Scott Olsen, Iraq Vet Hurt by OPD Projectile: “I’m Not Alright.”

Scott Olsen visits the site of the Occupy Oakland protest in downtown Oakland on November 27, 2011. The Iraq War veteran and Occupy activist suffered a head injury after being hit with a police projectile in Oakland in October 2011.Martin Klimek/Zuma

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As protesters from Occupy Oakland marched through Downtown Oakland, picketing from bank to bank as Wells Fargo preemptively shut its doors and cops in riot helmets stood by for trouble, I ran into Iraq veteran Scott Olsen. As you might recall, he’s the former Marine who suffered a serious brain injury last October, when Oakland Police fired a beanbag projectile into the Occupy crowd, striking him in the head at close range.

It was two and a half weeks before Olsen could speak at all, and about a month “before I was comfortable speaking,” he told me. “It took a while.” Olsen, who is in his mid-twenties, is now out of formal therapy and has been focusing on activities involving Iraq Veterans Against The War. In the meantime, he is filing a claim against the City of Oakland, which is “already playing games,” he says. “The police department is blatantly at fault.” He is optimistic, he adds, because “I have the support of the people.”

So, is he okay? “I’m not alright,” he replies. “I’m good enough to do stuff like this.”

He explains that still has PTSD from Iraq, and still has a brain injury from the OPD incident. But he wasn’t about to miss the May Day action. “I think today is going to be a real testing day for Occupy,” he says. “I don’t think people have given up on it. They’re afraid to come out for several reasons.” Namely, the police presence. Olsen says he’s been seeing fewer and fewer children on marches since start of Occupy Oakland. But, he adds “I think we’re emulating the society we want to create, and I think that’s the main element of Occupy.”

Click here for our on-the-ground coverage of May Day protests on both coasts.

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

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