Читать книгу Barriers to Rebuilding the African American Community - Tywan Ajani - Страница 13

2 The Unarmed Paradigm

In times past, there was often a fervent and compelling reason for the escalating use of force by law enforcement personnel. In the 1990s, gang violence was at an all-time high throughout the United States, especially in cities with high rates of poverty and unemployment. Federal, state, and local government agencies made committed attempts to suppress gang-related violence and its subsequent criminal behavior. Increased police patrols, more frequent arrests, and harsher punishments were some of the common methods used to suppress violence.

As a result, the United States of America has the highest rate of incarceration in the world, amounting to a total of approximately 6.8 million people living in correctional facilities at one point in 2014. According to the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), “in 2014, African Americans constituted 2.3 million, or 34% of the total 6.8 million correctional population. African Americans are incarcerated at more than five times the rate of whites and the imprisonment rate for African American women is twice that of white women. Nationwide, African American children represent 32% of children who are arrested, 42% of children who are detained, and 52% of children whose cases are judicially waived to criminal court (7).”

However, despite the escalation of police presence in urban communities, stricter enforcement of local laws, particularly those related to the possession and ←9 | 10→use of illegal drugs, and higher rates of incarceration, there were relatively few police killings of unarmed suspects in the 1990s compared with this past decade. In recent times, the proliferation of fatalities as a result of officer-involved shootings of unarmed African American suspects is staggering. The Washington Post conducted a two-year-long study on the relevance of race in police shootings. The following is an excerpt of the findings of that study, published on December 26, 2015.

“Race remains the most volatile flash point in any accounting of police shootings. Although black men make up only 6 percent of the U.S. population, they account for 40 percent of the unarmed men shot to death by police this year, the Post’s database shows. In the majority of cases in which police shot and killed a person who had attacked someone with a weapon or brandished a gun, the person who was shot was white. But a hugely disproportionate number, 3 in 5 of those killed after exhibiting less threatening behavior were black or Hispanic (10).”

The results of the study should be sobering, if not downright appalling. Both the investigation by the United States Justice Department and the study by The Washington Post found evidence to support claims of unlawful racial targeting by multiple police departments throughout the country. In addition to these reports, there are numerous additional on-going investigations of police officers, police departments, and other law enforcement agencies for similar practices.

Predatory police practices and the killings of unarmed African Americans have likely persisted for over a century with an inkling of impunity. The difference maker today is due to essentially two key reasons, the advent of the body camera and civilian video tapings with their camera phones. People are now able to capture footage of these violent altercations and bring them to the public view, which is precisely what occurred in the Rodney King police brutality case. On March 3, 1991, while Mr. King, an African American taxi driver, was being violently beaten by Los Angeles Police Department officers, a civilian, George Holliday, filmed the incident from his nearby balcony and sent the footage to the local news station. This event sparked a historic wildfire series of riots and civil unrest.

One of the leading explanations for unarmed killings of African Americans as proposed by critics and analysts, both within and outside of law enforcement, is the lack of training of police officers on how to de-escalate situations at potential crime scenes and during arrests. This argument points to an alleged inability of officers to accurately assess and effectively respond to an African American suspect’s mental and emotional state. One could say that the white officers’ unfamiliarity with the communication styles, customs, and protocols used in the black community, combined with the innate fear and suspicion of African American stereo ←10 | 11→types is the deep-rooted behavior arising from nearly four hundred years of brutality and oppression stemming from colonial slavery. Regardless of the reason, America and the rest of the world are finding it harder to ignore the significant rise in the number of police killings of unarmed black men.

For example, during the writing of this book, unarmed African American male, Walter Scott, a United States Coast Guard veteran, husband, and father was gunned down and killed in the state of South Carolina by former police officer Michael Slager, in April of 2015. After the incident, the North Charleston Police Department immediately fired officer Slager, who was subsequently charged with murder. The case went to trial and unfortunately, resulted in a mistrial, which understandably outraged the civil rights communities. This case is just one of many cases of white law enforcement officers being exonerated of criminal charges in the deaths of unarmed men and women of color. Like countless similar preceding cases, the black community is again left with no answers. How can an unarmed man, fleeing from the police, warrant six lethal shots to the back? Furthermore, how can such an action, resulting in Mr. Scott’s death, be justified? Mr. Scott, being unarmed, posed no threat to the police officer’s safety and well-being, nor to the community at large, and yet, he was killed without any severe consequences to the shooter.

Just three months later, on July 10, 2015, the bizarre case of Sandra Bland drew national and international attention. Bland, a 28-year-old African American Chicago woman was living in the state of Texas at the time. On a July afternoon, she was pulled over for a minor traffic violation; a failure to signal during a lane change. The conversation between Sandra and a Texas State trooper, Brian Encinia, turned volatile quickly. Coincidently, as the situation escalated, while Officer Encinia was commanding Sandra to exit her vehicle, the police trooper’s dashboard camera ceased to work properly. An eyewitness, who overheard Sandra screaming and crying, began recording the incident, but was immediately ordered to leave the scene. Shortly after being pulled over for what many argue did not even warrant a traffic stop, Sandra Bland was arrested and jailed at the Waller County Jail.

Within three days of her incarceration, Bland was found dead in her cell. The autopsy report cited the cause of her death as suicide by hanging. This was a complete shock to Sandra’s immediate family members who were fully convinced that she was en-route to her first day on a new job at her alma mater, Prairie View A&M University. Understandably, several private and federal investigations were launched, culminating into a $1.9 million dollar wrongful death civil settlement to Sandra’s family.

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Though the Bland vs. Waller County jail case resulted in a large civil settlement and multiple private and federal investigations, it did not lead to any criminal conviction for Encinia or anyone connected to the Waller County Jail. Officer Encinia was indicted by a grand jury for perjury for making false statements in his incident report, which included the claim that he removed Sandra Bland from her car in order to conduct a “safer traffic investigation.” But the perjury charge was later dismissed because a grand jury refused to indict anyone in the death of Sandra Bland.

Another national uproar followed the event. Civil rights organizations thrusted themselves intensively into the case, advocating for justice for the victim’s family. Bland’s mother, Geneva Reed-Veal, was one of nine grieving mothers who spoke at the 2016 Democratic National Convention regarding unlawful traffic stops and arrests and mentioned the fact that six other women died in custody the same month that her daughter was found dead in her jail cell. According to a study by the University of Texas at Austin Research Institute, “nearly 7,000 people died in Texas jails and prisons, or while in police custody over the past decade,” and over 1,100 of the deaths occurred while suspects were in custody in jails like the Waller County Jail. African Americans, who make up only 12% of the state’s population, account for 30% of custodial deaths. In addition, the New York Daily News reported that “nearly 90% of the people who died in such encounters had not been charged with any crimes (8).”

An article published on July 29, 2015, The Guardian.com, stated that according to Brandon Wood, Executive Director of the Texas Commission on Jail Standards, said that “140 inmates in Texas county jails have killed themselves since 2009, mostly white men. Suicide, usually by hanging, represents about one-third of the total deaths. Bland’s gender and race mark her out as unique (4).” What makes the county’s findings in the Bland case so dubious is the fact that white men account for most of these suicides, at about three times the rate as black and Hispanics people. According to Wood, “Bland’s gender and race mark her an unlikely prospect for suicide and if the allegations were true, she is the first African American woman to kill herself in a Texas county jail since the state’s standards agency started keeping death records (4).”

Nevertheless, the case sheds greater light on the issue of racial profiling and police brutality. The Marshall Project, which reported the Texas Commission’s findings, states that “after Bland’s death, the Texas Commission on Jail Standards inspected the Waller County Jail (3).” That inspection revealed several violations of protocols established to guarantee inmate safety and to insure staff ←12 | 13→competence. In fact, according to a report from ABC13.com, “as a condition of the settlement, Bland’s mother, Geneva Reed-Veal, says the Waller County jail must provide emergency nurses for all shifts; use automated electronic sensors to ensure accurate and timely cell checks; and activity seek the passage of additional state funds for jail intaking, inmate screening, training and additional jail support (1).”

Unfortunately, it took the death of an unarmed, college-educated, African American woman on her way to a new job to bring about these necessary changes. Some would argue that Sandra Bland was obligated to comply with the officer’s demand and that had she not “mouthed-off” at Officer Encina, maybe she would be alive today. However, the opposing views point out the fact that when law enforcement engages the public, in many cases, it is not going to be a consistently pleasant experience for the citizens being pulled over. Asking why questions, and even being disrespectful to a police officer, does not warrant imprisonments, the use of aggressive or lethal force which ultimately ended in Bland’s death. Nevertheless, the controversy regarding police protocol, traffic stops, adherence, and office etiquette continues to divide the nation.

The trend of killing unarmed African Americans continues into the 2020 New Year. Maryland police officer, Corporal Michael Owen shot and killed suspect William Green. Mr. Green was unarmed, in a seatbelt, and handcuffed in the back of a police cruiser when he was killed. Interestingly, officer Owen was not wearing a body camera during the altercation. This incident is America’s most recent example of negligent and inappropriate use of lethal force. The death of William Green was completely unnecessary and absolutely avoidable. Conduct a brief Internet search and you will learn the latest information and results of the case.

The Data Shows a Bleak Outlook

The following are the findings from Mappingpoliceviolence.org, which utilizes U.S. Census Bureau data from 2014 (6):

• Police killed at least 102 unarmed black people in 2015, nearly two every week.

• Nearly 1 in 3 black people killed by police in 2015 was identified as unarmed, though the actual number is likely higher due to underreporting.

• 37% of unarmed people killed by police, in 2015, were black despite black people being only 13% of the U.S. population.

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• Unarmed black people were killed at five times the rate of unarmed whites in 2015.

• Only 10 of the 102 cases in 2015 where an unarmed black person was killed by police resulted in the officer(s) being charged with a crime, and only two of these deaths (Matthew Ajibade and Eric Harris) resulted in convictions of the officers involved.

Sadly, there very few improvements in the numbers a year later. Mappingpoliceviolence.org reported the following data for 2015.

• African Americans have the highest likelihood of being killed by American police departments than other racial groups.

• Police departments disproportionately killed black people, who were 41% of victims despite being only 20% of the population living in these cities.

• 41 of the 60 police departments disproportionately killed black people relative to the population of black people in their jurisdiction.

• 14 police departments killed black people exclusively in 2015, 100% of the people they killed were black.

Interestingly, there is no recorded incident an African American police officer accused or convicted of shooting and killing an unarmed Caucasian American in the history of the United States of America at the time of writing this book. According to datausa.org (5), there are approximately 737,000 polices officers in the United States, of which nearly 80% of them are Caucasian. Datausa.com reports that the national police force comprised approximately 13% of African Americans; yet, they are without a history of a single record of major racial profiling and racially motivated, unarmed killings of white Americans.

In June 2018, prominent African-American actor and author, Terry Crews, made some paramount statements regarding the issue of wrongful imprisonment and treatment of African Americans. During Crew’s testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee hearing in 2016 relating to the sexual assault of his agency’s film producer, he made several comments regarding the plight of African American males overall. “As a black man in America,” he said, “you only have a few shots at success. You only have a few chances to make yourself a viable member of a community. I’m from Flint, Michigan. I have seen many, many young black men who were provoked into violence, and they went to prison. Or, they were killed. They’re not here (9).” What a dismal predicament for Americans to face just because they were born a particular race; a choice that they did not have a say in.

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Balch Springs, Texas

In the Spring of 2017 a Caucasian police officer shot and killed a 15-year-old African American teen, named Jordan Edwards, in Balch Springs, Texas. What is fascinating is that prior to this incident, Officer Roy Oliver had been disciplined in the past, which included a 16-day suspension for what sources at Nbcnews.com describe as, “anger-related problems (2).” In January 2017, Oliver had also performed poorly on an evaluation on questions about the code of criminal procedure, problem solving, and critical thinking. Oliver was, nevertheless, dispatched, along with Officer Tyler Gross, to the scene of a teenage house party, to investigate a report of alleged underage drinking.

According to witnesses at the party, gunfire rang out from somewhere in the vicinity of the house. When that happened, Jordan and his brother along with two friends decided to leave the area by driving away from the home. Officer Oliver claims to have ordered the driver to stop the vehicle upon arriving on the scene. But when Edward’s sixteen-year-old brother continued to drive away with Jordan in the front passenger seat, Oliver opened fire on the vehicle. Oliver shot through the front passenger side window with his police-issued Carbine MC5 rifle, striking Jordan in the back of the head and killing him instantly.

The careless and irresponsible actions of a low competent police officer with a history of anger issues led to the death of yet another innocent black, unarmed young male. No drugs, alcohol, or weapons were found at the party or in the teen’s vehicle. Though officer Oliver was consequently fired from his position at the Balch Springs Police Force, no amount of civil compensation or punishment to the former police officer will return Jordan back to his family.

Jordan Edwards was a happy, healthy, normal teenage American kid, who played football in high school, and who was loved by his family, teammates, and friends. He has been permanently deprived of the opportunity to grow up, graduate from high school, attend college, marry, and have children of his own because of his race. His death could have been prevented through a series of administrative quality control checks aimed at removing high-risk officers with a history of anger issues.

Former Officer Oliver was later convicted of murder and sentenced to fifteen years in prison. Sadly, he will likely be released early contingent upon “good behavior,” which is common legal practice in the United States. Even if Mr. Oliver served the full sentence of 15 years, he will be released before his fifty-fifth birthday. He will have ample time to restart is life and to live the American dream. Nevertheless, the Edwards family will never again have the opportunity to hug ←15 | 16→their beloved son Jonathan, attend his college graduation, and to watch him get married and to raise children.

Shot in the Back

Another not long past killing of an unarmed black male hails from Sacramento, California. The police were looking for a burglary suspect during a cool spring evening on March 18, 2018. Mr. Stephon Clark, a 22-year-old father of two, had no idea that he would not have the opportunity to take his one-year-old and three-year-old boys (at the time), to the beach, or Disney Land, or the county fair the upcoming summer. As two local police officers stormed Mr. Clark’s vicinity looking for a suspect, they fired 20 rounds at Clark in his grandmother’s backyard, believing that Clark had pointed a gun at them. Even more shockingly, Stephon Clark was gunned down from the back, holding no weapon, but rather just his cell phone.

In many cases police officers use what they refer to as a ‘perceived threat to the officers’ as the primary justification for the use of excessive violence. Nevertheless, several of the unarmed killings in the past couple of years were executed by officers shooting suspects in the back or while the suspect was in a position of submission and while even laying prostrated on the ground. While the officers involved in Clark’s case enjoyed paid administrative leave and were able to relax and watch the NBA finals on television in their homes with their loved ones, the Clark family has been delivered a crushing, and brutal lifestyle change without their son, father, and provider no longer available to them. In overwhelming sadness, despite the officer’s perceived threat, rationale, and/or excuses for killing Mr. Clark, the police officers have permanently removed any and every opportunity for his children to receive a hug from their dad in this life. The officer’s use of excessive force was unwarranted, and their decision will last a lifetime for the Clark family.

Another more recent and deeply deplorable cases of a police officer killing an unarmed man happened in Dallas, Texas. A young, single black male accountant named Botham Jean was quietly relaxing in his apartment on a chilly January evening when he lost his life. Mr. Jean was 26 years old when he was killed by former officer Amber Guyger. The former Pricewaterhouse Coopers firm accountant was alone in his apartment eating ice cream when Ms. Guyger placed two rounds from her pistol in his chest.

During her trial, she was emotional and continued to state that she was “afraid for her life.” She accused Mr. Botham of being in her apartment when in fact she ←16 | 17→was mistaken and accidently gone to Mr. Botham’s apartment. The prosecuting attorneys delineated that the former officer behaved with incredible error and distraction as she was exchanging romantic texts with another officer moments before the shooting.

In the end, she was fired from the police force, and convicted of murder. The victim’s brother Brandt Jean made international headlines by requesting to hug the defendant during her sentencing. He told her that “she was forgiven.” Amber was subsequently sentenced to ten years in prison. Civil rights community and community members believe that the sentence was shockingly light, another example of racial inequality and injustice. Guyger was given a ten-year prison sentence for the murder of an armed African American male eating ice cream alone in his apartment.

An even more frightening twist to this story is Mr. Jean’s death did not stop with him. Just a few days after the trial concluded, Jean’s neighbor Joshua Brown was also gunned down five miles from his former apartment complex where Jean was killed. Was Brown’s death a coincidence or a random incident? That would be difficult to believe for any intelligent person especially since Mr. Brown moved to another apartment complex shortly after testifying in court regarding the death of his neighbor. The scales of justice are not balanced for African Americans in the United States. America is unable to control its rampant gun violence presenting another barrier to the rebuilding of the African American community.

References

1. ABC13.com. (September 2016). Sandra Bland’s family says civil suit settled for $1.9M. Retrieved from https://abc13.com/news/sandra-bland-family-says-civil-suit-settled-for-$19m/1512442/

2. Ali, S. Nbcnews.com. (May 2017). Cop in Jordan Edwards shooting was ordered to anger management for past behavior. Retrieved from https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/cop-jordan- edwards-shooting-was-ordered-anger-management-past-behavior-n754996

3. Chammah, M. (September 2016). The Marshall project. Sandra Bland, one year later. Her death at a Texas jail spurred a striking amount of reform talk across political lines. Retrieved from https://www.themarshallproject.org/2016/07/12/sandra-bland-one-year-later#.hoViWWsQm

4. Dart, T., The Guardian.com. (July 2015). Sandra Bland’s death in police custody puts spotlight on Texas jail standards. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/jul/29/sandra-bland-police- custody-deaths

5. DataUSA. (2018). Police officers. Retrieved from https://datausa.io/profile/soc/333050/

6. Mappingpoliceviolence.org. (2014/2015). Police violence report. Retrieved from https://mappingpoliceviolence.org/2015

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7. National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. (October 2018). Criminal justice fact sheet. Retrieved from https://www.naacp.org/criminal-justice-fact-sheet/

8. Salinger, T., New York Daily News. (July 2016). Nearly 7000 people died in Texas police and jail custody in the past decade, report finds. Retrieved from http://www.nydailynews.com/news/crime/7-000-people-died-custody-texas-decade-article-1.2730186

9. Vagianos, A., Huffington Post. (2018). Terry Crews explained why fighting off his assailant wasn’t an option as a black man. The “Brooklyn Nine-Nine” actor discussed his sexual assault before a Senate committee. Retrieved from https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/terry-crews- fighting-off-assailant-not-an-option_us_5b326908e4b0b5e692f1cb36

10. Washington Post. (December 2015). A year of reckoning: Police fatally shoot nearly 1,000. Retrieved from https://www.washingtonpost.com/sf/investigative/2015/12/26/a-year-of- reckoning-police-fatally-shoot-nearly-1000/?utm_term=.26f9eecdb688

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