BlackPerspective.net
Discussing the Diaspora as seen through an internal Black lens
Sean Bell Verdict: Judge Reinforces Police’ License To Kill
April 25th, 2008
Previously I’ve asked, Do Police Have A License To Kill ? Well, I guess once again the question has been answered in the affirmative. Three unarmed Black men shot 50 times by cops for no specific reason, and they are aquitted. Yet again, the New York “law enforcement” system renders police harming Blacks as lawful.
The fact that two of the three killer cops were Black doesn’t belie the point. Actually that’s what’s so insideous about the fabric of many police departments in this country and how they are rooted in certain mentalities. Blacks who put on the uniform become Blue, incorporating the mentality of the shield as described rather succinctly in a 1988 Ice Cube lyric:
“don’t let it be a Black and a white one
Cause they’ll slam you down on the street top
Black police showing out for the white cop”
But we have to “Respect the verdict”, in other words; except the police’ right to shoot citizens down in the street with impunity.
-
Disappointment in Jamaica after Sean Bell verdict
BY CARL MACGOWAN | carl.macgowan@newsday.com
12:45 AM EDT, April 25, 2008
On Liverpool Street, as the noontime hour approached and word of the officers’ acquittals spread on Friday, anger was directed toward the Police Department.
“This was a travesty. This tells black males that our lives are devalued,” said Antoine Johnson, 43, of Jamaica. “It tells NYPD that you have a license to kill black males.”
Johnson, who said he had known Sean Bell and also was acquainted with shooting victims Joseph Guzman and Trent Benefield, called Justice Arthur Cooperman’s decision “racist.”
He described the message sent to the black community in these words: “If you are white, you are right. If you are black, stay back.”
“The court is not going to help us,” Johnson said.
Supreme Court Justice Arthur Cooperman found that the state’s case was riddled with problems and that the prosecutors had failed to defeat the cops’ claim that they fired in self-defense on Liverpool Street the night of Nov. 25, 2006. The 50-shot barrage killed Bell and wounded two of his friends.
“The prosecution has not proven beyond a reasonable doubt that each defendant was not justified” in using deadly force, Cooperman said.
After the verdict, Mayor Michael Bloomberg said “there are no winners in a trial like this.”
http://www.newsday.com/news/local/newyork/ny-nystre0426,0,3138952.story
Sean Bell’s wife to be, since the shooting; changed her last name to Bell, and is raising their two young children.
posted in News & Events, Racial Injustice | | | View blog reactions |
14 Responses to “Sean Bell Verdict: Judge Reinforces Police’ License To Kill”
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Yobachi Boswell is creator and publisher of BlackPerspecitve.net. I’m a writer, activist and political watcher based in Nashville, Tennessee. I’ve also been know to do some spoken word and MCing in my day.
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Hi Yobachi,
I was listening at the former CourtTV now TruTV this morning, and a journalist who sat in the courtroom for the entire trial stated that, at the time that the shooting happened and with what he knew, he believed that it was a wrongful shooting.
He said that he believes that the verdict came down as such because of a shoddy prosecution job. He said that witnesses did not appear prepped, information that was given to the grand jury was not presented in court, and on and on. What a shame…not that we haven’t seen it before.
That’s an impressive observation, Yobachi– never knew that Ice Cube had rapped those lyrics, but he makes a good point with them.
I have some sympathy for cops in general, they have a tough job with tough calls, but this was just inexcusable. I have white, Latino and Asian friends backing us up on this, so this is hardly an unusual conclusion. This was, without any doubt, a horrendous act against a human being, and a decent one at that, taking care of his family. While accounts vary, Sean Bell seems to have been reasonably afraid that he was being carjacked– the undercover officer did not identify himself, and when Bell and Guzman took off like that, they were doing so in the fear that they were being attacked, not running away from an arrest. Besides, why shoot 50 times against someone who’s obviously fleeing? It’s so frustrating that this was given short shrift.
Despite the anger we all justifiably have due to the injustice of the Sean Bell case, we need to harness this anger toward productive uses.
If things are ever going to improve for African-Americans, we have to redouble our efforts to gain social, political and economic power here.
Remember, time and demographics are both on our side. Whites now have a birth rate well below replacement in the USA, while the African-American population grows steadily both by natural growth and immigration from Africa, Brazil and the Caribbean. Even some Blacks immigrating to the USA from France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany and Spain. (BTW if any of you can speak Spanish and/or Portuguese, please encourage our Black brethren in Latin America, especially from Brazil, to emigrate to the USA. There’s strength in numbers.)
I know Blacks and Latinos have often been at loggerheads, but we’re natural allies– both fighting against White oppression, with Latinos having been invaded in multiple wars by the Anglos in Florida, the Mexican-American War and Spanish-American War. Latinos lost half of Mexico when Anglos invaded in 1848, and were ethnically cleansed by Anglos so that they could start slavery in the conquered territories. Blacks and Latinos today are natural partners in the fight for social justice, both fighting for affirmative action and against discrimination. Spanish is an easy language to learn, and the more that we reach out to each other, speak some Spanish ourselves, and support our Latino brothers and sisters, the more our alliance is cemented.
I’d say if anything, the key for us is to gain political power, and to do that, it’s best to concentrate ourselves geographically a bit more in a few states, where we will soon be the majority. On the one hand, we need Blacks throughout the country to demand our rights, but on the other, a better geographical focus is the key to political power, as it is throughout the world’s democratic countries.
IOW, we need to have our own “North American Nubia” where we have a demographic majority and political power. Some Deep South States are obvious candidates– Mississippi, Alabama, Louisiana for example, all of which will soon be Black-majority within perhaps a decade. This would be a core of our nation.
But we can have a second North American Nubia (or North American Africana, whichever name you prefer) in the Upper Midwest– Michigan is one of the Blackest states in the Union, and much of Illinois is also strongly African-American in demographics, culture and social importance.
Some of my homies from college have even urged conversion to Islam for African-Americans. It’s not something I’ve considered myself, though I’ll acknowledge that at least for many urban African-Americans, they’ve done quite well after the conversion. Many having been in jail or kept out of jail, they become more focused and disciplined, as fathers they take care of their Black children and care better for Black women, stay away from drugs and violence and so forth. (interesting link a friend sent to me– The Nubian Manifesto )
IMHO there are many different personal routes we can take for empowerment, but as a group, we must stay strong and focused and, again, have enough of a geographic concentration that we can gain political power. Just as we should ally with Latinos as they become the majority in their own homelands in Southwestern states and Florida, so should Blacks ally with Muslims in Michigan (who will soon be the majority in that state).
It’s obvious from our people’s history here, that we’ll survive only by standing up for ourselves. Political and economic empowerment are the central aspects of this.
Shelia, I think if you look at the DA’s post verdict press conference in the clip above, where he so dispassionately says he just accepts the verdict and that’s it; shows how much he did not care about the case.
I have been dumbfounded all day. I don’t even know what to say.
It appears it’s open season on black folk. I got sick to my stomach when I heard this verdict today. It seems many black folk don’t care about these issues unless they are directly affected, but what they don’t seem to get is that this could have easily been one of their loved ones…….
I pray for the family of Sean Bell.
I kept looking to see the composition of the jury, but now I realize that the police officers had the good legal sense to request a bench trial, to a judge, rather than a jury. If they couldn’t get the trial moved out of New York City to an all-white suburb, then getting a white judge seems to have been the next best thing.
I agree that this ruling basically says that there is no way in which the police can kill a Black man that is illegal. It’s like Dred Scott for police officers.
Barack came out and said Blacks shouldn’t riot because ours is a nation of laws. He was smart to say that, so that no one can blame him if Blacks DO riot. Plus, his (apparent) ability to keep Blacks from rioting might make him more palatable to white people. (I think that’s why whites realize they NEED Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton, as much as they criticize them.)
Whites hate to lose money. If decisions like this inevitably caused white America to lose money somehow, then there would be less decisions like this.
Nubianus good comment.
I’ve had the same ideal about concentrating ourselves to amass geographical power, and have actually mapped it out on paper. There is a triangle (or really a diamond) from Nashville TN, east to Atlanta, then south to Birmingham/Montgomery, then west to Jackson MS back through Memphis to Nashville that have cities of high Black population. You can also extended it out east to Charlotte NC; with Huntsville AL and Jackson TN inside the diamond having high Black populations.
But yes, whatever the case, until we learn to stand up and fight and channel our anger into action; were not going anywhere or getting any justice.
Fifty shots and no one was charged with any form of crime. How in the hell can that be justified? I read all the latest information and my conclusion on this matter is simple. The unreliable testimony came from the other victims involved in the attack.
This is an OUTRAGE to decent people everywhere! I am related to law enforcement folks myself and even they have questioned why?
I hope that the Bell Family continues to seek justice in this matter.
Because it is obvious that the police are out of control and it is going to be okay for them to respond with excessive force.
AJ, the fact that people don’t care and don’t want to do anything until it directly effects them, is why we stay in this predicament. Until we learn that we are our brothers keeper, and we’re sinking in the same ship, it’s going to continue.
Francis, yeah, they new to keep the decision with the New York injustice system establishment, rather than taking a risk with the people.
msladydeborah, the police never identified themselves, and they never saw a gun; they just started shooting because Black lives don’t matter. It’s better to shoot first and ask questions later when the lives of the people you’re shooting at don’t matter in the first place.
I guess that I am an old fogey, from peace movement and nonviolent demonstration days. I found myself on the defensive recently at a party comprised of various age groups from mid twenties to sixties and seventies. An argument, peaceful, but with forceful expression, about this case and others.
I believe in strengthening our position as black peoples politically and economically; that is the way to solve this. Apparently some of our young men, some women, believe that we should arm ourselves and when the judicial system does not work, vigilanty justice is the way. Not only is this morally wrong, it is not practical. It will only make police officers more paranoid than they are now, in increase their desire to use deadly force. It will become warfare on our streets in the neighborhoods of black peoples.
In civil trials the rules of evidence are short of reasonable doubt. Each deadly event should be litigated, no quarter given. Make the incidents costly to the municipalities. When possible sue the officers.
Get political clout so that you can throw the rotten cops out. That is clear.
If you are white and want to become a police officer in America :
YOU CAN:
1. Be a coward and murder innocent sleeping black children as young as seven and just say it was an accident!
2. Shoot a black unarmed mothers in the head and then shoot her two year old son finger off and just say TOO-BAD-SO SAD!
3. You can shoot a unarmed innocent black man 41 times (MOST IN HIS FEET) and be back to work before his body in the ground! With nothing more then a out and out LIE!
4. Shoot a black man and his friends over fifty times killing the unarmed black man and putting 19 bullet in the surviving passenger and 4 bulletin the body of the back seat passenger!
5. Shoot a unarmed black man in the back murder him in cold blood and get three to four years in prison!
6. Shoot a 92 year old black senior citizen 39 times 6 hitting their mark. Then plant drugs in her home and a gun in her hands and handcuff the dying senior citizen. Then lie lie lie!
7. Kick handcuff punch innocent black men get caught on video and be back to work in a couple of months found not guilty!
8. Chase a black man and shoot him upwards of 60 to 90 time after the unarmed man stop his car!
9. Stop & Frisk black children in New York going to and from school. Make them take off their shoes and drop trousers in public!
10. Kick down black people doors and make their children and them lay in their floor! You can place your foot on their back,neck or throat and hold a conversation!
11. Can murder black cops and just say TOO-BAD-TOO-SAD just another accident!
NOTE: And the society we live in could careless …They are concern about other country civil right and NOT black Americans!
[...] November 5th, 2010 The sentencing of the minimum of two years for the Cop that shot a lying still, flat on his face, Oscar Grant, on video is the latest stamp of approval on U.S. police officer’s license to kill Black folks. [...]