If you are black in the United States, you are three times more likely to be killed by a police officer than if you are white, even if you are unarmed, according to data collected by Mapping Police Violence. The 24% of people who died at the hands of the police in 2019 were African Americans something that is disproportionate considering that they represent only 13% of the American population. The police brutality against that community is evident.
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Floyd died after being pulled over in his car, accused of trying to use a fake ticket. He was unarmed and did not resist the Police. He ended up lying on the pavement, subdued by a white officer, Derek Chavin, who with his knee pressed his neck against the ground for almost nine minutes. Floyd pleaded “please, I can’t breathe” while Chauvin’s colleagues were around without offering relief.
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The brutal scene unleashed a new wave of protests across the country against police violence and racial injustice.
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‘New’, because six years ago, in 2014, the streets of several cities were also filled with protests demanding justice for cases similar to those of Floyd: in Missouri, a policeman shot Michael Brown, and in New York, policemen suffocated Eric Garner on the floor. They were both black. Both were unarmed. Both died at the hands of police. Garner also pleaded “I can’t breathe.”
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Fatal encounters
This police violence is so prevalent that there are organizations working on how to overcome that tense relationship that exists between the black community and the security forces when they meet.
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Shortly before the deaths of Brown and Garner, BJ Council She was retiring as Deputy Chief of the Durham City Police Department in North Carolina.
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“After I retired in 2010, several cases happened, Trayvon Martin, then Eric Gardner in 2014”, Council tells Univision News, the first African-American woman to become a Durham Police deputy chief. “I was thinking then what I could do about it as a black cop.”
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Council then founded the organization You & Five-O, to precisely address those fatal interactions between the forces and the communities they serve. The program seeks to make people understand their rights and the role of the police and try to work to achieve mutual respect.
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The BJ Council teaches in its talks how to interact in an encounter with the police and also how to proceed with complaints if police misconduct existed.
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“I tried to think of how to educate in that regard,” he adds.
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“Comply, then you complain”
What to do in a meeting with the Police? Council explains that its primary advice is always “comply, then you complain” ( Comply, then complain, in English). “Things will always end badly if you resist. But if you comply, then you can survive.”
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At the time of arrest, it is easy to fall into anger and that can lead to a bad ending.
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“You should try to check your own emotions. You have no control over how the officer will act or react to you. What you can do is control your emotions, try to be as calm as you can, be in control of your own thoughts, “advises Council.” Just try not to fall into your emotions, anger, you’re not thinking or saying. .. things like ‘I hate the police’ or ‘I am arrested because of my racial profile’. Rest easy and comply. “
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In the end, explains Council, at the moment of arrest it is a matter of “going through it”, of passing it, and of leaving it, at that moment it is not necessary to try to achieve anything.
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“The core of this is getting home safely, that’s what I convey. I want everyone to get home, even if you have to be taken to prison” because from prison “you can get out,” he says.
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Since kids
In March, shortly before Floyd’s death in Louisville, Kentucky, police shot and killed African-American Breonna Taylor in her bed while executing an alleged search warrant for a narcotics investigation against her boyfriend. No drugs were found in the home, according to reports.
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Of the 1,098 people killed by the police in the US in 2019, 264 (24%) were black. Some of these deaths are recorded on video as Floyd’s, and that unleashes social fury because in that case, he was complying, he was not resisting and still ended up dead.
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For black families this reality is so manifest that they are forced to have ‘The Talk’ ( The talk, in English), as it is called when parents explain to their children the risks of being black in the US and that is why they must avoid confrontations and be careful when interacting with the police.
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Council explains that it is an “awkward talk” in which it is difficult to “make a child understand” this violent reality that they face. “In the black community we have this conversation early, as early as 6 or 7 years old … but with what is happening (with the Floyd case), surely many parents will be talking to their children.”
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“Black children are much more exposed to these things than white children, we cannot say that they are not exposed, but perhaps it is not a problem to have a discussion at home. We can say that for black children, these types of subjects are a kind of normality. It is something that happens in almost all black families, in finding ways to help children navigate this “, Explain.
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Since childhood they are in contact with this reality. Council gives talks mainly to black and mestizo communities and works with adults, people who have been in the correctional system and who are returning, but also with children. In the encounters they usually analyze videos of encounters between the Police and a person and analyze “what is right here, what is wrong or what could have been done differently”.
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