New York City Hall's spin doctor can't cover up NYPD
racism
By Scott Scheffer
New York
There is a canyon in New York. It's even bigger
than the one on Fifth Avenue where another water main blew up
the second day of the new year.
Call it NYPD Canyon.
On one side is the public spin that Mayor Rudolph Giuliani
and all the aides buzzing around him try to put on the New York
Police Department's brutality and racism. Their explanations
and excuses make them seem like bumbling idiots in a situation
comedy.
That is, it would be funny-except that what sits on the
other side of NYPD Canyon, far from the Giuliani spin, is
reality.
Reality is so distant from the spin that you can't even see
it from the Giuliani side-the side from which the mayor, police
and media want everyone to view things. Looking from the other
side you see what really happens. You realize that the Giuliani
spin is no joke.
Raheem Dawkins is part of the reality. An energetic, caring
16-year-old African American, Dawkins had thought becoming a
police officer would be a way to help his community.
On New Year's Day, he saw an off-duty cop in an altercation
with some youths on a subway platform. He did what he thought
was right: tried to protect the cop.
The cop shot him.
Dawkins is recovering in the hospital after a colostomy
operation.
The Giuliani spin people kept the story from reporters for
several days. Police listed Dawkins as a "possible
perpetrator."
Then the spin people finally figured out what to do.
Giuliani and Police Commissioner Howard Safir praised Raheem
Dawkins for his bravery and said it would be really good if he
did in fact become a police officer. They went to the hospital
bed and gave him an NYPD hat and a nice NYPD T-shirt as a sort
of consolation prize for destroying his colon.
Barely a week before, on Dec. 25, a cop had shot and killed
William Whitfield-22 and unarmed. This time the police had to
resort to yet another version of "I saw a shiny object and
thought he had a gun."
Officer Michael Davitt said he mistook Whitfield's keys on a
leather strap for a gun. Davitt's partner corroborated the
story.
Then Newsday reported that evidence indicated Whitfield
didn't have his keys in his hands, that someone had tampered
with internal police reports after the shooting to make it look
like he did-and that Davitt's partner wasn't even nearby and
didn't even witness the shooting.
People in the community call it a plain execution of a young
Black man. After several militant demonstrations anger is still
growing.
Out-of-control cop racism
Then there is the Black undercover narcotics cop who was
beaten by his white partner during an undercover sting
operation. There isn't much they can do to make this one stink
of racism any less.
The white cop knew his colleague on a first-name basis. The
plan was for the African American cop to buy drugs, walk up the
street with the alleged drug dealer, and then run around the
corner while the other cops jumped out of a van and made the
arrest.
Instead, Officer Edward Hughes chased his partner, grabbed
him from behind, threw him to the hood of a car, and bash ed
his head three times with a radio.
The Black cop, whose name has not been released, required
eight stitches. He has blurred vision and neurological
problems.
He bore no resemblance whatever to the suspect, who had
already been arrested, except that they are both Black.
Lawyers for the Guardians, an organization of Black police
officers, and the Latino Officers Association asserted in a
news conference that the attack was deliberate and fits a
"pattern of attacks on minority officers that reflected a
culture of bias in the Police Department." They filed a $10
million lawsuit against the NYPD.
All this comes only months after the near-fatal beating and
torture of Haitian worker Abner Louima by 70th Precinct police.
The cops declared "it's Giuliani time" as they smashed Louima's
teeth out and shoved the handle of a plunger into his
rectum.
The Louima case galvanized anti-police-brutality sentiment
here like the Rodney King case did in Los Angeles earlier in
the decade.
Through it all, the spin people keep using deceit and
manipulation to try to quell public anger and build support for
Giuliani's racist and reactionary administration.
During the fall mayoral campaign, they claimed the number of
civilian complaints against police for abuse and brutality had
dropped. It had actually risen, which they admitted after
Giuliani was re-elected.
The mayor has also claimed credit for a much-touted drop in
crime. The fact that a similar drop has occurred in Washington
hasn't stopped the racist right wing from vilifying Mayor
Marion Barry, but the same forces give kudos to Giuliani.
Yet now it seems the Giuliani administration has lied about
this too. According to widely published reports in early
January, the transit police underreported subway crime by about
20 percent for years.
New counting methods detected the "error" last August. But
the truth wasn't disclosed until now, after Giuliani's
re-election.
That's because Giuliani was using these figures to claim
success for his repressive, pro-cop program-including the
notorious crackdown on so-called quality-of-life crimes like
subway turnstile jumping, which has given police free rein to
round up poor and oppressed youths.
This article is copyright under a Creative
Commons License.
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