Community Network Journalists Arrested and Beaten

Community Network Journalists Arrested and Beaten / Martha Beatriz Roque
Cabello
Posted on February 18, 2014

Juliet Michelena Díaz, José Antonio Sieres Ramallo and Billy Joe Landa
Linares, were stopped on San José between Belascoaín and Manrique,
talking with me, on the balcony, which they've dubbed "The Ferns," an
allusion to the Cuban telenovela, when Patrol Car No 767 appeared to
arrest them. They wanted to take the two men and leave the woman. She
opposed it.

At that moment, officials from State Security officers and two women in
uniform with the rank of Major arrived. They jumped on Billy Joe and
Juliet. At first they beat him by squeezing his testicles, and injected
something in his left arm, near the shoulder.

When he was released, he had to be transferred to the Poze Bernardo
polyclinic of San Miguel del Padrón, where he was supplied oxygen. He
didn't want to go to the hospital to avoid being subjected to the
political police.

Juliet was dragged by the two officers and a third woman dressed in
civilian clothes. They gave low a low blow and hit her in the mouth when
she screamed. The public intervened, saying, "Don't hit her, she's a
woman," "Don't be abusers." Only one woman shouted "Viva Fidel," and
"Down with the worms," but it didn't have any resonance. Also arrested
wereYuleidis López González and Juan Carlos Diaz Fonseca, who were
driven out to Guanabacoa and abandoned there.

Barbara Fernandez Barrera and Misael Aguilar Hernández, arrested in San
Antonio de los Baños, were taken to an unknown place, and had to walk 3
kilometers alone until a truck picked them up and took them to Quivicán
in the province of Mayabeque.

In front of my balcony those cooperating with the police hid behind a
column so we couldn't take their picture, but we did.

Wherever the people are concentrated, the regime acts repressively. They
can not allow the street to heat up from the "Balcony of the Ferns."

Cubanet, 13 February 2104, Martha Beatriz Roque Cabello

Source: Community Network Journalists Arrested and Beaten / Martha
Beatriz Roque Cabello | Translating Cuba -
http://translatingcuba.com/community-network-journalists-arrested-and-beaten-martha-beatriz-roque-cabello/