A00272 - Four Years After George Floyd, What Has Changed?
Over the weekend, many news programs noted the anniversary of the murder of George Floyd and reflected on the change or lack thereof with regards to policing in America
This issue has always been important to me. I started my legal career at the City of Richmond in the early 1980s dealing with a number of in custody deaths of young black men. Matters were so bad that Mike Wallace and the 60 Minutes team actually came to the City of Richmond and did a segment on the "Cowboys" within the Richmond Police Department. Those were traumatic times for the City ... and for me.
In response, to this problem, i spent the next twenty years handling the requests for police officer records pertaining to excessive force complaints. In this capacity, I paid attention to individual officers for whom there appeared to be an excessive number of complaints ... and an excessive number of in custody injuries. During my tenure, I do not recall there being another set of in custody deaths such as occurred in the early 1980s. Some of that success I attributed to me, but the successful federal court cases that were brought against the City along with the Court mandated Police Review Commission also played a significant role in making sure that the 1980s did not return.
The City of Richmond's negative notoriety was some 40 years ago, but as was evident with the George Floyd situation the problem seems to have not been confined to a notoriously rough city like Richmond.
In October 2023, in the aftermath of attending the wedding of a dear friend who lives the Minneapolis area, I ventured over to the George Floyd memorial. It is a very somber memorial. The air still seems to be filled with grief. The street on which George Floyd died has now been blocked and used to write the names of so many people of color who had been killed during encounters with police. The names were painted on the pavement and the list of names went all the way down the block. Additionally, nearby there is a small city park that has been converted into a symbolic graveyard which at that time was filled with crosses with the names of all those that were listed on the street ... and more..
After listening to the report on developments, or lack thereof, since the death of George Floyd, I began to read a little more. First, I went to Wikipedia and read this
then I went fo a website about the Marshall Project and read this
and then I went to the Guardian newspaper which for years has taken the lead on reporting such matters and I read this;
How police killings are kept hidden: ‘We don’t know how many George Floyds there are’ | US policing | The Guardian
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Next year, 2025, I am slated to return to Amherst College for a 50th Year Reunion and I may be asked to discuss the progress that has been made in this country on race relations over the last 50 years.
Based on what is set forth above, what should I say?
Peace,
Everett "Skip" Jenkins
Fairfield, California
May 30, 2024
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