Video The ATL 61 episode 2: Jamie Marsicano

Story written by Matt Scott
Video directed by Nolan Huber-Rhoades

I first met Jamie in North Carolina, outside the Mecklenburg County Courthouse in August. A member of her support crew reached out to me on Aug. 8, asking if ACPC could cover a press conference Jamie was holding Charlotte the next day. My only real knowledge of Jamie prior to meeting her was that she had been banned from UNC’s campus because of the domestic terrorism charge, but she was so beloved by her fellow students that they walked out of class en masse to deliver a letter to the chancellor demanding the ban be lifted. I was curious to find out who Jamie was and how she could draw so much support.

It was only a few weeks into a new relationship at that point, but I asked my partner if she wanted to take an impromptu road trip to Charlotte. She said yes, and we were in the car a few hours later. We left Atlanta at the start of rush hour and got into Charlotte five hours later. I was pretty tired and irritable by that point and not even a delightful meal at Lang Van Vietnamese restaurant could lift my spirits. Parking difficulties the next morning led us to arriving outside the Courthouse—my mood still unimproved—a little after the 9 a.m. scheduled start time. 

Out front a group of about 15 people gathered holding signs. At the center stood Jamie in a bright pink jumpsuit—an homage and a bit of a fuck you to her weeks spent in DeKalb County Jail following her March arrest at the South River Music Festival. Several of Jamie’s friends wore cowboy boots and rhinestones. I later learned the outfits were in preparation for the Beyoncé concert they planned to attend that night; nevertheless, the costuming added a certain flair to the press conference that journalists rarely get to enjoy.

What intrigued me most was that this joy existed along with pain. “My reputation has been tarnished,” Jamie said in August, “the impact this has had on my mental health… I’ve been diagnosed with PTSD since I got out of jail and going through this. This is trauma that I’m going to have to navigate for the rest of my life.” 

My girlfriend and I chatted briefly with Jamie and her friends after the press conference and headed back to Atlanta. We spent a good bit of the car ride talking about Jamie and our admiration of her. However, with the killing of Deacon Johnny Hollman and the referendum campaign approaching its goal, my attention quickly diverted away to other issues. That is, until Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr announced racketeering charges against 61 people, including Jamie, on Sept. 5. I thought of Jamie, her press conference, and how discordant it felt to put her and the words “domestic terrorist” or “racketeer” in the same sentence. 

I had been kicking around the concept of doing profiles on the 42 people charged with domestic terrorism because of the Stop Cop City movement, but time and resources being limited, I backburnered the idea. In early October, ACPC got crucial support from a Babochki Collective grant and we were able to bring on Nolan Huber-Rhoades as our full-time video news producer. I brought my early concept to Nolan and together with our producer Paul Glaze, we came up with the idea for the In Their Words series. We took that idea to the rest of ACPC and, with their support, went into pre-production. 

I reached out to Jamie, who had first come to mind when I was toying around with the idea, and Priscilla Grim, who we knew had prior on-camera experience in a documentary film and had written an extraordinary piece in Scalawag Magazine about her time in DeKalb County Jail. They both agreed to the project, and we were on a plane to New York to film with Priscilla two weeks later with a still malleable concept of what we were trying to do. 

We prepared to leave New York after filming our first episode– you can watch it here–with a little more clarity and scheduled a pre-interview call with Jamie, which we took while waiting for our flight at JFK airport. 

I had mistakenly booked us on a flight to Charlotte, despite knowing that Jamie was attending UNC and would be in Raleigh. Nolan and I were both exhausted from the filming we did the day prior and the thought of a two hour car ride from Charlotte to Raleigh in the morning sounded pretty awful, but as we wrapped up our call with Jamie and Nolan looked over at me and said, “I think this is going to be great and worth it.”

We drove to Raleigh and met Jamie for breakfast where we gameplanned the day. As we talked, my exhaustion faded, and I became more excited. My original impression of Jamie was only reinforced by hearing her talk about her life, passion and the struggle of dealing with these charges. Throughout the filming day, she continued to impress me. 

For the second time in almost as many months, I’d come to meet Jamie feeling tired and spent and walked away excited and hopeful. 

Ultimately, filming with Jamie solidified in our minds what we hoped to do with the In Their Words series. 

Nolan met back up with Jamie a few weeks after we filmed with her out front of another courthouse, this time in Fulton County where she and the other ATL61 defendants were arraigned on racketeering charges. Despite a pending stint in Fulton County Jail after the arraignment, Jamie was there in front of a crowd of supporters, dancing. 

Appropriately to who she is, this is where episode 2 begins: Jamie dancing in the face of trauma.