The Emory Wheel Emory community condemns Cop City death

By Mitali Singh and Marian MoSS Asst. A&E Editor and Contributing Writer

As the sun set on Jan 23., a group huddled close together on Asbury circle. Some held bunches of flowers in their arms, kneeling to place them around candles and pictures. Soft guitar lingered in the air.

Emory University students hosted a vigil on Asbury Circle to honor the life of Indigenous environmental activist Manuel Terán, known as Tortuguita, who was shot and killed on Jan. 18 in an altercation with the Atlanta Police Department and Georgia Bureau of Investigation in the forest. They were 26 years old.

Dozens of students, alumni and community members attended the vigil, and many were dressed in black for mourning.

This was the first time in United States history that an activist was killed in an attempt to protest the forest being developed.

Terán was one of the environmental activists living in the South River Forest, also called the Weelaunee Forest to protest the Atlanta Police Foundation’s $90 million proposed Atlanta Public Safety Training Center, coined “Cop City” by activists. This follows the Atlanta City Council proposing the construction of the police training facility in June 2021. Building the Atlanta Public Safety Training Center would require 85 acres of Weelaunee Forest land to be cut down, and in total, City Council leased 381 acres of land to the Atlanta Police Foundation.

The facility aims to “improve morale, retention, recruitment and training” for the Atlanta Police Department and the Atlanta Fire Rescue Department in a state which would have the fourth highest incarceration rate in the world if every U.S. state were a country.

The encampment includes common spaces and kitchens, and the community often holds teaching sessions on the history of the land, guided walks, dinners, book talks and music shows.

When the Atlanta City Council opened for solicited public comment on the facility in September 2021, they received 17 hours of comments.

Of the comments, 70% opposed the Cop City facility on environmental