I was originally going to detail my experience in participating in a day of Civil Disobediencefor Sean Bell but I decided to let the pictures speak for themselves. The media channels covered the Protest with only Black Faces making sure to edit out the fact that a significant number of Whites both young and old participated. They also did not mention the LARGE number of NYPD that surrounded and patroled all demonstrators, helicopters and riot officers. They even had desk jockies get off their butts to stand around as guards with Undercover Officers in the March (like we wouldn't know, especially since we took rollcalls and had signup sheets prior to setting up). Here I show their support for the Sean Bell Case as they walked the walked and talked the talk for Justice. If a picture can have a thousand words, a few need not be wasted with typing. I hope you enjoy the Photos.
1, 2, 3, 4, 5, ..... 48, 49, 50 BULLETS !!!
GRANDMOTHERS, MOTHERS AND DAUGHTERS
MEDIA, CROWD CONTROL, DETECTIVES, UNDERCOVER
FIRST TIME YOUNG ACTIVIST
ON THE MOVE ACROSS EAST 60TH STREET
CAPTAIN DIVIDING THE GROUPS PROTESTING
ALL PEOPLE, BLACK, WHITE, YOUNG, OLD TOGETHER FOR THE CAUSE
ALL TRAFFIC COMES TO A STOP
A CHAIN ACROSS THE QUEENSBORO BRIDGE
I SEE YOU, YOU SEE ME (YOU ARE ON RECORD FOR OUR FILES)
WE COME IN PEACE, WE COME IN PRAYER WE COME IN JUSTICE FOR SEAN BELL
MOVE OR BE ARRESTED (OR SHOT) WHICH EVER COMES FIRST
WHO ARE WE? WE ARE SEAN BELL !!!
LEGAL TEAM REPRESENTATIVE TAKING NAMES FOR BAIL OUTS
IN THE WAGON AND REPRESENTING FOR JUSTICE
ACTIVIST FROM THE 1960'S STILL ACTIVE AND BEING ARRESTED
THE LOCKDOWN
THE HOUSE NEGRO AND THE CHICA FROM HELL --She kept instigating me to confront her.
There is one thing about being inspired. There is another thing about being inspired for a purpose of doing. Today was one of those days. A day for Doing. I often remind Black folk that our work is not done. Like any job or career pursuit, one does not go into it with just working for that day and then coasting on a days profit. There is a point in one’s life when we have to choose between what is RIGHT and what is EASY. Today was a day for choosing what is RIGHT.
Twenty-four hours after the damning decision that cast cold stones into the hearts of the Bell family, a community gathered to express that although you were blindsided by the legal system, your community has your back and will not allow New York City, the State, a Country and quite possibly the World to witness how the NYPD and the New York City Justice System to create a separate Black or Brown rule. The role we all will play isn’t that of Revenge or Reretribution but of LOVE; a Love for keeping children alive. The community has decided that Black and Brown children are not and will no longer be defined as Collateral Damage as part of the rule of Over Policing without Accountability.
Policing is never the issue when talking about a community. Communities want Policing and look to law enforcement as part of keeping rule in a Nation of Laws, but the cancer that has grown, maturated and expanded has inflicted deadly damage to Black Families in great numbers and the only people who are most concerned are Black folk. Today’s rally is a reaffirmation that the NYPD and New York City will no longer get a pass. Every death will be deal with a series of political assaults, economic shut downs and civil disobedience. A declaration of commitment from Religious, Social and CommunityGroups and individuals were signed and a public understanding that sacrifices will need to be made for the many who walk the streets Disconnected from the reality that WORK NEEDS TO BE DONE to save the children of tomorrow.
“April 25, 2008, they killed Sean all over again. I’m still praying for justice, because this is far from over. Every march, every protest, every rally, I’m going to be right up front.”, said Paultre Bell. This is what the public will hear as the universal sound bite, which will be looped over, and over for days to come and as so, forgotten by the media and public often does. What the rest of the world needed to know were the words that followed:
“I may have broken down, but I'm OK. I was bent, but I’m not broken.” she assured the Ralliers, and with those words, the tears flowed throughout the hall.
Valerie Bell, the mother of Sean Bell spoke, “I didn’t go through labor pains with my son because he was born C-section. But on Nov. 25, 2006, that’s when my labor pains started. The pains that come with bringing life into the World. When a mother looses a child to violence or any kind of loss, she experiences those pains all over again. I felt my labor pains then.”, as she explains while holding her stomach.
Through out the rally, Rev. Al Sharpton and the families detailed and answered why it was important and necessary for the methodology before the trail and to the day as well as where the Community goes next. We learned how Youth organizations are helping, partnering and not being absorbed but given free reign to develop their own strategies to enforce change in the community. With emphasis on Non-Violent Disobedience, part of the rally was making it a matter of letting those who plan to participate, understand that people talk about Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. but people don’t understand him. So as part of the lesson of demanding Massive Civil Rights, we have to look back in history. Highlighted was the legal decision, which lead to the Dred Scott Decision of 1857 where Courts decided that there were no Black Rights that any White was bound to Respect. If you understand the nature of that 1857 decision and how the argument to support that law was applicable to the justification that Justice Arthur J. Cooperman gave as to why the NYPD aren’t responsible for taking innocent life and the reason why obsessive force was merited in the Sean Bell case, the decision sends a message that there is a DIFFERENCE between Black lives and White lives. Black Justice and White Justice. That we value the lives of "caged animals" in zoos more than the freedoms of innocent Black American citizens.
So all the while Black and Brown people were meeting peacefully, the City of New York is pumping millions of dollars beefing up patrols, having armed guards standing outside the homes of the attorneys and offices involved in the shooting, and having helicopters flying over Judge Cooperman’s house and while this happening, in a Peaceful Rally we are discussing meetings with the Attorney General and meeting with Representative John Conyers Jr. of Michigan, the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee. So we all sit back and call to our Faith in GOD to give a clear path for Righting a WRONG and in “fear”, the NYPD cling to tax payer dollars to beef up against an enemy that doesn't exist. Clueless in understanding how all the training and military style conditioning has no purpose against a Peaceful people. So what do they do NEXT?
Calling upon biblical text, Rev. Al Sharpton tells stories or in this case, gives examples of what we will all face as people demanding JUSTICE, the rules by which the agents against positive change will use. How the rules change for those that question when the game all of a sudden is skewed against Black folk when their fairness is written out. How there will be times when those dressed to protect will test you by agitation and ridicule, but if you are in the know, if you know the truth in your objective, you can overcome it all without screaming or physical violence. The law is the LAW and Black folk will inquire, challenge, change and keep LAW. That is how it was. How it is and how it will always be because when you rest, somehow, some way, we can go from 2008 to 1875 in the time it takes to send off 50 rounds of bullets.
“It has always been a struggle to keep young men alive when the “wicked” are in change. You can find this in the Old Testament with Abraham, in the New Testament with Jesus and throughout history. Sean Bell was a good YOUNG man and what happened to him was wicked.”, spoken by Rev. Al Sharpton.
So now the commitment begins and from a cross section of Black and Brown New Yorkers are and have made the commitment. Now that Black folk have made the pledge to save Black Babies, it is only a matter of time before Asian, Foreign born as well as other People of Color will come along and JOIN once they realize that their children are next and need equal protect.
So I wake up in anticipation to the Sean Ball case. I pretty much stayed quiet on my opinion and public statements because many of the Community Groups decided to pull back and allow the justice system to work it's magic. In the past, the New York Justice System always used and accused community groups, especially Black and Latino Activist Groups for inciting Racism, manipulating the and or interfering with the structure of the courts, misleading evidence and pressuring litigators for political reasons by threatening the potential for Riots in decisions involving Police brutality and obsessive force. So this now was a test. A test to see that if a community were to NOT be involved, would the system own up to its word of carrying out JUSTICE without excuses and blame. So much was the non-involvement that the local media was asking, “Where is Al Sharpton?” as well as other locally known activist such as Councilman Charles Barron. The Black Church made mention of the events and the activities leading up to the decision. There was a conscious practice of non-involvement until the final days.
The media played the day-to-day strategies of the court, its inconsistencies, the play on words, legal analysts read their tea leaves trying to predict what was going to happen but BLACK folk knew what the endgame was going to be, and YET they still Hoped that the Legal System would do the right thing. Black folk knew what the final decision was going to end up being the moment the courts ruled to forgo a jury and have a SINGLE JUDGE make the decision. Common Sense would say that anyone, unarmed and in a closed environment (a car) being shot with 50 bullets, some of which fired haphazardly at innocent bystanders, and others still having bullets lodged in their bodies of the defendants, it would stand to reason that someone would be found guilty of at least the minimum charges. So as a statement of calm, we all sat, and waited and PLANNED until the final conclusion was made.
The Sean Bell case is a clear example of Police Brutality 101 by the NYPD. You could not write a better “script” than this. Without building a coalition, the story itself took on a life and lived in the hearts and minds of all New Yorkers because no one in their right mind could comprehend how 50 bullets were needed to stop three men in a car when all three were innocent. In events past when there were questions about OVER POLICING by the NYPD, sides were drawn, but in the Sean Bell case, people know what sided to be on and the NYPD had very little support. There was no need for massive protests in the streets because the American justice system would rule correctly on this one. The possible reason for lack of overt activism in the beginning may have been the lack of media enticement or lack thereof without Black Community Leaders as a catalyst for fanning the flames and decent as material to work with. Then again, it could have been due to the event’s simplicity. This was an Open and Shit Case. It took very little to keep the importance of Sean Bell’s life out of the media everyday. Sean Bell was what you would call a "Clean Cut Kid" with no record, no violent background, no drug usage, well educated, and a hard working family man. Even with the conscious strategy of having Black Lawyers representing the police officers and their use of the term, "GOOD BLACKS vs. BAD BLACKS" used against Sean Bell and his associates throughout the case, there was a public acknowledgement that the courts were really stretching to find something to justify his murder. Here you had an American, attending a Bachelor Party the day before he was to get married to his wife and begin his family with a child, not having a criminal background and you end up being shot by several police officers because they “thought” they heard he was going to "get a gun". As the lawyers continued to dig deep into the officer’s story, the initial causes for shooting went from "fear of being shot" to "fear of being run over with a car" to the people who were all shot had "criminal affiliations" (Trent Benefield and Joseph Guzman) to their stories changed and consistent because they wanted to sue the Police Department and make money from Civil Case. Open and shut case right? Wrong. Somewhere along the line, Sean Bell's Human and and Civil Rights were left at the door and walked over.
The officers; Michael Oliver, Gescard Isnora and Marc Cooper were all the central players in this Legal Drama. Marc Cooper, 40, was noted for firing so wildly, that his bullets sprayed into a near by train station, almost hitting an idle standing bystander. Cooper faced charges of reckless endangerment. Officers Michael Oliver, 36, and Isnora, 29, faced Manslaughter charges and Assault and Reckless Endangerment with their uncontrolled weapons. In the end, it was Justice Arthur Cooperman delivered the verdict, Not Guilty.
When those Words were uttered, the Bell family broke down but they remained strong. Deep down, behind the Hope, they KNEW. They knew that the Police would not get what normal people who murder indiscriminately would get. As things would go, the Bell family would have HOPED to get an apology from the System for their loss and as of the decision, had not. As Black folk, the understanding of bias, double standards, two legal systems, police brutality, over sentencing, under reporting, over policing, militia style policing, creating name and affiliation data bases and profiling is power for the course when living in Inner City New York so HOPE is the ideal word for what Black folk prophetical live by. When Community Leaders put out the message to stand down and allow the System to function without intervention, the tensions had never subsided. Knowing that “if” and “when” THAT decision is made, that ENERGY will be directed not into DestructionBUT into a wave that will flow ALL OVER THE CITY.
"This verdict is one round down, but the fight is far from over. What we saw in court today was not a miscarriage of justice. Justice didn't miscarry. This was an abortion of justice." --http://video.wnbc.com/player/?id=244770Rev. Al Sharpton
I sat in the audience, as did the community when Sharpton explained that when a Woman miscarries, medically this means that the body was unable to handle the life that is was given. It means that due to no fault of the Woman or accident, life CANNOT be carried and it fails. When a life is “aborted”, it is a conscious decision, a planned killing, and a methodical step-by-step murder of life. In the case of Sean Bell, from the shooting to the systematic structure of the court to bring about a decision of Not Guilty, their was a premeditated plan for an ABORTION of justice and it should be seen, understood and explained as such.
"Obviously, there are some people who are disappointed with the verdict. ... We don't anticipate violence, but we are prepared for any contingency." http://video.wnbc.com/player/?id=244683-- Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly.
The lack of “expected” criminal and destructive actions has stunned the NYPD and its Legal Community. There were no riots, no fighting in the street, no rocks thrown, cars being turned over, gun shoots in the distance or threats and cursing after the decision. Black folk gathered their anger and their fears tied together by their HOPE and made way to their Churches, Community Groups, Local Organizations, Homes and Schools and coming out with all the RESERVED ENERGY needed to CLEAN HOUSE. This was easy to do because prior to the decision, Black folk in New York prepared and had a "CONTINGENCY" as well. In the past 10 years in New York when citizens thought that the worst the NYPD can do is murder Amadou Diallo, it had gone complacent and bored and decided that 21 shots needed to grow to 36 to 41 to 50 shots. Now New Yorkers know that 50 shots will grow to 60 and into 70 and ultimately into an arsenal of body holes and it needs to stop. But how will Black folk do that? They aren’t telling nor advertising their strategy this time. This lack of knowledge has begun to increase the NYPD and New York City “fear”. This much they all know, Uptown WILL be coming Downtown.
Walking the streets of Harlem and I saw no Beat Walkers. All of the Officers are in Patrol Cars. Driving. Searching. Wondering if and when the time will come and the "explosion" begins. With the weather getting warmer, the children on their Spring Break, what now? No longer comfortable to walk the streets, the command offices now feel that Black folk will became dangerous, uncontrollable and detrimental to their livelihood. Not true, Black folk have decided to change the script.
"Today we're grateful that this court ruled on the evidence presented in this case. But with this case, there's no winners, there's no losers. We still have a death that occurred. We still have police officers that have to live with the fact that there was a death involved in their case. ... It's a tragedy for all police officers who have to live with the difficult job we do but nevertheless we're grateful for this outcome." http://video.wnbc.com/player/?id=244688 --Patrolmen's Benevolent Association president Patrick J. Lynch.
The comments of Patrick J. Lynch read from the typical and old NYPD script. Translation: “Yeah people got shot, and some N____ got shot too but Shyt happens. You’ll get some money from this but HEY, as Police, we are under a lot of pressure so get off our backs aiight.”
"There are no winners in a trial like this. An innocent man lost his life, a bride lost her groom, two daughters lost their father, and a mother and a father lost their son. No verdict could ever end the grief that those who knew and loved Sean Bell suffer. Judge Cooperman's responsibility, however, was to decide the case based on the evidence presented in the courtroom. America is a nation of laws, and though not everyone will agree with the verdicts and opinions issued by the courts, we accept their authority. Today's decision is no different. There will be opportunities for peaceful dissent and potentially for further legal recourse -- those are the rights we enjoy in a democratic nation. We don't expect violence or law-breaking, nor is there any place for it. We have come too far as society -- and as a City -- to be dragged back to those days. http://video.wnbc.com/player/?id=244865 -- New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg
Politically and Publicly speaking, the Mayor of New York cannot tarnish the NYPD and yet when this whole incident occurred he did say that the shooting was, “obsessive”. Not the NYPD and it is because of this attitude towards Black life, the people are DONE, no more passes.
"We ask people to be calm as they protest, if that's what they choose to do. ... On the same token, though, we ask police to be calm as people protest. ... We have not heard what these men did that caused police to act as though they were America's most wanted, yet still we hear a verdict of not guilty. We will go to the next level, whatever that might be, to seek justice." -- Leroy Gadsden, president of the Jamaica, Queens, branch of the NAACP.
The role of Youth is heavily highlighted in the movement. The numbers on the streets swelled to a major capacity. This is good for several reasons. Through the marches, the interviews and rallies, the main theme spoken was, "This could be you. This could be Me. This could be your child? Sean Bill is me." for what is it worth, the Mothers and Fathers that broke down in tears and stood tall and shouted know that this is a TRUTH that cannot be ignored. When asked, during Al Sharpton's National Radio Show, how do you think the current political figures running for president should react? It was noted that it was not anyone's place to predict but Black folk will put Hillary Clinton and Governor David Petersonon NOTICE and an active commitment to making this RIGHT will be DEMANDED.
Later, as the groups retired to meet the next day, some of the protesters heard Barak Obama's reaction to the decision, the skepticism and wariness rose to the top with some when Obama said:
After watching Obama's comment, many of the people who left the rally gave pause to the response. After a few minute of dialogue one man's thoughts were this:
"It's in moments like this is why I feel Obama will fall short of addressing Black issues. Sure he may be able to fix the economy, bring back the troops, possibly bring about a solid foundation for jobs in America but for the individual Black person, what do he bring to the table in situations like this besides Hope. I don't want any more Hope, I want justice."
I would have to agree. The response was a bit disconnected, generic and dismissive to the Pain and Hurt that Black and Brown people feel and have felt for years in relation to Police brutality by the NYPD. Like the "bitter" comment that offended the people of Centeral Pennsylvania and Small Town America, the Obama Multiculturalist Philosophy of "let's come together" aren't the words for calm that Black folk want to hear just about now. I mean, how do you tell a HURT PEOPLE to accept a people that greets them with open arms; flowers in one hand and guns and bullets in another?
