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BART admits halting cell service to stop protests

Michael Cabanatuan
SF Chronicle
Aug 14, 2011

Oakland – BART’s shut-off of subterranean cell phone service in its downtown
San Francisco stations may have prevented a protest Thursday, but it sparked
accusations Friday that the action stifled free speech and smacked of the kind
of government intrusion employed by Middle East dictators.

“All over the world, people are using mobile devices to protest oppressive regimes,
and governments are shutting down cell phone towers and the Internet to stop
them,” said Michael Risher, a staff attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union
of Northern California. “It’s outrageous that in San Francisco, BART is doing the same thing.”

BART officials acknowledged Friday afternoon that they had switched off the
transit system’s underground cell phone network, which runs from Balboa Park
Station through the Transbay Tube, from 4 to 7 p.m. Thursday to prevent
protesters from coordinating plans to stop trains.

A cluster of groups under the “No Justice, No BART” banner said on websites that
they planned to protest the fatal July 3 shooting of a knife-wielding man,
Charles Blair Hill, by BART police. Protesters briefly shut down the Civic Center,
Powell Street and 16th Street Mission stations July 11.
Trains ran through the stations without stopping.