The Village Voice: Runnin' Scared

New York Indymedia Journalist Shot in Mexico

posted: 5:24 PM, October 28, 2006 by Sarah Ferguson

Shock is reverberating among American social-justice activists with the news that New York-based independent journalist William Bradley Roland was shot and killed Friday when gunmen in civilian clothes opened fire on demonstrators in the southern state of Oaxaca, Mexico.

The 36-year-old Roland, who went by the name Brad Will, was in Oaxaca covering the popular uprising of teachers and workers who in the last five months have seized streets and government buildings to demand the resignation of the governor there.

(image of Brad Will, via nyc.indymedia.org, which has ongoing coverage)

According to witnesses interviewed by Free Speech Radio News, Will was filming in Santa Lucia del Camino on the outskirts of Oaxaca City as groups of gunmen reportedly affiliated with the ruling PRI party opened fire on demonstrators manning a street barricade.

(El Universal photo of a gunman, via nyc.indymedia.org)

"He was filming as the paramilitaries began their assault on the crowd," says Shannon Young, a reporter for Free Speech Radio News based in Oaxaca. "According to witnesses, someone grabbed Brad's shirt and said, 'Come on, let's go,' but he kept filming and he got shot."

Will was felled by a bullet to his stomach. He died while being transported to a Red Cross hospital.

(photo of the fallen Brad Will, via nyc.indymedia.org)

A photographer for the Mexican daily Milenio Diario who was standing near Will was also shot in the foot.

According to news reports, two others were killed in the clashes Friday, including teacher Emilio Alonso Fabian, and more than 20 were wounded.

The Mexican daily El Universal published chilling photos of the plainclothes shooters, which it identified as members of the Santa Lucia police, and also of Will filming just before he was shot.

The U.S. ambassador to Mexico, Tony Garza, also suggested Will had been shot by local police.

"It appears that Mr. Will was killed during a shootout between what may have been local police" and protesters, Garza said in a written statement, according to the Associated Press.

Other news reports, however, claim the protesters were armed only with rocks and sticks.

In an update by Mexican journalist Diego Enrique Osorno, posted on the Narco News Bulletin, Saturday, the mayor of Santa Lucia acknowledged the armed men in civilian clothes were "police acting in legitimate defense against the threat of an occupation of City Hall."

In Mexico, Indymedia journalists are now piecing together Will's own videotapes in hopes that he may have filmed his own killer.

As word of Will's death spread last night, friends and fellow activists converged at the radical Bluestockings Bookstore on the Lower East Side to mourn his loss and strategize for action.

Friends remembered the lanky Wisconsin native as a globetrotting, self-taught journalist with a love of adventure and a knack for finding himself at the center of hot spots. "He was one of the most dedicated activists I ever worked with," said Brooke Lehman, owner of the activist-oriented bookstore, who met Will during the 1999 street protests in Seattle against the World Trade Organization.

"You could pretty much guarantee if there was a cause or an action, Brad would be there," added Lehman. "He felt a tremendous responsibility to do media where other media outlets wouldn't go, or were afraid to go."

Last year Will was beaten and arrested by Brazilian police while filming the forced eviction of an urban squatter camp in Goiania, in central Brazil. Friends say he was the only journalist there. He displayed a similarly reckless zeal in 1997, when he stood on the roof of his East Fifth Street squat in Manhattan as a wrecking ball slammed into the front of the building. His act was a last-ditch effort to save his home.

In recent years, Will traveled to Ecuador, Argentina, and Chiapas to document social struggles there.

Yet despite the dangers he encountered, friends say he would return to New York singing folksongs from the places he'd been.

"He was committed to documenting injustice, but also the communities of resistance, to let people know that there is a vibrant community of people out there fighting for these causes," recalled Beka Economopoulos, a fellow activist from Williamsburg. "He was able to take what was dire and turn it into folklore and make it mythical. He had a gift for that. He would dance around and hug you and get you caught up in whatever was going on."

You can get a taste of Wills idealism in his last dispatch from Oaxaca, a near stream-of-consciousness report about marching to the morgue to identify a 41-year-old man named Alejandro Garcia Hernandez. He had been shot at a street barricade, just as Will would soon be.

The dispatch ends:

"one more death -- one more martyr in a dirty war -- one more time to cry and hurt -- one more time to know power and its ugly head -- one more bullet cracks the night -- one more night at the barricades -- some keep the fires -- others curl up and sleep -- but all of them are with him as he rests one last night at his watch"

There will be a vigil for Will at 7 p.m. Saturday tonight outside the Mexican Consulate, at 27 East 39th Street. Activists are planning another demonstration there Monday morning at 9 a.m. to demand that the Mexican federal government fully investigate Will's murder and the cases of the other protesters killed and wounded recently by government-backed forces.

Similar vigils and protests taking place in San Francisco and Arizona.

categories: In the Streets

Comments

I love you Brad. Love never dies. You can't be gone. I know you are. But you're not - not from my heart. It is cold wind and cold rain here in NYC now. How many times you warmed us with your songs and jokes. I liked your cover of Angel From Montgemery...

In your raspy voice, from your big broken heart, you would sing,

"Just give me one thing that I can hold on to
To believe in this living is just a hard way to go

When I was a young girl well, I had me a cowboy
He weren't much to look at, just free rambling man

But that was a long time and no matter how I try
The years just flow by like a broken down dam."

Yeah Brad, its sure is a hard way to go.

But my favorite song you ever sang was the Anarchist love song, "Girl you make me want to smash the state!" How I loved to sing along with you to that one, and you tolerated our duets with affection even though I can't really hold a tune.

Wish we hadn't argued over stupid things like whose turn it was to wash the dishes. You are my brother.

So many actions and uprisings we have seen together, and finally it is this one that you gave your life to. At least your life is part of something bigger and greater than one man or one life... it is the dream of all the wretched of the earth. The dream of dignity, humanity, love, esperanza...

I'm sorry baby. It was never to be this way. Hope you can feel our love where ever you are.

We are anarchists. Any cop that kills a comrade will be executed.

Posted by: Warcry at October 28, 2006 7:05 PM

There are enough "causes" and "issues" to champion right here in the usa, no need to run off to some 3rd world hell hole.

Posted by: bob at October 29, 2006 12:15 AM

You've caught the westbound too early dear friend. Images of you flash through my mind that span years, continents, eras, song, fires and many freight trains. In your loss, a part of our cultural history has been written. In reading all the testimonies I remember how vibrant & quilted our community is and once was. You were always a warm and welcomed conversation in the sometimes standoffish New York Loisida counter culture scene. Who will ever forget your broad hugs. Thank you for you friendship. Will miss ya brother, B.

Posted by: mr. b at October 30, 2006 12:42 AM

I am so angered and confused by what has happened that I feel compelled to comment. I faintly remember Brad when the NYC Indymedia was just forming and John and I were there. I remember the work, writing the mission, living the mission, the protests, and running with my camera as a police officer was about to hit me with his baton, even more. But what I remember most about when Brad was crossing my path, was that I was empowered to change the world. I had a voice. And while I think of myself as an activist still, it is Brad that continued doing the real work for those of us that couldn’t – for one excuse or another. It is Brad, as an independent journalist that was really fulfilling that mission, every time he attended an action. Brad’s death reminded me of how important and precious having a voice is. Peace my brother, others will continue your fight. I will be one of them. No more excuses. No excuses for this.

Posted by: Di at October 30, 2006 6:03 AM

Message from Davis Mirza,

Saddened activists from Toronto send their condolences out to the Roland family upon the death of their son, Wiliam Bradley Roland (Brad Will). We are shocked and appalled at the violence that has been perpetrated against Mexican civilains and international journalists at the hands of the Oaxaca City police...I urge one and all to seek justice for these terrible crimes. Rest in Peace Brad...our thoughts, prayers and love are with you... We will not let your efforts be silenced.

In solidarity,
Davis Mirza
Toronto, Canada

Posted by: Davis Mirza at October 30, 2006 12:03 PM

To me, his life is a living example of how each individual can contribute to the whole in their efforts to make the world a little better place. He brought his skills, his learning, his love for music full of his mind and heart to be engaged in the world. Through becoming the change he wished to see in the world, he became a circle of change and peace so as to enlarge it (this circle is enlarging every minute and every second by courageous ordinary citizens on the front line of resistance happening in Oaxaca and many others all over the world).

The Circle that He Became

Each as an individual

Unique and different

Musician, Poet, Mathematician,

Teacher, Farmer and Student,

All come to a circle-

Born out of our hearts,

The circle that he became

A quilt of peace

Weaving our dreams together

Hand in hand

Patching together

Our imperfect selves

Each with skills and talents

Unique and different

Melody, Words, Logic,

Imagination, Hands and Curiosity,

All come to the circle-

Born out of love

The circle that he became,

A quilt of peace

Weaving our threads together

Stitch by stitch

Creating together

A mosaic portrait with

A peaceful loving

Smile of our diverse Self

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