Jaywalking as a Capital Offense
I have been under the misimpression that Michael Brown & his friend Dorian Johnson were ambling down the middle of a busy street, blocking traffic. However, this New York Times map shows that this was not the case:
The site of the shooting was Canfield Court. Canfield Court is a short stretch of the through street Canfield Drive, which in this section is a residential street of two- & three-story apartment buildings & townhouses surrounded by greenspace. About a block west, the residences appear to be single-family homes, & just to the east are single-story apartment buildings, again surrounded by ample greenspace. Here's what Canfield Court looks like on Google's street view:
Not exactly a busy street. Moreover, the sidewalks are fairly narrow -- too narrow for two people to walk abreast. So it seems quite natural & sensible for two friends to be walking together in the street rather than on the sidewalk.
When I'm driving on local roads like this one, I often come upon people walking along them. When there are pedestrians, I just wait for them to move to the side or I drive around them, taking extra care if there are small children in the group. Sometimes I wave & smile. Whatever. I have never considered these events noteworthy or unusual. Walking in the street is the way people who don't have cars -- you know, poor people -- use public streets. I'd be surprised if the situation was much different in Ferguson.
Knowing this, it appears to me that Officer Darren Wilson purposely & without cause provoked Brown & Johnson by telling them to move to the sidewalk. (According to Johnson, Wilson shouted to them, "Get the fuck on the sidewalk.") The fact that Wilson was cruising a residential street suggests that he was a neighborhood patrolman, someone who is supposed to establish rapport with residents & create a sense of public trust in the police. ("Get the fuck on the sidewalk" is not the best outreach initiative.)
According to Johnson, he & Brown complied with Wilson's order. After that, Wilson "began to drive away, but then threw his car into reverse and came back alongside the teens, nearly hitting them." A scuffle between Wilson & Brown ensued. Wilson will dispute Johnson's account.
What actually happened to escalate a perfectly normal stroll down the street into a death-by-shooting is critical, of course, but not to the point of "who started it." Officer Wilson did.
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Reader Comments (5)
By Marie's commentary this Wilson guy sure seemed pumped up with aggression. Like he was looking for a fight. All this militarization of the police makes me wonder if that includes supplying them with "go-pills" to keep them alert and battle-ready because I guess that's how they look at their jobs, not as community protectors but as tricked-out warriors and black people are the enemy and you never know when one of 'em is gonna step off the curb in his own neighborhood.
Nancy,
I scanned an article in which an anonymous resident of Ferguson related an exchange she had with Wilson that was apparently highly agitated and unnecessarily aggressive, not to mention foul-mouthed. I wouldn't base any serious assessment on the sole strength of an anonymous report (likely, if she still lives there, she's not happy about the local police learning her name), but, this description seems to align with Wilson's actions and demeanor prior to his shooting Michael Brown.
As Marie points out, the level of aggression displayed in encountering a couple of guys walking on a neighborhood street--way out of proportion to the event--seems to indicate something deeper and darker. The fact that Ferguson is 60% black (sorry, I meant, of "continental origin") and is policed by an all-white force also says something.
For one, it says there is simply no attempt at diversity, something most police forces have found to be essential, not to mention fair. One can imagine (and I don't know this for a fact, but having past knowledge of such situations, I can state that it's certainly possible) that an all-white police force in a predominantly black community might develop a pretty fierce tribal attitude, an us against them mindset that plays havoc with those individuals who come to the job with a feeling of being put upon by minorities, a smoldering racism or racial animosity, which might not take much more than a nondescript bit of jaywalking to boil over.
Add to that the overwhelming ferocity of the response towards black protesters, and I don't think it's out of bounds to suggest that racial animus is the only "go pill" many of those officers require.
Unfortunately it's not something they can decide not to take.
I am white and privileged, but have occasionally felt, in interactions with police officers, that they were looking for trouble. Once, stopped for an expired car inspection sticker, the rookie (he looked barely older than my 12-year-old son in the back seat) stood out of my line of sight behind me as he gruffly asked me for license and registration. Meanwhile, he left his cruiser parked blocking the traffic in a very dangerous spot (cars coming off a busy main drag would not likely seem him until almost on top of him). Meanwhile, he took his time going back to his cruiser and computer to check if I had any outstanding warrants, whatever...as cars backed up into the main drag-- too much traffic coming from the other direction so cars could not swing into the oncoming traffic lane to pass him. I was really afraid the whole time that he would cause an accident.
The attitude many police have that they "must be obeyed" for whatever small infraction they can nail you with feels like an an abuse of power. Last night I rewatched the pathetic arrest of the black Arizona college prof by a cop for jaywalking!! It reminded me of the old saying about surgeons, they have a scalpel and they'll always find a reason to use it. I think the same could be said of many policemen. They have the arrest power, and, by god, they're gonna use it... I guess the prof should be glad she was a woman who could relatively easily be thrown onto the ground, instead of a 6'4" black kid. She might be dead now, too.
On NPR this am, in a story about Ferguson, it was pointed out that the voter turnout was 6% African American in a community that is 60% African American. There is 1 out of 6 Council members who is black. Getting it right this time, Jesse Jackson, showed up encouraging a get-out-vote effort. Clearly, not an immediate or comprehensive solution, but the importance of exercising voting rights needs to be vigorously underscored.
Militarization of law enforcement is a central issue. I saw this 1st hand in 30 years of working in a probation dep't that was armed. The attitude of " us against THEM" is encouraged from recruitment to promotions. The armed aspect, complete with Kevlar vests, gave probation officers status, opportunity and accolades. The closer to SWAT the department guiding principles, the less value was placed on those who worked with probationers on effecting changes in behavior and lifestyle. Driving the SWAT like behavior is a widespread group think that pumps up an overblown idea of "danger" in the community defined as each member of that community.That kind of belief about people and communities is used to justify indiscriminate force.
I have been wondering how much the encounter between Brown and Wilson was influenced by Brown knowing that he had just committed a felony even though officer Wilson was not aware of that circumstance. I can see where the officer might have been in 'police mode' and received an aggressive reaction from Brown which quickly was escalated to a physical confrontation which frightened and confused Officer Wilson and brought about the discharge of multiple shots by Wilson. Brown's size probably contributed to the officers fear. Today police wear protective vests because some have lost their lives during 'simple' traffic stops.