Jessup, Maryland is home to the state’s only women’s prison, the Maryland Correctional Institute for Women, commonly known as “The Cut”. For years, advocates fought for a women’s pre-release center, which would house prisoners eligible to go out on work release, receive an income, and take family leave. Despite passing a bill into law mandating the construction of a women’s pre-release center, the state has only pledged $2 million towards its construction. Monica Cooper, founder and Executive Director of the Maryland Justice Project, joins Rattling the Bars to break down the significance of the pre-release center, why the state government is dragging its feet, and the real impact official inaction is having on women in The Cut.
Studio Production: David Hebden, Cameron Granadino Post-Production: Cameron Granadino
Transcript
Mansa Musa: Thank you for joining me on this edition of Rattling the Bars. I’m your host, Mansa Musa. The state of Maryland has never really known what to do with its population of incarcerated women. Women have always been an afterthought, as far as the prison system is concerned. And it has led to a perpetual state of neglect and disinvestment in the facilities and programs that incarcerated men get, but women don’t.
The Maryland Correctional Institute for Women, commonly called “The Cut,” is one of the oldest prisons in Maryland. In the 19th century, women were first housed in the quarters reserved for them at the Maryland Penitentiary. They were later lodged in a section of the Maryland House of Corrections, The Cut, which opened in 1879. Not until 1941 did the state construct a separate prison for women.
The Women’s Cut in Jessup was established in 1941 as the Women’s Prison of the State of Maryland. It was renamed in 1945 as the Maryland State Reformatory for Women. In 1962, it became the Maryland Institute for Women. Its present name was adopted in 1964. It housed prisoners from various custody levels: from minimum, medium security, to death row. After a two-year struggle to secure funding, 82 years later, the legislature passed a capital budget measurement to funnel $2 million toward the planning and construction of a woman’s pre-release center.
Joining me today to talk about the impact of this is Monica Cooper. Welcome, Monica. Tell our audience a little bit about yourself.
Monica Cooper: Yes, yes sir. First, I want to thank you for allowing me to be here and to speak on this topic here at Rattling the Bars. My name’s Monica Cooper. I’m the executive director of the Maryland Justice Project. We’ve been around since 2013 and our main goal was to try to push legislation that would help women and girls that are formerly incarcerated to have a better life and be able to have access to jobs, education, homes, and things like that. We’ve since pushed the boundaries some.
Realizing that one of the main things that a person needs; particularly women because they tend to be the breadwinners in the household and they tend to be the ones responsible for the children – One of the things that we’re pushing the boundaries of is in terms of moving women and girls into solar energy, moving women and girls into the tech fields, into robotics. Into those jobs that (1) are going to be around for years to come, and (2) that are going to pay a good salary. It’s hard for a woman that’s got three children to work at McDonald’s and is still expected to be able to provide a decent life for her children. So we’re pushing the bars a little bit and trying to be a part of the climate change initiative, the greening of our spaces.
Mansa Musa: Okay. So basically y’all are involved in all aspects of –
Monica Cooper: We are.
Mansa Musa: – Ensuring that women develop the necessary skills so they can have a quality life. Speaking of quality life, we have a situation in the state of Maryland, where we know for a fact that there’s only one prison that houses women. It’s called the Maryland Correctional Institute, commonly called The Cut. We recognize that when it comes to women in any prison system anywhere in the US, there’s a disconnect between them and the treatment that they’re getting or the lack of treatment that they’re getting, and that of men.
I’m going to outline, then you can walk us back through the progression. Y’all had got the Maryland General Assembly Legislature to pass a bill that highlighted the necessity for women to have a pre-release center. ‘Cause Maryland doesn’t have a pre-release center for women. And in getting that done, y’all was able to get the state legislature to mandate that the governor allocate money towards this project. Initially, y’all asked for $125,000. Y’all have since then gone back and got $2 million towards the building of this project.
Walk our audience through what exactly is going on. Because $2 million is not going to build anything in terms of providing a lesser security environment for women and allowing women to have the opportunity to be able to (1) go out on work release, (2) get an income, and (3) be able to have family leave. So unless they have these things, unless they have this institution, the chances of them being able to have that in any shape or form will never exist. Walk us through what exactly is going on with this pre-release system and the history of it.
Monica Cooper: Okay, a brief history: in 2016, the Maryland Justice Project went to Annapolis, not knowing who would sponsor such a bill. We sought out several candidates, we went to then-Sen. Barbara Robinson. We were having meetings with her, asking her if she would sponsor this bill to help us to get a pre-release center back open. Well, Sen. Robinson didn’t come back during the next legislative cycle when we finally got the support that we needed so we asked then-Del. Mary Washington if she would sponsor the bill. It failed. We brought it back again. This time she was now Sen. Mary Washington.
And we thought that the fiery candidate from Montgomery County, Charlotte Crutchfield, would be a great person to push this bill. When it comes to legislation, you really have to choose those people who are going to work hard for the bill; that’s going to rally people around this bill, their constituents, while the advocates do the on-the-ground work. That’s what the partnership is about because you have some legislators that don’t work at all unless it’s something that really, really suits them. They’ll have a hundred bills, but none of them pass, none of them are successful because they don’t really do the work that’s required.
But in the interest of time, the bill was passed in 2020. Then-Gov. Larry Hogan vetoed the bill. We were able to come back the following legislative session in 2021 and get the override that we needed to make that thing law. So it became law in 2021. But what happened was, as I had mentioned earlier, one of my colleagues called it an economic veto. An economic veto is when the person in power doesn’t have the will to make this law become the law of the land. So what they’ll do is they will fail to put that money in the budget and that means you can’t do anything. It’s almost as if the veto was effective, so there’s an economic veto that stymies your efforts.
But what that previous governor didn’t know, is we are tenacious. We have had to set up meetings in the subcommittees, capital budget, public safety subcommittees, appropriations, wherever the money is. That’s where we had to go, which really caused me to learn something: when you really want to get something done, start where the money at.
Mansa Musa: That’s right. Show me the money.
Monica Cooper: Because all of it is going to end up in spaces where those people who are in control of the budget will have to vote on what we are actually going to spend this money on. So we all learned a great deal, and we were all excited to be in those spaces because those spaces are generally reserved for big-time lobbyists, those spaces are generally reserved for companies with a whole bunch of money, that get to have those back-door meetings and get to have the time of those people who sit on the finance committee. They are willing to give those people that time. But lowly advocates, very rarely do they see us and they are not even willing to give us their time in many cases.
We played good in the sandbox, we let them know that we want to be partners with them. So we had made some inroads where they don’t even hear from us. We would call and say, hey, can I meet with Senator So-and-So? Or, can we set up a meeting with Delegate So-and-So? Well, they’re busy. But if I called to say, I’m from the Xerox Company, if I called to say, I’m from Whiting-Turner, if I called to say, I’m from Potts & Callahan, Saputo – The big-time developers – They would set up meetings quick, fast, and in a hurry. So I was thrilled that they actually worked with us with some nudging.
We were able to get them. Because the legislation says that $2 million would’ve been allocated to do research or a study, what’s needed to go in this space. And it was another $150,000. Well, of course, we know and they know, that’s nowhere near the amount of money that we need to have this facility built. But in our mind, as long as it’s in the line item and it’s in the budget, the next logical step is to add more money to that budget line item. Because all the hard work had been done. But much to our surprise, we still were being stymied.
Mansa Musa: How so?
Monica Cooper: By folks who didn’t have the will to do so.
Mansa Musa: Okay. Okay.
Monica Cooper: The administrations have changed. So at this point, there’s really no reason why this project in this past session wasn’t fully funded. It should have been, we still have work to do. And we’re hoping that – Fully fund the project. It’s needed. It’s a Title IX issue. No lawyers are involved at this point. But you should not have to –
Mansa Musa: – and Title IX, for our audience, is?
Monica Cooper: – Title IX is an issue that says if you do it for the boys, you have to do it for the girls.
Mansa Musa: Okay. That’s what we need to have happen. That’s right.
Monica Cooper: If I can break that down for you. It’s against the law.
Mansa Musa: Right. To discriminate against women.
Monica Cooper: To discriminate against women. That’s in sports, that’s in every facet of our society. It all hinges on that Title IX issue.
Mansa Musa: And we know that the reason why it’s a Title IX and why we can invoke Title IX is because the men have pre-release. The men have family leave. The men have the ability to go out in the street and work, whereas the women, under the same Department of Corrections, under the same Public Safety and Correctional Service, under the same regulations and rules, don’t have these things. Okay, but tell me this, then: Why do you think it wasn’t fully funded in this past legislative session?
Monica Cooper: Well, the new historical-appointed Carolyn Scruggs, who made history being the first African American Secretary of Corrections – Hats off to the Moore administration, and hats off to our new secretary – Ms. Carolyn Scruggs has been in the business for about 27 or 28 years. In fact, I believe that her previous role was that of the re-entry person handling those things. She was a leftover. Well, I’ll say she was previously in the Hogan administration.
Mansa Musa: Under Green.
Monica Cooper: Under Rob Green. I don’t know what her personal decision might be, or her personal feeling about it. But I know that she didn’t budge, Green didn’t budge, and former Gov. Hogan didn’t budge when it came to this effort. And unfortunately, it feels that way still. It was said, well, that was an oversight. That they didn’t put it in there because if the annual budget comes out every year, then, the Department of Social Services, Department of Transportation, Department of Corrections, if they don’t make the request, then it’s not going to be put in there.
So it is my belief that the Department of Corrections didn’t even make the request. The Department of General Services as well played a role because they are the ones who are going to see this project through. And we believe that neither of them has been in a hurry to make this happen, even though it’s the law. They are breaking the law by not making that happen.
Mansa Musa: I did 48 years in the Maryland prison system and I was under the Department of Public Safety and Correctional Service. The Division of Corrections is the same system that the women are housed under. The same regulations exist: in order for men to get a reduction in security, they have what they call a point system. You accrue so many points and automatically, your security is reduced. When your security is reduced, you either move to another institution or are released. So when your security is reduced from medium security to minimum security, from minimum security to pre-release, all this is predicated on a number of factors.
But more importantly, the number one factor is the amount of time served. It automatically opens up the door for, whatever my sentence is, how much time I served on it. When I become parole-eligible, that means I serve at least one-fourth, and under new law, maybe one-half. But that automatically says that I’m entitled to a security reduction. How is this being done or exercised now, with The Women’s Cut being the only women’s prison and these different levels of security in these institutions? How are these women able to progress, or even have access to progress?
Monica Cooper: Well, unfortunately, what the Maryland Correctional Institution for Women has done under the Department of Corrections is, they had called themselves shutting down the one pre-release center that they had in the whole state for women. They shut it down and sent them all back to Jessup in 2009. When we were calling them on it, they decided that they would set up the pre-release inside the prison. That’s impossible.
Mansa Musa: Yes sir.
Monica Cooper: It’s impossible because it violates COMAR. There are regs, as they call them, there are regulations that say once a person reaches minimum pre-release and work release status, they are supposed to be housed in a specific manner. You’re not supposed to be housed behind wires, then a door, then another door, and another door. So the way that they are housed is against the law. But they call themselves having the pre-release center inside a facility that houses maximum, medium, and minimum. And they dug a hole for themselves because now that you have stymied the efforts to have a standalone facility, now you are forced to lie. Now you are forced to intentionally stagnate the progression of the women.
It’s women that are medium security that probably should be minimum or pre-release. But because they don’t have a facility to send them to, and they don’t want their numbers to rise, they stagnate them. So if you ask them, well, how many eligible folks do you have? They might say, we got 60. When in actuality, if you had classified them according to what COMAR says, you will probably have about 200. So what the Department of Corrections is, they continue to dig a hole for themselves. You know how when you tell one lie, then you got to tell another one? Then you got to remember that lie. Then you’re in this pickle, you’re in that pickle. That’s almost the situation that they are currently in now, honestly.
Mansa Musa: Okay. And as we close out, I want you to highlight where are y’all going next. Because as you outlined, women are being stagnated by virtue of this intransigent attitude toward putting money in there. And shovel, dirt, dig, build. Where do y’all go now? Y’all got $2 million, and y’all strategies seem to be working in holding their feet to the fire. Where do y’all go now? And when do you envision this entity or your work coming into fruition, in the form of a pre-release being, and coming into existence?
Monica Cooper: Well, our legislative sessions here in Maryland are usually from January 9 or 11, up until April 15. We have a 90-day session here. In those entire 90 days, we are constantly setting up meetings, trying to come into spaces to talk about our work, and trying to gain some support from the community at large. So one of our next steps is going to be to go back yet again, even more firmly, and ask that we be fully funded. But this time we are going back with even more supporters. And we’re going back with a little more statistics and a little more facts.
Because when you’re in these spaces, it’s not only for work release. It’s not only to be able to go home. This facility is the more concentrated effort on preparing you to go home. That’s why it’s called the pre-release. This is pre-exiting. So during your pre-exiting, you have to be strong enough to fight your urges to use drugs. You have to have a foundation of training so that you can get a job and maintain a job. We should never send anybody home from incarceration unemployed. Everybody that exits a facility should have a job before they come home so they’re already coming into the community being functional. They’re already coming into a community helping to build that tax base that we need for our schools, for our roads, those things that we need. So they’re doing a disservice by having a record number of overdoses at MCIW.
Mansa Musa: Yeah, I already know. That’s right.
Monica Cooper: They’re doing themselves a disservice by sending a woman home that hasn’t had a chance for training. She hasn’t had a chance to get a job. You’re sending her home in the same situation that she came in the prison with and it’s a disservice because if you had that facility, you would be able to concentrate on those things and produce and send home people who are less likely to re-offend. So we’re coming back with more facts and more statistics and stronger advocacy.
We have been staying away from using the court system in trying to work with the administration and everything. But it’s a sin and a shame that you would have to take somebody to court for something like this. This is obvious. There’s no way in the world that a logical-thinking person wouldn’t say, well we have all of these facilities for men, but we don’t have any for women. That’s small. There’s no way. You don’t have to have somebody prove to you why you need it. In fact, the Women’s Pre-Release Center came online in the ’70s. They were called Community Rehabilitative Centers.
Mansa Musa: Rehabilitation Centers. Right.
Monica Cooper: So because you took it away, put it back.
Mansa Musa: That’s all. That’s simple as that.
Monica Cooper: So we’re coming out strong, and we need a lot of support.
Mansa Musa: All right. Talk about that. Talk about how our audience can get in touch with you. What do you want our audience to do?
Monica Cooper: Info@marylandjusticeproject.org. And Maryland is written completely out. We’re going to need everybody. And I promise you that we can do this but we got to do it collectively, and we got to push back. And it doesn’t matter what party you belong to. This is not about a particular party.
Mansa Musa: It’s not about politics, it’s about humanity.
Monica Cooper: It’s not about a particular individual. It’s about people seeing that this is what we need, and getting it done. If you can spend $50 billion to study oysters, bluefish, and things like that; these things that I love. I love the Maryland blue crab. But if you take a look at the budget and see how some of that money is being spent on some of those studies, even on a federal level, you look at the budget, you say, doggone, man. They’re studying how plants open and close. They gave the National Institute of Health $40 million to study if the sun is going to wink at you. If you look at it, some of the stuff that they actually put monies towards, it’s like, come on. This is a simple kind of fix.
Mansa Musa: That’s right. Okay. So there you have it. The Real News, Rattling the Bars, Monica Cooper. As she outlined, this is a matter of humanity, this is not a matter of earmarking money for something that is not going to have a return. It’s a matter of giving women the same equal rights that you give everybody else. Monica, thank you for joining us today.
Monica Cooper: My pleasure. I look forward to coming back.
Mansa Musa: We appreciate you and we look forward to you coming back. We know that you have a hard schedule today, but we look forward to you coming back. And more importantly, coming back and telling us that the money has been allocated, and women will be given equal opportunity to return to society as they should be. Thank you very much.
Monica Cooper: Thank you.
Mansa Musa: And we ask you to continue to support Rattling the Bars and The Real News. It’s only on Rattling the Bars and The Real News that you get this information about what’s going on with women in the Maryland prison system. More importantly, how we can change this narrative. How we can get our families, our friends, and our loved ones to support the efforts that are being done to get a woman’s pre-release center built that will provide the opportunity for women to come out with jobs, come out with education, come out with the skills that they’ll be able to use to stay in society. And more importantly, to repair their lives and bring up their children. Thank you.
We are sending out condolences to the family members of Mutulu Shakur, an activist and member of the Black Liberation Army. He transitioned July 7. He was 72 years old, a political prisoner of war. Mutulu was incarcerated for 36 years before being granted parole in December of 2022, due to his declining health. He was denied parole nine times and diagnosed with terminal bone marrow cancer, with doctors giving him six months to live. Rest in Power, Dr. Mutulu Shakur.
Inequality lies at the heart of contemporary American politics—from the dizzying power of corporations and the billionaire class to the racialized and gendered dimensions of wealth and income disparities. Yet the question of economic justice, as well as the struggle to attain it, also has long historical roots. Mark Paul joins The Marc Steiner Show to discuss his new book, The Ends of Freedom: Reclaiming America’s Lost Promise of Economic Rights, an historical treatment of historical pursuits of economic equality in America spanning centuries.
Mark Paul is an Assistant Professor of Economics at the Edward J. Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy Rutgers University. He is a political economist working in the areas of inequality and environmental policy.
Studio / Post-Production: David Hebden
Transcript
The following is a rushed transcript and may contain errors. A proofread version will be made available as soon as possible.
Marc Steiner:
Welcome to the Marc Steiner Show here on The Real News. I’m Marc Steiner. It’s great to have you all with us again. We’re going to talk about a book today. It’s called The Ends of Freedom. It’s a really fascinating book by Rutgers professor Mark Paul. Its subtitle is reclaiming America’s Lost Promise of Economic Rights. It takes us on a journey from the legacy of Thomas Paine and Alexander Hamilton to Lincoln and the Radical Republicans, FDR, A. Philip Randolph, Henry Wallace, Martin Luther King, and some of the folks we might not remember, like Harry Hopkins, all of them fighting and organizing for everything from the Freedom Budgets to the Bill of Economic Rights.
This is not just a journey through our past struggles. It looks at the struggles between negative and positive freedoms, the battles for the soul and future of our nation, and what all that says about where we are today. I said our guest is Mark Paul. He’s assistant professor at the Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy at Rutgers. His work has appeared in numerous publications, New York Times, Economist, Washington Post, The Nation, Financial Times, covering the spectrum, and joins us now to talk about this book, the Ends of Freedom, Reclaiming America’s Lost Promise of Economic Rights. And Mark, welcome, good to have you with us.
Mark Paul:
It’s wonderful to be here with you.
Marc Steiner:
So this is a pretty expansive book. I mean…
Mark Paul:
I just did off a few things.
Marc Steiner:
Yeah, just a couple of things. Just a couple of things. So let’s take it from the beginning and talk a bit about your approach to this subject, what we face in the world today, but why you took us on this journey and what that journey was.
Mark Paul:
Look, I didn’t grow up wanting to be an economist. I don’t know about you.
Marc Steiner:
Who does?
Mark Paul:
Some people grow up wanting be a journalist, but I don’t know any six year old that wants to be an economist when they grow up. But from when I was 14, I really wanted to be a chef. And thanks to public broadcasting, Julia Child on PBS helped me learn how to cook. And I worked in restaurants since I was 14 and I loved it and I still love it here today. And the reason I start here is because this is what got me interested in economics. It was the real world. It was working on the line at high-end restaurants next to immigrants who had been showing up for work 60 hours a week every week. And they were making marginally above minimum wage, maybe $10 an hour, $12 an hour, but they were nowhere close to being able to make ends meet.
And none of us, with the exception of the head chef and sous chef, could actually afford to eat in the restaurant we’re cooking in. And this got me interested in inequality, and this notion of the American dream and work hard, you’ll get ahead. And I just kept realizing so many people around me are working so incredibly hard, yet the barriers of inequality are just blocking their road to success time and time again. And it’s at that point that I really started studying the economic system and started realizing that here in the United States we have 40 million people in poverty. We have another a hundred million people living just a paycheck away, a lost paycheck away from economic imprecarity. And there’s nothing natural about that. It really is a policy choice. And so I went to school for economics, but let me tell you, economists don’t really study history these days.
And it was later in my time as a graduate student studying economics that I decided to look back in American history and understand a little bit more about this promise of the American dream and this promise of freedom here in the United States. Jefferson’s proposed life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness. Because I realize that in order for those words to ring meaningful, to be held true, we not only need political rights, we not only need social rights, we not only need reproductive rights, all rights which are increasingly coming under attack, but we also need economic rights. We need food on the table, a roof over our head, healthcare when we’re sick and the like. So that set me on a course to study American history and better understand how we’ve been thinking about this notion of economic provisioning throughout American history because the story we tell today, which is a story of unfettered free markets coupled with limited government, delivers us to heaven essentially just isn’t working for the vast majority of people.
And I wanted to try to figure out a different story. And the main reason I focus on US history is precisely because today the right completely owns the US story. They completely own the American story. Freedom for instance, the most powerful word in our political discourse is completely associated with the Republican Party today. And I think that’s something that we need to understand and reconsider at a much deeper level because the Republican Party is not exactly delivering freedom for the American people through their policies. And so I wanted to take a look and think about what is a more meaningful robust notion of freedom that lets people actually live dignified lives and be and do what they themselves have reason to value.
Marc Steiner:
So as I was reading the book, one of the things that struck me was your discourses on freedom and how that has been a debate about what America is from the very beginning, and that there have been periods as you write about when your notions of freedom you can, let’s talk a bit about these kinds of ideas about freedom and how they interact and how they confront one another. But this has been the struggle in America from the beginning. That to me rang really true in this book.
Mark Paul:
So when we talk about freedom today, people often think of the Don’t Tread on Me flag. They think of Grover Norquist famous quip, you want to shrink government down to size where you can strangle it in the bathtub coupled with access to markets, which is really a notion of freedom. That is a radical notion of freedom itself. And I think part of what I wanted to do is challenge that. The common understanding we have of freedom today is not the common understanding throughout American history. It’s not the understanding of freedom for those who partook in the Freedom March or wrote the Freedom Budget during the civil rights era. They had a much more robust understanding of freedom, as did our founders. And what they realized was that yes, we need negative freedoms, which are so famously articulated in the Bill of Rights, freedom from government.
But let’s also remember when the founders wrote the Bill of Rights, we were not rebelling against a government of the people for the people by the people. The people were rebelling against a monarchy. So it’s a very different situation than we find ourselves in here today. But those negative freedoms, freedom from government, which are important, we need access to free speech, we need personal protections, but those aren’t sufficient. And that’s where positive freedom comes into play as well. And this idea was articulated clearly by Isaiah Berlin, an Oxford philosopher, but also by another wonderful Oxford philosopher that I wish were better known, T.H. Green, who really talked about to live a dignified and meaningful life, we need our basic economic rights met.
And what’s fascinating is when you look back at the American story, you realize that these were always central to it. Thomas Paine, who wrote the most incendiary pamphlet of the Revolutionary Era, Common Sense, talked at length about the notion how everybody, every single citizen deserved a piece of the collective economic pie, not as charity, not as welfare, but as their birthright. Because to be a citizen, it meant that everybody got not just those political rights, but also economic stability. And we actually see this play out through American history. The Homestead Act might be the most famous example of this, where Lincoln and the radical Republicans intentionally redistributed land larger than Texas today to try to provide economic security to new settlers.
Marc Steiner:
So a couple of things here, one is that when you look at the struggles in this country historically, before we get into your ideas about what these struggles tell us about where we could go and we can talk a bit about how we can get there, is that there’s always been this battle in America over the notion of freedom and what that means. And a lot of it was based that you touch on in portions of your book around race, around enslavement, around racism, segregation that also has hurt the struggle for freedom as well as advancing the struggle for freedom.
So I’m curious, having gone through all of this, when you look at Thomas Paine and even Hamilton, when you look at the struggles in the Civil War and the three acts that you focus on of the radical Republicans that they created, we can talk about, and then you look at how that was defeated and thrown back, and you look at then the New Deal that you spent a lot of time talking about and how that kind of changed America in profound ways. And again, the pushback that puts us in the place where we are today in struggling for what freedom and equality actually means and economic freedom. So talk about how you see that historic dynamic, why it has been played out the way it’s played out, and where you think that takes us.
Mark Paul:
Yeah, I think it’s a crucial point. Look, I just mentioned the Homestead Act a moment ago. And the Homestead Act, it’s important to note largely was available to white male settler. And in general, the vast majority of blacks were excluded from the Homestead Act. Now we did for a brief moment, have 40 acres and a mule, which unfortunately was essentially repealed following the assassination of Lincoln. But this country is founded on settler colonialism and we do need to reckon with that fact. And Aziz Rana’s work, The Two Faces of Freedom is just absolutely brilliant for folks who want to dig into that notion more. But when we come into the New Deal, for example, we see there too, the New Deal was essentially a Faustian bargain between Roosevelt and Southern segregationists where in many instances, women and black workers, particularly in the South, were excluded from sufficiently benefiting from New Deal programs. So there is a long racist history in this country.
Now the question arises then, does that mean that we should forget that history or does that mean that we need to reckon with that history and when developing legislation to correct it to actually consider how is it that we build the strongest policies moving forward so that we don’t have a real fracturing of the working class, which is what has been happened so many times throughout American history? And this is where the work of King, A. Philip Randolph and Bayard Rustin during the 1960s, I find so instructive. When King for instance, turned his attention to the Poor People’s campaign, he made it very clear that this was not a campaign for poor black Americans. This was a campaign for all of America because he understood that the only way to build meaningful and enduring freedom in this country is for all to be free.
And that meant, and we can get into the policy discussion a little later, but that meant that we have to develop universal policies that benefit everybody. Now the best example of this in our modern political era is when we look at Medicare versus Medicaid. Now Medicare is a high quality program because everybody over the age of 65 is benefiting from it. Medicaid on the other hand, is a substantially lower quality program and comes with much more stigma, particularly because it is a program designed for the poor. So as Wilbur Ross quipped, he’s said one of the chief architects of the New Deal and Great Society programs for the Poor Make Poor Programs. And I think that rings true.
And I think the same thing can be said for race specific programs. If we were to develop a lot of programs just targeted, for instance, towards Black Americans or towards Brown Americans, I think that we would not only create substantial political divides, but I also would not have faith in our ability to build strong and politically enduring programs through that approach. So what we call this, and we can chat about it more, is targeted universalism, programs that apply to all but disproportionately benefit the least well off in society.
Marc Steiner:
So it really screamed out at me from your pages, the different parts of history you talked about, whether it was period of Lincoln and the radical Republicans and the two acts, the Pacific Railroad Act and the Homestead Act, and also the Moral Act. But those first two, especially to me, of course they were, were built on the backs of colonialism and genocide against indigenous people even to be able to make those things happen in the first place.
Mark Paul:
Absolutely.
Marc Steiner:
But that what the radical Republicans tried to do with the freedmen in the South through the 1860s and 70s to what Roosevelt attempted to do and the contradictions of race that you just mentioned that happened there, and then with King and the movement around the Poor Peoples campaign, which I was lucky enough to be really part of. So my question is, what do you think from all the work you’ve been writing about with all of this, what is the dynamic that allows the New Deal to take that as an example, those policies that completely transform America kind of put restraints on capitalism in many ways to fail and give rise to neoliberalism? Do you know what I’m saying? There’s always these push forwards and it seems like there’s this huge pushback because we can’t have that. We can’t have black folks having freedom. You can’t attack the fundamentals of capitalism in America. So why do you think as an economist and a historian as well, why that constantly happens and where that places us now?
Mark Paul:
Yeah, it’s a great question. Often the way I talk about this is as if there’s a pendulum swinging. So prior to the New Deal, the pendulum had swung to the right. We had Hoover, which largely embraced this notion of laissez-faire kind of free markets. And in reaction to Hoover is what precisely gave rise to Roosevelt in the New Deal. And then fast-forward and in the 1960s and early 70s, the reaction to war Keynesianism is precisely what gave rise to modern neoliberalism, which many people start with Reagan. But I would contend actually that Jimmy Carter was our first neoliberal president, Democrat mind you who just hugely embraced the deregulatory state. I mean in his first State of the Union address, he talked about deregulation at great length and really fought to limit government’s capacity. And here today we’re still struggling with the repercussions of what he started.
Now the question arises why. I think that there’s lots of reasons. And the second chapter in my book, I really try to outline how did we get here, meaning the neoliberal state that we are struggling with today. And I think it’s a really challenging question. On one hand, I think that we did have a rise of a coherent theory through the works of folks like Milton Friedman and Frederick Hayek who really outlined what we today call neoliberalism very methodically and very much took this to the people. They did not sit there and exclusively write academic papers. Instead, they worked at length to bring this to the business community and the political community. Friedman famously created a multi-part PBS series to explain his ideas to general audiences. And so they really took these ideas to the street in ways that just had a profound impact.
I think it’s a complicated story though. A number of the other things that occurred was very much the war, Vietnam and kind of the downfall of LBJ. I mean Johnson’s Great Society in general passed multiple pieces of incredible legislation, but was also largely a domestic failure due to his international policies that in part fueled inflation, which kind of opened the door to cracking down on domestic spending programs. So I think in part it was a failure to integrate a domestic progressive agenda with a broader progressive international worldview and agenda.
The final thing I’ll say here is that I also think a substantial part of this was Democrats themselves moving away from the New Deal. I mean Gary Hart for instance, ran on a stump speech, actually entitled The Death of the New Deal. I mean Hart lambasted the New Deal as a Democrat. And so we had the Democrats themselves running away from this as party lines started shifting and the white working class of the South started moving away from the Democratic Party following the civil rights movement.
Marc Steiner:
Again in the book towards the end of the book, you really outlined it in a very profound ways, policies that could actually alter America and move it in the direction that both New Deal and radical reconstruction actually attempted to do and did to an extent. So I’m curious kind of reflecting on your book, let’s talk a bit about those proposals, but also how you think you get there. I mean, clearly the resistance to change has caused the control among Republicans earlier and Democrats now to move to the right and they really have. And now the rise to the right is a profound moment. We’re in that moment at this moment. We see a rise of the right across this country and it’s a pushback even when the idea that we talk about are not in sway and in control. So talk about politically how you see looking at history again, how that begins to change and how you take the ideas that you talk about the end of your book and actually make them both palatable and understood and part of a movement to change.
Mark Paul:
If I had a full answer to that question, I think we’d be in a much better situation than we found ourselves in today. But look, let me do my best here. I mean, one of the reasons I wrote this book, which is it’s meant for a broad audience. I didn’t write this for other economists, I wrote this for your average person who is interested in politics. So for all of those of you who watch the news regularly, I think you’ll found this quite digestible.
Marc Steiner:
And accessible. Very accessible.
Mark Paul:
Yeah. And I think that that’s part of it. Neoliberals did a very nice job making simple supply and demand curves very understandable and accessible to the people. One of the most common classes in college is Economics 101, which teach you basic things like rent control is terrible, minimum wages will implode the labor market, so on and so forth. And guess what? Modern economics, and this is not progressive economics, just modern empirical economics, debunks most of the central tenets of neoliberalism. And so what I try to do is try to arm people with economic literacy so they can understand and think about how many of these progressive ideals programs like college for all, Medicare for all and the like make economic sense. And I try to arm folks with those arguments. And I think that’s very important because we have seen the Democratic Party for decades either embrace neoliberalism or be on defense against neoliberalism.
But what’s really been missing is an affirmative vision about how we can and should structure the economy and why. And that’s precisely what I try to outline with my economic bill of rights. I try to provide us with a North star so people understand what’s the connective tissue between so many of these policy programs that leftists have been talking about certainly for about a century in many instances, but at least in our recent political discourse really since Sanders’s 2016 run. But I think even Sanders himself really struggled to tie this together for voters so that they could understand why is college for all connected to the Green New Deal connected to Medicare for all? What are you really trying to work for versus just having a laundry list? So I think having a coherent vision is really important. And I also think grounding this in the American tradition is crucial to build a broader net than the kind of current left has today.
Marc Steiner:
What does that mean? What do you mean by that, grounding it in the American tradition?
Mark Paul:
Yeah, so a lot of what I’m trying to do here is almost a Howard Zinn economics version where I’m trying to lift up all these stories here in the United States where we’ve struggled for so many of these ideas that get labeled as radical or lefty here today. When you go out and you talk to voters, and we actually did this, and you outline the ideas in an economic bill of rights, not only do we see a vast majority of Democrats supporting it, in fact 92% of Democrats under 45 embrace the notion, but the majority of independents and Republicans do as well. Why? Because freedom is an American idea. And everyday people understand in order to live a free life, you need food and housing and healthcare and the like. And so these ideas are wildly popular and in part they’re popular because they come out of our own American tradition here in the United States that we don’t need to say, hey, look what Finland does. Let’s import those policies. We should do that to a degree. We can learn a lot from our neighbors, don’t get me wrong.
But I also think providing an alternative history to just, we have capitalism, every man works for themselves type of narrative, which is what’s common in the Republican Party is really detrimental. And so people need to be proud while recognizing the struggles we’ve had in the US of this kind of decades and in many cases centuries long struggle for economic justice. In many cases this is what some of our founders really put front end center, not only Paine, but also Hamilton and Jefferson talked about these ideas at length.
Marc Steiner:
So that’s interesting what you just said here, and I was thinking about that I was also was reading in the book that the stories you tell around Thomas Paine, the stories that most people have not heard about ever. I mean like Mr. Hopkins, to most people he’s lost to history are happy because people don’t know who he is or who he was. The question becomes for me how you tell these stories and how you would tell these stories because you do it here. You tell the stories of these men, predominantly men in the book, but men who have pushed these ideas and really fostered change that people could really kind of support. If you look at the polls you talk about, they talk about people actually support these ideas that we call left, but they really become universalist ideas for people for Americans to have a better life. I just wanted to take your book and figure out how to translate that into stories in a broader sense to bring people in to say there can be a different way.
Mark Paul:
Yeah, yeah, that’s absolutely right. Well, let me focus on one of the women that I put front and center in the book-
Marc Steiner:
Go ahead. Yes, please.
Mark Paul:
… Who I absolutely adore is Frances Perkins. I mean she’s somebody that I wish every high school graduating senior had to read about her. She is first of all the longest serving Secretary of Labor in US history. And she was also the first female cabinet member in the United States government. She was Roosevelt’s Secretary of Labor. And when Roosevelt was building his cabinet, he called her in and wanted to ask her if she would serve. And she had long been a labor activist. And when asked this question, she, unlike most people, did not just say yes. Instead, she marched into his office and said, I have a list of demands. If you are willing to back my demands, which included disability insurance, unemployment insurance, modern day social security for retirees, universal health insurance, which is one of the main things she did not win.
In short, she put it to Roosevelt, and this was actually her phrase, “cradle to grave economic security,” which Roosevelt then embraced that idea moving forward. She was really one of the chief architects behind what we call the New Deal today. Yet she doesn’t get near enough love and attention. And I think lifting up these types of historic stories is really important to simply raising awareness of how we got to where we are here today.
Now how do we tell those stories? I think what I try to do, at least in the book, is kind of integrate three pieces to every story. One piece is the historic struggle. So let me give you an example of this. Here in the United States in 1910, we had roughly 12% of the US population graduating from high school and people didn’t want to make high school universal because disproportionately white wealthy people were going to high school. And why would broad-based taxation be applicable to serving the elites, was kind of the argument. The exact same argument mind you that we hear about college for all today. The high school movement, a grassroots movement was able to push forward broad based taxation across the country to publicly finance higher education. Within decades, just a couple of decades, we shot from just over 10% high school graduates to more than half of America graduating high school. It was a tremendous achievement in public education.
And the reason I bring this up is because the arguments levied against it were literally the exact same arguments levied against universal college, college for all here today. And so those stories are so powerful because when we have these debates, often it’s like it’s the first time we’ve had this debate, but in fact, two factoids are important to lift up. One is we’ve had this debate before as it applied to high school, and second, hey, guess what? That thing called the Moral Act that created land grant universities across the country, it was created with the intention of having free college in the first place. And so in fact, the foundation, the bedrock of our modern day higher education system had enshrined into it these notions that were fighting here still hundreds of years later, that education should be free and universal. And lifting those up I think helps people kind of connect the dots that where we are here today didn’t just happen, we legislated it, and that in fact we can choose a different path forward.
Marc Steiner:
I think that that’s a really good example to use. And the Moral Act I think we will look at it and think about, we’re talking about something that happened in 1862, is that right?
Mark Paul:
That’s right.
Marc Steiner:
1862, we’re talking about free education and people understand that as a legacy. And as you go through the book, you also really weigh in on what should be the rallying cries today and how that really does resonate with the American people. But with a neoliberal control of the Democratic Party, it’s almost impossible to get that out. Not impossible, but it makes it tougher. I’m curious if all the things you’ve written about what responses got from certain political leaders?
Mark Paul:
It’s a really great question and some of these ideas that I’ve laid out in the book already have quite a bit of traction. So the one that has the most traction of course is probably Medicare for All. It was a centerpiece of both the 2016 and 2020 Democratic primaries. And we see just tremendous support, including majority support across the nation. So that’s the idea that’s been fleshed out the most. But many of these ideas have been adopted by political leaders. Another one I talk about at length in the book is the idea of a job guarantee, ensuring everybody has access to a well-paying job. This is how overnight we eradicate unemployment and we also eradicate poverty level wages. And actually Senator Booker introduced a pilot program to Congress on this idea. Representative Ayanna Pressley also introduced a very extensive job guarantee resolution. And so many of these ideas have gotten substantial buy-in. I’m lucky enough to have worked with Representative Lee and Jayapal’s offices who just last week introduced a resolution calling for an economic bill of rights into Congress.
So these ideas are starting to gain steam. And my hope is that they continue to do so as we move forward. And I think progressives are excited about it, but I also think it’s time to hold center’s feet to the fire. I mean, Roosevelt’s portrait right now is in the Oval Office. Biden is the first president to hang up a portrait of Roosevelt rather than a portrait of Washington. And in fact, if Biden wants to actually carry the mantle of the New Deal as he says he does, he needs to realize and hopefully embrace what that actually means. And for Roosevelt, the cherry on top of the New Deal, the culmination of the New Deal was economic rights. And so I think that the struggle here needs to not just be for the left wing of the party to embrace these ideas, which they increasingly are, but to connect this to the long struggle for what the Democratic Party actually stands for or at least should stand for.
Marc Steiner:
And given that we are in a place in America now where people are so economically insecure, where people can lose their homes over nothing. And almost half of US families can’t even afford the basics of food and rent. I mean this is, we’re at that moment where it could go one way or the other. And what your book is doing here to me is outlining the real potential to look at the New Deal, to look at the radical Republican era, to look at some of the founding folks, fathers of this country to say, the kernel of that is there. And we have to expand that and understand it and explain it, put it out there, and the people will come.
Mark Paul:
That’s right. I think that by providing this message to people and by helping them understand what is a coherent alternative to neoliberalism, I think that it’s a really important unifying message and rallying cry. I mean, we all have a dozen books on our bookshelves that talk about how neoliberalism dead or almost dead, or it might be done soon. And what they all do is in the last chapter, they squish in, and this is what we should do now. And I flip that formula on its head, and the bulk of this book is really talking about what is the economy we want? How do we build it? And answering the important question, is it feasible? And not to give it all away, but the answer is yes, it is feasible.
We can do these things. We can afford to ensure that we eradicate unemployment and that we actually house each and every person here in this country, and that we actually educate those who want a college education. We can do these things. It’s not an economic problem, it’s a political will problem. And I think really pulling back those curtains is crucial to help the electorate wake up and demand more.
Marc Steiner:
And it is one of the ways to clearly fight the rise of the right and in the process, fight the racism that plagues this nation and build something different. And let me just say one of the things, Mark Paul, that really struck me about this book. I’ve been doing this for years and sometimes I’m loathed to pick up a book by an academic, even though many of my friends are academics because they can be so bloody ponderous. But your book is not ponderous at all. It’s really accessible and really well done and I appreciate it. The book is The Ends of Freedom, Reclaiming America’s Lost Promise of Economic Rights. And Mark Paul it’s been a great discussion. I look forward to actually having you rejoin us for different discussions as we look at this and parse it out and bring you into discussions with other kind of activists and political leaders to say, this is where we are and this is where we can go. So I deeply appreciate the work you did and for joining us here today on the Mark Steiner Show at The Real News.
Mark Paul:
It’s been a great pleasure.
Marc Steiner:
Thank you so much. I hope you enjoyed our conversation today with Mark Paul about his book, The Ends of Freedom, Reclaiming America’s Lost Promise of Economic Rights. It’s a really good read, it’s highly accessible. Check it out. And thank you all for joining us today. Please let me know what you thought about the conversation today, what you’d like us to cover. Just write to me at mss@therealnews.com and I’ll get right back to you. And by the way, while you’re there, stay there for a minute. Go to www.therealnews.com/support. Become a monthly donor, become part of the future with us. For David Hebden and Kayla Rivara and the crew here at The Real News, I’m Marc Steiner. Stay involved, keep listening, and take care.
Former President Donald Trump is facing 34 felony counts in New York State and an additional 37 felony federal charges. None of this prevents him from freely campaigning for President and appearing before the media. Yet the reality for most people targeted by the criminal justice system is far different. Take Rikers Island Jail—where more than 80 percent of inmates have not been convicted of a crime. Legal reform advocate Dyjuan Tatro joins Rattling the Bars to discuss Trump’s indictment and how it illustrates the two legal systems that exist side-by-side in the land of the free: one for the rich and white, and another for the poor that disproportionately targets Black and Brown people.
Dyjuan Tatro is a publicly recognized legal reform advocate and strategist who has worked to bridge the gap between policy and practice. As an alumnus of Bard Prison Initiative, he has leveraged his education and experience to shift public policy in favor of expanding and incentivizing college in prison.
Pre-Production: Maximillian Alvarez Studio Production: David Hebden Post-Production: Cameron Granadino
Transcript
Mansa Musa: Welcome to this edition of Rattling the Bars. I’m your host, Mansa Musa.
One of the foundations of democracy is equal representation under the law. In the modern world, supposedly no one is above the rule of law, not CEOs of wealthy corporations, not even current and former presidents. But of course, here in America, US, the realities of our so-called “criminal injustice system” are constantly reminding us that equality before the law is a dream that only exists on paper, not in practice. Look at what’s happening right now with the indictment of billionaire, former president Donald Trump, and compare that to the nightmare that poor Black and Brown people are living through every day in Rikers Island in New York.
Trump was already indicted by a Manhattan grand jury and is facing 34 felony charges in New York for alleged crimes committed during his 2016 presidential campaign. Now, Trump is also facing federal indictments for 37 felony counts related to mishandling classified documents, obstructing justice, and making false statements. All the while, Trump is campaigning for his 2024 election run. He’s fundraising, he’s enjoying his freedom, and he’s running his mouth on every media outlet that will give him a platform. At the same time, the majority of people being held captive in the notorious Rikers Island jail in New York, have had their freedom taken away, even though they haven’t been convicted of any crime.
In February of 2022, the Vera Institute of Justice reported that of the 5,548 people detained in New York City jails, including in Rikers Island and The Boat, 82%, or 4,487 people had not been convicted of a crime. Listen, equality before the law in America does not exist. And that’s what we are going to talk about today with our guest, Dyjuan Tatro. Dyjuan is a formerly-incarcerated legal reform advocate and strategist, who is now a Senior Advisor for Strategic Outreach on the Democrat Congressional Campaign Committee. Dyjuan, thank you for joining us today on Rattling the Bars.
Dyjuan Tatro: Really happy to be here. Thank you for having me.
Mansa Musa: And Dyjuan, as you saw in our outline, what we’re going to try to do is educate our audience on understanding how the system that we now look at when we talk about the criminal system – And what more notably is, when I look at it, I call it the criminal injustice system – We want to talk about how this system is not fair. We say that justice is blind but the reality is, justice is only blind when it comes to people that have money; justice has got 20/20 vision when it comes to poor and oppressed people.
Tell us a little bit about yourself before we get started. We gave a brief overview of who you are, but tell us a little bit more about yourself.
Dyjuan Tatro: Yeah, so that’s a very interesting question and I’m eager to dive in. But my name is Dyjuan Tatro, I’m an alumni of the Bard Prison Initiative in New York. Some people may not know what that is but it’s one of the foremost college and prison programs in the country. And our alum works all over the criminal justice space, not only in New York but nationally, doing amazing things: mostly working back in their communities to alleviate the conditions and circumstances that led to their incarceration in the first place. And so I spent 12 years in prison and spent the last six years working in politics at the nexus of criminal justice and narrative change.
Mansa Musa: Okay, now let’s talk about the elephant in the room: Donald Trump. Now, Donald Trump, former president of the US, has been indicted on a 37-count felony indictment. Now most felonies are punishable when you are convicted of them, 10 or more years or better. Or in some cases, the death penalty or life. Why do you think Donald Trump has been given the red-carpet treatment when it comes to this whole process? And for full disclosure, you, yourself have been incarcerated, so you can attest to some of the things that go on, in terms of when people are charged with felonies and how they’re treated, compared to how Donald Trump is treated.
Dyjuan Tatro: To refer back to your opening, there’s this idea that we have a fair justice system in this country. And anyone who pays attention to what happens in our courtrooms, who police arrest and don’t arrest, knows that we do not. Some people find it helpful to say that we have two systems of justice in America: one for white people and one for everyone else, or one for rich people and one for everyone else. I don’t take that view. We have one system of justice. The primary function of which is to incarcerate and oppress primarily Black and Brown people to the benefit of wealthy elites as well as privileged white individuals. And so we have one system that’s doing exactly what it is meant to be doing.
The same system that will coddle Donald Trump after he sought to overturn a legal and fair election on January 6, also put Crystal Mason in prison for five years for mistakenly casting a provisional ballot as someone who had a felony conviction. And so it is one system operating exactly as we should expect it to be, which is deeply rooted in slavery. Policing in this country is deeply rooted in slave-catching. And so we shouldn’t be surprised about this differential justice, per se, or the type of treatment that someone like Donald Trump receives from the system.
Mansa Musa: And you know that hypocrisy. Speak on the felony aspect and in terms of educating our audience on, when we say felonies, what exactly does that mean in criminal justice?
Dyjuan Tatro: Yeah, so generally when we’re talking about a felony, we’re talking about what we could call a serious crime. That doesn’t mean a crime of a person, that doesn’t mean that somebody has necessarily been harmed. And that’s one of the common manipulations of the term. But we are talking about a serious crime that will lead to someone being sentenced to time in either state or federal prison.
Mansa Musa: And former president Donald Trump has a 37-count indictment and he’s charged with violation of the Espionage Act. The Espionage Act came into existence in the early 1900s, under Woodrow Wilson’s administration. And since the implementation of this act, they have executed people under the act. But Donald Trump is being charged with taking classified documents to his house, showing these classified documents to different people that he wanted to, and telling his aide to hide the documents from the federal government. Which is obstruction of justice.
And under these circumstances, do you think that he should have been given the red-carpet treatment? It’s evident because they got all the documents out of his house and everything that’s been outlined by the media is not falsification, it is a reality that exists. Do you think he should get the red-carpet treatment?
Dyjuan Tatro: Absolutely not. Donald Trump’s flagrant disregard for the law and national security has been egregious. Not only did he break the law, but he has also, at several points in the investigation, attempted to subvert that investigation and evade the FBI and the Department of Justice and their ability to recover those documents. And so his treatment goes to this fundamental piece of the conversation that we’re having is that you have this system that is set up to allow certain individuals like Donald Trump, the presumption of innocence, that allows them to walk out of a courtroom and remain at home with their family while they fight their case. They can meet with their lawyers every day, whereas the average Black or Brown person in this country, who is going through the criminal justice system, has a radically different experience.
They are put in handcuffs, they are put on buses, are trafficked around from jail to courthouse. They are trapped inside cages for 24, 72, 168 hours without running water, sleeping on the floor, and stacked on top of each other. The inability to make a phone call to anyone, let alone your family or your lawyer. Donald Trump is able to walk in one door in the courthouse and out of the other. And that’s not because his crimes lack seriousness.
Mansa Musa: That’s right. Correct.
Dyjuan Tatro: That is because he is being treated in a differential way for, one: political reasons, two: because of privilege, and three: most importantly because we have a system that is geared toward facilitating the easy overcoming of justice by people like him.
Mansa Musa: And I’d like for you to flush that out about the severity of his charges because this is where the disconnect comes with society when it comes to rich people. Both of us, we can be charged with the same crime. But based on the economics, their crime is not looked at as being as severe, albeit the same crime, because of them being rich. Why did you say that it’s not because it’s the severity of the crime? Flush that out a little bit.
Dyjuan Tatro: So I was saying if we look at someone like Donald Trump’s case, and not only with the DOJ, but his cases back in New York; he was someone who was found liable of sexual assault. Any person of color that had sexually assaulted a woman in a dressing room would be sitting in jail, but he walked free in New York at the same time when police and politicians across New York state are attacking bail reforms. I didn’t hear any of those organizations or people attack Donald Trump’s unconditional release from federal custody over very, very serious crimes that can compromise the integrity of our national security.
There are even reports that state the increase in the loss of covert agents throughout his presidency can be linked to his handling and mishandling of classified information and documents. So we are potentially talking about people having lost their lives in service to this country because of someone’s egotistic, irrational, and what may be self-serving, remains to be seen as the case develops, conduct. But he is out, he’s free. He’s in Florida comfortable with his family, while there are thousands of people charged with lesser crimes, let alone sexual assault, who are sitting on Rikers Island or in jails across this country. And so what we really, really see is that whether or not someone is remanded to jail is disconnected from what they have done.
Mansa Musa: I like that articulation because when we talk about the severity of the crime, we had Julius and Ethel Rosenberg in the ’50s. They were executed for the same crime that Donald Trump is charged with. Then we had Daniel Ellsberg, of the Pentagon Papers, who was vilified. Nixon had his office broken into to stop him from publishing documents relative to the US imperialist aggression in Vietnam. But Donald Trump gets the full pardoning of the law and benefits from his privilege.
People in Rikers Island, you briefly talked about this process where a person charged with a less severe crime or inability to pay the bail, what they have to go through being under the so-called same system, what they go through in terms of their process. Talk about that.
Dyjuan Tatro: I want to be clear. We’re not only talking about Donald Trump but people like him. Individuals like Congressman Matt Gaetz, who’s been accused of widespread inappropriate behavior with minors and prostitutes. We are talking about the CEOs of Fortune 500 companies, as well as the companies themselves, that regularly pollute our rivers, that burn trains, and burn toxic material that is carcinogenic. We are talking about the pollution of our air. Air pollution in this country harms and kills far more people than homicides every year. But we’re not having a conversation about that in relation to criminal justice. We are not prosecuting those companies. And so when we start having a conversation that focuses on harm rather than crime and criminality, it changes our lens and perspective, so I want to be clear.
Mansa Musa: Yeah, that’s a good observation.
Dyjuan Tatro: Donald Trump is a really, really egregious example of the differential treatment that the justice system in this country has for people of power and privilege, versus those who are trapped on Rikers Island. If you’re looking at someone who’s arrested in New York City, I was reading an article the other day about a young man, Emmanuel Morales, in Brownsville, who went to throw some trash in a trash can and missed the bin. Several police officers jumped out of an undercover car, confronted him, tackled him, bloodied him, and arrested him. He was put in jail for having made a mistake.
And so this is the type of casual brutality that happens at the level of policing in places like New York City and all over the country, in the senseless ways in which people of color land on Rikers Island and are incarcerated. But when we look at the severity of harm caused by major corporations, by people like Donald Trump; they often walk away with a fine. And again, we have one system of justice in this country that is really functioning to the benefit of those it has been meant to protect. We have a system of justice that is protecting a criminal like Donald Trump.
Mansa Musa: And I’d like to highlight this point about the observation you made about when we focus on the crime and not focus on –
Dyjuan Tatro: The harm.
Mansa Musa: – The person. The EPA came into existence as a result of what they called Love Canal, where there was toxic waste and they were polluting a particular part of this country. And it was killing the people that were drinking the water. Or we look at Flint, Michigan, where we have the pollution of the water and poor people are being highly affected by it. But yet the corporation that’s responsible and the corporate figures that’s responsible for it, they’re not indicted. Such as in the case of Donald Trump. You made the observation, which was very astute, that because of his behavior, citizens of the US have been killed.
You can trace a lot of the collateral damage to Donald Trump’s sheer disregard for national security. But yet at the same token, he had someone locked up for having a felony and voting. What was the severity of that crime? Exercising your right as a citizen? And they say, well, one vote might not make a difference, but in the landscape of things, the probability of that one vote changing the political landscape at that point in time was slim to none.
Dyjuan Tatro: Think about the optics of that. You can incite a riot on Capitol Hill and try to overturn an election; a free and fair election. I really want to emphasize that point. But you can’t mistakenly cast a ballot as a Black person in this country who has a felony. That is a systemic problem. The fact that there are over a million people in this country that have been felony disenfranchised is not a mistake. It is a mechanism of voter suppression. The prosecution of Crystal Mason was an instrument of voter suppression. But people like Donald Trump and those who collaborated with him could, on live TV, on CNN, and on MSNBC, incite a riot, and cause great harm. Several people were killed on Capitol Hill that day.
Mansa Musa: Exactly.
Dyjuan Tatro: Walked away with their hands clean. And so justice is not blind in this country. It is not fair. I don’t know if it ever will be. And I have no hope that if Donald Trump is convicted, that that somehow vindicates the system because it doesn’t. The evidence against the system is damning. The system should be on trial alongside Donald Trump.
Mansa Musa: When they had this thing happen at the Capitol, I was thinking about the Puerto Rican nationalists, Lolita LeBron and them, back in the ‘60s. They went into the Capitol and shot a gun up in the air. And their whole thing was they wanted independence for Puerto Rico, they wanted Puerto Rico to stop being a colony of the US. That’s the only crime they committed, and they were given life. Donald Trump incited a riot and they changed the narrative. And this is another part of this draconian system that we call justice. He incited a riot, they go down there, it’s an insurrection. They’re trying to overthrow the government. They changed the whole language: it’s not a riot, it’s not an insurrection, it’s a protest. They’re exercising their rights to protest.
To go back to your point, we find that it is the number one system and it’s the system that’s there primarily for the benefit of corporate America, capitalism, imperialism, and fascism. When it comes to poor and oppressed people, we’re always going to find ourselves in Rikers Island. I can’t pay 10% of $1,000. I’m in Rikers Island because I threw trash out and missed the trash can. And because you beat me half to death, now you have to arrest me and justify this brutality you’ve given me. So now, you give me a bunch of fabricated charges and at the end of the process, when I come to court, I’m already in a whirlpool of other people that’s coming to court. One public defender got 200 to 300 people on their case, so they are speed-balling it when it comes down to the process.
But talk about what we have to do to get people to understand this narrative that we outlined: that it’s only one justice system. And that’s a system that represents the have and it’s a system against the have-nots.
Dyjuan Tatro: We have to become more sophisticated in our analysis, at the base. We have to understand that we have a legal system in this country that is not concerned with public safety, that is not concerned with crime prevention, that is not concerned with reducing harm, but it is geared toward reinforcing the status quo. And the status quo is Black and Brown bodies brutalized by police, imprisoned, and warehoused by the system. Sometimes, and in some states, to create jobs in failing farm communities for white people. I think a lot of us hear or have heard about coal towns or factory towns. In the US, we have prison towns. That is absurd.
All prisons are for profit. And, with respect to our analysis becoming more sophisticated, we need to make an important distinction between crime and illegality. So there are a lot of things that are illegal that all types of people do in this society. Only certain segments of the population are criminalized for those things, and these individuals are overwhelmingly Black and white. And when we step back and start looking at the data and start understanding how the system is functioning, it behooves us to start taking on and confronting those popular narratives.
What happened on January 6, is the system communicating to all Americans, that it is okay for some people to be violent, that is okay for some people to try to overthrow and subvert an election, but it’s not okay for others. The elephant in the room is race, because we know in the summer of 2020 when we had Black Lives Matter marches through DC, they wheeled out the Army and the National Guard. And the Capitol steps looked like the US was invading a foreign country. Those troops were nowhere to be found on January 6 and that was not by happenstance.
We not only have to become more sophisticated in our analysis, we have to become more sophisticated in countering disinformation and calling out the bigotry and hypocrisy, but also mobilizing our communities around this type of rabid injustice. We really, really got to get people voting along the lines of their sense of morality and justice and not only whether or not they’re going to have a job tomorrow, whether or not they’re going to have healthcare. Because all of these things, especially in Black and Brown communities, are inextricably bound to social and racial justice.
Mansa Musa: That’s right. And I like that observation because when we look at the political landscape as it exists now, and we know now that Donald Trump is running again, and he has this mannerism of political discourse that borderlines on insanity, but yet everybody that’s in that arena is scared or reluctant to challenge him or call him out on it. And then when they do call him out, they become more insane in their counter. And the public and people of color are in the middle. Because at the end of the process, it doesn’t make a difference – Malcolm X said this clearly – If it’s a Democrat or a Republican in there; they’re both the same. We’re talking about Hunter Biden in one regard and we’re talking about Donald Trump in another regard. And it shows that the scales of justice, as they weigh out, Hunter Biden right here, Donald Trump right here, the scale is balanced. You take Hunter Biden off and you put a poor, Black, and oppressed person on the scale, and the scale is becoming imbalanced.
Tell us, how can our listeners and viewers get in touch with you or stay in touch with what you’re doing?
Dyjuan Tatro: The best way to find me and follow what I’m up to and the things that I care about is on Twitter. And so that’s my first name, last name on Twitter. I’m pretty easy to find. So D-Y-J-U-A-N T-A-T-R-O on Twitter.
Mansa Musa: All right, thank you, Dyjuan. There you have it, The Real News, Rattling the Bars. Dyjuan, you rattled the bars today. We definitely created the climate for people to start looking at the political landscape and the criminal injustice system. Here at The Real News and Rattling the Bars, you only get this kind of information. You’re not going to get this kind of discourse on main media. Hunter Biden is pleading guilty to a serious offense, Donald Trump has been charged with a serious offense, and no one is talking about why they’re still walking around. But yet you go on Rikers Island and you have people over there dying day in and day out, and no one is talking about that either. You only hear about these things on Rattling the Bars.
We ask you to continue to support Rattling the Bars and The Real News. Because at the end of the day, we are actually the real news. Thank you very much. Continue to support us.
At two Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention centers in California’s Central Valley, a cycle of resistance and retaliation has been intensifying over the past three years. Detainees at the facilities, which are operated by for-profit prison company GEO Group, have organized against abysmal conditions, prompting detention center authorities to respond with increasing levels of punitive action.
A motion was filed with the Eastern District Court of California on May 18 as part of an ongoing class-action lawsuit against GEO pertaining to the facilities. The filing marked a major escalation in a multipronged campaign being waged by current and former detainees, and outside advocates, to hold ICE and GEO accountable for their mistreatment. It reaffirmed a key demand that detainees in the Mesa Verde ICE Processing Center in Bakersfield and the Golden State Annex in McFarland put forward when they launched a labor strike last year: pay for detained workers commensurate with the prevailing minimum wage in California.
The consequences detainees appear to face for failure to participate in the purportedly voluntary work regime can render it akin to forced labor.
The motion entreated a federal judge to issue a ruling that affirmed the plaintiffs’ contention that the $1-per-day pay detainees receive for labor within GEO’s “Voluntary Work Program” inside Mesa Verde and the GSA violates California’s minimum wage law. The state’s minimum wage stands at $15.50 an hour as of January 2023.
According to the new report “One Dollar A Day: Labor Conditions Within California Immigrant Detention Centers” from the UCLA Luskin Institute on Inequality and Democracy, detained individuals scrub toilets, mop bathrooms, and sweep and perform other maintenance tasks as part of the VWP. The report includes testimony from current and former detainees as well as data and research on commissary expenses, grievances, and information about the working conditions from within the detention centers. “They didn’t have supplies to actually clean,” said one person interviewed for the report. “Whether it was to mop or disinfect the phones or the tables… they just weren’t there… People had to clean the showers a lot of times in their shoes… [Y]our shoes get wet, and we only get one pair of shoes, so that’s unsanitary.”
The same interviewee mentioned the shortage of gloves needed for the work. “Who wants to be scrubbing a toilet with no gloves on? Or clean the showers when you’re dealing with these chemicals,” the individual told the authors of the report. Detainees inside the GSA and Mesa Verde facilities labor under difficult conditions for only a dollar per day, which saves GEO the extra expenses of hiring outside professionals—and increases the corporation’s already bloated bottom line. “GEO is benefiting, because if we don’t do it, they have to pay somebody to do it,” a UCLA report interviewee explained. “And they had to pay somebody good money to come in here and do those jobs.”
While the class-action lawsuit plays out in the Fresno Division of California’s Eastern District Court, individuals confined inside the Bakersfield and McFarland facilities continue to withhold their labor and coordinate with attorneys and immigrant rights’ advocates. They do so despite the retaliation GEO and ICE have repeatedly meted out in response to their refusal to accept the treatment and conditions inside the Central Valley detention centers.
“GEO is benefiting, because if we don’t do it, they have to pay somebody to do it,” a UCLA report interviewee explained. “And they had to pay somebody good money to come in here and do those jobs.”
One person interviewed by the UCLA researchers mentioned that staff get angry when detainees raise issues with detention center staff. “And then they want us to get mad and interact with them, just so they have a reason to get us in trouble, because whenever we get a petty ass write-up, it sticks, and we get denied commissary, and you get all these other violations that are put against us. When we write to them we will see no benefits at all,” the detainee said.
The cycle of resistance and retaliation escalated in early 2020, just as the COVID-19 pandemic was beginning to rage across the United States. Dozens of men in Mesa Verde went on multiple hunger strikes in response to the dangerous conditions inside the facility. According to a class-action lawsuit filed in February 2023 by the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California, hunger strikers called on authorities to release medically vulnerable persons, to stop bringing new people into an already-crowded detention center, and to provide adequate cleaning supplies. In response, the legal complaint alleges, the GEO Group “retaliated against hunger strikers” by withholding sanitation services, commissary access, medically necessary items (including prescription medication and walking canes), contact with attorneys and loved ones, and recreation time.
Two years later, dozens of individuals went on strike against the prison’s $1-a-day labor compensation scheme. ICE’s Performance-Based National Detention Standards set the minimum pay within the Voluntary Work Program at $1 per day. As explained in the “One Dollar a Day” report, in the “70 years since its inception, a provision under an appropriations bill that the 95th United States Congress passed has allowed immigrant workers in detention centers to earn just $1 a day.” According to a 2017 report by Seth H. Garfinkel, the 1978 Appropriations Act passed by Congress codified the remuneration rate, which enables companies like GEO to “compensate workers at $0.13 an hour for as many as eight working hours a day,” while the VWP helps detention centers save about $40 million in labor costs each year. The UCLA report notes that $1 in 1978 is now worth $4.61, and the reimbursement rate has not been adjusted for inflation.
“Detained people are forced to submit to GEO’s $1 per day scheme, the so-called ‘Voluntary’ Activities Program (‘Work Program’), to buy the basic necessities—including food, water and hygiene products—that GEO systematically deprives them of,” states a July 13, 2022, lawsuit filed by two advocacy groups and a Bay Area law firm in the California Eastern District Court.
Mohamed Mousa, an immigrant from Egypt, said that detention center meals typically consist of unappetizing, unsalted beans or unpalatable soy-based meat substitutes. At the time of the interview, he was still detained in the Mesa Verde facility. “It tastes just like newspapers,” Mousa said. “It’s just terrible.”
Detainees in both the GSA and Mesa Verde told the authors of the UCLA report that they found cockroaches in their food. Even when not on hunger strike, people inside won’t touch what the detention centers serve. “Inadequate or inedible food provided by GEO led many detainees to rely on the commissary to supplement some or all of their meals,” the authors of the UCLA report wrote. “Interviewees we spoke to expressed that the commissary was also vital to supplement basic care products that the facility failed to provide, creating additional economic hardship for them.” To afford necessities, detainees thus feel compelled to participate in the VWP, making it less than voluntary.
Likewise, the consequences detainees appear to face for failure to participate in the purportedly voluntary work regime can render it akin to forced labor. For example, participating in the work stoppage almost got one person confined in the Bakersfield immigrant jail transferred, if not for the swift actions of those advocating on behalf of detainee rights.
In August 2022, ICE officials in the San Francisco field office prepared to transfer a striker from solitary to a facility outside of California. “The Facility Administrator stated in a written message to this individual that his efforts to ‘stand up for [his] rights’ would “not be tolerated,’” according to the lawsuit filed in February. ACLU attorneys responded by sending a letter to the field office stating a retaliatory transfer would constitute a violation of the detained person’s First Amendment Rights. ICE returned the man to Mesa Verde shortly thereafter.
The [UCLA report] authors noted their team “felt it necessary to physically go onsite to Mesa Verde in order to collect the grievances and write-up forms” referenced in the report because of the real fear of repercussion for interviewees.
The lawsuit from last July alleges other forms of retaliation perpetrated by GEO against detainees on labor strike. Per the suit, GEO stopped allowing entire dormitories outdoor exercise time when individuals inside refused to work, and staff placed strikers in “administrative segregation”—a form of solitary confinement.
According to a September 2022 complaint the ACLU and other organizations sent to the Department of Homeland Security Office of Civil Rights and Civil Liberties, Mousa spent two months in solitary confinement for allegedly posing a risk to the Mesa Verde facility. Rigoberto Hernandez Martinez—a Mesa Verde detainee who joined the strike—was also confined in solitary for over a month due to an alleged security risk after being initially moved there for medical reasons; he was later told he remained in solitary because he participated in the collective action, according to the February lawsuit. “The GEO Group [is] using security as an alibi,” Mousa said.
“Regarding the strike, many described the retaliation by GEO employees, resulting in additional write-ups and denying access to the commissary,” the “One Dollar a Day” report states. Indeed, the authors noted their team “felt it necessary to physically go onsite to Mesa Verde in order to collect the grievances and write-up forms” referenced in the report because of the real fear of repercussion for interviewees.
Retaliation for failure to participate in the VWP also illustrates the not-so-voluntary nature of the labor regime inside the detention centers. The UCLA report states that the filing of grievances significantly increased after the labor strike started, “which detainees described as a response to increased retaliation from GEO officers.” Interviewed individuals said GEO staff used disciplinary write-ups to punish people for participating in the labor strike.
“Write-ups have two impacts on you,” one person explained. “The first is the psychological taste of injustice. So, when you get a write-up for something that is definitely clearly you committed no error, nothing wrong, you didn’t violate anything, you didn’t commit a crime… The mental agony of this is bullshit…. The other aspect is… You can’t even order commissary. You’re gonna have to be starving because they know that you don’t eat their food that they offer.”
The labor strike that began in April 2022 continues, with at least 59 people participating, per sources. Previously, it drew the attention of members of Congress. In September 2022, 16 members of the House and Senate called on ICE to investigate reports of unacceptable conditions and retaliatory behavior directed at detainees in the two California facilities. They also called on DHS to terminate the federal contracts with GEO if the allegations against the facilities could be confirmed.
According to a press release from the ACLU, on March 7, ICE and GEO employees in full riot gear and wielding batons and pepper spray entered Mesa Verde’s Dorm C to confront weak and depleted hunger strikers.
In an effort to increase the pressure on ICE and GEO, more than 70 detainees at the GSA and Mesa Verde facilities participated in a hunger strike between February 17 and March 24, 2023, demanding their immediate release and the closure of both immigrant jails. A hunger strike support committee made up of advocacy groups including the ACLU, the Asian Law Caucus with Asian Americans Advancing Justice, and the California Collaborative for Immigrant Justice, published a press release in which the men inside described the living conditions as “soul-crushing.”
Milton Mendez, who spent 11 months inside Mesa Verde, said GEO not only failed to provide basic necessities and urgently needed medical care, but the company also maintained intolerable living conditions within the jail. “The bathroom, in the shower, there is mold all over,” Mendez said in a March 17 interview.
In the class-action lawsuit filed this February, attorneys for the plaintiffs rebuked ICE and GEO for violating the First Amendment rights of detained individuals on hunger strike. As a result of the pressure, the detention center relented. “ICE officials and GEO officials [came] to the dorms and referenced the pending litigation,” said Minju Cho, a lawyer with the ACLU, adding that afterwards detention facility staff “ameliorated some of the conditions, including offering the strikers Ensure nutritional shakes to allow them to maintain their strike but not experience death—and allowing them to receive medical care inside the dorm, which would have been a big point of contention. They also restored arts and crafts, law library, barber shop and yard time, all of which had been taken away.”
In response to the hunger strike, GEO deployed retaliatory measures more violent than previously used. According to a press release from the ACLU, on March 7, ICE and GEO employees in full riot gear and wielding batons and pepper spray entered Mesa Verde’s Dorm C to confront weak and depleted hunger strikers. They forcefully removed four strikers from the dorm, handcuffing some and shoving others to the ground. At one point, as Mousa described, “ICE people in camouflage … grabbed [a detainee as if he were] a fucking animal … and they threw him on his face on the ground.”
Aseem Mehta, a legal fellow with AAAJ, said that after several hours, the attorneys for the four individuals who’d been removed from Dorm C received word that their clients were transferred to El Paso, Texas, supposedly for medical care. “Those individuals [had] never before requested medical care [and] showed no signs of acute medical distress,” Mehta said, adding that no explanation was provided as to “why whatever medical care that they purportedly needed could only be accessed in El Paso, Texas,” and not in California. He suspects GEO and ICE might have initiated the transfer to intimidate and punish hunger strikers.
“We hope that, in exposing the futility of the grievance system, this project will show that immigration detention is not a system that can be reformed; it must be dismantled.”
Sana Singh, Immigrants’ Rights Fellow at ACLU of Northern California
A week after the Mesa Verde raid, ICE and GEO also raided GSA dorms. During that raid, an officer also kneeled on one detainee’s head, injuring his face, according to a March 29 ACLU press release. One hunger striker had to be hospitalized several times as a result of the raid, and GEO transferred three individuals to a Texas facility under medical pretexts, per the press release.
Detainees have learned criticizing the agency and its detention practices can also result in retributive relocation. In February, advocacy groups filed a complaint with the DHS Office of Civil Rights and Civil Liberties that documented ICE’s transfer of an individual in November 2022 after that person and a fellow detainee from another facility authored an op-ed for the San Diego Union-Tribune criticizing conditions of confinement and the agency’s “brutal and excessive use of retaliation.”
In response to the March raids, lawyers from ACLU and other groups filed another emergency motion in federal district court seeking a temporary restraining order to prevent ICE and the GEO Group from retaliating against those on hunger strike. Days after the motion was filed, the seven people transferred to Texas were returned to California.
The anti-carceral group Freedom for Immigrants released a report early this year titled “Trafficked & Toured: Mapping ICE Transfers,” which shows how the transport of human beings functions within “a larger system of punishment of detained individuals for organizing for their rights.”
When reached for comment via email, an ICE spokesperson said that the agency “does not comment on ongoing or pending litigation,” while a GEO spokesperson said via email that the company “has a zero-tolerance policy with respect to staff misconduct.”
“We take our role as a service provider to the federal government with the utmost seriousness and strive to treat all those entrusted to our care with dignity and respect,” the GEO spokesperson said.
The campaign for freedom and abolition continues
Most detainees who participated in the recent hunger strike—including Mousa—resumed eating food by mid-March, but with help from outside advocates, they are continuing a campaign to break the cycle of violence. Lawsuits by allies at the ACLU, CCIJ, AAAJ, Immigrant Defense Advocates, and others have helped defend the rights of those in custody, stem retaliation, and put pressure on ICE and GEO.
On June 23, the ACLU of Northern California filed another suit, this one against ICE for failing to respond to Freedom of Information Act requests for grievance logs kept at the six agency-affiliated immigrant detention centers in the state.
The ACLU also just launched the “California Immigration Detention Database” to track grievances submitted in the state’s immigrant jails. One individual who contributed to the database, Jose Ruben Hernandez Gomez, a former Mesa Verde detainee who was transferred to El Paso after participating in the hunger strike, filed grievances without success while incarcerated in the Central Valley facility, as detailed in an ACLU NorCal report published on June 26. “I’m participating in this project because I want people to know that detention centers are not safe to house human beings,” he told the ACLU.
In 2021, a district court in Washington ordered GEO to give more than 10,000 current and former detainees $17.3 million in backpay for labor they earned $1 to perform each day inside the Northwest ICE Processing Center in Tacoma.
Of the nearly 250 complaints already in the database, many come from Mesa Verde and date back to the 2023 hunger strike, an ACLU press release explains. “We are committed to working alongside people in detention to expose the cruelty of the immigration detention system—even as ICE fails to come clean about its oversight of facilities marred by systemic neglect and abuse,” said Sana Singh, an ACLU NorCal immigrants’ rights fellow, per the press release. “We hope that, in exposing the futility of the grievance system, this project will show that immigration detention is not a system that can be reformed; it must be dismantled.”
Further augmenting the campaign against ICE, GEO, and their detention regime, recent precedent suggests the lawsuit alleging GEO’s dollar-a-day VWP compensation rate violates the minimum wage requirement in California could prove successful. In 2021, a district court in Washington ordered GEO to give more than 10,000 current and former detainees $17.3 million in backpay for labor they earned $1 to perform each day inside the Northwest ICE Processing Center in Tacoma. Judge Robert Bryan also issued an injunction requiring the company, which pulled in $2.2 billion in revenue that year and receives a quarter million dollars from ICE annually for every detention facility it operates for the agency, to pay detainees participating in the VWP at the Tacoma facility Washington’s minimum wage, now $15.74 an hour.
In addition to using their support networks to exert legal pressure from the outside, those in the GSA and Mesa Verde have inspired and drawn inspiration from detainees elsewhere. Mousa said that hunger strikers in California heard about similar actions in the Tacoma detention center, and in the ICE-affiliated Aurora, Colorado, facility. “We live in [the] same conditions they’re facing all over the place,” he said. “So we’re all supporting each other.” Actions and support for those inside the GSA and MV seemed to have inspired some 300 detainees inside the also GEO-run South Louisiana ICE Processing Center in Basile, Louisiana, to launch their own hunger strike in March.
Organizers and advocates have reason for cautious optimism regarding the possibility of ending for-profit detention for good. In 2019, California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a bill to phase out private prisons, immigrant detention centers included, but last year an appellate court ruled that the law might be unconstitutional. President Joe Biden voiced support for ending for-profit immigrant detention, but under his administration the Justice Department joined GEO in the suit challenging the law the California legislature passed and Newsom endorsed. A final judgment on the unconstitutionality of the ban was handed down in May 2023, effectively repealing the ban.
Despite these setbacks, current and former detainees and their advocates remain undaunted in their efforts. From inside the GSA in mid-March, Gustavo Flores, a man in his early thirties, said immigration detention “is like waking up in a nightmare.” He hopes to see both ICE and GEO abolished and he and his fellow detainees released. “We’re gonna keep pushing,” Flores said. “If I were to get out [and] win my case… I’m gonna continue advocating.… This is gonna be an ongoing effort that’s going to continue on until our goals are met.”
Too often, the rule of law just means the rule of police—but knowing your rights can still be an important way to protect yourself from police injustice. Here on Police Accountability Report, we often document how frequently the police conduct unjust and illegal stops, searches, seizures, and even arrests. But the significance of being educated on your rights isn’t just important because of rampant police abuse; there’s also a lot of misinformation out there. And when it comes to keeping yourself safe from capricious cops, disinformation is just as bad, if not worse, than no information. Legendary cop watchers James Madison and James Freeman join PAR for a special “Know Your Rights’ Livestream about how you can protect yourself and exercise your rights to fight back against police injustice.
James Freeman is a copwatcher who runs his own YouTube channel.
James Madison Audits is a former police officer whose own personal experiences at the hands of cops turned him into a copwatcher and activist. He runs his own YouTube channel.
Production: Stephen Janis, Taya Graham Studio Production: David Hebden
Transcript
The following is a rushed transcript and may contain errors. A proofread version will be made available as soon as possible.
Taya Graham:
Hello, this is Taya Graham and welcome to the Police Accountability Report. Know Your Rights, protect Your Rights Livestream, a show where we will talk to people who know how to do both, to give you the tools and the perspective.
Taya Graham:
Sorry. I’m having a little issue,
Dave. I’m having a little technical issue. Yeah, sorry. Sorry, you guys. This is a show where we’ll talk to people who know how to do both, to give you the tools and the perspective to ensure that when and if police challenge you are prepared. But we’re also going to delve deeper into why American law enforcement can seem so interested in entangling people in the legal system rather than improving public safety. And what we can do, not to just fight back, but think back, meaning how we can collectively think of ways to create a community where police aren’t in charge, but we are, and that law enforcement serves us and not the other way around. And to make this happen, I am so excited to share this with you. We have two guests who have a tremendous amount of experience and expertise, both dealing with cops and in one case actually being a cop.
The latter is a former cop turn cop watcher, James Madison, who’s known for his unique insider’s perspective on how police use their law often to their advantage, or they sometimes choose to ignore the law entirely and what you can do to counter it when they do. Also, he has an exceptional investigation he is working on, and you all will be some of the first people to see parts of it here on our channel. Then we’ll be talking to the legendary James Freeman, who’s actually fighting the entire justice system to protect his right, to hold them accountable. It is an absolutely epic battle between transparency and power to keep the inner workings of government secret, which we will be unpacking for you in all its ugly details. And at the end of the show, there will be a special shout out to all my Patreon patrons for their kind support.
It’s just one small way I try to show the people that help this show and make it possible show. Just show them how much I appreciate them. And during the show, I will try to get your comments on the screen and answer some of your questions for our guests. But please remember, this is live. As you may have noticed, this is very, very live. So please try to be patient with any technical glitches we might have. But before we get to that, I want to turn to my reporting partner, Steven Janis. Steven. Hey, Dave. Could do you think you could find Steven on the live stream?
Stephen Janis:
Yeah. Stephen,
Taya Graham:
Stephen. Stephen. We have a live stream tonight. Have so many could
Stephen Janis:
Nuts tonight.
Taya Graham:
Seriously.
Stephen Janis:
Taya, what do you We have a lot. What do you We have a lie. What do you want,
Taya Graham:
Stephen? We have a live stream.
Stephen Janis:
We have a live stream tonight. Are you kidding me? Look, I’m doing, I’m fine, Tay. Thanks at me, but no thanks tonight and
Taya Graham:
Stephen. Good, didn’t
Stephen Janis:
You right now? All right. Okay. Okay. I’m raised my hands. Seriously. Drop the, you see my hands. Jesus. I’m coming in. Would you
Taya Graham:
Drop the nuts? Dropping the nuts. Thank you.
Stephen Janis:
I’m coming inside.
Taya Graham:
Thank you. Don’t
Stephen Janis:
Worry.
Speaker 4:
Here it comes.
Taya Graham:
I seriously can’t believe this. You know what? It’s technical difficulty after technical difficulty tonight. Honestly, I think Steven’s getting a little too uncomfortable outside. But while we’re waiting for him to get inside the studio, let me share with you our audience, how we intend to break down these stories for you and why they’re essential and why, as we always say, you have the right to be informed. I think the idea for this show started with our investigative report on Texas firefighter Thomas C As you remember, Thomas was pulled over by the Denton County Sheriff’s Department in April of 2021 for what they say was speeding. Although Thomas denies this after he was pulled over. However, police had a different agenda. That’s because they immediately started to accuse Thomas of being drunk. Now, first, it’s worth noting that Thomas has not had a drink for 30 years, and he does not use illegal drugs of any kind, but that didn’t stop police from charging him with a D U I. Let’s just watch a little bit of what transpired.
Speaker 4:
Hello? Hello. I’m Deputy Brant with the Danton County Sheriff’s Office. I didn’t catch you earlier. Where were you coming from today?
Speaker 5:
From,
Speaker 6:
Yeah, my left. Yeah, you’re right.
Speaker 4:
What happened to your eye again? I only call part of
Speaker 5:
That. I had a detached retina, and then the subsequent surgeries have led to it. It’s kind of got a blue haze right now. Okay. Yeah. And so it’s just hard to see through this eye, but okay. Sometimes it gets kind of irritated. It turns red and yeah, I don’t know if it is now, but looks
Speaker 4:
Liquidated right now. Yeah.
Speaker 5:
Is it really? Looks, is this one is? That’s clear. Clear? Okay. Yeah. So, okay.
Speaker 4:
Once the last time you said you took any medications today,
Speaker 5:
Like three,
Speaker 4:
Two, about three o’clock today. Two o’clock
Speaker 5:
Or something. Okay.
Speaker 4:
One o’clock. At this point, I just want to Sure, you’re safe to operate a vehicle. Just giving kind of everything I’ve seen so far. I just want to make sure you’re safe to operate your truck. Oh. So we’re going to bring you through just a few standardized field tests and we’ll kind of go from there. Okay? All right. Have you ever had traumatic brain injury? Never. Okay. Nothing like that. Other than detached retina, any other medical issues?
Speaker 5:
No.
Speaker 4:
Okay. Nothing like that? No. Diabetes, hypertension?
Speaker 5:
Well, I’ve had hypertension. Okay. I’ve taken medicine. Was taking medicine.
Speaker 4:
Okay. Other than Adderall, are we taking anything else right now? Just Adderall. And what’s the Adderall for?
Speaker 5:
Attention deficit.
Speaker 4:
A adhd? Yeah. Okay. Or a D. D. Okay. You can set ’em up.
Speaker 6:
Okay. Just stand right here on the flat ground together like this, your arms down this.
Speaker 4:
And so I asked him like, well, what else besides your eye hurt? Anything else? No, just my, I mean, I gave him every opportunity to explain to me like, legs aren’t working right, arms aren’t working Right. It came out the truck looking good, like walking pretty decent. Little heavy footed, but he wasn’t stumbling out. Do you believe he’s intoxicated?
Speaker 7:
I believe he’s unable to drive from whatever he has. I
Speaker 4:
Dunno about alcohol. Is that a medical emergency or we talking about intoxicated on something, but I don’t think alcohol. Do you think they have a medical emergency here? No. Okay. So if it’s not a medical emergency, is he normal or would you believe possibly he’s intoxicated under something? Yeah, I think he’s intoxicated on something. We’re probably going to go that route. We’re probably going to try to do a Dre we.
Taya Graham:
Well, thank you for gracing the studio with your presence.
Stephen Janis:
Steven, you could’ve told me we had a live stream.
Taya Graham:
I
Stephen Janis:
Think I did. I was outside. I was outside. I was comfortable. I was there for the night. Yes, I know. I had my freaking coordinates. I know,
Taya Graham:
I know. But you have other obligations. I think you’re getting a little too comfortable.
Stephen Janis:
Do I use this mic or this one?
Taya Graham:
I think you use the This one,
Stephen Janis:
The bigger one. Sorry. All right. Yeah. Well, I mean, it’s nice out there. I’m learning a lot. There’s a lot of things that happen. Bringing me inside, just kind of messes up my vibe as a reporter. I am breaking stories constantly out there reporting and you’re like, oh, come on in for a live stream. But what do I get out of it?
Taya Graham:
Well, you know what Stephen, the problem is, is that everyone
Stephen Janis:
Know poor nuts are not enough for a man
Taya Graham:
To survive.
Stephen Janis:
I need more than that.
Taya Graham:
Listen, everyone expects you to be a hard-nosed investigative reporter. Yes. You got to give the people what they want. That means you got to be out there beating the streets. Okay. Putting in that work. Okay,
Stephen Janis:
Let me just put it this way. I’m willing to do a documentary about what it’s like to be outside. I’m willing to the documentary tell the secrets. A lot of people ask me about our esteemed editor, max, the famous Maximilian Alvarez. I’m willing to give you guys the inside scoop, but I need one thing. We need to raise a little money. So we have
Taya Graham:
Super chats tonight, I think.
Stephen Janis:
Yeah, we have Super Chats chat. That’s right. We
Taya Graham:
Actually chat, have Super chats for their first time tonight. So I’m really excited.
Stephen Janis:
So I’m just saying to people out here, if you want to know what I was actually doing before Taya interrupted me, I guess wasn’t, and what really goes on outside. Yeah, we need to raise some money, but not a lot. A couple hundred dollars would be nice. So I can hire a director, cinematographer, some of the things I need to execute my vision.
Taya Graham:
You’re just trying to get more coffee and corns,
Stephen Janis:
Hey, these things are really expensive and they’re hard to find. But nevertheless, I am inside now. So I’m here. I’m ready to participate. And I’m looking forward to hearing more about Thomas’s case. Well,
Taya Graham:
Actually, as I was saying, Steven, go ahead. You will see the cops basically charged Thomas due to a highly subjective and easy to fail field sobriety test, which Steven, you’ve learned has literally almost no scientific basis. What’s
Stephen Janis:
Really interesting about this hay is I did some research because I thought there was so much subjectivity when we looked at the documents. Yes, having your clothes being ruffled or
Taya Graham:
Disheveled or the way that was his attitude. Was it apologetic? Was it irritable? Just so many subtleties that are so subjective when it comes to a cop’s determination. And
Stephen Janis:
We talk about the law enforcement industrial complex. This is the forensic industrial complex where they create things. This was created out of a wholecloth by a couple of psychology professors. Nothing scientific about it. And also really, so the entirety of this idea of a field sobriety tests, and it varies from state to state. There’s nothing scientific. It fails every time to really learn if a person is drunk or not. And it’s highly, highly, highly just made up out of whole cloth. And so I’m not going to go through all the actual research, but I can say this very specifically, there is no scientific basis for a field sobriety test. And yet in this particular case, in Thomas’s case, it was the sole justification for arresting. And that’s the problem. I don’t think any of us have a problem with a police officer using some subjective diagnostic tools or even subjective judgment when they’re looking in, when they’re investigating some of, but to ruin a man’s life over your impression that he was talking slowly or he was a little heavy footed or some of the other subjective ways, they now analyze it.
I think especially in light that we have breathalyzers and that we have blood tests, I just think is highly problematic. And I think what this particular type of law enforcement diagnostic tool shows is that there’s this sheen of absolute certainty that rubs off on these things over time. Cause over time, they just become recirculated and recirculated. We had an example out in Colorado where people are inex using ketamine during arrest to subdue people and people died and they’re like, how did this happen? And no one really knew. When I dug into it, it was almost impossible to figure out. So in this case, I think we need to call into question this way. None of us support drunk driving and almost think it’s serious, but we should not have a system that is completely dependent upon the subjective. And I think the bias, I mean, I think that the most interesting thing about Thomas’s case is I think they’d already made up their minds. They just needed to stat. I mean, we’re still looking into it and we’ll get to that. But yes, these tests are completely subject to the officer’s whim, and that’s very scary and very dangerous considering the consequences for either getting it wrong or getting it right.
Taya Graham:
Steven, you actually have an update. You did not let go of this story. I know that you were very moved by what happened to Thomas, the ending of his career and the loss of his firefighting family. But you kept on pressing and asking questions. Tell maybe you can share some
Stephen Janis:
Of the cover. Well, so here’s the biggest thing. Now everyone knows in a misdemeanor case or any sort of criminal case there, there’s supposed to be a judge and a prosecutor’s a check on the police. Police can charge anything they want, and it goes into a court and a judge, a prosecutor looks at and says, well, this evidence is weak. Or judge. Well, it turns out Thomas’s case never made it to the prosecutor’s. I asked the Denton County Prosecutor’s office, do you have this case in your system? Why are you prosecuting? I didn’t even really ask them that. I said, why are you prosecuting this case given the evidence is so flimsy? And she wrote me back and said, there is no record of this case. This case never existed. So think about that. The profound consequences for Thomas Thomas is fired from his job. They do an internal investigation, and yet there’s no case in the system.
He has to hire a lawyer, pay thousands of dollars. There’s no case in the system. So I went back to the Denton County Sheriff’s Office and I said, well, this case isn’t in the system. Where is it? And well, you actually sent the email to their spokesperson. And a couple days later they got back and said, oh yeah, we tried to submit the evidence after the statute of limitations had expired. So it’s literally insane how they tortured this poor man, how they extended this case for two years. He didn’t even know it was in the system, and technically it was not an active case. They said, we tried to put it in the system after the statute of limitations, limitations expired, and the system rejected it. Well, you’re law enforcement, you don’t pay attention to the statute of limitations. It’s a misdemeanor in Texas, so it’s only two years.
You got to get your case. And they blamed the crime lab, but they’d already had a negative test on the alcohol. So they had zero on that. So they didn’t have a narcotics test. They weren’t going to get anything anyway. They just made this man miserable. And then when I said, could you release the blood test on the narcotics because we’d like to know what you found. And they said, no, we can’t release it because of the public shield laws that don’t allow you to release information on cases that had been dropped. So they basically were able to cover up their own tracks on this case after they had literally destroyed this man’s life. So it’s really, I think, a very, very troubling use of the power of law enforcement. And unfortunate for Thomas too.
Taya Graham:
You know what? What’s interesting, some of the comments here, and I’ve been doing my best to throw some of them up on the screen, someone said, I think it’s Alan Killian. Field sobriety tests are all about collecting evidence against you. And I think earlier it might have been catman, and I apologize if this is incorrect, but they said the field sobriety test is about as accurate as the canine test. So we’ve seen, right, right. We’ve seen some terrible ways. Can nine have been used as an excuse to be able to access someone’s
Stephen Janis:
Field? The thing ISS alarming is there’s an entire industry of dui, aggressive d UI traffic enforcement that is built upon the field sobriety test. So it’s quite alarming how subjective and unscientific this is. And it’s used to such an extent that really it can put someone in jail, you can lose your license, you all sorts of horrible repercussions. And also I think maybe there’s a lot of drunk people that could pass it to be even worse. So I don’t know what the answer is to this question, but I do think we need to stop walking around and thinking, or at least as mainstream media rep, not main as reporters. We need to stop this idea that somehow there’s some scientific certainty in this process of field sobriety tests.
Taya Graham:
And we, we’ve got some great comments in here, and some of them I wish I could put on the screen, but I can’t put all of them on the screen. But some of them are very funny, John Eagle. So as we move on, given the consequences for Thomas and the very flimsy evidence, we decided to spend some time not just on how to protect your rights, but also trying to understand why cops do what they do. Meaning why do we keep seeing this type of abuse of power over and over and over and over and again with very little actual reform? Why do cops continue to make bad arrests and why when they’re clearly presented with evidence, do they continue to try to entrap people when it would just be so much easier to just let them go and allow them to move on? I think this aspect of law enforcement has become more fascinating.
And at the same time, more inexplicable for me mean. And bear in mind, I watch a lot of videos of police encounters. In fact, I’ve spent the past five years just knee deep in body camera and cell phone videos of police behaving badly. And many times when I do, so, I find myself asking the same question, why can’t the cop just walk away? Why do they so often escalate? And what can I do to help people overcome bad policing? And I’m hoping that I have at least part of the answer, because often we don’t know our rights, and even more importantly, how to apply them given the circumstances. And I have watched many routine encounter with a cop go wrong. And I’m struck by just how subjective it can be and how much dissembling police often do, how often they simply ignore the law or in the worst cases, just make up their own rule book entirely. And that’s why we’re going to address this. So let’s call it the law enforcement knowledge gap. And we’re going to do so by having a series of discussions to share that information, to help you and help close that knowledge gap. Because I literally watched three Deputy Sheriffs destroy Thomas’s life. And I honestly thought I need to do something, not just as a reporter, but as a human being. I mean, not that those two things are mutually exclusive, but meaning
Stephen Janis:
Sometimes they’re
Taya Graham:
Meaning we need to do something. We need to talk about, not just why, but how these types of cases continue to happen. And we need to discuss what we can do to fight back. And this is conversation that involves more than just talking about the law and your rights and other important aspects of our legal system. It’s also discussion about the underlying imperative that drives all the ills mentioned earlier, a system that trains them to embrace a psychology. The idea of that their job is not to police for us, but against us to use the law as a barrier, not a common set of rules for everyone. I think we have to try to understand what and who these cops are really working for and why often they seem to have other priorities besides keeping us safe. I mean, Steven, I think we’ve probably had this conversation a million times before about the underlying imperative that drives policing. But why is this important? Why even talk about it? Why aren’t we just showing videos of bad
Stephen Janis:
Cops? Well, I think it’s very important when we look at a case like Thomas’s and other cases we’ve covered that there’s this sense when you report on that this is an example of law enforcement gone wrong. But I think what we need to do in our conversation is flip that around. This is actually, in some sense, if you examine the system, what we call the system that allows bad police, makes bad police impossible. This is an example of actually, I think from the perspective of the way law enforcement has been construed in this country of law enforcement succeeding. And when I say that, you’re like, what are you talking about? Why is that success It? It’s because law enforcement is not construed in many ways for public safety. As many of our cop watchers point out. It has a million other agendas. I think there’s this famous saying, the arc of justice, the arc of the universe bend towards justice.
Well, the arc of the law enforcement universe bends towards inequality and bends towards enforcing laws that are about monetizing processes, monetizing poverty, many monetizing many social ills so that when you see a case like Thomas, you’re not saying law enforcement has gone bad, which is the way we report it. And of course, that’s kind of the way it’s perceived. It’s also, we have to think about it. Maybe this is the way law enforcement is intended to work. In many of these cases. It wouldn’t exist if didn’t, the powers that be didn’t want law enforcement to make these kind of so-called mistakes. They wouldn’t happen. And that’s why we have to acknowledge it and think about it in kind of a different way. We have to sort of say, wait, this is law enforcement working as it’s intended to work. And when we look at it that way, I think we have a better chance way of saying, pointing out what’s wrong with it on a systemic level, not just on the individual cases.
I mean, you and I have watched enough body camera, oh gosh, to know things go bad quite often, but we have to be able to look at it in a larger picture and say, well, what’s working here? Why isn’t it working? And it’s not working because it’s not intended to work for the people, for the working class of this country. That’s not how law enforcement is constructed. And that’s not how we see it work. And so when we report on it, we kind of have to flip the, it’s like narrative inversion, right? We’re trying to come up with a way to tell this story in a different way so we understand, okay. It’s sort of the idea I’ve had about, I’ve talked about police corruption. There’s no such thing as a corrupt police department. There’s a corrupt society that creates and begets a corrupt police department.
That’s a good, the corruption and police department simply reflects the power structure, the elites and the society. It really serves not the people. So we have to kind of dismiss this notion that there is corrupt. And then over here, there’s this great utopian police department that comes out and serves the people. And that can sound a little harsh, but I think sometimes when you see the things that happen and we see people’s lives, it’s destroyed and everyone, no, I mean, everyone I called, no one wanted to talk about Thomas. No, wanted to talk on behalf, right? This guy served his community for 30 years as a first responder and they throw him out. So you think that you’re, say the system’s not that indifferent. Oh, yes. We know how indifferent. It’s because every time we call on people’s behalf, whose lives have been literally torn as thunder, no one responds.
People will be like, I’m not going to talk about it. We’re not going to talk the department of public safety number. We’re not going to talk about it. We can’t talk about this, blah, blah, blah. But you sure can charge him. You can fire him. Absolutely. You can put him in jail. You can make him hire a lawyer. You can do all that. But what you can’t do is talk about it. You can’t explain why you ruined this man’s life. And that’s what I’m trying to say. Like law enforcement is not constructed around serving the working class and the people. It’s constructed around. Well, an elite sort of way of parsing us and saying, you’re here. You’re bad. You’re good. We’re the heroes. So anyway, sorry. Didn’t very true.
Taya Graham:
No, I’m sorry. Look, you get fired up sometimes. Well, yeah. And just got to let you,
Stephen Janis:
I think I got a little upset when you called me inside.
Taya Graham:
Maybe
Stephen Janis:
That’s, I’m telling. I’m so happy out there. And Max gives me one bag of CORs every night, max, I know you’re watching. He says, Stephen, you can
Taya Graham:
Have this
Stephen Janis:
Whole
Taya Graham:
Bag. You know what? You will get a suit eventually with these coronets. Oh God, you’re right. You know,
Stephen Janis:
He gives me a bag every night. It’s pretty cool. Not many employees have those kind of benefits union power. Anyway,
Taya Graham:
So I just want to let you know for some of the people who have put in questions, I’m going to, I’m putting them aside for later, so if there are any questions or comments, I’m going to make sure to put them aside, and I’m going to throw ’em up on the screen later for when James Freeman and James Madison join us. And back to moving forward, I think when we talk about our rights, we have to remember, based upon our experience reporting across the country, we have learned that quite often our rights are conditional. Meaning they’ve either been watered down by the courts or in the name of the drug war, or simply ignored in the service of racking up stats for fines, as we’ve seen in a variety of cities and small towns as well. But that idea also applies to something that is important to acknowledge about the law itself, which it is often subject to interpretation.
And unfortunately at the moment, the interpretation of the cop is what we would call in legal terms, controlling. In other words, an argument over the law that involves an encounter with a cop is usually hashed out after you’ve been subjected to it. So it’s something to keep in mind when you cite the law, because an officer can simply ignore it while you suffer the consequences. And only after you’ve been jailed, ticketed, arrested, can you go to court and try to right the wrong. And that is why part of the Know Your Rights Show tonight will be focused on getting a better understanding of police, why they do what they do, and of course, how they think. And I can think of no guest better than a man who used to be a cop and is now a cop watcher. His name is James Madison, and he’s a former law enforcement officer who has used his talents as a content creator to share valuable insights into policing your rights and how to defend yourself.
But he has also applied his investigative skills to the benefit of the public, as evidenced in his most recent work about the breaking the story about a police lieutenant in Daytona Beach who brought his three and a half year old son to the station and put him in jail. And excuse me for saying this, but for going to the bathroom in his pants, that same cop also admitted that he put previously put another one of his children in jail for a similarly unusual crime. So thanks to James, this story has just started to receive national attention. Let’s run a clip of his work.
Speaker 8:
He’s not here right now. And that’s, what’s his name? He’s new, right? Yeah, Bob Michael Fowler. Fallon. That’s it. And let me ask you, I guess there’s an IA going on. That’s why you said this is a big deal. I would hope. I dunno. I dunno about that. Okay. Oh, excuse me. Hey. Hey, what’s going on, mark? Oh man, not much. I heard you in a meeting, but hey, I just got a tip or something like that. I dunno if you want to make a comment on it, but two police officers that were put their kid in a jail cell. Yep. I got no comment now. But is an ia, you go upstairs and get that is an IA active there? I Well, I couldn’t comment if there was, you can. The state statute allows you the details of the I. There’s not one. No. Oh my gosh. All right. You do a request for you to see her calendar.
Speaker 9:
I don’t have her calendar.
Speaker 8:
Who does? Do you know
Speaker 9:
Sherry Schwab? Schwab would have all public
Speaker 8:
Documents. Do you know what time she left or when she left?
Speaker 10:
She
Speaker 9:
Left at 10 o’clock.
Speaker 8:
10 o’clock. All right. Sounds good. I appreciate it.
Speaker 11:
Okay. And I think you’re probably saying the same thing. This is a big runaround, right? And heard that background noise, right? She did not want me going into these elevators. This is a community center and upstairs is the public information office. Now, this request to her was done in March, five months after the initial request
Speaker 12:
Here to stand by for them to do a thing. And then, we’ll, right here, Mike, bro, thanks Smith, man. Devin ld, Mike Scho. Hello. Hi, Kathy with DCF Pleasure. Mike. Sean, bro, nice to meet you. Nice to meet you. Let me gate back. I hear the hear puppies. I hear doggies too. There are, hang on a second. I walk your time. No.
Taya Graham:
So I just wanted to let you know that for the follow up report that James has on his channel, Nolie D in the live chat is going to be dropping a link so that later you can follow up and take a look at these incredibly disturbing allegations. He actually has the officer on record saying exactly what he did to his young child. And now I’m going to introduce James Madison. James, thank you so much for joining us tonight. I know, oh, you are actually on mute right now, unfortunately. So if you can just,
Speaker 11:
No mute,
Taya Graham:
Now you’re back.
Speaker 12:
We’re good. We’re good. You’re
Taya Graham:
Good. All
Speaker 11:
Right. I hope I didn’t miss it. Yeah, good evening too. Thank you. It’s been a while. So last time was about two years ago, so yeah.
Taya Graham:
Thanks. Well, we’re fi glad to finally have you back. It is absolutely our pleasure. But before we talk about your investigation, I just want to get your feedback just to get your opinion on the D U I video that we watched together. What is your assessment of the police tactics? I mean, what could a driver and who ended up being the victim of this false d u ire arrest, what could he done to protect himself? What could he have done differently from your perspective?
Speaker 11:
Well, the least that you talk to law enforcement is always the better it is. Everything you say yes can and will be used against you, whether it’s Mirandized or not. And in this situation here, I was watching that video and unfortunately, the cops were asking things that my doctor would ask me. And I’m not going to be answering questions like that to law enforcement, depending on the state by state. You’re not required to do field sobriety exercises in Florida. That’s specific here. Some of the other states you might be able to or be required to. But at that point, when I know that I haven’t been doing anything and I haven’t been drinking, I’m going to say, Hey, listen, you need to do what you need to do. I don’t want to answer those questions. They kind of violate my HIPAA rights. I don’t want to have my public information out there or private information out there. And that’s where I would’ve stopped at that one and just said, Hey, listen, if you have something, let me know. But when you get stopped by the police, I’ve stopped people several times. It is nerve wracking you. You’re nervous as it is. I mean, that’s it. It’s nerve wracking. So you might talk a little bit more. And that’s what people do sometimes when they get nervous.
Taya Graham:
Well, I think that is absolutely excellent, and that fifth Amendment in our wonderful constitution, it’s the right not to incriminate yourself. Please make sure to avail yourself of that. But Steven, I know I’ve been doing a lot of talking. Let me give you an opportunity.
Stephen Janis:
Well, first of all, James, congratulations on your investigation. But first, just tell us, so how did you get ahold of this story? I mean, I’m fascinated, just so everyone knows. As Teo was saying, a police lieutenant put his son in jail because he pooped in his pants. Excuse me. But how did you get wind of this? I mean, this is a fascinating process. This is some really outstanding investigative reporting, I guess. So tell me how first you came across this story, who tipped you off? Well, you don’t have to give me your sources, but how did you learn about it?
Speaker 11:
Yeah, so just like law enforcement, you, they’re going to be reliant on sources. And so am I, because I can’t dig in every little spot and find out. And that’s it. If someone wouldn’t have came to me and told me about this, this would’ve been buried and dead and nothing would’ve happened of it. But instead, we learned that they were on their ia. They were charged with allegations of committing a felony. So that’s pretty serious when you have law enforcement doing that. When general citizens run around, if we commit a felony clink time, you’re going to be arrested. And so you have to rely on sources there. And thankfully, there are a few good cops that are still out there. However, those few good cops, they don’t go and punish though.
Stephen Janis:
So explain to me how a police lieutenant believes he has the use of the facilities, a jail facility, to bring his child in there, how that even becomes a reality in any way, shape, or form. I mean, I can’t even really kind of wrap my mind around who would ever do that to their own child. But how does he get the idea that he can go ahead and do this?
Speaker 11:
Well, I don’t know, and I can’t speak for him, but if I were in his position and it was 20 years down the road, or 15 how many ever years he’s been there, there’s probably come some complacency. And there’s probably some idea that, Hey, I’ve worked here so long, I can do what I want. And I’m not speaking that that’s what he did. But if I was in a job for that period of long time, that’s my maybe how I feel. I don’t know. Yeah. I’m not in his shoes. So
Stephen Janis:
Now, one of the things you were talking about before the show is the coverup is worse of the crime. So when you got this tip, you’ve, you’ve this crazy tip, which I’m sure when you first heard it, you’re probably like, what? But you get this tip, you’re going to be, how are people pushing back and what are they saying when you first kind of say, Hey, I know this information. I know it’s true. What kind of pushback and what were people saying to you when you were trying to uncover this?
Speaker 11:
Well, it was that very, you felt the resistance almost immediately. You asked for something. Oh yeah, you either get a delay or you get excessive charge. So when I first asked about it, the first time that I was able to speak to someone, was there the elevator, I have had some really good luck. One of the participants or one of the subjects in the investigation, I was able to somehow get in the same presence of her at a restaurant and obviously no comment, but was able to ask her a question, Hey, let me tell you about the child. Same thing with the chief. I went to the PD there, and somehow or another, that chief is coming down that elevator or that coming out that elevator as soon as I’m coming in there. And it’s just been a luck, luck of the draw there
Stephen Janis:
With that. Wait, wait, wait. Hold on. That’s really interesting. So when you first confronted them, were you saying the way they responded, you said, because this is pretty smart, you’re like, oh, I know this is true. Just by the way they responded to you. I’m kind of fascinated by that because that that’s really some gumshoe kind of reporting.
Speaker 11:
I mean, we all know body language. If you’re married, if you’re not your kids, when someone’s lying to you, you feel it. Right? It’s just one of those things. And when I asked him that question there, and he was reaching to knock on the door to get away from me as soon as possible, I was like, yeah, there’s something going on. And at the time that I asked him that there was no ia, which it was true, there wasn’t one. But the situation did occur, and it was something like 22 days after the incident. So there should have been an IA already started. If we learn later that you’re being alleged that you’re charged with violating policy that says you committed a felony.
Stephen Janis:
So do you think your question started the IA investigation, or did they then they knew you were snooping around. They knew someone knew about this, so they kind of tried to cover their backsides, in other words, and just try to quickly assemble an investigation.
Speaker 11:
Yeah, it’s possible. That’s what happened. I don’t know. I don’t have those details in there. But many times that is what happens in law enforcement. It’s all swept under the rug until someone finds about, oh, we got to do something about it. I got to either, I got to smack you with a day off or two, but you’re going to have to deal with this now because now the public knows. So, I mean, there is a lot of cover up in different departments. They don’t want you get it out.
Stephen Janis:
Well, congratulations you for bringing this to public, but explain that to people who don’t understand it. So you’re a cop. You see someone lieutenant, bring his kid and lock him in jail, and you’re like, wow, that’s really messed up, but I’m just going to keep this under the rug. We’re just all going to look the other way. And even though a great injustice occurred, or you see it in arrests and beatings and all, explain that psychology to people who aren’t cops who don’t understand it. Cause it’s kind of fascinating.
Speaker 11:
Yeah. Someone told me one time that the thin blue line is not a brotherhood of law enforcement. It’s actually whoever you’re loyal to that’s in the head of the department. Because if you cross that line, you’re out of there. And that lieutenant said that there was people that seen this happening and what was going on, and a few of ’em came out and said something. They were interviewed by F D L E, but from what I was told by the source is that they were ultimately punished somehow or some way. So that’s it. If you’re in that psychology there, you see something like this, even though police tell us citizens see something, say something, right? And they make our information public. But when a police officer can see something, right, they generally don’t say something because they’re afraid that if they cross that thin blue line of whoever’s their chief or their supervisor, they’re not going to have a job. And if you dig into shores and look at it, there’s been several resignations, a nine year veteran, I think it was put on probation mysteriously. And there’s no record of why.
Stephen Janis:
So you’re saying that if you see something really messed up, you’re more at risk of getting in trouble for saying something about, than not saying something about it in the sense that if this person is connected or higher up, he’s a lieutenant, he’ll quickly file a complaint against you and put you in this system. Is that, that’s kind of what you’re saying,
Speaker 11:
Right? Yeah. You’re a rat.
Stephen Janis:
Yeah.
Speaker 11:
I mean, that’s the term. Don’t be a rat,
Stephen Janis:
But that’s, that’s a criminal term. Okay. Yeah. That’s what mafiosos call people rats, right? Criminals, not cops, but you, there are things such as things as, I’m not naive, but there are rats in cop land. Is that what you’re saying?
Speaker 11:
I mean, that’s what it is. You’ll hear that term when you’re working there is like, oh man. For instance, when I was working, something occurred with a juvenile and he had a little small amount of cannabis on him, and none of us wanted to do a report. We didn’t want to do a report because it took so much paperwork to get this. We took the stuff, threw it down a storm drain. I didn’t, someone else did, but took it down the storm drain, which is fine. I would’ve done it too. Took it. And then the one person that saw it was like, Hey, I saw that we can’t be doing that. And the other guy said, what are you going to be a rat?
Stephen Janis:
Wow.
Speaker 11:
And it favored the juvenile. It was in the cusp of when cannabis was coming to legalization, but it was, you know, hear that. And that’s what the scary part is. You’ll be called that, and then you are pretty much blackballed as a police officer, and no one will trust you.
Stephen Janis:
I mean, that just seems so inimical to the idea of having a just system where if you say one wrong thing, your career is, if you say one, if you expose anything that’s wrong, it just seems to me that the system will ultimately be corrupted. By that, I mean, there’s no way around it that it won’t be corrupted. People can’t say, Hey, you made a mistake or you did something wrong. But if I say anything, it’s the end of my career. I just don’t see how that system functions.
Speaker 11:
Well, let me break it down in syllables, it’s justice system, right? Okay. Just us. That’s generally what it is. I mean, you think about it, right? Yeah. And that happens in every agency. I did another story where a captain of a police department was taking money from a disabled adult. Everybody knew about it, but they turned a blind eye to it and, and that’s just the way it is in this law
Stephen Janis:
Enforcement. Yeah. So what was the turning point for you where you said, I can’t take this anymore. And I know you told this story to before, it’s still fascinating, but where you said, I’ve just got to not be a part of this system. What was for you? Was there a moment or was it just a long progression where you said, okay, I’m done. Yeah, I’m going to be a civilian.
Speaker 11:
Well, leaving the law enforcement, I was making 35 to 45,000 a year, and I was getting a girlfriend, my wife and I just couldn’t afford to live like that. I mean, it was a low paying job. I was making 11 eight. And then when I was on motors riding the motorcycle, it turned into $16 an hour, and that’s after eight years of work. And then at Wow, I said, you know what? I’m done. I’m going to go pursue a career with a father, with a construction company. And that was it that,
Stephen Janis:
Do you have any regrets or are you happy with the choice you
Speaker 11:
Made? Oh my gosh, it’s so freedom. There’s so much freedom when you work for yourself. And ultimately, I started a little small businesses that kept us afloat during the 2008, 2009 crash. But those blossomed into shipping businesses, and I love it. It’s working from home. It’s freedom. And after I left law enforcement, I actually watched the guy that is in here in the standby room, James Freeman. I was watching him afterwards. And what happened is I was building a house and the neighbors were upset. He called code enforcement a bunch of times. Turns out he was married to one of the people at the city, and they just ultimately were after us for building this house calling code enforcement violations. And that was the turning point. I said, what is going on here? They came and searched my backyard, tried to write me up on code violations, and then the police came, wouldn’t let me sign stalking charges against the neighbor. And I said, if they’re doing this to me, are they doing it to someone else? I turned on YouTube, and I found, I’m telling you, I found James Freeman
Stephen Janis:
And the couple other people I think of, think James Freeman said a lot of people on the cop watching path. Oh, yes. But yeah, just let me ask you a question, and this is for me personally, so think’s better being a journalist or being a cop, what do you enjoy more?
Speaker 11:
Oh, being doing what I do now. I love this. I mean, it’s intriguing. There’s some elements of the surprise when you find something, when you open up an email and you look through the email string and you find some detrimental stuff in there, it is perfect. You get excited for that. You find it. And also you help people all the time helping people get some satisfaction with law enforcement and some resolution with them too.
Stephen Janis:
Well, I think the public owes you a huge debt for breaking that story.
Taya Graham:
Oh, absolutely.
Stephen Janis:
That poor child. I mean, I can’t even imagine. I know. Talk
Taya Graham:
About, I know. And the thing was is that I had been listening to some of the video evidence that James had gotten, and I was listening to the police officer describe what he did with the child saying, oh, I only put the child in handcuffs and in the jail cell for 13 minutes, and I knew the jail cell’s really dirty, so I made sure to put them in the part of the jail cell that was the least problematic. And he did what I expected him to. He started to cry. That was the response I expected. And he had mentioned that previously his wife had done the same thing, and he brought the child back because it hadn’t worked. Now, interestingly enough, someone in the comments said, it’s his child. He can do what he wants. Well, that’s an interesting response. First amendment. First amendment.
Stephen Janis:
I mean, look, we want to have a robust discussion, right? Absolutely. I don’t necessarily agree with that idea, but I think the more important point in James’s story is that people should know about it. If you’re going to use a public facility to discipline your child in a very sadistic way, I think the public has a right to know, because James, I mean, in a lot of ways, some of these cops become chronic in some sense, where they do one crazy thing and they get away with it, and they do another crazy thing. I mean, it’s not just always an isolated incident.
Speaker 11:
And listen, there in our area, there was two teachers that were teaching the E ESC students exceptionally education. I don’t know the acronym, but they were teaching those students and they were having some issue. They stuck ’em in a bathroom and locked the door. They were arrested for false imprisonment. And yes, that’s different from what the viewer was saying about we should be able to parent parental discipline, our child, but the trauma that a child receives when they are utilized as they are in something like this, if I don’t have dogs, but if I have a dog crate in my house, and I stuck my child in there, because guess what? My dog doesn’t poop in the crate. It always waits to go outside. I would be arrested for false imprisonment. I mean,
Stephen Janis:
Good point.
Speaker 11:
Exactly. It there would be in there. But then you add the element of handcuffs. That’s just not that My child is five years old. He has some potty training issues. Sometimes he has that every once in a while he has an accident. We don’t go off into some tangent and do that to our child. And I agree that I have a cat in the background.
Stephen Janis:
Well, James, can’t you just write him a citation?
Speaker 11:
Well, I mean, you should be able to do something like maybe conducting a thorough investigation instead of just throwing it under a bus. Right. But yeah, I would never absolutely put my child in No. Any cell. I never threatened my children with, oh, there’s a cop over there. If you do something bad, they’re going to get you. Because I want my children to be able to go to a police officer if they need help. Very rare that they would, because they’ll be with us and that. But along the lines of you don’t want them afraid of people because No,
Stephen Janis:
Just
Speaker 11:
That’s what you condition your children for.
Stephen Janis:
Yeah. Now, you said before we went on air that you were going to work on a skit. What if a police officer is in retail? Is that actually something that your viewers can look forward to seeing?
Speaker 11:
Yes. So we’ve got three people that are involved in it, and it’s going to be banter back and forth. If you walk up to a a counter and you say, Hey, real quick, I just need to ask you something out there. It will be the responses of the law enforcement, how they would treat you on the street, but it will be in a retail setting. Yeah, right.
Stephen Janis:
Oh, we can’t wait to see
Taya Graham:
That. I cannot wait to see that. Now, look, I just wanted to make sure there are one or two questions we have here. I’m hoping you’ll stick around. There’s one question I had to make sure to ask you because of your level of expertise, James? Yes. And what would be, now this is of course, you’re non legally binding. You are not a lawyer advice, but what would your advice be when someone is stopped by police while they are in the process of recording, what would your advice
Speaker 11:
Be? So if I’m out there holding the camera where you, you’re filming and you’re approached and confronted by the cops, the first thing you want to say, sir, am I being detained? And if he Yes. Then you say, well, I don’t have anything to say to you. I’m just going to stand here quietly if you have any questions. I want to direct him towards my attorney. I don’t want to have him here during questioning at all times. And that’s it. And then it should be over. They shouldn’t ask any questions. They may ask you for that driver’s license id. And if you can always ask them. I mean, if you ask more questions than they do, it puts ’em on the offensive, am I being detained? Well, yeah, you are. Well, can you just tell me what I’m being detained for? So I know what I’m expecting here?
What did I do? How do you recognize me as the person that you need to detain? I’m standing here filming, doing a legal and lawful activity, and if they continue on, you may have to provide id. A lot of people say, take the arrest. And that’s just one of the things that you never want to do. You can be violated without being arrested, because that starts the criminal justice program. And as you said earlier, two years on this case, right? They will stretch out these criminal cases so that you have nothing for a civil case later on.
Taya Graham:
Wow. That’s good point. That’s an excellent
Stephen Janis:
Point. Run out the statute of limitations on the federal.
Taya Graham:
That really is an excellent point. And James brought up something really important, which is initially there can be a stop that’s consensual, and then there’s a stop. That’s a detention, right? Yeah. So you need to find out, am I being detained? If you’re not, my advice is get out of there unless you absolutely feel obligated. Point to continue to recording’s A, because I personally don’t want to see anyone have to interact more with the criminal justice system than necessary. I have seen it destroy too many lives, and I don’t want to see anyone else go through
Stephen Janis:
That. And if you say, even
Taya Graham:
For the best of reasons, James,
Stephen Janis:
Can you say, if they say yes, you’re being detained, could you say, what’s your probable cause? Or what’s your reasonable articulate suspicion? Can you go that far? Or is it better just not to say anything more?
Speaker 11:
Well, the reasonable, articulate suspicion is for the charging affidavit. They don’t have any obligation to tell you that. But if you can peacefully and get that out of them, well, I think you’re suspicious. You set yourself up for an easy dismissal for a case if they do arrest you, not legal advice, but Right. What could happen if they’re saying, well, you’re just out here and you’re walking around with a camera, that’s kind of weird. I need your id. That’s not reasonable. Articulate su suspicion of a crime. You putting some opinion on something that you’re trying to make it illegal for me to be here filming. Oh, and now you’re going to set me up for resisting or failure to id.
Stephen Janis:
And that’s really smart, because you’re kind of turning, when you say anything can be used against you, you’re making the cop explicitly state why they’re detaining you, and thus you can use that against them. Yes. I guess if you have it, especially if you’re recording. Yes. Which is why you want to record,
Speaker 11:
Right? Yeah. Cause if you’re not recording, then it’s hearsay. You could submit the video as evidence, and if they don’t have body cameras, that’s a cue to get out of there quicker than anything else. Right.
Stephen Janis:
All right. Well, Jim,
Taya Graham:
This has been great. That’s great. You know what the thing is, there are so many questions I would love to ask you just to get more details, because I think even I learn something about the law every day. I mean, the crim, the criminal code, that Section eight team, or all the criminal codes, you could literally spend lifetimes going through it and still not across every criminal code. And unfortunately, yeah, unlike police officers, ignorance of the law is not an excuse for us. No. So there’s no qualified immunity for the law, no qualified immunity for us citizenry. Right. So I just think, I guess, which should we bring in James? Yeah. Should we bring in the other James? It’s so funny. There are people in the comments who are saying, it’s ginger night. Definitely.
Speaker 13:
Ginger night.
Taya Graham:
Whoa. Okay. Oh my gosh. So let’s bring in James night. Well, let me, oh, you know what? Let me give Ja the other. James got an intro, so this James deserves his intro too. Okay. Okay. So let me give it to him. Now, our next guest is one of the most popular, and I would say humorous cop watchers out there. His approach to watching cops has always been creative and innovative, and I think it goes a long way towards revealing the psychology of law enforcement that we have talked about today. Because James Freeman has a way of teasing out the truth from cops who really aren’t prepared for his approach to covering them. In other words, his tactics often create a power reversal that surprises them to the extent that they tell on themselves. For those out there who don’t know James Freeman, let’s run James Freeman confronting a cup
Speaker 14:
Says, sheriff, I don’t know what county though. Criminal interdiction unit. State of Texas Sheriff’s Office. Sorry. License plate. Hey, what’s up? Yeah, how about you? What department are you with? I work for Collin County Sheriff’s Office. Collin County? Yes, sir. You got ID on you? Yes, sir. I do. Can I see it please? You want to see my, yeah, please. I need to see your id. Yeah, yeah, no problem. You licensed to carry that firearm for real. Okay. Can you do me a favor and, sorry, hold on. That’s kind of loud. That’s you. Do me a favor. While I’m dealing with you, can we go ahead and put your firearm up for my safety? Absolutely.
Taya Graham:
So you might notice here that James is putting a little spin on the way cops ask us questions. Instead, he’s asking cops the questions they have a tendency to ask us. But the reason we’re talking to him tonight is because now he’s fighting for something that I think is incredibly important to almost anyone who believes that power needs to be held to account. And namely, that’s transparency. The ability of citizen journalists to cover and report on elected officials, cops, and what they do in their official capacity. It turns out that the Torrance, New Mexico Circuit Court administrators don’t want him covering them. It seems that some of James’s reporting exposed how the internal workings of the court were often incompetent and even downright absurd. But James’s effort to shed light on this has prompted this very public institution to fight back by banning him and just to show James’ work to hold him accountable. We have one more clip for you. Let’s take a look.
Speaker 15:
A New Mexico YouTuber and journalist with nearly half a million subscribers is now suing the Seventh Judicial District Court.
Speaker 16:
He says they’re not letting him do his job. News thirteens, Alexis Kki has that story.
Speaker 17:
Will you be able to give me all of the details?
Speaker 18:
His followers know him as James Freeman, a YouTuber who calls himself a government watchdog documenting the actions of local leaders in law enforcement. But behind the scenes,
Speaker 17:
I started trying to point out government corruption because in my daily life running a business, I was constantly dealing with issues with this little stuff with the state where they were constantly breathing down my neck. For
Speaker 18:
The past six years, he’s been in and out of the courtroom covering cases, but lately he’s not allowed because
Speaker 17:
There are some very specific ones that people have asked me to at least view and show the public what’s going on. And they denied me at every corner. Not only that, but they started calling the police on me and tried to have me arrested.
Speaker 18:
He says, it all started back in January when he sat in at a court hearing in as Stasia Springer says, he was just observing when a hearing officer yelled at him to leave the courtroom, he later requested the court audio and published a story about what he heard.
Speaker 17:
He had allegedly told both of the individuals on both sides that it was illegal to cuffs, cuffs at each other in a text message, and that they could be thrown in jail for a year for doing it.
Speaker 18:
As part of that story, he confronted the hearing officer,
Speaker 19:
I just asked you to leave my courtroom, and if not,
Speaker 17:
Well, I was told by quite a few people back there that you had demanded that they arrest me and bring me back into the courtroom for a contempt hearing
Speaker 16:
That you were told very
Speaker 18:
Wrong. And that’s when Springer says the order came down.
Speaker 17:
After I ran that story, they made an administrative order saying that I can’t come to the courthouse anymore.
Speaker 18:
Court documents say Springer was harassing staff, but he denies that he’s now filed a lawsuit going after the Seventh Judicial District Court, two judges, a court clerk and a court administrator who he says are violating his civil rights. The goal he says, is to bring transparency back to the court system.
Speaker 17:
They’re not always doing it right, but they’re, they’re not always doing it wrong, but transparency is needed.
Speaker 18:
Alexis Eski Care, QE News 13.
Speaker 16:
We reached out to the Seventh Judicial District Court. They said in a statement they do not comment on pending litigation.
Taya Graham:
So as you can see, James has applied his uniquely deliberate reporting style to the wheels of justice in New Mexico. And the people and institutions he has put under his own unique microscope just don’t like the attention. So to talk about his fight and the lawsuit, why his coverage is critical in the state of government and cop watching in general, I am joined by Mr. Freeman himself. James, thank you for joining us.
Speaker 17:
Hey, thank you so much for having me on again. It’s always a pleasure to be with you guys. Oh,
Taya Graham:
It’s so great to see you. First off, I have to ask you, are you still asking cops the same stupid questions they ask us?
Speaker 17:
It doesn’t work as well as it used to because I’ve gained such a reputation for it that they already know that it’s coming. I approached a Farmington, New Mexico police officer just yesterday and was going to try and get that going, and right off the bat he goes, oh, Mr. Freeman, your reputation proceeds you.
Stephen Janis:
So
Speaker 17:
It doesn’t work as well when they know it’s coming.
Taya Graham:
Oh, that’s great. I mean, I’m disappointed, but I’m glad that your reputation proceeds you. No, I think that’s just terrific. And I’m also just, I was so glad to see that the mainstream media actually acknowledged A, that cop watcher existed, and B, that they can actually do something useful for the community. How is that process interacting with the msm, with your local news?
Speaker 17:
I wasn’t entirely shocked myself because what I’m dealing with this court, the mainstream media is also dealing with, we are all constantly trying to get the truth of all kinds of stories out there and government. It’s not just us cop watchers and independent journalists. They try to stop everyone from doing it. And so I think that the mainstream media realized if they’re going to do this to me, they’re going to do it to as well. And so a precedent needs to be set here that this is unacceptable and that it’s not going to be allowed. So
Stephen Janis:
Is this a federal lawsuit you filed and is this a municipal, is it a circuit court, or what kind of court is this a state court that this is occurring in? Just to understand some of the details.
Speaker 17:
This is a district court and New Mexico. It’s kind of a rural area. So it actually covers, I think four or five different counties. And we did file the lawsuit in federal court simply because we don’t believe we were going to be able to get justice anywhere in any of the New Mexico courts because we believe that they’re getting their orders from the Supreme Court of New Mexico.
Stephen Janis:
So is this a First Amendment case or what’s your basic argument? And I’m fascinated by this because we have the same problem here in Maryland. So is this a First Amendment case or what are you arguing in your suit?
Speaker 17:
Yeah, so what they did is after I ran that story, they made it an administrative order saying that I can’t come to the courthouse at all unless I have official business. But they don’t recognize reporting on their corruption as official business. They don’t, of course not
Stephen Janis:
Recognize that.
Speaker 17:
And so essentially what it did is there was no due process either. There was no hearing, there was no trial. It was just boom, your first amendment rights are gone and there’s no due process. I continued to go to the court and I continued to report anyways for about three months, and then finally the judge said, all right, you violated the order. We were already getting ready to file a lawsuit simply because of the order itself. And then one day the judge said, you know what? You violated the order by continuing to report on us. We are going to have you come in for a hearing and we’re going to try to throw you in jail for contempt of court. Oh God, for disobeying the order, violating your first amendment.
Stephen Janis:
Well, now James, this is very disturbing because there’s nothing more public than court, nothing where there’s more laws about what should be public. A court hearing evidence, what basis did they use to order you out of a courtroom? What was their I don’t even see where they’d have a legal basis.
Speaker 17:
So no, they definitely don’t have a legal basis, but the state of New Mexico, the court system, there’s a reason they don’t want me in there. And it’s because they don’t use the law in their courts. They use whatever they feel like at the moment. What they put on the actual administrative order was that after I ran the story, there were people who viewed the story and called the courthouse to redress grievances and to let them know, Hey, we’re upset with what you guys are doing here, and we want you to get your act together. And so they specifically are articulated in the order, you cannot come to the courthouse due to the fact that other people have contacted us and they claim that it was on my behalf. I mean, obviously you can’t conceal all that. I didn’t.
Stephen Janis:
Right?
Speaker 17:
Yeah. And so they didn’t even ban me for anything that I did. They banned me for things that other people did when they saw the corruption that I published.
Stephen Janis:
I mean, this is so ridiculously first amendment fraught wrong that it’s hard for me to understand. It just sounds like they’re just, like you said, making up the laws as they go along. So then they have a hearing. You said, what happened in the hearing? Was there actually really a hearing? I mean, was there evidence presented and arguments made or what actually happened?
Speaker 17:
So once they decided to schedule that hearing, my lawyers fast tracked it and said, that’s it. We’re filing the lawsuit today. There were a few other things we were waiting on some open records request to, because once you file the lawsuit, they’re going to clam up on everything and not give us anything. And so we were trying to wait until we had some more evidence of the things that they were doing. Once they said, Hey, let’s bring him into court and throw ’em in jail. We immediately filed the lawsuit that day and the judge had to recuse herself. We asked for injunctive relief from the federal court, which they haven’t even given us yet. And so this, they’ve continued to retaliate against me since we filed the suit.
Stephen Janis:
How are they
Speaker 17:
Retaliating? So yeah, there was no hearing.
Stephen Janis:
How are they retaliating? What are they doing?
Speaker 17:
So there’s this, one of the stories that I was covering in that courthouse, there was another hearing just today for him, and he had asked me to be there to record documents so that I could report on the final leg of his story with that court system. The chief judge, Mercedes Murphy, refused to allow me into the courtroom, and it was just a remote hearing through Google, whatever the
Stephen Janis:
Right
Speaker 17:
Zoom or whatever. But she refused to let me into the hearing. And
Stephen Janis:
Wow. It’s interesting because you have sat in a courtroom, I’ve sat a lot in a courtroom, and we know both Eric Brat had had, who’s another cop watcher called a lot of attention to the court process. Just talk about why you see a lot of things go on in a courtroom that just don’t really make any sense and don’t seem to be following the law. Can you talk about why it’s so important to have eyes in the courtroom like yourself, why it would be important for people to see stuff or know what’s going on?
Speaker 17:
As a matter of fact, in the very first story that I broke on the Seventh Judicial District Court in Torrance County, they had said, well, you know what? This is a court of record. We record everything ourselves. Now, previously, a lot of courts weren’t even recording audio or video. They just had somebody typing what they could catch. And there were a lot of problems with that. If you go in and actually record, you’ll find that the record does not match what you record.
Stephen Janis:
Absolutely.
Speaker 17:
And I showed that in the very first story that I ran on them, that even though they were recording, they went off the record and then the hearing officer did and said some things that he later denied He did and said, and the only reason we had evidence that the hearing officer Gordon Bennett lied was because there happened to be a deputy in the courtroom with his body camera on him during that time that he was off. Supposedly off the record, that it,
Stephen Janis:
It’s, wow,
Speaker 17:
These hearings are public.
Stephen Janis:
Go ahead. No, but I was going to say, I mean, one of the things I’ve learned as a reporter being in the courtroom is like, wow, you think there’s this idea of the law and everyone’s following the law, but you realize it’s really, really up to whatever the whims of a judge and can be very capricious. Can you talk a little bit about that? Because sometimes when I go leave a courtroom, I’m like, I’m pretty scared because if I ever ended up there, I don’t think I’d get a fair shake.
Speaker 17:
Y Yeah. I’m no lawyer, I’m no attorney. I work with attorneys, and so they kind of show me the process and have specifically shown me while I’m watching court hearings and on hearings that I’ve reviewed or recorded, been able to go back and watch ’em with lawyers and they say meant that this judge isn’t even following the legal process. Right. And even I’ve got one of my lawyers that’s representing me that has a recording of him telling a judge, Hey, you’re not following the legal process, and he wants to read it into the record, and the judge is yelling at him. No, no. You can’t read the legal process into the record because she just blatantly doesn’t want to obey the law. And so she doesn’t want it on the record that she’s aware of what the law is.
Stephen Janis:
Do you think, I mean, I know we both know Eric Brant, he’s now in prison for threatening judges, and it’s a very interesting case allegedly, but allegedly exactly correct. Thank you for that. But he would always say judiciary does not get enough attention. Yeah. Is that something you agree with?
Speaker 17:
Absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah. And I mean, you talk about qualified immunity for police officers, judges, prosecutors have, it seems to be absolute immunity. Please correct me if I’m wrong. No, but it seems to be absolute immunity untouchable. Yeah,
Stephen Janis:
Yeah. No, and it’s a little scary because really when you think about it, classic, traditionally prosecutors, or at least judges are supposed to be a check on police and other types of law enforcement. But often, I mean, what I’ve seen is that judges pretty much are in cahoots with police in so many cases. And I, we’ve had many corrupt cops who have run through courts forever lying, just blatantly lying and cops and judges doing nothing about it. And I guess that’s what you’re trying to watch out for in this court system. Right.
Speaker 17:
And I’ve been trying to show people too, look, this whole system of three branches of government and checks and balances, that exists for a purpose. These branches aren’t supposed to be working together. They are supposed to be butting heads. They are supposed to be challenging each other. I totally agree. They are supposed to be refusing to cooperate with each other. And I’ll tell you what, with this case, over the last three months, I have seen something that I never thought that I would see in my lifetime. The local law enforcement in this area have refused to enforce the judge’s orders. I have been ordered to be arrested multiple times by hearing officers and judges and the Torrance County deputies and the local police department next door. They have tried to call in every police department possible because none of them will touch me. Wow. And it’s because they know that what the judges are doing is wrong.
Stephen Janis:
So wait, a judge literally issued what? A bench warrant for you, or just an order to arrest you for no reason?
Speaker 17:
Yeah, just an order to arrest. Said, Hey, you know what? He came to the courthouse. He wasn’t supposed to come to the courthouse to report on us. It was a hearing officer just a couple weeks ago, ordered me to be arrested. And I haven’t even uploaded the footage yet. And the two deputies are saying, well, he’s not doing anything illegal. We can’t arrest
Stephen Janis:
Him. I mean, this is an administrative order. You didn’t break a law. Okay, right. So how on earth can this judge justify an arrest? I mean, what? I think the deputies are behaving correctly because they’re following the law, right? It you’re exercising your First Amendment rights and you violate administrative order. It should be an administrative sanction, not an arrest. What’s wrong with this judge?
Speaker 17:
Well, besides that, the administrative order shouldn’t exist in the first place either. True. It violated due process. Right.
Stephen Janis:
But I don’t understand how you jump you to arrest from an administrative order. I don’t get it.
Speaker 17:
I really don’t know. You’d have to ask the judges and the hearing officers why they think that. Actually, one of the hearing officers, when he ran out of excuses and realized, we really can’t get him on violating this order because even the order says he’s got to have a police escort. And I had two deputies with me the whole time. He said, well, I’ll have you arrested for disorderly conduct. Then I said, where did you get your law degree? Do you even know what disorderly conduct is?
Stephen Janis:
It’s like this just is the go-to pickup line for cops. I mean, that this is just really, really, really concerning. And so have the deputies at all or anyone said, Hey, James, we know this is illegal and we’re not going to enforce it. Or is it just kind of implicit? Do they actually tell you, or do they say what they’re thinking is here?
Speaker 17:
I don’t necessarily want to say like we were talking about with James Madison earlier, and that’s been really, really, really tough about this case. For me, people have asked me before, Hey, why don’t you talk about good cops on your channel? Said, because I don’t want put a target on their back. Get control. That’s why, right? And it’s been tough. No. Cause some of these deputies have outwardly, you can request the body cam footage. They have outwardly made it perfectly clear, no, they are not going to follow an unlawful order. And a lot of them, it’s been really tough because the sheriff at the top, David Frazey, is a nut job who would love to see me arrested, but he won’t do it himself, and his own deputies won’t do it for him. So I mean, some of these deputies have really, really stuck their necks out. And I’ve been so conflicted with this incident going, all right, do,
Stephen Janis:
Yeah, that really,
Speaker 17:
Do I published this and praise them or,
Stephen Janis:
Well, I think you’re wise to let them be in the sense that I think as we’ve seen, like you said, we just talked to James Madison, there’s a retaliatory structure there, and if this comes out, they’ll probably be in trouble. And I think probably just be grateful. But that is a really interesting dilemma for you because you’re technically a person who holds cops accountable. And in this particular case, the police are actually, the cops are actually, deputy sheriffs are doing the right thing. But that this is just an amazing case. Mean really to me, this is a premier First Amendment case that the media should be covering all over the country, that you’re doing this, you’re having this battle. Because they could do this to any reporter. And one of, there’s another thing I have to talk about court covering as a reporter, the arrogance of the people in a courtroom, you know, have your phone open because you need to get a story out.
And they’re like, they’ll confiscate your phone. They’ll kick you out of the courtroom if they think you’re, I don’t know what, I’ve encountered so many jerk judges as a reporter who have harassed me. And just for sit in the back of the courtroom, move over here, don’t do that. Or I go to and try to talk to maybe a suspect’s family and say, can I talk to anybody? Why are you talking in my courtroom? And it’s not that I don’t understand, you have to have an order, the courtroom, but the arrogance of the people in the court system is insane. They think that we are, we’re there because they’re letting us be there. Not because the Constitution has the first amendment, and not because we’re doing a job that is protected, but they make it seem like, oh, we’ll let you come in here, you know, can come, but you don’t really have any right to be here. And your perfect example of that case where they’re saying, just because of our whims, we can get rid of you. We don’t like what you say, we can get rid of you. That, I mean, there’s a lot of arrogance, these courthouses, right?
Speaker 17:
Yeah. And I think that’s why they are going to fight this really hard. We believe that the Attorney General of the state of New Mexico is about to weigh in on a very heavy way because they, they’ve been completely out of control for a very long time and gotten away with everything. And it’s wrong it, and they know it, and they know that if we set precedent in this case, it’s going to change a lot of things across this country.
Stephen Janis:
I hope so.
Speaker 17:
It’s just going to be the beginning. And I think they know that.
Taya Graham:
So you know what, we have a bunch of questions both for you and James Madison, but I have one or two questions for you first that I want to hit you with, if that’s okay. James Freeman. Is that all right? Yes. Yes. Okay. All right. Just want to make sure. Okay. So the first question is, has flipping the script on a cop ever gone wrong?
Speaker 17:
Gone wrong? I don’t think I’ve ever gotten arrested doing it. I’ve done it a lot of times and I don’t always get the results that I want. The result that I want is for the roles to literally be flipped to where I’m the dominant one who’s a total jerk. And the cop becomes the submissive one who’s like, oh my gosh, do I do you start stumbling over his words? We do often when we’re confronted by police and we get nervous. I wouldn’t say it necessarily went wrong though.
Taya Graham:
You know what? Now this question is kind of tough, but I did promise that if someone asks, I would throw the questions up there. How do I find an attorney to file a federal lawsuit in Texas? That can be kind of tough. Texas.
Stephen Janis:
You’re the fifth circuit. You’re screwed in Texas. Well,
Speaker 17:
Sorry. No, no, I got you there. That’s, that’s going to be Brandon Grable, Grable and Grimshaw.
Taya Graham:
Oh,
Speaker 17:
Great. He represented us on the Leon Valley case. He’s representing quite a few other people. Actually, one of the cases that you guys covered a family who was recording police, I can’t
Stephen Janis:
Remember where it was. Oh yes. Oh,
Taya Graham:
That’s
Stephen Janis:
Hoagland. Yes.
Taya Graham:
Oh, yes. And really appreciate, and she really appreciate your help in helping connect her know
Stephen Janis:
We have to
Taya Graham:
Useful
Stephen Janis:
Lawyer. We have to connect Thomas with this lawyer because the firefighter who was forced out out of his job.
Taya Graham:
That’s a
Stephen Janis:
Great idea. Not that it’s our job to, but we should at least connect them, right. And do them that. Yes. At
Taya Graham:
Least.
Stephen Janis:
Well, thank you, James. That’s a great recommendation. Absolutely. But I mean, just can’t say enough about this case that James, this case is for all the journalists all over the country. We have to go into courtrooms and beg forgiveness for reporting on what people are doing, how people are exercising, government or power against them. I really, James, I am so impressed and supportive in whatever we can do to help you. And if you could send us a lawsuit, I would like to write a story about it for the real news, because this could be critical. I mean, I don’t know how it works, how the interchange interplay between federal and circuit courts, but it’d be great to set some precedent that they can’t just make things up as they go along. I mean, ultimately hope that’s what’s going to happen. I hope. I mean, hope you’ll win that. Right.
Taya Graham:
By the way, we have someone rather insistent in the chat, wants to know their question is, can I be Freeman’s intern from Matt R in the chat? So do you have interns? Do you have interns? Do you have an internship program? I wasn’t aware you did, but I don’t want to assume
Speaker 17:
I’m a one man show.
Taya Graham:
Okay. A one man band. Okay, got
Speaker 17:
It. Sorry.
Taya Graham:
Sorry about that. Met
Speaker 17:
R I’m paranoid. I’m paranoid. So every, everybody’s a the Fed. Understandable.
Taya Graham:
Oh my gosh, I didn’t even think of that. Yeah. Oh, that’s a good point. You’ve got to be really careful. Yeah. I’m sorry to deliver disappointing news met R, but I did ask for you. So you know what? This is so great. You know what I was just thinking You saw, I have to ask you just to get your perspective. You saw Thomas’s interaction earlier, the firefighter who was put through that field sobriety test. One of the things that really stood out to me is the officers, they take him to all these tests and they’re judging him so harshly. One of the things they did was they did a Romberg test where he has to stand there with his arms at his side and his head back and count to 30. And when he believes he counts to 30, he says, done. And so the officer stands there and does a timer.
And if you have between 25 seconds and 35 seconds, when you say stop, then it’s considered a pass. But the firefighter said, stop at 36 seconds. So they considered that a fail of the test. So that field sobriety test was, it was just cruelty. I thought of so many reasons why it would be difficult for someone to pass a field sobriety test effectively if you’d had a long day at work and you were just a little bit shaky. Yeah, this gentleman literally had a tumor pass it in his ear. I couldn’t, as a matter of fact, I made Steven try to do the field sobriety test and I walked him through it. And I think honestly, a lot of guys who’ve been athletic have tight hamstrings or don’t do yoga, won’t do well at it. I’m being honest. I’m being honest, believe it
Speaker 17:
Or not.
Taya Graham:
No, you don’t do yoga as far as I know. But I just wanted to know what, what’s your advice would be if someone is stopped for, allegedly for an investigation to see whether or not they have been drinking or driving. What sort of advice you would give or what would you say to Thomas, Hey, this is what I would’ve done in your situation.
Speaker 17:
Are you asking Freeman or you Oh, you Madison. Okay.
Taya Graham:
You, sorry.
Speaker 17:
Okay, you
Taya Graham:
Freeman,
Speaker 17:
I, that is a really tough question because it seems to me as a non-attorney that you’re damned if you do and you’re damned if you don’t. You don’t take the test, they’re taking you to jail. I really don’t know. I would almost rather the blood draw though. And yeah. And besides that though, there’s so many other elements to this particular case that are just bizarre.
Taya Graham:
I agree wholeheartedly. Yeah. I mean, in all honesty, the reason why, even though the alcohol test came back completely negative, allegedly there was a backlog. So the drug blood test didn’t come back in a timely fashion. He was dismissed simply for having the arrest charges. Not because he was convicted, but because he simply had been arrested. And so he lost his job as a driver engineer, a career he’d loved for 30 years. He said the fire department was his family. It was absolutely heartbreaking. Absolutely heartbreaking.
Speaker 17:
And that doesn’t happen to police when they get pulled over for dwi. Oh, absolutely. As they’re put on paid administrative leave quite often and innocent until proven guilty. And really, that is the way it should be, even though I’m not a fan of police. That should be the same across the board, that we’re all innocent until proven guilty.
Taya Graham:
Very well said.
Stephen Janis:
Well, as we report on that show, there’s a thing that New York police officers get called courtesy cards that they give out to their relatives and friends. Yes. And speaking to what we’re talking about, James, we were talking about good cops getting in trouble. We reported on this police officer who got sick of these courtesy cards because he’s pulling people over for reckless driving and all sorts of stuff. And they’d give him this card and he was supposed to let them go and he wouldn’t do it. And so guess what happens? He suffers retaliation, his career is destroyed. He sent to Staten Island, has to work the 12 to midnight shift or whatever. So there are two sets, sets of laws in this sense. And I think James, you see that probably every day, or I’m not asking you to agree, but that is something that is Oh,
Taya Graham:
That’s right. Which James,
Stephen Janis:
Oh my God. Whoa.
Taya Graham:
Yes. I know Mr.
Speaker 17:
Freeman. We we’re bringing James Madison back in.
Stephen Janis:
No, Mr. Freeman. Mr. Freeman.
Speaker 17:
Yeah, absolutely. There are definitely two sets of laws. And really more than anything else, that is what I’m trying to show on my channel through every single video that I do, every single, it’s, Hey, we’ve created these rules and laws so that we can have a civilized society. And we all kind of agree, look, these are the rules we’re going to obey. These are the rules we’re going to follow so that we can all get along and be civilized. And you and I do it. And then there’s this class of people that we call government that don’t and that are not accountable to it.
Stephen Janis:
And I mean, the only way that we’re ever going to be able to win that battle and have accountability is if people like you can go into a courtroom and make people uncomfortable. They’re not supposed to be comfortable around reporters. I mean, we’re not trying to make people uncomfortable. We’re not like cops are not harassing people, but they’re not supposed to be comfortable with everything we report. That’s not how the First Amendment works. It doesn’t mean that we’re rude, but it means that we tell the truth and the truth makes them uncomfortable. And I’m just really, we want to follow your lawsuit all the way because I, I’m just hoping that a federal court, which circuit is that the sixth or what
Speaker 17:
Circuit? 10th.
Stephen Janis:
10th. Oh, 10th, okay. Yep.
Speaker 17:
Same one where we just got the case law out of of Colorado from Azaria and
Stephen Janis:
Yeah, the one where the Eric was filming the traffic. Stop that one,
Speaker 17:
Right? Yep.
Stephen Janis:
Yes. Yep. So the 10th circuit that you have some hope there. I mean, when we were talking to Thomas, his lawyer was saying The fifth Circuit is really difficult when you’re suing cost. So we need to get into the details of that. But James, we support you. I as a fellow reporter, and we will cover this story. And we wish you the best of luck with this. Cause if you win, maybe I can go in the courtroom and actually do my job without getting harassed by a deputy sheriff who doesn’t like the fact that I have a cell phone. Right. Exactly. As if that’s really important. But anyway, so I think,
Taya Graham:
Oh my gosh, at first, I just have to thank every single James that Yes.
Stephen Janis:
Joined us. Oh, all
Taya Graham:
James, I realized we are going a little over
Stephen Janis:
On our
Taya Graham:
Time and we have one or two more things to do, and I really wanted to make sure to highlight people’s comments. So I’m down here in the chat trying to throw comments on the screen, but we might need to move forward a little bit. Okay. Because
Stephen Janis:
Yeah, it’s past everyone’s bedtime. It it’ll
Taya Graham:
Be past everyone’s bedtime. Yeah.
Stephen Janis:
Soon you, so let’s get to the let’s
Taya Graham:
We should move forward. Yeah. And I’ll just say talking to James about what he’s dealing with brings to mind how important essentially citizen journalism is to the health our of our democracy. I mean, the hardest hit facet of the news business is local journalism. There’s just not a business model that can sustain it. And Steven, actually, we were talking about this the other day, how YouTubers and some cases have stepped into fill the void. Yeah. Can you talk, I don’t know, maybe a little bit
Stephen Janis:
About local journalism you did that? Well, you see with James there, the mainstream media, which I came from, you’re taught to sort of operate a certain way. But the chaos that’s created by lack of accountability and power has to be met with a very creative type of journalism. And that’s the type of journalism that James can do that we do at the Real News. We’re much more creative. We follow the case of Thomas to the Bitter End. Yes, most mainstream media would’ve moved on, but we don’t move on. That’s fair. And I think that’s what James, James is going to all sorts of court hearings and would get no coverage whatsoever. The only way to respond to the chaos that lack of accountability creates is with creative journalism. And that’s why cop watchers and independent journalists are great.
Taya Graham:
Steven, that’s such an excellent point. And I think there’s an underlying question that informs a lot of this discussion, and that’s why is any of this important? Why is local journalism important? Why is knowing your rights important? Why is it important for Steven and I to sit here and talk to you all about this? And even more critically, why are you the people who watch us and talk to us and comment on our work so important to this, our entire question of preserving our right, I guess these are what we would call existential questions, which means in part, they’re about constructing or perhaps in what Steven was talking about, defining the type of world we want to live in. For me, I see in the work of James Madison and James Freeman, a struggle to reconcile worldviews that although not explicitly explained, are at the core of who we are, how we think about ourselves, and how a subtle change in the balance of power can forever alter our lives in ways that I think can be hard to live with.
I have a sort of simple way to boil this down into two words that are critical to understanding what I’m talking about. One is consent, and the other is dissent. One cannot exist without the other. And both are critical to maintaining and expanding our rights to live our lives as we choose with a government that serves us not the other way around. Okay. What do I mean? Let me try and explain. I think the whole notion of holding power, cops, politicians, the government in general accountable, starts with the idea of consent, the foundation, the assumption underlying the whole concept of governance by and for the people, there lies a simple notion that wielding power cannot occur without the consent of the people. And I think the idea is self-evident in what it means, but still important to reexamine consent means that there is an implicit agreement in every government action that we have consented to the use of power for some sort of common good.
That means, essentially, if police are empowered to write traffic tickets for speeding or reckless driving, we the people have consented to this because we believe this use of power is for the good of all of us. And that so-called common good outweighs the intrusion on our personal liberty in order to benefit everyone. So when you see police writing tickets for quotas or to fund their own salaries or to accrue accolades, or simply make an arrest just because they feel like it, that implicit consent is being erased. When you examine tools like the field sobriety test or these fake forensic techniques that are used to incriminate innocent people, they are offensive to us, to all of us, because that’s not what we consented to. We didn’t consent to erode the Fourth Amendment. So law enforcement, industrial complex could continue to fight the ill conceived war on drugs.
And we didn’t also consent to have our property confiscated without due process so the police could profit from the spoils of the aforementioned war on drugs. Nor do we consent that America’s well-oiled punishments machine could wear us down with fines and fees to fund the same apparatus that continues to grind us into the ground. These things seem intrinsically wrong because none of us consented to them. And that’s where the other word dissent comes in. Because the way we fight back when the political system ignores our consent is by dissenting. And the best way to do that is by using the process of accountability. For example, affirming our First Amendment rights, filing freedom of information Act requests to let those people in power know we don’t agree to your terms of service. This is why people like James Freeman and James Madison and other cop watchers. And you know what?
I’m going to list a few. Okay. Yeah. I’m going to list a few. Go ahead. Cop watchers like David Barn and Monkey 83, and out of the Watchdog and Liberty freak in the Batusi and Lackluster and San Joaquin Par Transparency and Chuck Bronson in Blind Justice. And I think I saw Mrs. Justice earlier, Laura Shark, Tom Zebra, Joe Cool. Writes Krispy Irate Productions, H B O, Matt Corners News, Amanda Acura, long Island Audits News Now, Johnny Five Oh, so many others are so important. It’s also why independent journalists like the Real News or Truth Out or our partners in these times are important as well. And even our mainstream media counterparts who we do give a hard time on occasion are vitally important to the process of descent because it takes all of us to take on the messiness of descent. Wouldn’t you agree, Steven?
Stephen Janis:
I totally agree.
Taya Graham:
Well, yeah, me, you described descent as messy, and I think I’d like to give, do you want to talk about
Stephen Janis:
That or should I Well, yeah, I mean, think that’s the thing. The whole thing with the Thomas story we unpacked tonight was messy. It was messy, yes. It wasn’t something you could organize in a big investigative piece. You had to go piece by piece and confront different aspects of governance that were really not answering. And the only way you can really do it is by being messy yourself in some ways. So yeah, it can, dissent is not always a clean, and that’s why cop watchers and other types of creative forms of dissenting need to exist because it can’t always be copacetic and clean. Sometimes it just has to seem as messy as a system it’s trying to address. And
Taya Graham:
You know what, Steven, I’m glad you talked about the messiness of dissent. And I’m also glad you talked about how important transparency is and how important it’s to have journalists and citizen journalists and cop watchers participate in this. And let me give you an example. It starts with a story of a group of state police officers in Connecticut facing a dilemma. They wanted to write lots of tickets to garner the approval of their superiors and special rewards and promotions, but there was just one little problem getting in the way. People aren’t violating the law enough to meet their goals. So you know what, Dave, if you could just put a few clips on the screen so people can see this amazing reporting that was done, but these ingenious heroic, oh, you don’t have, that’s okay. But these ingenious heroic cops decided they wouldn’t be deterred by the people complying with the law.
No. They devised a plan to bend the system and the law to their benefit. What did the cops I mentioned do? Okay, this is what they did. They entered hundreds if not thousands of bogus tickets into the system. They simply made up violations out of whole cloth. Now, an investigators say it doesn’t seem like these tickets were issued against anyone specifically, which of course raises a whole bunch of other questions about what happened. A preliminary investigation found that over 25,000 fake or inaccurate tickets were submitted, and now almost a quarter of the entire police force participated in some form or fashion. There were a few officers who wrote over 600 bogus tickets each, and they also found that part of the motive was to juice the stats to show troopers have written tickets to more white motorists in an attempt to dodge an accusation of racial bias.
I’m not even going to touch that, but here’s the part where both the consent and dissent work together and why both concepts are equally important. That’s because none of this, and I mean none of it would’ve come to light if a local newspaper had not unearthed the investigation into the fake tickets and reported it to the public. This whole manipulation of the criminal justice system to the advantage of a bunch of rogue officers was kept secret, so secret that until it was reported by journalists protected by the First Amendment, these officers literally had no consequences. That’s right. After falsely swearing out thousands of bogus tickets, the officers received only mild internal discipline, a veritable slap on the riffs for committing professional perjury on a massive scale. And these same professional liars were allowed to go out into the community and continue to write tickets, make arrests, testify in court, and earn their lucrative pensions all at our expense.
And let me repeat, it was only after a report by a Hurst owned newspaper, only after the dissenters made us all aware of the issue that the state government promised to undertake a criminal investigation into those troopers. And now even the governor himself has been forced to call for a criminal probe of the professional fraudsters who are still armed with guns and wearing badges. Now, who in their right mind would consent to that? Rogue ticket writers and congenital liars emerging unscathed. But my point here goes beyond the bad apples apparently living happily in the rotten barrel known as the Connecticut State Police, what’s more important here is how easily, and apparently without conscience, the whole system of law enforcement can be used to facilitate widespread abuse of the power for some at the expense of the many. And how little the officers who are supposed to represent us care about that overreach.
That is why we have to dissent consistency and continually, that’s why we need local reporters, cop watchers, activists, auditors, citizen journalists, TV journalists, and of course even us independent journalists here at the Real News, even us to provide this continuum of dissent that ensures that the government by consent remains intact. That’s why we need people to use their cell phones to film police, and we need YouTube and citizen journalists like James Friedman and Madison to have access to courtrooms regardless if it makes someone uncomfortable. What I’m saying is that we need all of us, every single one of us to contribute, participate, and otherwise join the fight to preserve and expand our rights. No single person can do it alone, but together. I know we can. Right Steven?
Stephen Janis:
I’m willing to stay outside as long as it takes.
Taya Graham:
Oh, that’s beautiful.
Stephen Janis:
Yep. I’ll go right back out there after the show and I’ll be standing out there where you saw me at the beginning of the show doing journalism.
Taya Graham:
That is actually kind of beautiful. Yeah.
Stephen Janis:
Well
Taya Graham:
Commit commitment. That is beautiful. Commit commitment. You know what? I think that’s actually a great way to end this show. Absolutely. With your renewed commitment to journalism, the great outdoors and corn nuts.
Stephen Janis:
Right. Corn nuts.
Taya Graham:
So you know what, before we go, I just have to make sure to thank James Madison and James Freeman for taking the time to be here with us to share their insights, to share the incredible work they’re doing. If you haven’t already gone to their channels, you should definitely check them out. And I know you folks in the live chat had noticed there’s some amazing cop watchers in there too. Maybe you want to go check out their channels. And I want to thank the mods of the show. Noli d and Lacey are thank you both for your support. Thank you for sticking by me for showing up every Thursday and just being an incredible help to me. Yes. And also a very special thanks to our Patreons. We appreciate you so much. And in one second, I’m going to thank each and every one of you personally, especially my associate producers, John R. David k, Louis P, and my p a r Super Friends like Pineapple Girl.
I saw you in the chat. Hi, pineapple girl, Shane Busta, Chris R Matter of Rights. But I want everyone watching to know that if you have video evidence of police misconduct or brutality, you can reach out to us. You can email us directly@therealnews.com. If you follow me on social media at Taya Baltimore on Facebook or Twitter, you can also reach out to me there. We have a police accountability report, Facebook page. We have a police accountability report, Instagram, we have a police accountability report, Facebook. So if you want to contact us that way, please do so. We’re actually going to be taking about a week or so off just to go through the tips we’ve gotten. We have some shows in the works that we’re working on. We’re doing an extra big show coming up. I think we’re going to be dipping back down into Texas.
And it’s going to be an in-depth show. We’re working on it now. It’s going to take us, at least, we’ve been working on it for the past two weeks. So that means it’s going to take us three weeks to complete this show. So I really hope you’ll stick with us to see it. And of course, we want to be able to reach out and help the people. We can. Like I’ve mentioned before, there are a lot of conversations I have with people interactions via email or messages where there’s never a show produced. I, I just try to connect someone to Legal Aid, legal help. I try to help someone fill out a Freedom of Information Act request, or just try to give them some general advice and guidance just to help them. And there’s never a show that comes from it, but it takes a lot of time to go through all those tips and emails and comments.
And I want to do what I can to help support people. So just so you know, I’m going to shout out all my Patreons and I want to thank each and every one of you that showed up here tonight to participate in this conversation. I love the live chat. I wish I could have put even more of your comments up and now for the great reading of thanks to the rest of my Patreons. And I apologize if I don’t get a name. First thank you to Matter of Rights. Shannon p Cameron. J. Farmer, Jane, U s A, Joseph P Marvin, g Kimmy, cat, p Dur Devil, Nope. Curt A Patty. Angela Tru T, social Nationalist, David, B Marcia, E, Daniel, W zero M, Louis William, D B M. Shant. Chemi. John, K X, X, X, X, potshot. Kenneth Lawrence, K Stephen, B Blitz. Cindy, K Dante.
John Keith. B M Joe, six, six, estate A, Z, John Miller, Gary, T, Janet, K, Ryan, mark, William, L, Noli, D, Kyle, R, guy B, Calvin, M, Stephen, D Ron, F, Allen, J, Trey, P, Julius, geezer, Omar, John, Ryan, Lacey, rod, B Douglas, Andre, H, Siggy, young. Stephen. J Michael, S L default Urine. Celeste, D, S, P, T, just my 2 cents. Talia, B, Peter, J, Sean, B, k, a, Joel, a Tim, R Larry, l Ronald h Tamara, a Artemis, LA John, K Jimmy, touchdown, true tube Live. Kenny, g A is Circle of the quantum Note. Brian, m Byron, m, felonious, punk, Loretta S, Mike K, Mike K. And to the new patrons, Michael Willis, Joice, Frank K, Mary M, we appreciate you, your support and to help make our work possible. And remember, if you have video evidence of police misconduct or brutality, please share it with us and we might be able to investigate for you. Please email us the tips privately at pa the real news.com. Thank you so much for everyone who was here tonight. I hope you enjoyed the conversation. I know it was live. I know it was glitchy, but we did it with love and we appreciate you so much. Please be safe out there.
Speaker 20:
Thank you so much for watching The Real News Network, where we lift up the voices, stories and struggles that you care about most, and we need your help to keep doing this work. So please tap your screen now, subscribe and donate to The Real News Network. Solidarity Forever.
The system of mass incarceration extends into the public education system. Known as the school-to-prison pipeline, policies that criminalize youth and their families, from the presence of police in schools to discriminatory and punitive practices that push youth to drop out, disproportionately affect communities of color. Kentucky State Rep. Keturah Herron joins Rattling the Bars to discuss the school-to-prison pipeline and how it can be tackled through state legislatures.
Keturah Herron (D) represents District 42 in the Kentucky House of Representatives.
Production: Maximillian Alvarez, Cameron Granadino Studio Production: David Hebden Post-Production: Cameron Granadino
Transcript
Mansa Musa: Welcome to this edition of Rattling The Bars, I’m Mansa Musa. When we hear “June 19th” or “Juneteenth”, we are given the impression that we should be celebrating the end of slavery in one town, one part of Texas. What is being celebrated is, in essence, people remained in slavery well after they were freed. This is the case when it comes to mass incarceration and the prison-industrial complex. The 13th Amendment legalized slavery and with slavery comes abolition. The tagline being offered by Californians United for a Responsible Budget or CURB is, we’re calling on California to close 10 prisons in five years. Here to talk about this is Amber-Rose Howard, Executive Director of CURB. Welcome, Amber.
Amber-Rose Howard: Thank you so much for having me on. It’s such an honor to speak with you today.
Mansa Musa: I opened up with, this is going to be out June 19, all things considered. As I said earlier, I outlined that we are celebrating something that, most people and most activists, realize that it’s a misrepresentation of reality. That the people that were told on June 19 that you’re free, were being held up for more labor until they didn’t have a choice but to tell them. Because eventually, somebody will come down there and say, oh, y’all got to go. First of all, tell us a little bit about yourself and about CURB.
Amber-Rose Howard: Okay. Sure, sure. Thanks again for having me on. Folks, my name is Amber-Rose Howard, you can call me Amber-Rose. Executive Director here at CURB, Californians United for a Responsible Budget. We are a coalition of over 80 member organizations across the state of California. We have a three-point mission, which is to reduce the number of people incarcerated in California; that includes prisons, jails, and immigrant prisons, to reduce the number of institutions like that, that exist, then to get the state to redirect all the money they’ve been spending on prisons and jails and put it into the community because that’s where we know safety really is. If we have what we need, then the people will be safe. That’s our mission.
I got into this work because I am formally incarcerated. I was convicted of a serious violent felony when I was 18 years old. It propelled me into life to think about how we tear down the prison-industrial complex. Realizing that it is an extension of slavery, realizing that it is racially charged, realizing that it does target Black people. I said this is the new fight. This is where the fight has been handed off from our elders and ancestors. So, this is where I am.
Mansa Musa: Okay. Amber-Rose, CURB has what they call The People’s Plan. First, let’s talk about The People’s Plan, and then roll that over into some of the recent developments, and implementation of The People’s Plan.
Amber-Rose Howard: Absolutely. Okay. CURB got together– We were filed in 2003. The opportunity for CURB, for folks that got together to found the organization, there was an opportunity to close a prison down here in Southern California, but it fell through. Folks said, well, how do we build from there? Well, this is 20 years ago in 2003, when folks were building up to closing prisons. Not until 2019 did the governor say, finally, we’re going to start to close some prisons in California.
That is strictly because of the advocacy of people. Let’s never think that any state governor is going to say, let’s do the right thing, and free people and close prisons, on their own. That’s full people power. The thing is, they kept looking to the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, with a small rehabilitation. They kept looking to the CDCR department for a plan on how to select prisons, which ones to close, how is that going to happen, and what it was going to look like. And, meeting after meeting at the budget committee hearings and all that, at the Capitol, they never came up with a plan.
So, we got together in our coalition and said, let’s give them the people’s plan. Because we know that they’re not going to include our voices. They’re not going to people who are directly impacted by this prison system. So, it’s up to us to hand them the plan, because they don’t know what they’re doing. So, we got together and created The People’s Plan for Prison Closure, which really outlines, in order for us to keep closing prisons, we have to reduce the number of people inside. So, we’re giving suggestions on, pass these laws, pass those laws, in order to reduce that population. This is how you do it safely to make sure that people have resources when they come out. Once we do that, we can start to shut down prisons.
That leads back up to 2019 when the governor finally announced some prison closures. Now, again, they didn’t have a plan for it. So, even after our People’s Plan for Prison Closure, we had to produce another document to say, this is the roadmap. If you all are a little bit confused by this lengthy report produced, here is something that can be straightforward for you. We can really lay it down for you, to say there are a few phases to this. One phase is selecting prisons for closure. Now, we have centered the voices of not only folks who are formerly incarcerated and on the outside, like myself, but we sent you the voices of people who are currently incarcerated in California state prisons.
We sent in to all 35 prisons and we got almost 3,000 responses back. So, the folks were saying, these are the criteria that you should consider when you’re closing prisons, outside of how much it’s going to cost to rebuild the prison or the operations of the prison. The state thinks about the money part. The people said, no, we need to consider, how far is it from your loved ones? How far do they have us sitting away from people who are going to support us in the community? Those should be closed. Thinking about how many homicides and suicides happen in these prisons. What is the violence looking like in these prisons? We should consider those. And then, what is the climate and environmental justice looking like around these prisons? Because in California, we have brush fires happening every single summer when it gets too hot. We have two prisons right now, up in the Central Valley, that are about to be flooded.
So, the people inside said, these are the extra things that you all should be thinking of in the state in order to close a prison. So, we offered that. The second phase is prison population reduction. Passing policies that would attack all of those harmful policies that came out between the ‘70s and the ‘90s in retaliation to the Black Liberation Movement: laws that will criminalize more people, because they realized Black folks are standing up, we don’t like this. How do we get rid of them? So, we said, well, let’s reverse those policies. That’s how we’re looking at it. We have reversed many of them, which continues to bring down the population.
The third part we say is, we need a just transition to support impacted communities. Now, the state is really focused on, these neighborhoods, these towns where prisons exist, how do we keep their economy going after a prison is closed? Many of these towns are fighting back to say, no, we need this economy. Don’t close our prison. And, for me, you all sound like slave owners.
Mansa Musa: That’s what they are. Come on, talk, tell the truth. That’s what they are. Slave owners, plantations.
Amber-Rose Howard: You all been [inaudible] from the slave economy. So, we’re like, no, you don’t need a slave economy. There are plenty of other ways to produce for this town and the people in it, rather than this form of slavery. So, we talk about what are the economic opportunities that the state can provide, that can be pulled from federal funds, in order to keep a town going without a prison.
Mansa Musa: Let me hold you up right there.
Amber-Rose Howard: Yeah.
Mansa Musa: The reason why I want to hold you up right there is because, in the conversation of abolition, that’s the one thing that you hear. We know that in these towns if you take these prisons out, that tumbleweed will follow. As soon as the last prisoner’s there, a tumbleweed’s going to replace. And that’s why I wanted to stop you right there because I want people to understand that CURB is not inhumane in terms of what they want to get done. This is a humane call. This is not a vengeance call. This is not a, we’re going to pull out and leave your ass in there, and let you feel what we felt. No, we’re then reimagining the abolition, reimagining prisons going, we’re reimagining a holistic society, and this is a part of it. Go ahead, continue.
Amber-Rose Howard: That’s right. Exactly. You’re totally right in saying that. I appreciate you bringing that in, because people think, oh, we want to get our people out, move on, whatever. No, we’re talking about changing the entire structure of society here. We’re saying, listen, we need our people free, we need our people living outside of prisons, we need resources in the community. And, we know that people who work for the Department of Corrections, and corrections officers, they have one of the highest suicide rates in the state of California.
Mansa Musa: Come on. That’s right. That’s right. Yeah. They’re doing a bit. They’re doing a bit.
Amber-Rose Howard: It’s unhealthy for everybody. It’s a disruptive system for everybody. Folks who work for that system are, what am I going to do for a job? Wouldn’t you like a job that doesn’t cause you the type of stress that you get from being a slave owner? Really? The overseer? Wouldn’t you want something different for yourself, for your family, to prolong your life? So, this is a revisioning that can benefit everybody.
Mansa Musa: Didn’t you all come up with a victory in terms of the budget or the divestment? I want to echo that point because this is our conversation about Juneteenth. We’re saying that we’re coming. We’re not looking for somebody to come and tell us that we’re free; we’re saying that we are free. And now we’re saying that not only are we free, but that we’re going to dismantle the 13th Amendment by taking away the profit margin that keeps the 13th Amendment alive. Once that profit margin is gone, the 13th Amendment will be gone in and of itself. Go ahead and talk about the recent initiative that you all took.
Amber-Rose Howard: Absolutely. We took the people to the Capitol. We got together folks from across the state and said, let’s go up here and have conversations with these people in person. We do online advocacy a lot where folks can send in letters and make phone calls, but we went to the Capitol to advocate. California had this idea that they would spend $360 million to rebuild San Quentin State Prison. Which is ridiculous.
Mansa Musa: What?
Amber-Rose Howard: Yes. Which is the oldest prison in the state. We said, no, this is ridiculous. You can’t rebuild a structure and say, we’re going to rehabilitate you all if we do more construction on this prison. That has nothing to do with it. When the people are inside, the people get their minds free, together with themselves in a community. It has nothing to do with this system of imprisonment. It has nothing to do with the physical prison.
So, we went to advocate to say, no. We have to fight back. We can say that the people’s power helped push them in the right direction. The State, the Assembly, and the Senate told the governor, we reject this proposal. We don’t need $360 million more on San Quentin. That is a victory. Of course, there’s a long way to go there. Another victory, I’d say, is that the people pushed the governor to announce more prison closures. So, as of now, there were already two closures. One happened and one is in the process. The governor announced an additional two closures and a bunch of yard closures at different prisons.
Mansa Musa: Hey, come on.
Amber-Rose Howard: What we’re looking forward to is another five closures happening by 2027. We know that it’s possible because even the state’s own Legislative Analyst’s Office, which is nonpartisan, said, we have 20,000 empty prison beds in the state of California. You all have to close more prisons. So, we’re getting the state’s analysis to say this is the right direction to move in. So, we do really feel like the people’s power is pushing toward that. I tweeted something a couple of years back about Juneteenth, and I was thinking about James Baldwin when he [quoted Frederick Douglass] “What is the 4th of July to the slave?” So, I said, well, what is Juneteenth to the incarcerated Black person?
Mansa Musa: Yeah. What is it? Yeah.
Amber-Rose Howard: What is Juneteenth to me if I’m sitting in a prison cell? If I’m in chains, if I’m behind bars, it doesn’t have any significance. So, I say to everyone who wants to celebrate Juneteenth, to everyone who wants to go out and party, and eat your food and celebrate, that’s cute. We like that, but –
Mansa Musa: Yeah, we don’t have a problem with people celebrating.
Amber-Rose Howard: I don’t have a problem with a little plate.
Mansa Musa: Yeah.
Amber-Rose Howard: – But I do implore people to think about the fact that we have thousands –
Mansa Musa: 2.5 million people in prison. 2.5 million people locked up because of the 13th Amendment. It’s reimagination, that’s what we’re doing. The whole thing about this conversation we’re having today is saying, this is the implementation of our reimagination. It’s not a stretch of the imagination.
Amber-Rose Howard: It’s happening.
Mansa Musa: My director sent me this quote saying that we live in capitalism. Its power seems inescapable. But then, so did the divine right of the king. See, at one time it was a saying, the sun never set on the British Empire because of how massive it was. That’s how much territory they had colonialized. The power they got right now is probably one outhouse. That’s how much power they got because of people coming together and getting their liberation and people coming together and imagining another life.
So, I want to push on this issue about reimagination going forward. Because you outlined some critical things that you all implemented. But okay, we get to 2027, and we got what we want. What are we going to do with our people when they come out? We don’t want them to take one incident and then make that one incident become the reason why they should revisit the plantations. So, what do we have in place for our people when they come out? Because we know we’re going to need help.
Amber-Rose Howard: Absolutely. That’s the importance of the work we’re doing around the budget. Because in California, for example, we spent $18.5 billion a year on incarceral structure. So we’re saying, with prisons closing and populations reducing, people going back to the community, let’s get these millions of dollars that we paid and put them into the community. We’re talking about permanent, safe, and secure housing. We’re talking about resources in the community where people can have mental healthcare, physical healthcare, and emotional wellness. Where the youth can have places to go to express their creativity, and further their education.
That’s what we need that money to be spent on. The state is taking steps to do that, but we know that it’s going to take a lot more work from the people to get here. We know that infrastructure in the community is what’s going to keep us safe. If people weren’t in crisis, then they wouldn’t be harming each other. If we all have what we need, there’s no space for harm. So, that’s what we’re pushing the state to do: reinvest those funds into the community so that returning citizens and returning people can experience life, and thrive in it. Because we do have those resources. We’ve been spending them the wrong way.
Mansa Musa: I’m thinking, as you’re talking because I remember somewhere along the line in history – And you can correct me if my rendition of history is incorrect – But I remember somewhere along the line in history when they freed us, they said they’re going to give us 40 acres and a mule. $18.5 billion is a whole lot of acres and a whole lot of mules to be given to the population of California. More importantly, to your point, you create jobs. A friend of mine would tell me, when a person has a job and has an income, they feel good about themselves. They got a life. When you’re taking the money that you are putting into maintaining the prison-industrial complex, the military-industrial complex of the California system, the prison system as we know it, then all you’re doing is taking it and furthering the narrative about the 13th Amendment and legalized slavery.
Amber-Rose Howard: Yep.
Mansa Musa: But now, because of CURB, we can see the reimagination taking shape in the form that you outlined. Talk a little bit more about going forward what you all are going to be doing.
Amber-Rose Howard: Absolutely. Going forward, we plan to continue to engage the state, the governor’s administration, and the budget committees where they make the decisions about public safety. We have pretty good relationships there now but we have to continue to push them to spread that money out. There are a few roadblocks: the people have to apply for the funds that have been released and have been redirected. We’re trying to fight those barriers, to say it should be a lot easier for people to apply for this. For organizations, all these strict guidelines aren’t going to help us. We’d like to be able to funnel the money to the communities a lot faster. So, that’s what we’re going to be working toward. Also, if they do agree to close five more prisons by ’27, that means that the state will have closed eight prisons in less than a 10-year span.
Mansa Musa: That’s phenomenal. That’s phenomenal. That’s right. Right here. Hey, that’s a June 16th. That’s a June 16th when 2027 get here. Every time they close a prison, we’re like, yeah! Fireworks. Marching around with whatever flag we want. Hail to the King and a whole bunch of other stuff.
Amber-Rose Howard: Exactly. It’s a reason to celebrate, but it’s also something that pushes us to say, wow, if we can go from 35 prisons and cut that down by eight, then what’s that? 27 left? Then we can do 10 more in the next eight years. Then, we can do 10 more after that.
Mansa Musa: You know what this does, in terms of effect? Because I did 48 years before I got out, and when changes were coming in, in terms of us knowing we were getting ready to get out, this is what it does. It changes the mentality of the people that are locked up. It changes the mentality of the people that are on the plantation. Because now it’s a difference between me never getting out, or me being in an environment where it’s fight or flight, where you put me in the system and say, oh you a gang member. Versus saying, oh, there’s this group, CURB. This infrastructure in California closed five, they’re coming down the road and they’re getting ready to close these.
It’s different when you hear that resonating through the population, saying, if I’m alive I can get out, so I’m going to stay alive to get out. But more importantly, I’m going to create an environment where everybody thinks like that. Oh, we getting ready to get out of prison. Why are we at each other’s throats? Why are we battling over turf war in a prison when we got a reality before us to say, I’m going to be able to get out there and raise my kids. I’ll be out there to hug my mother. I’m going to be out there to hug my wife. I’m going to be out there networking with my sister.
The impact of this, what you all are doing, is resonating in prison. Because you even outlined it when you said in your strategy you all went inside. Tell us how this looks inside and worked your way outside to develop a policy and a perspective. More importantly, you ain’t said this word out of your mouth, which I was proud of. You never said “reform” because we’re not trying to reform a plantation.
Amber-Rose Howard: We don’t need no reform. We’re not reforming a dang thing. We want to tear it down and show the world what we really can build up. Absolutely.
Mansa Musa: Yeah. We thank you for coming on. Tell us how can we get in touch with you, and tell our audience what they can do to get in touch with you all and support your effort.
Amber-Rose Howard: Absolutely. You all can look us up at curbprisonspending.org. If you want to reach me directly, you can reach me at amberrose@curbprisonspending.org.
Mansa Musa: There you have it, Amber-Rose.
Amber-Rose Howard: Thank you so much for having me.
Mansa Musa: Yes. We’re saying this here, you rattled the bars today. George Jackson said that they will hear the rumbling of our feet. We know for right now, that George Jackson is proud of the members of CURB. Because we know that when you all had taken the initiative to say you’re not putting one more penny into that decadent-ass San Quentin, when you all made that statement and stepped forward, that went a long way in terms of the future of the men, and more importantly the women, in the prison system. So we ask you, our audience, to review this information, to review CURB, to look at what they’re doing, and reimagine a society without a prison.
Reimagine a society where $18.5 billion is being invested in schools, hospitals, grocery stores, and infrastructures or playgrounds where your children can play. Reimagine that the monies that are being put into the prison-industrial complex, the military-industrial complex, are being put back inside society and being reinvested. And, the reinvestment would yield this, the reinvestment will yield a quality life for people; not only the people that are getting out, but the people that are left behind. In the communities where the prisons were, you can have a quality life. You can reimagine having an industry and living in a town where you don’t have to wake up and think about whether or not your loved one would come out of prison alive because of the brutal conditions that they work under. We thank you, and we continue to ask you to continue to support Rattling The Bars.
Amber-Rose Howard: Absolutely.
Mansa Musa: Because it’s the only way that you’re going to get Amber-Rose and a CURB report, on Rattling the Bars. You’re not going to get it from no other major network. Nobody is going to talk about $18.5 billion being taken away from a prison-industrial complex. Nobody is going to sit up here and talk about the devastation of prison. They’re not going to give you this information on a major news network. You’re only going to get this information on The Real News, and you’re only going to get this information when you rattle the bars. Thank you very much, and thank you, Amber, for enlightening us, and giving us this opportunity.
Amber-Rose Howard: Thank you so much for having me on.
Arkansas resident Shawn Chaperone was cut off by a reckless driver and was shocked that police chose to pull him over. However, it was the local police department’s turn to be surprised when they discovered how well Shawn knew his rights and local ordinances! Join us for this episode of the Police Accountability Report, which illustrates the importance of knowing your rights and the dangers of arbitrary police power.
Production: Stephen Janis, Taya Graham Post-Production: Stephen Janis, Adam Coley
Transcript
The following is a rushed transcript and may contain errors. A proofread version will be made available as soon as possible.
Taya Graham:
Hello, my name is Taya Graham and welcome to the Police Accountability Report. As I always make clear, this show has a single purpose: holding the politically powerful institution of policing accountable. And to do so, we don’t just focus on the bad behavior of individual cops. Instead, we examine the system that makes bad policing possible. And today, we will achieve that goal by showing you this video of a cop who tries to entrap a motorist with false accusations about a costly traffic violation. However, it’s how this driver fought back, and how police responded when he did, that shows how cops can bend the law when they’re caught misusing it.
But before we get started, I want you to know that if you have video evidence of police misconduct, please email it to us privately at par@therealnews.com, or reach out to me at Facebook or Twitter @TayasBaltimore, and we might be able to investigate for you. And also please like share and comment on our videos. It helps us get the word out and can even help our guests. And of course, I read your comments and appreciate them. You see those hearts down there. And we do have a Patreon, Accountability Reports. So if you feel inspired to donate, please do. We don’t run ads or take corporate dollars, so anything you can spare is truly appreciated.
All right, we’ve gotten that out of the way. Now, as we’ve reported on this show, there was no process more fraught with potential for both abuse and overreach than the American traffic stop. It is in some ways unique to our American version of law enforcement, simply because cops here think there is no better way to catch criminals than by randomly pulling over hundreds of people. How else can you explain the myriad of stops we have reported on for this show that have led to, let’s just say, bad outcomes, unnecessary and often futile efforts to entangle innocent Americans in our sprawling criminal justice system that often seems more motivated by greed, stupidity, or even just a hunger for power? And to prove my point, I’m going to show you this video of a traffic stop that explains all the preceding overreach and backwards rationalizations that American police use to justify their addiction to lighting up the roof and ensnaring often innocent motorists in the labyrinth system of tickets, fines, court fees, and more.
But this take on over policing also has a twist, which you’ll see leads to an even more revealing truism about law enforcement’s addiction to traffic stops than all the aforementioned incidents combined. Now, this story starts in Stuttgart, Arkansas. There, Sean Chaperone was driving home after a long day at work. He was traveling at the reasonable speed of 35 miles per hour, when suddenly a motorist jumped in front of his car, slowed to 20 miles per hour, slammed on their brakes, and cut him off. Now, Sean did what any driver would do when confronted with a reckless motorist, he switched into the next lane to avoid a collision and maintained his speed. But this seemingly reasonable reaction to a reckless motorist apparently caught the eye of the ever vigilant Stuttgart Police. This laser-like attention was not drawn to the driver who cut Sean off. No, these able practitioners of law enforcement where apparently focused on the fact he changed lanes to avoid an accident. Just watch.
Sean Chaperone:
So he’s behind me, but you couldn’t catch him, but you could catch me?
Speaker 3:
This is what I seen. I seen you slam on your brakes and come to a sliding stop in the middle of-
Sean Chaperone:
That is correct because he cut me off, sir.
Speaker 3:
Listen to me. Listen to me. Listen to me. First of all, I’m not going to roadside court. Second of all, your attitude, you should probably lose it right now. Do you understand?
Sean Chaperone:
Or what?
Speaker 3:
Do you understand?
Sean Chaperone:
Or what do you going to do, man?
Speaker 3:
It is a simple yes or no.
Sean Chaperone:
I don’t answer questions, man. You go do what you got to do.
Speaker 3:
All right.
Taya Graham:
Now, it’s interesting to note that this alleged traffic infraction caught the attention of not one, not two, but three Stuttgart cops, a veritable posse of law enforcement that descended on his car with a variety of allegations. Take a look.
Sean Chaperone:
Got a officer right here over here. Can I get your name and badge number? Are you going to be officer right here too?
Speaker 4:
Oh, the reason why I pulled you over, because I’m the one that actually pulled you over, is a high rate of speed.
Sean Chaperone:
Okay, well, I was cut off. Did you get my speed?
Speaker 4:
What I saw was a high rate of speed.
Sean Chaperone:
So this is-
Speaker 4:
I’m worried about people walking down the street.
Sean Chaperone:
Right. And I’m worried about someone cutting me off.
Speaker 4:
Okay. My issue is people walking down the street. I get it. At that point you should have called 911. “Hey, this is my issue.” We could have solved it then. But you speeding down the street, that’s-
Sean Chaperone:
Doing 35 in a 35?
Speaker 4:
Nu-uh.
Sean Chaperone:
Yes, ma’am. Absolutely.
Speaker 4:
Okay, so the reason why I pulled you over was a high rate of speed. We’re not going to play this game, okay?
Sean Chaperone:
Yeah. No, we’re not. We’re just going to go to court.
Taya Graham:
But even though Sean was now confronted by a full interrogation by these traffic enforcement vigilantes, he had an ace in the hole, so to speak. Because unbeknownst to the cadre of cops, Sean had a dash cam, which was running at the time of the near collision. And when he lets the cops know this, I think it’s curious how they respond to the fact that there is evidence that might challenge their capricious interpretation of the law. Take a look.
Sean Chaperone:
I ain’t got a problem with it. I got a dash cam. Y’all want to say that I’m speeding? Go for it. But the dash cam’s going to make y’all look really funny.
I mean, if she’s going to shine her light in my eyes, I can do the same back.
Speaker 4:
[inaudible 00:05:47], you mind coming up here please?
Sean Chaperone:
I’m going to need a supervisor. Can y’all give me a supervisor?
Speaker 4:
No problem. He just rolled up on here.
Sean Chaperone:
All right, perfect. Hey-
Corporal Williams:
How you doing, sir? Corporal Williams, Stuttgart Police Department.
Sean Chaperone:
All right.
Corporal Williams:
What’s going on, man?
Sean Chaperone:
Not much, [inaudible 00:06:01]. You don’t have to roll it all the way down. How’s it going?
Corporal Williams:
Pretty good. What’s going on?
Sean Chaperone:
Oh, not much. I had someone cut me off back there. They were on a traffic stop. They decided to pull me over. The guy that was behind me was the one that initially cut me off. They told me that they couldn’t catch him, that they decided to pull me over even though he was behind me.
Corporal Williams:
Okay. If he cut you off, how was he behind you?
Sean Chaperone:
Because I jumped around in front of him.
Corporal Williams:
All right.
Sean Chaperone:
He was doing about 25, getting ready to turn. I pulled back over in front of, got in the left-hand lane, passed him, got back over in the right-hand lane, took the right right back here at the stoplight.
Corporal Williams:
Okay. Well, according to the other officer, he said all he saw was you slam on your brakes, stop in the middle of Michigan-
Sean Chaperone:
I did. I slammed on my brakes because I had just gotten cut off and I slammed on the horn. That’s absolutely what I did.
Corporal Williams:
Okay.
Sean Chaperone:
He’s got that part right.
Corporal Williams:
All right. And the car cut you off?
Sean Chaperone:
That is correct. 110%.
Speaker 4:
Well the horn part-
Sean Chaperone:
Can you ask her to get her light out of my eyes, please?
Speaker 4:
[inaudible 00:07:02]-
Corporal Williams:
What’s that?
Sean Chaperone:
Can you ask her to get her light out of my eyes?
Corporal Williams:
Well, if he didn’t see what took place is what I’m saying. You understand that? If he didn’t see the car cut you off because he was on a traffic stop, obviously he’s paying attention to this traffic stop.
Taya Graham:
As I watch this video, I’m reminded of an idea that I think we sometimes forget: the notion that enforcing the law is often subjective and therefore arbitrary. But despite that truism, what happened to Sean here is a stark reminder that once the law is aimed at you, the subjective aspect of law enforcement is simply forgotten. Instead, we, and Sean, are subject to its exacting consequences, often solely because an officer, in their opinion, deem you guilty. And this exacting judgment persists even if the evidence presented challenges their assumptions. Just watch this idea play out as officers give Sean a ticket while simply ignoring his version of events.
Sean Chaperone:
Hey, it’s been well more than 15 minutes. Are we going to go or what? Are we being detained? We free to go? It’s been more than 15 minutes. Turned into an unlawful detainment three and a half minutes ago. We’ve been here 20 minutes, man.
Speaker 3:
Okay.
Sean Chaperone:
All right.
Speaker 3:
Go ahead and roll your window down for me.
Sean Chaperone:
It’s cracked. I can hear you just fine.
Speaker 3:
Okay. That’s cool. I need you to roll the window down.
Sean Chaperone:
I mean-
Speaker 3:
Roll the window open.
Sean Chaperone:
No, sir. I’m not going to. That is against my constitutional rights. I do not have to.
Speaker 3:
Okay. First of all, you need to learn your constitutional rights.
Sean Chaperone:
I do know my constitutional rights. Do…
Speaker 3:
So roll the window down.
Sean Chaperone:
… you know that your vehicle’s an extension of your house?
Speaker 3:
Yeah. Okay.
Sean Chaperone:
Okay.
Speaker 3:
So roll the window down so you can sign this citation.
Sean Chaperone:
I’ll sign the citation. All you got to do is just hand it to me right here.
Speaker 3:
No, I don’t hand my clipboard through the window. Roll your window down.
Sean Chaperone:
If you won’t hand it through your window, then how is rolling my window down going to help?
Speaker 3:
You’re going to lean toward me, you’re going to sign this citation, and we’re going to go about [inaudible 00:08:57], or-
Sean Chaperone:
I can step out and we can sign it. I can step out and we can sign it.
Speaker 3:
Or I’m going to take you to jail for obstruction. You understand?
Sean Chaperone:
Obstruction is a physical crime. You do realize that?
Speaker 3:
You are obstructing my justice.
Sean Chaperone:
Obstructing is a physical crime.
Corporal Williams:
You can go ahead. [inaudible 00:09:15] refused to sign, hand him his copy, and go [inaudible 00:09:17]. It doesn’t change it either way.
Speaker 3:
Are you going to sign my ticket?
Sean Chaperone:
I mean, did he just said… What did he just say?
Speaker 3:
[inaudible 00:09:27].
Sean Chaperone:
That’s why we have to have y’all’s supervisors here to keep y’all honest.
Taya Graham:
Now, the ticket was just the beginning of Sean’s ordeal, a series of events that have forced him to fight back in a way we will be discussing with him soon. But first, I’m joined by my reporting partner, Steven Janis, who’s been looking into the case. Steven, thank you so much for joining us.
Steven Janis:
Taya, thanks having me. I appreciate it.
Taya Graham:
So Steven, you’ve been reaching out to the Stuttgart Police. What are they saying?
Steven Janis:
Well, Taya, not a lot right now. I reached out to the Chief of Police of Stuttgart through his departmental email, asked him a couple questions, most notably, why the obstruction of justice charges? I thought that was kind of weird. I asked him if he actually thought that was a legitimate use of that charge in that situation. I also asked him why they didn’t take into account Mr. Chaperone’s version of events, why they didn’t look for the other driver. I’m waiting to hear back. If I hear something, I’ll mention it in the chat. I haven’t heard it back yet, but I will keep reporting on it.
Taya Graham:
Often when reporting on these types of questionable tickets, there are some underlying reasons rather than just public safety. You’ve been looking into the town itself. What have you learned?
Steven Janis:
Well, it’s really weird. I went to the Stuttgart town website to look through their financial information, budgets, et cetera. Nothing was posted. It was completely blank. I’m showing you on the screen right now. They do not share budget information with the public, which I think raises a lot of questions. They’ve also given police officers a raise, although they weren’t making a lot of money, like $11 an hour for a rookie, so maybe they need to raise money and write a lot of tickets. I get that feeling because they really don’t share information. Lack of transparency always leaves questions unanswered.
Taya Graham:
So I talked about the idea of an arbitrary nature of police power and how it can infect the process of law enforcement. I know you have some ideas on the topic. Can you talk about them?
Steven Janis:
Yeah, Taya. There’s nothing more anti-democratic than arbitrary power, especially police power, because the consequences of when it is imposed upon us are life altering. So, really, giving someone the ability to, say, write you a ticket when it’s not justified, or put you in a cage when there’s no real basis for criminal charges, all results in the same thing, a sort of roving sort of mobile fascism that really can entrap you in a system that’s unjust. And I think that’s why we have to keep our eye on, and always hold in check, indiscriminate and, what we say, arbitrary police power.
Taya Graham:
And now to discuss this confrontation with Stuttgart Police, why he challenged the officers, and how he’s fighting back against the ticket, I’m joined by Sean Chaperone. Sean, thank you for joining me.
Sean Chaperone:
Thank you for having me.
Taya Graham:
So first, tell me why you were pulled over. What are we seeing at the beginning of this video?
Sean Chaperone:
So initially, I had turned left onto the street that I was on. There was a vehicle that had cut me off and had their right turn signal on. After they cut me off, they turned their turn signal on signaling that they were going to turn into the motel. Well, when they had cut me off, I was doing approximately 35. They were doing about 20. They cut me off, I slammed on my brakes, slammed on the horn, and then got in the left-hand lane, went around them, and then got back in the right-hand lane. They never ended up turning into the motel and ended up coming up behind me. Well, I took a right at the stoplight, and that’s when the police got behind me and pulled me over and said that I was going at a high rate of speed.
Taya Graham:
I think it’s interesting that the officer said that he chose to stop you as opposed to the more reckless driver. How did they explain that?
Sean Chaperone:
Yeah, well, initially in that video, he says that he saw both vehicles. He saw me and the vehicle that had cut me off. And then in the video three times, he denies ever seeing the vehicle cut me off. So my question is, what did the officer really see? I think he just heard some things. He just heard me slamming on my brakes and blowing on my horn, and then decided that I was the aggressor even though I was driving defensively.
Taya Graham:
Sean, some people might say you were confrontational, and others might say you were standing on your rights. How did the cop respond to your pushback?
Sean Chaperone:
He initially walked up to the vehicle with an attitude, yelling at me. Personally, I mean, I was just acting defensively. Yet again, I was driving defensively, and then when he comes up acting aggressively, now I’m acting defensively. And I’ve seen people say that, “Well, this is a bad time for an audit.” Well, first of all, this wasn’t an audit. I’m just on my way home. So this is… Exactly, this is just me standing up for my rights. And unfortunately, he got a little upset about it.
Taya Graham:
You seem very knowledgeable about your rights and the rules surrounding traffic enforcement. How do you think that helped you in the situation? How do you think things would’ve turned out if you hadn’t?
Sean Chaperone:
Oh, it definitely helped me in the situation. I mean, towards the end of it, they’re threatening to arrest me. So, I mean, definitely know your rights and record the police. Even if you don’t know your rights, just record the police to hold them accountable because there’s so many times that their body cams come up missing when it comes to court, and the only thing that you have to stand on is your evidence.
Taya Graham:
How did you become so knowledgeable about your rights? What inspired you to learn so much?
Sean Chaperone:
Well, my father’s a retired police officer. He is a retired K9 officer, so that definitely helped. As well as him being a police officer, he has also gone over the last probably four or five years and really hammered to me, educating me on my rights, because he sees it as well. He sees the officers that are stripping people of their rights and he never was that way, but he sees it happening now and he sees that if we don’t stand up for it, we’re going to lose it.
Taya Graham:
Did you have any concern that the officer might violate your rights because of your pushback, because of the way you asserted yourself?
Sean Chaperone:
Absolutely not. If they’re going to violate my rights, if they want to arrest me, I guess that they have every right to do so. I’m not going to let them intimidate me or try and bully me in any way, shape, fashion, or form. Let’s say they would’ve arrested me. I mean, we’d be going to court right now on a counter suit for unlawful arrest. So, no. I mean, for me, personally, it doesn’t intimidate me.
Taya Graham:
So I noticed that you were counting down the time, that the officer only had 15 minutes to write you a ticket. What was your next move if he took over 15 minutes?
Sean Chaperone:
I mean, I wasn’t going to run. That’s for sure. It’s a state specific law. It’s Arkansas Criminal 3.1 that states that an officer only has 15 minutes to write you a citation. So it’s a very state specific thing. I wasn’t going to leave, but I was definitely going to get out of my vehicle, start asking questions, because now it’s starting to turn into an unlawful detainment. So that’s pretty much what I would’ve done.
Taya Graham:
So what exactly was the ticket for?
Sean Chaperone:
So the ticket ended up being for… I think it was reckless and prohibited driving. It’s $150 ticket and currently we are going to court. The court date is, I believe, August 3rd. So it’s going to trial and I will be representing myself and I look forward to seeing the officers on the stand.
Taya Graham:
Now, I think it’s important to expound a little bit on the idea Steven and I discussed, namely the arbitrary nature of police power. It’s important because I think it acknowledges that policing is just as much an idea as it is an institution, and for that reason, something worth examining beyond the usual critiques that views cops and badges as the inevitable result of our ongoing experiment with self-governance.
Let’s remember, as we’ve said before, modern policing was one of the last iterations of democratic governance to emerge, an institution that didn’t evolve until the form resembles today until the mid 19th century. Which is why we need to sometimes examine it in a way that doesn’t simply assume it should, or even inevitably, exist. Not so much to say we don’t need police, but rather a way to truly understand what the prevalence of policing in our country truly engenders. In other words, how does the existence and growth and proliferation of law enforcement actually affect the way we live? To answer that question, as I already mentioned, we need to explore the notion of the arbitrary nature of police power, meaning how the latitude to enforce the law, take our freedom, and sometimes even our lives, affects how we both move through the world and even view ourselves.
First, we need to focus on the idea of what it means to be subject to arbitrary power and how it affects us. I want to examine this idea through the prism of another refrain we hear over and over again from politicians and other elites. Namely, “No one is above the law.” Now, this idea has become an oft used talking point of the mainstream media and their elite group of proselytizing pundits. The concept that the law is an unbiased arbiter that applies to everyone is pretty much a mantra for elites to pat themselves on the back as objective arbiters of justice.
Well, fair enough. But it’s an intriguing invocation when you consider just how the law works, especially if you view it through the lens of the stories we have reported on for this show. Because as we’ve seen, in case after case, how the law is applied can be quite arbitrary. In other words, whether we’re talking about a Texas firefighter falsely accused of a DUI, a man whose car was searched while he was walking his dog, or this story about a quite subjective rendering of traffic laws, all of this means, in reality, is that the law is arbitrary for those of us who actually have to live with it. Which, of course, sits in stark contrast to those who don’t, namely the cops who enforce it. How do I know?
Well, consider the predicament of a dedicated New York City traffic cop, Matthew Bianchi. Bianchi was a veteran officer who actually liked enforcing traffic laws. That’s because, at a young age, Bianchi lost a friend in an accident to a reckless driver. Therefore, when he felt someone was being particularly over the top and driving poorly, he would write a ticket as the law requires. That is with one fairly broad exception. Turns out New York cops are given what are known as courtesy cards. What are courtesy cards? Well, basically a get out of jail free pass handed out by police unions, so officers can give them to friends, family, and anyone else they want to. So when an officer pulls someone over, regardless of the infraction, the informal rule is to let them go, provided they have a courtesy card.
Unfortunately, for Bianchi, this was a problem. He found himself often having to let people go who were endangering others. To prove his point, he cited an encounter when he pulled over a driver who was not just recklessly speeding but didn’t even have a license or insurance. That same motorist had a courtesy card, which he refused to honor and subsequently ticketed the driver. But this exercise of officer discretion did not go unnoticed. Soon he found himself the recipient of retaliation across the department. He was demoted and the union told him it would not protect him. He was sent to work in the borough of Staten Island, where he estimated half, that’s 50% of the people he pulled over, had courtesy cards.
To make matters worse, officers can buy them for a dollar a piece from the union, no word on who keeps the dollar by the way, and hand them out to anyone they want. Things came to a head when Bianchi refused to honor a card from a relative of the department’s highest ranking officer, a move that led to further demotion. Now, Bianchi is suing over what he says is unfair retaliation and abuse of his discretion. But I think this whole ordeal makes a more interesting and important point. And that is, of course some people are above the law. In fact, the people who are empowered to enforce it are not just above it, but can grant impunity to friends, family, and anyone else they please. And this so-called unqualified immunity is applied indiscriminately to anyone and everyone who happens to know a cop who happens to have a dollar.
But it also points out the impact arbitrary enforcement has on a democratic, supposedly free society. Because if the people who enforce the law are not subject to it, then the law itself truly has no meaning. If the cops who profess to be the bastion between uncivilized and civilized society can dole out pardons like confectionary treats, then what we have is not a nation of laws, but a Congress of tyranny. That’s right. I said it. I know it sounds a little discomfiting, but it’s true. And please let me explain why I used it.
Let me start with a question. Have you ever worked for a bad boss who made your life miserable? Who constantly changed your assignments, ignored your input, belittled you in front of others, called you at all hours and otherwise just treated you like a toy? Because if you have, then you know what it’s like to work for a tyrant. Someone who’s bounded by no rules, a person who implicitly works under the assumption that what applies to you does not apply to them. And by embracing that notion, they are then free to wreak havoc on your life any way they see fit. Well, that’s called tyranny, and I think you can see how this concept is applicable to the police. Because if cops in New York can enforce laws on others that don’t apply to themselves and their friends, then they’re basically above the law. And if they can retaliate against people who follow the law honorably, they can assure they are immune from it. That means they, in a sense, become the law itself, which literally allows them to engage in a form of individual tyranny towards the people they subject to it.
Think about it. How can the institution that professes to fairly enforce the law simply exclude themselves from it? How can a group of people called law enforcers use that same power to evade it? The point is that this idea of occupational immunization simply makes the law wholly subjective. That is, when the law enforcers can also be the lawbreakers, the whole process becomes subject to the whims of an individual, namely a tyrant. That is why we have to continue to hold cops accountable, because clearly it’s up to us, the people, to guard our freedoms and preserve our rights from the people who would otherwise abuse them.
I want to thank Sean for coming forward and helping educate us about our rights and sharing his experience. Thank you, Sean. And of course, I have to thank intrepid reporter, Steven Janis, for his writing, research and editing on this piece. Thank you, Steven.
Steven Janis:
Taya, thanks for having me. I really appreciate it.
Taya Graham:
And I want to thank friends of the show, Nolie D and Lacey R, for their support. We appreciate you. And a very special thanks to our Patreons. We appreciate you, and I look forward to thanking each and every one of you personally in our next live stream, especially Patreon associate producers, John E.R., David K., and Louis P., and Super Friends, Shane Busta, Pineapple Girl, Chris R., Matter of Rights, and Angela True.
And I want you watching to know that if you have video evidence of police misconduct or brutality, please share it with us and we might be able to investigate for you. Please reach out to us. You can email us tips privately at par@therealnews.com and share your evidence of police misconduct. You can also message us at Police Accountability Report on Facebook or Instagram, or @EyesonPolice on Twitter. And of course, you can always message me directly @TayasBaltimore on Twitter and Facebook. And please like and comment. You know I read your comments and appreciate them. And we do have a Patreon link pinned in the comments below for Accountability Reports. So if you feel inspired to donate, please do. We don’t run ads or take corporate dollars, so anything you can spare is truly appreciated. My name is Taya Graham and I am your host of the Police Accountability Report. Please, be safe out there.
Juneteenth has become a federal holiday—yet prison slavery under the 13th Amendment continues. Uprooting the prison industrial complex is vital to completing the abolition of slavery. In California, the Californians United for a Responsible Budget (CURB) coalition aims to close 10 state prisons in the next 5 years as part of the People’s Plan for Prison Closure. CURB Executive Director Amber-Rose Howard joins Rattling the Bars to discuss this bold plan.
Amber-Rose Howard is a poet, public speaker and organizer from Pomona, California. She currently serves as Executive Director of CURB.
Production: Cameron Granadino Studio Production: David Hebden Post-Production: Cameron Granadino
Transcript
The following is a rushed transcript and may contain errors. A proofread version will be made available as soon as possible.
Mansa Musa:
Welcome to this edition of Rattling The Bars, I’m Mansa Musa. When we hear “June 19th” or “Juneteenth”, we are given the impression that we should be celebrating the end of slavery in one town, one part of Texas. What is being celebrated is, in essence, people remained in slavery well after they were freed. This is the case when it comes to mass incarceration and the prison-industrial complex. The 13th Amendment legalized slavery, and with slavery comes abolition. The tagline being offered by Californians United for a Responsible Budget or CURB is, we’re calling on California to close 10 prisons in five years. Here to talk about this is is Amber-Rose Howard, Executive Director of CURB. Welcome, Amber.
Amber-Rose Howard:
Thank you so much for having me on. It’s such an honor to speak with you today.
Mansa Musa:
As you seen, I opened up with, this going to be our June 19th, all things considered. As I said earlier, I outlined that we are celebrating something that, for most people and most activists, realize that it’s a misrepresentation of a reality. That the people that was told June 19th that “you are free” was really just being held up for more labor until they didn’t had no choice but to tell them. Because eventually, somebody will come down there and say, “Oh, y’all got to go.” Here, I want you to talk about, first of all, tell us a little bit about yourself, and about CURB.
Amber-Rose Howard:
Okay. Sure, sure. Thanks again for having me on. Folks, my name is Amber-Rose Howard, you can call me Amber-Rose. Executive Director here at CURB, Californians United for a Responsible Budget. We are a coalition of over 80 member organizations across the state of California. We have a three-point mission. Which is, to reduce the number of people incarcerated in California. That includes prisons, jails, and immigrant prisons. To reduce the number of institutions like that, that exist. Then, to get the state to redirect that spending, all the money they’ve been spending on prisons and jails, and put it into the community, because that’s where we know safety really is.
If we have what we need, then the people will be safe. That’s our mission. I got into this work because I am formally incarcerated. I was convicted of a serious violent felony when I was 18 years old. It just really propelled me into a life to think about how do we tear down the prison-industrial complex? Realizing that it is an extension of slavery, realizing that it is racially charged, realizing that it does target Black people. I said, “You know what? This is the new fight. This is where the fight has been handed off from our elders and ancestors.” So, this is where I am.
Mansa Musa:
Okay. Amber-Rose, talk about CURB got what they call The People’s Plan.
Amber-Rose Howard:
Mm-hmm.
Mansa Musa:
All right. First, let’s talk about The People’s plan, and then roll that over into some of the recent developments, and implementation of The People’s Plan.
Amber-Rose Howard:
Absolutely. Okay. CURB got together, we were filed in 2003. Really, the opportunity for CURB, for folks that got together to found the organization, there was an opportunity to close a prison down here in Southern California, but it fell through. Folks said, “Well, how do we build from there?” Well, this is 20 years ago in 2003, when folks were building up to closing prisons. Not until 2019 did the Governor say, finally, “We’re going to start to close some prisons in California.” That is strictly because of the advocacy of people. Let’s never think that any state governor is going to say, “Let’s do the right thing, and free people and close prisons,” on their own. That’s full people power. The thing is, they kept looking to the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, with a small “rehabilitation”, right?
Mansa Musa:
Mm-hmm.
Amber-Rose Howard:
They kept looking to the CDCR department for a plan on how to select prisons, which ones to close, how is that going to happen, what it’s going to look like? And, meeting after meeting at the budget committee hearings and all that, at the Capitol, they never came up with a plan. So, we got together in our coalition and said, “You know what? Let’s give them The People’s Plan.”
Mansa Musa:
That’s right.
Amber-Rose Howard:
Because, we know that they’re not going to include our voices.
Mansa Musa:
That’s right.
Amber-Rose Howard:
They’re not [inaudible] people who are directly impacted by this prison system.
Mansa Musa:
That’s right.
Amber-Rose Howard:
So, it’s up to us to hand them the plan, because they don’t know what they’re doing. So, we got together and created The People’s Plan for Prison Closure, which really just outlines, look, in order for us to keep closing prisons, we have to reduce the number of people inside.
Mansa Musa:
That’s right.
Amber-Rose Howard:
So, we’re giving suggestions on, “Pass these laws, pass those laws, in order to reduce that population. This is how you do it safely to make sure that people have resources when they come out.” Once we do that, we can start to shut down prisons. That leads back up to 2019 when the Governor finally announced some prison closures. Now, again, they didn’t have a plan for it. So, even after our People’s Plan for Prison Closure, we had to produce another document to say, “Look, this is the roadmap. If you all are a little bit confused by this lengthy report-“
Mansa Musa:
That’s right.
Amber-Rose Howard:
“… [inaudible] produced, here goes something that can be real straightforward for you, right? We can really lay it down for you, to say there’s a few phases to this.” One phase is selecting prisons for closure. Now, we have centered the voices of not only folks who are formerly incarcerated and on the outside, like myself, but we sent you the voices of people who are currently incarcerated [inaudible] state prisons.
Mansa Musa:
That’s right.
Amber-Rose Howard:
We sent [inaudible] to all 35 prisons and said, “We got almost 3,000 responses back.” So, the folks were saying, “These are the criteria that you should consider when you’re closing prisons,” which look like… Outside of how much it’s going to cost to rebuild the prison or the operations of the prison. The state thinks about the money part. Right?
Mansa Musa:
That’s right.
Amber-Rose Howard:
[inaudible] said, “No, we need to consider, how far is it from your loved ones?”
Mansa Musa:
That’s right.
Amber-Rose Howard:
“How far do they have us sitting away from people who are going to support us in the community?”
Mansa Musa:
That’s right.
Amber-Rose Howard:
Those should be closed. Thinking about how many homicides and suicides happen in these prisons.
Mansa Musa:
That’s right.
Amber-Rose Howard:
What is the violence looking like in these prisons?
Mansa Musa:
That’s right.
Amber-Rose Howard:
We should consider those. And then, what is the climate and environmental justice looking like around these prisons?
Mansa Musa:
Mm-hmm.
Amber-Rose Howard:
Because in California, we have the brush fires happening every single summer-
Mansa Musa:
Yep.
Amber-Rose Howard:
When it gets too hot. We have two prisons right now, up in the Central Valley, that are about to be flooded. So, the people inside said, “These are the extra things that you all should be thinking [inaudible].”
Mansa Musa:
Yeah, that’s right.
Amber-Rose Howard:
In order to close a prison. So, we offered that. The second phase is to say, “Prison population reduction.” Again, passing policies that would attack all of those harmful policies that came out really, in the 90s, between the 70s and the 90s, in retaliation to the Black Liberation Movement. That’s what it [inaudible].
Mansa Musa:
That’s right. That’s right. Come on, come on.
Amber-Rose Howard:
For real.
Mansa Musa:
That’s what it was.
Amber-Rose Howard:
So, [inaudible] laws that will criminalize more people, because they realized, “Black folks are standing up, we don’t like this.”.
Mansa Musa:
Yeah.
Amber-Rose Howard:
“How do we [inaudible] get rid of them?” So, we said, “Well, let’s reverse those policies.” That’s how we’re looking at it. We have reversed many of them, which continues to bring down the population. The third part we say is, “We need a just transition to support, impact the communities.” Now, the state is real focused on, what do these neighborhoods, these towns where prisons exist, how do we keep their economy going-“
Mansa Musa:
Right, right.
Amber-Rose Howard:
“… after a prison is closed?” Many of these towns are fighting back to say, “No, we need this economy. Don’t close our prison.”
Mansa Musa:
Yeah.
Amber-Rose Howard:
[inaudible] for me, you all sound like slave owners.
Mansa Musa:
That’s what they are. Come on, talk, tell the truth. That’s what they are.
Amber-Rose Howard:
Yeah, yeah.
Mansa Musa:
Slave owners. Plantation.
Amber-Rose Howard:
You all been [inaudible] from the slave economy. You know what I’m saying?
Mansa Musa:
Yeah. That’s right. That’s right.
Amber-Rose Howard:
So, we’re like, “No, you don’t need a slave economy. There are plenty of other ways to produce-“
Mansa Musa:
Come on.
Amber-Rose Howard:
“… for this town.”
Mansa Musa:
Right.
Amber-Rose Howard:
[inaudible] in it, rather than this form of slavery. So, we talk about what are the economic opportunities that the state can provide, that can be pulled from federal funds, in order to keep a town going without a prison.
Mansa Musa:
You know what? Let me hold you up right there.
Amber-Rose Howard:
Yeah.
Mansa Musa:
The reason why I want to hold you up right there, because in the conversation of abolition, that’s the one thing that you hear. We know that these towns, if you take these prisons out, that tumbleweed will follow. As soon as the last prisoner’s there, a tumbleweed’s going to replace. But the humanity, and that’s why I wanted to stop you right there, because-
Amber-Rose Howard:
Yep.
Mansa Musa:
… I want people to understand that CURB is not inhumane in terms of what they want to get done. This is a humane call. This is not a vengeance call. This is not a, “We’re going to pull out and leave your ass in there, the way you-“
Amber-Rose Howard:
Right.
Mansa Musa:
“And let you feel what we felt.” No, we’re saying that the responsibility… and then reimagining the abolition, reimagining prisons going, we’re reimagining a holistic society, and this is a part of it. Go ahead, continue, [inaudible].
Amber-Rose Howard:
That’s right. Exactly. You’re totally right in saying that. I appreciate you bringing that in, because people think, oh, we just want to get our people out, move on, whatever. No, we’re talking about changing the entire structure of society here. We’re saying that, listen, we need our people free. We need our people living outside of prisons. We need resources in the community. And, we know that people who work for the Department of Corrections, and corrections officers, they have one of the highest suicide rates in the state of California.
Mansa Musa:
Come on. That’s right. That’s right. Yeah. They’re doing a bit. They’re doing a bit.
Amber-Rose Howard:
[inaudible]. It’s unhealthy for everybody.
Mansa Musa:
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Amber-Rose Howard:
You know what I’m saying? It’s just a disruptive system for everybody.
Mansa Musa:
Right.
Amber-Rose Howard:
Folks who work for that system are, “What am I going to do for a job?” Wouldn’t you like a job that doesn’t cause you the type of stress that you get from being a slave owner? Really?
Mansa Musa:
Yeah. Yeah, come on.
Amber-Rose Howard:
The overseer?
Mansa Musa:
Yeah.
Amber-Rose Howard:
You know what I’m saying? Wouldn’t you want something different for yourself, for your family, prolong your life? So, this is actually revisioning that can really benefit everybody.
Mansa Musa:
Going forward, didn’t you all just come up with a victory in terms of the budget-
Amber-Rose Howard:
Yes.
Mansa Musa:
Or the divestment? I want to echo that point, because this is our conversation of Juneteenth. We’re saying that we’re coming. We’re not looking for somebody to come and tell us that we’re free.
Amber-Rose Howard:
Right.
Mansa Musa:
We’re saying that we are free, and then now we’re saying that not only are we free, but that we’re going to dismantle the 13th Amendment by taking away the profit margin that keeps the 13th Amendment alive.
Amber-Rose Howard:
Right.
Mansa Musa:
Once that profit margin is gone, the 13th amendment will be gone in and of itself. Go ahead and talk about your recent initiative that you all took.
Amber-Rose Howard:
Absolutely. We took the people to the Capitol. We got together folks from across the state and said, “Let’s go up here and have conversations with people in person.” We do online advocacy a lot where folks can send in letters, make phone calls, but we went to the Capitol to advocate. California had this idea that they would spend $360 million to rebuild San Quentin State Prison. Which is [inaudible].
Mansa Musa:
What?
Amber-Rose Howard:
Yes. Which is the oldest prison in the state.
Mansa Musa:
What?
Amber-Rose Howard:
We said, “No.”
Mansa Musa:
That’s right.
Amber-Rose Howard:
“This is ridiculous.”.
Mansa Musa:
Yeah.
Amber-Rose Howard:
You can’t rebuild a structure and say, “Oh, we’re going to rehabilitate you all if we do more construction on this prison.” That has nothing to do with it. When the people are inside, the people get their minds free together with themselves in community. It has nothing to do with this system of imprisonment. It has nothing to do with the physical prison.
Mansa Musa:
That’s right.
Amber-Rose Howard:
So, we went to advocate to say, “No. We have to fight back.” We can say that the people power helped push them in the right direction. The State, the Assembly, and the Senate told the Governor, “We reject this proposal. We don’t need-“
Mansa Musa:
That’s right.
Amber-Rose Howard:
“… 360 million more dollars on San Quentin.” That is a victory. Of course, there’s a long way to go there. Also, I guess, another victory, I’d say, is that the people pushed the Governor to announce more prison closures.
Mansa Musa:
Right.
Amber-Rose Howard:
So, as of now, there were already two closures. One happened, one is in the process. The Governor announced an additional two closures, and a bunch of yard closures at different prisons.
Mansa Musa:
Hey, come on.
Amber-Rose Howard:
What we’re looking forward to is another five closures happening by 2027.
Mansa Musa:
Right.
Amber-Rose Howard:
We know that it’s possible, because even the state’s own Legislative Analyst’s Office, which is nonpartisan, they said, “Listen, we have 20,000 empty prison beds in the state of California. You all have to close more prisons.” So, we’re getting even the state’s analysis to say this is the right direction to move. So, we do really feel like the people’s power is pushing toward that. You know what? I tweeted something a couple of years back about Juneteenth, and I was thinking about James Baldwin when he said, “What is the 4th of July to the slave?” Right?
Mansa Musa:
That’s right. Come on.
Amber-Rose Howard:
Along that line. So, I said, “Well, what is Juneteenth to the incarcerated Black person?”
Mansa Musa:
Come on.
Amber-Rose Howard:
It’s just [inaudible].
Mansa Musa:
Yeah. What is it? Yeah.
Amber-Rose Howard:
What is Juneteenth to me if I’m sitting in a prison cell?
Mansa Musa:
Yeah, yeah, that’s right.
Amber-Rose Howard:
If I’m in chains, if I’m behind bars, it doesn’t have any significance. So, I say to everyone who wants to celebrate Juneteenth, to everyone who wants to go out and party, and eat your food and celebrate, that’s cute. We like that, but-
Mansa Musa:
Yeah, we don’t have no problem with people celebrating.
Amber-Rose Howard:
I have a problem with a little plate.
Mansa Musa:
Yeah.
Amber-Rose Howard:
But I do implore people to think about the fact that we have thousands [inaudible]-
Mansa Musa:
2.5 million people in prison.
Amber-Rose Howard:
Exactly.
Mansa Musa:
2.5 million people in prison.
Amber-Rose Howard:
[inaudible].
Mansa Musa:
2.5 million people locked up because of the 13th Amendment. It’s reimagination, that’s what we’re doing. The whole thing about this conversation we’re having today is saying, our reimagination, this is the implementation of our reimagination.
Amber-Rose Howard:
Right.
Mansa Musa:
It’s not a stretch of the imagination.
Amber-Rose Howard:
It’s happening.
Mansa Musa:
My director sent me this quote saying that we live in capitalism. Its power seems inescapable.
Amber-Rose Howard:
Yeah.
Mansa Musa:
But then, so did the divine right of the king. See, at one time it was a saying that on the British Empire, the sun never set on the British Empire, because of how massive it was. That’s how much they had colonialized territory. Now, the sun, like right now, probably set right on… the power they got right now… probably is one outhouse. That’s how much power they got, because of people coming together and getting their liberation.
Amber-Rose Howard:
That’s right.
Mansa Musa:
And people coming together and imagining another life. So, I want to push forward on this issue about reimagination going forward. Going forward. Because, you outlined some critical things that you all implemented, but going forward, okay, we get to 2027, and we got what we want. Okay. What we going to do with our people when they come out? What you all plan to get out, because we don’t want them to, say, take one incident, and then make that one incident become the reason why they should revisit the plantations. So, what do we have in place for our people when they come out? Because, we know we’re going to need help.
Amber-Rose Howard:
Absolutely. I think that that’s the importance of the work that we’re doing around the budget. Is because in California, for example, we spent $18.5 billion a year-
Mansa Musa:
Come on.
Amber-Rose Howard:
… on incarceral structure.
Mansa Musa:
Yeah.
Amber-Rose Howard:
So we’re saying, well, with prisons closing and populations reducing, people going back to the community, let’s get these millions of dollars that [inaudible].
Mansa Musa:
Come on. Come on.
Amber-Rose Howard:
And put them into the community. We’re talking about permanent, and safe, and secure housing.
Mansa Musa:
That’s right.
Amber-Rose Howard:
We’re talking about resources in the community where people can have mental healthcare, physical healthcare, emotional wellness.
Mansa Musa:
That’s right.
Amber-Rose Howard:
Where the youth can have places to go to express their creativity, and further their education.
Mansa Musa:
That’s right.
Amber-Rose Howard:
[inaudible] we need that money to be spent on. The state is taking steps to do that, but we know that it’s going to take a lot more work from the people’s to get [inaudible]-
Mansa Musa:
That’s right.
Amber-Rose Howard:
… here. We know that infrastructure in the community is what’s going to keep us safe.
Mansa Musa:
Come on. That’s right.
Amber-Rose Howard:
If people wasn’t in crisis, then they wouldn’t be harming each other.
Mansa Musa:
That’s right.
Amber-Rose Howard:
If we all [inaudible] we need, there’s no space for harm. So, that’s what we’re pushing the state to do. Let’s reinvest those funds into the community, so that returning citizens and returning people can experience life, and thrive in it. Because, we do have those resources. We’ve just been spending them the wrong way.
Mansa Musa:
You know what? I’m thinking, as you’re talking, because I remember somewhere along the line in history… and you can correct me if my rendition of history is incorrect… but I remember somewhere along the line in history, when they freed us, they said they’re going to give us 40 acres and a mule. 1.5 billion is a whole lot of acres and a whole lot of mules to be given the population of California. More importantly, to your point, you create jobs. A friend of mine would tell me, say, “When a person have a job and have an income, they feel good about themselves. They got a life.” When you’re taking the monies that you are putting into maintaining the prison-industrial complex, the military-industrial complex of the California system, prison system as we know it, then all you doing is taking it and furthering the narrative about the 13th Amendment and legalized slavery.
Amber-Rose Howard:
Yep.
Mansa Musa:
But now, because of CURB, we can see the reimagination taking shape in the form that you outlined. Talk a little bit more about going forward, what you all going to be doing.
Amber-Rose Howard:
Absolutely. Going forward, we plan to continue to engage the state, the Governor’s administration, and the budget committee’s really where they make the decisions about public safety. We have pretty good relationships there now, but we have to continue to push them to spread that money out. There’s a few roadblocks, the people have to apply for the funds that have been released and have been redirected. We’re trying to fight those barriers, to say it should be a lot easier for people to apply for this [inaudible].
Mansa Musa:
Yeah. That’s right, that’s right. That’s right.
Amber-Rose Howard:
[inaudible] for organizations, all these strict guidelines aren’t going to help us.
Mansa Musa:
Right.
Amber-Rose Howard:
We’d just be able to funnel the money to the communities a lot faster. So, that’s what we’re going to be working toward. Also, you know what? If they do agree to close five more prisons by ’27, that means that the state will have closed eight prisons within less than a 10-year span.
Mansa Musa:
Come on. That’s-
Amber-Rose Howard:
[inaudible].
Mansa Musa:
That’s phenomenal.
Amber-Rose Howard:
Yeah.
Mansa Musa:
That’s phenomenal.
Amber-Rose Howard:
Yeah.
Mansa Musa:
That’s phenomenal. That’s phenomenal. That’s right. Right here. Hey, that’s a June 16th.
Amber-Rose Howard:
Yeah.
Mansa Musa:
That’s a June 16th when 2027 get here. Every time they close a prison, we’re like, “Yeah!” We… Fireworks.
Amber-Rose Howard:
That’s right.
Mansa Musa:
Yeah. Look, marching around with whatever flag we want.
Amber-Rose Howard:
[inaudible].
Mansa Musa:
Hail to the King, a whole bunch of other stuff.
Amber-Rose Howard:
Exactly. It’s a reason to celebrate, but it’s also something that pushes us to say, “Wow, if we can go from 35 prisons and cut that down by eight, then what’s that? 27 left? Then, I think we can do 10 more-“
Mansa Musa:
Yeah.
Amber-Rose Howard:
“In the next eight years.” You know what I’m saying? Then, we can do 10 more after that.
Mansa Musa:
You know what this does, in terms of the effect? Because I did 48 years before I got out, and when changes was coming in, in terms of us knowing we was getting ready to get out, this is what it does. See, it changes the mentality of the people that’s locked up.
Amber-Rose Howard:
Yeah.
Mansa Musa:
It changes the mentality of the people that’s on the plantation.
Amber-Rose Howard:
Yeah.
Mansa Musa:
Because now, see, it’s a difference. Between me never getting out, or me being in an environment where it’s fight or flight, where you put me in the system and say, “Oh you a gang member. So, therefore, [inaudible].” Versus saying, “Oh, there’s this group, CURB. This infrastructure in California, they just closed five. They’re coming down the road, they’re getting ready to close these.” It’s different when you hear that resonating through the population, saying, “Man look, if I’m alive, I can get out.”
Amber-Rose Howard:
Yeah.
Mansa Musa:
So, “Oh, I’m going to stay alive to get out.”
Amber-Rose Howard:
Yeah.
Mansa Musa:
But more importantly, I’m going to create an environment where everybody think like that, “Oh, we getting ready to get out of prison. Why are we at each other’s throats?”
Amber-Rose Howard:
Yeah.
Mansa Musa:
“Why are we battling over turf war in a prison when we got a reality before us to say, ‘I’m going to be able to get out there and raise my kids.’”
Amber-Rose Howard:
Absolutely.
Mansa Musa:
“I’ll be out there to hug my mother.”
Amber-Rose Howard:
Yeah, yeah.
Mansa Musa:
“I’m going to be out there to hug my wife. I’m going to be out there networking with my sister.” You all really, when this whole [inaudible] impact, the impact of this, what you all doing, is really resonating in prison. Because, you even outlined it, when you said that your strategy, you all went inside.
Amber-Rose Howard:
Yeah.
Mansa Musa:
“Tell us what need to be. Tell us how this looked inside.”
Amber-Rose Howard:
Yeah.
Mansa Musa:
And worked your way outside-
Amber-Rose Howard:
Yeah.
Mansa Musa:
To develop a policy and a perspective. More importantly, I never heard… you ain’t said this word out your mouth, which I was proud of. You never said “reform”. Because we’re not trying to reform a plantation.
Amber-Rose Howard:
Mm-mm. We don’t need no reform.
Mansa Musa:
Yeah.
Amber-Rose Howard:
We’re not reforming a dang thing. We out here, we want to tear it down.
Mansa Musa:
That’s right.
Amber-Rose Howard:
And show the world what we really can build up. Absolutely.
Mansa Musa:
Yeah. We thank you for coming on. Tell how can we get in touch with you, and tell our audience what they can do to get in touch with you all.
Amber-Rose Howard:
Absolutely.
Mansa Musa:
And support your effort.
Amber-Rose Howard:
Absolutely. You all can look us up at curbprisonspending.org. If you want to reach me directly, you can reach me at amberrose@curbprisonspending.org.
Mansa Musa:
There you have it, Amber-Rose.
Amber-Rose Howard:
Thank you so much for having me [inaudible].
Mansa Musa:
Yes. Uh-huh. You know what? We saying this here, you rattled the bars today.
Amber-Rose Howard:
Yeah.
Mansa Musa:
George Jackson said that they will hear the rumbling of our feet. We know for right now that George Jackson is proud of the members of CURB.
Amber-Rose Howard:
[inaudible].
Mansa Musa:
Because, we know that when you all had took the initiative to say, “You’re not putting one more penny into that [inaudible], decadent-ass San Quentin,” when you all made that statement and stepped forward, that went a long ways in terms of the future of the men, and more importantly the women, that’s in prison system. So we ask you, our audience, to review this information, to review CURB, to look at what they’re doing, and reimagine a society without a prison.
Amber-Rose Howard:
Yep.
Mansa Musa:
Reimagine a society where $1.9 billion is being invested in schools, hospitals, grocery stores-
Amber-Rose Howard:
[inaudible].
Mansa Musa:
And infrastructure, or playground where your children can play. Reimagine that the monies that’s being put into the prison-industrial complex-
Amber-Rose Howard:
Yeah.
Mansa Musa:
The military-industrial complex, is being put back inside society and being reinvested. And, the reinvestment would yield this, the reinvestment will yield a quality life for people. Not only the people that’s getting out, but the people that’s left behind. Them communities where the prisons were, you can have a quality life. You can reimagine having an industry, and living in a town where you don’t have to wake up and think about whether or not your loved one would come out of prison-
Amber-Rose Howard:
Yeah.
Mansa Musa:
… alive, because of the brutal conditions that they work under. We thank you, and we continue to ask you to continue to support rattling the bars.
Amber-Rose Howard:
Absolutely.
Mansa Musa:
Because it’s the only way that you’re going to get Amber-Rose and a CURB report, on Rattling the Bars. You’re not going to get it from no other major network.
Amber-Rose Howard:
[inaudible].
Mansa Musa:
Nobody going to talk about $1.9 billion being taken away from a prison-industrial complex. Nobody going to sit up here and talk about how the devastation from prison… They’re not going to give you this information on a major news network. You’re only going to get this information on the real news, and you’re only going to get this information when you rattle the bars.
Amber-Rose Howard:
That’s right.
Mansa Musa:
Thank you very much, and thank you, Amber for-
Amber-Rose Howard:
That’s right.
Mansa Musa:
… enlightening us, and giving us this opportunity.
Bradley was finishing a walk with his dog along a nature trail near the rural town of Plattsmouth, Nebraska when local police suddenly pulled him over. When the officers immediately went for Bradley’s center console and produced a CBD pipe, he knew something was off. When he confronted the police, they admitted they’d searched his parked car while he was away—and then waited for him so they could pull him over while driving. Police Accountability Report examines this disturbing case, and what it says about the activities police departments devote their bloated budgets toward.
Production: Stephen Janis, Taya Graham Post-Production: Stephen Janis, Adam Coley
Transcript
The following is a rushed transcript and may contain errors. A proofread version will be made available as soon as possible.
Taya Graham:
Hello, my name is Taya Graham and welcome to the Police Accountability Report. As I always make clear, this show has a single purpose: holding the politically powerful institution of policing accountable. And to do so, we don’t just focus on the bad behavior of individual cops. Instead, we examine the system that makes bad policing possible. And today we will achieve that goal by showing you this video of a cop who tried to search a man’s car while it was parked and he was walking his dog. But it’s what happened when the officer confronted the motorist on the road that reveals just how destructive and unfettered police power really can be.
But before we get started, I want you watching to know that if you have video evidence of police misconduct, please email it to us privately at par@therealnews.com, or reach out to me on Facebook or Twitter @tayasbaltimore and we might be able to investigate for you. And please like, share, and comment on our videos. It does help us get the word out and can even help our guests. And of course, you know I read your comments and appreciate them. You see those hearts down there. And we do have an Accountability Reports Patreon page, so if you feel inspired to donate, please do. Anything you can spare is truly appreciated. Okay, we’ve gotten that out of the way.
Now, if there is one refrain we hear from police unions and cop partisans and tough on crime politicians, it’s that there just aren’t enough cops. The complaint, no matter how much we fund them, is that law enforcement is simply stretched too thin to do their jobs. Of course, if that is true, I think the video I’m about to show you now will require some explaining from the elites who demand more dollars for cops and less power for us because the encounter with the cop on the screen now calls into question the entire, “We need more cops,” mantra, a sequence of events that paints an entirely different picture than the conjured crisis of a country chronically short on law enforcement.
Because if it’s true, why would the officer who I’m showing now on the video do what he did here? That is, searching for a parked car in rural Nebraska next to a nature trail with no evidence of a crime. If there are too few cops, then I am all ears as to why this particular act of law enforcement is worth the precious time of the dwindling number of officers on the job.
Now the story starts in Plattsmouth, Nebraska. There, Bradley Connolly was walking his dog on a nature trail after a hard day at work. At the time, Connolly was building a dollar store for the town, which is why he was taking a breather and enjoying nature with his beloved dog, Rosebud. Afterwards, Bradley and Rosebud hopped into his car and headed on their way. However, he was almost immediately pulled over for a traffic stop and was surprised that the officer reached straight into his car and headed for the center console and retrieved his CBD pipe. When Bradley confronted the officer and asked the officer how he knew where the pipe was, he made a shocking discovery. Just listen.
Sargeant Sommer:
I said I smelled marijuana coming from your vehicle, and that’s not marijuana, sir?
Bradley Connolly:
You went in my car… No, that’s CBD, but you went in my car when I was over there.
Sargeant Sommer:
So now you know you’re playing games with me.
Bradley Connolly:
I’m not playing games.
Sargeant Sommer:
Yeah, because you knew.
Bradley Connolly:
That you went in my car. You went right to it. Yeah. You shouldn’t have went in my car. Nobody gave you permission to go in my car.
Sargeant Sommer:
Yes. So let me explain how this works, okay? Your vehicle is a rental car. It’s parked in a place that it’s not supposed to be.
Bradley Connolly:
We’re on a trail.
Sargeant Sommer:
Let me me explain to you the situation. If you want to listen, I’m more than glad to explain to you, okay?
Bradley Connolly:
I’m listening. I’m listening.
Sargeant Sommer:
Like I said, you’re parked in an area where you’re not supposed to be parked. We just had a bunch of break-ins and cars stolen out here last week.
Bradley Connolly:
That’s not me, man. I just explained to you, I’m here-
Sargeant Sommer:
It doesn’t matters if it’s you. I’m explaining to you, your car is not registered to you. It’s a rental car and it’s parked in a place-
Bradley Connolly:
I’m here-
Sargeant Sommer:
I’m not going to continue to talk over you.
Bradley Connolly:
You’re being idolatry.
Sargeant Sommer:
You can stop and listen-
Bradley Connolly:
This should be a consensual conversation.
Sargeant Sommer:
It should be a, you listen to me because I’m explaining to you the reason why we are where we are right now. Okay?
Taya Graham:
This officer revealed that he had opened his parked rental car, carried out a search without his permission or presence, and then waited for him to drive away to pull him over.
Sargeant Sommer:
Okay? You’re parked in a place where you’re not supposed to be parked.
Bradley Connolly:
Not a crime.
Sargeant Sommer:
I’m sorry?
Bradley Connolly:
That’s not a crime.
Sargeant Sommer:
Blocking the road is. I could have towed your vehicle.
Bradley Connolly:
I was off to the side.
Sargeant Sommer:
Your tire’s in the roadway, okay?
Bradley Connolly:
I’m glad you didn’t. I’m glad you didn’t tow.
Sargeant Sommer:
Yeah, I’m glad I didn’t either. I was waiting because you know what? I’ll be honest with you. I’ve already run you. I know you have warrants in Illinois for burglary-
Bradley Connolly:
They’re unextraditable.
Sargeant Sommer:
… For burglary and drugs-
Bradley Connolly:
Out of Illinois.
Sargeant Sommer:
See? Exactly. You know, all this, and yet you want to play games with me.
Bradley Connolly:
I do. I’m not playing games.
Sargeant Sommer:
When I asked you for your ID, you could have simply given me your ID and we would’ve been done.
Bradley Connolly:
I didn’t want to.
Sargeant Sommer:
But you want to argue and you want to play games.
Bradley Connolly:
So you broke into my car…I’m not.
Sargeant Sommer:
I did break into your car. I have a right to determine if this car is stolen and who owns the vehicle.
Bradley Connolly:
You could have run the plates. All that other stuff is irrelevant.
Sargeant Sommer:
I did. You know what? Rental cars aren’t reported stolen until 30 days after.
Taya Graham:
Now, Bradley was of course disturbed by the officer’s actions. So he did whatever US citizen has the right to do and he asked the officer to legally justify the search. But how the officer responded is a troubling commentary on the state of our constitutional rights at this particular moment. Just watch.
Sargeant Sommer:
You can sit here and argue the law with me all day, but guess what? I’ve been a cop for over 20 years.
Bradley Connolly:
Okay.
Sargeant Sommer:
I know what the law is, okay? So all you have to do-
Bradley Connolly:
Then you know that warrants are unextraditable.
Sargeant Sommer:
Yeah, exactly.
Bradley Connolly:
Yeah, and so-
Sargeant Sommer:
All you had to do was provide me a driver’s license.
Bradley Connolly:
I shouldn’t have to, man.
Sargeant Sommer:
Yeah, you should.
Bradley Connolly:
This this isn’t Nazi Germany.
Sargeant Sommer:
If you’re in an area doing something illegal-
Bradley Connolly:
This isn’t Nazi Germany. I wasn’t doing anything illegal. I was walking my dog.
Sargeant Sommer:
I have reasonable suspicion that you have a vehicle that’s not registered to you.
Bradley Connolly:
Not so.
Sargeant Sommer:
It’s a rental car parked illegally in an area that had break-ins last week.
Bradley Connolly:
Not so.
Sargeant Sommer:
I have every right to do an investigation. That’s what I’m going to do.
Bradley Connolly:
Listen, I’ve been up here seven weeks building that store, man.
Sargeant Sommer:
Right.
Bradley Connolly:
No trouble. As a matter of fact, the police in Plattsmouth were very, very good.
Deputy Murphy:
[inaudible 00:05:39].
Bradley Connolly:
I can’t believe you went in my car.
Sargeant Sommer:
This is very simple.
Bradley Connolly:
No, it’s not simple. When you break into my car-
Sargeant Sommer:
It’s not breaking in, sir.
Bradley Connolly:
It is. You can’t-
Sargeant Sommer:
No, it’s not.
Bradley Connolly:
You can’t just go in the car.
Sargeant Sommer:
You left the vehicle unlocked.
Bradley Connolly:
It doesn’t matter.
Sargeant Sommer:
I have a right to go-
Bradley Connolly:
No, you don’t.
Sargeant Sommer:
… In your car and determine who owns it.
Bradley Connolly:
So anybody has the right to go-
Sargeant Sommer:
I have a right to-
Bradley Connolly:
Come on, man.
Sargeant Sommer:
I’m a law enforcement officer. It’s a difference.
Bradley Connolly:
Yeah, and I’m a citizen of the United States. Free.
Sargeant Sommer:
There’s a big difference.
Taya Graham:
Just a note. Searching a car that is on a public road requires two prongs, so to speak, for it to meet the threshold of conducting it lawfully. One, the officer must have probable cause to search, and that means reasonable, articulable suspicion that a crime has occurred. And two, there has to be exigent circumstances. That means the car has to have been on a public road where someone can move it.
So in this case, that means probable cause is critical to making this search lawful because the car is parked on the side street where, conceivably, it could drive off. Which is why I want you to listen again to the officer legally justifying the search. But also, take note of how once he realizes how his case is weak, he throws every theory against the wall, so to speak, to see if it sticks. Take a look.
Bradley Connolly:
And I’m a citizen of the United States. Free.
Sargeant Sommer:
There’s a big difference.
Bradley Connolly:
Free.
Sargeant Sommer:
Yeah, exactly.
Bradley Connolly:
Yeah, exactly what? You can’t just go-
Sargeant Sommer:
And you want to stop arguing. Yes, I can. By law, I can determine who owns this vehicle and where it’s supposed to be be, okay?
Bradley Connolly:
You don’t have a supervisor?
Sargeant Sommer:
I am the supervisor.
Bradley Connolly:
Man. You can’t go into go into somebody-
Sargeant Sommer:
You lied to me, first off. Okay?
Bradley Connolly:
I did not lie to you.
Sargeant Sommer:
I’ve explained this and I’m not going to continue to explain it.
Bradley Connolly:
I understand what you’re saying.
Sargeant Sommer:
You did lie to you. I did say I smelled marijuana in your car. You said, “There’s no marijuana.”
Bradley Connolly:
You went in my car and you found it, man. Without my permission.
Sargeant Sommer:
I smelled it before.
Bradley Connolly:
No you didn’t.
Sargeant Sommer:
Yeah.
Bradley Connolly:
Because I haven’t smoked it in two days.
Sargeant Sommer:
Guess what? It doesn’t matter. Marijuana has a distinct smell and I smelled it earlier. It’s on my body camera. When I was looking in your vehicle for a rental agreement to determine who owned the vehicle to make sure it wasn’t stolen.
Bradley Connolly:
Okay.
Sargeant Sommer:
All completely legal-
Bradley Connolly:
Was it stolen?
Sargeant Sommer:
Under the state law and under the constitution, okay?
Bradley Connolly:
Well, I’m not trying-
Sargeant Sommer:
Simple. Plain and simple. And so this is CBD, it’s not marijuana?
Bradley Connolly:
That’s correct.
Deputy Murphy:
[inaudible 00:07:47].
Bradley Connolly:
That’s correct.
Sargeant Sommer:
Okay. So when it gets tested, it’s not going to come back as marijuana.
Bradley Connolly:
That’s absolutely 100% true.
Taya Graham:
Oh really? You smelled marijuana, Officer? But wasn’t the car door closed? Isn’t that what you admitted on camera? So how did you smell this marijuana? I mean, had Bradley literally been smoking a bong two hours prior to your arrival so that the car reeked? Because your probable cause only works if you opened the door, and that is before you have met the legal threshold. So we’re going to have to give you a fail on our impromptu field constitutional policing test.
But don’t worry, I’m not going to ask you to touch your finger to your nose or stand on one foot. I would just suggest you take some time to review a few law books. You may find it enlightening. But I digress.
Now, Bradley’s obvious discomfort turns into a heated discussion about the law, which the officer declares he doesn’t have to explain. A curious assertion given his clear lack of understanding revealed by his haphazard and possibly illegal search. Just take a look.
Sargeant Sommer:
So then why were you so worried about it?
Bradley Connolly:
I’m not worried, man. This is my right.
Sargeant Sommer:
You’re making a complete issue out of it.
Bradley Connolly:
I’m trying not to.
Sargeant Sommer:
No, you absolutely are.
Bradley Connolly:
You should watch some of my videos, man. I highlight great officers all over the country.
Sargeant Sommer:
Right.
Bradley Connolly:
I do.
Sargeant Sommer:
Okay. And I appreciate that you-
Bradley Connolly:
Yeah, but you’re not. You’re acting like a tyrant right now.
Sargeant Sommer:
You know what? Here’s the situation. If your job is to drive around and try to all lure officers into doing something-
Bradley Connolly:
I don’t do that, bro.
Sargeant Sommer:
Because-
Bradley Connolly:
That’s not me.
Sargeant Sommer:
… Obviously you parked in a place that you shouldn’t have been.
Bradley Connolly:
No, it’s a golf course with a walk. I came back with my dog. The first thing you should have said is, “Oh, he just took his dog for a long walk.”
Sargeant Sommer:
Right.
Bradley Connolly:
Yeah.
Sargeant Sommer:
Right.
Bradley Connolly:
Do you think I’m going to take my dog to break into fricking houses? Come on.
Sargeant Sommer:
You know what, sir? All kinds of things happen, unfortunately.
Bradley Connolly:
Well-
Sargeant Sommer:
My job is to investigate those things. Again, like I said, last week, multiple cars were stolen… I’m sorry. Multiple vehicles were broken into-
Bradley Connolly:
That happens all over the country, man.
Sargeant Sommer:
… And a car was stolen.
Bradley Connolly:
I’m all over the country. I’ve seen it.
Sargeant Sommer:
And that’s fine. I’m glad that you’re all over the country and I’m glad that you’re doing your part to be a great citizen.
Bradley Connolly:
Can I have your name and badge number?
Sargeant Sommer:
Sergeant Summer. 92021.
Bradley Connolly:
S-O-M-M-E-R?
Sargeant Sommer:
That’s correct.
Bradley Connolly:
And you, sir?
Deputy Murphy:
Deputy Murphy.
Bradley Connolly:
Murphy? And your badge number?
Deputy Murphy:
[inaudible 00:09:58].
Bradley Connolly:
One more time?
Deputy Murphy:
92032.
Bradley Connolly:
Thank you.
Taya Graham:
You know, just watching the video and the officer’s justification that there have been car break-ins is intriguing. Is that why he had to then break into Bradley’s car? I mean, if, as officer says, he is investigating the crimes, how is going through someone’s car going to solve it? How is searching out parked cars for a supposed criminal who’s breaking into cars productive?
Finally, the officer decides that contrary to the evidence, he has to entangle Bradley in the legal system by issuing him a citation. But he also, without justification, confiscated Bradley’s wallet, which Bradley alleges had $2,000 in it. Money he has yet to get back. Just watch.
Sargeant Sommer:
All right. We’re going to get you a citation for the paraphernalia and the marijuana. If it comes back that it’s not marijuana, then most likely they’ll drop the charge. But I can’t field test it at this point right here. It smells like marijuana. It appears to be marijuana.
Bradley Connolly:
Same thing as CBD, you know?
Sargeant Sommer:
Okay. I don’t use marijuana, I don’t use CBD, so I can’t think of the difference.
Bradley Connolly:
Well maybe you should, because you’re a little high-strung.
Sargeant Sommer:
No.
Bradley Connolly:
Yes.
Sargeant Sommer:
Well unfortunately, that happens when people are uncooperative.
Bradley Connolly:
No.
Sargeant Sommer:
That’s what happens.
Bradley Connolly:
I’m not uncooperative.
Sargeant Sommer:
You were absolutely uncooperative.
Bradley Connolly:
You have no right to go through my vehicle. You have no-
Sargeant Sommer:
I’m not going to continue.
Bradley Connolly:
I don’t care if you want to continue or not.
Sargeant Sommer:
Why don’t you Google the constitution?
Bradley Connolly:
Why don’t you Google… Man-
Sargeant Sommer:
You’re good.
Bradley Connolly:
Tell me what the first amendment is in.
Deputy Murphy:
Right.
Sargeant Sommer:
I choose to-
Bradley Connolly:
Because you love to put people in cages.
Sargeant Sommer:
Sir, if you choose to be a criminal and be belligerent to officers-
Bradley Connolly:
I’m not a criminal.
Sargeant Sommer:
That’s your-
Bradley Connolly:
You’re a criminal.
Sargeant Sommer:
That’s your decision.
Bradley Connolly:
You went through my car while I was walking my dog.
Sargeant Sommer:
Legally check… If I leave-
Bradley Connolly:
He’s got my wallet. That’s the only money I have.
Sargeant Sommer:
Think that matters that he has your wallet?
Bradley Connolly:
Shut up.
Taya Graham:
But this encounter was just the beginning of the legal repercussions for Bradley, because the officer and department contacted his employer after he posted a video exposing the illegal search. And the consequences for Bradley were devastating.
And for more on that, we will be speaking to Bradley shortly. But before we do, I’m joined by my reporting partner Stephen Janis. Steven, thank you so much for joining me.
Stephen Janis:
Taya, thanks for having me. I really appreciate it.
Taya Graham:
So Steven, first I know you have some breaking news about the case we reported on last week involving a former Texas firefighter. Denton County sheriffs used a bogus DUI to destroy his career and run him out of the department. What’s your update?
Stephen Janis:
Well, what’s amazing to me is when I sent the case to prosecutors for comment, because I’m like, “Why did you prosecute this case?” They said they have no evidence of this case even existing. And I said, “Blood tests, whatever?” They’re like, “No, we have nothing. We never received this case.”
I think it’s really questionable. I mean this case was devastating for Thomas. He was basically run out of the fire department. It turned his life upside down, and yet this case ever made to prosecutors. Let’s remember, prosecutors are a check on police. They’re very, very, very important to make sure the police don’t file bogus charges. In this case prosecutors haven’t seen it, and I think it raises a lot of more questions about the Denton sheriff’s office.
Taya Graham:
Wow. Steven, that is really disturbing. Please continue to follow up on that and keep us updated.
Okay. So back to Bradley. You have been reaching out to the Nebraska Police Department. How are they explaining this case?
Stephen Janis:
Well, I reached out to the Plattsmouth prosecutor because I really wanted to see how this case was processed, and he sent me a very detailed email about what happened with the charges. First of all, the charges were dropped. He would not comment on the legality of the search, but he did say nothing was used against Mr. Connolly from that search, and he also said that he disputes, or at least was not able to reach a conclusion about the $2,000 that Bradley said was missing.
He says that he did an investigation, it’s still ongoing, but at this point he has no evidence either way. So that’s where this case stands. Certainly the prosecutor seemed to take it seriously and the prosecutor also said there were no charges brought against him. The case was dropped. So that’s pretty much where we are right now with this case.
Taya Graham:
So the officer seems to suggest that the smell of marijuana is probable cause, but using that as a pretext is facing some pushback. Can you talk about that?
Stephen Janis:
If there is one statement into probable cause that is really eroded our constitutional rights, it’s the smell of marijuana. It’s basically been used as a bogus pretext for decades and it’s wreaked a lot of havoc. In our own city, we had police officers chase two young men for the smell of marijuana at 100 miles per hour and cause a fatal accident that killed three innocent people.
So really, a lot of states and a lot of legal authorities are saying it is time to end this. This is not a statement of probable cause. It’s absolutely irrelevant in the particular case we’re talking about. Supposedly searching for cars that have been rifled through or stolen. What the hell does marijuana have to do with that? So it’s evidence not even pertaining. It is bogus and it really erodes our rights and a lot of states are saying, “Stop.”
Taya Graham:
And now to talk to the man who endured this invasive search and some of the lingering consequences for him. I’m joined by Bradley Connolly. Bradley, thank you so much for joining me.
Bradley Connolly:
Absolutely. Thank you. I’ve been watching you since the beginning. You and Steve, I love you guys.
Taya Graham:
So first, what are we seeing at the beginning of the video? I mean, at first I didn’t even realize it was a traffic stop.
Bradley Connolly:
If I may back up just a little bit. So for the past five years I’ve built Dollar Trees and Family Dollars around the country, and I built one in Plattsmouth, Nebraska, which is a small town. Her and I actually went through a tornado there during the build, but I had to come back to hang up a couple signs and do a couple things, and I’d rented a car. I drove 12 hours approximately with her. Of course we stopped along the way and stuff, but while I was up there building the store, we always went to this rural golf course and there was long paths and walks and it was not in golf season, so nobody golfed.
And we had got there maybe 20 minutes before dusk or so on this long drive and I said, like I always do for her, “Hey, do you want to go to the park or golf course? Do you want to go to the park?” And she gets really excited. So we pulled off there and I actually had pulled behind somebody, and like I say, there’s a few neighborhoods around, but cornfield surround the thing. I mean it’s out in the middle of nowhere. And we went on a walk and I came back and I got in my car and it was completely dark when we got back. And when I started the rental car, I noticed that some lights came on in the back of me. And me being an advocate, I was just like, “I hope that this isn’t a cop.” Of course I’m following all the speed limits and the laws and as I turn at the stop sign, I see the insignia. And he started the lights and I pulled over and he asked me for my license, and me being an advocate, I wanted to know what I did wrong.
Taya Graham:
So why were you initially pulled over by the officer?
Bradley Connolly:
When I asked him why he pulled me over, he said I was suspicious. And I asked him, of course, “A suspicion of misdemeanor or felony, and how am I being suspicious?” And then he went from that to, “It smells like marijuana in the car,” which it definitely didn’t. It was a rental car. And that’s when they pulled me out and went into the center console.
When he pulled me over, I rolled down the window. He wanted my ID and I said, “If I haven’t committed a crime, I’m not going to give you my ID.” And he called his back-up, and that was Deputy Murphy, came up and pulled the taser at my passenger side window and told me to get out. So I got out and I had no idea that they had went through my car. And I’m not the smartest person in the world, but I got out and the only thing I had in the car… It was a rental car. I don’t smoke marijuana in the car, CBD or anything, so I know that the car didn’t smell. It was in the center console, it was a pipe, and he went right to it and pulled it out. And like I say, I’m not the smartest person in the world, but I thought, “He’s been in my car.”
Taya Graham:
Were you surprised to discover through your conversation that the officer had admitted to searching your car before he pulled you over?
Bradley Connolly:
Honestly, I was mind baffled. I couldn’t believe that he had went into my car. I mean, if I would’ve broke into his car in his reasoning, which, again, mind baffled. It gives me chills. It makes me so upset. He said it was because I left the car door unlocked, and now that should tell everybody how rural the place is. My wallet was on the front seat with $2,000 on it. That’s how rural the place was.
I questioned him that way and sure enough, he said he had every right to go through my car and he’d been through my car. If you find a pipe in a car as an officer, you probably are going to want to search the trunk. He never looked in the trunk. You’re probably going to want to search under the seats. In my presence, he never looked under the seats. So anyway, from my point of view video, you can kind of see… And I stopped at one point and went live, and I think I’ve tried to air that, but it’s all bits and pieces. That’s kind of why I wanted the dash cam footage. And I’ve been trying head over heels. I’ve spoke with the prosecutor.
Taya Graham:
Do you think your knowledge of the law helped protect you from the situation becoming worse?
Bradley Connolly:
To answer your question, I think it could have went both ways and I’ll tell you why. Because if I wouldn’t have known my rights, I probably would’ve handed over my ID and I knew I had warrants for theft of my dog right here. Long story, but ex, easy. It’s nothing. But I knew they were non-extraditable. I could have just handed him my ID and been on the way, maybe. He probably would’ve escalated it, the way he is.
Now, the other aspect of that is I was really angry that he went into my car. All I wanted to do a after a 12-hour drive was get to the store, finish up what I had to do, get some rest, and go back. He stole my wallet that night. I ended up having to sleep in my car because I didn’t have any way to pay for anything. That being said, I don’t like bullies and the way I reacted isn’t typically how I talk to people. I try to treat everybody with kindness and respect, and I have so much mad love for people and things. I really do. And I try to portray that, but with auditing cops who seem to be untouchable and above the law, something in me just gets so mad because I see them treat people… And I’ve been in areas where I’ve seen what they do because they can. And just because you can doesn’t mean it’s right.
Taya Graham:
Why do you think the officer was so fixated on it being a rental car?
Bradley Connolly:
I have no idea. That’s a good question. I’ve never really thought of it before, so I don’t have an answer that I know to be the truth. All I can say is that all the police in Plattsmouth, they would stop by and see me building the store. I built it with one other guy, and I got to know them. They were okay. They watched my tools and my equipment. So it was really, really odd to me. I don’t know why.
Had he just been doing his job… And I have no problem with him running. He sees a car, they’re running the plates, see if it’s stolen or whatnot. But when he broke into it and then ran my license and all that good stuff, that really irritated me. There’s no burglary tools. There’s a dog and a leash and a guy coming back on a trail. I mean, use your common sense. If somebody didn’t call in that there was a burglary, why are you bothering me?
Taya Graham:
I have to admit, this does seem a bit like what some people call a fishing expedition.
Bradley Connolly:
I know exactly what you mean. Even in the video, if you watch the entire video, I told them that’s all the money I had on me. I had $2,000 in it. Well, when they released me, I took off, obviously, and then I realized that they never gave me my wallet or my money back. So it was two miles up the road and I called dispatch, the sheriff’s office, and I told them, “Hey, they never gave me my wallet back.”
And they told me… Mind you, two miles, two minutes. It’s 15 minutes to the police station. They told me it was in the property, I could get it tomorrow. And that’s when I went in live and they told me that the property officer wasn’t there. So a month later they sent me back my wallet without my money in it. So they stole my $2,000. And that’s all on video, too.
Taya Graham:
How has posting this encounter impacted you? I mean, it did cost you your job.
Bradley Connolly:
Well, it’s affected many nights of sleep. I have made countless calls to the prosecutor’s office, countless calls to the police department and he called my work, Southwestern Services, who gets the contracts from Dollar Tree. I don’t know what he said. It was never told to me what he said. I tried to FOIA request that phone call and apparently there wasn’t one, but they told me that I could no longer work for them because of the video.
And my response was, “I did nothing wrong.” I didn’t commit any kind of crime. I actually highlighted Dollar Tree and Family Dollar, and I put my blood, sweat, and tears into it for five years. I’ve built maybe 60 by myself, ground up. I hired a few people to help me along the way, but I know them backwards and forwards. I practically don’t even need the plans. So anyways, to answer your question, they told me that I could no longer work for him.
Taya Graham:
Okay, so the officer referred to a warrant. What was the warrant for?
Bradley Connolly:
So the warrants are… There’s two. I was building a store in Iowa and I had a passenger and he had four grams of marijuana on my center console. We actually worked so long that we slept all day. And I’m not saying that I’m a perfect person and I’m not saying that I smoke or don’t smoke marijuana, but I’ve never done another drug in my entire life. So it’s not like I’m out there committing crimes for drugs. Actually, I was in the parking lot that I was building, resting, taking a nap with one of my workers that I hired. And he came up on us and I’m not one to tell on anybody, and they were asking us, so they did a walkthrough, four grams, a walkthrough in jail, and I told them I’d never be back in Iowa. Forget it, right? What’s in Iowa? Beans?
So anyways, the other one is my dog that I’ve had since a baby, supposedly, allegedly was taken. And it’s a long story, but to make a long story short, my ex of three and a half years tried to take my dog from me and it’s the love of my life. So that didn’t happen. So I have two warrants, felony warrants with a $75,000 bond, but they’re unextraditable as of present, and as they were, out of Illinois, I’m not saying I was a perfect child, but I haven’t had a conviction on my record for… Oh, no, this is going to date me. Since 2000.
Taya Graham:
What would you like to see change about policing or how do you hope posting on your auditing channel will help?
Bradley Connolly:
That’s an amazing question. I just want police… Because we’re all human. We are all going to make mistakes. We do some pretty idiotic and dumb things at some certain times. A couple months training is not enough for an officer. I want them to treat everybody, whether they’re drug-induced, mental health. You see these videos where the police kill these mentally ill people. I mean, I could have got them out of the car with maybe a butter knife and they shoot them in the head. It just doesn’t make any sense.
And don’t get me wrong. I want to make it very clear, I do not hate police. I actually have a lot of police friends on my Facebook and officers. And not all officers are bad, but I think that being in a negative environment along with the… And I would almost… Man, I’ve just seen it too much to not say that to become an officer, you have a certain personality. And that personality needs to, or persona, it needs kindness, love, respect. There is going to be times when evil is there and you got to do what you got to do. I get that. But if you see somebody’s hurting, if you see somebody that is maybe able to talk down, negotiation skills, deescalation skills and realizing that that’s another human on this planet.
Taya Graham:
Now I want to address something that I’m sure police partisans are soon going to squawk about in the comment section after they watch the show. It’s the off-sighted, but nevertheless unchallenged assertion that the right to search a car is simply a legal question. And so long as police can conjure, and notice I’m using a very specific word here, a reasonable, articulable suspicion, they should be able to search when and wherever they please.
What usually companies that argument is this addendum.”Why should you have a problem with a search if you have nothing to hide? What’s the big issue with cops doing their job? I mean, aren’t you always calling them out for not solving cases? I mean, why are you making such a big deal about constitutional rights when you should be more concerned about crime?” Well, besides the fact that we’ve had several cops here in my hometown, Baltimore, caught on their own body camera planting drugs, I think we need to consider for a moment just how the system, so to speak, only amplifies bad policing. Not just by abusing search powers, but turning those illegal searches into the life-altering stigma of criminality that happens all too often. How the system created to ensure cops don’t overstep and the innocent aren’t unjustly charged has been warped by our culture of indiscriminate guilt. So what do I mean?
Well consider this recent ruling by the Massachusetts Supreme Court regarding the misuse and withholding of evidence by the state police over a faulty breathalyzer test, a case that could lead to the possible dismissal of over 27,000 convictions. That’s right. Convictions. The case focuses on the fact that a common breathalyzer machine, the Dräger Alcotest 9510 breathalyzer, which the state police crime lab determined could produce false positives when not calibrated correctly, was still used despite the evidence. In fact, in 2017, a representative of the company that made the machines said that of the 400 they tested in the state, none were correctly calibrated and thus capable of flagging false positives.
Fair enough, no machine is perfect and certainly if the lab quickly and appropriately revealed the problem, the state could have fixed the problem and perhaps procured a different device. But that’s not what happened. Not hardly. The state continued to use the machines despite the fact that the concerns had been raised publicly and were found to be factual. Instead, thousands of people had to live with convictions for a serious crime despite the real potential of tainted evidence. That is until the recent state Supreme Court decision giving everyone, every single person convicted, the right to ask for a new trial.
This is an unusually sweeping case, but it didn’t happen because the state who had imposed harsh sentences on innocent drivers asked for it. No, this all occurred because one of the victims of a false conviction sued, and that case was finally decided last month. In that decision, the court called the state’s actions egregious government misconduct, which is why the court made the sweeping decision to allow anyone, meaning 27,000 people, to ask for the new chance to prove their innocence.
Now I want you to think about that number in relation to Bradley’s case or to the case we just updated of Thomas the Texas firefighter falsely charged with a DUI. How sweeping and consequential the impact of a decision to ignore the flaws in the machines was for the people who were victimized by it. How many lives were turned upside down or thrown into chaos and otherwise destroyed by this inexplicable decision to ignore the facts? How many licenses were revoked, jobs lost, and opportunities cast aside because the state, the state, simply chose to ignore evidence?
It’s kind of an interestingly cavalier attitude towards the consequences of our massive law enforcement industrial complex, a defiance to the truth, which I think can only be countenanced by people who are simply immune to it, meaning only the elites cosseted from the law could simply stand by while thousands of people suffered. And that’s kind of what you have to conclude when you attempt to understand the cruel indifference of the people who made the decision to allow innocent people to go to jail.
That’s right, and it was not elected officials or anyone in power who felt compelled to act in defense of the innocent. It was not a governor or a state legislator, or anyone with the ability to intervene who defended people unjustly accused. It was solely up to a victim of their malfeasance to take up the defense of the people wrongly accused, someone who had to hire lawyers and battle the case all the way up to the state’s highest court.
That’s why I think it’s important to remember that when we see videos like Bradley’s to put them into the proper context, that we remember the larger and broader injustices when we analyze how these same forces bear down on smaller but no less insignificant cases like the one we reported on today. Because I think the same sense of entitlement and immunity that prompted that Nebraska cop to illegally search Bradley’s car and confiscate his wallet is similar to the callous indifference of the Massachusetts State Police. I think the sense of careless impunity exhibited by that individual cop is really part of a larger process that allows an entire state to put innocent people in handcuffs.
It’s all about that intangible but potent power of unconstitutional entitlement. The idea that I, meaning the cop, I am the law, not representing it. That I, the cop with the gun in a badge, I am the sole arbiter of your rights, and that the power conferred upon me is not a privilege to be exercised with prudence, but a legally prescribed intoxicants that allows me to confiscate your rights, put them in handcuffs, and then discard them on the roadside like an abandoned vehicle.
This impudence, both in one case and in thousands, is the result of the culture of our version of an untouchable elite. Those elites who don’t pay taxes, have amassed ill-gotten fortunes, and who simply aren’t worried about the law. It’s their power, conferred upon cops, that we witnessed on that video. And also what spurred Massachusetts police to act without conscience. It’s also why the institution of policing must be watched as ardently as they like to watch us. Their utter disregard for our rights must be matched with the vigilance of our cameras. Their casual and consequential indifference must be overwhelmed by our passion for the rights that we must refuse to relinquish. What they treat as unimportant, we must make paramount. What they think is just the cost of doing business, illegal searches, unjust DUI convictions, we must define as unambiguously wrong.
The plethora of fake charges and false criminal records that they cast upon us like a blanket unconstitutional conviction, we must throw back at them with the indignity of a people who know our lives and our rights should not, cannot, and will not be torn asunder. That’s what we do on this show and that’s why we will continue to grow our community of constitutional activists, of defenders of rights and believers in the proposition that all of us, and I do mean all of us, are entitled to the rights to often ignored, but I believe will endure if we are willing to fight for them.
I’d like to thank Bradley Connolly for joining us and for sharing his experience. Thank you, Bradley. And of course I have to thank intrepid reporter Stephen Janis for his writing, research and editing on this piece. Thank you, Stephen.
Stephen Janis:
Taya, Thanks for having me. I really appreciate it.
Taya Graham:
And I have to thank friends of the show, Nolie D. and Lacey R. or their support. You know I appreciate you. And I want to thank every single Patreon that supports us. In our next live stream, make sure to listen for your name. I want to thank you too.
And of course, I want you watching to know that if you have video evidence of police misconduct or brutality, please share it with us and we might be able to investigate for you. Please reach out to us. You can email us tips privately at par@therealnews.com and share your evidence of police misconduct. You can also message us at Police Accountability Report on Facebook or Instagram, or @eyesonpolice on Twitter. And of course, you can always message me directly @tayasbaltimore on Twitter and Facebook.
And please like and comment. You know I read your comments and appreciate them, and even if I don’t get to answer every single one, you know I read them. And we do have a Patreon link pinned in the comments below for Accountability Report, so if you feel inspired to donate, please do. We do not run ads or take corporate dollars, so anything you can spare is greatly appreciated.
My name is Taya Graham and I am your host of the Police Accountability Report. Please be safe out there.
The consequences of a questionable DUI charge against Thomas, a former firefighter, have been devastating.
“The fire department was my family. I didn’t want to lose them, and I definitely didn’t want it to end this way,” Thomas (who does not want to use his last name out of fear of retaliation) told TRNN, explaining how the since-dropped allegations that he was driving under the influence cost him his nearly 30-year career
Along with losing his job, Thomas spent thousands of dollars on attorney fees, and was spurned by friends. All over charges that, as a Police Accountability Report investigation revealed, were levied against Thomas even though police were caught on body camera admitting he was not drunk.
But now new developments in Thomas’ case are raising questions about the Denton County sheriff who charged him.
PAR has learned that the Denton County District Attorney which would be responsible for trying the case, has no record of it—no blood tests, statement of probable cause, or documents pertaining to the charges. In fact, a spokesperson for the agency that prosecutes cases in Denton County said that, for them, the case simply does not exist.
“We did not receive any documentation from the DCSO (Denton County Sheriff’s Office) regarding this case,” Kim Geuter, an administrator with the Denton prosecutor’s office, told PAR in an email.
“We would have no way of keeping track. The only reason I knew this was not submitted to us is because I looked it up specifically. Police agencies do not notify us when they have not submitted a report to us,” she added.
Along with losing his job, Thomas spent thousands of dollars on attorney fees, and was spurned by friends. All over charges that, as a Police Accountability Report investigation revealed, were levied against Thomas even though police were caught on body camera admitting he was not drunk.
The fact that the DCSO, which initiated these devastating charges against Thomas, did not turn said charges over to prosecutors raises troubling questions about how cases are adjudicated in Denton County.
Normally, charges filed by a sheriff or police officer are submitted to a prosecutor for review in the jurisdiction where the arrest was made—in this case, Denton County. Eventually, the charges go before a judge to determine whether or not the prosecutors have sufficient legal grounding to proceed. But Thomas says that, other than a preliminary bail hearing, he never had a day in court to contest the allegations against him.
“The only appearance I made was at the jail before they let me go. They brought a bunch of us into a courtroom and read the charges,” Thomas said.
The Denton County Sheriff’s Office did not respond to multiple emails and phone calls for comment.
PAR has since filed a public records request with the DCSO for the number of DUI cases initiated by the department; in order to determine the number of cases initiated by Denton sheriffs which have not been turned over to prosecutors.
Even though this two-year-old case never found its way to a courthouse, the impact it has had on Thomas’ life in that timespan has been devastating. The charges spurred an internal affairs case against Thomas inside the fire department where he had served for nearly three decades.
That probe led to Thomas’ departure from his job. But that was only one part of the ordeal he faced after he was charged.
He was hauled off to jail and forced to fork over $1,000 for bail. His dog was handed over to animal control. His movements were restricted by bail bondsmen while his father lay on his deathbed. He had to hire a lawyer—another $3,400. And then, the aforementioned internal investigation led to his separation from a fire department to which he had devoted a lifetime of service.
“It’s hard because they look at you differently. People think you must have done something wrong to get arrested,” Thomas said. ”But I haven’t had a drink in 30 years!”
Thomas’ arrest was caught on a body camera. Three Denton deputy sheriffs audibly admitted on the recorded video that he was not drunk or otherwise impaired by alcohol. Instead, they based their charges on his “slow talking,” his “heavy-footed” gait, and his lack of balance during a field sobriety test.
“I was stone sober and they turned my life upside down… It’s a good thing to catch drunk drivers, but it’s just not right to turn innocent people into criminals.”
Thomas, former texas firefighter arrested by Denton County sheriffs on false dui charges
However, Thomas had a tumor, a neuroma, only recently removed from his left ear, which affected his balance. Moreover, Thomas freely admitted to the sheriffs he had taken his legally prescribed medication, Adderall, to treat adult attention deficit disorder—a medication that was prescribed to almost 41 million people in 2021, according to NBC News.
He was shocked that being forthcoming with officers about his medical conditions, and in particular about his ADHD medication, was the beginning of the downward turn in the interaction.
“I explained my right eye was bloodshot from my detached retina, it was why I was on light duty at the [fire] department. They asked me if I took any prescription medications so I told them about my ADHD meds… the Adderall. I think from that point the questions became more intense.”
The charges against Thomas weren’t resolved, his lawyer simply told him they were dropped.
But even though the DUI was effectively dismissed, his life has been fundamentally changed.
“I think I should practice the field sobriety test every time I leave the house now,” Thomas said halfheartedly. “I was stone sober and they turned my life upside down… It’s a good thing to catch drunk drivers, but it’s just not right to turn innocent people into criminals.”
At a January “Take Back Our Streets Town Hall,” Baltimore City officials gathered to discuss the ongoing spike in violent crime and to tell the public what they were going to do about it in 2023.
2022 was the eighth year in a row the city endured more than 300 homicides.
Organized by newly-elected Baltimore City State’s Attorney Ivan Bates and moderated by a former Baltimore cop and city Judge Wanda Heard, the conversation gestured towards diversionary programs, but mostly proposed the kinds of tough-on-crime policies the city has attempted plenty of times before: demands for additional “accountability” in the form of increased arrests and enhanced sentences; calls for more cooperation from the overpoliced yet underserved community to help solve crimes; and the targeted policing of certain offenses, such as illegal gun possession.
“Every time I turn around, the police are talking about getting more and more guns off the streets,” Bates said. “Guns are what’s being used to kill and terrorize our community.”
The Baltimore City police commissioner, Michael Harrison, boasted to those in attendance that the police had seized thousands of guns last year. “In 2022, the Baltimore Police Department took over 2,400 guns off the streets of Baltimore, making over 1,600 arrests for people with those guns—in one year,” Harrison said. “That’s more guns taken off the street and more arrests than when the department had 3,000 police officers ten years ago. So, we’re doing more work, better work, with far fewer people.”
The exact number of gun seizures in 2022, according to Harrison, was 2,416. But seizing over 2,000 guns is not a useful benchmark to measure improvement, given how consistently Baltimore police clear that number. The department confiscated 2,296 weapons in 2012, and has topped 2,000 gun seizures eight of the last 10 years.
Regardless, while Baltimore police are surely doing more work—indeed, fewer officers are seizing more guns—how this police work is “better” is not clear. In 2012, there were 218 homicides and 370 nonfatal shootings. In 2022, the year Harrison claims Baltimore police were doing more and better work, there were 333 homicides and 688 nonfatal shootings.
About two hours into the town hall, many in attendance lost patience with officials citing data that does not address the deadly reality. Mourning friends and family of murder victims yelled out from the crowd.
Heard lectured them. “You’re being rude,” she said. “So your issues are more important than everyone else’s? Because you won’t let me talk.”
“You don’t know how the mother of a murder victim feels every night,” a woman in the audience shouted.
For decades, Baltimore City’s threshold for an unacceptable amount of violence has been 300 murders. The city has exceeded 300 murders per year in 17—more than half—of the last 32 years. Additionally, there have only been seven instances when Baltimore City’s murder rate has dipped below 40 murders per 100,000 residents—even in years when the total number of murders was below 300. Only once since 1990 have there been fewer than 200 murders per year in Baltimore.
The past 30 years are also marred by chaotic crime interventions—strategies introduced only to be directly contradicted or undone by new commissioners or administrations. None of these strategies have resulted in sustained reductions in violence.
In lieu of significant, long-term successes when it comes to reducing murders and nonfatal shootings—or “failed murders,” as cops often call them—the Baltimore Police Department frequently leans on short-term and often minuscule increases or decreases in police metrics to assuage community concerns. Talk of gun seizures is a way to demonstrate that the police are “doing something” and shift attention away from the headline-making 300-plus homicide number.
Those who spoke out at the town hall were talking about Baltimore’s violence from experience, but what they said is backed up by the data. The Baltimore police are not preventing murders and nonfatal shootings and they are solving fewer and fewer of the murders and nonfatal shootings they do not prevent.
This is the first in a series of stories from The Real News examining the past 32 years of police and crime data to determine the efficacy of varied police strategies. The years 1990-2022 were chosen because 1990 marked the first year in nearly two decades in which the city reached 300 homicides, beginning an extended period of murders and shootings that the city has never fully escaped.
We began by analyzing the solutions police have cited over the years as central to reducing violence: solving homicides, making arrests, seizing guns, and increasing police spending. We found that in years when Baltimore police solved a large number of homicides, murder numbers were high; murders are high again, this time amid plummeting clearance rates. Similarly, Baltimore has experienced high numbers of murders and shootings both when it was making around 100,000 arrests per year and now when its arrest numbers are less than 20,000 a year. Strategic focus on gun seizures is not associated with reductions in the number of murders or nonfatal shootings.
Meanwhile, Baltimore spends the most per capita of any city in the United States on policing.
Common, carceral wisdom on violence reduction has not worked in Baltimore. The city has effectively been in a “crime spike” the past three decades, and in periods where violent crime numbers have dropped, police cannot always convincingly demonstrate that it was their own policies that caused the decline.
Dirty Cops, Dirty Data
There is no way to discuss crime from a statistical perspective without first discussing the statistics themselves. Police practices are opaque at best—fraudulent at worst—and each stop, arrest, and seizure by police represents a judgment made by the officers involved. This means the validity of any number—whether it accurately represents the thing it is intended to measure—that relies on the discretion of police is questionable. An increase in gun seizures at a specific point in time may not reflect more guns out on the street, just a greater strategic focus on guns. Even drawing certain conclusions from the homicide rate is difficult when we can’t easily audit why some deaths are ruled accidental and others are ruled intentional.
The Baltimore Police Department provided The Real News with data that is frequently inconsistent and sometimes incomplete. The data we did receive is often contradicted by other statements by police, and even their own reports. For example, in April of this year, the Baltimore Police Department published its year four review of its “Crime Reduction and Departmental Transformation Plan”, implemented from July 2019 through March 2023. There, gun seizures for 2022 are listed as 2,688—272 more than Harrison himself cited at January’s town hall.
Most of the data cited and analyzed for this series was obtained via Maryland Public Information Act Requests, which the Baltimore Police Department frequently failed to respond to in a timely manner. Sometimes, the police did not respond at all. When police did not provide data, we consulted Federal Bureau of Investigation data, reached out to community organizations, and consulted city documents to obtain basic information about the city and how it operates.
All of this information should be much more easily accessible.
Moreover, the way the Baltimore Police Department previously categorized some crime statistics means that even full transparency from the department about their records wouldn’t necessarily answer questions about missing or inconsistent data. For example, they explained that because nonfatal shootings were counted within the broader category of “aggravated assault” before the year 2000, they could not tell us how many nonfatal shootings there were during the ’90s. A current key metric cited by Baltimore police to determine their success at crime reduction can’t be easily compared to any year earlier than 2000.
Common, carceral wisdom on violence reduction has not worked in Baltimore.
Additionally, decades of perverse incentives to push the narrative of a safer city have inspired corner-cutting, corruption, and criminality within the notorious Baltimore Police Department, both in its vaunted homicide unit of the ’80s and ’90s and its “elite” plainclothes squads such as the Gun Trace Task Force. And since 2017, following the police killing of Freddie Gray, the Baltimore Police Department has been under a federal consent decree.
There is no way to properly quantify the effect that decades of police mistrust has on Baltimore City, let alone the harm of real, literal crimes committed by police: beatings, shootings, evidence planting, drug dealing, lying in paperwork and on the stand, sabotaging violence interrupters, exploiting informants and sex workers, and more.
In 2021, American Civil Liberties Union Maryland attempted to calculate the scale of police corruption between just the years 2015-2019 and discovered misconduct complaints filed against 1,826 cops—10% of those for “false arrest or imprisonment,” and 40 of those complaints for “criminal association.”
That 300 Number
“300-plus homicides” has often been a death knell for police commissioners and elected officials’ careers in Baltimore City, former Baltimore Police Commissioner Frederick Bealefeld told The Real News. “If there were 300 homicides in Baltimore, the commissioner was out. I mean, it was the trip wire. You cross that line, ‘See ya, look for another job,’” he said.
When Kurt Schmoke, Baltimore’s mayor from 1987-1999, entered office, the city’s homicide number was nearing 300, but murders didn’t yet dominate the conversation about crime. The focus was drugs, he explained, with murder primarily viewed as a problem experienced by the city’s majority Black population in historically redlined and divested neighborhoods: “It appeared to the community that the high level of violent crime was concentrated in two sections of town: one on the far west and one in the far east. So it was not perceived as a citywide threat the way it became later and is now,” Schmoke told The Real News.
But then Baltimore ended 1990 with 305 homicides—a jump from 259 in the previous year—and the murders became a larger part of the discourse. This rise in murders coincided with New York City’s ongoing drastic reduction in homicides, putting pressure on a much smaller city such as Baltimore to get that homicide number under 300. “If New York had not seen as dramatic a decline as they did, the 300 number probably would not have been as magnified by the press, community, and policymakers,” Schmoke said. “The significant reduction in New York started in the late ’80s, so the comparison kept getting greater and greater.”
In 1993, Baltimore saw 353 homicides, the most of any year on record.
That same year, Schmoke noted, Homicide: Life On The Street, an hour-long network drama based on reporter/showrunner David Simon’s 1991 book of the same name, premiered on NBC. The book and show focused on Baltimore’s homicide detectives—“murder police”—who were single-minded in their quest to solve each murder and remove it from the hundreds on their “open cases” dry erase board.
Along with the daily news, Schmoke said, “David Simon’s book, the TV show, and all that stuff had the community fixated on the homicide number, and particularly on 300.” Cases are “cleared” when a suspect has been identified and arrested (a conviction isn’t required) or by “exceptional” means (such as the accused dying). In recent years, it has been argued by many law and order pundits that clearing cases reduces homicides. This is one of the central arguments of Jill Leovy’s 2015 book, Ghettoside—solving murders facilitates community trust and reduces people’s perceived need to take justice into their own hands.
The effects of zero tolerance were truly devastating for Baltimoreans, and it taught an entire generation of cops that policing was solely a numbers game.
In the ’90s, more alleged murderers were being arrested, but the city’s homicide rate was not that much lower than it is now, when the murders are high and the clearance rate is low. Baltimore has seen over 300 homicides both in years when police cleared over 70% of cases and in years when the clearance rate sank below 40%. Since 1990, Baltimore police have actually become much worse at solving murders. In 1990, the Baltimore Police Department clearance rate on homicides was 75%. By 2022, that number was down to 36%.
The homicide clearance rate is a measure of how often police are able to close a murder case, but it is also a measure of the strength of the political and professional pressure put on cops to clear more cases.
While Baltimore’s homicide detectives retain the shabby nobility assigned to them by Simon more than 30 years ago, some of the detectives who worked homicides in the late ’80s and into the ’90s (including the real-life versions of “Munch” from Homicide and Law & Order and “Bunk” of The Wire) have since been revealed to have engaged in police misconduct. To clear murders, these cops forced confessions, threatened witnesses until they changed their accounts of events, and withheld exonerating evidence. As a result of such practices, men such as Jerome Johnson and Gary Washington spent decades in prison for murders they did not commit.
These wrongful convictions should call into question the validity of the celebrated 70%-plus clearance rate throughout the ’90s. As New York Magazine reported last year, “since 1989, 25 men convicted of murder in Baltimore have been exonerated, according to the National Registry of Exonerations. Official misconduct was present in 22 of the cases.”
“Zero Tolerance”
By the end of the ’90s, Mayor Schmoke hadn’t located the carceral solution that he believed would get the city’s homicides back below that 300 number. A critic of the drug war, Schmoke opposed calls to ramp up small-time arrests New York City-style, and ultimately decided not to run for reelection. “Honestly, I just ran out of ideas on homicide. That is the reason that I didn’t run for a fourth term,” Schmoke said. “I just said, ‘I cannot figure out any other strategy that’s going to get us under this magic number.’ We tried a lot of different things.”
In 1999, Baltimore City Councilperson Martin O’Malley was elected mayor, largely based on his promises to reduce violence—especially homicides. 1993’s shocking 353 murders was often invoked by his campaign.
O’Malley proposed reducing violence by adopting New York City’s aggressive (and unconstitutional) “broken windows” style of policing which focused on so-called quality of life, low-stakes arrests. The New York strategy, popularized by then-Mayor Rudy Giuliani and then-Police Commissioner William Bratton, relies on the assumption that serious crime is reduced by arresting people for low-level charges (loitering, fare evasion, open containers).
In this metaphor, the low-level charges are the “broken window” that, if not dealt with, leads to more “windows” being broken (more low-level crimes committed), which police argue creates an environment for more serious crimes.
It’s actually simpler than that: Locking up significantly more people means there are significantly fewer people around to potentially commit crimes—and locking up more people is done through constitutionally fraught tactics such as mass arrest and stop-and-frisk.
O’Malley adopted New York’s strategy. He called it “zero tolerance” and, upon his election, enacted an expansive, unprecedented experiment in mass incarceration in Baltimore City. At the peak of zero tolerance in 2003, Baltimore City police made over 110,000 arrests in a city of 610,000 people. That’s nearly 18% of the population.
At the peak of zero tolerance in 2003, Baltimore City police made over 110,000 arrests in a city of 610,000 people. That’s nearly 18% of the population.
Frederick Bealefeld, who joined the Baltimore Police Department in 1981 and was a major by 2003, saw cops and command instructed to petty-arrest their way out of high crime. “The city made about a hundred thousand arrests. Now, some of them were the same people over and over again, but think about that: 100,000 adult arrests in a city of [600,000] people. It’s incredible. And it didn’t move the needle,” Bealefeld said.
In 2003, a year with 110,164 arrests, there were 270 murders and 545 nonfatal shootings. This period of years where murders were below 300 perpetuated the idea for those invested in zero tolerance that increasing arrests had “worked.” It also was enough of a reduction to get O’Malley reelected as mayor in 2004.
Bealefeld frequently adopts a fishing metaphor to explain what was going on. Before zero tolerance, he explained, police were looking for a “big fish” (a high-profile dealer or shooter). But under O’Malley, the size of the fish no longer mattered. Arresting a corner boy, a person who uses drugs, or an inebriated person passed out on a stoop—all were deemed worthy endeavors. In fact, not arresting the drunk guy on the stoop is why more serious crimes happen, cops were taught.
“Eventually, Baltimore, in terms of arrests and fighting this drug war—and in hopes of scaling down the violence—built this massive trawler with a giant net behind it and it would go through Baltimore scooping up all the fish we could get,” Bealefeld said. “But you know what happens when you fish with a net? You catch a lot of really little fish, and almost none of the fish you want to catch.”
Jails overflowed with people arrested for nonviolent crimes. The effects of zero tolerance were truly devastating for Baltimoreans, and it taught an entire generation of cops that policing was solely a numbers game. Community outrage over these arrests—and a 2006 American Civil Liberties Union Maryland lawsuit against the city and police department for a pattern of improper arrests—made zero tolerance unpopular enough that the city was forced to listen to its residents, tired of seeing their friends and family locked up.
While Baltimore looked for another way to reduce its arrests and its murders, O’Malley took the results of zero tolerance—the city had, indeed, seen homicides per year drop below that 300 number—all the way to the governorship. The Washington Post endorsed O’Malley’s 2006 run for governor of Maryland, citing the “dent” he’d made in Baltimore crime.
Bad Guys With Guns
Soon after O’Malley became governor, new Mayor Sheila Dixon appointed Bealefeld as police commissioner. In 2007, the new mayor and new commissioner focused on further reducing murders while also reducing arrests. Bealefeld’s approach shifted to targeted arrests—as he put it, “fishing with a spear,” or going after “the sharks,” the most dangerous and notorious shooters in the city. He took to calling them “bad guys with guns.”
Arrests began to decrease, with no increase in murders, and then murders decreased more—but internally, many cops raised on zero tolerance resisted. Former cops explained that Deputy Commissioner Anthony Barksdale was especially unforgiving when it came to dressing down higher-ups and the cops they oversee for focusing too much on context-free stats and not reducing violence. Many cops complained about Barksdale’s approach, saying he was too mean and needed to ease up.
This period was also one of aggressive plainclothes policing; both Bealefeld and Barksdale had come up as plainclothes cops—or “knockers,” as they were called on the streets. 2007 also saw the creation of the Gun Trace Task Force, whose approach to catching “bad guys with guns” would soon go terribly wrong.
Then, in 2010, Dixon resigned after she was found guilty of theft, misconduct, and perjury. The city’s leadership changed—then-City Council President Stephanie Rawlings-Blake became mayor—and another new administration meant, again, new priorities.
In 2011, Baltimore police made 60,008 arrests and recorded 196 murders and 379 nonfatal shootings—the lowest murder count in the 1990-2022 time frame we analyzed. The homicide clearance rate in 2011 was 46.2%.
“What we accomplished with that homicide mark in 2011, people thought it was a fait accompli,” Bealefeld said. “The fact of the matter was, it was all just a good start.”
Bealefeld and Barksdale left the Baltimore Police Department in 2012. That year, there were 218 murders and 370 nonfatal shootings. The homicide clearance rate was 48.1%.
By 2015, homicides began to skyrocket beyond ’90s levels. In 2014, there were 46,231 total arrests, 211 murders, and 370 nonfatal shootings. The homicide clearance rate was 45.5%. In 2015, there were 32,932 total arrests, 344 murders, and 635 nonfatal shootings. The homicide clearance rate was 30.7%.
Baltimore’s reduction in arrests is partially explained by the 2014 decriminalization of cannabis possession. In 2014, there were 13,356 arrests for drug offenses. In 2015, the first full year of cannabis decriminalization, that number dropped to 6,604 drug offense arrests.
The national murder rate also increased by 11% between 2014 and 2015. Law and order pundits invoked the so-called “Ferguson Effect” to explain Baltimore’s 2015 violence. They claimed that, following the April 2015 death of Freddie Gray and the massive uprising against police violence, embattled cops stopped doing their jobs, both out of revenge and for fear that they would become the next “viral video.”
If police refusing to police is to blame for 2015’s murder spike, it would mean that the department is engaging in an eight-plus year work slowdown during which there have been 2,667 murders and 5,588 nonfatal shootings.
No Legitimate Authority
2015 began a period in which the police and elected officials, as far as many residents were concerned, had almost no legitimate authority. The thousands who took to the streets in protest of Freddie Gray’s death were not only angry about what happened to Gray but at the entire city’s policing apparatus reverting to the zero tolerance policies of the recent past.
The United States Department of Justice’s 2016 report on the Baltimore Police Department blamed O’Malley’s policies for the public’s distrust of the police, and for poor policing: “Zero tolerance enforcement made police interaction a daily fact of life for some Baltimore residents and provoked widespread community disillusionment with [Baltimore police],” the report says.
Promises of radical change and serious reflection “post-Freddie Gray” morphed into technocratic reforms and short-lived do-gooder organizations that didn’t do too much good.
Then, in 2017, the Gun Trace Task Force scandal shocked many and confirmed so much of what Black Baltimoreans had been saying for years: the Baltimore Police are ostensibly a criminal gang, creating crime rather than stopping it and lying, stealing, dealing drugs, and planting evidence.
Promises of radical change and serious reflection “post-Freddie Gray” morphed into technocratic reforms and short-lived do-gooder organizations that didn’t do too much good.
While the plainclothes squad was essentially a robbery crew, its public-facing mission was to “get guns off the street,” which they did by driving around, stop-and-frisking dozens of Black Baltimoreans each night. If they found someone with a gun, they made an arrest. If they found someone without a gun, they might plant one. It was a disastrous, stats-driven hybrid of “zero tolerance” and the “bad guys with guns” strategy.
The revolving door of police commissioners has also undermined the department’s credibility. Counting interim appointments, there have been 15 Baltimore Police Department commissioners since 1990, five of those since 2015. Anthony Batts and Kevin Davis, the two commissioners after Bealefeld, were fired because of their inability to reduce homicides. Davis’ replacement, Darryl DeSousa, lasted just a few months before he was federally indicted for tax fraud in 2018. He was replaced by interim Commissioner Gary Tuggle and then, in 2019, Commissioner Michael Harrison.
Harrison was hired due to his role as superintendent of the New Orleans Police Department during a period in which he oversaw New Orleans police’s federal consent decree and was credited for reducing murders and nonfatal shootings—reductions that have not sustained themselves.
Population Decline
Since 1990, Baltimore’s population has declined by 150,000 people. In 1990, Baltimore’s population was 736,000. As of 2022, there were about 570,000 residents. That loss of residents makes decade-to-decade and year-to-year comparisons regarding crime deceptive—and makes some of Baltimore’s most significant and celebrated homicide reductions far less impressive.
Comparisons using the total number of homicides recorded per year without considering the proportion of the city population represented by that number mask how little has changed even in years when homicide numbers have dropped. The murder rate (the number of murders per 100,000 people) is a clearer illustration of the difference from year to year.
In 1993, when Baltimore experienced 353 homicides—a record high number—the population was 724,671. The city’s murder rate that year was 48.7 murders per 100,000 people. In 2007, when O’Malley campaigned for governor on his success reducing murders via mass arrest, there were 282 murders. The population in 2007 was 606,006, making the murder rate 46.5 murders per 100,000 people.
Comparing only the raw number of recorded homicides shows that there were 157 fewer murders in 2007 than in 1993. But accounting for population between those years reveals that the celebrated reduction in murders is a difference of only three people per 100,000. During this period, the population of Baltimore declined by 16% and murders dropped by 20%.
Fewer people were killed in 2007 than 1993, but how much of that can actually be credited to policing is hard to determine. The city failed to protect nearly the same percentage of people from murder in 2007 as it did in the early ’90s.
Since 2015, Baltimore’s population has declined by around 50,000 people. Considering the murder rate rather than total homicides also shows just how dire the situation has been in Baltimore. In 2015, the murder rate jumped to 55.2 murders per 100,000 people, from 33.8 murders per 100,000 people in 2014. It has remained in the 50s for the past eight years. During the ’90s when the 300 number first became a concern, the murder rate was in the mid-to-high 40s.
The national murder rate as of 2020 was 6.52 people per 100,000.
The difference between the ’90s homicide rate and now, when accounting for changes in Baltimore’s population, is about 10 murders. The city has never really escaped its troubling ’90s numbers. Based on the data from the past 30 years, it is conceivable that the spike in arrests during the era of zero tolerance policing in Baltimore had minimal effect on homicide and nonfatal shooting reductions.
Factoring in population change further illustrates how solving homicides does not help reduce violence. Comparing the clearance rate to the murder rate shows that since 1990, the number of cleared homicides has generally followed the same increases and decreases as the total number of homicides.
Nonfatal shootings in Baltimore are generally around twice the number of homicides. The nonfatal shooting clearance rate over the past 30 years in Baltimore is not clear. The Real News’ request to police for nonfatal shooting clearance rates going back to 2000 was ignored. The nonfatal shooting clearance rate was 20.2% in 2020, 25.3% in 2021, and 23.3% in 2022.
Funding the Police
The police murder of George Floyd in 2020 mainstreamed calls to defund police departments, and with those calls came a backlash of easily disprovable claims that reducing police budgets increases crime. Baltimore City seemed to be an ideal candidate for “defunding the police”: The city spends more per person on policing than any other city in the country and it has one of the country’s highest recorded levels of violent crime.
The current Baltimore City police budget is nearly $580 million per year, which breaks down to around $1000 per resident spent on police.
In 2020, the abolitionist group Organizing Black mobilized Baltimoreans to show up at the city’s Taxpayers’ Night budget hearings and demand that the city reduce the police budget. Their messaging stressed that for every dollar spent on policing, 50 cents is spent on public schools, 20 cents on public housing, 12 cents on homeless services, 11 cents on recreation and parks, and 1 cent on mental health services.
In Baltimore, there is no connection between decreasing the police budget and increases in violence, and no connection between increasing the police budget and decreasing crime.
That year—both a mayoral election year and part of the momentary “racial reckoning” in response to George Floyd’s murder—there was a slight reduction to the Baltimore City police budget. That decrease was followed by an increase the next year. A look at the Baltimore Police Department budget over the past 30 years shows occasional reductions which are often made up the next year.
In 1990, the police budget was $169 million. Accounting for recent inflation of 2.3%, the 1990 police budget was $395 million. In 2022, the police budget was $555 million.
In Baltimore, there is no connection between decreasing the police budget and increases in violence, and no connection between increasing the police budget and decreasing crime. A department which has not effectively done its job reducing violence receives more and more money to do more of the same thing.
“The community is saying this ain’t working, and we need to cut the funding to the police department,” Organizing Black’s Rob Ferrell said back in 2021 as his organization rallied around reducing the police budget again.
Epilogue
This year, Baltimoreans once again gathered at Taxpayers’ Night events to provide their input on the city’s proposed budget. The proposed budget for the 2024 fiscal year adds up to $4.4 billion in total, and despite cuts to other programs, includes around $15 million more for the Baltimore Police Department, increasing its budget from $579,579,068 to $594,475,789.
Some budget cuts, people stressed, could be easily avoided if police were given just a fraction less in 2024. For example, Mayor Brandon Scott’s budget proposes reducing the city’s public library budget by $2.6 million. Housing advocates, meanwhile, called for $1.6 million so that Baltimore’s “right to counsel” law for tenants could be implemented.
“I call on the city council to invest in critical investments that our community needs, such as affordable and safe housing, rather than the same field pattern of increased police spending and subsidizing of wealthy developers,” Loraine Arikat, senior policy analyst with 1199SEIU United Healthcare Workers East, told the council last month.
Along with the proposed police budget, the city pays out additional money because of past police corruption. Last month, Baltimore City Comptroller Bill Henry released a Gun Trace Task Force Settlement Tracker, which provides a searchable database of settlements tied to the GTTF scandal and calculates how much money those corrupt cops have cost the city. Since the 2017 Gun Trace Task Force scandal, 41 settled cases involving the GTTF have cost the city nearly $23 million.
At Taxpayer’s Night last month, Terrence Fitzgerald, a member of Physicians for Social Responsibility, demanded a reimagining of the Baltimore Police Department: “You can keep pouring money each year into the Baltimore Police Department system but if you do not make fundamental changes, rethink what public safety means, and rebuild the system from the ground up, then you will end up with the same police department that murdered Freddie Gray and has been riddled with corruption for years,” he told the council.
Fitzgerald suggested that the city is stuck in a loop of funding an embattled, corrupt police department, watching it fail to meet its own goals, and then funding it even more. The past few weeks of headlines involving Baltimore police illustrate his point.
On May 11, Baltimore Police Officer Cedric Elleby shot a 17-year-old. It was a sunny Thursday afternoon and Elleby spoke to the teen at length on a stoop, and then asked to search him because, Deputy Commissioner Richard Worley claimed at a press conference, the teen displayed “characteristics of an armed person.”
The teen refused to be searched and he ran. Elleby chased him through the Southwest Baltimore neighborhood of Shipley Hill. Video shows the 17-year-old removing a gun from his pants and running with it but not aiming it at the officer. As the teen turned a corner, Elleby told him to drop it and, when the teen didn’t, he was shot.
As the teen lay on the ground, residents surrounded Elleby and other police.
“He didn’t even pull that gun out,” someone told Elleby.
“You shot him for nothing,” someone else screamed.
The 17 year-old survived the shooting. He underwent surgery which involved the removal of one of his kidneys and his spleen. He is currently facing first-degree assault charges as well as a number of weapons charges.
Elleby is a member of Baltimore City Police Department’s Southwest District Action Team, a specialized unit established after the Gun Trace Task Force was federally indicted in March 2017. DAT’s job, like the GTTF when it was established back in 2007, is to go after “violent offenders” and get guns off the street, with a focus on illegal handguns.
Baltimore police would not provide any data about DAT’s role in reducing crime. “While it can be difficult to correlate officer proactivity and visibility to what crimes have been prevented, we have seen that when these units are deployed, they have an impact on crime suppression and calming for the community,” Baltimore police spokesperson Lindsey Eldridge told The Real News.
These aggressive tactics by a member of DAT are one example of the department repeating past behavior. Problems with Baltimore’s homicide unit made the news again this year after another past murder conviction was overturned.
On April 18, 2023, Anthony Hall—who was convicted of the 1991 murder of Gerard Dorsey—was released from prison. The case lacked physical evidence, and one of the supposed eyewitnesses to the murder had told Baltimore police detectives multiple times that he did not witness the shooting. Police, however, told the eyewitness he could get out from under drug charges if he identified Hall as the shooter. So he did. Another eyewitness who knew Hall did not identify him as the shooter, and others provided descriptions of a shooter who did not look like Hall.
Back in 1992, this information was not provided to Hall’s defense. Hall was convicted of second-degree murder and sentenced to 50 years.
Anthony Hall is the 26th convicted murderer in Baltimore to be exonerated since 1989.
The homicide clearance rate in Baltimore City in 1991 was 70.7%.
The 2023 homicide clearance rate so far is unclear. In early May, Deputy Commissioner Worley’s presentation before the City Council Public Safety Committee said the homicide clearance rate for this year so far is 13%. After outrage from many—including Public Safety Committee Chair Mark Conway—Worley said 13% was an error and corrected the number to 40%.
At a June 6 hearing about the police budget, Councilperson Zeke Cohen mentioned a Memorial Day shooting near downtown Baltimore just feet away from Baltimore police. “I’m incredibly concerned that people are committing heinous acts of violence with seemingly no fear of consequences,” Cohen said. “Frequently we hear that there was an officer within the vicinity of the shooting within a block or a few blocks—and yet folks are still pulling the trigger.”
Cohen also expressed concern about the 40% clearance rate for murders this year.
“It’s actually about 47%,” Harrison told Cohen.
“So it went up a little bit since the last hearing?” Cohen asked.
Harrison nodded yes.
On June 8, Harrison announced he would be leaving the Baltimore Police Department.
Mayor Scott said Worley, a 25-year veteran of Baltimore police, will be the next commissioner. Worley will be Baltimore’s sixteenth commissioner since 1990 and sixth since 2015.
At a press conference about his departure, Harrison took credit for changing the Baltimore police into “a world-class department”—and for slightly reducing violence.
“I’ve been in conversations with the mayor about my future and the future of the Baltimore Police Department and in those conversations it became convincing to me that this was the most opportune time for me to pass the torch,” Harrison said. “We truly have become the best comeback story in America.”
This investigation was supported with funding from the Data-Driven Reporting Project. The Data-Driven Reporting Project is funded by the Google News Initiative in partnership with Northwestern University | Medill.
Mandatory minimum sentencing has come under fire in recent years as a crucial pillar of the prison industrial complex. By codifying a regimented system of punishment into law, mandatory minimums leave little room for consideration of individual circumstances or the possibility of rehabilitation. On April 27, 2023, the United States Sentencing Commission submitted to Congress amendments to the federal sentencing guidelines that would recommend lower sentences for certain defendants. If these changes are applied retroactively, some 18,775 people in federal prison could become eligible for a sentencing reduction—including 3,288 individuals who could be eligible for immediate release. Mary Price of Families Against Mandatory Minimums joins Rattling the Bars to discuss the proposed amendments and what they could mean for thousands of prisoners and their families.
Mary Price is General Counsel of FAMM. She directs the FAMM Litigation Project and advocates for reform of federal sentencing and corrections law and policy before Congress, the U.S. Sentencing Commission, the Bureau of Prisons, and the Department of Justice.
The deadline for submitting public comments is June 23, 2023.
Production: Cameron Granadino Studio Production: David Hebden Post-Production: Cameron Granadino
Transcript
The following is a rushed transcript and may contain errors. A proofread version will be made available as soon as possible.
Mansa Musa:
Welcome to this edition of Rattling the Bars, I’m Mansa Musa. As of 2022 there was an estimate of 145,602 people sentenced under the federal jurisdiction for a number of so-called offenses. On April the 27th, 2023, the United States Sentence Commission submitted to Congress amendments to the federal sentencing guidelines that would recommend lower sentences for certain defendants, including those with so-called point status. The commission is considering applying these changes, retroactive, meaning incarcerated people whose sentence would be lower today may be eligible for a sentencing reduction. Around 18,775 people might be eligible for a sentence reduction. And of those, an estimated 3,288 people would be immediately eligible for release. Here to talk about this is Mary Price, general Counsel for Families Against Mandatory Minimum. Welcome, Mary,
Mary Price:
Thank you so much. I’m delighted to be with you and I’m so glad you and your audience are interested in this topic.
Mansa Musa:
Okay, as we should be. First tell our audience a little about yourself and what the organization that you’re working for so we can get them to see just how you wind up in this space.
Mary Price:
Absolutely. Thanks for the introduction. So I’m the general counsel of FAMM and that role at FAMM, I work on a number of different things including the federal sentencing guidelines that you described earlier. FAMM is an organization of currently and formerly incarcerated people, and many others, who have joined together to urge sentencing and corrections reform in both the Federal Bureau of Prisons and the federal system as well as in states. So we work to lift up the voices of people who have been touched by or affected by the criminal legal system so that they can advocate for reform. Now FAMM believes really strongly in the power of storytelling. Bringing the actual impact of the laws and the policies that our lawmakers pass to their attention so that the lawmakers can reconsider their positions and perhaps change their trajectory. So that’s a very important aspect to us and so we are very proud of the work that we do with all of our members.
Mansa Musa:
All right. So now, let’s start going down the road of what we are looking at and what FAMM is trying to get done. Okay. So we have the sentencing commission, the Federal Sentencing Commission is responsible for developing the sentencing guidelines for anyone under the federal jurisdiction. Am I correct?
Mary Price:
That’s correct. So the sentencing commission writes the guidelines that govern sentences below, between and above the mandatory minimum sentences. That’s correct.
Mansa Musa:
Okay. And they are mandated by Congress to do, and they have and it has the force of law, whatever recommendations they make has the force of law. Am I correct?
Mary Price:
To some extent. Originally…
Mansa Musa:
Explain the difference.
Mary Price:
Yes, of course. Originally, so mandatory minimums judges, except in a very few circumstances, cannot avoid imposing a mandatory minimum if it applies to a certain conviction. And for many years that was also the case with the sentencing guidelines. The sentencing guidelines became advisory a number of years ago following a decision in the Supreme Court called Booker. And I won’t go into all the details, but what it means is that judges have a lot more flexibility with the guidelines than they do with the mandatory minimums and they’re able to depart from those guidelines and more importantly, to vary, to sort of find a better place to rest a sentence if the imposed sentence is either, excuse me, if the calculated guideline is either too long or too short, and generally judges sentence in many cases below those guidelines because they can be very strict.
Mansa Musa:
Right. Okay. So now we are at the juncture now where the sentencing commission is recommending a change in the sentencing guidelines. Walk us through the changes that they’re recommending and then walk us through how everybody’s going to be affected by the variations, like the point system.
Mary Price:
Exactly. Okay. So it’s a little bit complicated, but you can think of the sentencing guidelines as a great big grid with 43 boxes this way and six boxes this way. Those boxes that go across the top are criminal history points. How many points, and there’s a system within the guidelines that says, “You’ve been or arrested fairly recently or you had three prior convictions,” or there’s a variety of lots of complicated rules, but it’ll put you somewhere in that box and as you go over on the box, your sentence gets higher and higher and higher. The recommended guideline sentence.
So with this change, the US sentencing Commission took a look at some of those criminal history rules and they decided to, going forward, lower the impact of two of them. Now those two have to do with what are called status points. So that’s when an individual is convicted of a crime while serving another sentence. So for example, being incarcerated or being on probation or being on supervised release, if any of those things happened, it used to add points going across the top to make the sentence greater. And those status points were found not to have any impact on one’s, or very little impact on one’s recidivism. In other words, adding status points. Didn’t do anything to make our community safer because it somehow kept people incarcerated longer, thus not able to re-offend.
Mansa Musa:
Right, right, right.
Mary Price:
The other proposal that the commission has is to reduce the sentences for people who have zero criminal history points.
Mansa Musa:
Right, right.
Mary Price:
Now, right now that first box going across the top, that very first one is for people who have either zero or one criminal history point. And it’s going to take that zero out essentially for a number of people, not everyone, but it is going to lessen the impact of putting you in that criminal history box.
Mansa Musa:
And what happens is, from what you explained to our audience is because you have a arbitrary system where in terms of like you were saying, “Okay, you’re giving me points to increase my sentence based on my prior and if I didn’t have a prior, but I’m going to be putting in the category of having a prior or the effect of having a prior, that’s automatically going to increase my sentence regardless of the,” and I want to get into this part of the conversation, “Regardless of what I did, regardless of what I did coming in the door, regardless of what I did at this juncture, because of this point system, because of this sentencing mechanism, everything is on the table. I was locked up, before I had priors, I’ve been in and out of the system. Therefore, regardless of what I’m doing right here, what I’m here for right now,” this sentencing mechanism going say, “It ain’t what you here for now is what you did in the past.” Am I correct?
Mary Price:
Well, it’s a combination.
Mansa Musa:
Okay, explain.
Mary Price:
Yeah, it is a combination. So your guideline for the offense that one is convicted of right now is handled on this axis. Remember I told you it goes across the screen like this with the 43 and then with the… So on this axis there’s a number of factors including sort of the nature of the crime of conviction, whether they were victims, was there a gun, was there a large amount of loss? If there’s a fraud. All kinds of things will set somewhere based on the nature of your conviction. But then you can go up or you can go down based on some of those characteristics. So you may have a mitigating factor that will reduce that sentence, but anyway, you get to that point. And so that’s the sort of current offense and then the history. If you have criminal history, that’s going to move you over and that’s going to increase your points as well, or your guideline sentence rather as well.
Mansa Musa:
Right. And I think that’s what I’m trying to get, I always understand is that on the front end, and I agree, I understand what you’re saying, that they going to take into account what the offense is. So if it’s a victimless offense, if it’s a property crime, if nobody was harmed, then I’m going to get factored in that. But then if I have a history, criminal history, regardless of what I did here, it’s going to be impacted by my criminal history.
Mary Price:
Exactly correct.
Mansa Musa:
And therein lies the problem. With these changes a person in that situation, in the situation I just described, I got a property crime, no victim, nobody was harmed. It might be a series of mitigators.
Mary Price:
That’s right.
Mansa Musa:
Under this new system, how would that play out?
Mary Price:
So if you were convicted of that crime when you were serving another sentence, and by that I mean not just if you were incarcerated, but let’s say you’re on probation, you’ve been released, released and you’re on probation and then you are convicted of this crime, they take the fact that you’re on probation and add points, they’re called status points, the status of being, convicted of something else or of serving or committing this offense while serving that probation is going to add points and they’re basically going to lower that. So right now you get two additional criminal history points which could move you over into new criminal history categories for having status points. But they are going to change that so that only people who receive seven or more criminal history points anyway without status points and who committed the incident offense while under any criminal justice sentence will only get one point as opposed to two added to the proceedings. So that’s one limitation that’s going to take some time off of people’s sentences.
Mansa Musa:
So in terms of applications, say for example, I come in and my offense, so this is for education of the public, so they understand why y’all are asking for support in this regard because some people might think, well, if you can’t do the time, don’t do the crime and therefore the time that you get for the crime, regardless of how they cut it up, is time for a crime that you committed. So in terms of what getting people to understand this, so I come in, I get locked up, I’m on five years probation, I got two years left on my probation and I get an offense. And the offense I give is, like I said, it’s a property crime, no victims, no weapon. All right, how would that play out in terms of these changes? Mary, first take it, if I don’t get a change versus if I do get a change. If you follow me on that?
Mary Price:
I do, but it’s impossible to do that calculation.
Mansa Musa:
Okay.
Mary Price:
Number one in my head. But number two, I really need to sit down and understand where the sentence is and things like that. Right now what it means is that you can have a fair amount of criminal history up to seven points and if you don’t have those seven points, then that being on status is only getting you the one. Right. But it’s hard to do the calculation of…
Mansa Musa:
Okay. Okay. I understand, I understand. And I’m really, the reason why I’m trying to get the simplification of it because I’m trying to get… I understand the system because I went through it, but I’m trying to educate our audience on understanding that the changes that you’re asking are humane changes in terms of people. You serve in time, you serve your sentence and serving your sentence or being given a sentence, give you hope on having a future in terms of getting out versus not having no hope because of prior history or bad decision making or none of the above. But the fact that you find yourself back in this space and now because of your prior history, your initial sentence is going to be augmented by a number of factors that you don’t have no control over and it’s going to create you serving, him or her serving a lot more time if these things didn’t exist. So that’s really what I was trying to get to understand. But walk us through what it is y’all trying…
Mary Price:
I just want to add one thing, I misspoke a little bit. You don’t get any status points unless you have seven criminal history points and you’ve committed the incident offense while under supervision. I mean I think the sentencing commission found that unfair. And I think that that’s what you are driving at, that this was something that was really unfair to people and it was unfairly inflating the sentence and it wasn’t helping us do anything with respect to reducing recidivism. It didn’t have any impact.
Mansa Musa:
And I think that the goal of this draconian system was to, even though misinformation or misapplication was to reduce recidivism, I think that was the goal of the sentencing mechanism to try to stop people from coming back. But that’s another conversation in itself. But tell our audience about what it is FAMM trying to get done. Explain to our audience what FAMMs trying to get done.
Mary Price:
Well, let me just go back and explain a little something. So these two changes both to status points and also first offender, that’s going to have an impact on reducing sentences for people going forward. So if the sentencing commission sent all of the amendments, all of the amendments included these criminal history amendments to Congress at the end of April as you pointed out earlier, they’re going to sit with Congress until November 1st. So there’s a waiting period and if Congress wants to change anything, it has to pass a bill in both houses and has to be signed by the president to either disapprove any of these amendments or modify them.
Now we don’t think anything’s going to happen with respect to criminal history changes that we’ve been talking about. But here’s the other thing, while we’re waiting, while the commission is waiting, it took a look and it has the statutory duty to explore whether a change that it makes that would lower a sentence going forward should be applied retroactively. So in other words, what that means is, if the sentencing commission were to declare these changes retroactive, it means that people who are currently incarcerated who meet the criteria that’s going forward, but they would meet the criteria if they were sentenced today, they get to go back to the sentencing court and ask the sentencing court to apply those changes retroactively.
Mansa Musa:
Right.
Mary Price:
And I think you mentioned some numbers earlier about just the numbers of people that would be affected by that. And that is a change that we think is super important and should be supported. And when the sentencing commission makes a change like this, it always has to do a thing called notice and comment. It has to publish the fact that it’s doing this and then it wants to do this, rather. And then it asks the public to comment on it. And what we always do at FAMM is to try and encourage everybody, people who are incarcerated, people on the outside, loved ones, everyone to comment, to tell the commission, “Yes, this is the right thing to do.”
Because they haven’t decided to do it yet. There’s a lot of considerations. Is it going to be a lot of work, going to be, is the magnitude going to be very great? Is the difference in the sentence that people are serving now and the one they’ll get after this enough to justify making it retroactive. So they’re asking all those questions and so what they want to hear from the public is thumbs up or thumbs down and why. So we sent a note around which I think you saw saying we hope that you’ll comment on this. And we sent it both to our members, loved ones on the outside, but also through our core link system, to our federally incarcerated members on the inside.
Mansa Musa:
Okay. And why, why, why? So you say if they change it, what would be the answer? What should be out people’s answer? Why should they change it?
Mary Price:
Why should they change it? Why should they make it retroactive? They’ve already decided to make it… Because, well, in my view, I think that if you determine that a system is unjust and you’re going to end that system, so for example, all this criminal history points that we’re talking about turns out to be unjust or unwarranted and we’re going to end that. There’s no reason not to go back and apply that to the people who are serving sentences that are now unjust or unwarranted. So it’s a little bit of just common sense and a little bit also of common justice.
We have looked at the experience of people who are serving these sentences or longer because of these criminal history points that we’re going to get rid of. And we’ve decided based on their experience that that’s too much and we’re going to take it out. Then it’s only the right thing to do is to go back and make sure that everybody who is sentenced under those systems gets an opportunity to make their case. It’s not a get out of jail free card, not everybody’s going to get out. The judge gets to decide on a case by case, an individualized basis, and they have to look at public safety. They have to look at all the sentencing factors before they can say, “Yes, I’m going to apply this change and lower your sentence accordingly.”
Mansa Musa:
At least I think in regards to the advocacy of the family’s advocacy, it gives the prison population mainly those sentenced under the federal prison guidelines, it give them some hope because a lot of them their sentences was enhanced by virtue of their criminal history. Their sentence was impacted by a lot of the draconian status points that they interjected. So in that regard, it give them hope. And when you got a system where it’s overcrowded as it is, its resources are not being afforded individuals in the system in terms of the ability to do some things to progress. It gives a person hope to say, “Well, okay, I can do, I can focus on getting out because I can see light at the end of the tunnel.” So I think that’s one of the things. Tell our audience going forward outside, is there anything else you we need to know going forward other than what you’re saying as far as your advocacy?
Mary Price:
Sure. The one point I want to make that the sentencing commission reveal to us is, and you will not be surprised, there is a racial disparity aspect to this history point counting as well. There’s going to be 11,500 people who would get a lower guidelines day because of status points. And of those, 43% of them are black. So it’s a big number. And then if the amendment was made retroactive, a little over 2000 people would be eligible for immediate release. And then similarly, if that zero point offender guideline was made retroactive, that would affect almost 70% of the people who were sentenced based on those zero points, who would get a lower sentence a day are Hispanic. So it never surprises me. I mean the numbers are rather large and it doesn’t entirely surprise me that this is the case, but it is also I hope some small advance for racial justice in the system as well.
Mansa Musa:
And I recall looking at a report where they talked about that the racial disparity in this mechanism and how it is and the fact that it automatically created a situation where black and brown skinned people and basically poor people in general would be heavily impacted upon by it, which automatically opened the door for the conversation of why are you using it, what’s the purpose behind it? But going forward you say, what is it that you want us to do going forward?
Mary Price:
Well, what we’d love for you to…
Mansa Musa:
People to do going forward.
Mary Price:
Right, going forward between now and June 23rd, that comment period’s going to be open. And we sent out a sample letter that people can send to the sentencing commission. You can find that at our website at www.famm.org. But I can also send you a link to publish on your show, and that just explains a little bit about this change and why it’s so important and asks people to write a letter of the commission and encourage them to make this change retroactive. So that’s the thing I hope that all of you will be able to do once you’ve finished watching the show.
Mansa Musa:
There you have it.
Mary Price:
The deadline is June 23rd.
Mansa Musa:
There you have it, the real news. June 23rd, we’re asking everyone to review this information and make a determination. If you have a family member that’s locked up in the federal system, it may make a big difference between the information they use to enhance their sentence versus that information no longer being used and you might look to have your loved one home by Christmas, by Thanksgiving or some of the more memorable opportunities. We ask that you continue to look at these things and evaluate them in the context that they’re being offered. Thank you, Mary for educating us and educating our audience on the importance of this.
Mary Price:
Thank you for having me on, and thanks for the wonderful questions and I appreciate your participation in this project.
Mansa Musa:
And we ask you to continue to support the real news and Rattling Bars. Mary Price and FAMM has been around for a long time, but you don’t hear about this individual or these groups on NBC or your major news networks. You only hear about them on the real news and you only get the opportunity to really hear the impact that when you start rattling the bars, when they come on and rattle the bars about the sentencing structure, the sentencing guidelines and the impact that’s having on mass incarceration. We are talking about dismantling the prison industrial complex. Well, it starts with one shovel at a time and here’s a shovel that’s being offered by FAMM. Thank you and continue to support rattling the bars.
Thomas, a Texas firefighter, was driving in Denton County when he was suddenly pulled over by local sheriffs. Despite being completely sober, he quickly found himself railroaded into a DUI charge by police, who claimed he appeared “slow” and “heavy footed.” Body camera footage has since revealed that the arresting officers even commented during the arrest that they did not believe Thomas was drunk. So why was Thomas arrested, and what does this reveal about the capricious nature of police power? Police Accountability Report examines the evidence.
Production: Stephen Janis, Taya Graham Post-Production: Stephen Janis, Adam Coley
Transcript
The following is a rushed transcript and may contain errors. A proofread version will be made available as soon as possible.
Taya Graham:
Hello, my name is Taya Graham, and welcome to the Police Accountability Report. As I always make clear, this show has a single purpose, holding the politically powerful institution of policing accountable. To do so, we don’t just focus on the bad behavior of individual cops. Instead, we examine the system that makes bad policing possible. Today, we will achieve that goal by showing you this video of yet another questionable DUI arrest, a video that catches officers in shocking unguarded moments, making admissions about the whole process of DUI arrests that raises troubling questions about what aspect of public safety they’re actually intended to address.
But before we get started, I want you watching to know that if you have video evidence of police misconduct or brutality, please share it with us and we might be able to investigate for you. You can email us tips privately at PAR@TheRealNews.com and share your evidence. You can also message us at Police Accountability Report on Facebook or Instagram, or @EyesonPolice on Twitter. Of course, you can always message me directly @TayasBaltimore on Twitter and Facebook. Please share, like, and comment. It really can help our guests, and it helps us get the word out. And as you know, I really do read your comments and appreciate them. We have a Patreon to donate for Accountability Reports. So, if this type of work is important to you, please help us keep doing it.
Okay, now we’ve gotten all that out of the way. We all know that drunk driving or driving while impaired is a serious and consequential crime. In 2021, roughly 13,000 people died as a result of motorists operating under the influence. As a result of this tragic toll, authorities have passed laws that have profound consequences for people who are charged with it. They’ve also rolled out federal grants to incentivize catching DUIs that encourages officers to rack up arrests and thwart people who insist on driving under the influence. All of this is allocable, and certainly no one disagrees with the underlying goal, public safety. Just like any power conferred upon the government, it also requires vigilance to make sure it is not abused. The DUI arrest we will show you today reveals just how important that task is.
The story starts in Lakewood Village in Denton County, Texas in April 2021. There, a lifelong firefighter, Thomas, he does not want us to use his last name, was driving home from work. That’s when police started following him and eventually pulled him over. From the outset, even though he had not exhibited any conceivable type of erratic driving. The officer began questioning him about being impaired for reasons, that at that moment remained unclear. Let’s watch.
Male Officer:
How much you had to drink today? What have you taken today? You taken prescription, narcotics, or anything like that? No? Okay. Are you prescribed anything?
Thomas:
Actually, I’m prescribed Adderall with medication.
Male Officer:
Okay. What time you took that?
Thomas:
I think it was today earlier [inaudible 00:03:18].
Male Officer:
[inaudible 00:03:18] at work? What time did you work today?
Thomas:
From 7:00 to 3:00.
Male Officer:
Okay. 7:00 to 3:00? Where at?
Thomas:
Downtown Dallas. I work for the fire department. Right now, I’m on light duty.
Male Officer:
Okay. Okay.
Thomas:
For my eye, I had a detached retina a few years ago, and then I had five surgeries since then. It’s now starting to plow down [inaudible 00:03:47].
Male Officer:
Okay.
Thomas:
Anyway, they won’t let me work in the field.
Male Officer:
I gotcha.
That’s a better excuse for his eye. He’s still acting kind of odd. You think he’s normal, or do you think he’s just-
Female Officer:
He’s lethargic.
Male Officer:
Lethargic, mm-hmm.
Female Officer:
Slow-moving. Slow-talking.
Male Officer:
Very. Do you think he possibly could be intoxicated?
Female Officer:
Maybe.
Male Officer:
You want to run him through FSFTs?
Female Officer:
I can.
Male Officer:
Even if he has only good eye, we can in theory still do HGN on him.
Female Officer:
Tell him to cover up his bad eye?
Male Officer:
We’re going to let him run with it open-
Female Officer:
Okay.
Male Officer:
… because even to do HGN, you work the good eye out, you’re still going to see signs of that.
Female Officer:
Okay.
Male Officer:
He mentioned Adderall. Adderall’s a stimulant. So, we may not see HGN on a stimulant. We should see a lot of other stuff.
Female Officer:
He’s acting so lethargic. You think it’s…
Male Officer:
From the indications of a stimulant? He’s very rigid.
Female Officer:
Yeah.
Male Officer:
Like very weird. A lot of body movement, almost like he sort of moved everything out of his wallet and just kind of maneuver in general. Go ahead and pull him out. We’ll just talk to him outside of the car for a little bit. He told us he’s on light duty because of his eye. Everything else should be fine. We’ll see what comes of that.
Female Officer:
Okay.
Male Officer:
Go get him then.
Taya Graham:
Now, in the sworn affidavit, the officer said Thomas had been speeding, which Thomas denies. But he also made a somewhat curious claim about Thomas’s behavior, which is odd to say the least. He wrote that Thomas appeared “slow” when he handed over his ID. He also noted that he made exaggerated movements while he responded to the officer’s demand. It’s a somewhat puzzling take on Thomas’s behavior because the video tells a different story. Take a look and decide for yourself.
Thomas:
No, my right eye. It’s your left.
Female Officer:
Yeah, my left. Yeah, your right.
Male Officer:
What happened to your eye again? I only caught part of that.
Thomas:
I had a detached retina, and then the subsequent surgeries have led to… Its kind of got a blue haze around there. And so, it’s just hard to see through this eye. Sometimes it gets kind of irritated and it turns red. I don’t know if it is now, but-
Male Officer:
It looks a little tender right now.
Female Officer:
Yeah.
Thomas:
Is it really? This one is-
Male Officer:
It’s clear.
Thomas:
… clear, okay. Yeah, so.
Male Officer:
Well, when’s the last time you said you took your medication today?
Thomas:
Like 3:00, 2:00-
Male Officer:
About 3:00 today?
Thomas:
2:00 or something, 1:00.
Male Officer:
I just wanted to ensure you’re safe to operate a vehicle, just giving kind of the [inaudible 00:06:29] so far. I just want to make sure you’re safe to operate your truck. We’re run you through just a few standardized field tests, and we’ll kind of go from there.
Taya Graham:
This, at the very least, questionable rendering of Thomas’s actions led to what’s known as a field sobriety test. This test was to say the least a bit surreal, a series of instructions that seemed at once contradictory, and at the same time hard to understand what exactly they were intended to prove. Just a note before we watch, Texas has several tests as part of the field sobriety assessment that you will see during this video. They are as follows, a leg turn test where the person has to walk in a straight line, heel-to-toe, turn, and walk back. The one leg stand test, where you raise one foot and stand in place for 30 seconds. And, the modified Rhomberg balance test, which requires the subject to bend their neck, close their eyes, and count to 30. Finally, the finger-to-nose test, which is self-explanatory. Take a look.
Female Officer:
All right, look at the tip of the pen. Don’t move your head. You’re just going to look at the pen. The next test, stand over here in the grass real quick. Imagine there is an inch-long line right here in front of you. One foot on the line. You put your right foot right in front of your left foot, with her heels touching your toes. Your arms down by your side. You’re going to take nine heel-to-toe steps forward.
Thomas:
I did.
Female Officer:
All right, look down.
Thomas:
It’s sloppy isn’t it?
Female Officer:
You said your legs feel weak?
Thomas:
Yeah.
Female Officer:
Okay, we probably got one more test for you okay? Arms down by your side. You’re going to keep your arms just like that. In excess, you’re going to raise one foot, either one, approximately six inches above the ground with your foot parallel to the ground.
Thomas:
Okay. One thousand one. One thousand two. One thousand three. One thousand four. One thousand 15, 16.
Female Officer:
Okay, you’re good.
Male Officer:
I just have maybe one or two more I’d like you to run through real quick.
Thomas:
Are you going to tell me when 30 seconds are-
Male Officer:
No, you’re going to tell me when 30 seconds is up.
Thomas:
Okay.
Male Officer:
To the best of your knowledge. Do you understand that? Okay. How long was that?
Thomas:
30 seconds or so.
Male Officer:
36. Pretty close. When I tell you, I’m going to pick a hand. I’m going to say, “Right.” You’re going to bring your right finger up and touch the tip of your finger to the tip of your nose. Right. Left. Right. Left. Left. And right. Go on and have a seat for me right there on the bed of your truck for a second.
Taya Graham:
Now I want you to think about what you just witnessed. Not just how Thomas performed, but how bizarre and counterintuitive the test was. Even more important, the conclusions the officers reached based upon Thomas responded. I’ll read them as you watch what unfolds on the screen. “Thomas was heavy-footed as he walked,” the officer wrote. “During the walk-and-turn, Thomas’s actions were exaggerated and he forgot instructions. During the hand-to-nose, Thomas used the pad of his finger.” And so, as you can see, this process led to officers being able to charge Thomas with a DUI, but not before having a very revealing conversation captured on body camera that calls the entire series of events we’ve just witnessed into question, an admission that these officers probably never thought would see the light of day. But we are going to show you now. Just watch.
Female Officer:
Miscounting steps. Turned wrong. Stopped on walking. Used arms.
Male Officer:
He stepped out of position briefly during the [inaudible 00:10:07] phase. On the Rhomberg, I was to estimate 30 seconds to kind of see where the clock’s at. He came in at 36 seconds, which is right on the edge of the window of error. The error is 25 to 35. I told him to close his eyes, watching it. His eyes were flooding like crazy, and his body’s super rigid. He does have a messed up eye. He’s been on light duty. He has a detached retina. I asked him, I’m like, “What else besides your eye hurts? Anything else?” “No, just fine.” I gave him every opportunity to explain to me legs not working right, arms not working right. He came out of the truck looking good, walking pretty decent. A little heavy-footed, but he wasn’t stumbling out. Do you believe he’s intoxicated?
Female Officer:
I believe he’s unable to drive from whatever he has. I don’t know the alcohol-
Male Officer:
That a medical emergency? Or are we talking about intoxication?
Female Officer:
Intoxicated on something, but I don’t think alcohol.
Male Officer:
Do you think we have a medical emergency here?
Female Officer:
No.
Male Officer:
No, so this is not a medical emergency. Is he normal or do you believe he’s possibly intoxicated under something?
Female Officer:
Yeah, I think he’s intoxicated on something.
Male Officer:
Okay, we’ll try to get [inaudible 00:11:02]. I don’t think it’s alcohol. I don’t see any signs of alcohol. I see some signs of a narcotic that he admitted to. So, we’re going to go that route. There’s also the dog in the car. We’re going to have to [inaudible 00:11:12].
Female Officer:
[inaudible 00:11:12] or just go?
Male Officer:
We’ll cross that bridge [inaudible 00:11:17]. Let’s first get him taken care of, and then we’ll address everything else.
Taya Graham:
That’s right, even though the officers wrote a statement of probable cause that Thomas was guilty of driving under the influence, they admitted on camera, on camera no less, that he was not drunk. The only substance in his system they suspected was a legally prescribed non-narcotic adult deficit attention disorder medication known as Adderall. For that, without an apparently legally sufficient justification, Thomas was arrested.
Female Officer:
[inaudible 00:11:48].
Male Officer:
Our decision’s made.
Female Officer:
So go up and tell him, “More tests. Put your hands behind your back?”
Male Officer:
Go that route if you’d like to. Or you can tell him point-blank… I’ve done it both ways depending on whether they’re engaging. If they’re [inaudible 00:11:56] compliant, I’ll tell them “Hey, be advised that you’re placed under arrested [inaudible 00:11:59].” If I don’t believe that’s going to work, I’ll play the tricker. I’ll be “One more test. Turn around for me,” and that’s what I’ll do. I gave the guy that wanted to do that. I think we can go that direction with him.
Female Officer:
Sir, we are putting you under arrest for driving while intoxicated. We believe that you’re unsafe to drive. Stand up. Put your hands behind your back.
Male Officer:
Turn around.
Female Officer:
Turn around.
Male Officer:
Do you have anybody at home who could come up here and pick up your dog and possibly your truck?
Thomas:
No.
Male Officer:
No one at home?
Thomas:
Nope.
Male Officer:
Okay.
Female Officer:
Do you have a friend that could get your dog?
Thomas:
I don’t know.
Female Officer:
Can’t think of anybody?
Thomas:
No, I’d have to make some phone calls.
Male Officer:
All right, like I said, if you’re willing to give me somebody to call, a person I can call myself, if not, I’m going to have to call my Animal Control officer and they’re going to pick up your dog, and they’re going to put him in our shelter for the night. I’m trying to avoid that option.
Thomas:
I haven’t had a drink in over 30 years.
Male Officer:
I didn’t say you were drinking, sir.
Thomas:
I haven’t had a drug in over 30 years. Where’s the Animal Control?
Male Officer:
He works for my agency. I’ll have to call him to come over with me.
Thomas:
Where is he?
Male Officer:
It’s just in Denton. About five minutes from our jail.
Taya Graham:
But even this highly questionable arrest was not the end of Thomas’s ordeal. That’s because the police, after admitting he was not drunk, filed a complaint against him at his job, which I’m showing on the screen now. That complaint led to an Internal Affairs investigation which then prompted his employer, a local fire department, to let him go. That’s not all the problems with this arrest, because we have been investigating and digging deeper into both the department and the county where it occurred. What we have uncovered is that there was more behind-the-scenes driving police to make this arrest than is readily apparent. That evidence shows just how far astray American policing can be from it’s overarching goal to keep us safe.
So soon, we will be talking to Thomas about what he has endured since his arrest and how it has changed his life. But first, I’m joined by my reporting partner, Stephen Janis, whose been reaching out to police and as already mentioned, investigating the motive that may have been driving police to charge Thomas. Stephen, thank you so much for joining me.
Stephen Janis:
Taya, thanks for having me. I appreciate it.
Taya Graham:
Stephen, before we get into the behind-the-scenes maneuvering regarding this case, I want to do something kind of different. I want to administer a field sobriety test to you, just to make a point of how tricky these tests actually are, and show that even in less stressful circumstances they can be difficult to pass.
Stephen Janis:
What? No.
Taya Graham:
Okay, you have two choices. Do the test, or stay outside.
Stephen Janis:
You know what, Taya, I haven’t had anything to drink, but still, I don’t want to do a test.
Taya Graham:
All night.
Stephen Janis:
Fair enough.
Taya Graham:
But first, have you had anything to drink?
Stephen Janis:
No. No, I haven’t anything to drink. No. Taya, nope I have drank a freaking thing.
Taya Graham:
Now first, I want you to walk in a straight line by pacing one foot in front of the other, heel-to-toe, then turn around and walk back with your hands at your sides.
Okay, not too good. Let’s try balancing on one foot for 30 seconds and don’t use your hands.
Not too good, Stephen. Last chance. Touch your hand to your nose with your eyes close, left then right, then right then left.
All right, that’s not bad. One out of three. Unfortunately, despite your claims to the contrary, I’m going to have to refer you to the nearest law enforcement agency for reporting while intoxicated.
Stephen Janis:
You know what, I spend so much time outside, I don’t care. Refer me to anyone who will give me a place to sleep for the night. So, fine.
Taya Graham:
But we’ll put that on hold for a moment. So, you’ve been looking into the Denton Sheriff’s Department and their DUI program. What have you found?
Stephen Janis:
As you can see what I’m showing you on the screen now, Denton incentivizes DUI. They have this whole program. One of the major parts of it that we found was that they actually incentivize officers to make arrests. They have a small section where they say they want to give them awards. So clearly, Denton has some incentivization of DUI arrests that’s in black and white, and you can see it right there.
Taya Graham:
Did the Denton Sheriff have any comment about this arrest, and why Thomas was charged? What was it that you dug up in Denton County that might explain why police were so aggressive?
Stephen Janis:
I sent an email to the prosecutor, because that was my main concern, why did they even continue with this case when there was no sign of alcohol and the officers admitted on body camera they should have dropped it right away? What I did find is very interesting. Number one, Denton takes in about $2 million in fines from traffic arrests, traffic enforcement. One thing I found in their budget that’s really interesting, they said “Fines are a very important source of revenue.” So, just do the math. You have one thing in their sort of police procedure book that says, “Hey, we need to incentivize arrests.” You have something in the budget that says, “We need fines.” Put two and two together, you add it up, you get really crazy enforcement like I think we saw in this body camera footage. That perhaps explains why they did what they did.
Taya Graham:
And now, I’m joined by the man who was the subject of the unrelenting scrutiny of the Denton County Sheriffs to discuss how the arrest has impacted his life, and the status of the case going forward. Thomas, thank you so much for joining me.
Thomas:
Thank you, Taya. I love your program.
Taya Graham:
Thank you, Thomas. I really appreciate that. First, you mentioned something to me that could not be seen on the dash camera footage. How did the officers initially follow and approach you?
Thomas:
I’m coming up over a bridge and once I kind of reached the top and come over the top, I noticed there’s a car sticking in the lane. The front of this vehicle is sitting in the lane. When I work as a fireman, once you see that you assume it’s a wreck. We look for wrecks all the time. You get called out and you see cars all turned around, facing the wrong way on the freeway. That’s what it reminded me of. And so I just kind of tapped my brakes and slowed down, but I continued on and that’s when I noticed ah, it’s a police car. They just sat there. They didn’t move.
As soon as I passed them, I could see them real aggressively spin around, because they were facing me where I passed them. They do a U-turn and come right up on on me real close. And so I thought wow, they’re going to pull me over. Well, he didn’t pull me over. He was just following me. When he hits his lights, I pull over. I’m ready to be pulled over because they’re still behind me. Now he’s not right up on me like he was at the beginning, but it almost felt like he was trying to get me to do something, or scare me, or something.
Taya Graham:
When the officers pulled you over, what did they say was the reason?
Thomas:
All they said was, they asked me for my identification, driver’s license, and my insurance or whatever. While I’m getting that she said, “Do you know fast you were going?” Or she said, “Do you know the speed limit?” I said, “I think it’s 50. Is that right?” She goes, “Yeah, it’s 50.” I said, “Well how fast was I going?” She goes, “You were going a little faster than that.” I’m thinking okay, a little faster than that. I’m thinking, well are they going to give me a ticket for going a little faster than that? What is happening? Five miles an hour over the speed limit or something like that? Now, what I was thinking at the time was a little over the speed limit. That’s it. How this would turn into an arrest, I’m just thinking this is… Blew me away.
Taya Graham:
Okay, so the officers asked you to pull over to a second location, and you were polite and compliant while the officers asked you very personal questions. Did you have any idea of what was going to happen next?
Thomas:
When he said that I look really lethargic and sunked, and all that, just from when I handed him my driver’s license, that was only about 30 seconds, maybe a minute. That’s how it was started. Then when the second time they told me, he starts asking about medications and medical history, and all this stuff. I’m thinking, I know the HIPAA laws for privacy. At the same time, I’m thinking, well I understand they’re police officers. If someone’s a diabetic or something, they’re going into a coma, and I’ve seen this happen where they’re on the freeway and literally one time a car turned around on the freeway going the opposite way. I get it.
This was a diabetic who was going through that, and had lost their consciousness more or less, but was able to still drive the car. Ended up crashing and we got her out of the car or whatever. But, I get it. I just went ahead and answered those personal medical questions, but before that even happened I was offering to them, because of my eye, I had this issue where it’s blue now. I don’t know if you can see it, but there’s a blue haze over it. If you ever looked at my mugshot, you can see that that is significant enough that you can’t even see my pupil very well. You would have to look real hard. You’d at least have to a pen light and shine it in there to see my pupil. If you were looking for a reaction.
Well, they never did check my pupils. They checked my gaze. They’re looking for the horizontal gaze. That’s not checking pupils. Pupils, you’re going to check for a reaction. Kind of why I said more than I should have, because looking back now I shouldn’t even have opened my mouth. I should have just told them “I don’t talk to police.”
Taya Graham:
Now, I apologize for having to bring this up, but you have two health conditions that could affect your responses on the DUI test. You’re hard of hearing in one ear, and you have a detached retina in one eye. How do you think that impacted your reactions to the field sobriety tests? And how do you think this impacted the officers’ response to you?
Thomas:
He brings it up that I talk extremely slow. He said it quite a few times in the body cam footage. I’m thinking, I can’t even understand this guy. I checked just one small clip, he said seven words in one second. They were all like [inaudible 00:23:37]. As I was watching on the replay, I’m thinking yeah, I don’t talk that fast, but I’m not sure I talk that slowly either. But he kept bringing that up. The thing is about me hearing them, that affected it too.
It also, because it’s a neuroma, it’s a tumor actually, so it affects your balance as well. I haven’t had really issues with it, but watching the replay on the video… That’s why I was so surprised. I can’t do this because I was flopping around trying to balance on one leg. Now, I did it, but I was having to balance like I’m on a high wire or something. Anyway, the point is, is that yes, my hearing affected me understanding him, and he’s picking up every little detail. He’s looking for anything. If I asked him or repeat something, he turned that into kind of like “There’s something wrong with him.” Be that as it may, it’s clear to me. They wanted a DWI from the word go.
Taya Graham:
So you complied with the field sobriety test. Were you surprised to discover how stringently they were judging you? Were you surprised by their comments?
Thomas:
I wasn’t surprised what she said because she’s doing this for the first time. But if she saw a drunk person doing these tests, she might have a different viewpoint of the whole thing. I am stone-cold sober, and I’m actually very agile. So, I don’t know if my hearing or my ear was better… I had that tumor treated, and I don’t think it’s gotten worse, but my balance was off. Yeah, I can pick out stuff, but he had her looking every little thing. It was just sudden. I was not prepared for it. In your mind, you think this easy, but when you’re doing it, it’s a little different. I probably should practice my DWI field sobriety tests every time I leave the house because if that’s what determines if I’m intoxicated or not, if they send my blood to Austin, Texas and it takes over 10 years to get back the results, then they’re going to charge me and convict me if they want. The fact that he keeps calling this… The medication he keeps calling it, a prescription narcotic, it is not a narcotic.
Taya Graham:
How long were you in jail, and what was your experience like? What were the exact charges?
Thomas:
I was charged with DWI. I got to the jail probably… I think the video started about 6:00 PM. I got to the jail about 7:00 PM. I was there until 3:30 in the afternoon the next day. I had to go to an arraignment and make my plea. I had no access to a lawyer. I had no access to a phone. I couldn’t call anyone. Which surprised me. Not only that, but I was on my way home to get something to eat when this started, and so I was already hungry. Then we get this little sandwich thing, two pieces of white bread and a piece of bologna at about 11:00. So, I hadn’t eaten since 7:00 in the morning or something. And then we got another one at about 4:00 in the morning, the same thing, two pieces of white bread and a piece of bologna. They’re already punishing you for nothing. They made up their mind before they pull you over, or the initial stop that they’re going to take you in. Don’t you need more evidence than just somebody looks lethargic?
Taya Graham:
Despite the difficulty in being arrested, separated from your pet, and having them taken to Animal Control, there were other consequences. You almost missed your father’s funeral because of this. And it cost you your job, and impacted your finances, right?
Thomas:
I had already been on light duty because of my eye. I would need a cornea transplant to get my eye fixed. The fire department only gives you so long to be on light duty before they turn you loose and no more pay. If they have another job, I believe they’re obligated to you offer you another job. So, they sent me to go work in Communications as a dispatcher. I was in training to become a dispatcher at the time. Because of the DWI, I was no longer allowed on the floor of the dispatch center. Because I was no longer allowed on the floor of the dispatch center, they ended up giving me a letter “You can retire now or go work in another department in the city,” or by then I already knew that once I’d been charged, I go to tell someone, “You wouldn’t believe what happened. I got charged with a DWI. I don’t even drink. I haven’t in 33 years.” I never heard of someone getting a DWI that doesn’t even drink.
Taya Graham:
You mentioned something to me that stood out, because it’s an impact that isn’t measured. That is, people often aren’t believed when they say that they are innocent, and that being charged and arrested can be very isolating. Can you talk about that?
Thomas:
People start distancing themselves from you a little bit. I’ve got friends that didn’t care, but at the same time, that was my family. The whole fire department, it’s a big department and it’s a good department. We’ve got some incredible people working there, and I had some really close friends that were like family. So, leaving was, although I had 30 years already, leaving was going to be difficult. I knew it. But leaving like that was kind of… It wasn’t really what I had hoped for.
Taya Graham:
Because of the legal entanglement, you almost missed saying goodbye to your father before he died.
Thomas:
The issue with my father was, when he passed away, just before he passed away, I had to call my bail bonds people. If you leave the county you’re supposed to call them. I called them and they seemed kind of resistant to me leaving. I had to just tell them, “I’m going anyway.” You could hear them on the phone, kind of in the background going “Whoa.” You know, they could have theoretically arrested me for doing that without their permission. This is happening before he died. My sister called me up and said, “Dad’s passing away. He might not make it until tomorrow.” So I’m trying to throw everything together and go, and I had to call the bail bonds people, and they’re going to resist? Come on. I hadn’t done anything, but I haven’t been convicted either. So it’s like you’re already convicting me. You’re treating me like I’m a criminal already.
Taya Graham:
You told me you were worried about your dog. In the video, you can even hear the dog whimpering as police take you away. How much did this ordeal cost you? It cost you your job, but there were out-of-pocket costs, right?
Thomas:
First of all, the bail. Check this out, they say “Well, we need to get to your credit card to pay the bail.” There’s a phone on the wall and there’s a list of bail bond agencies, and the phone only goes to them. You couldn’t call anyone else except collect. Sign a release, and they take my credit. Well, they took the cash out of my wallet. I had $80.00 in my wallet. They gave me a debit card. Come to find out, there’s no money on it at all. Instead of giving me the $80.00 cash back, they gave me the debit card. There’s no money on it. It has no value. I had no access to a phone.
The next morning, I wanted to call my employer. The employer at their jail should have access to right there through a main line of some kind called a dispatch center in Dallas and tell them, “Hey Tom’s up in jail in Denton,” just to let them know. Because I’m supposed to be at work now. I pay bail for $1,000.00. They took it off my credit card. That was the first one. Then I went to get a lawyer. I asked random, “What do you do when this happens?” And the lawyer cost me $3,300.00. Then to get my truck back the next day, to get my truck it cost $470.00. For one night overnight. Then I had to get my dog, which cost me… He had to stay in the pound for two nights because I couldn’t get him out in time. I had heard horror stories in the past, so I’m thinking they’re going to see him, he looks ferocious, and they’re going to strangle him with one of those ropes or something.
The way that deputy was acting, there’s no telling… To me, I’m thinking there’s no telling this guy has no conscious, because he’s just deliberately ruining my life. For nothing.
Taya Graham:
I have quite a bit to say about the arrest of Thomas, little of it having to do with the usual complaints about law enforcement that seem to, in my opinion, limit the debate over the broader structural issues that prompts the type of arrests we have witnessed in this story. As I’ve said before, our fixation on the particulars of law enforcement, i.e. bad cops and bad arrests, often limits our ability to critique the justifications that empower them. What do I mean? Well, let’s drill down into the details. Not of the arrest itself, but the actual paperwork used to facilitate it. What I mean is, let’s take a look at some of the details of how cops are enabled to make these kinds of arrests that at least on the surface seem hard to justify.
As we do, I want you to hold a question in your head that hopefully when I’m done you’ll be able to answer. That question is simply, why are cops empowered with making arrests by just using adjectives? In other words, since when did we bestow the right to put us in a cage solely based on their subjective interpretation of our behavior? I mean, how many times have we had police apologists say, when confronted with police brutality that, “Cops aren’t social workers, and police aren’t worried about your feelings. They enforce the law.” It said simple, “You either broke it or you didn’t.” Well, apparently based on the form used to turn Thomas into a criminal, cops are actually very perceptive clinical psychologists. I wish I were kidding, but I am not. Just take a look at the form given to Denton Police to assess a DUI that I am showing you on the screen now. It lists, and I’m not kidding, a series of adjectival descriptions to justify charging a motorist with a DUI.
I just want you to ponder this for a second. The flexibility this list provides cops who want to make an arrest and contrast it with the harsh consequences is apparently literary description can impose. Let’s start with clothing. Is it torn, stained, or disorderly? You’re drunk. Or how about your attitude? Yes, your attitude. Are you cocky, indifferent, or apologetic? You clearly shouldn’t be driving. Or is your speech thick-tongued? I’m not even going to touch that one. Or slow? Again, are charges justified? Just remember, never drive with droopy or watery eyes because that’s apparently a crime too. My point is these descriptors are not meant to evaluate a person’s condition. They are so utterly subjective. They’re more like a tool to justify an officer’s desire to make an arrest. I mean, if you look at the document it looks more like a fictive or ChatGPT writing prompt than an objective assessment of someone’s ability to drive. It’s a random list of enforcement adjectives, for lack of a better phrase, intended to give cops the illusory pretext for racking up arrests and earning those rewards Stephen was talking about earlier.
Now, this criteria is even more suspect given the technical tools police have at their disposal to determine if someone is drunk. I mean, don’t we have blood tests and breathalyzers to figure out if someone is drunk? Can’t we find a way to utilize this same technology to more objectively assess a person’s ability to drive, especially considering the consequences if they’re charged? Well, I think what we have here is a manifestation of the cultural power conferred to policing that in some ways is much more insidious than the already-consequential ability to arrest and imprison us. An excessive amount of social capital bestowed upon cops makes a questionable form we showed you before not only possible, but in some ways inevitable.
So, what do I mean? Well there’s actually a cultural theory that explains this phenomena. It generally applies to advantages of being rich and powerful. I think it merits application to this question as well. It’s called the “Hierarchy of Credibility”. It was a concept proffered by sociologist, Howard Becker, in an attempt to explain a thorny question, who gets to set the narrative or define the truth about the present conditions in which we live? Whose interpretation of current events is used to set the agenda for policy decisions that affect millions of lives? Becker said that the richer and more powerful person, the more likely their interpretation of current events would be believed and accepted. This process, he argued, led to the perpetuation of the injustice and inequality we see today, where a working class person can toil their entire lives, pay taxes, follow the law, and still end up broke, bankrupt, and homeless just because they got sick.
I think it also applies to policing because how can you justify destroying a man’s life over a baseless allegation, other than by acknowledging that the Hierarchy of Credibility applies to police as well? How can you use such scant evidence to force a man into a cage, out of a job, and into a world where he cannot be hired and will forever be branded a criminal, unless you’ve been bestowed the immeasurable power of cops to brand us unworthy of fairness and justice? I can prove to you just how potent the police version of the Hierarchy of Credibility is. I have the receipts, so to speak, to show you just how this works. To do so, I want to share with you a piece about a very sketchy fundraising scheme that was the subject of a New York Times investigation. You might even be familiar with it because it’s primarily facilitated by robocalls.
These calls are made to millions of people every day. During the call, a person whose actually a pre-recorded voice solicits funds from groups with names like The American Police Officers Alliance. The voice asks a person who answered to consider donating to support law enforcement. The pitch is, support cops because they deserve it. Now, the New York Times investigation found that these robocalls raised roughly $89 million over a seven-year period. They also found that the organizations that ran them spent almost nothing on funding the politicians who support policing over the years the fundraisers were the most active. In fact, almost all the money raised was spent on, you guessed it, more fundraising. Oh, and by the way, the Times investigation also found that the organizations that purported to support cops paid hefty fees to political consultants, totalling millions of dollars.
So, we have a fictitious charity making questionable claims able to raise tens or millions of dollars, all while doing nothing to support it’s purported cause, a scheme that led thousands of people to donate multiple times without a single iota of proof that the organization had done anything to work on behalf of law enforcement itself. Which brings us back to the concept of this so-called Hierarchy of Credibility, because let’s remember, the ruse used to extract money from the unsuspecting donors was simply to invoke the name “police”. All they had to do was say the word “cop”, and people parted with their money apparently no questions asked, which shows how police fit into the pyramid of credibility because there are few institutions that can prompt you or I to simply turn over cash without explanation. There are even fewer professions so to speak that can literally open your wallet without having to provide anything tangible in exchange.
I think what this example points out is the crucial role police play in reinforcing the Hierarchy of Credibility for the powers that be, and why disseminating copaganda in our media and culture is a vital part of that process, and that by making arrests like what we just witnessed, the police become enforcers who impose essentially a sociology of silence on the working class. That is, through fake arrests, false charges, extortion-level fees and fines, and other impediments police make our stories theirs. They construct a narrative so to speak where our police for justice for equity are sullied by false charges and bogus arrests. It’s really an insidious calculus, a method to the madness that enables our system of growing income and wealth inequality to flourish unchecked. It’s essentially the scaffolding of our structural divide between the ultra-rich and the rest of us buttress by bad policing.
In a way, police in this capacity amplify the voices of the most powerful, and they do so by telling a tale of us, the people who act indifferent, whose clothes are stained, and whose eyes are watery. If that is the basis to convict us and take our freedom, and sully our future, then we must battle the system that makes it possible. Certainly, on this show, we will continue the fight to do so. I’d like to thank my guest Thomas for joining us, and for sharing his experience with us. Thank you, Thomas. Of course, I have to thank Intrepid Reporter, Stephen Janis, for his writing, research, and editing on this piece. Thank you, Stephen.
Stephen Janis:
Taya, thanks for having me. I really appreciate it.
Taya Graham:
And I want to thank friend of the show, Nole Dee and Modley CR for their support. Thank you both so much. A very special thanks to our Patreons. We appreciate you. I look forward to thanking each and every one of you personally in our next livestream, especially Patreon Associate Producers John ER, David K, Louie P, and super friends, Shane Bushtup, Pineapple Girl, Chris R Matter Writes, and Angela True. I want you watching to know that if you have video evidence of police misconduct or brutality, please share it with us and we might be able to investigate for you. Please reach out to us. You can email us tips privately at PAR@TheRealNews.com and share your evidence of police misconduct.
You can also message us at Police Accountability Report on Facebook or Instagram, or @EyesonPolice on Twitter. Of course, you can always message me directly at @TayasBaltimore on Twitter and Facebook. Please like and comment. You know I read your comments, and that I appreciate them. We do have a Patreon link pinned in the comments below for Accountability Reports, so if you feel inspired to donate, please do. We don’t run ads or take corporate dollars, so anything you can spare is truly appreciated. My name is Taya Graham, and I am your host of the Police Accountability Report. Please, be safe out there.
The movement to Stop Cop City in Atlanta has brought environmental defenders and police abolitionists together to fight a mega-project that would demolish the historic Weelaunee Forest to create a massive urban warfare training facility. For standing up for people and the planet, more than 40 Cop City activists have been struck with domestic terrorism charges. Will Potter, author of Green Is the New Red, joins The Chris Hedges Report to place the repression of Cop City activists in a longer history of labeling environmental activists as ‘domestic terrorists.’
Will Potter is an investigative journalist whose work has focused on social justice and environmental movements, and attacks on civil rights post-9/11. He is the author of Green Is the New Red, among other books.
Studio Production: Adam Coley, Dwayne Gladden Post-Production: Adam Coley Audio Post-Production: Tommy Harron
Transcript
The following is a rushed transcript and may contain errors. A proofread version will be made available as soon as possible.
Speaker 1:
(singing)
Chris Hedges:
When police in Atlanta stormed a music festival in March being held by activists protesting Cop City, the proposed $90 million police and firefighter training center that would be built on forest land, 23 of the activists were arrested and one, Tortuguita, a 26-year-old Indigenous environmental activist and community organizer was shot and killed. Those who were arrested were accused of carrying out acts of vandalism and arson at a Cop City construction site over a mile from the music festival under George’s domestic terror statute, although none of the arrest warrants tie any of the defendants directly to any illegal acts.
Cop City is yet another complex designed by the corporate state to train police in urban warfare. The plans include military-grade training facilities, a mock city to practice urban warfare, explosives, testing areas, dozens of shooting ranges, and a Black Hawk helicopter landing pad. “It is a war base where police will learn military-like maneuvers to kill Black people and control our bodies and movements,” Kwame Olufemi of Community Movement Builders points out. “The facility includes shooting ranges, plans for bomb testing, and will practice tear gas deployment. They are practicing how to make sure poor and working class people stay in line so when the police kill us in the streets again like they did to Rashard Brooks in 2020, they can control our protests and community response to how they continually murder our people,” he said.
But just as ominous as the militarization of domestic police forces and training complexes to turn police into internal armies of occupation is the use of terrorism laws to charge and imprison activists, protestors and dissidents. Former Chicago Tribune reporter Will Potter, in his book, Green is the New Red, documents how terrorism laws are used to crush dissent, especially dissent carried out by animal rights and environmental activists. He likens the campaign to McCarthyism in the 1950s and warns that we are on the cusp of cementing into place a police state.
Potter, who became a vegan when he was a student at the University of Texas, participated in a canvassing campaign organized by a group called Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty while working at the Tribune. The goal was to close down the laboratory of Huntingdon Life Sciences, which still uses animals for testing. The organizers were arrested for trespassing, and then Potter got a firsthand look at what was happening to civil liberties in the United States. Two FBI agents appeared at Potter’s apartment demanding information about the group. If he refused to cooperate, he was told his name would be included on the domestic terrorist list. Potter would eventually leave the paper to report on the government’s intimidation of activists, including nonviolent activists who spoke out against the corporate state and the seizure of political and economic power by the 1%. Joining me to discuss the Orwellian world being erected around us is Will Potter.
You open the book in the Chicago Tribune newsroom. We both come out of the newspaper industry. I think we both worked at one point in the Dallas Morning News, and there’s a story, you’re sent out to cover the killing of a child. And I think for those who don’t come out of that environment, they don’t understand the cynicism, maybe even numbness that takes place in those newsrooms and how difficult that is if you actually care. I mean, I always say there’s two types of reporters, the ones who care and the ones who don’t. That’s the real divide in a newsroom. It’s not politics. But let’s just open with that since we both come from that environment.
Will Potter:
Yeah, I think that’s a great observation. I mean, it’s something that journalists, we rarely ever talk about. That kind of environment is one in which in order to survive just the onslaught of daily news and blood and guts and violence and kind of despair that comes with it, you have to really get a hardened shell. And I think that’s kind of fetishized a little bit in journalism. We embrace that machismo and just kind of push full steam ahead without acknowledging trauma and acknowledging some of these things that we encounter. And that’s certainly an environment I felt I encountered at multiple newspapers. Like you said, I think like a lot of people, you go into news with ideas about making a difference in the world, educating the public, allowing and creating an environment for change and social change to happen. But it can be quite crushing and cynical, as well.
Chris Hedges:
Well, those news organizations will beat that out of you if you let them.
Will Potter:
Very quickly.
Chris Hedges:
Very quickly. Exactly. Let’s talk about the Huntingdon Labs. You were just handing out leaflets, I think, or something. I mean, it was pretty innocuous.
Will Potter:
Yeah.
Chris Hedges:
Explain what it was, why it’s important, and then I want to go in, because this was a pivotal moment in the animal rights movement.
Will Potter:
It was. This was a pivotal campaign, and in that moment when the FBI agents came to my door, that time period was pivotal in the campaign, also. And so as a little bit of background, this laboratory had been exposed multiple times by undercover investigators working with groups like PETA, and they had documented egregious acts of cruelty, things like punching beagle puppies repeatedly in the face because the technicians were frustrated at their small veins to get an injection or dissecting a monkey that was still alive. And all of this was caught on video and was used in a very savvy way to mobilize and push forward this emerging movement.
What was different about this campaign compared to other animal rights or other protest campaigns is they operated quite differently. I mean, they were not intended on having signs and banners outside of the laboratory because they knew the lab didn’t care. The people in the lab didn’t care and the people investing in this lab didn’t care. So they started targeting the finances of this company. They went after everyone from UPS to toilet paper suppliers. Anyone who had business in any way with the laboratory was the target of protests. Sometimes this was kind of spontaneous demonstrations, sometimes this was as simple as people anonymously putting stickers or wheat paste or breaking out a window. I mean, the campaign was really that diverse, from these really kind of small, seemingly insignificant acts of sabotage or even harassment to mass protests outside the laboratories.
What happened is that it was so incredibly successful internationally that it brought the campaign near bankruptcy. And as that was happening, these corporations mobilized their allies in Congress and they worked together behind closed doors in order to label these protest groups as terrorists and ultimately to convict them and send them to prison as terrorists, as well.
Chris Hedges:
And we should be clear, so Huntingdon, which still exists under another name, but it’s Envigo I think is who bought up-
Will Potter:
That’s right.
Chris Hedges:
Right. So at the time, it was killing between 71,000 and 180,000 animals a year, and these animals were being killed to test for household cleaners, cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, pesticides, and food ingredients for major companies such as Procter and Gamble, Colgate, Palmolive. In the book, you write about the two kind of major organizations that confront of animal activists. One is the underground organization, that’s groups like Animal Liberation Front, and then the aboveground groups. And the underground groups I think at one point invaded the labs and caused significant damage. And the aboveground groups, the ones who ended up being prosecuted, engaged in nonviolent activity and organizing. But the relationship between those two groups, we’ll get into it later, but the ones who engaged in nonviolent traditional organizing ended up in essence being charged for the crimes of the underground organizers, even though they had nothing to do with it. But talk about those relationships.
Will Potter:
That’s really the heart of this entire protest campaign and the heart of why I think this case sets such a dangerous precedent for social movements. In the sixties in the anti-war movement, there was a phrase among activists that, “We didn’t do it but we dug it,” meaning I was not engaged or I don’t know who was engaged in illegal protest activity against the war, but it was loosely in the name of the same cause and it was nonviolent, and so I will support it. And that was the mentality of Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty. And specifically they ran a website, and on this website everything related to the campaign was published. Everything from those stickerings and wheat pastings that I mentioned all the way up to groups like the Animal Liberation Front doing things like stealing animals from laboratories and breaking into facilities connected to HLS, and also property destruction, vandalism, sabotage. In the scheme of this protest movement, though, there were no targeting of human beings. I mean, this is something that Animal Liberation Front has made sure of for decades and something the organizers of SHAC were very passionate about.
Chris Hedges:
SHAC, by the way, is Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty.
Will Potter:
That’s right.
Chris Hedges:
That’s the organization that was organized to confront Huntingdon.
Will Potter:
They’re the ones who were organizing this protest campaign. And really by organizing, the government said this was a couple of people in a house in Philadelphia and in New Jersey that were running a website. And as news came in on the website, there was a real intensity around this at the time. I mean, this was kind of pre-social media. In a lot of ways, I would argue this was one of the first digital campaigns of this new era that relied heavily and even almost exclusively on online organizing. And so what the government argued, as you indicated, is that by the SHAC organizers, by the aboveground lawful groups saying through their words and their website that they support the ideology of those crimes and they also support people doing them, they thought that this was all legitimate in the name of this struggle, the government argued that this created a conspiracy and that conspiracy created an environment that allowed the illegal activity to take place.
So in other words, the people who ran the website were never accused at any point of doing any of the illegal things that were on the website or for that matter, the legal things that were on the website, but the government in this ambitious court case argued that they needed to be held responsible for creating a criminal conspiracy under the Animal Enterprise Protection Act. So these activists were convicted of animal enterprise terrorism, is the name of the charge, conspiracy to commit that and conspiracy to violate the telecommunications law, which means that they were collaborating across state lines in order to protest this multinational company.
Chris Hedges:
So in your book, you write that the reason terrorism laws, this of course was in the wake of 9/11, the reason terrorism laws were employed against animal rights activists was because the corporations were being hurt. And they essentially prodded the political leadership in both parties, beholden to corporate money, of course, to declare these kinds of activities, even nonviolent activities, as acts of terrorism. They also, through tremendous resources, surveillance resources at these groups, I think if I remember correctly, in your book you say it’s the longest criminal investigation by the FBI in US history or something. You write about a woman, her name, she went by the name Anna. Her real name was Zoe Elizabeth Voss, a paid FBI informant. We saw this with Muslims after 9/11, where she provided the money, the logistics, at one point a cabin that the FBI wired to essentially prod people to discuss carrying out a bombing that never took place.
There’s this one poor 26-year-old kid who kind of falls for her and it was entrapment. I think he ended up spending a decade in prison, but the FBI withheld 2,500 pages of evidence. And so he got a what, a 20-year sentence roughly and served 10. You write that the FBI is estimated to have had 15,000 informants in these environmental and animal rights groups. Let’s talk about the tactics that were employed against these groups.
Will Potter:
I think the most important tactic is the recognition of the power of language. And that’s something that began really in the 1980s when industry groups made up, I mean they actually invented the term ecoterrorism and they were quite proud of it. And for the next several decades, as you know, there was an international focus on terrorism in a very different context. So in that time through the eighties and nineties, there wasn’t a lot of headway on these corporate efforts. I mean, there were gains being made, without a doubt, but what I found in my research is that after September 11th, the infrastructure and the strategies that were being developed and honed for decades leading up to 9/11 were implemented incredibly quickly and boldly after the attack, to the point where as first responders were still trying to clear survivors from the rubble after 9/11, you had multiple members of Congress speculating that the terrorist attacks were the work of environmentalists or animal rights activists. I mean, that’s the kind of climate that these groups created.
In that climate where the unreasonable becomes reasonable, where you’re blaming nonviolent groups or saboteurs for the most costly loss of life in US history, in that environment, they were able to kind of manipulate other structures to push this agenda. And what I would kind of summarize is that they really did this in three ways. There were three parts to their playbook. There were legal efforts, there were legislative efforts such as creating new terrorism laws and new protest restrictions, and then there was what I would call extra legal or operating outside of the law. And that’s where some of these informant tactics come in.
The FBI has been called to the carpet multiple times by their Inspector General’s office and oversight boards for the rampant misuse of informants. And that certainly has taken place in the animal rights and environmental movements, but this has also been corporate-driven, as in corporations hiring private investigators in mercenary firms that operate outside of the very little restrictions that the FBI has to pursue activists and to create dossiers on them. We’ve seen this not just in the campaigns we’ve talked about so far, but also in things like the Standing Rock protest and the Keystone Pipeline protests where these major corporations are sitting down, and I literally have some of the documents showing it, that they give PowerPoint presentations to law enforcement. They identify protestors, they recommend prison sentences in specific criminal statutes that can be used to go after their opposition. At really every step of the way, these corporate groups have sat down and worked in lockstep with the FBI and with those mercenary companies.
Chris Hedges:
Yeah. Well, you talk about fusion centers, so these are state programs that essentially collate or put together information coming from various law enforcement agencies, but they also work, as you point out in the book, with these corporate security firms. When I went to Standing Rock or you couldn’t, they blocked the roads, and the people blocking the roads were wearing Kevlar vests and carrying long-barrelled weapons with no identification. They were private security drawn from police, drawn from military. And so there’s this kind of centrifugal force where all of these entities are coming together to target these activists with tremendous amounts of resources. The film The Animal People is a documentary about this campaign, and in that documentary you show or there’s an attempt to show the staggering kind of sums of money and manpower that’s been put in to crush these groups.
Will Potter:
Oh, the amount of resources is just, it’s unbelievable. I mean, as you all with this show, you’re monitoring social movements and protest campaigns and you know how little resources these activists have. And so as one of the defendants, one of the protestors put it, when you see those court papers that say the United States versus Will or versus Chris or whatever it is, it really is that full weight of the US government combined with the full weight of the corporate state. In addition to some of the things you’ve mentioned like how this was the largest domestic terrorism investigation in US history, they’ve thrown just an ungodly amount of money into making these policies happen.
One thing that I would throw out is when these activists were awaiting prison sentences on the Huntingdon campaign, so they were already convicted under this ambitious previous law called the Animal Enterprise Protection Act. They were already being sentenced to prison as terrorists for a protest campaign. And politicians and members of Congress and also these corporate representatives were simultaneously arguing, “Our hands are tied. We need more power, we need more money, we need more funding, police resources.” And like you said, I think you put it quite well, that there is this kind of centrifugal force that emerges of this revolving door of state agencies and private sector, and really that’s what’s happened with this issue. Those forces together have worked over the last several decades to turn nonviolent protestors into the FBI’s, “Number one domestic terrorism threat.” And it’s really because of their money and influence.
Chris Hedges:
They also have twisted the courts. Maybe you can talk about the terrorism enhancement laws. These can add 20 years to sentences. They can, in some cases, quadruple sentences. And let’s be clear, these are nonviolent crimes.
Will Potter:
And this was something, the terrorism enhancement is something that was passed by Congress after the Oklahoma City bombings by right wing groups who killed, up until that time, was the most civilians that had ever been targeted. So in this kind of specter of fear of violence, that’s when this provision was passed. And instead, it’s been deployed to elevate the sentences of nonviolent environmental protestors that were convicted, for instance, as part of the Earth Liberation front. Those sentences not only are exacerbated by the terrorism enhancement, but it also redefines who these prisoners are.
I saw that personally visiting prisoners after they’ve been sentenced, and also in my interviews with countless former prisoners, that their experience once they’ve been classified that way is quite different. These activists in general have very little priors. They have no serious criminal history, and yet after being sentenced for their protest activity, they can end up in medium or even maximum security facilities. They are called red tagged by the BOP, by the Bureau of Prisons, and red carded. That means they have to sometimes carry and wear a large red card identifying them as a high risk terrorism inmate. They’re treated differently by guards, they’re singled out.
The ramifications of this in terms of from a human rights perspective extend far beyond just the disproportionate and I would call malicious sentencing of these protestors. It really redefines them. And I think that’s, to me, one of the most surprising takeaways of this language of terrorism is that even though it began as a public relations maneuver, it’s completely taken on a life of its own to the point where it’s worked its way into bureaucracies within power that kind of self-replicate these systems after people have even been convicted.
Chris Hedges:
Well, they’re put in management control units. I went out to Marion, Illinois, and I know you went out there as well in the book, which replaced Alcatraz as the kind of supermax prison. Now we have in Florence the kind of latest iteration of that. But I went out to visit Daniel Hale, who leaked the drone papers, and he, again, it’s a nonviolent crime. In fact, he shouldn’t even be in prison, but he, like these activists, was placed in a high security prison in the middle of farmland, the middle of nowhere, but in a special, highly restrictive unit. And that’s what’s happened to many of these activists.
Will Potter:
To be clear, I think when people, in my experience, start hearing about things like this, there’s a tendency to either think one, that can’t be true because this is the United States, or similarly, something like, “Well, this only happens in X, Y, or Z other country that has a disdain for human rights.” And the truth is that there’s actually a long history of using political prisons in the United States in these types of cases, including for social movements that we now regard by members of Congress even in these kind of heroic terms, the anti-war movement, the Black liberation Movement, the American Indian movement, all have been targeted. And many of those protestors ended up in experimental prisons.
What’s I think significant here is these communications management units were opened as clearly, explicitly political prisons for political prisoners, targeting prisoners because of their communications and their ideology. People were sent there because of their, “Anti-corporate and anti-government beliefs,” according to government documents. And as this is happening, it further codifies and cements political repression. It is stabilizing and really introducing what are quite extreme tactics of destroying and subverting social movements, and has turned them into something that’s now part of the official government apparatus. And these CMUs, these secretive prisons are now being codified into the law, and they are receiving more and more prisoners every year. What started as an, “Extreme response by the government for dangerous and violent prisoners,” is now being used against people that are very far from that. And I think that’s the mission creep that we see and that you’re really pointing to here.
Chris Hedges:
Yeah. We just have a few minutes left right in there about the loyalty oaths that mainstream environmental groups, Sierra Club, Greenpeace, National Wildlife Federation, were kind of called upon to denounce these underground groups, which unfortunately most of them rapidly did or quite willingly did. But let’s talk about where we are now. This has created the foundation for a very frightening kind of police state where any kind of dissent becomes terrorism. And that’s why I opened with the incident in Cop City.
Will Potter:
And that’s exactly why I’ve been following Cop City so closely as well, because the dynamics that we’ve talked about are really starkly on display in that campaign. Not just the repressive tactics, but the movement tactics, as well. I mean, it’s a similar dynamic to that Huntingdon Life Sciences campaign where in the Cop City protest, you have people that are protesting, writing letters, working with church groups, running websites, doing free concerts like you mentioned, offering free childcare, food, all of these kind of multiple aspects of movement organizing. And then you also have people that have sabotaged property and broken the law.
And what the state has done in this case is argue that all of it, the entire campaign is reflective of domestic terrorism, anarchism and threats to public safety. So that dynamic is still at play. So is that, I think it’s right to call a loyalty oath that’s being put on mainstream organizations. If you run a national group, it’s understandable why it would be tempting to come out and publicly condemn someone who vandalized a bulldozer because you run a nonprofit, you have donations and staff, and you’re not involved in protest activity like that, and you certainly don’t want to be at risk threatened by the FBI. And that’s the type of fear that they prey into.
And what happens, though, is when more mainstream and established groups start making public comments about the radicals with Cop City or the Anarchists, which is the kind of classic boogeyman that has rolled out, it drives a wedge. And I think in terms of state repression, the intention is to drive a wedge between these social movements inside themselves, between the aboveground and the more radical groups, and then to drive a wedge between Cop City protestors and everyone else in the more liberal or mainstream left. And they do that by really tightening the screws on mainstream organizations that have something to lose.
Chris Hedges:
Yeah. Although as you point out in your book, these nonviolent protestors ultimately get charged for acts they did not commit. I’m not going to go into the details. People should read the book and watch The Animal People, the documentary, but they weren’t even physically there. They didn’t even know these things were happening in many cases, but they’re charged.
Will Potter:
In the Cop City case, it gets even more just kind of surreal. I mean, you have bond hearings where protestors are being denied and police are pointing to mud on their shoes as evidence-
Chris Hedges:
Right, right, right.
Will Potter:
[inaudible 00:30:33]
Chris Hedges:
That’s right, muddy clothes.
Will Potter:
Muddy clothes, black hoodies. The raids of some of these activists that happened recently in Georgia, the warrant, I have to tell you, I don’t think either of us would look very good if we were raided, Chris. I mean, our bookshelves can be quite incriminating. And that’s the type of stuff that they’re listing in these warrants and then dragging into court as evidence of illegal activity. And I think that’s why it’s so important for mainstream organizations to fight back militantly against what is happening right now. Staying silent has never protected social justice groups from political repression like this, period. Historically, it has never worked. It has never worked to try to cozy up to corporations or to politicians hoping that they’re not going to be targeted in the backlash, because what happens every single time is at the point you become truly effective, at the point you become a true threat to business as usual is when the full weight of that apparatus is deployed.
So I think that what we’re seeing in Cop City, I’m not going to say I’m I optimistic or hopeful yet. I mean, I am a journalist after all, but it is quite inspiring, I’ll say, to see church groups, community groups, and the diversity of voices that have come out against Cop City. And to me, I think that’s really the best defense that we can have against these tactics is bringing everyone under the tent and saying very loudly that we’re part of this same movement, the same cause, and we’re not going to be singled out as terrorists to stop us.
Chris Hedges:
Great. I want to thank The Real News Network and its production team, Cameron Granadino, Adam Coley, Dwayne Gladden, David Hebdon, and Kayla Rivara. You can find me at chrishedges.substack.com.
Speaker 4:
And the Chris Hedges report gets some extra time now with a few minutes of bonus material with Chris and his guest.
Chris Hedges:
So in this second part, I want to ask you about the underground/aboveground groups. I was very involved in the Occupy movement and very critical of the black bloc and critical of property destruction, because I thought it was effectively used by the police and the state to demonize the Occupy movement. And it didn’t achieve much, especially in cities like Oakland, where throwing a trash can through a window in a Oakland is… Ishmael Reed, who lives in Oakland said, “If they want to throw a trash can through a window, why don’t they go up to La Jolla where the rich people live and throw a trash can through,” Mitt Romney apparently has some kind of estate up there, his place.
So I’ve always been very critical. The other thing, and I think this is captured in your book, and it was something that I often said to Occupy activists, is you just go back and read COINTELPRO. That’s kind of the primer on how it works. They have so many resources that the only effective strategy is transparency and the kind of the azan provokatörs, they love the black bloc because they could cover their faces so they couldn’t be identified. But you’re much more forgiving to the underground groups. But I just wanted you to address that.
Will Potter:
Yeah, I think those are valid critiques. I feel like the more I’ve been immersed in this for so many years now, the more I’ve kind of come to believe one, how little I know about ultimately what tactics work and what don’t, but to a greater point, seeing the response of the FBI and the state to a wide range of protest activity. So I think that the argument could be made that seeing property destruction like you see in a black bloc protest, it could give the immediate pretext in that moment for a political crackdown on those groups of spreading to other movements at that time. But what I’ve seen more broadly is that the repression that activists experience seems to have very little to do with the legality or the tenor of their actual tactics, if that makes sense.
So for instance, the underground groups who have done things like break into laboratories, steal animals, burn down buildings, I mean, at some cases these are very serious property crimes that someone could have been hurt. But what we’ve seen in the last few years is the FBI and the industry, I guess on the animal rights side of things more broadly, has focused on national groups. They’ve been much more concerned with undercover investigators in criminalizing photography and people that document animal abuse on farms.
And so I guess to respond to your question, I see that there is kind of a spectrum that exists in protest activity, and really the determining factor of whether any of that activity is going to be hit with intense state repression is whether it starts moving the needle. I feel a little bit naive, I’ll admit, in the last few years to see how quickly, rapidly and forcefully these tactics have been deployed against activists who had no sensible connection whatsoever to anything illegal. Right? I mean, for years, that’s what they said in going after the Animal Liberation Front and Earth Liberation Front. “We have to crack down on these radicals. We have to go after the black bloc.”
And what we’re seeing is that the FBI seems much less concerned with that on the whole right now than it does about true movement building. So I don’t know where this goes from here. I don’t know if those tactics are going away. I feel like anytime that there is a heavy-handed or a violent response from the state, we might see protest tactics like that, but we’re also seeing in Cop City, I think a lot more sophistication and movement creation and bringing lots of different people together and not, I guess I’ll say not turning some people off with some of those tactics that you mentioned.
Chris Hedges:
I want to talk about what’s happened. At the end, the movement, the Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty Movement does cripple the lab, but it’s bailed out, and then eventually it merges with other laboratories, Harlan Labs, NDA Analytics, et cetera, and creates this new super company, Envigo. What’s the lesson from that?
Will Potter:
Well, it’s kind of a similar story from your time in Occupy, right? That they’re too big to fail. That’s what the industry said with HLS, with vivisection industry, but also just all these diverse industries that have something to do with animals rallied behind them because they said, “If HLS falls, if this lab falls, everybody’s going to be vulnerable.” And I think that kind of too big to fail mentality is what caused people to rally behind such an abusive, corrupt facility as this one. And it also really speaks to just the overwhelming power of these industries.
My work focuses on political repression, which is pretty dark and depressing beat, but you also see the strength of social movements. And in this case, the industry was absolutely terrified about a protest campaign that was being run by a half a dozen people, allegedly in the United States with a couple of computers and who were bringing a multinational company to the point where it’s kicked off the New York Stock Exchange and kicked down to the pink sheets in the market makers. I mean, this was the power of this movement, and it just rattled them to their core. And I think that fear is still there. I mean, that’s why we still, there isn’t a campaign like this happening right now, but I think you’re still seeing this level of repression and kind of paranoia by corporations because they know it’s possible and they know this is always right around the corner.
Chris Hedges:
Well, they also know what they’re doing, which is why they hide it.
Will Potter:
Oh, without a doubt. Without a doubt. Jon Stewart used to do a good bit on his show called Evil or Stupid, where he would debate something and be like, “Oh, this is happening because they’re so horribly evil.” And then the other guy would say, “Oh no, it’s because they’re so stupid.” And I kind of do that a lot with this issue, but I think I firmly come down on the side of evil. I have to say that after seeing this for so long, there is nothing unintentional about any of these maneuvers. There’s some people that are just following orders. But as you mentioned with the SHAC case, when that was happening in New Jersey, Chris Christie was one of the people that was really trying to make a name off of it, just to give you an idea. And these are political opportunists. They’ve used this war on activism to make a name for themselves as being tough on crime or tough on terrorism and to catapult their careers.
I think we’re still going to be seeing that for quite some time. In the fallout of January 6th and the rise of fascist groups internationally, more and more people are going to be fighting back because we don’t have a choice but to fight back against it. And I think that state apparatus is going to be employed against them, as well.
Chris Hedges:
Great. That was Will Potter. His book is Green is the New Red, and you can see the documentary, which he is in, The Animal People, it’s on, where is it? On Amazon?
Will Potter:
Yeah, you can watch it on all the streaming stuff.
Chris Hedges:
All the streamings have it. Yeah, it’s a great documentary. Thanks, Will.
Vincent Quiles, a 28-year-old father and union organizer in Philadelphia, is part of a fledgling labor effort to support the months-long protests against construction of the notorious Atlanta Public Safety Training Center, popularly known as “Cop City.”
For Quiles, this also means speaking out against his former employer: Home Depot.
When he was fired from a Home Depot store in northeastern Philadelphia in February, Quiles was already struggling to support his toddler son on his salary, which he says never felt like enough, given the meager benefits. He says he was forced to lean on his “very strong support system.” This was despite his demanding job as a receiving supervisor, he notes, in charge of tasks like tracking incoming merchandise and overseeing maintenance of machinery in the store.
Quiles had been with the company for almost six years and played a leading role in a unionization drive that sought better pay, staffing and training. The drive was inspired by the successful unionization of an Amazon fulfillment center in Staten Island. His store’s effort, he says, was met with a “vicious union-busting” campaign from Home Depot management and culminated in an unsuccessful union election in November. Quiles, who comes across as friendly and direct, is adamant that he was fired about three months later in retaliation for trying to organize what would have been the first union in a Home Depot store. He says he is currently pursuing a wrongful termination charge with the National Labor Relations Board.
“The company would dispute this,” he says, “but I was fired for organizing.” Home Depot did not return requests for comment about Quiles’ claims or any of the other assertions about Home Depot in this article.
But Quiles is not only concerned with his own situation—he is deeply upset about how the company’s policies and priorities are playing out in a city 800 miles away. Tax returns show that the Home Depot Foundation is a funder of the Atlanta Police Foundation (APF), the private entity driving the fiercely opposed plan to build a $90 million police training center in the South River Forest, which protesters refer to by its Muscogee name, the Weelaunee Forest. Cop City is slated to include a shooting range, a driving course, and a mock city to train police from across the country in urban warfare, as activists put it, and would raze an important ecosystem and carbon sink in a majority-Black part of the Atlanta metro area.
“So Home Depot has money to allocate toward things like this, things that many people in that community don’t want because of the harm to the environment,” says Quiles, “but you can’t pay people more for the measurable value they bring to your company?”
Approved by the Atlanta City Council in 2021, the plan has been met with months-long opposition from neighbors and protesters concerned with the destruction of the forest at a time of intensifying climate change and environmental racism. Protesters are also alarmed by the expansion of policing and its associated violence, and “Stop Cop City” has become a national rallying cry for environmental and racial justice movements. Law enforcement, in turn, has responded with a ferocious crackdown that has left one forest defender killed (Georgia state troopers riddled 26-year-old Manuel “Tortuguita” Terán with 57 bullets in January) and 42 charged with domestic terrorism. Three organizers with the Atlanta Solidarity Fund, a bail fund, are now facing money laundering and charity fraud charges, following SWAT arrests at the end of May.
Quiles is not alone in expressing concern; his voice is part of an emerging labor effort publicly speaking out against police repression of the “Stop Cop City” protests. He is flanked by two unions—United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America (UE) and the International Union of Painters and Allied Trades (IUPAT), a list that activists hope will grow—and quickly.
Quiles, meanwhile, is the president of Home Depot Workers United, an independent union which he says is in touch with workers at 25 stores around the country, some of which are actively planning union campaigns. He declined to disclose the exact number because he was concerned about retaliation and union busting tactics from the company. Home Depot Workers United released a statement in early April calling on Home Depot “to pull their support, both financial and otherwise, from the Atlanta Cop City project.”
The Home Depot Foundation gave $25,000 to the APF in 2021, $35,000 in 2020, and $50,000 in 2019. When asked about these payments, Terrance Roper, a spokesperson for Home Depot, said over email, “I can tell you we haven’t donated to The Atlanta Police Foundation’s proposed training facility. We have specifically donated to The Atlanta Police Foundation’s veteran housing program.”
But Maurice BP-Weeks, a fellow at Interrupting Criminalization, says, “This doesn’t pass the smell test. A dollar is a dollar, and Home Depot’s dollars have helped enable APF’s programs. Cop City is the signature program of APF at the moment.”
The corporate relationship goes beyond funding: As LittleSis pointed out, Daniel Grider, Home Depot’s vice president of technology, sits on the APF’s board of trustees. (Grider is also on the leadership team of the Home Depot Foundation.)
“Corporations the size of Home Depot don’t have executives join boards like this by accident,” says Maurice BP-Weeks, a fellow at Interrupting Criminalization. “They are sophisticated political actors, and when you see someone on a board, it’s a sophisticated action. Home Depot clearly expects something out of the relationship.”
Grider isn’t the only connection. Arthur Blank, the co-founder of Home Depot, has a family foundation that pledged $3 million to the “Public Safety First Campaign,” which is the term the APF uses for the project. (In a statement to In These Times reporter and editor Joseph Bullington, the foundation sought to distance itself from the project by claiming the funding went to a different project of the APF.) Furthermore, Derek Bottoms, vice president of employment practices and associate relations for Home Depot, is the husband of Keisha Lance Bottoms, the former mayor of Atlanta who supported the construction of Cop City.
I spoke with a Home Depot worker and organizer who played a lead role in drafting the Home Depot Workers United statement—he requested anonymity to protect himself from retaliation. The worker said he was especially outraged to learn about these direct donations. “Home Depot’s profits come from my labor,” he says, “and we get a tiny fraction of that. The rest they get to decide what they do with. So often, what they do with that money is they enrich themselves or they give it to organizations or other things that don’t help the associates, and that actively harm workers.”
Some union leaders say the fight to stop Cop City has significant stakes for the labor movement as a whole. “Working people always have to be wary of any repression against protesters, because there is a history in our country that once it’s used against anyone protesting government policies, it can be turned against workers in their union,” Carl Rosen, the general president of UE, says over the phone from Erie, Pennsylvania, where 1,400 UE members who work for Wabtec Corp. could soon go out on strike.
This is especially concerning amid increasing enthusiasm about unions, even if density remains low. “At a time when workers across the country are increasingly willing to strike and use other militant tactics to oppose rampant corporate greed, working people must remain vigilant and united against any attacks on our right to peacefully protest against injustice,” UE officers, including Rosen, wrote in a June 2 statement. UE says it represents at least 30,000 workers.
The leadership of IUPAT was the first major union to weigh in, a significant development from a construction trades union that says it represents “over 100,000 workers across the United States, including across the Atlanta metro region.” A late March statement from general president Jimmy Williams Jr. emphasized racial justice issues at the heart of the matter.
“The IUPAT was proud to stand in solidarity during the height of the pandemic with the Black Lives Matter protests in Washington D.C.,” according to the statement. “Today we stand in solidarity with the protesters in Atlanta who are facing egregious and unnecessary violence by the Atlanta Police force and others for simply disagreeing around matters of public policy.”
When Williams became president in September 2021, he was hailed as a progressive new leader, unafraid to talk about tough issues like racism.
The unions that have spoken out in defense of activists only represent a tiny fraction of the labor movement. But BP-Weeks says, “We are at the very beginning of reaching out, and the support we have is really exciting—good on them for getting out in front.” BP-Weeks is part of an effort to circulate a sign-on letter so that unions can show their solidarity.
“Larger institutions generally don’t move as quickly, so we are continuing to reach out to the rest of labor, and we expect more sign-ons in the future,” BP-Weeks continues. “And we also realize not all of labor is in the same place on that. This moment can be a tool to organize and do some political education with unions as well.”
But even where union leaders—or their memberships as a whole—have not signed on, some workers and union members are involved in Stop Cop City organizing. Among them is Bill Aiman, a part-time United Parcel Service (UPS) worker who is a member of the Teamsters and is also involved in Teamsters for a Democratic Union, a rank-and-file movement for improved democracy and militancy. He is based in the Atlanta metro area and says over the phone that he has “been attending protests, and trying to organize where possible.”
“When I talk to coworkers,” he says, “the Cop City project is extremely unpopular.”
“Cops are the first line of defense for business owners and employers, so I think it makes sense for labor to be opposed to Cop City,” he says. “These cops are being trained at Cop City and will use the tactics they learn to crush our strike if we go out.” The UPS contract will expire on July 31, and around 350,000 Teamsters could go on strike.
Some union leaders say, in addition to the immediate interests of labor, there are bigger principles at stake. In their statement, UE officers noted that, “In a democracy, decisions about the use of publicly-owned land and public funds should be driven by robust public debate, including the right of members of the public to peacefully protest. Instead, Atlanta has chosen repression.”
Early Tuesday, Atlanta’s city council approved the allocation of $67 million in public funds for the project: around $31 million in public funds for the construction of Cop City, along with $1.2 million a year over 30 years for use of the facility. This was approved despite an outpouring of impassioned public opposition. The rest of the funding will be raised privately. The APF’s board is filled with a host of Georgia-headquartered corporate leaders, ranging from Delta Air Lines to Waffle House to UPS. Protesters say that the supporters of Cop City—in government, the corporate world, and police-aligned nonprofits—are ramming through the project without meaningful democratic input. Emory University conducted a survey in March which found that a plurality of Black Atlanta residents oppose Cop City. Many protesters say the funds should instead be invested in public programs that improve human and environmental wellbeing.
Kerry Cannon, the interim vice president of Home Depot Workers United, says, “Home Depot has a set of core values they like to say they live by, and their financial and other support of Cop City is in complete contradiction of their values, from destroying a forest to ignoring the will of the people of that area.” The company advertises a wheel of “core values” on its website—these include “respect for all people” and “taking care of our people.”
Cop City is not the first time Home Depot has come under fire for the actual values it promotes. Another co-founder, billionaire Bernie Marcus, has donated to the campaigns of far-right politicians, including former President Donald Trump and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis. In 2021, a coalition of Black faith leaders called for a boycott of the company, which is headquartered in Georgia, for its “indifference” to a sweeping law to curb voting rights, even as other corporations spoke out. Numerous Home Depot employees have also spoken out about a host of nightmarish working conditions, ranging from sexual harassment to timed bathroom breaks.
After losing his job, Quiles is organizing for Home Depot Workers United in a strictly volunteer capacity, and says he is having to “limit expenses in the household” and is “cutting it fairly close.” The “current corporate culture in the country” is what inspires him to keep organizing, he says, and speaking out about Home Depot’s links to Cop City is a critical part of that.
“The point of labor organizing,” he says, “is to improve society as a whole.”
This article is being co-published with WorkdayMagazine and The Real News.
The topic of solitary confinement was the focus of a recent episode of John Oliver’s Last Week Tonight on HBO. Thanks to the hard work of activists organizing against solitary confinement for decades, awareness of the brutality of this practice has begun to enter the mainstream. Its history as a counterinsurgency tactic, however, has yet to be fully examined in the light of day. TRNN Editor-in-Chief Maximillian Alvarez joins Rattling the Bars to speak with Mansa Musa, who spent 48 years behind bars himself, a number of which were spent in solitary, to discuss the cruel truths about solitary confinement that people on the outside need to know but rarely hear about.
Studio Production: David Hebden, Cameron Granadino Post-Production: Cameron Granadino
Transcript
The following is a rushed transcript and may contain errors. A proofread version will be made available as soon as possible.
Mansa Musa:
Welcome to this edition of Rattling the Bars, I’m Mansa Musa.
Maximillian Alvarez:
And I’m Maximillian Alvarez, Editor-in-Chief here at the Real News. Recently on his wildly popular weekly news and entertainment show Last Week Tonight, host and comedian John Oliver spent an entire segment analyzing and exposing the practice of solitary confinement in America’s prisons. As usual, John Oliver and his staff did a pretty thorough job of exposing one of the many horrifying practices that are commonplace in the United States. Solitary confinement in the prison industrial complex is very much a horrifying practice that we should all be horrified by.
Having said that, there of course are many other facets to the practice of and the experience of solitary confinement, particularly the experiences of those who are locked up in solitary confinement. They’re worth unpacking at greater length than Last Week Tonight was able to do in a 20-minute segment. I wanted to sit down with Mansa once again in the Real News Studio to get your thoughts on this segment, and to walk viewers and listeners through your perspective on the practice of solitary confinement, how widespread it it in the prison system in the United States, your own experience with solitary confinement, and what the hell experiencing something like that is like.
A lot of people watching and listening to this will have no idea of what that’s like, how frequently it’s used and what damage it does to human beings in the longterm. Given that we have the incredible fortune to get to work with you, someone who was locked up for 48 years, but never stopped organizing while you were incarcerated, and now that you’ve been released continue to organize and raise awareness. So I figured what better opportunity than for us to sit down and get your thoughts on this John Oliver segment, and the practice of solitary confinement writ large. So I guess first things first, I was just curious what you thought of the segment.
Mansa Musa:
It’s ironic that a comedian would be doing this and bringing this to national attention. The reason that local governments, state governments, the federal government should be the one to be addressing, since they’re the ones that’s responsible for implementation of it. But overall, I thought he did a good job in terms of observation, because that’s really what it was about. He was making an observation about how ridiculous the policy makers talk when they talk about these types of things, people not staying in their cell more than 24 hours, people being let out frequently. All those things was suspect and didn’t exist at best, right?
So overall, I think he did a good job in terms of, one, bringing to the attention of the public and opening the door to have conversations about it. I know most people that looked at it probably would respond to his comedic behavior, but at the same time he wasn’t making light of that, he was making light of how idiotic the policy makers are when they come out and they get to talking. They’ll just say anything that comes to the top of their head that they think is just going to come across and sound intelligent, but it really is ignorance.
Maximillian Alvarez:
Right. Like New York Mayor Eric Adams saying, “Oh, we don’t do solitary confinement, we do punitive segregation.” Motherfucker, that’s the same thing. Pardon my French. So one of the things that John Oliver talked about in the beginning of that segment, when he was trying to give the history of solitary confinement, is that this is a practice that was developed by Quakers hundreds of years ago as a form of punishment that was, at least in theory, supposed to isolate prisoners to give them time to sit and reflect on their misdeeds, their wrongdoings, become more penitent before the eyes of God, which is where we get the name of penitentiary, right?
Then in the narrative that John Oliver lays out in that segment, he says that the practice was ineffective and was more or less abandoned, until around the 1970s when the period of mass incarceration, the new Jim Crow really started to explode. This is what I mean when I say we’re incredibly fortunate to get to work with you and talk to you, because that is essentially where your timeline in the prison system began. So you have firsthand knowledge of that system and you can tell us how accurate that narrative Oliver laid out was. But I guess let’s start there, so when you first entered the prison system, was the practice of solitary confinement widespread? I guess how would you explain to people how and why prisons started using this system more?
Mansa Musa:
That’s a good point, Max, because when I got locked up and I went into Maryland Penitentiary in ’73, they had what they called the hole, and the hole probably would have been consistent with the concept of solitary or isolation, because they basically had made about four or five cells and they would isolate people in them that they deemed to be unruly. But overall, you had punitive segregation, which was you stayed locked in your cell, but you was in an environment where you had access to people, you could talk to the person in the cell next to you.
But when solitary confinement reemerged, it reemerged and when they started locking up radical elements, they started locking up the Black Panthers, the Weathermen, Puerto Rican nationalists, anybody who was fighting, anybody who was antiestablishment, anybody who would stand up for human rights and self-determination, that’s when it became a tool, a mechanism to be used to suppress that. I think George Jackson talks about that when he talked about in his essay Towards United Front, how this massive prison population exists and in its existence it creates a threat. The threat being the potential for organization and organizing to combat and fight fascism, racism.
So that’s where it started taking shape. When I was locked up, you had basically tools to segregation. Maryland hadn’t got to the point where they had developed what they call security housing units, but on the West Coast, the Adjustment Center, that’s where you see the development of that concept, of what we know to be solitary confinement today and what they called SHUs, security housing units. That evolved, that came out of Quinton and probably Angola, Louisiana, places like that where in the southern part of the country, Alabama prisons, where they could get away with it with impunity. But in Maryland, Maryland developed a concept when they created Supermax in the ’80s. That’s where I ultimately winded up at.
Maximillian Alvarez:
Yeah. Speaking of Angola, and we’ll get to this in a minute, but that’s where Albert Woodfox was incarcerated after being another lifelong activist, Black Panther, wrongfully imprisoned for over 40 years and spent over, I think it was 44 years in solitary confinement in Angola, and was released I believe in 2016 and died only a few years after that. Just the thought of 44 years in solitary confinement breaks my brain a bit. Like I said, we’ll talk in a second about how to possibly try to communicate to people what it’s like to be in that situation.
But I guess two things I wanted to just underline for people, because already you gave us I think a really crucial detail that was not in the Last Week Tonight segment, which is, like I said, John Oliver and his team of writers, they talk about the reemergence of solitary in the 1970s, coinciding with the explosion of the prison population. So we’re entering the age of mass incarceration, more people are coming into the prisons, I think the way that they explain is that there’s overcrowding, there’s fighting, and then solitary emerges as this punitive weapon to try to get this prison population under control.
But what you’ve already added to the conversation is that, like you, like our dearly departed brother Eddie Conway, like so many other radicals that we’ve talked to on this show and that you knew when you were on the inside, when they started coming into the prison they were targeted for solitary confinement because they are these radical elements coming in, they’re going to organize, they’re going to talk to other inmates, they’re going to build and develop that revolutionary consciousness as we talked about the last time we did one of these episodes on May Day. We talked about the organizing you and Eddie did on the inside.
So for a prison warden, they’re like, “Well, we don’t want that, so let’s just isolate these guys.” So there’s that, I think was a really crucial additional context to the John Oliver segment. Then I just wanted to clarify for folks watching and listening, so like you said, before solitary really became the weapon of choice in the prison system, there were other proto mechanisms for isolating, proto solitary confinement mechanisms. So the punitive segregation that you’re talking about, you’re still in your regular cell, but you’re not allowed to leave. So you’re still restricted, but you’re not as isolated.
Mansa Musa:
Right. In those situations, you get an infraction, and you get … The thing about solitary confinement that’s separated from punitive say, you might get an infraction, you get 30 days on punitive segregation, you’re released back into the jail population. In solitary confinement you have no way of knowing when you’re going to be released, ergo we just talked about 44 years in solitary, because now you’re in there indefinitely. There was the design is to break you, because now you’re in an environment where you’re totally isolated, you have no contact with nobody. The guard is the only person you have contact with and when they come everything is like handcuff you, come to the back, put your hands behind your back, in some institutions come to the slot, kneel on the ground, put your hands behind your back.
You’ve got to literally stick your arms all the way up so they put the handcuffs on you, then they tell you, “Stay right there.” They hit the door, when they open the door they come in there and raise you up and then move you. Now, you imagine that kind of practice for 44 years. Every day and all you find yourself in a situation where you’re supposed to get an hour out of your cell. I know when I was in Supermax, mind you we’re in a highly secured environment, they got these sensitive sensors on the roof, so whenever the wind blows it sets off the alarm. So what they will say is, you’ll be getting ready to come out for your shower, they say, “Now the jail’s locked down.”
That’s an oxymoron, the jail is always locked down. So now you’re telling me that I can’t come out because the sensor went off on the roof, but the reality is it’s 12 people on a pod, it’s 12 of us, we have very little, no contact, and you’re going in there indefinitely. So that’s what they call security housing unit, and that’s where Hugo Pinell and Pelican Bay, right? That’s where Ruchell Magee is at right now in Pelican Bay, that’s where Jalil Muntaqim was in in Pelican Bay. Then you had Conrad George, San Quinton Six, and they was in security, they was in adjustments in San Quinton, which was 120 people in one area.
You don’t have no … They still use it today. So this is the reality that when we talk about the John Oliver piece, he raised a conversation, a subject matter, but when you go delve down into it, when we was talking about New York, New York got what they call, passed a law called HALT, stop solitary confinement, because of the amount of people that was dying as a result of being isolated and not having no human contact, losing their mind, that they now just say that it creates posttraumatic stress disorder, but they qualify it by saying, “Prison posttraumatic stress disorder.” The disorder that comes from being housed in these type of environments are so inhumane that the person’s ability to function after they get out of them is hard.
I know this to be a fact, because I know when I went to Supermax I went in there in 1996, ’97, and went on the pod, the average person was on the pod had been there three years prior to me getting there. I did four-and-a-half years before I was let out of it, and the people that was in there prior to me being there was still in when I left, and had been in there indeterminate amount of time, years. No programs, no real interaction with nobody, everything is restricted, they didn’t have no library, they didn’t have no books. The things that you could probably get and that your family could send you, depended on what the attitude was of the administration, depended on whether you got them or not.
So when I left, I knew that I was damaged. There was no doubt in my mind. I knew that in my mind, because I had to really dial down on how am I going to deal with this day in and day out, not having no human contact? The conversations that you’re having is so neural at times, and you become frustrated real fast, that when I got out of prison the first thing I did was went and seen mental health to unpack the damage that not only the 48 years did, but the periods that I spent in Supermax did. This is what they’re talking about today, the impact of it. This is one of the reasons why they’re trying to abolish it and eradicate it completely because of the impact it has on a person mentally.
Maximillian Alvarez:
Yeah. That was one thing that I thought the John Oliver segment did really well was emphasizing that you don’t just … Solitary confinement isn’t just something that is done to people in prison, it’s done to them for their whole lives. So if you go into solitary, the impact that it has on you is going to traumatize you in ways that are going to stay with you long after you’re released from prison. Which really does beg the question, if our whole justification in this society for the prison industrial complex that we have and the brutal practices that go on there, if the whole reason that we keep that system going and the whole justification for it is that it’s meant to rehabilitate people, how can we possibly say this is a rehabilitative practice when it’s clear it’s just torture that damages people and probably makes them more likely to die or hurt or harm when they get out of prison? That’s not rehabilitation, that is just pure torture and punishment, regardless of what the consequences are to the individual or to the society that they’re released to afterwards.
Mansa Musa:
That point you raise, that’s exactly what it is, torture. Because I remember I was in Supermax with one guy, and it was a young guy, and the whole entire time we was in there, he kept on complaining about his stomach. They told him he had gas, so when we get out and we wind up in another environment together, I don’t see him so I ask, “Where he at?” They said, “He’s over at the hospital for a bleeding ulcer.” You don’t get a bleeding ulcer overnight. So all that time he was in there, the stress from being in isolation, the stress from being in solitary confinement and not knowing when you’re going to get out had created, had caused him to get cancer.
Because of that, and they misdiagnosed really, it’s not a misdiagnose, what they do is they ignore what the symptoms are because it’s expensive to treat. So it’s easy to ignore it to the point where it becomes irreversible, and then you give him some medication until they die off. This is what happened with this guy, he literally died. That’s what they talk about in pushing them to abolish and eradicate solitary confinement and not have another person be confined no more three days, no more two days. If their behavior’s that egregious where it calls for you to put a person in an environment for 44 years, what did he do to put him in that environment 44 years, other than have independent thought? He was a threat that educated the population that they should stand up for themselves.
So that threat right there was so severe to the establishment that they said, “Well, we’ve got to keep him isolated.” Then as a result of that, when he got out he passed on because of what they did to him while he was incarcerated. This is where the torture, and it’s inhumane and it’s criminal.
Maximillian Alvarez:
I want to follow up on that, because one thing that I’ve heard repeatedly from reading testimonies of people who have experienced solitary confinement, like yourself, I think one of the most common things that they say is it’s impossible to communicate what it’s actually like to people who have never gone through that. So I guess let’s take that as a given here, that me and the people watching who have never experienced this are only going to be able to understand so much of what you and others have gone through. But I guess as best as we can, can we try to communicate to people what a day, a week or more in solitary is? What does your life look like in what I can only imagine is the most hopeless place imaginable?
Mansa Musa:
Just imagine, lock yourself in the closet and wait for somebody to open the door, put a tray in there, shut the door, open the door, tell you you can go out in the courtyard, that you don’t have no contact with nobody. You go out there for an hour maybe, put you back in the closet. Open the closet up again, tell you to go to the shower, put you back in the closet. Everything is controlled, all your movement is controlled. We talk about passable conditioning, this is a perfect example because you anticipate everything is designed around what they’re going to do for me, what am I entitled to?
Okay, they’re going to bring the tray at 7:00 in the morning, that’s breakfast. They’re going to bring the lunch tray at 10:00, that’s lunch. They’re going to bring the dinner tray at 4:00, that’s dinner. So now I’m anticipating that. Every other day I’m supposed to get out and get a shower, so I’m anticipating that. Everything is designed around me anticipating what you’re going to do for me next. I don’t have no individuality. So it stands to reason that I’m not going to have no social skills, I’m not going to be able to communicate unless I take the initiative to educate myself, unless I take the initiative to try to take advantage of, if I can get something to read, unless I take the initiative to exercise, unless I take the initiative to not allow these four walls to close in on me like a vice grip, then I’m going to break.
That’s the design, and it don’t have nothing to do with how strong you are mentally, it’s the relentless pressure like waterboarding. It’s really like that. Day in and day out you don’t have no control over what’s going on with you. If they feel like they want to come to your cell, strip you like a pancake, take all of your stuff and leave you in there by yourself, with nothing, with the jumpsuit you’ve got on, no mattress, no sheets, no nothing. If they want to do that, they can do that. They have done that. To find yourself in that situation and how do you hold onto hope in that situation?
Then the breaking point is you don’t know how long you’re going to be there. So it would be something different if you could say, “Well, okay. I’ve got a year.” Half the time I try to focus on, “Okay, I’ve got a year of this. I can hold out.” No, 44 years, Albert, and he held out. The reason why he held out was because he knew he was in there for his thinking, and so he held onto his thinking. My thinking got me here and my thinking is going to get me out. My thinking will make me survive when I get out, because if I relinquish that, I’m relinquishing my right to my own humanity. That’s the purpose, the whole purpose of it is to take and dehumanize you to the point where you don’t have no more individuality. Now you just become what they call you, a number.
Maximillian Alvarez:
Jesus, man. I genuinely can’t wrap my head around it, because we know … I remember saying this at one point during the first year of COVID-19, something like this hadn’t happened in my lifetime, at least on this scale, where we went into crisis mode, as many who could socially distanced and locked themselves away in their houses and so people were going a bit stir-crazy with their kids and their spouses. So they got a tiny, tiny taste of what it’s like to be socially isolated, and people freaked out about it, because human beings are not meant to live like that. We are social creatures who actually depend on our relationships to other people to be ourselves.
When you take that away, I can just imagine it’s like the features of the human being start to get erased, they start to drip and melt off and disappear, like you said, until you’re basically just a number. That’s such a cruel and inhumane thing to do to people. I get, again, like John Oliver said, we all understand that there are times when if a person is a danger to themselves or others, you maybe have to get them out of that situation so that more violence doesn’t happen, but this is all taking place in the context of a prison industrial complex that is violence, that is a violent institution.
I just wanted to ask one more personal question on that front, again, as you’re isolated, you’re socially cut off, everything, like you said, revolves around what the guards are going to give you at what time. When you’re in solitary, you do not know when that period is going to end, it could be 30 days, 60 days, a year, three years, four years, or like Albert Woodfox 44 goddamn years. I genuinely can not imagine what it takes to survive that and still have some of yourself intact afterwards. What did you do? I guess how did you think? How did you pass the time or what did you hold on to when you were locked up in that situation?
Mansa Musa:
See, because I had been so accustomed to being, I had been back and forth on lockup, and lockup is nowhere near what solitary confinement at Supermax is, but I had been accustomed to being locked behind the door, so I always had a routine, I always went … I would basically schedule myself out. I would work out, I would study, I would draw or whatever I could develop as far as an outlet, that would become my routine. I would do it in and out. When we was in Supermax, me and a guy, because we was in the proximity to talk, we had got our family’s to send me two Spanish books. So every day we would get up and outside the door we would talk, we would teach each other Spanish. It was bastard Spanish, but it’s a new language, and we would talk about people on the tier, in the area.
This was our way of having an outlet. What it did, it made me have to get a routine. So in that routine I would create vocabulary mechanisms. Those are things that you find most people do, but at the end of the day it still comes down to [inaudible 00:29:48]. The breaking point is you don’t know when you’re going to get out. So in your routine mentality, you’re just holding on because that’s what your fortitude tells you to do. But you’re not being given no encouragement. I seen men, I seen them lose it. I seen guys hang themselves, I seen people commit suicide in this environment, primarily because of the inability to cope. I seen them get to the point where they medicate them and then that becomes an outlet, so now I went from being a human being to being in a cage to being a vegetable in a cage, because now I’m depending on the medication.
These are the things, that’s why they have this thing in New York called HALT, stop security housing, this is why you got ADX in Florence, Colorado, where it’s ultra-max. This is what you have, this is the kind of environment you have there. This is what you have in most major institutions now, you have security housing that’s primarily designed to isolate you and dehumanize you to the point where you will go crazy, or you’re such a shallow individual when you get out that you’re such a shallow individual that you don’t have the ability to function no more.
Maximillian Alvarez:
Right. There was a study that came out last year spearheaded by the Yale Law School, which we’ll link to in the show notes for this episode, showing that around 50,000 people a year are subjected to extended solitary confinement. That is crazy. It’s crazy that tens of thousands of people are just locked away in solitary confinement, a box the size of a parking space basically, living like this, not knowing when they’re ever going to get out, if they ever do get out. We’ll round off in a second by talking about what could we do about this, and what a better option is. It feels like anything’s a better option than solitary confinement.
But I just wanted to pick up on two points really quick. One thing that the John Oliver segment noted was that prison officials, politicians, people in the media, people who’ve never experienced what you’ve experienced, they will talk confidently about how and why we need solitary confinement, and how it’s only used in the most extreme cases. But that’s obviously not true. As John Oliver mentioned, people can get sent to solitary for looking at a guard the wrong way, or not tucking their shirts in, so on and so forth. So I wanted to ask if you could just comment on that, but also if you can say a little bit about what it was like the day that you got out of that. What the fuck was that like?
Mansa Musa:
The fact that they started out by utilizing it to stop political prisoners from having access to the population, but because it became, it started growing, so you’re right, John Oliver’s observation was correct. So now you put somebody in solitary confinement under the pretense they’re a gang member, so that’s the big one that they use, they put you in solitary confinement because you’re a gang member. Then they put you into solitary confinement because you have mental health issues, so now I’m being put in solitary confinement because I’ve got a mental health issue and they know I’ve got a mental health, but they’re going to put me in solitary confinement, it’s going to do no more than exacerbate the problem.
Therein lies the problem. It should be outlawed and there’s a push to outlawing it. But I remember when I got out, when I was going back and forth to court, the warden of the Supermax he knew us from when he was a correctional officer in the penitentiary when we first come in there. So he knew me and he knew Eddie, he knew all of us, and he knew pretty much where we stand. So I was sitting in the hold waiting to go back to my cell and I seen him walk by, and I said, “Well, I’m not going … Hey, hey, look at me.” The door opened and he came in there and he said, “Man, you think I’m going to walk by and see you and don’t say nothing?”
So he, because of the years we had been locked up and the fact that we stood up, he respected that. So we’re talking, so he asked about my situation, I tell him, I said, “Yeah, I don’t know when they’re going to let me out. I seen the board, I’m waiting for them to tell me.” That’s another thing they do, you go up to see the board and two years later you’re still waiting for them to come back and tell you no. They might in two years later, three years later come and tell you no. So all that time that you went from, “I don’t know when I’m going to get out.” To “I don’t know when they’re going to tell me no.”
First I went from, “I don’t know when I’m going to get out.” To I went up in front of the board, the board said, “Okay, we approve you to come off, we’ve got to send it to somebody, they’ve got to approve it, and they’ve got to send it to somebody and they’ve got to approve.” So now you wait three years later, they say, “The third person, no.” So now you’re really jaded. But they came and got me, they just came and got me abruptly. Somebody, the warden had called there and told them let me off, that he had made, whatever he did, he helped me get off. So when the police came to my door, the guard came to my door and said, “Look, pack up, you’ve got to go. Hurry up.”
I’m like, “Well, I don’t want to leave all this stuff that I’ve got. I don’t want to take it with me.” Somebody asked me for the mattress, “Hey, let me get your mattress. Let me get your blankets.” You want to leave that stuff to people. Anything extra that you’ve got that’s going to help them. I was taking my time, he was like … I said, “Man, look, you shut my goddamn door. I’m not rushing.” Because I already knew that if he’s rushing me, he’s rushing me because he’s thinking that the warden’s saying get me out right away. But I already knew that at some point in time, I said, “Well, okay. Somebody must have said something that got him like this, but it ain’t that serious.”
When I finally got out and got to the general population, I had issues because I wasn’t comfortable with people being around me. So it took me a minute. I wouldn’t, in the crowd, when the crowd’s going to chow, I’d always stand on the outskirts, because I wasn’t comfortable. I hadn’t had people around me, I hadn’t had people walking behind me, I hadn’t had people walking in front of me. Every time I came, I came up by myself and I came up with handcuffs and shackles on. So I wasn’t accustomed to not having that. I wasn’t accustomed to waiting on them to hit the doors when you stand on the tier and you wait for them to hit the doors, lock you in. I wasn’t accustomed to standing in the middle of the tier just socializing. I always had my back on the wall.
It took me a while to get not so much as not do that, but to understand why I did it. Because it didn’t really dawn on me that I did it until I started seeing other people that came out of Supermax that was in there with me doing it. When I looked and said, “Damn, as soon as you go on the tier you put your back on the wall.” Everybody else is just moving around freely, because now you’re in an everything that you’re not accustomed to. So at the end of the day, the push to abolish it is necessary. You’ve got your tax dollars paying for the prison industrial complex and the military industrial complex, your tax dollars are paying. So you should write on your tax form, “I want my money to go to torturing people.” Because that’s what your tax dollars are going to.
Or you should take a conscious effort to find out what this is and make a concerted effort to get it eradicated, because this is inhumane. There’s nothing humane coming out of this, a person to go on solitary confinement because they can’t cope with the general population, so they lose their mind, they have a breakdown. Instead of you trying to help them and treat them for that, you put them in solitary confinement that ain’t doing no more than exacerbating their problem and driving them further into their insanity. That’s why they was talking about the amount of deaths that come out of that, the amount of deaths that come out of it is a result of the torture that comes from that environment.
Maximillian Alvarez:
I guess even now do you feel like there are lingering effects from that time you spent in solitary?
Mansa Musa:
Yeah, because you ain’t going to spend no 48 years in prison and a portion of that in isolation or the uncertainty of the environment and not be damaged. That’s just not a reality. It’s really what I do and how I manage, how I deal with it. Like I told you, I got somebody to help me unpack and understand it, and understand I don’t have a big thing about being like I like to hang out. I’m sociable, but then I can also just be comfortable sitting in a chair in my house and not doing nothing, no TV on, no radio on, not reading, just sitting still, because I’ve done that repeatedly in prison. Just sat in a cell and did nothing, just sat there and just did nothing.
When Eddie turned me onto doing, when I got with Eddie and I seen Eddie doing puzzles, when I found myself when we was locked down in a prison, I got them to get us puzzles and I would do puzzles 17 hours. I would just get the most complicated puzzle. Wouldn’t do nothing but just do a puzzle all day long, because that’s solitude. So yeah, I see lingering effects, but at the end of the day, and I want our audience to know this, that when you look at this right here you need to understand what it is and take a stand on it. This is what we’re doing here at Rattling the Bars and the Real News. We’re talking about John Oliver, but who else is going to come and editorialize John Oliver? Who else is going to come behind an event like the Palestinian and give context to the murder and the genocide that’s taking place?
No other news media, no other outlet is doing it. This is why it’s important that you as an audience and our listeners support the Real News and Rattling the Bars. We are in fact, and I know this comes as a surprise to a lot of people, we are actually really the news.
The terror of police power is a recurring fact of American life, particularly in this country’s poorest communities and in communities of color. The power of officers comes not only from the strength of arms, but also from a legal system that is swift to protect its enforcers, yet slow to hold them to account. Where did this virtual immunity from prosecution come from? Has it always been this way? And if not, how has police power and impunity changed through the ages? Historian Joanna Schwartz joins The Chris Hedges report to discuss her new book, Shielded: How the Police Became Untouchable.
Joanna Schwartz is a professor of law at UCLA, where she teaches civil procedure and courses on police accountability and public interest lawyering.
Studio Production: Adam Coley, Dwayne Gladden Post-Production: Adam Coley Audio Post-Production: Tommy Harron
Transcript
The following is a rushed transcript and may contain errors. A proofread version will be made available as soon as possible.
Chris Hedges:
The police in the United States through a series of Supreme Court decisions as well as policies enacted by state and city governments have become largely immune from prosecution even when they commit serious felonies such as murder. Police officers are criminally charged in less than 2% of fatal shootings and convicted in fewer than one third of those cases. When officers injure but do not kill, they are even less likely to be prosecuted. Police in America are virtually omnipotent, prosecuted in a handful of high profile cases that receive national attention, but otherwise free to engage in lawless behavior, especially in poor communities.
University of California law professor Joanna Schwartz, in her book, Shielded: How The Police Became Untouchable, details the myriad of ways the legal system has stripped the citizens of protections from police abuse. The wholesale blocking of civil rights litigation means the police are rarely held accountable for the crimes they commit. Blunting all efforts to enact meaningful police oversight, legal accountability and reform. Joining me to discuss her book, our failed justice system in police forces that function especially in poor communities as rogue militias, is Professor Joanna Schwartz. Let’s begin as you do in the book with the legal antecedents, especially Section 1983 became law in 1871. What was Section 1983? Why was it made law and how did it protect the citizenry and why and how has it been rolled back?
Joanna Schwartz:
Section 1983 was first passed by Congress in 1871 following the Civil War during reconstruction when newly freed slaves, former slaves, black Americans were being tortured and killed by the newly created Ku Klux Klan and other white supremacist groups and local law enforcement and government was doing nothing to intervene if they were not themselves participating in the violence. And Congress looking at this evidence, decided that there needed to be a federal law allowing people to sue for violations of their civil constitutional rights in order to give those rights actual meaning. And so they enacted what is now known as Section 1983 for its place in the US code, but was at the time referred to as, the Ku Klux Klan Act. Very soon after Section 1983 became law, decisions by the Supreme Court and by Congress made Section 1983 and other reconstruction era acts lose much of their power.
And it was really not until 1961 when the Supreme Court first recognized that Section 1983 could be used to sue government officials, police officers in the case, which is called Monroe versus Pape, for the violations of their constitutional rights. So after 90 years in obscurity and disuse, Section 1983 was recognized by the Supreme Court as being this tool that could be used to sue for constitutional violations in 1961. But then after a sort of momentary heyday with the power and potential of 1983, the statute has lost progressively its power and it’s lost its power through Supreme Court decisions primarily that have cut away at the ability to sue in a variety of different ways that I outlined in the book that begin at the very initial stage of trying to find a lawyer through pleading a complaint with the court through proving a constitutional violation, qualified immunity, holding local governments responsible and beyond.
Chris Hedges:
So this 1961 decision opened as you write in the book, a kind of flood of lawsuits. I remember talking with the civil rights attorney, Lynne Stewart, and she said this was a kind of golden era in the judiciary where citizens really had the capacity to hold government agencies including police accountable, and that it was essentially that surge in suits that produced the backlash. And including in that backlash as you write in the book or accompanying that backlash was a kind of mythology. Can you explain how that worked?
Joanna Schwartz:
Absolutely, and I should say that the evidence definitely shows that the number of claims that were filed under Section 1983 increased dramatically after 1961 as well, you would expect because it was the first time the Supreme Court said you could sue under this statute. But the claims that were alleged, the story that was told about the effect of these claims really does take mythological proportions. The story goes that courthouses were overflowing or threatened to be overflowing with frivolous lawsuits, that these lawsuits were bankrupting or would bankrupt officers who were simply doing their job in good faith and that all of these lawsuits would discourage people from taking on the job of a police officer or from aggressively enforcing their duties as a police officer and without a robust police force that we as a society would descend into chaos. And truly you can see versions of that story or pieces of that story told by courts, by journalists and by politicians in the years after Monroe versus Pape was decided.
Chris Hedges:
One of the effects was that states passed laws, cities passed laws where they obliged local governments to pay damage awards and lawsuits against police officers. Can you explain that process and what effect it had on police misconduct and what happened when line items and the budgets for damages exceeded the amount set aside for damages?
Joanna Schwartz:
So in the seventies and eighties, particularly, I should say sixties, seventies and early eighties, states and localities across the country enacted what are called indemnification statutes. And indemnification is an idea that we see in private industry all of the time. If there’s a truck driver from a company, the truck hits you, you would want to sue not the driver themselves, but the company that hired them. The idea being that the driver probably isn’t going to have the resources to pay that settlement or judgment, and it’s really the work of the truck owner or the truck company that should be held responsible. This is the same idea that states and local governments had when they created these indemnification statutes which provide that when an officer is sued, they will be given a lawyer free of charge and that settlements and judgments against them will be paid by the local government or by their insurer instead of by the officer themselves.
And these indemnification provisions vary. There’s usually some exceptions to the kinds of things that the city agrees to cover and the coverage is limited to conduct taken in the course and scope of employment. Although when I have researched settlements and judgements and police misconduct suits across the country, what I found was, that virtually all of the money comes from the local governments and from insurers. I found in 81 jurisdictions, a six-year period, 99.98% of those dollars came from the local governments and their insurers. And notably it does not come from the police department’s funds. I did a follow-up study where I looked to see what financial impact these settlements and judgements had on the police departments. And what I found was often the money may come technically from the police department’s budget, but that money was already budgeted to the police department from the central budgeting process.
And when departments went over budget, when they spent more money than expected on lawsuits, the extra money came not from the police department. They weren’t required to cut back on overtime or equipment or anything like that. Instead, the money was taken from other parts of the central budget. And what I found when I looked into how this practice worked in Chicago was that the excess money ends up coming from portions of the budget that were earmarked to go to those least politically powerful people within the community. There was a city attorney for the city of Chicago who said when payouts went up in lawsuits, led paint testing went down. And so the very communities that are disproportionately the subjects of police surveillance, searches and violence are also the ones who have their budgets and the parts of the budgets earmarked toward them stripped away to satisfy settlements and judgements in cases alleging police misconduct against people within their very communities.
Chris Hedges:
And in cases like Chicago where you had Burge and that torture center, that sort of clandestine torture center, we’re talking about millions of dollars.
Joanna Schwartz:
Absolutely. I mean, in the last 10 years, I think Chicago paid half a billion dollars in settlements and judgements and they pay an extra many millions of dollars toward private attorneys that they use to defend their lawyers or excuse me, their officers in some of these cases. And as I describe in the book, there are many instances of cases where the Chicago police officers had extreme egregious allegations against them. Many millions of dollars were spent defending these cases only to lose at trial and have to spend many millions of dollars more. And the police department is playing with house money in these situations. They suffer no consequences of spending extreme amounts of money to fight these cases instead of what would be better for the community as a whole, which would be to resolve these cases, to satisfy the demands of people who have righteous claims and then to work to prevent these things from happening again in the future.
Chris Hedges:
Can you talk about the role of prosecutors and internal affairs divisions and both these two institutions you write in the book really serve as a way to protect police from legal accountability?
Joanna Schwartz:
Yeah, in the introduction I talk about the fact that if you are trying to seek justice following a right’s violation, there are really three paths. And I focus in the book on civil lawsuits, lawsuits seeking money damages or other kinds of forward-looking relief. And in part I focus on that because the other two paths which are criminal prosecution and internal affairs, investigations and discipline are so dysfunctional. As you mentioned previously, officers are very rarely criminally prosecuted, rare when they kill people, but far rarer when they use force or other kinds of misconduct that don’t result in death. And internal affairs investigations are also extremely difficult to have brought and successful. When the Department of Justice has looked at police department internal affairs investigations across the country, it’s found that police investigators don’t use the basic crime fighting tools that they would use if they were trying to solve criminal cases.
They don’t interrogate officers, who offer virtually verbatim statements to their fellow officers about what’s happened. They don’t interview all of the witnesses to the event. And for these and other reasons, officers are rarely disciplined or terminated. In addition, law enforcement unions have worked with passion to create law enforcement officers bills of rights that create a great deal of protection for those officers in the disciplinary process and the ability to appeal and arbitrate decisions that are against those officers. So even in the rare instances in which officers are disciplined or terminated, those decisions are often overruled or overturned through that arbitration process.
Chris Hedges:
Can you explain qualified immunity and how it works?
Joanna Schwartz:
Qualified immunity, which has been in the news a great deal, although it’s a term that remains elusive to many, perhaps because it is so nonsensical, it is a defense that was created by the Supreme Court in 1967. So six years after Monroe versus Pape was decided. And at the time it was described as a good faith defense for officers who had violated the Constitution but who had acted in good faith, thought that they were following the law. That standard for qualified immunity shifted dramatically in 1982 when the Supreme Court said, forget about officer’s subjective intent that will take too long to resolve.
The question is whether officers violated clearly established law. And the Supreme Court’s descriptions and definitions of clearly established law have gotten more and more constrained over the years fueled by these myths about the dangers of making it too easy to sue so that today officers are protected by qualified immunity from damages, awards in civil cases, unless there is a prior court decision holding unconstitutional, nearly identical facts, it’s not enough to find a prior case that offers a general principle like that an officer can’t use force against a suspect who is surrendered. You have to find a prior case in which an officer uses a similar type of force against a person who has surrendered and demonstrated that they’ve surrendered in a factually similar way.
Chris Hedges:
Public attorneys are provided for people convicted of a serious crime who can’t afford one, but they’re not provided for those whose constitutional rights have been violated by a police officer. How has this barrier benefited police?
Joanna Schwartz:
Well, it’s very difficult to bring a civil rights lawsuit without a lawyer. People do it and do it regularly, but when you think about trying to overcome a defense like qualified immunity, it’d be very hard to do that without the assistance of a lawyer. And the Supreme Court has made it more difficult for people whose rights have been violated to find lawyers. The Supreme Court has done this through a series of decisions that limit the ability of lawyers to get paid in these cases. Congress in 1976 created a statute which is called Section 1988, which gives prevailing plaintiffs the ability to get their reasonable attorney’s fees. And Congress wanted to enact the statute to make sure that there were enough financial incentives for lawyers to bring cases alleging constitutional violations, even in cases that didn’t have enormous damages awards from which a plaintiff’s attorney could take their cut.
But the Supreme Court has interpreted Section 1988 to allow that when settling a case, a defendant can offer and a plaintiff can agree to waive that entitlement to attorney’s fees and most cases that are successful settle, which ends up meaning that the sort of contingency fee relationship where lawyers are only expecting to get a portion of their client’s recovery is how lawyers are assessing the risks and benefits of taking these kinds of cases. And so cases involving people who have been killed by police, high profile cases that are expected to garner a significant amount in terms of a settlement are cases that are going to be… They’re people who are going to be able to find representation, but cases involving constitutional violations that don’t result in death or other high damages kinds of harms, even if they’re serious constitutional violations and people who are not going to be sympathetic to a judge or jury for any number of reasons are going to have a really difficult time finding lawyers.
And the problem is not only that those clients will not be able to find lawyers, but my research and interviews with lawyers suggests that the challenges of bringing these cases and the ways in which the Supreme Court has interpreted the ability of lawyers to get paid in these cases has led to lawyers deciding not to bring any civil rights cases at all and focus instead on criminal defense cases or personal injury cases, medical malpractice cases where they have an easier time making a living.
Chris Hedges:
Well, you write that the lawyers are reluctant to take cases and these are your words, unless the victims are, likable, credible, and articulate, and that criteria often cancels out the marginalized. Can you talk about that?
Joanna Schwartz:
Absolutely. So those quotes are from lawyers who are thinking about what clients they want to represent and they’re thinking, looking forward to how a judge who has tremendous discretion over these cases or ultimately a jury if the case gets to trial, is going to think about this client and what they deserve. And as a practical reality that may, it does for some lawyers, cut out anyone who has ever been involved in the criminal justice system before. This is not true for every jury across the country, but particularly in more conservative parts of the country.
Lawyers are concerned that jurors are not going to be sympathetic to a person who’s previously spent time in jail or prison. This may cut out people who have mental health challenges, people who are LGBTQ because of just the biases of jurors, black jurors, indigenous jurors, Latino jurors, excuse me, black plaintiffs, indigenous plaintiffs, Latino plaintiffs, homeless plaintiffs. These are all categories of people who are disproportionately the subject of police violence but may also be considered less articulate, sympathetic, et cetera to a jury. And so may have an especially difficult time finding a lawyer.
Chris Hedges:
Terry versus Ohio Supreme Court decision 1968, the court rejects the notion that stops and frisks are wholly outside the protections of the Fourth Amendment, which was ratified to ensure that Congress would not send government officials inside people’s homes without a warrant or probable cause. Then Chief Justice Earl Warren rejected the notion that police needed probable cause. This case was a significant blow as you write in the book to the Fourth Amendment and the protection against intrusive police behavior, Justice William O. Douglas, who was the loan dissent in Terry wrote, “There have been powerful hydraulic pressures throughout our history that bear heavily on the court to water down constitutional guarantees and give the police the upper hand. That hydraulic pressure has probably never been greater than it is today. Yet if the individual is no longer to be sovereign, if the police can pick him up whenever they do not like the cut of his jib, if they can seize and search him in their discretion, we enter a new regime.” Talk about that ruling and what it’s meant.
Joanna Schwartz:
So Terry versus Ohio was a case that assessed the power of police to stop and frisk. And that was something that even back at that time was happening all of the time. It’s certainly in the news today, but it was happening all of the time on the streets of our country. And there was an open debate about what police’s authority was to stop and frisk. It was the view of law enforcement officers that stopping and frisking was not covered, was not protected at all by the Fourth Amendment. The Fourth Amendment protects against unreasonable searches and seizures to the interpretation of law enforcement. This did not fall into either of those categories and to their opponents, to civil rights advocates like the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, stops and frisks should be treated as wholly within the Fourth Amendment, such that you, an officer would need probable cause before doing a stop or frisk.
So Justice Warren split the baby in some ways. He said that this kind of stop and frisk was covered by the Fourth Amendment, but it did not require the full protections of the Fourth Amendment. It did not require probable cause. Instead, it was only a reasonable suspicion that officers needed to have before they stopped and frisked people. And part of this justification, as Justice Douglass suggests in his dissent was related to the fact that the late sixties, it was a time of great upheaval, protests, assassinations, and the like. And so the argument was that police needed this kind of discretion and power in order to keep us all safe.
But the way in which Terry versus Ohio and the reasonable suspicion standard has come to be interpreted and understood, officers have virtually unlimited power to stop and frisk anyone under almost any circumstances. The police can have no reason or an unlawful reason, can stop someone because of their race. But so long as they can come up with a basis that is not unconstitutional after the fact, that is enough for this Supreme Court. And we’ve seen across the country millions and millions of people stopped and frisked, disproportionately people of color. And that power is really the product of the Supreme Court’s decision in Terry. And the subsequent interpretations increasingly expansive interpretations of what reasonable suspicion allows.
Chris Hedges:
You point out in the book that the killings of Michael Brown, Walter Scott, Eric Garner, all began as ordinary police interactions where police were within their constitutional authority to approach, stop and engage, but it culminated with police murder.
Joanna Schwartz:
Yeah. This is a point that has also been powerfully made by my UCLA colleague, Devon Carbado, who points out that, by making the power to stop and frisk as broad as it is, it ends up leading to interactions that can then ultimately culminate in the use of fatal force. Because if the officer exercises their extreme power to stop and frisk and then the person runs away, there is then the power and authority to pursue. Or if a person the appears to the view of the officer to have a weapon, this then authorizes the police under the Fourth Amendment to use fatal force against that person whether or not they actually did have a weapon in their custody. So by making it as easy as it is for officers to stop and frisk and have that initial action interaction, they also pave the way toward more violent and fatal uses of police power over those people.
Chris Hedges:
I teach in the New Jersey prison system through Rutgers and the college degree program, and most of my students are people of color, but very large black men say that because they’re large, and of course George Floyd, Eric Garner, were very big men, that in and of itself, just their size in the eyes of the police constitutes a threat and they have to carry themselves far more carefully on the street because they’re far more susceptible to Draconian forms of force simply because of their size.
Joanna Schwartz:
Yeah, that is not a surprise to me, unfortunately. And the way in which the Supreme Court has interpreted the phrase, unreasonable searches and seizures, is not from the perspective of the person being searched and seized and whether it was unreasonable for them to be subjected to that conduct when they had done nothing wrong, but instead on whether it is reasonable in the eye of the officer in the moment without the benefits of 2020 hindsight under all of the circumstances that appear to them whether force was appropriate under those circumstances. And it is a beyond unfortunate reality that assessment of threat will in some circumstances relate to the plaintiffs, the person, the victims’ race and size.
Chris Hedges:
The Supreme Court has legalized all court forms of warrantless searches. If you could explain how these warrantless searches are legally justified and what effect they’ve had on the public.
Joanna Schwartz:
Well initially, the warrant requirement has been viewed as sort of a hallmark, a key of the Fourth Amendment and of constitutional protections and the need for a warrant before going into a person’s home more than anything which has been described by conservative justices as sort of the pinnacle of constitutional protections. That warrant requirement has been eaten away in part by this reasonable suspicion standard that was first articulated in Terry that we were just speaking about related to stop and frisks reasonable suspicion has come to play an important role in weakening the standards as well for not knocking and announcing presence before entering the home with a warrant and also the allowance of many exceptions to the warrant requirement so that now this notion that you have to have a warrant is being swallowed by exceptions to that rule, all of which, or most of which are justified again by the same notion that you need to give officers maximum leeway in order to protect from crime or to keep people safe.
The whole warrant requirement, the goal of having a warrant, the intent behind it was to have a neutral third party, a judge or magistrate who could sit in and deliberate about whether to allow this most extreme deprivation of privacy and liberty. But that notion and those benefits have been outweighed time and time again by this claim of the need for quick action and shutting out the ability to have that neutral third party come in to assess the circumstances.
Chris Hedges:
Great. That was Professor Joanna Schwartz on her new book, Shielded: How the Police Became Untouchable. I want to thank The Real News Network and its production team, Cameron Granadino, Adam Coley, Dwayne Gladden, David Hebden, and Kayla Rivara. You can find me at chrishedges.substack.com
Speaker 4:
And the Chris Hedges report gets some extra time now with a few minutes of bonus material with Chris and his guest.
Chris Hedges:
So I want to ask you about the role of trial judges in litigation. That’s again, something in your book I didn’t really understand until I read what you wrote.
Joanna Schwartz:
Sure. Trial judges have tremendous power and discretion throughout the litigation process and they have power over whether and how to interpret various legal doctrines that are more familiar to many, whether a constitutional right was violated, whether the officer is entitled to qualified immunity, for example. But they also have tremendous discretion and power to decide less obviously relevant things like whether a request for discovery should be granted whether the party who’s requesting the discovery needs to pay for the production of that discovery, whether experts can be allowed to testify, what the timeframe is for the jury or for a jury trial, who can sit as a juror. And at all of those stages, judges are given tremendous discretion within the rules. There is a lot of mays and cans, not wills and musts, in the legal rules. And those decisions, those very discretionary decisions are extremely difficult to appeal because on appeal courts are supposed to look to see whether the trial court abused their discretion and because their discretion is so vast, it’s very difficult to abuse.
What this ends up meaning is, how a judge sitting in your case sees the world and views the case that you have brought, it’s going to have a great impact on how strong that case ultimately is allowed to be. And I tell the story in the book of a family who were before a judge, very hostile to their case, who carved away in multiple ways at their ability to seek a remedy in the case and ultimately led them to settle on the eve of trial a claim for far less than what you might expect it would have been worth because the value of the case really had been lessened and lessened through the litigation of the claim.
Chris Hedges:
Well, you’re right. Not only do plaintiffs lose trials usually against police, but you also write that they’re often rewarded relatively little when they win. Why is that?
Joanna Schwartz:
Well, it’s difficult to know always why juries award what they award or don’t award what they don’t award because juries aren’t required to explain their rationale and their rulings. But the way in which federal juries, and it’s true in many states as well, but I’m focused here on the federal system, the way that they select jury pools and jurors ends up weeding out a lot of people who would be sympathetic or more likely to be sympathetic to plaintiffs and civil rights cases. Anyone with a felony cannot serve as a federal juror. Juries are limited to people who are registered voters. In order to receive a jury questionnaire, you have to have stable housing. In order to fill the questionnaire out and return it and appear when you are called, you likely need to have the time to do all of those things, which may be more difficult with unstable employment.
And when there has been studies looking at jury pools and how they compare to the community, there is upwards of 30, 40% of black community members, Latino community members who are not allowed to serve as jurors in those cases. And then once you actually are in the jury pool, then the lawyer or judge can ask you a question about whether you’ve ever had a negative experience with a police officer and whether you can remain neutral despite those interactions. So at each of those stages, jurors who might be more likely to see the world from the perspective of the plaintiffs and civil rights cases are weeded out.
Chris Hedges:
Well, I live in Princeton and I’ve done jury duty in Trenton, very poor city, and it’s filled with white suburban people, cherry hill in the area, essentially rendering judgment on poor black people they’ve already largely demonized to begin with.
Joanna Schwartz:
And the goal of a jury is to have the opportunity to have your case heard before your peers, before your community. And clearly our system is not doing a good job of that.
Chris Hedges:
Well, of course most of them have to plea out anyway. They’re coerced to plea out. I think less than 94% don’t get a jury trial.
Joanna Schwartz:
This is a separate and important question, but the ABA has just done a report about this and about the damaging effects of really coerced plea bargaining, which I completely agree is a huge problem that we have.
Chris Hedges:
I just want to close your last chapter as a better way. So let’s look at what you propose to address these injustices.
Joanna Schwartz:
So I do offer a lot of different suggestions. In the last chapter of the book, they’re mainly focused on what you can think of as backend accountability, sort of what to do when police have violated people’s rights, how to make that aspect of the system better, and I should say there are a lot of important things that have been done or are being considered also at the front end of the system, ways to make it less likely that police ever come into contact with the people whose rights they ultimately violate. So cities across the country are considering ending low level traffic stops, considering getting trained mental health professionals involved to respond to people in mental health crisis and limitations on things like no knock warrants and choke holds, and all of those kinds of interactions or limitations along with more investment in other aspects of our social support system, are really important and need to be pursued.
My focus on the book and on the last chapter is really on that backend accountability. And there I think that some of the most promising work is being done by state and local governments. I don’t hold much hope in the Supreme Court or Congress taking the kind of action that we need, but there are state legislatures that are stepping up. Colorado in the weeks after George Floyd was murdered, passed a comprehensive police reform bill. Among other things, it created a state law right to sue for constitutional violations and prohibited the use of qualified immunity as a defense. This is a kind of approach that New Mexico and New York City have also adopted and that other states across the country are considering. There’s also a lot that can be done at the local level. Police departments receive a quarter to a third of many local government’s budgets, and I think more could be demanded of those police departments in exchange.
I think that police departments could be required to gather and analyze information from those lawsuits brought against them with an eye toward preventing similar events from happening in the future. I also think that the money to satisfy settlements and judgments in these cases should be taken from police departments’ budgets. They should have an incentive to reduce these costs and taking the funds out of their budgets would be one way to do that. There’s really work that can be done at every stage of government and even individuals reading the book or listening to this conversation have things that they could do, advocating for their state and local legislatures to take these actions and serving themselves as jurors, for example. I mean, this is a place where a lot of jurors have been weeded out of the pool for reasons that we’ve just described. So if you’re called to serve as a juror, don’t avoid it.
Chris Hedges:
Great. That was Professor Joanna Schwartz on her new book, Shielded.
Activists called the arrests an escalation in the state’s attempt to crush the Stop Cop City movement, with participants being hit with increasingly harsh charges.
“This is a major escalation — they’re arresting those who defend the arrested,” wrote Atlanta organizer Micah Herskind. “The implications of these arrests is that not only can you not protest, but you cannot defend those who are arrested for protesting. There is no first amendment in Atlanta.”
In a statement, Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp (R) spoke as though the organizers and other anti-Cop City activists were already found guilty of their charges from the GBI. He said that he was “proud” to have arrested the “criminals” who he says “facilitated and encouraged domestic terrorism,” referring to terrorism charges against Cop City protesters.
The city of Atlanta is pursuing a $90 million plan backed by both Republicans like Kemp and Democratic Mayor Andre Dickensto build an 85-acre police militarization compound in a forest in the area. If built, Cop City would be the nation’s largest police training compound, and activists say that it would only worsen brutality by local police, as evidenced by the violent response to nonviolent protesters — all while razing a forest to do so.
The Twitter account for the Defend the Atlanta Forest/Stop Cop City movement, pointed out that the Atlanta Solidarity Fund has aided in lawsuits against the Atlanta Police Department over its arrests of a journalist and protesters in the movement. “This is retaliatory,” the group wrote.
BREAKING: Police in the US state of Georgia have arrested three people for the supposed "crime" of raising bail funds to get peaceful "Cop City" protestors out of jail prior to trial.
Activists have also pointed out that the GBI’s statement about the arrest, as well as Kemp’s, seem to suggest that the state is preparing to use Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) charges against the bail fund, which the Atlanta Solidarity Fund has been predicting for months.
The organizers have said that the state appears to be creating a “flimsy narrative” that the group is a criminal organization. So far, over 40 activists have been charged with domestic terrorism for protesting the compound.
The Atlanta Solidarity Fund has been crucial in the fight against Cop City, helping to provide support for protesters hit with bail amounts that have sometimes exceeded $300,000, according to one of the arrested organizers.
“This is targeting of organizers and movements by the police and the state,” said activist Kamau Franklin, with Community Movement Builders, in a statement. “Bail funds have been a part of organizing the Civil Rights movement and labor movement. We will continue to fight back against cop city and the political arrest of our friends and comrades.”
Activists have long maintained that the charges lobbed onto anti-Cop City activists are bogus and that law enforcement are creating false narratives in order to justify the arrests.
Backing up activists’ argument is the fact that police have already been caught lying about one of the most crucial and inhumane actions taken against protesters so far: the killing of Manuel Paez Terán, whose chosen name was Tortuguita, in January. Though police claimed that Tortuguita shot first, a DeKalb County autopsy found that there was no gunpowder residue on Tortuguita’s hands when police shot them 57 times, killing them.
While the underlying logic of the cash bail system in the US may sound convincing on paper, in practice it has become a means of denying justice to, and destroying the lives of, people who have not even been convicted of a crime. “The US Constitution prohibits ‘excessive bail’” The Bail Project notes on their website. “Excessive bail forces people to stay in jail—even though they’ve not been convicted of anything. Unfortunately, today judges routinely set bail amounts that exceed what most people can afford. The result? Jails are full of people waiting for trial. They are presumed innocent on paper, but in practice, they are being held for weeks, months, and sometimes years as they wait for trial.” David Gaspar, CEO of The Bail Project, joins Mansa Musa on Rattling the Bars to talk about how cash bail creates a two-tier system of justice that punishes people for the “crime” of being poor—and what we can do about it.
David Gaspar is the Chief Executive Officer of The Bail Project, a nonprofit organization that provides free bail assistance to those in need and advocates for better, more humane pretrial policies. A formerly incarcerated individual directly affected by the cash bail system, Mr. Gaspar earned his GED and bachelor’s degree and studied law while in prison, won his appeal, and was released 11 years early.
Studio Production: David Hebden Post-Production: Cameron Granadino
Transcript
Mansa Musa: Welcome to this edition of Rattling the Bars. I’m Mansa Musa. In this country, he’s innocent or she’s innocent until proven guilty. In this society and our judicial system, this right very rarely gets acknowledged. Mainly when you get arrested and you can’t afford to get out because of excessive bail. An excessive bail might be in the form of the person’s inability to pay the bail. The bail might not be excessive for Donald Trump, the bail might not be excessive for Bernie Madoff, but the bail for the average person would be excessive. Here to talk about cash bail and all things relative to bail reform is David Gaspar of The Bail Project. Welcome, David.
David Gaspar: All right. Thank you for having me.
Mansa Musa: Tell our audience a little bit about yourself.
David Gaspar: I’m currently the CEO of The Bail Project. It’s a national not-for-profit that pays the cash bail on behalf of individuals in a position of need. I am somebody who has been system-impacted. At the age of 22 years old, I got sentenced to 21 years in prison. In large part, I received that sentence as a plea bargain, not understanding what my rights were, not being able to afford bail, and feeling the pressures of the system weighing down on myself as well as my family.
I ended up going to prison and getting my education. I wrote and filed my own appeal and ended up giving the state back 11 years of the 21-year sentence they gave me. But what was most surprising and hurtful to me was that when I went back for resentencing, my lawyer at that time said I had already done five years more than I should have ever done. And when I think about that and about the impact bail had on my life, and my inability to advocate for my innocence or a just sentence, it empowered me and put a fire inside of me that made me want to be part of this work now.
Mansa Musa: Well, tell us about The Bail Project. Give us an overview of what The Bail Project is and how it operates before we go into some of the aspects of cash bail.
David Gaspar: Yeah. The starting point is somebody finding themselves in the situation of needing assistance with bail. So this is somebody who is sitting in county jail and has not yet been convicted of anything. The only thing preventing them from actually having the freedom of being reunited with their family, as well as their ability to continue living their life, is the fact that they don’t have enough money in their pocket or enough money in their bank account.
And so a loved one on their behalf – Could be a wife, partner, could be a child – Will reach out to us and they’ll say, hey, we have a loved one that is currently sitting in jail and could require your help. And then we’ll reach out to the individual. We’ll schedule what we call an interview, but it’s our opportunity to talk to them directly. And if we feel like we have the opportunity and the ability to be able to support them post release, then we’ll go ahead and post their bond and then support them and return them to court successfully.
Mansa Musa: I opened up earlier talking about how in this country, everybody has a right to bail and to not be given an excessive bail. Talk about how this cash bail draconian system got to where it’s at right now in terms of creating a roadblock for people being able to get out for no reason other than not having the ability to pay 10%. I was in the county jail, and I recall a guy came in there, and he had a $1,000 bail, and he couldn’t pay the 10%. So what he did was wound up staying in the detention center for a year, and when he went back, the judge gave him time served. Talk about that.
David Gaspar: So when we’re talking about bail, it’s important to ground that. This is what we see in the Constitution of the US. The protection against excessive bail is the language, but we also have the right to due process, the right to be able to face our accusers, and the right to a speedy trial. And all of these rights, these principles that we stand on as a nation, they look and sound great on paper. It’s when we get to practice that we see this breakdown and what we see on TV also misinforms the public aspect. ‘Cause on TV it’s more aligned with what we see on paper. It’s a script for a narrative for a television show versus the reality that we live in.
And so what The Bail Project’s work is, is first proving that money is the actual driver that brings people back to court. And we’ve been able to do that successfully. 92% of the people that we bail out return to court. So they’re coming back, they don’t have any money in the game, they have no personal interest other than wanting to put this to rest, put closure to it, and be able to move forward in life. And there was an article that came out last year that said more than half of our American population doesn’t even have $500 in their bank account for an emergency. So when you stop and think about how they don’t even have $500 for an emergency, now you’re going to give them a $10,000 bond. You’re going to give them a $15,000 bond. Even if it was a $500 bond, what you’re doing is depleting that household of any means that they have to respond to an emergency.
But that’s for the bond itself. What about the days that they lost at work, what about the potential of them losing their job? What about the potential of them losing their children, their housing, and the ability to make their next car payment? When you hold somebody in jail each and every passing day, you are harming that individual and the family unit they’re part of. And so when we talk about the harms, when we talk about the need that’s there, protecting ourselves against excessive bail is to keep our family units intact, to keep our communities whole, and to allow our actual nation to succeed. When we start to tear that apart, what ends up happening is we cannibalize our communities, those who are the backbone, the Constitution, the preamble, “We the People –”
Well, which people are we talking about? Those with money that benefit from these systems or those without that are harmed by them? And so at the end of the day what we’re trying to do is level that playing field. We’re trying to make money not be the issue that’s standing between somebody and their freedom and allowing them to go home, keep their life as intact as possible, and support them with court reminders and transportation assistance so that they can successfully return to court and put closure to that bad moment of their life.
Mansa Musa: And you made a good observation earlier about the assumption of innocence, and then inherent in that right is the presumption that you have a right to a speedy trial. You have a right to confront your accuser. Now, if all things are perfect – And we know in Law and Order all things are perfect on TV – We know on every TV show where it’s the law and some kind of disorder, then we know that it’s a perfect scenario. But in the real world, we know it’s not. And the fact that a person has a right to a speedy trial when they’re first arrested, they’re offered this right.
Okay, I want a speedy trial. Okay, now you’re not going to give me a bond. Okay, you’re not going to give me a bond and you’re not going to give me a speedy trial. And then what you’re going to do is you’re going to give me a public defender ’cause I can’t afford to get a bond, I can’t afford an attorney. You give me a public defender and now my speedy trial is getting waived because it’s being postponed because they can’t find my accuser. Or they’re playing the waiting game until they get me to a point where I can’t get bail, I can’t get a speedy trial. The only thing I can get is the offer they put on the table. And that’s the plea bargain. And this is premeditated on the part of the state?
David Gaspar: I personally can’t go as far as to say that’s premeditated. What I can say is that we have a system that has been operating like this for decades. So it’s not unknown to people. It’s not one of those things where, wow, I wish I would’ve known that so I could have done something about it. We know this is how it works, we know this is how it moves. And going to the rights you were naming: being able to stand in a courtroom for your bail hearing and have an opportunity to make your case isn’t even afforded to everybody upon incarceration.
You walk in there and sometimes it’s already predetermined and you’re hearing the outcome for the first time. And what we want to do as The Bail Project is create a bail hearing where the defense has an opportunity to put forth their case, the state has the opportunity to put forth its case and there is a weighed decision point that the judge makes on record that can be evaluated. That’s what we all believe is happening anyway, so why are we not moving in that direction? But to get back to your question, if we know it’s not working for the people and we understand that there’s significant harm that’s being caused by it, there is a valid question that should be asked, and that’s why do we allow it to persist?
Mansa Musa: That’s right, that’s right. And, let’s flesh that out about that process, ’cause what you said, that’s the law. This is not a theory, this is supposed to be what takes place. The purpose of a bail hearing is to determine whether or not the person should be released on bail. Now, inherent in that concept – And you can weigh in on this when you want – Inherent in that concept is, the state put on evidence and information as to why bail should not be granted. That’s when there’s no bail. Or, why an excessive bail should be granted or why the state is not opposing being released on recon. The defendant is allowed to present information as to, one, why they’re a good candidate to be released on a low bail, and two, the damage that’s going to be done if they remain in this environment. All of these factors are supposed to be taken into account, am I correct?
David Gaspar: Yes. Yeah, you are.
Mansa Musa: Then the question becomes, why is this going on? And David, I wanted you to flesh this out because we’re not talking about, when we say over 2,000 people in the detention center in Cook County in Chicago, we’re not talking about 2,000 people that have a capital offense. We’re not talking about 2,000 people that are a flight risk. We’re not talking about 2,000 people that are recidivated. We’re talking about people that got caught in a situation that ultimately might result in their innocence, might result in exoneration. But in between then and there, they’re not given the opportunity to get the courts, going back to what you say, being back inside. Why is this, why are we allowing it to exist?
David Gaspar: Yeah, it’s a great question. I’ll try to unpack that a little bit, but I’ll go back to your point. We have over half a million people in our jails across the nation, and more than half of them are there without a conviction. So they’re there for the reasons that you said; they simply can’t afford the money. But what’s important for people to understand as well is that those three areas: being held without bond, being released with bond, and being released without bond, are the three options that a judge has in front of them. But two of them are release, so even though the bond is the triggering factor, the judge has determined that this person is safe to go back into society; this person is, to what they have in front of them, not going to cause any harm. That’s the judge’s decision that they’ve made.
Now, when we talk about the money, why does money need to be the factor when the money disproportionately impacts those within a poverty level? We know that people of color are the most impacted by these decisions, so why do we allow that persistence in that way? And a lot of it goes back to what is easy. When we think about human nature, change is difficult for people. So if we’ve already got a process in place, unless we find an easier way to get people to engage, they’re going to stand their ground on where they are. But there’s something else that we already know: bonds, and bail in general, are about money.
And so we have to ask ourselves, who’s benefiting, who’s profiting at the end of the day? And we can say there’s a whole magnitude or multitude of individuals that benefit from this. But what cannot be lost at any given point in time is that we’re not talking about a few million dollars here and there. We’re talking multibillion-dollar profits being made from keeping people incarcerated pretrial. Once again, people that have not been convicted of anything, people that the judge has determined that, if they’ve got the money, they’re perfectly fine to go back into society.
So we’re not talking about releasing dangerous people. The judge has it within their discretion, if they deem somebody to be dangerous, a threat to the community, they can hold them without bail. They can keep them. The decision point is why is the money still a factor if you’ve already determined this person is eligible for release as long as they’ve got the right amount of money in their pocket? Now we have to ask, well who’s benefiting from this? Who’s potentially profiting from that decision?
Mansa Musa: And on that point, as we wrap up, we know that the prison-industrial complex, mass incarceration, which is a new form of slavery, is profitable. So all hands are on deck when it comes to fueling it, we know the county jails have the fuel. In the few minutes that we’ve got left, let’s talk about bail reform. Where are we in terms of our national movement for bail reform? ‘Cause I’ve been in some spaces where they have made some astronomical progress in certain states, in certain cities. Where are we in terms of having a national movement for bail reform? Because as you said, the effect that it has is people lose their jobs, people lose their houses, people lose their medical, people lose their lives. So where are we in terms of bail reform?
David Gaspar: Yeah, great question. First I’ll start with, you mentioned the prison-industrial complex. Pretrial jail populations being where they are and the impact you named earlier, how people had taken plea bargains to put an end to it, to be able to move forward, is one of the leading factors to the prison population as we see it today. So it’s one of the leading drivers. If we could fix that on the front end, we wouldn’t see all this on the back end. With that said, where’s bail reform?
During these more recent election cycles, we saw the phrase “bail reform” being weaponized. And it confused people as to, what does that mean? What is bail reform and how does that impact me? And we saw them make a close association to the violence, all of the rise in violence that’s happening throughout our nation. And there’s no empirical evidence to say that there is a correlation between bail reform and not. As you said, there are few places that have put forth any meaningful bail reform. But we see the violence that people are pointing to happening in areas where bail reform has not even been part of the conversation, part of the change that could have even potentially contributed to that. So there’s a lot of work that needs to be done to dispel the misinformation that was spread during that period.
Now, what is bail reform and where are we today? Bail reform is about answering the question, is it necessary? Does it serve a purpose in our society today? And we’ve been able to prove that it has no place. Money is not what’s bringing people back to court. Money is not what’s preventing people from being a flight risk. What money’s doing is keeping people incarcerated unnecessarily and causing additional harm to their life. That, we have been able to prove. What taking the umbrella of bail reform has also done is stopped us from talking about specific issues that have led to our jail populations growing: mental health and substance mistreatment. These are things that have been diagnosed as actual medical conditions.
Why are we treating them with a cell? Why are we locking people in a concrete box and telling them their mental health needs to get better on its own for them to be successful, instead of giving them medical attention? Why are we saying that locking you in this box, and the abstinence, or us keeping you away from whatever your addiction is, is going to make you better? Let’s treat those the way that they need to be treated. And first and foremost, let’s treat them with respect by allowing them space and conversation and not bunching them underneath the bail reform umbrella. Then we could talk about homelessness, poverty. These are conditions that people live with. These aren’t choices. Somebody didn’t wake up this morning and say, I feel like I’m going to be broke today. Let’s look at what their opportunities are and how we can support them in being successful in landing, not a job, but a meaningful job that’s going to uplift them and their family unit.
Let’s take somebody who’s homeless and figure out how we get them the help they need so they’re no longer on the streets and in need of assistance. And then once again, let’s give those individuals that have mental health and substance abuse challenges the medical attention they deserve. Then we can start to talk about, well hold up, we’ve already released half the jail population anyways by addressing the underlying causes that led somebody to that potential interaction with law enforcement. And if we can even solve those, we can have a much more honest conversation about what bail reform means.
Mansa Musa: Thank you, man. Look, there you have it, The Real News. We are criminalizing poverty. It’s poverty that’s being criminalized and not criminal activity as we know it. And we ask that our listeners and our viewers take note of this. We’re not talking about bail reform – We’re talking about reforming a society that penalizes and criminalizes poverty. And if they change the poverty paradigm, then we won’t have to be having a conversation about the money ’cause we already know it’s not the money that’s the cause of people not coming back to court. It’s not the money that causes people to remain in prison; it’s poverty and poverty alone. Thank you, David. We appreciate you coming on. How can we get in touch with you? How can our viewers and listeners get in touch with you?
David Gaspar: So you can go to bailproject.org. That is our website, and you can reach out to us today.
Mansa Musa: All right. And we remind our listeners and our viewers to continue to support Rattling the Bars and The Real News. You only get this kind of information from Rattling the Bars on The Real News. You’re not going to get a David on NBC or CBS or Fox News. You’re not going to get a David talking about poverty and how poverty is being used, is being criminalized. You’re not going to get this anywhere but here. And we ask that you continue to support this network and continue to support Rattling the Bars. Thank you very much, David.
When West Virginia resident Caleb Dial found himself in handcuffs in the back of a police car in August 2021, his mind focused on a single question: “What had I done wrong?”
“If I could use one word that did an inkling of justice as to how it made me feel, I would choose the word ‘surreal,’” Dial told The Real News. Just minutes before his arrest, Dial had actually called police himself after a dispute with his father became heated. But when an officer from the small town of Milton arrived, the first thing he did was ask Dial to turn around so he could place him in handcuffs.
Dial calmly complied. However, the longer he sat in the back of the squad car, the more his initial complacency turned to quiet panic. The officer had explained the cuffs were only for his safety. If that were true, why was he now sitting in the car like a suspect? What crime had he committed? Again, what had he done wrong?
“The string of events that had occurred on that one ‘fateful’ evening left me so bewildered [and] wondering how I went from calling them for non-emergency assistance to sitting in jail with a battered face, looking at upwards of nine years in prison,” he said. That query was soon answered in a series of charges that stunned him.
Milton police officer Daniel Higgenbotham drove Dial to the station. There he was told he had assaulted Higgenbotham, been disorderly, and tried to escape. The officer wrote in the statement of probable cause that Dial was aggressive and protesting loudly. He had allegedly cursed at the officer and acted “agitated” while Higgenbotham struggled to force him into the car.
It was a narrative Dial knew to be false. That arrest was the start of a cascading series of events that would turn into a three-year ordeal for the 29-year-old occasional musician, propelling him into a fight to clear his name, and—more importantly—a struggle to heal from the wounds inflicted by what his lawsuit alleges was a false arrest. “That evening led to a downward spiral so fast that not even F5-rated tornadoes could spiral that fast,” he said.
Dial’s story is also a story of perseverance. Three years later, in early May 2023, the MIlton police department settled a federal civil rights lawsuit with Dial. He describes the agreement, which includes compensation for injuries he suffered during the arrest, as fair, even though Higgenbotham remains on the force and the town did not admit to any wrongdoing. For Dial, the settlement has afforded a sense of closure and a deeply personal victory against the overwhelming power of local law enforcement. “I had lost employment, I lost a few friends,” he recounted. “The worst part was I wasn’t able to talk about the case.”
But it’s also a cautionary tale of how a single arrest can wreak havoc on a person’s life even if they’re innocent, and in Dial’s case, an ordeal that could have been worse if not for the presence of a Ring camera.
First there were the rumors, then a ring camera
Shortly after his arrest, the Milton police department shared Dial’s mugshot on the department’s Facebook page. The post included the questionable allegations contained in the statement of probable cause. Unfortunately, the sloppily composed statement (which has since been taken down) alluded to an alleged domestic assault. Since the Facebook page is shared widely among Milton residents, friends and neighbors began to accost Dial and his family with the accusation he had beaten a woman.
“I still had many occurrences where I was being questioned about ‘hitting some woman,’ etc.” he told The Real News. “Even some of my family members were harassed about it because the way the post was worded made it sound like they were showing up for domestic violence, which was not the case.” Worse yet, Dial found himself sitting in the Western Regional Jail for several days, where he suffered a seizure. When he finally made bail, he realized that the mainstream media had already branded him a criminal, before an iota of evidence could be offered in his defense.
Local television station WCHS posted a story accusing Dial of all the charges outlined in the statement of probable cause, accompanied by the unflattering mugshot. “There’s a saying that at times social conviction can be just as bad as criminal conviction,” Dial said in response to the post.
The combination of these accusations made for a turbulent few years for Dial. The whispering about his domestic violence charges continued. Due to court appearances and the local television report he lost his job at an inpatient rehab house. Even more disturbing, the demons that had haunted him throughout his previous struggle with addiction reappeared, sending him into a spiral of heavy drinking that nearly cost him his life. “I ended up attending treatment for alcoholism which was tremendously exacerbated by the peripheral effects that were either directly or indirectly related to everything from that evening,” he said. “On the outside it doesn’t sound like much, but this only scratches the surface.”
Fortunately for Dial, not all the forces of fate were aligned against him: his parents’ house had a Ring camera, and the video of his arrest depicted an entirely different version of events than the statement of charges, signed under oath, by Higginbotham.
The doorbell camera shows Dial calmly complying with Higginbotham as the officer places him in handcuffs. However, Higginbotham wrote in his statement of probable cause: “[Dial] became very agitated and kept on raising his voice at me. I asked him several times to calm down and then decided to detain him for officer safety.”
Furthermore, Higginbotham wrote, “Dial became very irate and pushed me with his shoulder and tried to pull away from me. I asked him to calm down, quit yelling, and get into the cruiser. He got very aggressive once again and was trying to pull away. I asked one more time and then assisted him into my cruiser.”
Again, doorbell camera footage appears to contradict the officer’s sworn statement. At the beginning of the interaction, the camera audio reveals that Dial calls Higginbotham “sir,” and when asked to turn around to be cuffed, Dial does so without conflict. The footage then shows Dial calmly walking towards the cruiser and Higginbotham putting him in the back seat without incident.
After Dial’s lawyer submitted the Ring video as evidence, prosecutors quietly dropped the charges. But the story about his alleged crimes remained, and even though Dial called WCHS to have the story updated or retracted, they, too, refused to delete the post describing now disproven crimes until well after the damage had been done. By Dial’s estimate, the post remained up on the WCHS website for two years before it was ultimately removed. Their refusal to issue any timely correction or retraction led Dial to make the decision to fight back against the false and damaging narrative that had been spread throughout his community. That meant reaching out to independent journalists.
Fighting back against a local political economy forged by law enforcement
After The Real News produced a story on Dial’s arrest, he found a lawyer: a legal advocate that he says was not influenced by the insular politics and interconnected relationships that make it difficult to find representation in rural West Virginia. “It took many months for me to be able to obtain an attorney who is seriously a true individual to his soul. Not only did he obtain some form of recourse, but he also stood up for me quite a bit,” Dial said. That attorney, Tyler Haslam, told The Real News the settlement had been reached and that the case had been closed. A lawyer representing the police department did not return a phone call or email seeking comment.
The lawsuit accused the Milton police department of false imprisonment, unlawful arrest, and intentional infliction of harm, and outlined allegations that the department failed to properly train officers to practice constitutionally sound policing. That problem was highlighted in a Police Accountability Report investigation, which found that the town had written hundreds of tickets and assessed hundreds of thousands of dollars in court fines for a town of roughly 2,500 people—all while nearly doubling police spending since 2014. It’s a trend that continues today.
The latest budget estimates posted by the town show the city billed $500,000 in court costs and fines in the fiscal year 2023, a slight decrease from the previous fiscal year. Despite the recent decrease, the amount of fines has almost doubled in the past decade; the town assessed $275,000 in court fees and tickets in 2014. This uptick in policing has coincided with a substantial increase in the police budget. Since 2014 the police budget has more than doubled, from roughly $528,000 in 2014 to a planned expenditure of $1,333,807 in 2023.
For Dial, his primary focus now is not Milton PD, but healing, and the hope that his battle to clear his name will allow him to rebuild a life that was thrown into turmoil by a pair of handcuffs. For now, the struggle is about righting the wrongs, both for him and the town itself.
“The weight of the world has been lifted off of my shoulders. All I want to do is live a quiet life with my daughter, and for the department to restructure their training,” Dial said.
Editor’s note: At 00:56, host Mansa Musa misspeaks when quoting a report and says that 55 million people are in the system of mass incarceration; the correct number is 5.5 million.
Over 1.9 million people are incarcerated in the US today, and even greater 5.5 million people are subjected to the wide-ranging system of mass punishment from parole, probation, and beyond. One organization, JustLeadershipUSA, seeks to tackle the prison system by building leaders among formerly incarcerated people, and fighting for change from the local level up. JustLeadershipUSA President and CEO DeAnna Hoskins joins Rattling the Bars to explain the work of her organization and how it seeks to bring about to change.
DeAnna Hoskins has been at the helm of JLUSA as the President and CEO of JustLeadershipUSA (JLUSA) since 2018. A nationally recognized leader and dynamic public speaker, Ms. Hoskins has been committed to the movement for racial and social justice, working alongside those most impacted by marginalization for over two decades.
Studio Production: David Hebden Post-Production: Cameron Granadino
Transcript
Mansa Musa: Welcome to this edition of Rattling the Bars. I’m your host, Mansa Musa. In an essay called Toward the United Front, George Jackson saw that the sheer size of the prison population made it ripe for mobilizing prisons into a non-sectarian united front, with the goal of abolishing the prison-industrial complex, among other things. Since that essay, the prison-industrial complex has grown. Today, over 1.9 million people are behind bars in the US. In a recent report by the Prison Policy Initiative entitled Punishment Beyond Prisons 2023: Incarceration and Supervision by State, [because of] the overuse of probation and parole, along with mass incarceration, over 5.5 million people are in the system of mass punishment and under their control in some shape, form, or fashion. Joining me today to talk about how JustLeadershipUSA sees these numbers – And what they are doing with them – Is DeAnna Hoskins, president and CEO of JustLeadershipUSA. Welcome, DeAnna.
DeAnna Hoskins: Thank you. Thank you.
Mansa Musa: Tell our Rattling the Bars [viewers] a little bit about yourself please.
DeAnna Hoskins: I’m DeAnna Hoskins, president and CEO of JustLeadershipUSA. I’ve been at the helm of the organization since 2018. I actually was a leader who went through the training program in 2016. I’m an individual who’s been impacted by the criminal justice system – Formerly incarcerated – That has been able to break through some of those glass ceilings or places they told us we couldn’t go. Places and spaces. Prior to coming to JustLeadershipUSA, I served under the Obama administration as a senior policy advisor, and I managed all of the federal government’s investment in corrections and reentry, which included the Second Chance Portfolio, the National Reentry Resource Center, Collateral Consequences of Criminal Convictions, and Children of Incarcerated Parents.
I’ve been in this field for about 25 years. I worked in my hometown county government as director of re-entry, establishing re-entry perspectives around that area and also within the state of Indiana. As most people will say, who goes back? Who’s incarcerated and goes back and works in the correctional system? I actually worked as a unit manager at the state of Indiana’s Pendleton Correctional Facility. So I’ve not only been on the inside, I’ve actually come out and worked in the administrative and service side of this as well.
Mansa Musa: Very well-put. And you heard me set this up, George Jackson made this observation. And when he made this observation, he made the observation about the need to build, to utilize the prison population to create a non-sectarian organization for the purpose of abolishing prison and organizing around social change. Now, JustLeadershipUSA has a four-year plan for building local power and dismantling oppressive systems. Tell our viewers and listeners how this came about. How did this four-year plan come about?
DeAnna Hoskins: So one of the things, – Again, having worked in all levels of government, the inside of government from the state, local, and federal government – one of the biggest things that I realized was, anything that is moved from local up to federal almost forces the federal hand to change. Anything that comes from the federal government and rolls down always gets attacked and addressed by the new administration.
And I’ll give you some examples: Same-sex marriage came from the states up to the federal government. Forced their hands. We’re looking at the same with legalized marijuana. It’s rolling from the states, forcing the government’s hand. But things that come out of the government, such as what they titled Obamacare, every time a new administration comes in, they attack anything that comes out that benefits oppressed and marginalized communities. So one of the things we realized was that the oppressive policies that are hindering us are hindering us at the ground level. We don’t need the federal government to try to fix things for us around policies, because – I’m going to be honest with you and one of the things about me, I’m very authentic – Policy and legislation will never free Black people.
Mansa Musa: Come on.
DeAnna Hoskins: A lot of times we’ve got to talk about how we even got here to incarceration and mass incarceration. It’s the legacy of slavery. At the abolishment of slavery, it still was the way to utilize free labor with debtor’s prison and different things of that nature. So when you look at the misdemeanor system, it was created as a way to still incarcerate the bodies to provide free labor. So for me, it’s about understanding my history of how we got here, if I’m going to try to dismantle it. And the only way you can dismantle anything, nothing changes until those most oppressed rise up into power to change it. Every discipline in this country – Whether it’s mental health, substance abuse, veterans, women’s services – Uses people who are directly impacted by the issue they’re addressing.
Mansa Musa: That’s right.
DeAnna Hoskins: The criminal justice system has been the only system that is reluctant to utilize the voices and power of the people that have been incarcerated to help change and address the system. And we’re basically here saying, we ain’t asking for permission anymore, we’ll apologize later.
Mansa Musa: Right there, let’s unpack that. Because I did 48 years in prison, and the entire time I was in prison – Both of us can agree to this – It stands to reason that those on the other side would be more than eager to rattle the bars, more than eager to raise their voices. And in this regard, JustLeadershipUSA is saying that y’all are hanging y’all hats on those that are impacted: those that are locked up, those that are locked out, those that are on parole and probation. That y’all are hanging y’all hats on them and this class of underserved people to be the voice and the face of JustLeadershipUSA.
DeAnna Hoskins: Yes.
Mansa Musa: How do you get them to respond? Because, you’ve got a myriad of things that are going on with people coming out: I ain’t got no place to stay, I ain’t got no job. Baby mama drama. Trying to get back with my kids, trying to link back up with my family. So it’s a myriad of problems going on. What makes you feel so emboldened by this approach?
DeAnna Hoskins: One of the things is, we work with organizations typically led by individuals who’ve been directly impacted across the country to help with those immediate needs. What we don’t do is actually exploit people and say, we’re going to put you on the frontline. We want you to use your voice. No, we’re not going to do that. If you interact with us when you first come home, how do we connect you locally so you can be together? Because you have to be together if you’re going to stand for the people you left behind.
So we don’t even accept a person into our leadership training unless they’ve had three years post-incarceration. But that doesn’t mean we don’t interact and engage with you and try to connect you to what you need with the people and the leaders we have. So one of the things that I want to talk about – Something you said about the myriad of things going on – That’s one of the reasons we’re empowering them, is because the system is focusing on, they say, recidivism reduction. We want to make sure you get out and stay out, but you won’t be focusing on it from the system being successful, not the individual.
Mansa Musa: That’s right.
DeAnna Hoskins: I can be homeless and not go back to prison. I can use drugs and not go back to prison. Does that mean the person is successful, or is the system successful because I didn’t go back to prison? So how do we even hold the system accountable with discriminatory practices that they have? Which is why this JustUS Coordinating Council is important: because it doesn’t take legislation. It actually takes rulemaking to take the word “discretion” out of the housing: a definition of who’s homeless and who has access to housing.
How can you deny us a basic human need that every human on this earth needs? Whether you have a criminal background or not. You have stated that housing is a basic human need. That we got 600,000 people coming out every year that can be blocked from a basic human need and you say, go be successful? Hell, you ain’t even supplied me with the foundation. But any individual needs to be successful, and you allow the discrimination in your policies around giving discretion to local housing authorities to say who can come in and who can’t.
Mansa Musa: I noticed that one of the things I found enlightening in regard to this organization is the policy impact. I work for a group called Voice for a Second Chance, and the supervisor always says, if you’re sitting around the table and it’s not impacting policy, like Malcolm said, don’t call me a diner because I’m sitting there with a plate. I’m sitting around a table.
But let’s talk about policy. Going back to your point, we can be in this space, and you can have me sitting at the table with an empty plate, and I really think I’m a diner. Not so much because I have an empty plate, but because you told me I’m getting ready to eat and I ain’t got nothing on my plate yet. Because you gave me this false narrative. So we know we are confronted with that. How do y’all educate people to understand policy impact and policy versus getting a feel-good response?
DeAnna Hoskins: Right there. I am so happy you asked, because that was one of the biggest challenges when we said we were going to do this. We walked in knowing not only do we have to impact and empower people to build this table, we have to educate them. What I found out, a lot of people, when you say “advocate” or “advocacy,” they think of a t-shirt and a bullhorn. And I’m like, no, this is an inside-out game. One of the things I like to tell people, if you serve time, that means you committed a crime. What I need you to know is, all your skills that were in that lifestyle were not liabilities. I need you to understand some of them are transferable skills out on the road, and you have to utilize that. Part of that is – I use drugs and I tell people all the time that I didn’t wake up one day and know how to use drugs or how to cook up the product that I was using – Somebody taught me.
Mansa Musa: That’s right.
DeAnna Hoskins: If you’re going to work in this lane, you have to be willing to be taught the same way you were willing to be taught in the streets: find somebody. You have to have a mentor, you have to be educated. Because the big thing is, people power equals change, and the best thing that they do to break us apart is if you’re not knowledgeable of what you’re sitting at the table for. The respect comes when you sit at the table with the elected officials, or other people who are making a policy, and you shut them down better on their policies than they can.
Mansa Musa: Let me ask you this. How do you get around the poverty pimps? The poverty pimps are the ones that are in the space we’re dealing with that are grant-chasing. You’re educating me and I acquired these leadership skills and I’m going over here and I’m in an environment where they don’t have A, B, C, D, E, F, G. JustLeadershipUSA, help me get A, B, C, D, E, F, G so I can keep the mission going. Then when I get the return, I keep the money, and the people that’s supposed to get what they are supposed to get don’t get what they get. Get what they always got: nothing.
DeAnna Hoskins: Oh my god. That has always been the thirst of it. JustLeadershipUSA is the training part. We do our training, we raise our funds. We train you to be able to communicate, to go after your own funding for your own organization. Our coordinating council is open to the 70 million of us who have been impacted, to be educated on how – Even from federal money that rose to your state – To go push at your state where that money is and how it ain’t coming to our communities when it’s supposed to be designed.
Mansa Musa: Yeah, that’s right.
DeAnna Hoskins: But, you’re right. How do we stop people from having their own agenda? People are always going to have their own agenda. Our hope is that the JCC stands within itself, because if you start talking about policy, I’m not chasing the grants. So here’s how I break this down, having worked in government. I break it down into games: chess is legislation, that’s the long game; checkers are grassroots that should grab and get funding and all that.
And what I share with them, one of the things I’m going to share with you all, you all are doing criminal justice reform work. Poverty pimping on that level, you’re only in the department of justice and DOL’s pocket. That’s like going to an amusement park and only enjoying a water slide. You ain’t even figured out all of the money in the federal that you can get. So you don’t even know how to play this game for real. That’s why it is so scarce, because they’ve pigeonholed us to one department around funding.
Do you know how much money the Department of Transportation puts out across this country every year to fix roadways and bridges? If they simply adopted a Section 3 process like HUD that says, any federal dollars that roll into your state or your city, 35% of the workforce has to come from the most impoverished zip codes in your area. Do you know the game changer that would be in certain cities? My city is getting ready to overhaul a bridge that is going to cost $20 million.
Mansa Musa: Everywhere you see it’s a brick. One of the presidents used the term “mortar and shovel” as an indication of how the money is going to flow. But let’s talk about that, because that’s a good observation. And I know from experience, all of us had life sentences, so all of us that got out with the exception of maybe two or three out of hundreds were recidivated. Everybody else, they hit the ground running and they have been doing remarkable work in their regard. So how do we coalesce with all of these elements throughout the country that’s like that? In Kansas, in California, in the South, in Virginia, in Maryland. How do y’all go about coalescing with them?
DeAnna Hoskins: So that’s our goal to start building, taking our leaders we have now and saying, oh you’re in Maryland, you’re in Michigan, you’re in Chicago, you’re in Illinois. Now we want to come in and help you build a coalition in your state. Then all of us come together twice a year in DC and show up, because people power equals people. But if you’re working on something in DC and you say, DeAnna, I’m working on this, this needs to be changed in DC. If there’s 70 million of us with a record and we got 10% of that to participate with us – And we all support your issue by sending in letters, signing onto your legislation, whatever you’re doing – That shows you’ve got power behind you, and no matter what state you’re in, that this is an issue. And that’s what we’ve never shown: formerly incarcerated people have been exploited for everybody else’s –
Mansa Musa: That’s right.
DeAnna Hoskins: …People write a bill. Oh, we need the formerly incarcerated to be deleted. They give them a $10,000 check, and they show up. And who am I to tell you not to keep –
Mansa Musa: That’s right. Come on money, come on, come on.
DeAnna Hoskins: …You can make some good money. Therefore you’re still being exploited, but when they get to Congress and they start redlining it, we don’t have a say to say, we got carved out of there. I’ll give you an example. The First Step Act was great for whoever didn’t understand legislation. It was retroactive in the crack cocaine disparity, it was saying you couldn’t over-incarcerate certain people. But here’s what y’all didn’t catch that we came out and said: it legislated a risk assessment tool that had already been racially determined, racially biased.
Mansa Musa: I know that, I know that. Come on.
DeAnna Hoskins: Black people will never score low on a risk assessment, because our communities are over-policed and our schools have more police than counselors.Then y’all didn’t even pay attention when I said, how are you going to say the only people eligible for the crack cocaine retroactive have to be the people who did not have a weapon involved? Well in the hood, drugs and guns started going together like peanut butter and jelly.
Mansa Musa: Yeah, come on.
DeAnna Hoskins: You’re not a drug dealer without a weapon. Whether you used it or not. Whether you brandished it, whether the clip was in it. Y’all allowed them to exclude us because why? Because y’all didn’t have no power. And then y’all didn’t understand how this plays out in our communities. Let’s be honest, the ‘94 Crime Bill was a good policy on paper. Nobody knew how it was going to play out in communities.
Mansa Musa: That’s right.
DeAnna Hoskins: What we’re saying is, you don’t get to push legislation without our voices. As a matter of fact, I don’t want to ask for permission to join your bill. We’re going to build our own table to have enough power that when they push your bill back they say, formerly incarcerated can’t participate in the legalization of marijuana because they’ve got a felony. How are you going to create a policy that white men are gonna get rich off for what we’ve been going to jail for for years, and we can’t even partake in it? We’ll shut this bill down, and if not, we’ve got enough people power to vote you out of office.
Mansa Musa: All right, so as we wrap up, talk about where you are at right now in terms of – Because I know we all just came out of Washington – What’s the next step for JustLeadershipUSA?
DeAnna Hoskins: We just launched in DC to make sure people knew who we were. We were able to empower, directly impact the people. We’re going to hold general call-ins for people to keep joining, we’re going to give them updates. But right now I’m headed to DC to do a sit-down with DOJ leadership around some of our issues that are in our demands. I’m meeting with the department of labor to say this funding that we’re asking for to help us –This is when I talked about the game, chess and checkers.
There’s a middle game called Backgammon. That’s the strategy. We’re Backgammon, strategizing. Nobody flies at that. And that’s the administrative level. That’s the senior leadership who is going to be there no matter who’s in the White House. The NAACP keeps showing up no matter who’s in the White House. because Black people’s issues have not gone away.
Mansa Musa: That’s right.
DeAnna Hoskins: From the incarcerated need, we’re going to keep showing up, because our issues haven’t gone away. So we’ve got to learn to fly at the backgammon level, in the gray zone. It doesn’t matter who’s in the White House, our issues are important. We’re not going to wait for other agencies to say, this is legislation we need to push. This is a policy we need to change. We’re going to understand ourselves and show up and speak for ourselves because typically, the policy and the legislation others push for us continue to entrench harm in our communities. And we always say, if you don’t have a seat at the table, you are on the menu.
Mansa Musa: There you have it. The Real News. Rallying the boss. We’re not playing chess anymore.
DeAnna Hoskins: We ain’t playing.
Mansa Musa: We’re not playing checkers, we’re at backgammon. We’re at the strategy level. And being at the strategy level, we ask that you evaluate this information as it came out today. If you are formerly incarcerated, if you’ve got a number behind your name, if they put handcuffs on you, if they gave you a record, then you are a valuable asset in this coalition called JustLeadershipUSA. Now, you have the last word. What do you want to tell our audience?
DeAnna Hoskins: I want to tell everyone that we have been oppressed and marginalized for too long. If everyone believes in a system of rehabilitation and corrections, they will not have the continued barriers and policies in place that allows us, once we re-enter, to still be blocked out of being productive members of society. One of the things you have to know is that you are valuable, you are a leader, and you have the right to have your voice heard. And that is what JustLeadershipUSA is about: giving you a platform, providing you with the education, and empowering you to elevate your voice so that we can disrupt and change the system that has been oppressing us for too long.
Mansa Musa: There you have it. And speaking of our platform, we ask that you continue to support this platform known as Rattling the Bars and The Real News. It’s only on Rattling the Bars and The Real News that you’re gonna get someone like DeAnna Hoskins to come and educate you on the strategy of getting self-determination. The strategy of being empowered and not sitting at the table with an empty plate and somebody coming and telling you, wait a minute; you’ll be served in one minute. And what’s been like 20 years later, you’re still waiting for something to eat. We ask that you continue to support this organization, this network, and we ask that you continue to rattle the bars. Thank you, DeAnna.
DeAnna Hoskins: Thank you. Thank you for having me.
In 2021, the International Tribunal On US Human Rights Abuses Against Black, Brown, and Indigenous Peoples found the United States government guilty of genocide. The tribunal drew upon the legacy of the 1951 petition submitted to the United Nations by the Civil Rights Congress: “We Charge Genocide: The Crime of Government Against the Negro People.” Jalil Muntaqim joins Rattling the Bars to discuss his life, the US’s long history of genocide, the need for a New Afrikan independence movement in the US, and the strategy to internationalize this struggle beyond compromised institutions such as the United Nations.
Jalil Muntaqim is a former member of the Black Panther Party and the Black Liberation Army. He was incarcerated for 49 years as a political prisoner of the United States, and released in 2020. Muntaqim’s is the author of several books, the most recent of which is We Are Our Own Liberators: Selected Prison Writings.
Studio/Post-Production: Cameron Granadino
Transcript
The following is a rushed transcript and may contain errors. A proofread version will be made available as soon as possible.
Mansa Musa:
Welcome to this edition of Rattling the Bars, I’m Mansa Musa. And today we have a comrade of mine and a good brother, a freedom fighter, former political prisoner, prisoner of war Jalil Muntaqim. Welcome to Rattling the Bars, Jalil.
Jalil Muntaqim:
Salaam alaykum, jambo, guten tag, peace, whatever your language is, I speak to you and address you in solidarity and peace.
Mansa Musa:
And before we get started, Ramadan mubarak.
Jalil Muntaqim:
[Foreign language], brother, I appreciate that. Thank you for your time.
Mansa Musa:
Yes sir. And tell Rattling the Bars audience a little about who is Jalil Muntaqim.
Jalil Muntaqim:
That’s a good question. That’s a long sense of answer to that question. Jalil Muntaqim, I am a veteran member of the Black Panther Party, Black Liberation Army. I have been engaged in the struggle since age of 16. I actually have engaged in struggle since I was born, you might say. Let me just preface this one. My mom was a student of African dance as a young child and she used to teach African dance to myself and my sister. And her teacher told her that we are of African descent and this is what she taught us, so I was raised with the understanding that I was of African descent.
She did not allow us to be identified or named a Negro or a [inaudible] or a Black person or any other derogatory names that has been launched against our Black people in this country, African people in this country. And so as a result of that I always had been conscious of the reality of our situation here in this country. At the age of 16, I joined the Black Panther Party, became a member of the Black Panther Party. And at the age of 18 I was recruited into the Black Underground. By the time I was 19, I was with Black Underground, that evolved and turned into the Black Liberation Army. By the time I was 19, I was captured.
I was captured on August 28th, 1971, the week after they murdered Comrade George Jackson on August 21st, 1971. Allegedly our action was in retaliation of his murder. The resulted in my being in prison for 49 plus years, almost 50 years in prison, as a result. I didn’t get out until October 6th, 2020. And I’m also an author. I’ve written two books, one called We Are Our Own Liberators, and anybody interested, they can get it from blackdragonmme.com. We Are Our Own Liberators, blackdragonmme.com. And the other book I’ve written have published is called Escaping the Prism: Fade to Black.
And that can be obtained from AK Press. Let me see what else. As a result of my incarceration, I continued to be an organizer. I was an organizer while I was in high school. I started the first Black student union in my high school and I was in San Jose, California. And as a result of that, we was able to get Black study programs established because there was no ethnic programs in the schools back then. And so we was able to get Black studies program going on at that time. And so as my process of my evolving when I went to prison, I continued to organize in 1970-
Mansa Musa:
Well stop right there. Because we want… I got you. But no, that’s good information. And in full disclosure to our audience, I met Jalil as he was getting ready to go into his prison organized. I met Jalil in, I think it was ’73 when they was making a call to take the issue of political prison, prisons of war to the UN. And it’s right at this juncture that I want to open the next question is, walk us through the progression of the strategy to internationalize America’s oppression of Black and Brown people.
Give us a… Because we know that your strategy has been, and your organizational strategy has been to internationalize our struggle. And you find a lot of conversation around why internationalize it when we have a… And people have a tendency to look at the national problem, what’s going on on a national level and feel as though when you say international, it’s almost as if you overlooking local situations. So as walk us through that progression.
Jalil Muntaqim:
Very good. Back in 1975, I returned from New York City to San Quentin Prison. And at the time when I returned back to San Quentin Prison, I was put in Adjustment Center. And as a result of me placed in Justice Center, I decided it was necessary for us to move forward in terms of our struggle. One of the things that when I was in Adjustment Center, I was locked next door to [inaudible 00:05:19], the oldest political prison in the United States today.
Mansa Musa:
That’s right.
Jalil Muntaqim:
And San Quentin [inaudible 00:05:25] on the same gallery, he was in Adjustment Center. The area where Comrade George was murdered at. And I received a pamphlet, a newsletter from a National Committee of the Defense of Political Prisoners, was a committee that was put together in support of the Panther 21 case right back in 1970s, in ’70, ’71. Yuri Kochiyama, who was a friend and member of the AAOU, African-American organization that Malcolm X had put together. She sent me a newsletter, and in the newsletter, they talk about human rights and the issues of human rights.
So at that point in time and knowing that El-Haj Malik Shabazz had told us, he had instructed us that it’s necessity for us to take our struggle to the international arena and that our struggle is more than just a civil rights, it’s a human rights. And with that understanding, El-Haj Malik Shabazz says, “For long as we continue to maintain our struggle within the civil rights dynamics of struggle, that the United States will continue to confine our struggle within those parameters within the jurisdiction of the United States.” That’s been a civil rights issue. And he said that, El-Haj Malik Shabazz, Malcolm X said that we need to take it to the international community and make our struggle a human rights one.
And so at that point in time, when I decided that was necessary for us to establish what I organized, what they called the US Prisons Petition Campaign to the United Nations. And this was the first petition campaign that was submitted to the United Nations that dealt with the issues, not only the conditions of our prison situation, but also the issues of existence of political prisons in the United States. So that’s one other area for which we began to internationalize our struggle. Now naturally, as you well know, prior to that, our struggle has been internationalized due to Black Panther Party.
Was internationalized when Robert Williams went into exile. He had to go to Cuba and went to China. And then for other places talking about our struggle. Eldridge Cleaver, when they established the Black Panther Party office in Algeria, they traveled throughout the country. Huey P. Newton established a working relationship with [inaudible] when he went to China. And so for us, there has always been a means and a method for which we tried to internationalize our struggle and take it out of basically the jurisdiction of the US to codify and/or limit and prohibit to what degree we’re able to fight back to resist a White supremacy and capitalist imperialism.
Mansa Musa:
All right, let’s go right here then, on that right there. All right. So we recognize the progression and we recognize the historical significance and the relationship. But let’s look at this here, it says it is a consensus worldwide that the United Nations… Because that’s where, when we talking about internationalizing, we talking about going to an institutional body to get some type of mandate to come out to say that what the United States is doing is inhuman.
So the mechanism that we’ve been talking about is the United Nations, but it’s the public consensus, ineffective as a body, but mainly when it comes to addressing complaints against United States and human rights. Case in point, going back to your point, Paul Robeson, they took a petition to the UN in ’51, we charged genocide documenting the lynching of Black people and poor people in this country. Then you reference Malcolm X, and as you noted, we made it, we took it in terms of the strategy that you outlined, took it in and put political prisoners and prisoners of war in that space.
But what is it about this body? I understand international context, but what is it about the United Nations that gives you some type of solace that this is a good place to put attention in? When you look at the Palestinian situation, you look at, they allow United States to bomb our Iraq, both under false narrative of trying to get [inaudible] uranium, they killed [inaudible]. So we know that when it comes to United Nations, that it’s really the United States foot-stool for lack of better terminology. So educate our audience on why this particular body under that overview that I just outlined.
Jalil Muntaqim:
Very good. I’m glad you raised that question because there are some contradictions in regards to our movement trying to have the United Nations to support us in the broader scale of which it exists. I think it’s important to understand that the United Nations, in terms of international law, it’s a body of international law. And as much as there are held together by individuals, nation, state individuals and organizations who may be coattailed to the United States because of the money that United States put into the United Nations, it diminishes our capacity to influence the processes.
But that doesn’t mean that we not should try to influence the process. Ultimately what it does is we are by presenting our struggle and our issues to the United Nations, it goes to the people as well. Those individuals will bring those issues to the people. And that’s what we really want to address. We really want to address the people of the world by regard to our struggle. And so this is a body from which we can do so, at least raise the issues, our concerns, our struggle to that body. And so that it can be reached at a broader branch of people. Now we’ve had comments go to Geneva, we’ve had petitions submitted to Geneva on the issues of our struggle.
And we need to continue to do so because it is a body of laws, international law. We are trying to make the United States adhere to the international law, for instance genocide. In 2018 I proposed that we bring the International Jury to the United States and we held an International Tribunal. And the International Tribunal on October 25th, 2021, they found the United States guilty of five charges. This is an esteemed body of international jurors, some of them have working relationships with the United Nations, and they are now promoting their verdict of October 25th, 2021 stated that the United States is guilty of five charges that we brought to them.
Five charges of mass incarceration, police terror and murder of our people, environmental racism, health inequities, and also the exists of political prisoners. The United States was found guilty by an esteemed body of international jurors on the reality of that they have violated international law as it pertained to those five particular issues. And so for us, we are using what mechanism is available to us. If we could create another mechanism for which we can build our international relationship with other folks and people, then we would do so. But that’s the only mechanism that’s working at this point in time. As you stated, Paul Robeson in December 17th, 1951, about two months after I was born, had brought the issues of genocide to the United Nations.
As you well know, the FBI hindered hindered that process. They would refuse to allow Paul Robeson to leave the country. And although William Patterson was able to go over to Geneva and present the petition, they tried to prevent him from coming back to the United States. And so for us it’s always a means, based upon the instructions of El-Haj Malik Shabazz, Malcolm X, to find the ways that we can reach our people on the international platform. When I say our people, I’m talking about the progressives on the international platform. Let them know what is actually going on here in the United States amongst Black people, Brown people, Indigenous people in this country. It is a mechanism, it’s not the end results, it is a method for which we can bring our struggles into the international community.
Mansa Musa:
And that bring me to my next question. Because like you say, it’s a real effective strategy. You have got the international body of people that’s directly related to the UN in some shape, form, or fashion to come-
Jalil Muntaqim:
Which are supporting our movement now.
Mansa Musa:
… To come and review the indictment that we brought about genocide. And you had them review the indictment, and as a result of reviewing the indictment, they came out with the International Tribunal on human rights abuse against Black and Brown, Indigenous people. How are you taking that finding? Because that finding in and of itself, we know don’t have the force of law. It’s a nice document and it’s a nice support mechanism.
How do you plan on taking that document and moving the narrative forward to try to start peeling off more support from countries in terms of recognizing that the United States is practicing genocide against us. How do you plan on taking that document? Because as you said, if that same body would’ve been the voting body of the general assembly in the UN, then United States would be thus duly charged based on that. So how do you plan on-
Jalil Muntaqim:
Let’s look at that on a couple levels. First level is here, United States is a treaty member of the Genocide Convention of 1948. United States has on its books, in its federal books, 18 USC 1091, which simply mimics or copies the genocidal doctrine of 1948. But we know that the United States will not charge itself with genocide, although they’re in violation of their own laws. So what we’re going to do, what we intended to do is build our base so that we can file a legal petition in the federal courts charging the United States having violated their own rules or regulations and according to international law.
And so in that instance, we’ll be able to educate greater people both nationally and internationally of the contradiction that we have with the United States in regards to their… Adherent to this false philosophy, aberrant philosophy of White supremacy, that ensures that other people of color are inferior to White people. And so when we understand that dynamic, we are raised in people’s consciousness, using international law as well as national dynamics where we can engage them by building our base of support. We also are building toward what we call people’s assemblies. We’re building a people’s assemblies based upon what we call a Peoples’ Senate.
And we would have ambassadors who would travel throughout the world and raise our questions, our issues in those particular bodies. We have been over in the Caribbean, we have been the areas of Africa. I went to Greece last year to the International Symposium of Political Prisoners in Greece, African Greece. And I told them at my presentation that you will not be free, the international community will not be free until Black people were free in this country. And so in this way we’re making the connections with the international community based upon the idea and goals and objectives based upon the decision, the verdict of the International Jury finding the United States guilty of genocides.
And so with that understanding, based upon their own violation of their own laws, we can do two things. One, bring them to court, raise it on a national level and continue to send out our ambassadors around the world and speak on these issues, raise these questions. We’ve been to South Africa, we’ve been to Ghana, we’ve been to Barbados, we’ve been to Greece. I got some people once to, they’re thinking about having me go tour parts of Europe and also Latin America. And so this is how we built out our struggle and join the progressive communities around the world who has been engaging, fighting against US imperialism and White supremacy throughout the world.
Mansa Musa:
And now, I like that connection because as our audience would need to be made aware of, when we talk about international struggle, we’ve been able to make the connection in terms of United States own laws and that at some point in time a forum going to have to be held about that. And they going to have to address that at some point in time in the court of law in the United States, which gives them a lot more… People got a local mentality and a national mentality, be able to put them in a space where they comfortable with recognizing that, “We are affected by this because we can see it right here, right now.”
As opposed to trying to get them to take a broader perspective and say, like Malcolm say, “We all in the same boat.” All right, we talk about this here, Jalil. Lastly, so you mobilized the necessary support and you get the necessary results in terms of the United Nation, the courts. So what is the relief that we are asking for? What are we looking to get in return? Because I think most people want to know, are we just rabble-rousing or do we have actually got a strategy of what we want in return and what we going to do with our return?
Jalil Muntaqim:
Okay, well let’s look at this a little bit more deliberately. We know that the United States have been found guilty of genocide. We know they’ve been engaged in the process of genocides for the last 400 years. We know that the system of White supremacy is not going to just disappear. So it is our duty to divorce ourselves from a system that’s engaging in genocides. We have to ensure that we are suffering no more harm. The trauma that we have suffered in the last 400 years is indelible. It has been internalized for the most part. And so we have to do a whole new reeducation, reprocessing of our consciousness.
And that means that we have to decolonize ourselves, when I say decolonize our mentality and our thinking in terms of who we are as a people in this country. And that’s another issue that we have to address. Are we in fact a colonized nation, a colonized people? And if we are, then we need to figure out some ways how to manage that idea that we need to divorce ourself from the conditions of colonization. So that means that we need to move towards independence. I’m saying this here. At the minimum, we divorce ourself from a system that has been engaging in genocide. We have to remove ourselves from harm. That’s what I’m saying, because they been killing us for the last 400 years.
Mansa Musa:
And continue to do it.
Jalil Muntaqim:
And continue to do so. When they just shot this kid the other day, this young man the other day, shot him 60 times. They shot at him a hundred times and shot him 60 times. How many bullets does it take to kill one man? That was not just a message to this one guy or this one family, it was a message to everyone, of police terror. That’s the reason why they found guilty of genocide, by the way that they’ve been murdered us by police terror. You see what I’m saying? Mass incarceration is another issue. Mass incarceration, what they found guilty of by the international jurors of mass incarceration, that’s genocide.
So we got to fight against this mass incarceration. One way to fight against it is to end penal slavery by the 13th Forward. By ending penal slavery, we take the incentive out of mass incarceration. That means they cannot profit off our labor. Our people don’t understand that slavery was never totally abolished in the country, we have what we call penal slavery. They just [inaudible 00:21:26] to the United States Constitution. So that’s another area where we are fighting back. Other, environmental racism. We know what happened in Flint, Michigan. Or Mississippi. Why is it that our people… Health inequities is another area which we have found ourselves confronting the issues of genocide, which we have found guilty of.
Why is it that White people live twice as long as Black people in this country? Where does that come from? Why is it that it has been stated that Black man is an endangered species in this country? Where does that come from? It comes from the idea of White supremacy and trying to maintain a system from which we, Black people, Brown people, Indigenous people maintain inferiority to White superiority. Which again, I say is an average philosophy, it’s an average psychological… And in my understanding, it’s a mental disorder. And White superiority is a mental disorder. And I say that based upon what the DMS-IV book says, the diagnostic book says.
Mansa Musa:
That’s right. That’s their book.
Jalil Muntaqim:
The psychological diagnostic book states that superiority complex is in fact a complex, it is a psychological disorder. And White supremacy is a derivative of the superiority complex where they feel their superiority. So these people are crazy. So we got to remove ourselves from these people because they have been harming us for the last 400 years.
Mansa Musa:
I gotcha.
Jalil Muntaqim:
So for building this outward, both on the national, international level, is extremely important. This is the reason why after the verdict by the international jurors finding the United States guilty on those five charges, we decided it is necessary for us to build what we call a Peoples’ Senate.
Mansa Musa:
Talk about that.
Jalil Muntaqim:
We got to create alternatives to the existing reality of our existence here in the United States. And so what we’re doing now, knowing that the United States functions as a corporation in behalf of other corporations, the law says… Not what Jalil says, the law says, the Supreme Court has stated in, I think Citizens Action, but they determined that corporations are people. So we also know that the United States is in fact a corporation, based upon 28 USC 3002 Section 15A-
Mansa Musa:
Commercial code?
Jalil Muntaqim:
Yeah, commercial code. And it informs that the United States is in fact a federal corporation. And so when they say our people, “For the people by the people,” they’re not talking about sentient human beings, they’re talking about corporations. They function in behalf of corporations, not for human beings. And so when we decided that it’s necessary for what to build what we call a Peoples’ Senate to divorce ourself from a system that’s not working in our best interest and began to create alternative systems, alternative modes of operation, alternative ways of where we can fulfill our prosperity, our goals, our ambitions, our livelihood outside of the dictates of the system that has been engaging in genocides against us.
And so the Peoples’ Senate is important. So we’re going to have Peoples’ Senates across the country. We’re going to build people’s assemblies across the country, and we’re going to establish the financial and economic basis for which we can be able to strive, utilizing the resources that we have available to us in any cities and states across the country. And this process will begin to ensure that our struggle moving forward is safeguarded because we have created a condition for which we have a body of people who are engaged in struggle against a system that has been involved with genocides against us.
Not only that, but we’re also moving towards national liberation independence. And this is a hard one for people to chew on. We know that there are sovereign nations in this country. The Native Americans, the indigenous people in this country for the most part are sovereign nation. How come we aren’t? That’s a question I need to ask. If they can be a sovereign nation, how come we aren’t? If we look at the 14th Amendment of the United States Constitution as an example, we realized that we never had an opportunity when they promulgated the 13th Amendment in 1865. We never had the opportunity to do three things.
One, to decide whether we want to stay in the United States, decide whether we want to go to Africa or return back to Africa, or decide we want to create our own homeland, what is called a plebiscite vote. The part of our struggle is to ensure that we have a plebiscite vote, make determination what we want. So the Fourth Amendment imposed the civilization on the 3 million to 5 million African people who were emancipated in 1865. And so for us, it’s always made a question of who are we in terms of our nationhood, that has not been established by us for us.
And so that is another part of this process of separating ourself, divorcing ourself from a system that’s been engaged in genocides against us for the last 400 years. Now that we have law established in terms of international protocols by an esteemed body of international jurors have determined the United States has been engaged in this process of genocides against us. That informs us that we need to separate ourself and divorce ourself from a system that’s doing us harm, has been doing us harm for the last 400 years. And so that’s part of the process.
Mansa Musa:
So how can we get in touch with you and how can our viewers get in touch with the Spirit of Mandela?
Jalil Muntaqim:
Very good question. Go to spiritofmandela.org and tap over to the Peoples’ Senate, or go to Peoples’ Senate, spiritofmandela.org and you’ll find all the information you need to find to be involved with this process. We have what we call in the Spirit of Mandela, I’m raise this up so you can see it. You’ll find this particular document right here, for the Spirit of Mandela Explanation and Recruitment manual. And this is what we are organizing for.
Now, when we first initiated this campaign naturally in terms of our political prisoners, we was moving under the United Nations Spirit of Mandela Rule, which is the basic standards for the treatment of prisoners, which they turned into the Mandela rule. And so we’re using that idea of the Mandela rule, that’s why we came with this name, Mandela Rule, to ensure our people on the inside of these penal slave institutions are granted the same rights that are supposed to be granted to anyone who have been incarcerated or who have been imprisoned. Based upon the Mandela rules, based upon the United States standard treatment of prisoners, which is now the Mandela rule.
And so that’s one of the areas that we’re dealing with. But more importantly, we want to end penal slavery in the United States. When we end penal slavery, we end the school to prison pipeline, we end the issues of mass incarceration. We end, for the most part, targeting our community for mass incarceration. And so that’s one of the ideas of building a Peoples’ Senate and raising this to people’s consciousness and understanding to what degree we have to resist. So yeah, that’s what we’re doing.
Mansa Musa:
Okay, hey, thank you.
Jalil Muntaqim:
Spirit of Mandela.
Mansa Musa:
Spirtofmandela.org.
Jalil Muntaqim:
.org/peoples-senate. That’s what people need to go to.
Mansa Musa:
There you have it. The real news about the campaign to end and abolish slavery in the United States as we know it under the 13th Amendment, how we going to organize to gain our own independence, how we going to move forward on the international level to have the international community weigh in on this issue. We already recognize that United States has been cited for genocide, as Jalil just outlined the case. So we are asking all our viewers and our listeners to look into this and make a decision on what you think you should or should not do in this regard. Thank you, Jalil. Thank you for delighting us and educating us, brother.
Jalil Muntaqim:
Absolutely, brother. Let me make one selfish plug.
Mansa Musa:
Make a selfish plug.
Jalil Muntaqim:
We’re also building what we call decolonization programs across the country. And these decolonization program programs evolved out of the Black Panther party survival programs. The survival programs of the Black Panther party were defensive. We are building what call decolonization programs, which are offensive. We are creating a method from which we can divorce ourselves from the system by creating these alternative decolonization programs.
If anyone want to learn more about decolonization programs, I urge you to get the book, We Are Our Own Liberators that explains the whole dynamics of building towards what we call [inaudible 00:30:43] Liberation, New Afrikan Nation and these colonization programs. And they can get the book from blackdragonmme.com, We Are Our Own Liberators. So if we don’t liberate ourselves, no one else will.
Mansa Musa:
That you have it, The Real News. And we ask you to continue to support The Real News and Rattling the Bars. Where you going to get this kind of information from? Where are you going to get a formal political prisoner, prisoner of war, come in and educate you about genocide, colonialization and decolonialization, and more importantly, give you a strategy on how to eradicate all the above? So we thank you and we ask you to continue to support Rattling the Bars and The Real News. Thank you very much.
On Feb. 1, 1985, prison guards at the Indiana State Reformatory (now Pendleton Correctional Facility) affiliated with a KKK-splinter group known as the Sons of Light chained prisoner Lincoln Love in their office and began to mercilessly beat him. John “Balagoon” Cole and Christopher “Naeem” Trotter led a group of prisoners to the office and demanded entrance. When the Sons of Light responded with more violence, the prisoners took hostages and occupied a cell block for 15 hours, releasing a list of demands to improve inhumane prison conditions. John “Balagoon” Cole and Christopher “Naeem” Trotter were ultimately sentenced to 84 and 142 years for their successful attempt to save Lincoln Love’s life. Cole and Trotter remain incarcerated to this day, and now face major medical complications from old age and decades of institutional neglect.
The following is a rushed transcript and may contain errors. An updated version will be made available as soon as possible.
Mansa Musa: Welcome to this edition of Rattling the Bars. I’m Mansa Musa. Imagine if you will, you had three years left before you was released from prison or two months left before you released from prison and this happened-
Speaker: This third time they came down there in a matter of hours, they riot gear, you know, and this and that. Now, they lined up outside Lokmar’s cell. Now keep in mind, you done passed up four or five more cells, but you had no Lokmar’s cell. We in the middle. You got some more cells before you get to us. Why you lined up outside that brother’s cell? As I seen them going to Lokmar’s cell, he didn’t see what I seen on the side of the wall. There was some more guards lined up, sticks, shields, helmets, you know, ready to do battle. They lined up, man. They got, looked like guns and all type of stuff.
They went in on the brother. Had him subdued, had him handcuffed. And what really caused this riot this particular day, once he was handcuffed, one of the guards took the sticks and hit him in his head. Blood gushed out of his head. I’m right there. I got tears in my eyes because I tell them, “Look, give some of that”, just to take them off of him. So one of the guards say, “Don’t worry about it, y’all got some of that coming.” You know what I mean? [inaudible 00:01:35] So I look over there, there’s more blooding gushing out of the brother’s head. He’s cuffed behind his back.
Speaker: They beat him damn near to a pulp with a solid oak club. once they beat him, they drug him out of his cell. And then drug him down the range of the tier. [inaudible 00:01:53] of the range for all the other prisoners to see. And everybody thought he was dead. They thought he was dead.
Speaker: Hey man, somebody going tell. Hey man, they trying to kill us down here. Once John Cole got the word of what’s taking place, somewhere down that line, him and his brother named Christopher Trotter met up. So now they coming, trying to see what’s going on in this particular unit.
Mansa Musa: Today, I have two people that are instrumental in helping to bring to light and reverse this injustice that’s taking place against the Pendleton 2. And when I say injustice, that’s a understatement. Here we are in 2023 and we have in the United States of America, a prison system and a prison industrial complex in this country that operate racially with impunity, that they don’t have no restraints, have no oversight and continuously to operate in this fashion in a gang mentality. Welcome to the Rattling the Bars.
And Ms. Law, introduce yourself to the Rattling the Bars audience and tell us a little bit about yourself.
Victoria Law: Hey, thank you so much for having both of us and for covering this. My name is Victoria Law. I am an author and a freelance journalist that covers issues of incarceration, specifically resistance and organizing happening both behind the bars and outside to bring people home and to shrink the giant prison system that the nation has become.
Mansa Musa: All right. And Too Black, introduce yourself to the Rattling the Bars audience and tell us a little bit about yourself.
Too Black: Yeah, my name is Too Black, I am a poet and relevant to this conversation. I am the comms director, comms representative for the Defense Committee to Free the Pendleton 2. And I am the producer and editor of the film you just saw, the clip from the film you just saw, excuse me, The Pendleton 2: They Stood Up. So thanks for having me. And I also want to send my kind regards to Eddie Conway. I’ve watched his show throughout the years and I know about his story. So just rest in peace, Eddie Conway, as well.
Mansa Musa: All right. And we appreciate that. And let’s just get right into the heart of the matter. And I’m going to set the table up and then y’all start dishing out the dishes as y’all feel free. All right, so we have two individuals that’s locked up in the Indiana State Prison. And in Indiana State Prison have basically, the guards are basically a part of a hybrid group of the Ku Klux Klan, all Ku Klux Klan, All American Nazis, skinheads, all things racist, all things anti-humanity. And in this regard, they operate the prison system within the prison system with impunity. At some point, they got to the point where these guards got in a state of mind where it was all out assault on prisoners this particular day. Pick up from there.
Victoria Law: So this had been a longstanding occurrence. It wasn’t just that on this particular day, the guards at what is now the Pendleton Correctional Facility decided that they were going to brutalize incarcerated people. This had long been an issue where guards were allowed to brutalize people, to place them in solitary confinement, which is itself a form of brutalization and violence. They were allowed to what they call burn people for meals, for other things, so that they would just not give them what they were supposed to be giving them, such as food. And on February 1st, 1985, and men at the prison had said that there was constantly this tension and this threat of violence from guards. This was not a surprising occurrence.
On February 1st of that day, the guards had placed men in solitary confinement, including a jailhouse lawyer named Lincoln Love, who was very highly regarded by men in the prison. And he was in solitary confinement. And he was being subjected to what they call a cell search, which many of your viewers know is when guards come en mass to a person’s cell and say that they’re going to search the cell. And that means not just rifling through a person’s belongings, but violently tearing through everything that they own.
Mansa Musa: That’s right.
Victoria Law: This could mean that their loved one’s pictures get thrown in the toilet, they get stomped on, their legal work gets ripped up, and the person themself is unable to do anything about this. And on that day, they came to the cell, said that they were going to do a cell search. The man who was directly across the corridor from Lincoln Love said that usually cell searches happen in an orderly fashion. You go to the first cell, the second cell, the third cell.
Mansa Musa: Right, right.
Victoria Law: This time they came directly to Lincoln Love’s cell. And Lincoln Love was supposedly not quick enough to comply, so he didn’t immediately get up and run to the back of the cell to comply with this cell search. Instead he said something like, “You already searched me. Why are you doing this again?” And this to the guards, was their justification for going in and beating him, handcuffing him, and then brutalizing him some more. So he was unable to fight back. He was on the ground, the man locked in the cell across from him, tried to divert the guard by yelling at them and hoping that they would turn away from Lincoln Love and not kill him, to turn their anger and their fury and their violence against him. So he, in that moment, did what he could to save Lincoln Love’s life.
And other men yelled out the window to men who were on the yard that the guards were beating Lincoln Love and they were going to kill him. And men, including the two men we were talking about, Christopher Naeem Trotter and John Balagoon Cole attempted to go to the administration to have them stop the officers beatings. And there they were met by armed guards who refused to let them pass and attempted to beat them. And then they went to a housing unit to get in to escape these guards. And they ended up taking over the housing unit and taking several staff members hostage. And they issued a series of demands, because at that point they said that if they had not done so, it would have been a massacre.
Too Black calls the Attica of Indiana. It is [inaudible 00:09:17] in the prison system. And after 17 hours, the prison finally relented, people inside the prison called media on the outside, including an all-black radio station, which then reached out to other media. So there was media coverage. So the prison was not able to do what they did at Attica here in New York state, just go in, start shooting randomly and killing people. But instead, after 17 hours, the state said, okay, we will acquiesce to these demands. The media accompanied the men to the cells in the solitary confinement unit, meaning that the guards could not then immediately brutalize them. But the following day, they were all transferred. And Chris Trotter and John Cole were brought up on outside charges of attempted murder, rioting, assault, and confinement, which is another word for kidnapping. And they were sentenced to 84 years for John Cole, who had three and a half years left on his sentence. And for Chris Trotter, who had three months left before he went home, he got 142 years in prison.
Mansa Musa: Okay. Now, let’s start right there. In terms of the amount of time they got, but more importantly, when I read the article, I read in there where prior to this, they had filed lawsuits and civil rights suits about the conditions and about the brutality. And from your knowledge, and I’ll get to you in a minute, Too Black, from your knowledge, have the state legislators, have the federal government taken any notice of what was going, ’cause this been going on for a while. This ain’t just happen, like you say, this ain’t just happened that day. This was like, well, this is a good day to be somebody day this. That’s what that amounted to. Wasn’t like it’s not a good day, it’s just like, okay, the day we can do it with impunity or whatever the reason behind the lack of restraint. Talk about that. Who has been doing oversight outside of organization? What government agencies or if any?
Victoria Law: Well, the state Department of Correction operates under the auspices of the state, so the governor has oversight. He has the ability to appoint or remove the director of the prison system. A few years later, there was a report made to the governor’s office about a white supremacist organization called the Brotherhood in the Indiana State Farm, which is now called Putnamville Correctional Facility. And the governor did nothing. There had been outside investigators and state investigators who had investigated this Brotherhood and had not been able to do anything. These people operated with such impunity that when an investigator dared to file a report stating that a member of the Brotherhood, a guard associated with a white supremacist organization beat up a prisoner or beat up an incarcerated man and then falsified documents about the beating, the guard and his buddies went to the local bar and beat up the investigator.
I mean, this is the kind of impunity. They are not just targeting the people inside, but they also feel free to run amuck on the outside, going around to outside bars and beating people up when they’re having a drink or celebrating their birthday with their family members. So you can see that there is a deeper problem than just people who feel that they have so much power over incarcerated men that they can do this. But that ripples out into people feeling that they have the impunity to brutalize and violate incarcerated people and anyone who tries to hold them to accountability.
Mansa Musa: Thank you. Too Black, talk about where we at in terms of the defense. And before you get there, I just want to make this observation that when we find ourselves in these situations, and this is in defense of the actions and the behavior on the part of the individuals that was charged, when we find ourselves in these situations where we are incarcerated and we find ourselves where the guards are brutalizing us, and from a prison mentality we don’t have no choice but to defend ourselves. And from prison mentality, we take whatever necessary measures to defend ourselves. We don’t cow tow mainly when you know that they coming with blackjacks, plastic bullets, mace that take your breath, that you don’t have no choice, you going to die. So it’s better dying fighting than laying on the ground and getting beat half to death. So I’m saying that to say that for our viewers, if you look at what’s happening and you feel like that they did something to deserve this, this wasn’t something that they brought on themselves, this is the environment they in. They have a racist police guard union that this is what they do. Too Black talk about the defense and where we at with the defense for the two brothers.
Too Black: Well currently, they’ve been in prison for just since this case for 37 years and they haven’t exhausted, but they’ve went through several appeals trying to get sentence modifications, PCRs, et cetera. Some of the most recent stuff, ’cause again, we could be here all day going through the different challenges they’ve made. In 2018, Christopher Naeem Trotter, that’s the prisoner who received 142 years, he had his sentence vacated. And again, this is in Madison County, Indiana. Anderson’s the main city, but this is where Pendleton Prison is, originally where the uprising took place. So he had his sentence vacated towards the end, I believe, in October of 2018. For those who don’t know what vacated means, basically the sentence that he had was removed and he needed to be re-sentenced because they deemed that he had ineffective counsel on his original case. So that means he could have been released. The years could have been reduced dramatically to a few years left.
The judge had the freedom, really, to do whatever they wanted to do. But the judge who actually vacated the sentence was removed from the bench, that was Judge Dudley. Then they brought Judge Carroll in. So towards the end of 2019, his sentence was vacated then he was just re-sentenced to 122 years from 142. So effectively nothing happened. They just re-sentenced him to life in prison. It was a sham at that point. And the judge says, I can’t remember the direct quote, so I’m paraphrasing, but something to the effect, he says, we have to have our brothers back. And that was quoted in the Anderson Bulletin Herald. So it was obvious from our standpoint that this is deeper, this is why we call them political prisoners ’cause this is deeper than whatever so-called crime that would’ve committed.
Mansa Musa: And talk about, you made the good observation of, you juxtaposed this Indiana concentration camp plantation with the Attica plantation. Talk about that. And be mindful if you could make a connection between the little small county, because in the Attica documentary that was done, was remarkably done. The producer talked to some of the people in the Attica community and the woman said, “Attica is the major industry in Attica.” She was saying the prison industrial complex, the plantation Attica, was the number one source of income for the population of the people of Attica. From your observation and your insight or study, do you see the comparison in that regard?
Too Black: Maybe not so much in the employment aspect. There is, not a major city, but there’s a city in the county of Madison. But there did seem to be a pipeline from Ellwood, Indiana. Ellwood, Indiana is, again, stationed within Madison County. And a lot of people from Ellwood, Indiana, particularly at the time in which this happened, worked at the Pendleton Correctional Facility, even though that’s actually across the county. And Ellwood, Indiana is actually a known hub for the Ku Klux Klan. We actually have pictures in the film that were Klansmen, were taking pictures in Ellwood, Indiana. So there was always a relationship there. And then a lot of the people who were on the jury were from Ellwood, Indiana. And also, it’s important to know that the jury was all white, even though the county at the time was about 40% black. So most people on the jury from Ellwood, Indiana, and many of the people that worked in Pendleton were from Ellwood, Indiana.
So there’s just kind of a pipeline of white supremacist activity just in that nature. So I think it just becomes culturally where the people that’s, they know that’s their next job ’cause they have family there, they have friends there, and they just hire them on from there. So it doesn’t matter what the other industries are. I think it’s similar to these people, it’s similar to the way we understand maybe factory jobs, where if you have a friend or a family member, they could just bring you through the pipeline. So in the Indiana Department of Corrections, you have people even at the time who were there for 20, 30 years and then these people move up in the ranks of the Indiana Department of Corrections. And it’s also important to note, even the folks who were in this KKK splinter group that were part of the Sons of Light, that’s the name of the group who ran the prison when this occurred.
These weren’t just low level guards. You’re talking about lieutenants, talking about captains, talking about sergeants. You’re talking about people throughout the ranks of the prison. So sometimes, when people think about this, they just think about some just poor white people who do this ’cause they’re bored. And it’s like, no, this is systemic throughout being in the Department of Correction. And as was noted earlier, this wasn’t just in Pendleton facility. And I think someone brought up earlier that there was action taken prior. Yeah, there was a class action lawsuit that was taken against this prison because even some of the guards who worked there, regardless of their beliefs individually, felt unsafe because they treated the prisoners so terribly that they knew that eventually something was going to happen. It didn’t just end there. There was actually another uprising just the following year at Pendleton Correctional Facility, at the time it was Indiana Reformatory. So yeah, this is just the nature of how it works. And Indiana likes to act like these things don’t happen or these are isolated incidents. And this story has been swept under the rug for roughly 40 years now.
Mansa Musa: And in terms of when you made the comparison to Attica, because I know in Attica before the Attica uprising, one, the industry was like, it was slave labor. I think you was getting a penny a day or something to the effect. Two, the housing was oppressive and dehumanizing. You was cramped in small cells. The shower situation was dehumanizing. And the food was something that you wouldn’t even put in a pig trough that ultimately led Attica to critical mass where you had the rebellion. But talk about the conditions at Pendleton, if you can, about what kind of prison is it. A lot of the prisons, after the crime bill, they started modernizing in terms of electronics. Everything was controlled, all movement was controlled. Cameras everywhere. I was in supermax in Maryland. So describe these particular prisons or the prisons in Indiana for our audience to get understanding of how they are?
Too Black: Yeah, well, like you said, similar to Attica. And again, also want to say that I don’t just call this the Attica of Indiana, this is what the people inside say, I’m just conveying what they say. So that’s how it’s understood. It’s actually pretty well known inside regardless of what we know. But when they took over the prison after the uprising, they had 14 demands and many of those demands were addressing the actual conditions of the prison because they were asking for better food, they were asking for cleaning supplies and things that they needed ’cause even part of this started because they couldn’t get cleaning supplies. They couldn’t get the basic needs that they had. So as you know, when that doesn’t happen, often ruckus will occur because young people can’t get these things. So this wasn’t a sanitary place as well as the treatment that they were going through.
This was a place where it was, like you said, it was old and people were getting sick. So that was definitely the nature of it. That’s why part of their demands were to ask for those things. And you go through all 14 of their demands, they didn’t have any wild demands about, they wanted a helicopter to fly away.
Mansa Musa: Right. They just wanted to be treated like human beings.
Too Black: Exactly, exactly. Everything was addressing the situation that they were in. They weren’t asking for a hotel, they were just asking that while they’re there for whatever that’s worth-
Mansa Musa: Basically human rights.
Too Black: [inaudible 00:24:28] some dignity, and they weren’t receiving that. So yeah, it was coming from multiple angles. It’s the treatment of the guards, it’s the state of the prison. Even some of the charges people were getting for petty stuff that made them have to stay there even longer. Even with Christopher Naeem Trotter, for instance, he had a petty theft and he shouldn’t even have been in that prison. He was there technically because he had a military background so they put him in one of these maximum level security prisons, when based on his actual charge, he shouldn’t even have been there. So yeah, you have people who were assigned there, obviously, just because of racism, because of the way that they were treated even prior to getting in prison. So there was all these conditions that definitely led to the day we’re discussing.
Mansa Musa: Hey, Victoria, tell our audience what is the next step as far as from your perspective, in terms of trying to get some justice for the Pendleton 2?
Victoria Law: Well, I think that one of the things we’ve seen in Indiana, and Too Black can correct me if I am mistaken, is that we’ve seen that the courts are not willing to stand up when incarcerated people assert their right to self-defense. And one of the striking things when I interviewed both Christopher Naeem Trotter and John Balagoon Cole, is that they said that they didn’t want this story just to be narrowly about them. Yes, they want their freedom, they want this injustice to be abolished, but they also said what happens to us happens to people in prisons around the state and the country. So it is not just about them, but how do they use this story to ensure that other people who maybe don’t have the same platforms or the same access to folks on the outside, like in Indiana, there’s IDOC Watch, Indiana Department of Correction Watch, but that perhaps are in states that don’t have that kind of outside totally independent oversight that can take action. How to leverage that so that these injustices don’t keep occurring and occurring and occurring. So that Too Black and I are not here three years from now talking [inaudible 00:26:53]
Mansa Musa: Right, exactly.
Victoria Law: So I think that that’s important to note that we can’t look at this as an isolated incident. We can’t look to the same legal system that sentenced people to 142 years and 84 years for an incident in which nobody was killed. And even one of the guards who had been injured during the uprising filed a suit, not against Cole and Trotter, but against the state to say you created these conditions in which I and my fellow guards got hurt because you allowed people to go around, you allowed staff members to go around brutalizing people in custody and that then finally blew up into an incident in which I and other people who are supposedly not the bad apples ended up being hurt.
Mansa Musa: And Too Black, as briefly as you can tell our audience, one, how they can get in touch with you and how they can support your effort to get these men justice.
Too Black: Yeah, well we have a website that will be debuting on Thursday, just Pendleton 2, Pendleton and then the number 2.com. If you want to reach us, you can also reach us at The Pendleton 2. Again, the number, 2, at Gmail. We’re going to be releasing a film on Breakthrough News this Thursday, the Pendleton 2: They Stood Up. And that film documents many of the things that we talked about today. And it also chronicles their time in solitary confinement. We just recently added that addition to the film. So if you want to check that out, definitely do that. That’ll be at debuting at 7:00 PM eastern time this Thursday, March 30th on Breakthrough News. And if you’d like to book a screening of the film, if you’d want to sign the petitions or if you want to donate, you can do it at the website, but we definitely encourage that, particularly the screenings of the film. But you can have those in your local community and we can Zoom in, show up with something of that nature and we can help talk about this further.
Mansa Musa: Yeah, and thank you. Thank you very much, Victoria Law and Too Black. We want to encourage our viewers to check out the Rattling the Bars, all information that’s going to come out on this and review some of the activities going around The Pendleton 2. There you have, the real news about the Pendleton 2, two brothers that for no more reason than to want to be human beings and treated like human beings have been given astronomical sentences, astronomical time, and brutalized in the process. And we want to encourage everyone to look at this and evaluate it and let your conscience be your guide in terms of what you think you should do.
Thank you, Victoria, and thank you, Too Black. And we ask that you continue to support The Real News and Rattling the Bars. It’s our aspirations that you support this mechanism to the extent that it become your primary news source because we are actually the real news. You’re not going to get nothing about the Pendleton 2 on major media. You’re not going to have a author like Too Black or you’re not going to have a author like Victoria Law telling the real news about events that’s taking place in real people’s lives. All right, there you have, The Real News. Thank you very much.
In a special episode of Police Accountability Report, TRNN reporters Taya Graham and Stephen Janis report from the ground in Atlanta, where for weeks forest defenders have been fighting and risking their lives to stop the construction of “Cop City”—a massive planned police training center that would be used to instruct officers from around the country in deadly repression tactics. Speaking directly with activists on the frontlines, Graham and Janis explore the truth behind the police killing of Manuel “Tortuguita” Tehran, and the dark money sources funding the creation of the Atlanta Public Safety Center. This episode features special guests including cop watcher and auditor Lackluster, and Chris Reiter from the For Public Safety YouTube channel.
Studio: David Hebden, Cameron Granadino Footage: Stephen Janis and Taya Graham
Transcript
The transcript of this story is in progress and will be made available as soon as possible.
Across the US, people who attempt to resist the seemingly limitless power of the police often find themselves ensnared in a legal system that ostensibly exists for their protection. When a local police officer approached Paul Brophy of Weymouth, Massachusetts, and demanded to see his identification, Brophy attempted to invoke his constitutional rights. The officer then escalated the situation to an arrest, claiming Brophy attempted to reach for his weapon. Police Accountability Report examines the facts of the case, speaking to Paul Brophy himself about the incident.
Studio: Stephen Janis Studio/Post-Production: Stephen Janis, Adam Coley
Transcript
Taya Graham: Hello, my name is Taya Graham, and welcome to the Police Accountability Report. As I always make clear, this show has a single purpose: holding the politically powerful institution of policing accountable. And to do so, we don’t just focus on the bad behavior of individual cops. Instead, we examine the system that makes bad policing possible.
And today, to achieve that goal, we’ll be showing you this video of an arrest by a Massachusetts cop of a man who refused to show identification. But it’s what the officer did after the man who took the video fought for his rights, and how his charges contradicted what we will see on camera that will be the subject of the show today, an example of how law enforcement can turn mundane situations into life altering trauma.
But before we get started, I want you watching to know that if you have video evidence of police misconduct or brutality, please share it with us and we might be able to investigate for you. Please reach out to us. You can email us tips privately at par@therealnews.com and share your evidence of police misconduct. You can also message us at Police Accountability Report on Facebook or Instagram or @eyesonpolice on Twitter. And of course, you can always message me directly @tayasbaltimore on Twitter or Facebook. And if you can, please leave a like or comment to help share our work with other people who care about justice and accountability. All right, we’ve gotten that out of the way.
Now, one aspect of American policing we have covered extensively on our show is a topic that seems simple but isn’t. Namely, the seemingly limitless ability for police to ask for or even demand identification. It’s a question that usually focuses on the legal ramifications. In other words, when can a cop demand your ID? And what rights do you have if you refuse?
But there is more to this question than just criminal code or legal procedures, because the fact that there are so many scenarios when police can make the ultimatum, produce your ID or else, that it’s worth unpacking the broad implications of this power on both our lives and our rights. And no video is a better example of what I’m talking about than the fraught encounter with Weymouth Massachusetts Police I am showing you now. It happened when resident Paul Brophy and a friend were sitting in the parking lot of a convenience store in Weymouth in October in 2019. His passenger had just purchased some snacks and cigarettes when an officer approached their car. Watch.
[VIDEO CLIP BEGINS]
Police Officer: So let’s talk about what I’m asking you for. You cooperate, give me your ID, we see who you are. We can send you on your way in short time. But because now you’re prolonging this situation because you’re being defiant.
Paul Brophy: No, I’m not being defiant.
Police Officer: I asked you for an ID, a simple request, and you can’t give it to me.
Paul Brophy: I said, respectfully, officer –
Police Officer: That’s not respectfully, that’s actually defiant.
Paul Brophy: Well, you’re escalating now.
Police Officer: What’s that?
Paul Brophy: You’re escalating.
Police Officer: I’m not escalating.
Paul Brophy: I mean, it’s about de-escalation.
Police Officer: Okay.
Paul Brophy: Now, can we talk to each other? You’re a public servant. I’m a public servant.
Police Officer: Then why are you being defiant? Why would you not cooperate?
Paul Brophy: I’m not being defiant.
Police Officer: Ask for an ID, offer an ID.
Paul Brophy: I’m not being defiant. I’m defending my rights that you swore to protect.
Police Officer: Asked for an ID, you offer the ID. You’ll be sent on your way shortly after.
[VIDEO CLIP ENDS]
Taya Graham: Now as you can see, it’s clear the officer is completely unable to share what’s known as reasonable articulable suspicion that Paul committed a crime. That is generally the standard for making what’s known as a custodial stop, or where you’re not free to leave until the officer says so. In fact, he seems pretty much at a loss to even articulate why he’s talking to the two men at all. And I see this ironically because it appears the officer thinks that the routine act of parking and purchasing a snack is actually nefarious. Take a look.
[VIDEO CLIP BEGINS]
Police Officer: Why can’t you produce an ID?
Paul Brophy: Well, it’s about the Constitution [officer laughs]. I’m surprised you laughed at that.
Police Officer: Okay, which part of the Constitution?
Paul Brophy: The First Amendment.
Police Officer: The First Amendment?
Paul Brophy: It’s probably not the First. That’s what, the assembly and all that?
Passenger: The Fifth, it’s the Fifth.
Paul Brophy: It’s the Fifth? I’m not pleading the Fifth.
Police Officer: See, clearly, you don’t even know the Constitution.
Paul Brophy: Off my heart, no, I don’t.
Police Officer: Or your Constitutional rights, because what you’re saying is that…
Paul Brophy: You should advise me of my rights, now.
Passenger: Paul, yo.
Paul Brophy: You should be helping me.
Police Officer: I’m asking you to help me.
Paul Brophy: What is your name?
Police Officer: I’m asking you to help me.
Paul Brophy: Can I ask you, what’s your name?
Police Officer: My name’s Steven. What’s your name?
Paul Brophy: Well, can I see, are you a detective?
Police Officer: No.
Paul Brophy: Well, can I see your name tag?
Police Officer: We don’t have name tags.
Paul Brophy: Okay.
Police Officer: Are you going to operate this motor vehicle?
Paul Brophy: I had planned to leave when he said we were loitering. Yeah.
Passenger: We were just told to leave, officer.
Police Officer: If you’re going to operate this motor vehicle, I need to know if you have a valid license.
Passenger: Got a license. Yeah. Give him your ID. Get it out.
Police Officer: Let me see your ID.
Paul Brophy: That’s not my problem.
Police Officer: Then we can go right from there.
Paul Brophy: That’s not my issue. Come on now.
Police Officer: Well, clearly if you’re going to drive this motor vehicle away, I need to know if you are a valid licensed operator. That way I can find that out. How am I going to find that out? By you producing me an ID?
Paul Brophy: No, I’m sorry. I’m not going to, no.
Police Officer: You don’t produce me an ID. You don’t drive this vehicle away.
Paul Brophy: Okay. Whatever you say, officer.
Police Officer: That’s what I say.
Paul Brophy: You’re in charge.
Police Officer: That’s correct.
[VIDEO CLIP ENDS]
Taya Graham: Now it’s worth noting that Paul, at his own risk, refuses to relinquish his rights. In fact, even as the officer escalates the encounter, Paul attempts to de-escalate, all the while simply trying to protect the rights enshrined in the Constitution. Just watch.
[VIDEO CLIP BEGINS]
Police Officer: So if you’re not going to produce ID.
Paul Brophy: Power and control, it’s all about power and control.
Police Officer: No, it’s not power and control.
Paul Brophy: Yes, it is. Everyone’s a criminal.
Police Officer: It’s me doing my job.
Paul Brophy: Everyone’s a criminal.
Police Officer: It’s me doing my job.
Paul Brophy: Why do you look at people like they’re criminals? Do I look like a criminal to you?
Police Officer: Have I looked at you like a criminal? I asked you for an ID.
Paul Brophy: Yeah. No, you’ve talked to me like I’m a criminal.
Police Officer: No, believe me, trust me when I tell you, I’ve talked to people like they’re criminals. I’m not talking to you like a criminal. So rest assured, I’m asking you for your ID. You want to operate this motor vehicle?
Paul Brophy: I’m respectfully refusing.
Police Officer: Okay, then I’m going to respectfully tell you that you’re going to be getting out of this motor vehicle because you’re not going to drive the motor vehicle without a license that I know that you’re a valid licensed operator.
[VIDEO CLIP ENDS]
Taya Graham: Of course, at this point, you’re probably saying, why doesn’t he just hand over his license? Why not just give the cop what he wants? Why be what the mainstream media likes to call a troublemaker? Well, let me briefly address that before I show you what happened next, because the sequence of events you’re about to see will certainly answer that question full stop.
First, what are the point of our rights if they are strictly conditional? How are the First Amendment, which guarantees our ability to move about without government intervention, and our Fourth Amendment, which protects us from unwarranted search, is meaningful at all If we need permission from a person with a gun and a badge to invoke them? Seriously, and if you don’t think how and when we can invoke rights are important, take a look at what happens next.
[VIDEO CLIP BEGINS]
Paul Brophy: So you’re escalating now again, and you’re getting louder.
Police Officer: Whether I’m getting louder or not has nothing to do with it. Apparently you don’t understand that right now you not producing an ID [crosstalk] means you’re not going to be able to drive this motor vehicle.
Paul Brophy: Is standing up for my rights and I’d stand up for yours too. I’d stand up for yours too. And I did.
Police Officer: Although, be that as it may –
Paul Brophy: He was very aggressive, that guy, when he came to the window.
Police Officer: You’re ignorant. If this situation…
Paul Brophy: You trying to provoke me.
Police Officer: – When the clerk has called us.
Paul Brophy: Yes. What did the clerk say? Can I ask?
Police Officer: I have not spoken to the clerk. But what we got transmission wise over the radio.
Passenger: Yes. What was that?
Police Officer: That he was suspicious about the activity that was going on. Which means there’s a potential for a crime.
Passenger: Okay. Yes. I understand that.
Police Officer: If there’s a potential for a crime, have, are or about to commit a crime, I have every right to ask for your ID.
Passenger: If you believe or under suspicion.
Police Officer: Bingo.
Paul Brophy: Well, suspicion doesn’t give you rights.
Police Officer: It’s called reasonable suspicion. And at that point we have the right to ask for an ID.
Paul Brophy: No, you don’t.
Police Officer: And because you are under suspicion for that potential crime that may or may not be going on –
Paul Brophy: It’s a touchy area.
Police Officer: – It’s for us to investigate.
Passenger: I understand. I understand. It’s a touchy area though. It’s a gray area.
Paul Brophy: I can see the difference clearly.
Passenger: No, it’s a gray area. I know.
Police Officer: But now that we got to the point where he wants to drive this motor vehicle away, he needs to produce an ID, valid license.
Paul Brophy: You don’t if that guy down the street has a valid driver’s license.
Passenger: I have a question. Stop. Stop. Calm down.
Police Officer: That guy going up the street isn’t part of a criminal investigation.
Paul Brophy: A criminal investigation?
Passenger: No, no, no. It’s not a criminal.
Police Officer: There’s a potential criminal investigation here.
Paul Brophy: [Crosstalk] If I assert my rights, I’m not being uncooperative, officer.
Police Officer: You haven’t told me why.
Paul Brophy: You haven’t told me your name.
Police Officer: I did tell you my name.
Paul Brophy: No, I asked you for your name tag and you said…
Police Officer: We don’t have name tags. No name tag.
Paul Brophy: Badge numbers, what’s your badge number? 117?
Police Officer: There’s no number on my badge. There’s no number on this badge.
Paul Brophy: Well, you don’t have a badge number. So how do I know you’re a cop?
Police Officer: Do you see a number on the badge? Because I have a badge, and it says police right on here, and I drive a police car.
Paul Brophy: I can get one of them online.
Police Officer: I have a police car right there. Want to see it? Want to see the police? It says it right on the side of it.
Paul Brophy: Well, in this day and age, you know.
Police Officer: Do you want to see the police? It says it right in the side of the car. Come on out. I’ll show you.
Passenger: Go check it out, man.
Paul Brophy: I can see it.
Police Officer: Come on out.
Passenger: Go check, inspect the car.
Police Officer: Step out. I’ll show you it.
Paul Brophy: Okay.
Passenger: Inspect it. You convince me.
Police Officer: Come out, I’ll show you.
Paul Brophy: I’m not giving anyone permission to go into my car.
Passenger: No. You don’t have permission for that.
Paul Brophy: [Shuffling sounds] Why do you want me to step out of the car? I’m not stepping out of the car. Not a chance. Hold on. Can I close my door?
Police Officer: So you can see the police car.
Paul Brophy: Let me close my door. I don’t want to see it.
Police Officer: I’ll tell you right now, you just put your hands on me. That’s why I’m grabbing you. All right. You just put your hands on me. That’s why I’m grabbing you. Now what we have here is a different scenario. You’re being aggressive. And now I’m going to ask you out of this vehicle.
Passenger: Give him your license.
Police Officer: I’m going to ask you out of this vehicle.
Passenger: Going to let you go.
Paul Brophy: I’m not getting out of here.
Passenger: Give him your ID and we can go.
Paul Brophy: Can I get a supervisor please? Can I get a supervisor?
Police Officer: You can get 10 supervisors.
Paul Brophy: Now? Can I get a supervisor now?
Police Officer: Listen to your buddy.
Passenger: Listen, Paul. Just give him your ID. Can you let go of his arm, officer?
Police Officer: No.
Paul Brophy: Why?
Police Officer: Because I don’t feel safe right now with you reaching out.
Paul Brophy: I don’t feel safe getting out of the car.
Passenger: Oh my God.
Police Officer: I have a taser and I have a gun. You’ve reached out to me, and I feel unsafe with you doing that.
Passenger: Calm down, please. Listen to me. Look at me.
Police Officer: What I’m going to do now is I’m going to take you out of this car.
Passenger: [Crosstalk] Paul, look at me. Look at me. Listen please, guys, don’t be harsh. Be harsh with him, man.
Police Officer: If you do not step out on your own.
Paul Brophy: Okay? I’ll step out on my own.
Passenger: Please.
Paul Brophy: Is that a lawful order?
Passenger: Be easy. Be easy.
Police Officer: It is a lawful order. A lawful order.
Paul Brophy: Why do you want me out of the car?
Passenger: Because they want to talk to you and show you something. All right.
Police Officer: Now you’re going to turn around. Put your hands.
Paul Brophy: No. Let me go. I’m not resisting.
Passenger: Oh man. I don’t know. I don’t know what he did, but you’re just detaining him for a minute? What are you doing?
Police Officer: Just for a minute until we get an ID out of him.
Passenger: Okay. All right. Thank you.
Police Officer: We can get the supervisor for you in a minute.
Paul Brophy: That’s all I’m asking for, a supervisor.
Police Officer: Yeah, you get one of the supers.
Paul Brophy: Oh, you’re bringing me in?
Passenger: No, they’re not bringing you in, dude. They’re just detaining you for a minute.
Paul Brophy: No, he said I’m going to see their supervisor in the station.
Passenger: No, you can call him here.
Police Officer: Actually, you know what? I’m going to charge you. ABPO. You can see him. That’s assault and battery on a police officer.
Passenger: Oh my God.
Police Officer: Assault and battery is any unwanted touching of somebody.
Paul Brophy: I did not touch you. I reached out my door.
Police Officer: I watched you reach out. You reached for me. I have a taser right here. You reached for my taser.
[VIDEO CLIP ENDS]
Taya Graham: That’s right. The officer accused Paul of assaulting him and reaching for his weapons. I’m not kidding. After asking him to get out of the vehicle, he actually summons serious charges against him: assault and battery of a cop. all because he was parked in a car outside of a convenience store at the ungodly hour of 2:00 AM.
Now, we are going to talk to Paul Brophy about what happened, why you fought for his rights and how this entire ordeal affected him. But first I’m joined by my reporting partner, Stephen Janis, who’s been looking into the case, researching the law, and seeking comments from the police. Stephen, thank you so much for joining me.
Stephen Janis: Taya, thanks for having me. I appreciate it.
Taya Graham: So first, what does the law in Massachusetts say about providing an ID to police when they ask?
Stephen Janis: According to the AC of Massachusetts, it’s really clear. The only time a police officer in Massachusetts can request your ID is when you’re operating a motor vehicle, which clearly was not happening at this time. But really, I think this is a Constitutional case. I think federal law governs here, and he was doing what anyone is allowed to do in this country, which is pretty much peaceably assembled without a cop going in and saying, who are you? So I think this is clearly a Constitutional case, and I think that’s the overriding concern here.
Taya Graham: You’ve reached out to both police and prosecutors. How are they justifying the charges?
Stephen Janis: Well, Taya, I reached out to Weymouth Police. I sent them a video of the arrest. They sent me back the police report, and it is extraordinary and telling. Now the entire probable cause in this case was a man going in and out of a convenience store and getting in and out of a motor vehicle. That was the whole basis for a crime investigation. But even more important, there are no notes about the police officer talking to the clerk in the store and trying to understand or discern why this was so disturbing. But really, there was no basis for a crime. There was no basis for a criminal investigation. If going in and out of a store is a crime, well, I’m a criminal. You’re a criminal. We’re all criminals. It’s pretty scary what the officer used to construe this encounter and this custodial stop.
And then the officer, I think, really embellished – Actually embellished is not even really adequate to describe it. He said that Paul went out and grabbed him by the waist. I think you see on the video, that’s not what happened. So this whole statement of probable cause, this whole police report raises a lot of questions about this entire arrest.
Taya Graham: Now, a judge did rule about the officer demanding the ID. What was the ruling? And more importantly, what are your concerns about what happened during this seemingly illegal arrest?
Stephen Janis: Well, Taya, what’s interesting to hear is the judge actually agreed. The judge ruled that the officer did not have the right to ID Paul at this point, and really said that was not a reasonable or even legal request for an ID. The only problem is the judge did not rule that actually vacated the entire charge of harming a police officer or assault and battery of a police officer. So really it didn’t amount to much. But the truth is, no matter what, Paul’s First Amendment rights were violated.
And also I think the entire charges of assault and battery are insane. Look at the video, read the police report. There is no evidence of it. For example, in the police report, the officer did not sustain any injuries. So how is that assault and battery? So anyway, I think it’s good that the judge affirmed his Constitutional rights. It’s unfortunate for Paul that the legal system didn’t work in his favor.
Taya Graham: And now I’m joined by Paul Brophy, the man who endured this police overreach, and whose life has been profoundly impacted by these charges. Paul, thank you so much for joining me.
Paul Brophy: Really appreciate the work you do. Honest to God, it’s fantastic.
Taya Graham: So this encounter happened in a parked car. How did the police approach you?
Paul Brophy: Well, it’s very simple really. I pulled in, it was a 24-hour store. I was doing two things. It was late in the morning, it was like 2:30, 3:00 from what I recall. And I pulled into the store and my passenger got out and went in, and I was sitting there texting or something, or looking at my phone. He came back out, got into my vehicle, and I reached to start it up. Obviously we were getting going, and next thing I realized that there’s two police cars. One pulled in behind me, preventing me from leaving. And the other, first of all, it was just one car. And he pulled in behind me and immediately came to the window and started asking questions. Said they got a call and can I get your ID? This and that. And my passenger gave up his ID right away.
And I’m thinking to myself, well, wait a minute. Why do I have to give my ID in this position? Because first, I hadn’t done anything wrong. I had no idea why they were there. And secondly, I wasn’t pulled over or anything. And it was then that his backup came and he kind of took over. And as you can see from the video, I think it took him about 15 seconds just to focus in on ID. So it became from then on, ID, ID, ID as opposed to, we’re investigating, we’re asking you to stay here for a few minutes and we’re going to talk to the clerk and do a proper investigation. But it turned out to be none of that. And he told me that they got a call that two people were running in and out of the store. There was nothing happening out of the ordinary, actually. So as you can see from the video then, he just started demanding ID.
Taya Graham: What do you think the suspicion of you and your passenger was? And did he ever really articulate his suspicion?
Paul Brophy: He articulated a suspicion because he said they got a call of two people walking in and out, running in and out of the store. So I told him I had no problem going into the store to talk to the clerk. I hadn’t even been in the store. My passenger went in and came back out. He did spend about five minutes in there. I recall thinking, is he coming or what’s going on? But he did just come out and then we were going to leave. So I guess his articulate suspicion was a suspicion that the store was going to be robbed, I guess. But he did say that the suspicion he had was… I can’t recall his exact words on the suspicion, but he said, we got a call, two guys coming in and out of the store in a truck outside. And that gave him enough suspicion to investigate, which meant that I was compelled to hand over my ID, and I disagreed.
Taya Graham: Now, you chose to stand on your rights. Why did you do that?
Paul Brophy: I think one of the reasons, one of the big reasons was because I had educated myself through shows like yours and First Amendment auditors, and over the past year that I just really got into it. And I could not believe the fact that how the police police here is totally contrary to the rights of the people. I think because most people just follow their demands or their requests that they continue to do it this way with disregard for people’s rights. In particular, where you live, what your social security number is, what your background is. And I figured all you had to do was run my plates anyways. It was my car, it was registered under me, it was insured, I had stickers, everything was okay on the car.
And so that was what prompted me. I’d watched a lot of the videos, and I’d seen so many policemen and government officials just walk over people’s rights. I decided to push back and just to push it and see, get an explanation from him. And really, he came up with this same old tried and trusted methods of, where did you go to law school and this type of thing. So I just answered and tried to stay calm, and I could see he was getting madder and madder. And I actually had to ask him to deescalate a little bit because I could feel his energy. He wanted to drag me out of that car. He wasn’t used to people say, challenging him, and I didn’t want to do it aggressively. I just wanted to be on my way and this not to be an issue. So it turned into a big issue, and it turned into a person losing their freedom and being put in a cell because they’re stopped at a 24-hour store on their way over to drop some money off for my daughter, is where I was going.
And I was giving the passenger a ride to that town. It’s kind of metro Boston. So I was giving my passenger a ride as far as that town, and he was on his own from there. It was very late. I couldn’t drop him to where he needed to go, and he had a bicycle. So I was helping him out, and on my way to do that – Granted it was late in the morning, but that’s nothing new for me. I mean, I’m out and about at all times. It’s not suspicious to be out and about.
Taya Graham: So the officer started to escalate the situation. From my vantage point of watching, it seemed like you were reaching to close the car door. The officer said you were reaching for him. What happened in that moment?
Paul Brophy: Exactly. That’s the crucial moment, if you will, and it’s not clear on the video what happened. But what happened was, for some reason I said, okay, I’m going to get out of the car. But he opened the door. I didn’t open the door. I went to unlatch my seatbelt. He opened the door and came around, whereas he was now between the door and me. So I said to him, well, why do you want me to get out of the car? And I reached out slowly. I know a lot of cops, and I know that you don’t make sudden movements, you don’t do anything silly. And I reached out for my door, but I reached out from my door with the arm. But as I did, he grabbed me like that and we both looked at each other and you can hear it on the video, and he goes, okay, so now everything’s changed.
You reached out for me, and I have a taser and I have a gun, and you grabbed my belt, my duty belt. And I was just stunned. I’m like, oh no, come on now. You know that’s not true, or something I said like that. Pulled me out of the car as you could see, and put me up against the side of my car and immediately cuffed me. And the other officer then said, I’m just going to charge him with assault battery of a police officer. And they ended up doing that and charging me with failure to ID.
Taya Graham: Were you surprised that the police officer escalated this to an arrest and the charges that came out?
Paul Brophy: Well, surprised is an interesting word. I think in one sense, absolutely, I was very surprised. But having educated myself and seen the level of abuse, if you will, towards members of the public, from videos and from your channel and the work you guys do, some of it is just horrendous. And to think that the very fact that you stand on your rights, which is in a perfect world, should be completely accepted, if it’s grounded in fact and law, that they would violate that. Now, call me naive. But I was thinking right from, there’s no way that they will ever get up on the stand or anything and just lie. And when I’d say that to people, they’d be like, really? So I went with the proper course of the way to do things. And sure enough, when I heard that and saw that and the reaction, the nonchalantness in a court of law, I was saddened.
I was really sad about that, and sad for the system and sad for… It’s kind of sad for myself as well. It’s like, my God, they’re not going to go this route, are they? I could go to jail potentially here. So we set a trial. I was offered a trial, and so my lawyer said I had a really good case and blah, blah, blah. And all of a sudden then I got this phone call from her and she said you need to come out to court immediately. After talking to the DA, talking to the judge, and they’re offering you a great deal. And I think you should take it right away. So, I know, I’ve been disappointed with myself ever since. But I felt a little bit, I was pushed into it. I was on my own. I didn’t have an advisor. I didn’t have somebody to go over it with.
But I went down to the court and they were there and she was in the courtroom and the judge, and they had offered me three months probation with no restrictions whatsoever. So this was at the very top and it said, abide by state and local laws and the law, abide by the law and in three months time, this will be dismissed. So I signed it, and that didn’t sit well in me at all. I let it process without talking to my lawyer. And I did say to her, well, I thought we were going to go to trial on this. You seemed very confident and you were, and she was in the text she sent me, but they want to clear cases, I guess.
Taya Graham: Just out of curiosity, did you actually have a license on you?
Paul Brophy: Yeah, I did. Yeah. I had my license on me. And I know, the first lawyer I got, I ended up having a part company with him, but the first, I was so upset, but the first appearance in court where they assigned me a lawyer, the first thing he said to me, and he was actually mad. He’s like, why didn’t he just give him your ID? And I’m like, oh God, is this who’s going to defend me? I don’t know if that’s going to work. And he walked away. He came back with paperwork and he said, there, and walked away. So anyway, it didn’t work out with him. After a while I said, I need a different lawyer. This is not, your attitude is your way of working is fine, but it’s not for me, and I prefer… So I went to the court and they said, okay. They gave me a different lawyer.
Taya Graham: So what were you charged with and how long were you in jail?
Paul Brophy: I was charged with refusing to provide ID to a police officer on demand and assault and battery on a police officer. Those were the two charges.
Taya Graham: Now you told me they didn’t want to take you to trial, which is interesting, because I think you would’ve done great on the stand. You had the truth on your side, no criminal history, well-spoken. I think you would’ve been great. So maybe they didn’t want you to face a jury. Can you update me on the case?
Paul Brophy: Yeah, sure. And thank you for saying that. I appreciate it, in regards to looking good on the stand and everything and believable. And I felt the same way, to be honest with you, because when you’re telling the truth, you don’t have to stammer or you don’t have to make up more stuff. For me just to sit there and talk from my heart and tell the truth about what happened. So what happened from when she was appointed with me, we met a few times, kind of made me feel in a way that she threw me a big favor at times because I said to her, well, at one point I said, well, whose side are you on here? Because she was leaning towards, well, why did you do this and that? And that’s fine. But she said to me, look, I do private cases, and I just take cases from the courts to be helpful in the community and stuff.
And I don’t know about that after what it went through because she needs cases, she wants charges, she needs, it’s all pretty good money for them, and it’s kind of free clients, if you will. Because of COVID, the courts were shut down here in Massachusetts for quite a while. It opened up under Zoom, so most of it was being done on video, and I’m thinking, this is 4 years later here, and what happened to my… I think my Sixth Amendment right here for a speedy trial? Then she called me to the court one day and she said, look, you need to come down here. The judge wants to hear, wants to go over this, and I’ve gotten a great deal for you. I really think you should take it. It’s totally non-restrictive probation for three months and it’ll be all dismissed and it’ll be all gone.
But as you know well, it’s never gone. It’s there. It’s prevented me from getting jobs. This is a disaster, to be charged with this. And then now I suppose I’ve in a way accepted it because I took a punishment. It’s disastrous for my life.
Taya Graham: So how has this arrest affected you? Did you lose time for work or have to pay attorney’s fees or a bond?
Paul Brophy: Oh my god, yeah. Yeah, you’re not going to find out, nobody’s going to email you back and say, well, we can’t hire you because you’ve been accused of assaulting a police officer. But I started testing the water. Here I am. I’ve got a graduate degree and I’m applying for entry level positions to see if I’m going to get any. Now, I took the graduate degree off. I just said I had a bachelor’s degree and I applied for dozens and dozens and dozens of jobs, and 90% I didn’t even hear back from them, because I think the norm now is for… You know how easy it is to look up somebody’s record. And once a person has your name and your address or whatever, which you have on your resume and all. So all I have is gig work right now. In fact, I was out of work for quite a while, long time. I know with COVID it was obvious we were out of work, but I haven’t had a steady job since this happened. And it’s unfortunate, because I did spend 20 years serving the public myself, and I always knew who I worked for, and I treated them with respect no matter what.
Taya Graham: Okay. Now, there are times when I talk about a specific law or right or even policy that directly relates to the misuses of police power. In other words, I try to drill down on one aspect of policing and the law and provide context and comprehension of the way bad policing affects our lives in ways that are often unacknowledged. But today, I’m going to speak in broader terms about what happened to Mr. Brophy and why I think an overlooked consequence of police power needs more attention. There are plenty of people who would look at the video, we just parsed and characterized it as unremarkable. I imagine there are certainly a lot of people watching the show who would just shrug their shoulders and say, yes, these charges have made life difficult for Mr. Brophy, but the cop was just doing his job. What’s the point of delving into this arrest any further?
Well, let me take this question from a different perspective. Let me explore the idea of how police power affects the way we think, act and even perceive ourselves and the freedoms we purport to cherish. Now, first of all, let’s remember that for all of those who think the cop was “just doing his job”, consider for a moment what that actually means. Imagine if the officer’s assertion that he has the right to demand an ID without probable cause is correct. If that’s true, I want you to ponder what kind of power he actually has and what it implies about our rights.
If a representative of the government can ask you to identify yourself anytime, anywhere, for any reason, we might as well just cross out the First Amendment of the Constitution that guarantees the right to peaceably assemble – And while you’re at it, cross out the Fourth because apparently you don’t have the right to secure your personal effects from unwarranted searches and seizures. This means the government can arrest someone for protesting. This means if the government doesn’t like your perspective, it can seize your property and simply do with it as it pleases.
But there is an idea that transcends the law that I think warrants discussion in this case. The psychology, so to speak, of government power that is just as potent as the aforementioned incursion on our rights, but rarely gets the attention it deserves. That’s because what the officer did to Mr. Brophy is not just about an arrest, contemptive cop or simply a grumpy officer taking out his frustrations on an innocent man. It’s not just a story of police overreach, misuse of the law or another glaring example of the overarching power of a single cop. No, I think what we’re seeing is symbolic of the broader contempt the government in general has for the people. I think it’s meant to be a performative sort of power: indiscriminate, excessive, and most of all indifferent, and that so-called performance has a message, to quote our documentary Tax Broke: we are not worthy.
What do I mean? Well, consider this recent series of stories regarding the inability of pharmacies to provide crucial drugs to people who need them. The report recounts how critical drugs to treat conditions like ADHD, anxiety, and opioid addiction are in short supply, prompting pharmacies to reject legal prescriptions. Now, this shortage is not related to the pandemic, the often shaky supply chain, or any other common manufacturing issue. It’s not even a consequence of a lack of raw materials or some sort of effort by drug companies to raise prices. No, the problem is a shining example of how the performative power of policing and economic inequality are not just linked, but actually work in tandem.
That’s because the force behind this life-threatening shortage of crucial pharmaceuticals is no less than the government itself. I am not kidding. It is a result of a DEA settlement with opioid manufacturers who flooded the country with billions of pain pills, raking in billions of profits while hundreds of thousands of people died from overdosing. The settlement with the attorney generals of 48 states and the DEA led to huge fines but no jail time for the greedy executives. It also included a provision to monitor pharmacies for the sale of drugs that aren’t even opioids – On the surface, at least – To ensure the pills don’t flood the market again.
The expansive list includes not just the aforementioned laundry list of critical drugs, but even a medication known as Suboxone, which is used, ironically, to treat opioid addiction through a process called replacement therapy. This system, put in place with little thought for who it would actually punish, is now causing pharmacies to be flagged for legally prescribed drugs, and as a result, cutting off crucial supplies needed by innocent patients.
So let’s unpack this little public policy jujitsu while I explain how it relates to the previously mentioned performative aspect of police power.
So first, greedy drug executives flood the markets like big time drug lords with opioid pills, causing overdose deaths to skyrocket and profits to balloon. The federal government ignores the crisis until it becomes too big to hide under the proverbial protect the rich rock. But then while crafting a settlement, the feds devise a plan that actually punishes average Americans, even while maybe one or two executives ended up behind bars. Included in that stupendously thoughtless plan was to limit the availability of critical drugs that are used to treat the victims of the feckless greedy drug company lords who caused the problem in the first place. I am serious. This is what our own government, which is supposed to serve the people, conjured from its how to screw things up manual – Which, incidentally, is available online for a small fee.
But back to my point at the beginning of this segment, the connection between police power and the ridiculously bungled response to the corporate sponsored addiction epidemic is part of a larger theme. Police in this case serve as a barometer, so to speak, a gauge of how the government actually views our rights and what they truly mean. The job of cops in this particular case is to perform for us the liturgy of the elites, a ritual that demonstrates to us clearly that we don’t matter. But it is more than that because this performative power with of course real consequences also convinces us that unjust policies like the ridiculous drug clampdown are, in essence, our fault. That is, we who are the ones who caused opioid pills to flood the market while companies made billions off of human misery. From the ability to arrest us anywhere at any time flows the entire psychology that the reason your local drugstore can’t obtain crucial medication to fulfill your prescription is actually you.
What that cop told us with his indiscriminate and reckless use of government power is the same message that the elites were sending when they made a mess of a healthcare system already frayed at the edges. Keep your mouth shut, comply or face the consequences of our massive indifference. And if you do push back, we will find the means through a minor arrest, conjured crime, or a straightforward retaliatory sanction to make you take the blame.
That’s why the misuse of police power is not just about bad tickets, false charges, or unwarranted harassment. That’s why a cop being able to demand your ID whenever and wherever they want is not limited to the indignity of the act itself. What it means is what it’s designed to tell us about ourselves, that even though the Constitution says differently, our rights are subject to change. What it tells us is that no matter how many times Wall Street or big banks or big pharma screw us, we only have ourselves to blame.
Which is why Paul’s decision to assert his rights is a more consequential act than it appears at first glance. That is, his insistence that he has the right to not comply with police is even more consequential than simply pushing back on an overbearing cop. It is instead an act of defiance that refutes the neoliberal blame game to punish the many to ensure profits for the few. It’s the most consequential and imperative act there is: saying no to indiscriminate power, no to more policing, and no to the invasive and never ending push to take our rights and sell them to the highest bidder.
That’s why we will continue to report on stories like these, and that’s why we will always unpack and expose the system that makes what you witness on this show possible. Hopefully, by continuing our work, we can make it impossible for cops to act this way, but it is unlikely. But even a small step towards justice is worth taking in the longer journey of making our world a better place.
I want to thank my guest, Paul, for joining us and for sharing his experience. Thank you, Paul. And of course, I have to thank intrepid reporter Stephen Janis for his writing, research, and editing on this piece. Thank you, Stephen.
Stephen Janis: Taya, Thank you for having me.
Taya Graham: And of course, I want to thank friends and mods of the show, Noli Dee and Lacie R for their support. Thank you. And a very special thanks to our Patreons. We appreciate you and I look forward to thanking each and every one of you personally in our next live stream, especially Patreon associate producers, John R and David K, and super friends, Shane Bushta, Pineapple Girl and Chris R.
And I want you watching to know that if you have video evidence of police misconduct or brutality, please share it with us and we might be able to investigate. Please reach out to us. You can email us tips privately at par@therealnews.com and share your evidence of police misconduct. You can also message us at Police Accountability Report on Facebook or Instagram, or @eyesonpolice on Twitter. And of course, you can always message me directly @tayasbaltimore on Twitter and Facebook. And please like and comment. You know I read your comments and that I appreciate them. And we do have a Patreon link pinned in the comments below if you feel inspired to donate accountability reports. And please consider doing so. We don’t run ads or take corporate dollars, so anything you can spare is truly appreciated. My name is Taya Graham, and I’m your host of the Police Accountability Report. Please be safe out there.
Maximillian Alvarez: Thank you so much for watching The Real News Network, where we lift up the voices, stories, and struggles that you care about most. And we need your help to keep doing this work, so please tap your screen now, subscribe, and donate to the Real News Network. Solidarity forever.
The new one-woman play ‘The Road to Damascus’ reinterprets the biblical story of Saul and the tale of Little Red Riding Hood as an allegory for white complicity in the US prison system and the possibility of redemption through anti-racism. Creator and performer Kathy Randels joins Rattling the Bars to discuss her new work.
Pre-Production: Frances Madeson Studio Production: Cameron Granadino, David Hebden Post-Production: Cameron Granadino
Transcript
The following is a rushed transcript and may contain errors. A proofread version will be made available as soon as possible.
Mansa Musa:
Welcome to this edition of Rattling the Bars. I’m Mansa Musa. And today, I have a remarkable woman. I use these terms a lot: remarkable, extraordinary. But in this regard, she encapsulates all of these things: Kathy Randels. Kathy, welcome to Rattling the Bars.
Kathy Randels:
Thank you so much, Mansa. It’s great to be here.
Mansa Musa:
All right, Kathy. I asked you this off camera, and I was joking with you that it wasn’t going to be easy. How would you describe yourself?
Kathy Randels:
All right. Something new comes out every time, right?
Mansa Musa:
Always.
Kathy Randels:
A preacher’s daughter from Bulbancha, which is the Indigenous name for what people know as the city of New Orleans. Was born and raised here. I am a mother myself to a 16-year old named Emma. I’m a wife to Sean LaRocca. I’m a daughter to some ancestors who have already transitioned.
And I am someone who has worked inside the Louisiana Correctional Institute for Women for 26 years. I’ve seen a whole lot that I don’t like, so I have made a performance piece that is trying to rattle the bars right now, Mansa.
Mansa Musa:
And you know what? We going to rattle these bars. Because now, you took a subject matter and turned it into a play. And the subject matter you took in is called The Road to Damascus.
And in the road to Damascus, as anyone of a Christian persuasion know, the road to Damascus is where Saul, who later became Apostle Paul, who was a known persecutor of Christians. Matter of fact, on the road to Damascus, he had got permission to go find some Christians, bring them back and kill them. He had just stoned Stephen.
Kathy Randels:
[inaudible 00:02:15]
Mansa Musa:
And you chose The Road to Damascus-
Kathy Randels:
Yes, sir.
Mansa Musa:
… as a form of generating a play.
Give our audience a overview of why you chose The Road to Damascus, and a little snippet of what the play is about. And on the heels of that, maybe you can grace us with some talent and music. How’s that sound?
Kathy Randels:
That sounds beautiful. Thank you so much. Thanks for this opportunity to speak about it.
I feel like The Road to Damascus chose me. It was one of those moments where sometimes your intention as an artist is met with a calling from a divine source, or even a human source.
In this case, I’ve been working on this piece for about three years now, and there were several things that were swirling around. One, on the political spectrum was that last president who I don’t feel like naming right now.
Mansa Musa:
He will remain nameless.
Kathy Randels:
And especially being in Louisiana, I’m in probably the most progressive area of the State of Louisiana. And being a white person whose family has been in this country, settler colonizers for many years with a tiny bit of Cherokee, about seven generations back.
Yeah, I was very discouraged by the huge rise of white supremacy that was being not just condoned, but sanctified under the last administration.
And I came to something that I think Martin Luther King Jr. came to. He said it much more eloquently than me. But I really felt very deeply that racism is not something that we can legislate away. Racism is a spiritual disease.
And I really felt having grown up in the church and having grappled with church and Christianity for years now; I’m in my mid-50s; I really actually felt like I wanted to go back to the church with this, and to challenge my fellow white Christians, specifically, on the role our church has played in creating white supremacy in all the systems of our country, but especially the criminal legal system. So that’s part one.
Part two is an amazing woman named Mama Glo Williams. Gloria Dean Williams. She was a member of the LCIW Drama Club for over 20 years.
Mansa Musa:
And that’s the drama club you created?
Kathy Randels:
Yeah. I started it. And I have many, many partners in the work throughout the years. My main co-director now is a woman named Ausettua AmorAmenkum, who’s also based here in Bulbancha, New Orleans. And yeah, Mama Glo is the woman who served the longest sentence in the State of Louisiana. She did 52 years at LCIW.
And through another one of our graduates, a woman named Fox Rich, who some of y’all may have already met and heard of. She’s the woman who had a documentary film about her successful struggle to get her husband out of Angola, called Time. That’s the name of their [inaudible 00:06:20], almost on-
Mansa Musa:
Netflix, yep.
Kathy Randels:
Yep, yep. Actually, it’s on Amazon, I think. Amazon, if y’all want to catch that. I’m a big rabbit chaser, so bear with me, Mansa.
Mansa Musa:
Take your time. We having this conversation.
Kathy Randels:
A sidebar about Fox is, she’s in a runoff to become our next congresswoman in the State House of Louisiana. So we’re excited about that.
But I want to come back to the time when Mama Glo was still in prison. After Fox successfully got our governor, John Bel Edwards, to sign her husband’s clemency papers, and when he was out, they were thinking about what they were going to do with their blessing of freedom. And they really felt called to help free more people.
And they started a participatory defense movement chapter in New Orleans. It’s called PDMNOLA. They wanted to tackle a large case at the beginning, and spoke with Ausettua and I about any women in the drama club. And we were like, “Well, Mama Glo’s the one who’s been there the longest.” And they were like, “Well, let’s try to free Mama Glo.”
So we worked together to free Mama Glo. Many, many, many: her family, PDMNOLA, our organization called The Graduates, which is a performing ensemble of formerly incarcerated women out of LCIW, VOTE in New Orleans … Many, many, many folks contributed to helping build a case for Mama Glo to be released.
She was pardoned by the pardon board. And after two years, was still waiting on the governor’s signature. And Fox is originally from a city north in Louisiana called Shreveport. And she shared with me one day that three Black ministers from Shreveport had a meeting with the governor; this was during COVID. Mama Glo had had COVID, and almost died from COVID. And they asked the governor what it would take for him to sign Mama Glo’s papers. And he said, “A Damascus experience.”
Mansa Musa:
Hm.
Kathy Randels:
And I had been thinking about this piece already. I had been thinking about Saul/Paul’s conversion experience. Thinking about this idea that what all white people; but maybe even especially, white Christians in America; need is a major conversion experience, especially around prisons and the whole philosophy of prisons in our country. That was a Damascus experience for me, to hear that that’s what the governor felt like he needed.
So when I first started really diving into making the piece, my intention was to perform it for the governor, so that he would see it and feel so moved to sign Mama Glo’s papers.
Mansa Musa:
You know what? I like the way you took that when he said “A Damascus experience,” and he said that’s what he needed. But the thing is; now, my question to you is; because we know the Damascus experience is the conversion of Saul into Paul. So when he said that, who did you think he meant to be converted? Him or Mama Glo?
Kathy Randels:
I think he was talking about himself.
Mansa Musa:
So he was saying in essence; and you can follow me out on this; that he would have to see something in his thinking that would make him have compassion towards Mama Glo. All right?
Kathy Randels:
That’s [inaudible 00:10:47]
Mansa Musa:
I heard what you said about performing it, that that would be the performance. And if you would’ve been able to see it out, had the performance, had it for the governor, he see the play, he had a conversion, he cut Mama Glo loose, we ride off in the sunset, everybody happy.
But how did you see it in terms of the reality? Because that ain’t happened. But how do you see it in terms of the reality, of having this information out there? And maybe he could see it and have that conversion? Or if he didn’t see it, others would see it, and be converted to have him converted.
Kathy Randels:
Right.
Mansa Musa:
You follow me out?
Kathy Randels:
Totally. Totally. Well, and then the curve ball is that he finally did have his Damascus experience. And he did sign Mama Glo’s papers before I finished making the piece.
Mansa Musa:
Okay.
Kathy Randels:
Halfway through making the piece, one of the initial intentions of it went away. So I had to rethink what I was doing with the piece.
And just on the governor, I will say that he has released a lot of women. Something historic is happening in Louisiana right now. Releasing Mama Glo, he has signed, I think; I have to talk to Ivy Mathis from VOTE, who’s really keeping track of all of this; but he has released at least somewhere between 12 and 15 women within the last six months.
Mansa Musa:
Okay. So he has been converted. I’m thinking about Isaiah 61, saying what: “The spirit of the Lord is upon me.” So what, the spirit of the Lord is upon him?
Kathy Randels:
Yeah. We could use a little more spirit. There’s a whole lot more people on his desk still.
Mansa Musa:
A whole lot more spirit gotta be having.
Kathy Randels:
Yeah. We need a little more spirit. But no, we’re in a quote-unquote red state, Mansa.
Mansa Musa:
I know exactly where you’re at.
Kathy Randels:
And who gets into that position next is scary. We’re looking at … Anyway, don’t let me go down that road!
Mansa Musa:
Hey, but Kathy: talk about this here. Okay, let’s go and unpack, why drama?
In DC they had a group in Lorton. Lorton was the major maximum security prison in the District of Columbia, where I’m at presently. And they had a group down there called the Inner Voices of Lorton.
Kathy Randels:
Nice.
Mansa Musa:
And the Inner Voices of Lorton, they used drama. And to get out of the prison, they had to get Richard Nixon, of all people, to sign their pardons. And Richard Nixon pardoned quite a number of them as a result of the Inner Voices of Lorton.
Chris Hodges, he is a known author and professor; wrote a book and conducted and dealt with around plays that had men look at themselves and be able to unpack their trauma through a drama. But my question to you: what made you, one, look at this as something that could be used?
And two, why did you think that it would be helpful in an environment where it was so much trauma, degradation, a whole lot of ills going on as a result of the system that they inflicted on these women?
What made you think that this right here, your method, would really have an impact on helping them? And ultimately having a Damascus experience that resulted in 12 women being released to this day … or more?
Kathy Randels:
Well, when I started the drama club, I had just graduated from college. I was, I guess, about three years out of college in my mid-20s. And I had just moved back home to Louisiana.
But I went to university at Northwestern in Chicago. And I had made a solo performance piece. I was a performance studies major. So theater has been, I guess, my talent, my gift, my calling from age 12. And I’ve studied it and practiced it all my life.
My final performance for my senior project was a piece called Rage With/Without that was about anger, aggression, and violence in women. Which was something that as a white Southern Christian woman, I was not encouraged to express my anger growing up.
Taking women’s studies classes and also studying theater in college really got me thinking about that. That got me thinking about what emotions do I have access to? And what emotions have I closed myself off from, or not even been invited to experience?
Then three years after I did that performance, a dear friend of mine, Ruth Carter, was working with some lawyers on the Illinois Clemency Project for battered women in Illinois. That was back in 1994.
Mansa Musa:
That’s right.
Kathy Randels:
And we’re still dealing with this, right?
Mansa Musa:
Mm-hmm.
Kathy Randels:
But one of the professors had seen my performance. And I told her that I really wanted to meet some of the women who had killed their abusers to have … My piece was very much based on books. It was a college academic piece. And I really wanted to meet women who had gone through these experiences. So I met them, and I incorporated two of those women’s stories into Rage Within/Without.
One of the women that I interviewed: I told her I was going back to Louisiana. And she kind of put the finger on a third eye. She was another Damascus moment. She said, “Well, Kathy, when you go back home, you need to work with the women down there.”
And I was like, “Okay.” I had no idea how I was going to do it. But I wrote a grant; it was a small NEA grant; and I said that I would perform Rage Within/Without at LCIW and do a six-month workshop afterwards.
I got the grant; I hadn’t talked to anybody at LCIW. Again, the divine channel opened, and the person I called was Lorraine Gibson, who was an incredible social worker. She really believed in serving and helping the women at LCIW, not in punishing them. And she thought this was a good idea.
She let me come in, did the piece, did the six months. And then a woman named Cheryl Keahey, who is an ancestor now, put the finger on me and said, “Now Kathy, you know you can’t leave.”
Mansa Musa:
Oh yeah.
Kathy Randels:
And I said, “Okay.”
Mansa Musa:
Hey Kathy: now while we got a little time left, give us an overview of what The Road to Damascus is.
Kathy Randels:
Okay. So the subtitle is As Told by Grandmother to Little Red. Grandmother is an incarcerated woman; and in many ways, she’s modeled after Mama Glo. She’s been incarcerated for over 50 years. Little Red is her granddaughter, a teenager in many ways modeled after me.
Saul is the prison guard, and the wolf is … Hmm, I was trying to describe the wolf yesterday. The Wolf is the natural order; divinity untampered with by humanity. So the story tells these four characters, and how they intersect.
And maybe now would be a good time, if I may, to sing. There’s an opening song I think lays out the themes that are then explored more deeply in the piece.
Mansa Musa:
Oh yeah, most definitely. Yep.
Kathy Randels:
Is that okay?
Mansa Musa:
Yeah, most definitely. Yes.
Kathy Randels:
All right. Sorry about that, y’all.
(singing)
Mansa Musa:
Yeah. All right. Tell us where our viewers can get in touch with you, and where our viewers can support [inaudible 00:23:49] theater, this particular play.
Kathy Randels:
Thank you. Thank you so much.
Mansa Musa:
How they can get in touch with you.
Kathy Randels:
Yeah, definitely. Y’all can reach out to me at Kathy, K-A-T-H-Y, @artspotproductions, with an S on the end, dot org. And this piece, we just finished performing the piece here in Bulbancha, New Orleans. And we’re taking it to the state capital next, Baton Rouge, to a place called The Red Shoes. That’s going to be on March 11th at 6:00 PM.
Then we’re taking it to the Lafayette area on March 18th. That location is still TBD. And then I’m coming up to the Northeast. Well, first The Graduates are going to be performing at the Beyond the Bars conference. I hope some of y’all can come to that at Columbia University.
We’ll be performing on March 24th, and Mama Glo will be with The Graduates for that performance. And it’s going to be her first time performing in New York. She’s also going to be giving a panel called Mama Glo’s Healing Circle on Sunday, March 26th. That’s at 2:00 PM; that’s also going to be a part of that conference.
And then finally, The Road to Damascus in New York. We’re going to do it at Union Seminary in the James Chapel. That’s going to be on March 31st and April 1st. And Mama Glo is going to speak after the piece with our audiences there. So I think the best way to find out what’s going on is to come to our website, artspotproductions.org, or shoot me an email.
And yeah. Thank you so much, Mansa. Thank you for following my tangents. I know I can travel all over the world with words, but you are an amazing, amazing spirit. I feel blessed to have met you here today, and I’m grateful for the work you’re doing.
Mansa Musa:
It’s my honor. And we like to remind our Rattling the Bars viewers and listeners: that there you have it: The Real News about The Road to the Damascus, a play by Kathy about conversion. But more importantly, a play about healing and uplifting us in our humanity. In this time and day and age, this is what we really need: an upliftment of our humanity.
Thank you, Kathy, for being this remarkable woman that you are, and honoring us and gracing us with your song and with your work.
We ask that all our viewers and listeners continue to support Rattling the Bars and The Real News. As you well know, our comrade, Eddie Conway, has transitioned. And we want to continue to invoke his memory and his good works by continuing this work on Rattling the Bars and The Real News. So we ask that you continue to support Rattling the Bars and The Real News. Thank you very much, and thank you, Kathy.
Kathy Randels:
Thank you so much. Y’all have a great day.
Anncr.:
Thank you so much for watching The Real News Network, where we lift up the voices, stories, and struggles that you care about most. And we need your help to keep doing this work. So please tap your screen now, subscribe, and donate to The Real News Network. Solidarity Forever.
On Sept. 30, 2020, a SWAT team burst into the Henderson County, Indiana home of Chris Reiter under a falsely obtained warrant. Reiter’s girlfriend, Tiffany Napier, was severely injured as police ransacked the house, ultimately finding nothing before departing without acknowledging any wrongdoing on their part. Reiter has since filed a lawsuit alleging violations of his constitutional rights, and dedicated himself to helping others hold police accountable. Reiter’s efforts recently led to another arrest when he attempted to help the father of a victim of abuse by Clarksville police. Chris Reiter and Tiffany join Police Accountability Report to discuss their efforts to seek justice.
Studio: Stephen Janis Post-Production: Stephen Janis, Cameron Granadino
Transcript
The transcript of this episode will be made available as soon as possible.
Incarcerated people across the US could find their commissary funds depleted by a new proposed policy from the Bureau of Prisons to automatically deduct three quarters of all funds prisoners receive from loved ones on the outside. The BOP is justifying the proposed change by appealing to personal responsibility—claiming that the deductions will go towards covering prisoners’ financial obligations such as child support and court fees. But what about the financial obligations of the federal government? Billions of public dollars are earmarked for corporate contractors profiting from incarceration and war each year, while the costs of operating courts and raising children are pushed onto incarcerated individuals and their families. Tim Curry, Mark Ford, and Jodi Hocking join Rattling the Bars to discuss the new Bureau of Prisons proposal and how incarcerated people, their families, and organizers are fighting back.
Jodi Hocking is the founder and Executive Director of Return Strong, a grassroots organization of families and loved ones of incarcerated people fighting for transparency, accountability, and communication from the Nevada Department of Corrections.
Mark Ford is a formerly incarcerated person who won relief from the BOP’s proposed deductions after advocates won a statutory cap on the new policy.
Transcript
The following is a rushed transcript and may contain errors. A proofread version will be made available as soon as possible.
Mansa Musa:
Welcome to this edition of Rattling the Bars. I’m Mansa Musa, and today we’ll be talking to three extraordinary individuals that will be educating us on how the prison industrial complex, mass incarceration is profiting off of prisoners and their families. As if it is not enough to have us be dehumanized by being subjected to some of the most harshest living conditions, now we being subjected to paying for those living conditions. According to a report the Bureau of Prisons is proposing a change of the operations of inmate’s trust accounts. The new rule will automatically apply to 75% of the money received from family members or other outside sources, towards restitution, court costs, child support, and other obligations. That means that if your loved one has court ordered financial obligation, they have not been met and you send them a hundred dollars, only 25 will be deposited into their account.
Here to talk about this proposed policy and how the state has implemented some of these policies is Mark Ford, Jodi Hocking, and Tim Curry. Welcome to Rattling the Bars.
Mark Ford:
Thank you.
Jodi Hocking:
Thank you. Thanks for having us.
Mansa Musa:
All right, Mark, introduce yourself to Rattling the Bars, just tell us a little bit about yourself.
Mark Ford:
Hello, my name’s Mark Ford. I just recently was released from prison. I’ve been out about a week right now. I served 20 years for second degree murder and I’m currently staying at a halfway house and trying to get back in the track of life.
Mansa Musa:
All right. Welcome home. Jodi.
Mark Ford:
Thank you.
Mansa Musa:
Introduce yourself to the Rattling the Bars audience. Tell us a little bit about who you are and what your organization represents.
Jodi Hocking:
Thank you. My name is Jodi Hocking. I am the founder and executive director of an organization in Nevada called Return Strong. We actually came into existence because of this exact situation in Nevada. So we were are a group of family activists, formerly incarcerated people as they return. Mark is a perfect example that he was one of our members while he was incarcerated and comes home and becomes part of the voice of making change. So we work on humanity issues, privatization issues, and ultimately, are abolitionists that are looking to end incarceration.
Mansa Musa:
And Tim, Tim Curry, introduce yourself to Rattling the Bars and tell us a little bit about your organization.
Tim Curry:
Yeah, hi. Thank you for having me. I’m the policy and research director at the Fines and Fees Justice Center. We’re a national organization that’s working to reform the way that our court systems and our governments are funding themselves by taking money from people who are caught up in the system.
Mansa Musa:
All right. Mark, you said that you was recently released from prison after serving 20 something odd years. All right. While you was incarcerated and you was incarcerated in Nevada prison system. Am I correct?
Mark Ford:
Yes, sir.
Mansa Musa:
All right. And while you was incarcerated the policy of taking a percentage of the monies that was received from prisoners, can you explain what that policy looked like in the Nevada prison system?
Mark Ford:
So I have a few examples here. I worked at a prison industries, worked with vehicles, we worked with the casinos, packaging the cards and things like that. With the overhead charges from the prison industries, every time I made a hundred dollars, 34.5% was taken out of my check for victim’s fund, overhead charges, PI fees. After that deduction I was left with $65.50. If your savings wasn’t full, you would get deducted another 10%. So that was another $6.55. So after all that, I would clear $58.95. A little while back, we were getting 80% deduction for the Marcy’s Law, which left me with only $14.73.
Mansa Musa:
$14.73 of-
Mark Ford:
After two weeks from a hundred dollars paycheck, which is a very low amount after working eight hours a day every day, for five days a week. With that rate, to save for a pair of tennis shoes, you do the math, it takes almost four months just to buy a pair of tennis shoes. The taxation is high. It’s rough on everybody. I got the job in prison to relieve some pressure off my family so I didn’t have to ask them for money. With inflation, everything out there in the world, it’s hard for them. I still had to ask for help because it wasn’t enough. So there I am relying on family members again. It’s difficult.
Mansa Musa:
And let me ask you this here. Okay, so we know that they taking a large percentage of your money and they taking it under the pretense for a whole panacea of reasons. But in terms of outside of your hygienic needs that you have to pay for, did you have to pay for phone calls and you had to pay for sick call medical, and if you wanted to go with sick call, did you have to pay for a sick call and you have to pay for the phones? The calls for paying phone?
Mark Ford:
Correct. So the phone system set up where you can buy phone time right there at the phone. A 15-minute phone call, I believe, is roughly a $1.67. So just for me to call my family just to check in and let them know how I’m doing, every phone call is a $1.67. Any medical charges, you would put a request and be seen. It’s $8 to be seen for any medication or anything that is wrong with you. So just showing how much I would clear after two weeks, by medical bills and making a few calls just to let my family know that $14 goes real fast.
Mansa Musa:
Let me ask you this here. What impact did that have on the prison population? Like I said, I did 48 years in prison and I know that whenever a policy came out, it always have a collateral effect on the general population. I know the environments I’ve been in, when you have a situation where prisoners are unable to take care of themselves, it create a hostile environment, it created a black market, it created [inaudible 00:07:40] balance, it created a lot of tension and it created a lot of predatorial behavior. Did you witness that or was that something that took place in the Nevada prison system that you was in?
Mark Ford:
Correct. I’ve seen that with my own eyes. The prison provides very little of hygiene for yourself. It provides you some toothpaste and some soap. So you know, are forced to use your money to buy hygiene from the canteen. Better name brand, better products. Me, myself, I use most of my money for food. The prison food is not the best food due to a lot of strain on the system with officers not having enough to run the system and the inmates just want to go to the kitchen, get their hours done and get out. The food is bad, so I’m forced to spend my money for the canteen. And you see a lot of strain on other people.
And like you said, black market, you see people trying to get drugs in the system to get faster money and support themselves that way. So it does have a ripple effect. It puts pressure on everybody, makes hostile environments between different people. The drugs nowadays are stronger. People act wild, so it does put safety concerns for other inmates, officers. So definitely has a ripple effect.
Mansa Musa:
Okay. And so suffice to say that just draconian oppressive policies are the result of a lot of prison population being unstable. Jodi, your organization was successful in having the initial policy of taking 80% … your organization was instrumental in having that reversed. Talk about how y’all was able to get them to change it and where are y’all at now trying to get it eradicate all together?
Jodi Hocking:
So at that time, and I mentioned this earlier, we’d only been in existence for three weeks and on August 30th, 2020, they implemented this … 31st, sorry. And people woke up on September 1st and their trust accounts, everything had been gutted. There was no money and if you had made a deposit that night, it was gone. They were taking 80 to a hundred percent from everybody’s, anybody who owed restitution is really who was impacted by that at the time. And there was a Board of Prison Commissioners meeting coming up, so the policy had not been passed yet by the Board of Prison Commissioners. And we just started organizing families. There were only 15 of us at the time and we started writing letters to all of our loved ones and asking people to send their families to us. And we just showed up in force at that Board of Prison Commissioner’s meeting.
I think there were well over a hundred people. We don’t even know what the actual number was on phone calls, because it was all virtual at the time, because it was in the middle of COVID. So the phone lines were so clogged that they couldn’t even start the public comment process because people were there and so angry. But typically, angry people organize, so kind of worked to our benefit in that way. And the governor implemented a stay on the deductions, so for five months they stopped. So it was in September they took deductions, then starting on October 8th until March, they stopped taking deductions. What we did is we fought, we actually created a bill draft proposal and we just made as much noise as we could. We used the media, we used legal avenues.
We were brand new at at the time, so really what we did is make noise and we got every family that we could find to help us do it. From inside, our members that were incarcerated, we asked them to write us letters and talk to us about the impact. We collected, I don’t know how many letters at this time, because now we got 3000 letters this year. So I don’t remember how many we got, but we used those in the press. We did op-eds, we did everything we could to elevate this into the public eye so that the Department of Corrections couldn’t just slide it under the radar. Everybody knew what they were doing. And we really, this might sound bad, but we knew generally people didn’t care how it was impacting incarcerated people. But if we framed it from the impact on families that were left outside, people would listen.
And so our intention and concern was our loved ones that were incarcerated. We were very careful to message it so that it would appeal to legislators and decision makers so that they would care about people who could vote for them. We got the stay, we got a bill proposal and we actually passed a bill that, we wanted it to be no deductions, but this was very related to Marcy’s Law in Nevada and that was a constitutional amendment that had happened a few years prior. And so we weren’t able to win, no, that they couldn’t take restitution while people are incarcerated, even though other states do do that.
What we were able to do was implement statutory caps. So all of the deductions included, if you owed court fees and restitution and child support, and I add this to what Mark said is, in Nevada they charge people who work in prison industries, room and board. So you owe room and board, you owe all these things all together. If you didn’t work in prison industries, there’s a 25% cap now. So send my husband a hundred dollars, he’s going to get 75 of it.
Mansa Musa:
Basically, for y’all strategy, y’all was able to identify certain aspects of this concept or this draconian policy and attack them and get them to put a cap on it overall.
Jodi Hocking:
So I think in Nevada, one of the things that is happening is that it’s, one, we were able to do that with the deductions and get the caps on them. But in addition, this legislative session, well even before the legislative session, we’re fighting some other privatization attacks around mail and mail scanning. Which right now, so far, knock on wood, we’re doing really well and kind of leading in that unregulated industry in terms of protecting our mail from being privatized and scanned under the guise of it being drugs. And we also have a bill that we’re working together with the Fines and Fees Justice Center on that would eliminate medical copays, it would eliminate room and board fees, it would eliminate all of those fees. We’re calling it ending the cost of incarceration. And we’re waiting right now for the bill number to be assigned, but we’re doing some really heavy work in terms of how do we end the cost of incarceration and look at how prisons are funded. In Nevada, they don’t fully fund the prisons and they expect families, incarcerated people to make up the difference on that. And they were fighting that extremely hard.
Mansa Musa:
And Tim, I’m going to come to you in a minute. I just want to make this observation. The state’s legislative give, the prison budget is astronomical. So you putting money into the prison, you putting money into it in astronomical numbers. And then you turn around and say you going to charge a person that is in prison for life or in prison for 20 years, a fee for staying there, a fee for getting medical attention that you put money in the budget for medical, for have to go buy some food, that you put money in for food. It just stands to reason that the criminal justice system is actually the new form of slavery.
Tim, talk about where do y’all go at in your organization, talk about your organization and where your organization’s at in terms of trying to educate people and trying to get reversed on some of these policies that Jodi and Mark was talking about.
Tim Curry:
So the examples that Jodi and Mark are giving are things that we’re seeing play out all around the country. Kind of the way we approach this is we got to separate what fines and fees are. So fine is something that the court imposes as a punishment, it’s a financial punishment. But then states and courts add on so many other fees. These are things that they are basically hidden taxes that are only imposed on people in the system to pay for courts, prisons, or other government things. There could be payments for funds on autism research, but they’re only charging it for people who are in the system. And so we’re working around the country, state by state, to try to address some of these things. And when they come up in the federal system, we really try to raise a light on them as well because what happens is, Jodi and her group was successful in pushing back on what was happening in Nevada. But with the Bureau of Prisons trying to introduce something almost identical, it’s just a signal to other states that hey, this is okay to do. Why don’t you go do it too? And this is the stuff that we’re trying to stop.
Mansa Musa:
And talk about, I was reading where the Federal Bureau of Prisons right now, they made this proposal and we know that we got a conservative Congress and a conservative Senate and we got a conservative president when it comes to all things criminal justice or criminal injustice. Talk about y’all strategy in trying to get the federal, ’cause that’s the next leg up right now. And like you say, if the federal government does it, then it becomes the law of the land. Talk about what y’all are doing in terms of trying to educate people on what they need to do to try to get this reversed, because we have a large prison population, 2.1 million people down, incarcerated and a large percentage are federal prisoners.
Tim Curry:
So what we do is we try to shed light and educate both lawmakers, policymakers, but also the public on what’s going on so that they can kind of put pressure on their elected officials because this hits people from all walks of life. What this is really anti-family. And Jodi was talking about how her concern as an impacted family member was that the person who’s incarcerated, but it really is impacting families all across the country. We’re draining wealth from communities all over this country that actually need that wealth to survive. And so what we’re doing, so I’ll give you an example of what’s going on with the Bureau of Prisons proposal. Similar to what Nevada was trying to do, the Bureau of Prisons is now saying that they would like to implement, it’s not yet official. They would like to implement this policy that would take 75% of any contribution to a person in custody’s commissary account. So if your family puts any money in, they would take 75% of it.
And so think about that in terms of a struggling family back at home. If they’re trying to support their incarcerated loved one, and they wanted to get that person a hundred dollars for their commissary, right now, coming up, the Bureau of Prisons would take $75 of that and the person only get $25. So for that mother who’s trying to get her son a hundred dollars, she would now have to come up with $400 to be able to do that exact same thing. And Bureau of Prisons is no different than Nevada in the fact that it’s not providing for the basic needs of inmates, people who are in custody. And so people in custody rely on their commissary accounts to buy food and toiletries and clothing and everything they need to survive.
And so what we’re doing is we’re trying to rally advocate groups from around the country, but also the general population to let them know that the way the federal system works is if the Bureau of Prisons wants to do this, they have to put this what’s called a public comment. They have to put it out online and people can weigh in and say whether they think it’s good or bad idea. And right now, we’ve got nearly a thousand people who have weighed in and said this is a terrible idea and the Department of Justice really needs to listen to the population and say, stop doing this. And so that’s one of the things that we’re trying to do. I think the irony that we see here is that the Bureau of Prisons is a division of the Department of Justice and President Biden says that he is for equity, racial and economic equity in all federal policy making.
He’s issued executive orders that say all of his agencies have to implement policies that are racially and economically equitable.
Mansa Musa:
That’s right.
Tim Curry:
But the Department of Justice and Bureau of Prisons are his agencies and they’re not doing that. So in this proposal, they say explicitly in the proposal that they understand that taking 75% of everyone’s money is unjust, is racially inequitable and it is economically inequitable. And that they could do something different, they could kind of do a tier system. They could take more money from people who have a lot of money and less money from people who have no money, but they decided that that’s too difficult. And so what the Bureau of Prisons has said that equity is just not worth their time and effort, despite what the president and the White House has said they should be doing. And not only are they taking that money in the moment, but one of President Biden’s other policy priorities is helping with reentry, for people who are returning to their communities. But if you are taking any of the money that they’re trying to save for reentry, that’s not helping. And again, the Bureau of Prisons just is taking money, or is proposing to take all this money from affected communities because the money’s not coming from the individual people in custody. It’s coming from outside sources. That’s what the policy says. We’re taking 75% of money from outside sources, friends and families.
Mansa Musa:
Okay, thanks. And as we close, Mark, how much money did you come out prison with?
Mark Ford:
I saved a few thousand working in prison industries over the years. I just want to let the viewers also know my personal thoughts on restitution for the victims in my case. I was never opposed to paying, I just believe that 80%, 75% is very high. I transitioned to a halfway house and it cost me $600 to pay for the first 30 days there. Getting the money sent on my account so I could pay for it myself, the tax was so high that I was not able to do that to get released. So I had family still waste their time to go down there to pay, which is a big inconvenience for them. I also want to let people know that part of my condition on parole, I have to pay the restitution when I’m released. So I’m still making progress to pay that restitution fine off. So it’s not like we’re saying, hey, I don’t want to pay any of this money, but this is very, very hard on your family. Majority of the money that people get in prison is from their family and it takes a toll on them, especially in this hard time out there.
Mansa Musa:
Yeah, and I think that’s really the issue. The issue is not so much is whether person want to be accountable. The issue is whether or not you want to force accountability on me at the expense of my family or give me a double punishment. You give me 25 years in prison, you tell me that upon my release, I’m going to have to pay restitution. Do you want me to stay out but when I get out you taking money from me, money I need to survive. Jodi, you got the last word on this. What you want to tell our audience?
Jodi Hocking:
I just think that all of these issues with prisons, prisons have become predatory on not just the people who are incarcerated, but on families. And that if, as a community, like wide-based community, talking about the country, if we are going to choose incarceration, then they have to fund it themselves. But in the meantime, the reality is, this is not the just or equitable way to do this. It really is predatory on the people who are most vulnerable.
Mansa Musa:
And Tim, tell us how we can get in touch with you, how our audience can get in touch with your organization, and what y’all got plans coming up.
Tim Curry:
Yeah, so right now, first of all, if anyone is interested in submitting a public comment, anybody who’s an individual, can submit a public comment against the Federal Bureau of Prisons proposal and I can provide your team a link to that. The public comments close on February 13th. I’m sorry, March 13th. So you have a couple more days to get that in. But otherwise, we welcome input from the community, so feel free to reach out to the Fines and Fees Justice Center. You can email me directly, we have a form on our website. And we love to work with communities who are trying to make change in this. We know that fines and fees are a local and state issue around the country, predominantly and so we need partners in communities that want to see change and we’re happy to connect with folks.
Mansa Musa:
There you have it, the real news about the prison industrial complex taxing people’s family members by taking money from their families that’s being sent to them, 80%, 75%. They got a state budget that put money into the prison industrial complex for housing, yet they are charging prisoners family members money for housing. You have the state budgets that’s putting money in for medical, yet you have the prison industrial complex taxing people’s family members for medical. You have the state budget putting money in for phone calls, and yet you have the state prison industrial complex taxing family members for phone calls.
We ask that you continue to support Rattling the Bars and The Real News because we know that these things are wrong and we ask that you continue to support it because our comrade, Eddie Conway, passed away. But this was his passion. The Real News and Rattling the Bars thank you.
Speaker 5:
Thank you so much for watching The Real News Network, where we lift up the voices, stories, and struggles that you care about most and we need your help to keep doing this work. So please tap your screen now, subscribe and donate to The Real News Network. Solidarity forever.
Texas cop watcher Manuel Mata has been jailed again after he confronted a Ft. Worth officer on sidewalk while he was making arrest. The charges of interfering with public duties Mata is facing raise serious questions about the right to film police, and if law enforcement is ratcheting up the pressure on 1st amendment activists.
Studio: Stephen Janis Post-Production: Stephen Janis, Adam Coley
Transcript
The transcript of this story is in progress and will be made available as soon as possible.
“Do your little part. Do whatever you can to help change these conditions. Because we’re moving into a critical period of history, not just for poor and oppressed people, Black people, but for humanity itself. So you need to engage. Do whatever little bit you can, but you need to do something.”
—Eddie Conway in 2019, celebrating five years of freedom
It is with the heaviest of hearts that we announce the death of our friend, co-worker, and comrade Marshall “Eddie” Conway.
Eddie joined the ancestors on February 13, 2023, surrounded by family and loved ones. After falling ill nearly a year ago, while still dealing with the immeasurable toll nearly 44 years of incarceration as a political prisoner took on his body, Eddie had been hospitalized and fighting valiantly to recover. That is who he is, who he was, and who he always will be: a fighter. After a lifetime of fighting, though, the time has come at last for our dear Eddie to rest—and for all of us to carry on his fight.
Eddie was born on April 23, 1946, in a deeply segregated Baltimore—a city shaped by blockbusting, white flight, and the organized disinvestment from Black communities. At 18, he enlisted in the US Army, an experience that would prove to be politically formative for Eddie, throwing into sharp relief the contradictions of a country founded on slavery, structural racism, and genocidal violence that nevertheless professed to defend “democracy” with bombs, guns, and endless war.
Returning home to Baltimore, Eddie confronted the pervasive evils of racism head-on. He was working in the medical sector and at Bethlehem Steel when, in 1968, the city erupted like so many others following the murder of Martin Luther King, Jr.—an explosion of rage and pain and need for action that brought Eddie into the orbit of the nascent Black Panther Party, in which he became a core member of the newly-established Baltimore chapter.
The Baltimore BPP chapter, with Eddie’s support and leadership, built strong community ties through efforts like a free breakfast program, a system of robust internal political education, and an increasingly widespread local distribution network for the national BPP newspaper—despite near constant police harassment, and even high-level infiltration of the branch. This was the era of COINTELPRO, in which local police forces were enlisted by the national security state to crush the successful systemic challenge the Panthers and other associated revolutionary groups were posing to America’s racist, exploitative status quo. It was at the height of this era that Eddie was framed for the 1970 killing of a Baltimore police officer, convicted, and sentenced to life in prison in 1971, after a heavily politicized trial in which Eddie was denied proper legal representation.
Even in the darkest of times, in the most hopeless of places, Eddie’s commitment to organizing for liberation was unwavering. Within his first weeks inside the Maryland penitentiary, he had already emerged as a leader of the incarcerated chapter of the BPP. Despite constant, dehumanizing, and often violent pushback from prison authorities, he would go on to play a lead role in creating organizations like the United Prisoners Labor Union and the Maryland Penitentiary Intercommunal Survival Collective, organizing with fellow incarcerated people to build collective power for self-determination and self-defense. While incarcerated, Eddie worked relentlessly to protect and expand prisoners’ rights to communication and education; for instance, he helped organize the “To Say Their Own Word” seminar program, developed as a way to cross-pollinate radical thought inside and outside the prison. He was also instrumental in the founding of Friend of a Friend, a mentorship program designed to help young incarcerated men prepare for reintegration into their communities upon release.
Year after year, decade after decade, Eddie carried on not only with the tremendous bravery needed to contest America’s brutal system of mass incarceration while he was himself confined within it, but also with an enduring and perhaps surprising commitment to modesty. As he wrote in his autobiography, published in 2011:
Organizing is my life’s work, and even though I initially balked at becoming a prison organizer, that is where most of my work has been done. Friends and family tell me that I have influenced hundreds of young people, but I don’t know. I simply see the error of this society’s ways up close and feel compelled to do something about it; I have tried my hardest to avoid getting caught up in the cult of the personality that often develops around political prisoners. I have walked the prison yard and seen admiration in the eyes of others, but had to remind myself, as I straightened my posture, that it is about something bigger than me. Prisons are the place where society dumps those who have become obsolete, and at present there are perhaps no other people who have become more dispensable in this country than African-descended people. The minute that we began to stand up and hold this country accountable for the many wrongs done to us, the prisons began to swell with black women and men. It is as if the entire justice system is a beast that consumes black bodies, and prisons are the belly.
Eddie’s loved ones and supporters never gave up on him, keeping a decades-long solidarity movement going and agitating persistently for his release, but it was only in 2014—after a 2012 decision by the Maryland Court of Appeals that invalidated many historical verdicts due to faulty jury instructions—that Eddie was finally able to secure his freedom.
Despite the unimaginable toll that 44 years of incarceration had taken on him, Eddie’s organizing did not stop when he walked out of prison. He became our beloved colleague at The Real News Network, where he continued his passion for education and media-making in the service of the fight against mass incarceration as Executive Producer and the host of Rattling the Bars, his weekly video program. He also played a key role in the formation of Tubman House, which, in the wake of the Baltimore Uprising, seized vacant property and land for community needs in Sandtown-Winchester—the neighborhood where Baltimore police killed Freddie Gray.
Eddie never left the struggle he had been waging for so long, even as his health declined. We are endlessly grateful to him for that. And we are grateful that this incredible man, who endured so much, was also able to find years of joy, love, and solace in his marriage to Dominque Stevenson, a true comrade and freedom fighter who supported him inside and outside of the prison walls.
He will be missed—by everyone here at The Real News, by the city that loves him, and by all those around the world who were touched by his light. We will miss his voice, his revolutionary clarity, and his unbreakable commitment to fighting on the side of the oppressed. We will carry on that fight, because that’s what Eddie would do. We are heartbroken that he is gone, but we are grateful that we were lucky enough to know him, and we are sending all our love and solidarity to his family.
