Anonymous Says Protests to Continue Unless BART Cops Are Stripped of Guns, Chief Fired

Michael Short

How to please a hacker ...

​Commuters have been warned. The notorious hacking group, Anonymous, which has been responsible for ongoing BART protests that have created commuting chaos, now says the disruptive protests will continue every Monday evening until the transit agency meets its demands.

The group listed five ways in which BART could bring protests to an end, starting with firing BART's spokesman Linton Johnson.
According to an Anonymous blog:

We are Anonymous, over the past two weeks we have proven that we stand by what we believe. You have threatened to shut down cell phone service if needed again, although your threats went empty, the dictator like tactics did not go unnoticed by the world. BART police are becoming increasingly aggressive at the protest, and peaceful protesters are being arrested for "being too loud".  We will continue to show the world why #OpBART is necessary.  We have stated and will keep our promise of a protest EVERY week until our demands are met. Since these demands have not reached the BART board of directors yet, we will remind you of what we want in order to stop our protest:

1. Fire Linton Johnson and BART Chief Kenton Rainey.

2. Mandate new training for all BART officers.

3. Publicly apologize to the people for shutting down cell service.

4. Take the guns away from the BART police.

5. Reopen the investigation to the killing of Charles Hill.

"So now that we have made ourselves clear, we will continue with #OpBART every week until our demands are met. We will see you Next Monday the 29th, 2011 outside the civic center at 5 p.m," the group writes in its blog.

The ongoing protests are in response to the July 3 fatal shooting of Hill, a 45-year-old transient who police say was armed with knives when they shot him on the Civic Center BART platform. Two weeks ago, a protest was planned, but never happened after BART cut cell-phone service. The transit agency defended its actions, saying it was trying to stop the protesters from using their cellphones to coordinate.

The following week, Anonymous hacked into two BART websites, releasing personal information of both riders and BART police, including names, addresses, logins, and passwords. The hacker responsible claims to be a bossy French woman.

Meanwhile, the weekly protests are becoming increasingly more disruptive. On Monday, BART was forced to close two stations intermittently throughout the evening, frustrating commuters and rerouting passengers well past 8 p.m.. Police arrested more than 40 protesters tied to the BART demonstration.

Here is a glimpse of the scene:

Follow us on Twitter at @TheSnitchSF and @SFWeekly