PowerPoint; #003; Police Brutality in America

Production and broadcast of PowerPoint is made possible by a grant from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. This is PowerPoint, an Information Age Clearinghouse for issues affecting the African -American community, the nation, and the world. And now, PowerPoint's Kenneth Walker. Welcome back to PowerPoint. I'm Kenneth Walker with Studio Guest who will help us look at the social impact legislation and other issues that must be addressed in any discussion about police violence. Here's a question to think about. In a violent society, how do we define excessive force by the police? These and other pertinent questions frame our discussion and as always, we'll take your calls for questions, comments, and ideas. These are your stories, your voices. Our search for answers begins again right after PowerPoint news with Werna Avery Brown. This is PowerPoint,

news and information to empower the community. I'm Werna Avery Brown. What may have been one of the largest religious rallies in U .S. history took place yesterday in Washington, D .C., the Promise Keepers, an all -male evangelical Christian movement founded by former University of Colorado football coach Bill McCartney, flooded into the nation's capital to rededicate themselves to their wives and their children. Speakers recited the failings of Christian men from moral impurity and family abused to sectarianism and racism. Yesterday's gathering of the predominantly white organization was noticeably diverse. A sociology professor at the University of California Santa Cruz says, the government's attempt to counter the crack cocaine epidemic with harsh, sentencing laws and mass imprisonment of racial minorities has made it an accomplice, not a solution. In his book, Crack in America, Demon, Drugs and Social Justice, Crack Riharman cites a 1997 Rand Corporation study that found investing $1 million in drug treatment would cut consumption and reduce crime

15 times as much as investing the same amount in mandatory minimum prison sentences. Communities around the country are rising up against what they believe to be an increase in overzealous behavior on the part of police officers. On October 22nd, activists in 40 cities across the U .S. will participate in the annual national day to stop police brutality. James Lafferty, executive director of the Los Angeles chapter of the National Lawyers Guild, is one of the organizers. Powerpoint asked Lafferty if police brutality is actually on the rise or merely perceived to be because of increased media coverage of cases like Rodney King and more recently the beating of Haitian immigrant Adner Luima. It's a fair question. Part of the problem that we're discovering here at the National Lawyers Guild is that people do not keep accurate figures. For example, we're sponsoring something called the Stolen Lives Project. This is an effort of the National Lawyers Guild in the October 22nd people. To learn the names of everyone murdered by the police in the last five or six

years or so in this country and you would think that would be some information readily obtained from the Justice Department, not so. And so we've been having to gather this information the hard way. We know that there have been thousands of people killed, but we don't really know how many. With respect to police abuse itself, we know that in some cities it goes up or down depending on any number of circumstances. If you look at the amount of millions of dollars being awarded in claims, that can sometimes give you some idea of whether police abuse is going up or down over the long haul in a given community. But these figures are not accurately kept. It's kind of a dirty secret in this country. And part of what October 22nd and part of what the Stolen Lives Project is about is trying to uncover the truth about the real degree of police brutality. Well, now when a person is killed, they don't list on the death certificate that he was killed by police abuse. So how do you make sure that your accounting, your documentation is accurate? Very difficult. And we don't pretend that we can do that at this point. What we do attempt to do is get the police reports, talk to whatever witnesses we

can, do whatever kind of investigation we can with respect to the incidents that come to our attention. In some cases, they've been well documented because their lawsuits have been brought off of this shooting. And so we have a fair amount of evidence to go on. And in many cases, the police departments of cities have paid money to the victims. They're by acknowledging, if you will, that the shooting and the murder was wrong. But we cannot, in all cases, make a full determination because the folks who should be making these kinds of determinations, the justice department and the police departments of our, and the country can't be trusted to make that determination objectively either. James Lafferty, executive director of the Los Angeles Chapter of the National Lawyers Guild, an organizer of the October 22nd National Day to stop police brutality. In Chicago's Cabrini Greens infamous housing projects, there's a growing movement, literally. It's an experiment in biodynamic farming, and it involves children who live in Cabrini Greens. Then Underwood, a father of 10, is co -founder of the project. He's in Charlestown, West

Virginia today for a conference on urban farming. PowerPoint, I spoke with Underwood about the Cabrini Greens. It's an inner city guardian project using children from the inner city to grow gourmet vegetables, organically growing gourmet vegetables, to fail to restaurants in the area, which I have to say are some of the most expensive restaurants that you could, you know, imagine, and they buy from the children that live in Cabrini Greens. Exactly. What do you grow, Greens? What do you grow? No, not really. We grow specialty crops. Pink tomatoes, purple potatoes, miniature size, cucumber squash, carrots, the real tiny things that the chefs go crazy about. Those little teeny corns that you see, you're kidding, I often wonder who are those? We grow stuff like squash blossoms and other edible

flowers. Edible flowers, yes. So now they're called sort of designer vegetables, aren't they? Designer veggies. Now, how do you grow designer veggies, organically grown designer veggies in the heart of Cabrini Greens? I would think that the soil itself would be so polluted or contaminated. When they built the housing projects over 40 years ago, they hauled all the old topsoil away and brought in good, good topsoil. When they put those buildings in, they were like 15, 16 -story building. They hauled all that stuff out and they brought in really good soil. And when we started the project about seven years ago, we spent a lot of money on soil testing and found out that I also loved some of the best around. Dan Underwood, co -founder of the Cabrini Greens Urban Farming Project, he's hoping to replicate this urban farming program in

cities around the country. For PowerPoint news and information, I'm Verna Avery Brown. Welcome back to PowerPoint. I'm Kenneth Walker and our topic is Police brutality. Continuing with this discussion is Ron Hampton. He's the Executive Director of the National Black Police Association, Yvonne Estimae, who's the Executive Director of the National Organization for the Advancement of Haitians, Father Lawrence Lucas, a black Roman Catholic priest in New York City. He's a chaplain at Rikers Island Prison and a counselor to many police officers. Father Lucas has also been extremely outspoken against police brutality in New York City. Everyone,

welcome. Father you there? Yes, can you hear me? Yes. I can now. What about you, Ron? Are you still with us? Ron Hampton. You still with us? Yes, I'm still here. Great. I'm glad to have all three of you here. I want to remind our listeners to please get in on this discussion. Our number here is at 1 -800 -989 -8255. Our email address is PowerPoint at worldafrican .com. Miss Estimae, you represent the organization for the Advancement of Haitians. Could you begin by giving us, most of us have probably heard about the story involving Mr. Luima in New York City, but for those of us who haven't, can you give us some sense of what that case was about? Certainly. Mr. Luima was returning from a party in Brooklyn, New York on the night of August 9, 1997.

There was some sort of scuttle that occurred outside the nightclub. And at that point, from our understanding, the police arrived. And there was a confrontation between Mr. Luima and the police officer. He was then taken into a police car. And as far as we understand, he was beaten in the police car, excuse me, from the location to the police precinct. And then when he was taken into the police precinct, we understand that his pants were pulled down around his ankles. He had been handcuffed. He was exposed, was nude, exposed in the precinct. And then he was eventually taken to the men's room at which point a plunger, the handle of a plunger, was forcefully jammed into his rectum, causing severe internal damages to Mr. Luima. Mr. Luima is still hospitalized, and he is recuperating from his wound. We do not know whether or not he will ever recover completely from the damages caused by this attack. Ron, to give us some sense of what

really is going on with other police officers in a situation like this, since Mr. Luima's injury, there have been two officers in New York were arrested for directly being involved. And I imagine several others were at the very least suspended because they didn't do anything. What on earth can be going on in the minds and the environment at a police precinct among the other officers not directly involved in that kind of thing about what they should be doing? Well, I think that the fact that there was inaction, the fact that the screens, the brutal beating that took place on the way from the scene to the police recent, are indications that the systematic, systemic problem that exists in the police department around these very issues. And when we talk about those who want to talk about this as an aberration, and somehow know that this is bad and

this is not reflective of what happens every day, it is because the culture that environment has to be in place, the value system has to be in place to permit ultimately that they would perform in that fashion and not only just do it, but know that they can get away with it. And then the rest of the officers, I mean, again, that's evidence that there's a culture there that says that these kinds of things can take place and do take place. And officers just go along with it because they don't want to, they don't want to tell because they know talent will, the results of talent on the police officers who did it would be worse than anything else. And that's evidence again that that exists. But I would tell you that to me, the most disgraceful thing about this is that nobody questioned, nobody questioned the screens and the hollow that took place in the police precinct. And this seemed like to me. This was the usual deal, apparently. That's exactly right. And anything left, anybody who believes less than that is

inhuman. I mean, it's just unbelievable, but those kinds of things happen. I mean, you could, I remember working as a police officer the first time I reported a police officer for police retaliative was when they had brought in some cares from student craft by on the street. They bring him in the precinct and police just kept taught and then he turned around and hit the police and then all of a sudden when all of the police jumped on him and started beating him and we managed to get the police off of him. The fact of the matter was that when the story went down, the police story was that the defendant struck the police without provocation, without provocation. Now, that wasn't what I said, that wasn't in my documentation. I said that the police officer taught it to citizen and kept taught them and then with frustration, the citizen struck the police. I want to remind each of our guests, Mrs. Estimey Ron, Father Lucas, that this is a conversation. And obviously I have questions, but if you

feel or hear something you want to react to or respond to, please, please feel free. But Father Lucas, I do want to, I have a specific question for you, you are a chaplain at Rikers Island Prison and a counselor to many police officers, you're kind of standing in the gap as it were. And I'm wondering from that vantage point, how it is you see the alleged or potential victims of police brutality, their view on that side of the situation as well as the police officers. I mean, just, just, just, what is your unique viewpoint on the situation here? Well, first of all, I've been a Roman Catholic pastor in the Holland community, which I was, in which I was born and raised, I've been pastoring for over 30 years, before I'm now full time with the New York City Department of Correction. But I've also been sheer person for the public safety committee of

community board 10, in which covers most of central Harlem. I've been before the hospital takeover, you're domestically called Marjorie, when we had three distinct police departments in the city of New York, one state, one the MTA, the transit police and the housing police. I was here chaplain and also chaplain to the Grand Council of Guardians and chaplain to the Eastern region of the National Black Police Association, hi Ron. How you doing? And these kinds of things, that's give a particular vantage point, both from the police side and the citizen side. One of the things you have to remember is that most of the police that are allegedly served the poor communities, the poor communities of color, particularly are not residents of those communities. For example, in New York, because the PBA, which we refer to not as a police benevolent association, but as a police brutality association, spends lots of money on the state legislature

and you would think that we have home rule in the city, we do not. And they have consistently prevented a residency requirement, so that the large number of the police, particularly in our communities, come from not only outside the city, but from white neighborhoods where there only relationship with people of color is to watch on television where they're in handcuffs. And they come in with totally racist attitudes and very little respect for anybody in the community, as long as you're of color, or you speak a different language, particularly Spanish. Now, with that kind of thing, and then you have almost a clone of the original aid of Hitler in the mayor of the city of New York. This is the mayor who will practically let a police riot and city hall during the administration of David Thinking, close him every name but a child of God. And there were actual actual act, the n -word, nicknames, were used by many of

these officers on recorded videotape television during that. That's correct. In fact, some of them were so drunk, they were openly drinking beer and that kind of thing during it beat up a young kid in some way, but with that kind of mentality, you see, as the original Hitler, if you remember, that the police did no wrong under the Hitler regime because in order to create a police state, in order to dictate it, to survive, you need a police state. Yes, right. And that means that the police, as long as you deal with the designated victims, you're going to be protected and that has been the mo of this president administration, it wasn't by coincidence. For example, one of the animals beating up on Luima was heard to say that this is not Lincoln's time, it's Juliannie's time. Now in typical lying fashion, he denied it at first until one of the astute reporters took a videotape of Luima saying that's exactly what he said and he tried to put another spin on it so that you have a mentality in the police department

that whatever you do, you're going to be protected by the entire system. That includes from the justice, from the so -called judges, to the district attorney and to the media, which primarily is white control and protects and supports the kind of mayor that we now have, simply because he's the mayor of the big corporations and the media is simply big corporations and big business. So he gets away with a whole lot and to pretend that this is an operation. One of the things I had to contend with apparently Black and Latino young men are somewhat acrobatic and masochistic, but you couldn't bring a prisoner into the precinct without his being bloodied up when the explanation was he either drew himself on the sidewalk or he fell down the stairs. We had the only way we could lessen that down was myself and other folks I could sitting in the precincts as they bring in these prisoners. And it

calmed it down for a while, but of course if you're not able to be there consistently all the time, of course, the process or the beating up that police becomes not only the arresting officer, very often black kids are being arrested for things you wouldn't think of giving a while arresting a white kid and not only that, but the police become not only the arresting officer, but the judge, jury and executioner and some of them are statistic racers enough to get us really, really out of beating up on people and brutalizing people. We're going to go to the phones in a minute, but before we do, I just wanted to share a statistic with our guest and our listeners according to the Department of Justice, of the 11 ,721 civil rights complaints filed with the FBI in 1996. A substantial majority of which were physical abuse complaints against law enforcement officers, 2 ,600 and 19 were

investigated, 79 resulted in a conviction. We're going to Walter in Washington, D .C., operating out of our sister station, W .E .A .F .M. Welcome back Walter. I am back with you and I really appreciate this show. The nation needs to hear this type of information and it would take your gumption to do it because we're not going to get it from the network to major networks and we don't get it from them. We might get a 30 -minute -hour nightline excuses, but my point and I thank that priest for coming on and speaking his piece just now. When you have racists at the top and racists in the mix, then we have the apathy in our community. And I'm sorry that I missed Earl or Farah Hutchinson, but maybe we're not having to speak on this with regards to our community of Washington, D .C. The apathy of our community as you suggested to call us earlier, that everybody wants police or

in need. I would be first to admit needs, police services and IE protection, if it was protection. But we don't fully realize, Ron, are you there? I want you to comment on the fact that we have gone years and years in D .C. without a viable citizen review and we do not. And this is for your guests and particularly Ron, have a political base that would allow a strong citizen review. You mentioned that earlier, but Ron, I want you to explain to the audience that you have now what happened in D .C. and why we don't have a viable citizen review. And I'd ask the other guests to please comment for their areas nationwide. I see there's a problem, the vicious assaults and particularly on people of color. Thanks, Walter. Right ahead, Ron. Well, a civilian review, we some years ago, as a matter of fact, a local black police association was involved with one of the council persons, went around

the city, held hearings, and then ultimately legislation was developed. And a civilian review, the civilian complaint review board was established and it took two years of it sitting on the chair, chairman of the council's death to even get the budget, the proper kind of budget set up to get it running. But ultimately what happens, not only here, but across the country. I've been working with some citizens, brothers, and Pittsburgh. They got theirs through referendum. And then what really happens after you go through all that, it's the negotiations. The negotiations were about a police, the politicians, the union people beginning to impact on ultimately what you're going to have at the end of the day. And so you think that having independent investigators or having a subpoena power and cooperation and all of that, those kinds of things don't work. And having worked to the extent that they need to work because the unions have a great deal of power, the politicians don't want to be seen as anti -police. So then they turn around and gut them or don't give them all the resources that they need. And

so about two years ago, as a result of a backlog and a system that didn't work here, the politicians pulled the budget out of the CCRB. And then, so we've been without one for two years. Now we're in a mode again. Today, negotiating with politicians around and other people around developing a new CCRB. And then those who don't know, and probably most of you do know, we have a financial control authority here who also dictates and has more power than the man to the council. So they're involved in the process. But we hope that at the end of the day, we will have something in place that will begin to so that citizens can once again get involved in the process of being able to have some oversight. And some place to go because they don't have the confidence and trust in the police department. They're going to police themselves and discipline themselves in a way that's going to have some impact on the problem. So I mean, I try to remain optimistic about it. But I'm also a realist because I've seen how it has worked here as well as other places in the country. And I think

it's something that we really need, but we need to really have them in a way that they're going to be able to do what it is that they need to do. And then that's not the only thing that we need to be involved in doing either. So that's not the panacea. Before we get to those other things, Ron, I wanted to try to get Mrs. Estabay involved in this a little on the issue of what the victims or potential victims are dealing or doing about the situation. Someone mentioned earlier that until it's videotape and shown on TV, well, even we don't get too upset. And I get a sense of it that in the Haitian American community, as well as for other immigrants, there are other considerations like immigration and green card. What is the development of the level of police brutality against Haitian Americans? Well, Noah, as you know, is the organization, the young national organization for the advancement of Haitians. And what we are trying to do is allow people to become more sensitive

to the issues dealing with Haitians. We have very many friends, not only within the Haitian community, but also outside the Haitian community, who supported us. And certainly we'd like to thank everyone who came out in March, along with us back in August in Brooklyn, New York. And I think it was a powerful March. We have to keep in mind that currently there's a backlash against immigrants in this country, the recent immigrant bill that was passed by Congress. I mean, immigrants are really being made to take the brunt of certain issues and problems that are endemic in this society, that it really has nothing to do with immigrants at all. And unfortunately, what people have been able to do is try to concentrate and make the Luima, Abner Luima issue, a Haitian issue. And we really want to stress to everyone. This is not merely a Haitian issue. It is a human rights issue. A person's human rights were violated. No animal should have been treated that way. Certainly not a human being should be treated

that way. Everyone should be appalled by what happened to Mr. Luima and other victims of police brutality. He's not the only one out there. There's a brother and on New Jersey who is viciously attacked by the police as well. And we are not standing for it anymore. What we'd like people to know is we have to organize. We have to make our voices heard. We have to stay in firm. And if anyone wants to contact Noah, feel free. Please call us. We have to make sure that we do not sit silently by and permit this sort of brutality to continue. The Haitian community will not do it anymore. And I'm certain our friends, the Latino community, the Jewish community, everyone we cannot tolerate this anymore. And I really wish everyone would become just offended and upset as we are. We're speaking with Yvonne Estimate Executive Director of the National Association for the Advancement of Haitians. Father Lawrence Lucas, Chaplain at Rikers Island Prison, and a councilor to many police officers in Ron Hampton, the Executive Director of the National Black Police Association. Our topic is police brutality. This is PowerPoint. We'll be right back.

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Through Internet, broadband and new media technologies, the web address is www .world .africannet .com. Welcome back to PowerPoint. I'm Kenneth Walker. You're being joined by Ron Hampton, who's the Executive Director of the National Black Police Association. Yvonne Estimate, the Executive Director of the National Organization for the Advancement of Haitians and Father Lawrence Lucas, the Roman Catholic priest in New York, who's the Chaplain at Rikers Island Prison, and a councilor to many police officers. Once again, our number here is 1 -800 -989

-8255 -1 -800 -989 -8255. Yes. Before you go back to the phone, there are a couple of things that I think is important to say. Go right ahead. And the first place, we have to be very leery of so -called Department of Injustice, or they call it the Justice Department and FBI figures. There's an old saying that while some folks think the computers are the greatest things since sliced bread, all the computer does is compute what you put into it. You put crap in the computer. It's going to compute crap if you put something decent and they will compute it. The FBI and the Justice Department figures are simply computing what they're told from the local institutions, the local municipalities, et cetera. For example, we have a whole lot of foolishness going around as a country about Mayor Giuliani has cut crime tremendously in the city, et cetera, et cetera. If you recall, the red derailles and fall of the third Reich for those of us who are old enough, Hitler made that same claim. And meantime, corporate crime and police crime went through the ceiling

while they concentrated on the poorest or the designated victims. In New York, for example, when you talk about crimes going down, murders dropping in the first place, they tell us a trend was in the taking place nationally for over four years, five years before Giuliani became mayor. Secondly, they have all kinds of different ways of computing murders. What it goes on to statistics whether a body is a claim or whether a body is not claimed. So statistics have been cropped in practically every one of the precincts in the city by order of city law. So that these figures, again, when you think about murder over 60 percent in the city of murders are in the homes by people who either are related or know each other. Obviously, the police are not sitting down in the home. So to call that a lessening of crime is, you know, and giving the mayor and the police credit for it, it's absolutely ridiculous. What they have called quality

of life is simply building more jails at the expense of schools, at the expense of hospitals and so forth. And again, for the designated victims, young, particularly young black and Latino males. In our city, for example, 80 percent of drug users are upper middle class working white males, yet still 86 percent of those arrested for drug use and on Rikers Island are young poor or no income black and Latino males. So these are some of the things that you really have to be aware of. Again, the whole system from the judiciary down to the district attorneys down to the media and including so -called religious folks, police chaplains don't talk art against this at all. And so they're all protecting the police as long as the victims are the right victims. Moreover, again, when you began to look at the racial component of the police department, it hardly reflects the city and I won't be surprised as it's true in most of the

other large cities. That only about 10 or not less of the police department are people of color and when you get to the white shirts or the big brass, you could almost count them on your hand to hand. So that when you talk about CCRBs, even that's a joke. CCRBs meaning civilian review board. While it was pushed through the city council, it's hardly a civilian review board. The mayor has a great hand in appointments. The appointees to the board is a joke. Don't even know how to spell brutality, much less recognize it because hardly any of them would be a victim of police brutality. Much less have members of their family. The mayor cut the budget drastically and have got rid of the best director that they had because he couldn't put up with the mayor's interference of it. They have no subpoena powers. They have no power to discipline or anything. And so when they talk about complaints going

down, it's simply because people know that the CCRB is a waste of time. If it's not totally independent with the kind of subpoena powers, with the kind of punishment powers, you're only wasting your time and in the light of that then. The communities are going to have to do more than just marches and demonstration. I think the communities are going to have to learn that individuals and communities have a God given right of self -defense. And the community is going to have to itself try these murderers or these brutalizers and give them the punishment that it's once that begins to happen. I think it's going to lessen drastically. Provocative idea. And wait for the system to do it because the system has no intention of doing it or the will of doing it. I think it's safe to say that Father Lawrence Lucas subscribed to Liberation Theology. But in the meanwhile, let's go to the phones. We have Justice from Montgomery, Alabama, whose outer sister station WVAS. Justice, are you with us? Yes, sir. Welcome to PowerPoint. Thank you for allowing me to express my viewpoints on this subject of police crimes against our people. Right ahead. Left

right ahead. Very fruitful comments tonight. And I want to give you the solution. But before I give the solution, I feel that I must give you the purpose of the police and the neighborhood and the harmful effects. Otherwise, our people won't be willing to sacrifice and do what we need to do to implement the solution. Now, in the six years, we fought for and we've gotten more Negro policemen on the force into higher, promoted into higher position, a review of wars and et cetera. But yet, these police crimes against our people have escalated and increases. And the reason is the sole purpose of the police and the Negro hoods is to continue. The new violence suppressing the manhood in our people number one is to continue. Violet and stealing fear and Negro males because fear is mind control number three is to protect and all the Negro imposter. So -called leaders who are ignoring this problem and refusing to address and solve many of our other major problems to protect and to crime breeding crime manufacturing system that is systematically criminalizing Negro males within the Negro hoods to continue allowing illegal drugs flowing into Negro.

Get those who is which is in trapping our young people to contain in Negro crime and keeping Negro crime within the Negro hoods. That is the purpose of the police and the function of the police and the you see the illegal drugs, the violence of crime, the gangs and et cetera is filling up the jail's prisons and the graveyard with our people. So this means this is a serious epidemic that is destroying our race. So we talk about doing for self now. This is the beginning of doing for self. We must call upon all of our Negro politicians, preach a civil rights leaders, business people, educate towards and professional Negroes to demand that all the governors and all the states immediately call out the national guards into all the Negro ghettos. Then dismiss all the present police because as long as the present police among us illegal drugs will continue flowing. Why do you think justice that the National Guard would operate any different? Well, because there would be more or less compel once we presented to them that this is an epidemic but you see the Negro leaders have never seriously addressed

our problem. Now the National Guard was searching stop the supply line of drugs from flowing into our hoods and meanwhile we would call upon the nation of Islam to begin patrolling and protecting our hoods while at the same time the nation of Islam began teaching training and motivating young Negro males who are present living among us. That's the residential, residential requirement there living among us how to police and protect our own people. This means how to police our own people with brotherly love with brotherly counseling with daily examples of being mentors, friends, brothers and patriots and nationalists protecting our people. You can't say that justice doesn't have a plan. It seems to have thought this very well out and he seems to have several things that he thinks that we all need to do. And it's definitely food for thought on this subject which is police brutality in our number is 1 -800 -989 -8255. We're going to go to Cindy in Detroit with sister station WDET. We welcome both the station and you Cindy. Welcome to PowerPoint.

Cindy, are you with us still? Cindy, I don't think so. I think we've lost Cindy. Go right ahead and respond to that. Make a comment, Lucas. I think the brother outlined the purpose he left out of the very important wonder to police or in our communities to protect the property and the investment of white folks from outside the community, their financial investment. What's left? Most of the many of the businesses, all of the manufacturing has gone out of our communities. What are they protecting exactly? The community. So that's a very important aspect of what their purpose is to. On the other hand, I think the militarization of the police is growing just like it did in Nazi Germany. And I'm very little God because the National Guard are not composed of people from heaven. The National Guard are composed primarily in many instances of the same kind of people that make up the police department. So I do not know if I would appreciate a greater militarization in our communities than already exists.

Father Lucas, you really do need to explore for us this notion of genocide and comparisons with Hitler. You obviously have very strong feelings about the situations that exist, especially as far as police brutality is concerned. Explore for us just how much of a parallel you really do see. Well, first of all, if you remember under Hitler, first there was a concentration of power. Now, I'm using the mayor of the city of New York as a good example of that. We've had three independent police department merged into one with a stooge at the top. In fact, all of the commissioners in the city are simply robots on Charlie McCarthy's that the mayor runs all the agencies, particularly law enforcement agencies. Concentration of power. Information is controlled by city hall. There is no longer an independent, for example, police information bureau. Nobody gets in the city hall, press room. If

you've written or spoken anything that it is pleasing. So it's all very control. What passes for crime statistics are primarily police reports. You don't have two sides or reporters investigating hearing all sides of it. You get as crime reports. What the police say it is just like the so -called statistics on crime is what the police under the direction of the mayor says it is. So even the communication is. Now, when you look at, for example, we we quoted the statistics of drug use and who is arrested and who is not. They don't make sweep in Wall Street. They don't make sweeps that African -American expression. Here's the lemon or saltman brothers, but they make sweeps in the poor community and everybody is grabbed up into it in the scent or guilty. But father, excuse me for interrupting you for a second. But what is the solution? I understand that you mentioned earlier that community groups by protesting and marching that that really is not effective. I'd like to know. Please tell me what your solution is. What are you advocating? What should we do as far as your concern?

Okay. First of all, I didn't say it's not effective. I say it cannot be the only egg in a basket. Well, certainly. And what other suggestions are you answering? That the demonstration as long as it's this rupping the status quo, that's part of it. But I think another part of it, I don't want to use the cause. Folks have their own wild illusions of what? But the initial purpose and meaning of the black path of party where people got together to organize the self defense in their own community. And I think it ought to be taken once a further when you have police blatantly murdering us and still is able to function in that a present or in that area. I think it's a legitimate exercise of our God given right for the community to investigate the facts of the best of their ability to come to a conclusion and that officer in whatever punishment that may be required. And I think when this kind of thing starts to go or perhaps you're going to find just like what happened at the initial stage of the Panthers and Los Angeles,

police murders dropped drastically percentage wise. Let me suggest something to the system and to the list in the audience up until about 10 years ago, maybe within 10, 15 years ago, there wasn't an Asian person in this country. There wasn't an Asian person in the criminal justice system in our jail. And the reason for that was that the Asian community handled their own problems. What do you mean by that? They handled it on problems. What do you mean by that? And they had a situation that by virtue of it being a close in the community, they took care of it. But they've had like members of Chinese gangs like the Tongs. Yeah. That's something that has existed for a long time. But I'm just talking about in terms of when it came to taking care of their community. Let me just quote tell you that about 65 % of the time the people in our community call the police. It's really not a police issue. It's generally issue by virtue of the fact that the police get caught because we don't seem to have the power of the resources to deal with the issues in our community.

And I'm here to tell you that there are communities in this country that have been developing systems whereby they get the police out of their community. Now that happens in the white community every day because we know what power and resources exist in the white community. So they don't have to call the police every time they have a problem because they have to wear before to take care of the problem. What we need to do and what we teach at talk about it the National Black Leadership Association is that process that we need to go in and train and educate the individuals who live in our community. We need to empower them. We need to be a part of a process that provides the resources and get the police out of our community and we can handle our own problems. Our subject, our subject is police brutality. Our number is 1 -800 -989 -8255. And we're going to Marshal in Baltimore, Maryland out of Sister Station, W -E -A -A -F -M. Welcome Marshal. So it's United for Justice. I don't know what that was all about, but I'm just... I'll be waiting for

the next, a good example of what Ron was talking about is look at the Hesita Community in Crown Heights. They run their own community, they run the police. I mean these folks who get by with thrashing an entire police precinct, destroying it without one person being arrested, beating up black cops, housing police, and nobody goes to jail for it. If you got the ass for power and you will never ever get it, to take it. You will have to take it. That's right. But we were afraid. That's exactly right. Well, but we can teach and we can educate and then we need to move and get the job done. We can get them out of our business. We can do that. How does the Haitian American leadership get the police out of their business? I'd really like to know. How do we get the police out of our business? Look, in this country, we have a judicial system, we have a police system that is enforced to protect all citizens. Not certain citizens, not merely a small percentage of these populations, it's to protect all citizens. Our taxpayer dollars goes to pay for the salary

of the police to make sure that they protect us. I expect that the police will protect black citizens, immigrant citizens, as well as white citizens in this country. On what basis do you expect this? I expect it to be current. Pardon me? You didn't expect this from experience, do you? No, I'm not saying I expect it from experience, but certainly the expectation is there. We pay the attacks, the our tax dollars pay their salaries. But we've been doing it for a long time. Certainly, we have been doing it for a long time. For example, we're talking about... What you're talking about, what you are talking about, it seems to me, you are suggesting that we should keep the police department out of our communities altogether. No, no. Is that what you're suggesting? No, no, no, no. What do you suggest? Look at the statistics in a given city. Let's take Washington DC, for example, that the African -American community in Washington DC that makes up 70 % of the community

call the police more than the white community. But yet, when it comes to policing and protection, the police give more protection to the white community than they do the black community. But if you look at the crime, the crime is high in the black community than it is in the white community. So what is it that the white community has, that the black community don't have, that would cause them to call the police less or more than the other community? And the fact of the amount is that what it is is that they have more resources, they have more command, more power, more control over the certain things. And what I'm suggesting is that we need to do their communities in this country that exists right now. And prototypes of programs where when young people get in trouble, we don't take them down to the police station in tournament. There's a mentality in our community that we ought to turn our kids over to the police because the police can handle more. The police can intimidate them. Take them down to the police station so they can put them in the jail to show what happened to them. They don't do that in white community. They have community justice systems where when kids get in trouble, they go and cut grass off some, they learn what it means to quit pro -crow process or what

happens when you do things. We don't criminalize that young people. When the neighbors get an argument, they have a community justice center so you go sit down and mediate that stuff. And that's what we need to do in our community. We need to take control over those very issues that if you don't take care of them at the grass roots level, then they turn into real problems. And then you really have to call the police. Our subject, our topic is police brutality. This is PowerPoint. We're talking with Yvonne Estima, Executive Director of the National Organization for the Advancement of Asians. Father Lawrence Lucas, Roman Catholic priest, chaplain at Rikers Island Prison. Ron Hampton, Executive Director, National Black Police Association. Our number one nine hundred one eight hundred nine eight two five five. Please join us when we come back. Thank you very

much. Thank you. Welcome back to PowerPoint. Where we're trying to get some solutions to the epidemic, apparently, of police brutality that's going on in various places around the United States. Our number is one eight hundred two five five. We're going to Sherry in Houston, Texas, from my affiliate there. Sherry, are you there? Yes. Welcome to PowerPoint. Yes, welcome to you. How can we help?

Well, I wanted to stress on the point about someone saying that we don't need police protection. America needs police protection because organized crimes still live in this country. And for that reason, we need protection. You see what I'm saying? And how many of us look alike in America today? My sense of it, Sherry, was that our guests weren't so much saying that we don't need police protection as that we need to devise new ways of requiring it. If I understand, I guess. I think there is a great misunderstanding going on. Nobody is saying we don't need police protection. But that's exactly what we're not getting. That's right. What we're saying is we need to control criminality in our own communities. Well, there's a criminality of teenagers. Well, there's a criminality of organized crime. Again, Father, I ask this. And FBI are part of organizing. I agree with you, but clarify for me how. We do not have the resources currently. And that's not to suggest that it can't happen. What I'd like to know, what are the solutions that we are putting forth? These are wonderful suggestions and ideas.

But how are we going to implement them when we do not have the resources? As Ron mentioned, we are not the acidic Jewish community. Sister, is your mother alive? Pardon me, yes, she is. If you were alive in the street and saw somebody beating their head off your mother, would you go up to see how much money you have in your pocketbook or what would you do? What would the amount of money my pocketbook do with it? Oh, okay. I'm sorry. Of course. What would you do with the resources you have if you saw something? I would use everything within, I would use every resource within my power to protect my mother. I think as I understand Father Lucas's point and he can speak for himself. Basically, I think the point he made about the Black Panther Party is absolutely correct. In the immediate aftermath of the creation of the Black Panther Party in New Yorkland area, especially police brutality, police shootings did come down. And if I understand them correctly, you're saying, Father, that where are the Black Panthers when we need them? Okay. And I'm saying that the entire community are a large part of it must become the Black Panthers. For example, in Harlem,

there are about as many guns in Harlem as you can find anywhere. None of them are manufactured here or none of them are made here. They're imported and very often with the connivance of the police to protect their drugs. Now, the problem that we have is, of course, is that these guns are used against each other. Very often to protect the drugs of somebody else outside of them, they don't know. Now, I'm not suggesting that everybody armed themselves and go about shooting their heads off. But like the lady, if I ask, what would you do if somebody's beating up on your grandmother? You would use all the resources within your power. Yes, right. I think we were afraid to do that. I think we're going to have to use all the resources within our power to control criminality across the board. And that includes police criminality. I don't want to hear anything about road cops. We're talking about criminals, see? I'm not talking about a few bad apples in a barrel. I'm talking about a barrel that's almost completely rotten with a few good apples. And when these good apples come forward, like what we had in the case of Lavodi,

who strangled a young man to death because his football hit the police car. And when the Latino officer came forward and told it through truth, she was threatened by police officers and had to be reassigned to Nipper because they kept it. Right. And he could no longer protect a police officer for telling the truth against her fellow cops. Right. Now, instead of getting rid of that whole blankly blank precinct, what they did, they transferred her. We have another police officer who interfered with a sergeant and a couple of white cops beating up. He is not being on departmental charges for refusing to follow a direct order. These are the kinds of things that we have to come. We can't leave it to the system. The system is totally corrupt. That's what we're talking about. We want to take another call, get another call in here quickly. We're going to go to Jason in Boston, Massachusetts with Sister Station WU -MB. Jason, welcome to PowerPoint. Thank you. I was listening to everyone's comments tonight and

on my middle age 20. Actually, I'm 27. You're all black men. And I live in a Boston area, it's predominantly white. I live in a black community here. And I don't have too much interaction with the police here at all. But when I do get pulled over or it's a mindset and a police officer's mind that I'm going through the thorough check -in of everything and my time is held up. If I run a red light or something like that, I can expect to be held up for least. An hour and a half, I don't know. But I just think it's a vicious cycle. My question to the panel or those people there. Where are the channels where I can go, where I can voice my opinion or file a complaint and make sure he's properly done the proper check. Thanks, Jason. You're going to have to run. Take a quick stab at that because we're running out of time. A very quick stab. I

think in Boston they have something similar to office of professional standards. I don't know if that's independent or part of the institution. But I would encourage communities to come up with organizations and they're a lot of police accountable. Eight organizations out there. Sort of fifths were doing those kind of documentation and filing complaints. Okay, Ron. I want to thank you. I want to thank Yvonne Estimae with the National Organization for the Advancement of Haitians and Father Lawrence Lucas from New York City. We'll see you next week when we go international with the inauguration of our Ambassadors Roundtable and we'll also have a look at Black Sports Agents. We'll see you next week. God willing. Internet services for PowerPoint are provided by World African Network, offering news, information, sports and entertainment for African and African American communities through Internet, broadband and new media technologies. The web address is www .world .affriconnet. That's a -f -r -i

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