CHAPEL HILL – With town staff now allowed to speak again about the controversial Yates Building incident last November 13, Chapel Hill Police Chief Chris Blue is coming forward with new information about what he knew—and didn’t know—in the hours leading up to the police action.

Listen to Part 1 of Chief Blue's conversation with WCHL's Aaron Keck.


The action in question occurred in mid-afternoon on Sunday, November 13, about 18 hours after attendees of the Carrboro Anarchist Bookfair veered from a planned march to the Occupy Chapel Hill site in Peace and Justice Plaza—encamping themselves instead in the vacant building at 419 W. Franklin Street. After confirming with property owner Joe Riddle that the occupiers were in the building illegally, the CHPD sent in a Special Emergency Response Team (SERT), in riot gear and with rifles drawn, to remove them.

Nobody was injured in the action, but several passersby were detained, including two journalists covering the occupation—and some members of the public were incensed, particularly after it emerged that the occupiers were effectively unarmed.

***Click here to learn about Town Manager Roger Stancil's reactions to the "Communication Breakdown" at Yates...

From the beginning, Chief Blue has spoken on behalf of the CHPD with regard to the Yates incident—and during the events themselves, it was he who held responsibility for communicating information to Town staff. But in his first extended conversation with WCHL on the matter, he says most of the decision-making power that day—and most of the knowledge about what was taking place—actually rested with Assistant Chief Leo Vereen, the commanding officer on the scene.

Listen to Part 2 of Chief Blue's conversation with WCHL's Aaron Keck.


SATURDAY NIGHT: “WE’D PLANNED FOR A PEACEFUL MARCH”

The incident began on the evening of Saturday, November 12. Attendees of the Carrboro Anarchist Bookfair had planned to march down Franklin Street to Occupy’s encampment at Peace and Justice Plaza, and Chief Blue says the CHPD was on hand—as per usual, in the case of lawful marches—to provide assistance.

“We’d planned for a peaceful march,” he says, “and we’d actually set aside officers to work that march and (to) control traffic.”

At a contentious press conference the following Monday—and later, in Chief Blue’s official report on the matter—police would cite the potential threat of violence inherent in anarchist movements as one justification for taking every possible precaution in removing the occupiers. (Indeed some of the Yates protestors had been involved in an incident at the Greenbridge development that summer, which resulted in some property damage.) But aside from the Greenbridge incident, Blue says Chapel Hill Police hadn’t really had much trouble with anarchists before—and he wasn’t expecting any trouble that night.

“We absolutely did not predict anything like what ultimately happened,” he says. “Part of our planning for that weekend was to have staff able to respond, should there be some spontaneous demonstration…but we certainly didn’t expect any action beyond the kinds of things we typically see.”

Chief Blue was out of town that weekend, so it fell to Assistant Chief Vereen to oversee the march that Saturday.

“I spoke with him Saturday night,” Blue says. “I wanted to see how the march went, and at that time he told me that the marchers had gone in the Yates building…

“My reaction was surprise.”

CONFRONTATION: “I WASN’T AWARE”

Chief Blue says that initial conversation was the only one he had with Assistant Chief Vereen that evening. “Actually he and I didn’t speak again until the next day around midday,” he says.

By that time, several important developments had transpired. On Saturday evening, Vereen made an attempt to speak to the occupiers in the Yates building—only to be semi-surrounded and shouted down, by his account, with cries of “ACAB” (meaning “All Cops Are Bastards”) until he left the building.

Later that evening, representatives from the Chapel Hill Downtown Partnership—which was in the process of using that building for an art installation—were allowed to speak with occupiers after Vereen determined they wouldn’t be threatened. “(They) were primarily interested in finding out if any damage had been done to the property,” Blue says. “They were mostly interested in getting the Carolina Theater sign that had been stored inside the building…their interest was in making sure their sign didn’t get damaged.” But the CHDP representatives (Meg McGurk and Bobby Funk) were also able to learn that the occupiers planned to stay indefinitely, information they conveyed to Vereen.

But not Blue. “(Vereen and I) didn’t talk about those kinds of specific facts,” he says. “Our discussion really focused on the fact that people were in the property illegally….So we didn’t have conversations about the details of the Downtown Partnership’s encounter or his encounter, or the info about people on the roof at the time.

“…I don’t think that I knew about (Vereen’s encounter) until I’d gotten back into town (Sunday) evening.”

Vereen’s encounter on Saturday night—a far cry from what police had come to expect from protestors down the road at Peace and Justice Plaza—was cited later as a major reason for the CHPD’s decision to employ the SERT team without attempting further contact with the occupiers.

But there was a second encounter between police and protestors on Sunday morning—not publicized until January—that was far more cordial.

Read the report, from Carrboro Alderman Dan Coleman, which first made that encounter public.

Chief Blue says that conversation too involved a single officer. “(He) was on routine patrol, he was not aware of everything that was unfolding,” Blue says. “He stopped and had a cordial encounter with them.

“My understanding, from speaking to him since then, is that the people with whom he spoke did tell him they planned to stay in the building.”

Blue says the officer informed his supervisor, who relayed the information to Assistant Chief Vereen (and Captain Jeff Clark, also on the scene). “They were aware of that encounter” before the decision was made to employ the SERT team, Blue says.

In conversations with Vereen that afternoon, though, Blue says the subject never came up. “Some of that I didn’t learn about until I’d actually gotten back into Chapel Hill that evening,” he says.

Based on the information he did receive, though—coupled with confirmation from Joe Riddle that the occupiers had no permission to be inside—Blue says he “directed Vereen to begin developing some plans” to remove the occupiers from the Yates building.

COMMUNICATION: “A HANDFUL OF CONVERSATIONS”

By mid-morning, the Chapel Hill Police had made contact with the Chapel Hill Fire Department, who informed them that the Yates building was unfit for human habitation after years of vacancy—making it all the more important, Blue says, to get the occupiers out as soon as possible.

 The CHFD, Blue says, was only the first of several organizations police contacted prior to sending in the SERT team that afternoon. Police also requested assistance in traffic control from the Carrboro Police Department shortly before moving in, after Riddle confirmed he wanted the protestors removed. (Contrary to rumor, though, Chapel Hill Police officials say they were never in contact with any federal agency.)

And Blue also had “a handful of conversations” Sunday afternoon with Chapel Hill Town Manager Roger Stancil, who in turn relayed information to Mayor Mark Kleinschmidt.

“I made (Stancil) aware that we had a group of people in the building, and we were going to make contact with the property owner and figure out whether the people were supposed to be in the building,” Blue says. “Once we determined that they in fact (were) not, he and I again spoke and (I) let him know that we were developing plans to remove people from the building.”

The purpose of the conversation was not to consult, Blue says, merely to inform. Blue’s information, however, was already secondhand from Vereen at the site—and somewhere in the transfer of information from Vereen to Blue to Stancil to Kleinschmidt (and from Kleinschmidt to the Town Council), there was what Stancil calls a “communications breakdown” leading to some misconceptions on the part of high-ranking officials.

Kleinschmidt, for instance, wrote to Council Member Laurin Easthom on Sunday that “Police are asking one more time”—for the occupiers to leave—before moving in with force.

According to Blue, though, the Chapel Hill PD never intended to attempt further contact with the occupiers on Sunday afternoon—or at least he never discussed the possibility with Vereen. “We didn’t have specific tactical discussions,” he says.

Blue says he’s not sure how people ended up with that misconception. In the end, aside from Vereen’s hostile encounter with the protestors on Saturday night and the friendlier encounter on Sunday morning, Blue says there were no other direct communications between the Chapel Hill PD and the occupiers until the SERT team entered the Yates building on Sunday afternoon.

SENDING IN THE SERT TEAM

Since Assistant Chief Vereen was the commanding officer at the scene, Blue says he trusted him to make the decision on how to proceed.

“I directed Vereen, after speaking with the property owner, to develop plans to get the people out of the building and get the property secured,” Blue says. “(He) suggested it might be a good idea to bring our SERT officers in, because they provide some manpower that’s used to working together (and) on a Sunday afternoon we don’t have the same amount of support personnel…(and) that’s a group we’ve used in protest kinds of situations before…

“I agreed with him and asked him to begin developing plans…to initiate the activity to remove people from the building.”

In the middle of the afternoon on Sunday, the SERT team moved in. The dramatic scene that followed was shocking to many residents, but the decision to send in the SERT team wasn’t entirely unusual: Chapel Hill Police have deployed SERT 84 times in the last ten years, albeit mostly in drug cases.

Chief Blue gave his approval to the decision without complete information, but would additional knowledge have made a difference? “That’s hard to answer,” he says, “because I wasn’t here experiencing what my on-scene commanders were experiencing…and I want to be respectful of that. Certainly in hindsight…I think we could’ve selected some different options…but it’s very difficult to predict what you would do if you were plugged into a situation that’s rapidly unfolding, with those kinds of factors quickly popping up in front of you as you try to resolve a situation.

“So I think it’s unfair to my commanders for me to theorize about what I might have done had I been in their shoes or had I known something different than what they knew.”

In the end, the SERT team completed its mission as planned: numerous bystanders—including two journalists—found themselves caught in the middle, but the protestors themselves were removed from the building without injury. Eight were arrested—seven for misdemeanor breaking & entering and one, a bystander, for resisting arrest. All eight had court appearances in Hillsborough on January 30; one failed to appear, but the other seven were either found guilty or admitted guilt. Judges imposed no jail time.

At the time the decision to deploy the SERT team was made, Chief Blue was not aware of either of the two encounters between police and protestors—neither Vereen’s hostile encounter nor the cordial meeting on Sunday morning—nor did he question whether any contact had been made or attempted.

Vereen, however, was aware of both encounters, and with that information decided the SERT team was the best available option.

LESSONS LEARNED

“I certainly acknowledge,” says Chief Blue, “that some of the information I now know makes me think…how that information might make us react differently (in future situations).”

But he says he stands behind the decisions he and his officers made on November 13, given the information that was available at the time.

Still, he says the Yates incident points to several key flaws in police procedure, flaws he says police are actively working to resolve.

“We need to adapt some policies,” he says, “to be sure that we ask all the best questions we can, and that we check out assumptions rather than simply rely(ing) on assumptions…

“I say that meaning no disrespect to anyone from that weekend, because that was a tough weekend. At the same time I think we owe it to ourselves and the community…to reflect and learn.”

That includes not only redoubling efforts to gather fuller information at the scene of an incident, but also more consideration of how to better transmit information between officials. On November 13, according to Blue’s account, Mayor Kleinschmidt only spoke to Town Manager Stancil; Stancil only spoke to Blue; Blue only spoke to Vereen; and Vereen—after that initial failed attempt the previous evening—never spoke to the occupiers. Blue says police and town officials are actively discussing how to improve those lines of communication.

But even more important, Blue says, is the need to make sure the CHPD’s engagement with protestors—both law-abiding and law-breaking—is in keeping with the values that define Chapel Hill as a community.

“We have a long and storied and impressive track record in this community with regard to how our police department responds to people’s demonstrations and expressions of their rights,” says Blue. “Our record speaks for itself, and I wouldn’t want us to be defined by one incident…

“But I would like to acknowledge going forward that we will be faced with a situation like this again, I’m sure. And it’s important that we have a community dialogue about expectations and strategies…to respond to future situations where the expression of one person’s rights collides with another person’s rights, as was the case in the Yates situation.”