But
before continuing on, there is some room for criticism in the Black community.
First and foremost, we must stop using the police department as the
culturally-institutionalized racial boogey man or scarecrow to justify some
kind of almost inbred, generational hatred and mistrust of all police officers,
especially the ones who are White. Perhaps even more important than these
incidents that make national headlines in newspapers and lead stories on
broadcast news is the fact that more Black youth kill one another or are victims
of felony assaults than police shootings, so where is the outrage in that? This
is a real problem that the Black community doesn’t quite know how to come to
terms with and yet it is something that we just can’t ignore. What if Trayvon
Martin or Michael Brown had been shot by another Black youth, would we even be
talking about them or would they be just another entry in the local obituary
column?
Some
final thoughts: Does the age of the victim make a difference, I mean, what if
the police fatally shot an unarmed 12-year old Black male that was walking down
the street or on the sidewalk, or had just shoplifted some candy? What would be
the public reaction if a Black police officer shot a White teenage male six times,
with two bullet wounds to the head, or slammed a White teenager’s head on the
hood of a police cruiser, or if a minority officer placed a chokehold on a
White teenager who later died of a heart attack-would the officer be criminally
prosecuted or cleared to go back on duty? A few solutions: First and foremost, all
police officers or those who patrol in population dense urban areas or
communities with diverse ethnic minorities should be required to wear on-body
cameras as well as have dash cameras on their vehicles. These devices must be
working and on at all times, especially in encounters with criminal suspects.
Investigations of any suspicious shooting death by police should be handled by
an independent civilian review board or other agency unrelated to law
enforcement, and any forensics should be conducted by a medical examiner
outside the local jurisdiction.
The
U.S. Justice Department and Attorney General’s office should investigate these
kinds of events and take charge when local authorities are stonewalling, and
the government should vigorously seek indictments through a federal prosecutor
on civil rights violations, especially the Fifth Amendment: No one shall be
deprived of Life, Liberty, or Property without due process of law. President
Obama commented that this was another teachable moment, but for whom? What we
need is a “prosecutable” moment where these kinds of egregious abuses of police
power will not happen again. It is only when a police or law enforcement
officer is finally arrested, tried, and sentenced in federal court (because it
is highly unlikely that White jurors would convict) under a federal judge or
magistrate, that rogue cops will not be able to continue committing such criminal
acts with impunity.
What
the police departments have to realize is that the ‘real’ enemy is not the
Black community but one of your own fellow brothers in blue, and what the Black
community has to do is get over the internal programming of hating the
P-O-L-I-C-E that we have been spoon fed for generations; even when many of us
have had quite benign encounters with them which usually involved some kind of
traffic infraction or violation. And in those few instances when the police did
act in some other way, can we say we were just innocent victims minding our own
business and were randomly targeted without any prevailing circumstances to the
contrary, or that we weren’t doing something we should not have been doing, or
that we were at the wrong place at the wrong time? Let’s wake up and smell the
coffee and can’t we all just learn to get along.
Robert
Randle
ADDENDUM:
Since
the motivating idea behind the protests is about justice, would rioting in
Ferguson and other acts of civil disturbances and demonstrations taking place
across the country be happening if Michael Brown were White and shot by the
same policeman or another White officer? Why don’t White people get enraged and
tear up their communities or would they do so only if a Black cop shot a White
youth? In my local community there was a ‘rainbow coalition’ of residents,
probably more Whites than Blacks protesting the incident in Ferguson, but I
wonder how many Blacks would be participating in demonstrations where a White
youth was fatally shot by a White police officer- or even a Black policeman? I
mean, if it’s a matter of “justice” and not JUST US, then race, color,
ethnicity, gender, or sexual orientation shouldn’t matter- but we seem to be
nearly invisible when incidents of brutality happen to other people, or is it
only just about “us”? Lastly, I wonder what the level of tension is in the
squad room at the Ferguson police department, especially between the half dozen
Black policemen and their fellow White comrades in blue. Not only that, but
have any of the Blacks personally spoken to Officer Darren Wilson in a show of
support or shunned him, and would any of them be willing to partner with him in
future community patrols?776 Commerce St #B11
Tacoma, WA 98402
August 20, 2014
robertrandle51@yahoo.com
