Longtime Charlotte activist charged with domestic terrorism in Georgia
Georgia authorities arrested and charged a Charlotte activist — and 22 others — with domestic terrorism after the group breached a proposed police and fire training center in Atlanta Sunday.
DeKalb County police records show the Georgia Bureau of Investigation arrested Jamie Marsicano, a longtime local activist, with a group of protesters who infiltrated the proposed Atlanta Public Safety Training Center — dubbed “Cop City” by its opponents. Those arrested are accused of throwing bricks, flaming Molotov cocktails and fireworks at equipment and police, according to the Atlanta Police Department.
Marsicano’s last name was misspelled on various police records, which also appear to use the incorrect gender identity. In a biography published previously on The Funambulist, Marsicano wrote they are “a white trans femme organizer in Charlotte who is fiercely committed to supporting Black trans femmes, prison abolition, and destabilizing all forms of oppression.”
Marsicano is listed as a second-year law student and dean fellow at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Marsicano has an undergraduate degree from Brown University and worked with The Bail Project, an organization that distributes money to help people in poverty post bail.
Marsicano was a core organizer for Charlotte Uprising, a group that led police brutality protests in 2020, and one of two activists who turned themselves in for charges related to the protests over George Floyd’s killing by Minnesota police.
What is ‘Cop City’?
The proposed center is a $90 million, 85-acre training space, according to the Atlanta Police Foundation. It will include classrooms, a shooting range, a mock city and a driving course.
The project will also “hyper-militarize law enforcement,” according to the Defend the Atlanta Forest Movement. It will jeopardize the South River Forest and its surrounding Black and Hispanic communities, according to a letter a coalition of environmental groups sent to the Atlanta City Council.
Atlanta Mayor Andre Dickens said in late January the tract is filled with rubble and overgrown with invasive species from when it was cleared for a former state prison farm decades ago.
The first phase of the center, funded by the Atlanta Police Foundation according to city officials, is expected to open later this year.
Domestic terrorism charges
Police detained 35 of Sunday’s protesters, and the Georgia Bureau of Investigations charged all 23 arrestees with domestic terrorism.
In January, seven people were arrested and charged with domestic terrorism and criminal trespass the same day one protester — Manuel Esteban Paez Terán, also known as “Tortuguita” — was shot and killed by police, according to the Georgia Bureau of Investigations.
Officers found Tortuguita inside a tent when he suddenly shot one trooper in the abdomen after ignoring officers’ verbal commands, according the GBI.
Last year, police arrested and charged five people with domestic terrorism and other charges after they committed “violent acts and trespassing” at the site, according to the GBI.
This story was originally published March 7, 2023 at 2:15 PM.
