Witnesses thought that 16-year-old Alonzo Cox was in danger and so they called 911. The teenager was being threatened by a 14-year-old armed with a “large” knife. I imagine that they — the onlookers — wanted help to de-escalate a volatile situation and to protect all involved. The well-intentioned Good Samaritans forgot one crucial fact: black children were involved and to most cops, black children are criminals, criminals-in-waiting or something worse. Take a look at what happened when the law-enforcement officers arrived on the scene:
On Wednesday, police were called to respond to a fight across the street from Woodlawn High School. When they showed up, no one tried to run and Alonzo sat down. As the video begins, Alonzo, whose voice has not even broken yet, appears frightened and didn’t immediately comply with the female officer when she grabbed him.
Because Alonzo pulled his hands away, the officer jumped on top of him and began dropping elbows into his head. At this point, Alonzo is so frightened that he balls up in the fetal position. That’s when the much larger male officer joined in on the pummelling.
“I’ll Punch You Again”
In a video below cops are trying to take 16-year-old Alonzo Cox into custody. Just before that the teen was threatened with a knife by a 14 year old female. Why the cops wanted to arrest the victim is not clear. In the beginning of the video a female cop can be seen throwing handcuffs to the ground. Shortly after a male cop can be heard threatening to punch the teen. An eyewitness than says “Why are you hitting him?” The video also shows that Alonzo tried to protect his head.
“I thought I was going to get shot...”
Black children live in fear of America’s Law Enforcement Officers and that state of affairs suits the “law and order” types just fine. Said young Alonzo about his traumatizing ordeal:
“I was scared,” he told reporters the day after he was attacked by the officers. “I thought I was going to get shot; that’s all that was going through my mind. ‘Please don’t shoot me,’” he added. “I was scared for my life.”
The cops involved in the brutalization of young Alonzo are members of the notorious Baltimore Police Department. You know, that same department that oversaw the death of a perfectly healthy Freddie Gray who somehow miraculously managed to sever his own spine and break his own neck while in their custody. That same BPD that Obama’s Department of Justice was forced to investigate and concluded that the department was guilty as charged; that they found a well-established Pattern of Civil Rights Violations:
The Justice Department announced today that it found reasonable cause to believe that the Baltimore City Police Department (BPD) engages in a pattern or practice of conduct that violates the First and Fourth Amendments of the Constitution as well as federal anti-discrimination laws. BPD makes stops, searches and arrests without the required justification; uses enforcement strategies that unlawfully subject African Americans to disproportionate rates of stops, searches and arrests; uses excessive force; and retaliates against individuals for their constitutionally-protected expression. The pattern or practice results from systemic deficiencies that have persisted within BPD for many years and has exacerbated community distrust of the police, particularly in the African-American community.
To be sure, the practice of traumatizing and dehumanizing young black bodies is nothing new. The list of atrocities committed against them is depressingly long. In recent years, even as we fought the system, we knew we had a sympathetic ear in the White House, one who could empathize with the cries for justice. President Obama would say about the teenager stalked and murdered by George Zimmerman, “If I had a son, he’d look like Trayvon.” We heard that statement and we knew that he heard us and felt us.
But now here’s the salt in the raw, open wound: For the next four years, bad cops and their apologists know that they have friends and enablers in the highest of places. The occupants of this White House are not going to even pretend that they feel our pain. It is going to get a lot worse before it gets better. The new Attorney General, Jeff Sessions — if he survives the latest scandal — has already signaled his intention to turn a blind eye and deaf ear to cries for bad cops to be held accountable. Sessions did not bother to read the reports generated from the investigations into Ferguson, Baltimore, and Chicago police departments; he dismissed them out of hand. The message to abusive cops is simple, “As you were, officers. I have your back.”
Jeff Sessions may or may not survive #RussiaGate, but if he doesn’t, we’ll still have no reason to exhale. Donald Trump will surely nominate someone as equally odious. Trump has a whole stableful of Deplorables just raring to go, and in any case, “the fish rots from the head” my grandma was fond of saying. The idea that one 16-year-old black boy got punched in the head repeatedly by a grown man will mean nothing to Trump, Sessions, or any in this new administration.
We may not get the response we deserve but we can still make a big stink about injustice whenever wherever we find it. We can still protest, publicize, call, fax, email, and write letters. Until they do right by us, it is our duty to let our voices be heard in every way we can.
The Kalief Browder Story
Despite the injuries he sustained at the hands of the police, Alonzo is one of the lucky ones. He’s still here. Many have not been so lucky. Among them, Kalief Browder who took his own life after putting up a heroic fight to overcome the physical, emotional, and mental abuse heaped upon him by a barbaric system:
Seven years ago, a 16-year-old boy named Kalief Browder was plucked off Arthur Avenue in the Bronx, after being misidentified as a suspect in the theft of a backpack. Though he denied wrongdoing, he was taken to Rikers Island after a brief interrogation. There, he was held without trial for three years despite having never been convicted. Most of that time was spent in solitary confinement. He was finally released in 2013, but by all accounts he was irrevocably changed. On June 7, 2015, at the age of 22, Kalief Browder died by suicide.
Produced by Jay-Z and Harvey Weinstein, The Kalief Browder Story is told in a six-part series on Spike.
TIME: The Kalief Browder Story is a six-part documentary series about a 16-year-old student from the Bronx who spent three years on Rikers Island without ever being convicted of a crime.
Trailer for Time: The Kalief Browder Story:
Our children deserve better.