Philly Cops Captured in Disturbing Video Abusing Stop and Frisk Tactics

Philly PoliceOver the past few years, there has been a pervasive counter argument to those who oppose the police policy of Stop and Frisk, that if you have nothing to hide, there should be no problem in having cops ‘momentarily‘ detain you…

Such arguments have been uttered by Mayors like Michael Bloomberg as well as other elected officials who would like to adopt such policies to their respective cities. We’ve heard police commissioners like Raymond Kelly who heads up NYPD defend the practice, ensuring us that law-abiding citizens have nothing to hide. Law makers have stated that Stop and Frisk is a small price to pay for public safety..

For the hundreds of thousands who have been stopped, being innocent and having nothing to hide has not resulted in slight inconveniences. far too often the encounters teeter on life and death scenarios ..

We saw this with unarmed Ramarley Graham in the Bronx who was killed in front of his grandmother. The cop who shot him Richard Haste was not indicted.

We saw this in Pittsburgh, Pa with Jordan Miles, an honor student beaten by police within an inch of his life.. There’s a long, long list of abusive behavior by police during these stops with little or no change in sight..

Screen Shot 2013-10-12 at 6.31.49 AMBelow is a video highlighting the latest incursion. This took place in Philadelphia two weeks ago and is  indeed scary. It clearly shows you what so many have long complained about..This is not police work what we are seeing. This is bullying and abuse of power and two officers ‘hunting’ for Black men to mess with. Its part of much larger policy of containment.

in the video the two cops are shown cursing and berating the two men detained. They threaten them and warn them to stay out of Philadelphia, even though they live in the neighborhood.  It was truly demoralizing, which seems to be the end game of these encounters. Where’s Philly’s Mayor Michael Nutter ?

This incident comes on the heals of a retired Philly Cop named Herbert Spellman speaking out and saying Stop and Frisk is demeaning..He was recently profiled and accosted by Philly police while on his way to a bus stop. You can read about that HERE.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G4exZ-jXgWE#t=277

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nGc505WuxpE

Rupert Murdoch Unleashes a Vicious Media Attack on Black Folks Over Stop & Frisk

Rupert Murdoch

Rupert Murdoch

For some this headline and accompanying picture will come as no surprise. What can you expect from the New York Post? It’s always been a trash newspaper designed to prod people and get them upset, angry and fearful. Maybe Australian born Rupert Murdoch who owns the paper did this because of the recent killing in Duncan, Oklahoma of the Australian baseball player..

Perhaps this was his way of striking back to what he perceives as a racially charged wrong doing..  Or maybe he never stopped to realize that the longer you use media outlets to plant seeds of discord which he and his Fox media empire do everyday at every moment, that you will eventually have to face a dumbed down uncaring, angry at the world public..

Instead of fostering dialogue Murdoch seeks to end it and get people to be at odds with one another. He wants his publications to be the modern-day versions of Birth of a Nation film maker DW Griffith, whose destructive work of stereotyping and dehumanizing of Black people led to the rise of the Ku Klux Klan who were heroes in this movie,  mass lynchings of Black people all over the country and eventually race riots.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R4v_yRFf4-Y

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9t-7SVbLjBw

The layout including the picture of Madonna and her grill are quite deliberate and designed to ratch up more fear of the ‘Black male menace‘ who according to Murdoch, the New York City  council sided with when they voted to hold  NYPD accountable for Stop and Frisk. Expect a massive campaign from Murdoch and folks in the media who think like him to sensationalize and highlight every wrong doing by anyone Black to the point, that people will be begging to reverse yesterday’s vote against Stop and Frisk. Character assassination, negative, dehumanizing media depictions have impacted killed more people than guns ever have or will..

We should also remind folks, with a big mayoral election right around the corner, this is also Murdoch’s attempt to sway voters, by getting them to vote for candidates who will continue support fascist policing policies

On a side note, this week Al Jazerra America just launched and for many who are seeing it it has been a welcome change from the news we normally see here in the states. People like the news stories and the ethnic diversity shown on air. They also like the fact that the people being highlighted are not cheerleaders and paid pundits for particular political parties.

The campaign against AJAM is that they are run by Muslims who are gonna try and covert everyone to Islam and call for Jihad. Xenophobic backwards thinking people are upset that a foreign company is running the media. Sadly those same folks seem to forget that Murdoch is a foreigner and so is his Fox Media empire. But I guess if your white and foreign then its ok..

And yes, for those  who are wondering, I’m well aware in many parts of the world that state run Al Jazerra is just as problematic for some the same way Fox is. But how they squelch dissent in their homeland of Qatar is of little concern to the xenophobic folks objecting to them here in the US..
NY Post Headlines Thugs.06.11 AM

Raymond Kelly Ups the Ante on Stop & Frisk, Black Officers Reject His Logic

Raymond Kelly

Raymond Kelly

Over the weekend NYPD Commissioner Raymond Kelly upped the ante with assertions that Stop and Frisk is needed now more than ever..He along with Mayor Bloomberg are appealing last week’s historic ruling which demanded the practice be modified and monitored.

Kelly  also maintained his claim that Stop and Frisk was saving lives in Black and Brown communities. This is in spite of overwhelming evidence showing that people in those communities don’t want it.

Raymond Kelly also rejected the idea of police wearing cameras claiming that they would raise more questions than answer. He cited examples like domestic disputes and getting confidential information from informants as to whether or not officers should use cameras.

Kelly’s assertions were disputed by Noel Leader who is the co-founder of 100 Black Officers Who Care.. He appeared on the NY based TV Show Here and Now and talked about the outrage many are feeling around what he described as ‘illegal’ stop and frisk. He also rejected the notion that police wearing body cameras would be a hinderance as suggested by Kelly.

It was pointed out by former police Captain Reginald Lyles who is also African-American here in Oakland, California, that the logic being used Kelly and Bloomberg is similar to the logic used to lock up American citizens of Japanese descent during World War II.. He called it Apartheid logic..I definitely have to agree with perspective..

Check out the segment below featuring Leader and longtime activist Erica Ford..

http://abclocal.go.com/wabc/video?id=9208430

Although Leader didn’t get into this aspect too much other members of his organization have spoken out about how they themselves as Black and Brown police officers are frequently stopped and harassed by fellow officers.. This was highlighted last year in the Village Voice in an article called Cops By Day, Targets by Night.

LAPD Chief William H Parker

LAPD Chief William H Parker

It doesn’t take much to understand what Commissioner Kelly and Bloomberg are ultimately trying to do with this policy. It’s to make sure that people from targeted communities, no matter who they are frightened by the police. It’s a throwback to the bad ole days of policing in Los Angeles under Chief William Parker who militarized the police force and had a policy of making sure officers made contact with Black teens so they would know early on, who was in charge of the city.  His policies were adopted by police departments all over the country. They were enhanced by his successor Chief Darryl Gates. Below is a brief documentary on Parker so folks can better understand some of this invasive policing action under the heading Stop and Frisk.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2yFsx5vCLU

In closing we wanna give a shout out to another Hip Hop artists who has stepped up to use his talent to bring attention to Stop and Frisk…Most of us know about 10 Frisk Commandments from Jasiri X and Elon James..   Below is an incredible song and video from NY based artist Awkword who gives us an up close and personal view of what Stop and Frisk is like..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4RtncRj4yUc&hd=1

We also have a joint from Bronx based Rebel Diaz called Stop Stop and Frisk

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t-duTrV9hSg

 

 

 

Mayor Ed Lee Clarifies his position on Stop & Frisk Policy In San Francisco

 

In recent days SF Mayor Ed ‘Emperor’ Lee has come under fire about his public admiration of New York City’s infamous Stop and Frisk Police..The idea that he might adapt that policy led to a series of angry denouncements, demonstrations, lots of emails and phone calls to his office. Topping all of this was this recent stinging rebuke from Glen Ford of the Black Agenda Report..

MAYOR LEE’S STATEMENT CLARIFYING “STOP & FRISK POLICY”
AND SAN FRANCISCO

Mayor Ed Lee

Mayor Edwin M. Lee today issued the following statement on San Francisco and “Stop and Frisk Policy”:

“The month of June in San Francisco experienced a spike in shootings and homicides in our Southeast
neighborhoods. This is unacceptable and while I take this issue extremely seriously, I want to be clear that I
have not considered implementing a policy in San Francisco that would violate anyone’s constitutional rights or
that would result in racial profiling. I have stated that I am willing to look at what other cities are doing to
reduce gun violence, including cities like New York and Philadelphia that both have stop and frisk programs.

I have been meeting with community leaders, have attended services to meet with congregants and have met
with law enforcement about this issue. We share grave concerns about gun violence and its disproportionate
impact on communities of color and youth in San Francisco. We need to do more.

Public safety can only be achieved through collaboration and partnership between law enforcement and the
communities we all serve. Community policing and community development efforts have important roles to
play in the prevention of violence, and I will continue to meet with community leaders and faith based
organizations to advance these priorities.

I want to be very clear. As a former human rights director and civil rights attorney, I hold the individual
protections afforded to us all under the 4th Amendment as sacrosanct. As we continue our discussions to reduce
violence and get guns out of our communities, I will not support, nor will I put forward any proposal that will
violate any such protections, but I am willing to move forward with bold ideas that get to results.

I will continue to work with the community to end gun violence in San Francisco.”

7.17.12 Clarifying Stop & Frisk Policy Statement

 

Explosive Report from MXGM Reveals: Every 40 hours Police in the US Kill a Black Person

Some of the families of loved ones slain by police in Northern California

This past weekend at Everett & Jones restaurant in Jack London Square, there was a gathering of more than 10 mothers and members of their family who have all lost sons, daughters and husbands to police violence over the past 2 years…It was sobering, powerful and healing. It was also shocking to see so many families and hear story after story of how they lost loved ones to police terror. We heard from the mothers of Kenneth Harding, Derick Jones, Derrick Gaines, Rahiem Brown Jr, James Rivera and Oscar Grant..all gunned down by police.

The families came together for the second anniversary of Oscar Grant Verdict Day.. This was the day that a jury in Los Angeles, handed down their controversial decision about Johannes Mehserle, the killer cop who shot an unarmed handcuffed Oscar Grant in the back at point-blank range in front of hundreds of BART subway riders in Oakland, Ca on New Years morning 2009. Millions of people all over the world saw the shocking video and just knew that Mehersle would go to jail for a long time over his egregious actions.

On July 8th 2010, the LA jury came back with a verdict of involuntary manslaughter which left thousands of people who had gathered in downtown Oakland stunned. Adding insult to injury,  the Grant verdict was overshadowed by another ‘controversial decision’ being made that day-What basketball team NBA star Lebron James would choose. Many in the national media gave their time and attention to James and the NBA while folks in Oakland and the Bay Area were left pondering the injustice that was served before them after 18 long months of organizing and jumping over legal hurdle after legal hurdle.

Many that day walked away thinking that while the verdict was unjust that hopefully police got the message and would change their ways. There would be more caution and concern exercised by police departments, not just in Oakland, but all over the country.  This weekends gathering was proof that if anything the Grant verdict emboldened police to act with reckless abandon.

Unarmed Rekia Boyd was shot in the head by a Chicago Cop

Instead of a decline in police violence we seen a marked increase. Since the Grant verdict day, we’ve seen an outrageous 680 thousand people stopped and frisked in New York with over 90% of those stops being Black and Brown men with less than 5% resulting in any weapons recovered. Stop and Frisk led to the shooting death of unarmed Ramarley Graham We’ve seen police shoot a motorist Hernendez L Dowdy in Memphis, Tn after someone falsely accused him of car jacking.  We’ve seen police in Pasadena shoot 19-year-old Kendrec McDade falsely accused of stealing a computer. We seen an officer in Chicago shoot an innocent bystander named Rekia Boyd after he mistakenly thought the man standing next to her had a gun.. We seen police in White Plains New York shoot unarmed army vet, a senior citizen named Kenneth Chamberlain Sr.. who accidently set off his medical alert pendant. The officer at the center of the killing has a sordid history of brutality and racism. .. We seen Oakland police shoot high school senior Alan Bluford in the back and then lie about the self-inflicted wound the officer suffered. He shot himself and blamed Bluford. OPD has still refused to officially identify the officer.

We could go on for days citing story after story along with the fact that in many cities all over the United States police brutality incidents and police killing civilians are on the rise..For example, in Los Angeles which was supposed to have drastically reformed their police department, we seen a huge increase in police shootings. The department tried to blame it on citizens attacking them more. That assertion has since been disputed.Whats crazy about LA is that police pushed to get the city council to support a law that will keep officers records sealed from the public.

The bottom line is this.. Police are out of control and when it comes to Black people they are even more so..Today the Malcolm X Grassroots Movement released a Report on Extrajudicial Killings …Its pretty detailed and extensive.. It shows that since Jan 1 2012 , they have documented 110 Black people being killed. That amounts to one Black person being killed by police every 40 hours.. Since the shooting death of Trayvon Martin police and shot and killed over 80 Black people..This is outrageous and unacceptable..

Here’s the official press release and links to the report..

“Report on Extrajudicial Killings of 110 Black People since January 1st, 2012.”

Every 40 hours in the United States one Black woman, man or child is killed by police, and by a smaller number of security guards and self-appointed vigilantes.  These are the startling findings of a new Report on Extrajudicial Killings of Black People released July 9, 2012.

What motivated the round-the-clock research for this new Report?  More than two years ago, on New Year’s Eve, police killed two innocent men: Oscar Grant in Oakland, Adolph Grimes in New Orleans and shot Robert Tolan in a Houston suburb. Based on research started in 2009 after those murders, we learned there were a lot more killings that had not yet been uncovered. Then, after Trayvon’s murder, there was a huge public outcry and a few headlines about more killings. More grieving families and more calls for investigation. Further research became urgent and it demonstrated that Trayvon’s death was not an isolated tragedy. Between January 1, 2012 and June 30, 2012, at least 110 Black people were killed by police and their “deputies”.

“Any one of these people killed could have been my son or your husband or daughter”, says Arlene Eisen, member of the Malcolm X Solidarity Committee and co-author of the Report.

Rosa Clemente of the Malcolm X Grassroots Movement elaborates, “Nowhere is a Black woman or man safe from racial profiling, invasive policing, constant surveillance, and overriding suspicion.  All Black people – regardless of education, class, occupation, behavior or dress – are subject to the whims of the police in this epidemic of state initiated or condoned violence.”

The Report, produced by the Malcolm X Grassroots Movement (MXGM) and the “No More Trayvon Martins” campaign, is part of a larger effort. Kali Akuno, MXGM member and report co-author explained, “The Report shows how people of African descent remain subjected to institutionalized racist policies and procedures that arbitrarily stop, frisk, arrest, brutalize and even execute Black people. The killing will continue despite calls for investigations and lawsuits. We urge people to read this Report and join us in demanding that the Obama administration implement a National Plan of Action for Racial Justice to stop these killings and other human rights violations being committed by the government”.

To read the report visit www.mxgm.org. For information on the petition visit http://www.ushrnetwork.org/content/webform/trayvon-martin-petition.

Jasiri X

On Tuesday July 10th we will be doing a special broadcast on 94.1 fm KPFA at 8am PST.. www.kpfa.org This broadcast will include members of MXGM as well as family members who lost loved ones to police violence.. There will also be information on upcoming actions to take place around police violence. We will also be premiering a new song from Pittsburgh rapper Jasiri X called Riot which addresses the police violence and this report..

Rude or Polite, NY City’s Officers Leave Raw Feelings in Stops

Today’s NY Times has a good article on Stop-and Frisk that everyone should read… Here’s a brief excerpt..

The questions are probing, authoritative, but less accusatory. “What are you doing here?” “Do you live here?” “Can I see some identification, please?” During the pat-down, they ask, “Do you have anything on you?” They nudge further: “You don’t mind if I search you, do you?” They explain that someone of a matching description robbed a store a few days ago, or that the stop is a random one, part of a program in a high-crime area. Then they apologize for the stop and say the person is free to go.

In interviews with 100 people who said they had been stopped by the New York police in neighborhoods where the practice is most common, many said the experience left them feeling intruded upon and humiliated. And even when officers extended niceties, like “Have a nice night,” or called them “sir” and “ma’am,” people said they questioned whether the officer was being genuine.

You can peep rest of article HERE

LAPD Chief William H Parker

As your reading this keep in mind a few things about the history of police and controlling populations. During the 1950s in LA Police Chief William H Parker had a policy of suppression.  Under him, LAPD kept Black and Brown folks in sectioned off communities. Many African-Americans lived in what we now know as Watts.. Back in the days it was called the Duck Pond by police who would literally go hunting and make sure Black folks didn’t leave and enter other parts of the city..During that time LA had strict housing covenants that restricted Black and Brown folks from living in certain communities.

Aggressive harassment was routine and  was designed to ‘keep folks in their place’…Parker enhanced this harassment by recruiting officers from the deep south who had hostilities toward Blacks to be on the police force. These officers made it a point to humiliate adults in front  of their kids or on husbands in front of their wives…

Chief Parker who coined the term ‘Thin Blue line’ employed an even more sinister tactic..He made it a policy for officers to make sure they engaged as many young Black teens and pre-teens as possible. His philosophy was to establish a presence and dominance while they were still young and let them know who was boss.

There was study done in the 60s that showed that 90% of the juveniles arrested by LAPD were not charged. This was essentially Stop-N-Frisk decades before it showed up as police practice in NYC.

Parker’s harsh policies are what led to the explosion we now know as the Watts Riots.

Many were under the illusion that LAPD improved after those riots, but by the time the 1992 Rodney King uprisings took place, LAPD had replaced what they did under Parker with a new policy called Operation Hammer where they started keeping a gang data base. Chief Darryl Gates who replaced Parker used this resulting in 47% of Black males between the ages of 21-25 in Los Angles being deemed gang members thanks to the database.

Seems like Mayor Bloomberg & Police Commissioner Ray Kelly are heavily borrowing from the sordid legacies of LAPD Chiefs Chief William H Parker & Darryl Gates

With respect to NYC and the over 680 thousand people who have been stopped and frisk, things are headed off a cliff. It was just two weeks ago over 30 thousand people showed up and did a silent march down 5th avenue. One of the goals was to get a meeting with Mayor Bloomberg who has strongly supported Stop and Frisk. In spite of the dignified and solemn tone of the march, Bloomberg promptly refused to meet with organizers….Sounds like Chief Parker all over again both in terms of tactics being used and the dismissive response to complaints and concerns

I know one thing with all the police harassment going on in NY, visiting it does not seem too appealing anymore. Images of White shirted officers beating protestors or horrific stories of men cops randomly stopping  you is definitely not the lick. Maybe the goal for Bloomberg and police commissioner Raymond Kelly is to get Black and Brown folks who currently make up close to 90% of the stops, to ultimately leave the city.

Again we encourage everyone to peep today’s NY TImes article on Stop and Frisk

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/27/nyregion/new-york-police-leave-raw-feelings-in-stops.html?_r=1&smid=tw-share

Here’s a great song from Killer Mike that pretty much sums up whats going on in NY right about now..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J_nVBo8T6yE

 

 

 

Jasiri X Flips Biggie’s 10 Crack Commandments to an Anti-Police Brutality Anthem

I love when Hip Hop steps up and flips classic songs to fit a modern-day scenario.. In this case its Stop and Frisk… props to Pittsburgh artist Jasiri X and comedian/activist Elon James White for this joint called 10 Frisk Commandments.. It’s a play on Biggie’s infamous cut Ten Crack Commandments..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EhHYN7uw3AM

On another tip..Here’s a couple of other songs addressing the issue of police violence and how and why we should stand up against it.. The first is a video to the song Do We Need to Start a Riot by Jasiri X It was filmed in several cities including LA where Henry Rollings one of the LA 4 from the 1992 Rodney King rebellions showed up and gave a few words.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VcSm6EX1coo

Carl Dix: Connecting NYPD’s Stop and Frisk Policy w/ Trayvon Martin Case (HKR Intv)

It’s always a pleasure chopping it up w/ freedom fighter Carl Dix.. He’s dedicated to the struggle and willing to walk the walk of the things he talks. In recent months Dix along with scholar/activist Cornel West have pushed back hard on the NYPD and their infamous Stop and Frisk policy. They even put the policy on trial with plans to follow-up with similar measures in Brownsville, Brooklyn.

Last year over 680k people have been stopped and searched by police. Over 85% have been Black or Brown men with less than 5% convicted of carrying any weapon or committing crime. Dix noted that currently NYPD is on pace to stop and frisk over 800k. Dix noted the root cause of this disparity is racial profiling.

Currently Dix is down in Sanford, Florida on what is part of a BAsic Bus Tour through the South. Dix reaffirmed what M1 from dead prez had told us a few weeks back, that the spirit of resistance is alive and well and very strong in Sanford which is where the Trayvon Martin/George Zimmerman saga is unfolding.  This is a story often overlooked by the mainstream media..

During our conversation, Dix makes the connection between the Stop and Frisk policies in NY and the current climate of vigilantism that we saw play itself out in Sanford.. You can peep that interview below..

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

NYPD’s New Policy; Clean Halls..Allows Police to Stop and Frisk in the Hallways of Your Home

I hate to bring up instances of police brutality and terrorism because at this point in time in a very perverse way, I think the police feel emboldened and get off on stories highlighting their exploits. They know word of these accounts instill fear and leave many feeling overwhelmed and completely powerless.

At the same time we are challenged to alert folks because many are still in the dark and do not see these onslaught of brutality reports as systemic. Many have brought into the notion that the police don’t act out without reason. Hence when we hear a story about an unarmed man being shot, or someone being brutalized, many of us have been conditioned to ask 1-What did the victim do to deserve the mistreatment? 2-Did the victim have a troubled past?

Sadly many of us have come to rationalize police brutality as something that’s deserved if you have some sort of criminal record or fall into a marginalized demographic that has been grossly stereotyped and demonized. We buy into the police favored narrative because it’s comforting and allows us to avoid facing the fact that a system we come to believe in is broken and increasingly becoming more and more repressive.

Many of us do not want to face the fact that some sort of coup has taken place in this country where corporate entities are calling the shots and making policy while police forces all over are enforcing these rules and protecting their interests. Some call it Fascism.. Some call it the emerging police state. Whatever you wanna call it, its real and in your face. The question we need to be answering is how are we gonna deal?

The latest incursion comes at the hands of NYPD. This was an outfit we all sympathized with after brave officers lost their lives during the 9-11 tragedies. We gave the NYPD lots of leeway to recover and strengthen their force and in doing so, we either looked the other way or played dumb when they pushed for more powers. Now NYPD has vast sweeping powers. The most notorious is their Stop-N-Frisk policy where the police can at random pull you over while your walking and start searching you for guns, or contraband. Last year they stopped and detained over 680 thousand people with less than 10% resulting in any sort of violation of the law. Over 85% of those stopped were Black and Brown men.

The Stop and-Frisk policy has drawn lots of criticism and even a few lawsuits, but that has not stopped NYPD who now are set to take this to a whole other level. Its called the Clean Halls policy.. This is a new law that allows the police to come into public or private buildings including your residence and search you.. Yep you read that correctly.. Below are excerpts from recent  Rollingstone Magazine article giving you all the info .. Please check it out

An amazing lawsuit was filed in New York last week. It seems Mike Bloomberg’s notorious “stop-and-frisk” policy – known colloquially in these parts by silently-cheering white voters as the “Let’s have cops feel up any nonwhite person caught walking in the wrong neighborhood” policy – isn’t even the most repressive search policy in the NYPD arsenal.

Bloomberg, that great crossover Republican, has long been celebrated by the Upper West Side bourgeoisie for his enlightened views on gay rights and the environment, but also targeted for criticism by civil rights activists because of stop-and-frisk, a program that led to a record 684,330 street searches just last year.

Now he’s under fire for a program he inherited, which goes by the darkly Bushian name of the “Clean Halls program.” In effect since 1991, it allows police to execute so-called “vertical patrols” by going up into private buildings and conducting stop-and-frisk searches in hallways – with the landlord’s permission.

According to the NYCLU, which filed the suit, “virtually every private apartment building [in the Bronx] is enrolled in the program,” and “in Manhattan alone, there are at least 3,895 Clean Halls Buildings.” Referring to the NYPD’s own data, the complaint says police conducted 240,000 “vertical patrols” in the year 2003 alone.

In addition to this, you may wanna check out the insightful interview we did with activist, freedom fighter Carl Dix about NYPD’s Stop and Frisk policies from a couple of months ago.. here’s the transcript from our radio interview on KPFA

http://mediaroots.org/mr-transcript-davey-d-carl-dix-resistance.php

Here’s a short excerpt of that interview

Carl Dix:  “We’ve been out in Harlem, talking about Stop and Frisk.  And before we did the first action what we would hear, often from the same person, is I hate Stop and Frisk. They did this to me. They did this to my son. They did this to—even sometimes—they did this to my sister, or my daughter.  You know, because they’re doing this to women as well.

“But then the next point is:  But you can’t do anything about it.  And that’s why we decided we have to do something about it.  And we launched this campaign to stop Stop and Frisk, which is a policy under which the police can just step to you, stop you, make you turn out your pockets, or search you themselves.  And then often bust you for nothing.”

Davey D (c. 29:00):  “Right.  I don’t think people really clearly understand here [in the S.F. Bay Area] ‘cos we don’t see it as much.  But in New York that is a huge problem that you could be walkin’ with a tuxedo on with your wife and kids and they pull you over and say, empty out your pockets, to make sure you don’t have a gun.”

Carl Dix (c. 29:46):  “Yeah.  And how big is it?  They stopped and frisked almost 700,00 people; it was 684-thousand-plus last year alone in New York City:  85% of them Black or Latino, more than 90% of them they let you go after they’ve harassed you and humiliated you, but then even some of that 10% that they don’t let go, some of them were doing nothing wrong because when we did the action in Queens, they held us overnight.  So, we were in there with a bunch of other people and people were telling us, Oh, they stopped me under Stop and Frisk. I didn’t have my driver’s licence. I didn’t have an ID, so they ran me in the prison.So, it’s like, did I wake up in Johannesburg, South Africa, 30 years ago when there were past laws?  Because what’s the crime in not having an ID?

Davey D (c. 30:39):  “Right.  And that’s why I ask the question because it is so massive.  We just had, you know, we did a show about a brother who was killed over Stop and Frisk.  He had a little bit of weed.  The cops came by.  He decided to walk, you know, into his building—I’m sure you remember this.”

Carl Dix (c. 31:01):  “Yeah.  I’ve seen the video of it.”

Davey D:  “He just walked into his building—he wasn’t under arrest or anything—they ran up into his apartment, kicked down the door, and shot him in front of his grandma.  There was no gun, no nothing.  But there was a couple of joints that he was trying to get rid of, but this becomes the justification that is often used.  Well, they should’ve just listened to the authorities.  Or, they shouldn’t run.  Or, you shouldn’t, if you don’t have anything to hide, then there won’t be any problem.  But it’s those types of encounters that we see over and over again where people are like, the police are here, they’re gonna find something. I don’t want to deal with this.  And oftentimes it’s a fatal situation.

“When you have these types of scenarios, Amadou Diallo, another victim of Stop and Frisk, all he had was a wallet, shot 41 times.  How did we go from the Panthers and Dr. King and Malcolm X to allowing ourselves—or did we allow ourselves?—to be in such a situation right now where it’s not even talked about in the mainstream, even amongst our pundits?  You know?

“I mean, you do it.  Cornel does it.  But if I tune on and I see our own folks sitting up there, they’re not really making this a front and centre issue.  You know?  They’ll talk about LeBron James and what team he’s gonna choose before they’re talking about the absurdity of 700,000 people being stopped in one year.”

Carl Dix (c. 32:24):  “Okay, two things.  The first thing is we’re acting to change that.  And tomorrow night, when I talk, I’m gonna talk about a proposal for a national day of resistance to mass incarceration.  That’s the first thing, but to get back to your question:  How did we go from the days of the Panthers to this kind of situation?

You can also see another interview we did on this topic where go more in depth HERE

http://livestre.am/1jw1Y