Jen Angel: Family of 'disband the police' baker killed in robbery DOESN'T want jail time for suspects
OAKLAND, CALIFORNIA: The family of a woke California baker who was brutally killed during a robbery gone wrong this week, requested the authorities not to take her assailants to jail as it doesn't align with her social justice beliefs. Angel Cakes owner Jen Angel died on Thursday, February 9, from the injuries she sustained following a car break-in near Wells Fargo Bank in Downtown Oakland on Monday, February 6.
“As a long-time social movement activist and anarchist, Jen did not believe in state violence, carceral punishment or incarceration as an effective or just solution to social violence and inequity,” her loved ones wrote on a GoFundMe page set up after the attack took place.
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How did Jen Angel die?
Jen Angel was robbed by two thieves who smashed her car window and ran off with her purse near a Wells Fargo in Uptown Oakland Monday afternoon, as per The San Francisco Chronicle. The getaway car was being chased by 48-year-old Angel, but she got trapped in the door and was dragged more than 50 feet, hitting her head on the sidewalk. She was placed in a medically induced coma on Thursday and pronounced dead. According to the reports, the assailants are still on the run and police have not been able to identify the suspects.
What did Angel's friend say?
"We are really trying to orient towards her brilliant life, and that actually, she is not a person who would support the policing and imprisonment of the people who harmed her," Angel's friend Emily Harris said according to ABC7. The anti-prison director said that the baker was her first political mentor. Angel believed that using prisons prevents both the criminals and the victims from actually healing.
Locking up the people responsible for her friend’s death would only “perpetuate more harm,” Harris said. “That doesn’t mean that there isn’t accountability that we would want for (the perpetrators),” Harris said. She further added, “What (that) could look like isn’t about putting a person into further harm … (but) understanding how we’re going to prevent this from happening to the next Jen Angel.”
Angel's closed ones request the city to honor her memory by making sure that the criminals do not spend their time behind bars if they get caught, says the GoFundMe page which has now collected more than $138,000 so far. The group said that they would instead be open to alternatives to traditional prosecution, such as “restorative justice.”
Pete Woiwode, a friend, and political activist said that Angel was always present in the community for help and support in times of trouble which even includes once when a speeding car crashed through her bakery’s window and caused major damage in 2019. She sought financial help from her neighbors a year later when an unhinged man used a paving stone to smash her store’s window. “It was totally random, and just unfortunate on so many levels, like the state of mental health care in general and the randomness of that connecting with our big window,” Angel wrote on Instagram after the incident.
The case is being looked into as a homicide, according to Oakland Police. Through Sunday, February 5, major crimes in Oakland are down 9% compared to the same time last year.