On Monday, jury selection began in the first trial against a defendant indicted for opposing an Atlanta police training facility. The trial has already produced possible civil liberties violations, with the judge issuing what could be an unconstitutional gag order.
For nearly two years, activists in Georgia have engaged in a protest movement opposing the proposed Atlanta Public Safety Training Center. The facility, which opponents derisively call "Cop City," is to be built on an undeveloped patch of land in the forest. The protests have occasionally turned violent, and in January, police shot and killed a protester. (Police claim the activist fired first, though subsequent autopsies dispute that notion.)
