury of their peers.
Until the death of Lakhamy and Moushin, Villiers-le-Bel was a quiet little town of the Val-d'Oise. The train station, the Cerisaie, the ZAC, the PLM, the Carreaux, the Burteaux...(2) Since the riots, Villiers isn't a town any longer, it is a symbol, a stake), a fantasy. The power projects on it all its Law and Order angsts and most of all its fear that the police occupation of the neighborhoods will be met by organized riots; that the people that are being aimed at with flashball (3) for ten years end up putting cops in their sight. Every evening of the year, the boulevards from Villiers look like a ballet made of all the various police corps--UTEQ, gardes mobiles, CRS, Bac, etc. (4) -, in the meantime, they prepare the inauguration of the new police station of 360 men. It is an experiment in the level of police harrassment and provocation that a neighborhood can handle without exploding. The feeling here is not to live in the margin of society but in the laboratory of its future. If there is, in the coming future a risk of uprising, what is certain is that it is in Villiers-le-Bel that the power trains itself to manage it.
Anyone who takes a walk here after 5 PM understands - watching the "robocops" patroling Gaza style - that the State doesn't try to reestablish order where disorder would reign, but to provoke disorder at the right time to be seen as the one who brings back order when elections come.
In reality, this society has become so incapable of saying positively what it is or what it wants that it only manages to define itself againts its suburbs. That's why the power wants this trial to be the trial of the "cop killers'": to bind around it a society in iniquity. Our friends don't have to pay for this iniquity, nor for the salvation of those in power. In reality, this trial is not meant to establish responsibilities for precise acts, it is the trial of an event in its entirety, and foremost the trial of a whole historical moment. An historical moment that opens up with the death of Zyed and Bouna and the 2005 riots, and that the power would like to stifle with a big spectacle trial.
The problem is that the rage and revolt that were expressed there won't let themselves being stifled. Another problem is those explosions have resonated and still resonate in many other hearts than those of the so-called "suburban youth". And yet another problem is that this new operation of isolation is maybe about to completely fail. Some walls fell, some hands that were hesitantly looking, found each other.
We're calling for all those who cannot bear the occupation of our lives by the police anymore. We'll do everything we can so that this trial doesn't become another occasion to justify this occupation by the disorder it produces.
We refuse to let our brothers pay for the angst of those in power.
They've already served two years in prison.
We refuse to allow dozens of years of prison to be distributed on the basis of anonymous testimony paid by the police.
We refuse the scenario of the government. We have three months to tear it down.

A month of solidarity will happen from the 20th of May to the 15th of June 2010 that will end up with a demonstration a few days before the trial.
More will be announced soon.
Get in touch with us. Organize solidarity events, debates, actions.
Let's meet.

To financially support the accused you can get the bank account number of the support collective of Villiers-le Bel by writing at  respectveritejustice@gmail.com
For more info about the events or to communicate the various initiatives:
 fallaitpas@riseup.net

(1) The "fête de la musique" happens every year in France on the 21st of June. It consists of all kind of musicians playing in the streets of all town.
(2) Those are the names of the various neighborhoods of Villiers-le-Bel.
(3) Flashball is the name of the "non-leathal" guns used by the French police. Its rubber bullets have the same impact than a .38 special.
(4) Names of the various police and military corps that operate in the French suburbs.

This call for solidarity has been translated really quickly.
Do not hesitate to rewrite it in proper English. Please, spread it around and translate it in whatever language you want. The people doing the support committee do not belong to the anarchist milieu so we need to help them out creating a wide international mobilization and solidarity
actions month.