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Black Police Group Seeks To Redefine Role In Criminal Justice Debate

By Barrington M. Salmon -Contributing Writer- | Last updated: Aug 18, 2016 - 2:23:17 PM

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Law enforcement officials discussed improving community and police relations during the National Black Police Association Conference.
It seems that just about every day, cell phone cameras and other recording devices capture new incidents of police shootings of primarily unarmed Blacks, instances of brutality, aggressive and hostile behavior and general disrespect towards this constituency.

The images reinforce some of the reasons for distrust between Black and Brown people and those in blue, and speak to the amount of work that both sides must embrace and engage in to restore that trust. The National Black Police Officers Association just wrapped up their 44th annual conference in Baltimore, Maryland and this year’s theme and a common thread throughout the weeklong confab was the urgent need to reengage with the communities that police serve.

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“Among the topics we dealt with were that we should be involved in police-community relations, that we have to address issues of police force against citizens and (implement) police reform,” said Malik Aziz, NBPA national chair and executive director. “Our role has never changed but it’s been downplayed by systemic processes in police departments. Now, Black police officers are in position on issues that have taken center stage.”

“We’re bridging the gap between police and the community. I think that (Black) police are going to rise up and take our rightful place … our mission is to bridge the gap between the criminal justice system and the community. We have to tell the truth on all sides.”

Founded in 1972, NBPA represents more than 100,000 members in law enforcement nationally, Aziz said.

In the past three years, police officers have been under an intense and often harsh spotlight as more individuals and groups have begun to scrutinize and criticize the way some in their ranks interact with Black communities. The choking death of Eric Garner in Staten Island, New York by officers there over whether he was selling loose cigarettes, as well as the shooting deaths of Rekia Boyd, Walter Scott, Laquan McDonald, Samuel Dubose, and more recently, Philando Castile, Alton Sterling and Korryn Gaines, coupled with the steady trickle of acquittals or decisions by prosecutors and state attorneys not to charge officers who have killed civilians have led to protests, demonstrations and heated calls for greater accountability and transparency.

Law enforcement officials nationally are under intense pressure from groups like Black Lives Matter, ColorOfChange, Mothers Against Police Brutality and other groups in the conscious community to answer for the slate of killings as they clamor for victims to get the justice they deserve from a system unwilling and seemingly unable to be fair, just and impartial.

“Yes, we’re feeling embattled. Black officers are here because we love (our jobs) and because we wanted to serve our community,” said Aziz, deputy police chief of the Dallas Police Department. “It’s a sad state of affairs. We’re sad and angered by this and are experiencing the full range of emotions. This is a noble profession and we can do much better than we are.”

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Panelists participate in a town hall meeting at a recent gathering of Black law enforcement officials and officers in Baltimore.

The conference took place July 31-Aug.7.

Ronald E. Hampton, a retired officer with Washington, D.C.’s Metropolitan Police Department hammered those officers who look the other way and Black police and officials who have the bully pulpit to raise their voices against police brutality and the extra-judicial murders of Black people but who decline to do so.

“They’re bullshitting. You always hear that the vast majority of police officers are good but what is the responsibility of the 97 percent of the good cops in responding to police abuses?” he asked. “Black police should be speaking out. We have a special obligation to say something. But those who are quiet are representing their interests. I’m offended personally by them not saying anything.  They’re voiceless. But I’m not surprised.”

“I’m not sure what purpose they serve. When I close my eyes, they sound like White people.”

Mr. Hampton, who served as NBPA executive director from 1989-2010 and who was a police officer for 24 years, said he’s sickened by the indiscriminate killings, adding that what passes for “a conversation on race” is disingenuous.

“There’s a void in our community when we talk about these police officers,” said Mr. Hampton. “I was in the United Kingdom on speaking engagements for two weeks. They were asking me where is the Black voice? Where are the (good) police officers? They are shamefully missing from this dialogue. The NBPA isn’t thinking strategically. These guys don’t say anything and I don’t believe they’ll do anything. They are perpetuating nothingness. They won’t say anything controversial because they’ll go along to get along. You have a whole bunch of people afraid of criticizing these officers. They want a good job, good assignments. It’s sad.”

A key to breaking the status quo of cops killing civilians with impunity is to “deal with the union situation,” Mr. Hampton said. Unions have a tremendous amount of power and use it well. The lobby lawmakers get the benefit of the doubt from the public and are rarely if ever prosecuted by state attorneys and prosecutors. The union situation, as it exists, is out of control, Mr. Hampton said, and little will change until the contents and wording of contracts no longer arbitrarily protects wrongdoers. Greater public involvement in police affairs is also a step in the right direction. 

Major Sabrina Tapp-Harper, a 29-year veteran who currently works with the Baltimore City Sheriff’s Office, said that what’s happening around the country is a reemergence of organizations like NBPA who are taking on issues such as police brutality, racial profiling and speaking out, while also working to enhance the quality of professionalism police officers offer their respective communities.

When asked why more good police officers aren’t speaking out, she said: “What I think is going on is not that they’re not coming out but it’s not being publicized,” she said.

When asked, Maj. Tapp-Harper, who retired from the Baltimore City Police Department in 2014, said she feels that the level of trust between Baltimore City Police and residents grades out poorly.

“I rate it as a three. A lot of that mistrust is coming from inside the agency itself. Police Commissioner Kevin Davis has an uphill battle,” she said.

Among the rank and file, the major said, remains a stubborn resistance to change. And along with that almost absolute embrace of the culture, critics, contend is an unwillingness to accept any criticism, the protection of rogue cops and cover-ups of their wrongdoing and a reflexive response to the color of one’s skin that has resulted in the deaths of alarming numbers of Black and Brown people.

“It’s much deeper than the race thing. You can come into contact with officers of color and be blown off and dismissed. It’s gone beyond the color at this point,” Maj. Tapp-Harper explained. “It’s much more complex than that. The trust piece comes through mutual respect that is the basis of all relationships.”

Maj. Tapp-Harper and Aziz said community policing must be an integral part of the tools at police departments’ disposal with Tapp-Harper adding that the type of police-community relations she’s referring to is best illustrated by the relationship she’s developed with Andrew Muhammad—a captain with the Fruit of Islam in Baltimore—and the support she’s gotten from the Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan in the aftermath of a civil uprising last year triggered by the death of 25-year-old Freddie Gray while in police custody.  

“We talked about this at the town hall. We talked about different members of the community and community partnerships. As one preacher said, ‘if it’s not about relationships, it’s not about anything.’ These relationships have to be established before something happens.”

Maj. Tapp-Harper recalled that when she was the second in command at the Western Division, a young woman went missing “and (Fruit of Islam Student Captain) Andrew Muhammad went door-to-door handing out fliers in neighborhoods where people don’t usually go.”

“I can never have enough police resources to do this thing alone,” she said. “His help and the relationship we’ve developed has bailed me out so many times. The NOI (Nation of Islam) were seen on video interceding and confronting the rioters. I personally received a call from Minister Jamil Muhammad from Los Angeles calling on behalf of Min. Farrakhan to let me know that if we needed their help to let them know. I have to personally thank them. I have some strong relationships and those mean everything.”

Student Captain Andrew Muhammad spoke highly of the major too, saying he is pleased with the ties that have developed. He said he went to the National Black Police Officers Association conference, at the Hyatt Baltimore (Inner Harbor), with 15 FOI.

“I thought long and hard about whether to go,” he said. “I wondered if the community would be mad at us but I figured that if we want to change, we have to know how they think. Malik Aziz spoke highly of the Nation of Islam, talked about Baltimore and Dallas and the officers gave us mad love. A lot of them feel the pain but a lot of officers see the Black community as the enemy. They need community outreach to connect with the conscious community. That’s what most cities are missing.”

For more than 16 years, Muhammad has worked with young people in Baltimore’s prisons, jails and schools. He and his colleagues in the Nation are also on the streets, spending time in Gilmour Homes, protecting vulnerable residents elsewhere, brokering truces, developing relationships between the Crips and the Bloods, for example, mediating between warring factions and keeping the peace.

He said city officials usually don’t want to spend money on bringing in those who can assuage the problem.

“They’re getting ready to cut (the) Safe Streets (program). They won’t give us any money but they won’t have a choice,” he said. “We go into all the areas where all the drugs and crimes are. We go at them with love but firmly. We do that every week, several times a week and at least twice a week, for two to four hours, 40 men go into the community. We’ve been doing that for years. For the last four years we’ve been more aggressive. We’re successful by God’s grace.”