Qualla: Stop Cop City https://qualla.com/stop-cop en-us © 2026 Bendyline Mon, 20 Jul 2026 10:21:14 GMT Qualla serial false Qualla support@bendyline.com yes https://qualla.com/_m/d/j/u/p/stop-cop-city-wp/hero-small.webp Qualla: Stop Cop City https://qualla.com/stop-cop Stop Cop City: Introduction https://qualla.com/stop-cop/ Photo credit Chad Davis from Minneapolis, United States, CC BY 2.0. The 116,000 signatures filled boxes. Organizers from a coalition of Atlanta activist groups delivered them in September 2023, nearly double the 60,000 required to force a public referendum on a controversial 85-acre police training facility in the city's South River Forest. The Atlanta City Council refused to count them. That refusal became one chapter in a years-long collision between a city government determined to build what it called a public safety training center and a decentralized protest movement that called it Cop City -- a conflict that drew international attention, produced the largest RICO case ever filed against protesters in the United States, and ended with a protester shot dead by police in the woods.

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Image: Chad Davis from Minneapolis, United States | CC BY 2.0

]]> Tue, 10 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/d/j/u/p/stop-cop-city-wp/djup-stop-cop-city-intro.mp3 0:06 1 full Stop Cop City: A Forest and a Proposal https://qualla.com/stop-cop/ Photo credit Ypsilon from Finland, CC0. The Atlanta Police Foundation first proposed the facility in 2017 and Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms formally announced it in her 2021 State of the City address. The planned site was an 85-acre tract in the South River Forest, a stretch of urban woodland in unincorporated DeK...

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Image: Ypsilon from Finland | CC0

]]> Tue, 10 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/d/j/u/p/stop-cop-city-wp/djup-stop-cop-city-a-forest-and-a-proposal.mp3 0:06 2 full Stop Cop City: Tree Sits and Terrorism Charges https://qualla.com/stop-cop/ Photo credit Ethan Long, CC BY-SA 2.0. What began as public comment and community organizing escalated into direct action. Activists established encampments in the forest, building tree houses and occupying the land to physically block construction. The movement, operating under the banners "Defend the Atlanta Forest"...

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Image: Ethan Long | CC BY-SA 2.0

]]> Tue, 10 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/d/j/u/p/stop-cop-city-wp/djup-stop-cop-city-tree-sits-and-terrorism-charges.mp3 0:06 3 full Stop Cop City: January 18, 2023 https://qualla.com/stop-cop/ Photo credit Tatsoi, CC BY-SA 4.0. The conflict turned fatal on a winter morning. Georgia State Troopers and other agencies launched a raid on the forest encampment. During the operation, a trooper was shot in the leg. Manuel Esteban Paez Teran, a Venezuelan protester known as Tortuguita, was shot and killed by po...

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Image: Tatsoi | CC BY-SA 4.0

]]> Tue, 10 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/d/j/u/p/stop-cop-city-wp/djup-stop-cop-city-january-18-2023.mp3 0:06 4 full Stop Cop City: Sixty-One Names on an Indictment https://qualla.com/stop-cop/ Photo credit Tatsoi, CC BY-SA 4.0. The legal aftermath was unprecedented. In May 2023, the GBI and Atlanta police conducted a SWAT-style raid on the Atlanta Solidarity Fund, a bail fund supporting arrested protesters. Three organizers were charged with charity fraud and money laundering; all 15 money laundering ch...

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Image: Tatsoi | CC BY-SA 4.0

]]> Tue, 10 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/d/j/u/p/stop-cop-city-wp/djup-stop-cop-city-sixty-one-names-on-an-indictment.mp3 0:06 5 full Stop Cop City: Built Over Objections https://qualla.com/stop-cop/ Photo credit Chad Davis from Minneapolis, United States, CC BY 2.0. Construction proceeded through continued protests. Clergy members chained themselves to bulldozers. Over 400 protesters attempted to march onto the construction site in November 2023, and were met with pepper spray, tear gas, flash-bang grenades, and armored vehicles. Activists s...

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Image: Chad Davis from Minneapolis, United States | CC BY 2.0

]]> Tue, 10 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/d/j/u/p/stop-cop-city-wp/djup-stop-cop-city-built-over-objections.mp3 0:06 6 full