One Occupier’s Sad Story Of Foreclosure Is A Bit Less Sad Than Reported By The Press

[Geee]

Big Journalism:


The reality behind the often reported story of an ACORN member who is part of the San Francisco Occupy movement is far more complex than the mainstream press has told the public. Donna Vieira, a frequent spokesman for the 99% who tells the heartrending tale of having her home foreclosed on, is actually referring to a second home in another state that she and her husband paid nearly $750,000 for. It’s an example of how the press has been negligent in doing even basic checks to get to the reality behind the media myths of the Occupy movement and how a disparate group of people with their own agendas have glommed onto the Movement.

While researching the recent Occupy/Union/ACORN shut down of Wells Fargo and Bank of America in San Francisco’s financial district, I noticed that two different newspaper articles quoted the same woman: Donna Vieira.
The San Francisco Examiner identified her as a member of the renamed ACORN group ACCE:
But Donna Vieira, 42, a member of the statewide Association of Californians for Community Empowerment, welcomed some of the more provocative tactics, barring violence.
“I was sitting on the floor chained up with two teachers,” said Vieira, who spent Friday morning occupying Wells Fargo’s headquarters. “When injustice becomes law, resistance becomes duty.”
And Reuters reported:
Donna Vieira, 42, a real estate appraiser, said she was protesting because the bank had “unfairly” foreclosed on her home in Reno, Nevada, last year.
“Nobody is going after the big banks. And loss and pain and suffering doesn’t matter to the regulators,” Vieira said.
My first thought was probably about the same as many people reading those articles – here’s a middle-aged woman taking desperate measures against big banks that got bailouts while her home was foreclosed on. I noticed that the home was in Reno, Nevada and wondered for a moment if she might’ve been reduced to homelessness on the streets of San Francisco, hundreds of miles away; a victim of the cold injustice of capitalism.

[Rheo]

Excellent research by the author.