Justice, Police

To Stop Police Brutality, Maybe We Have To Teach White People How To Read? Or Something?

Officer tries to explain how he was brutal, but somehow people can't see it.

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Police in Georgia are re-opening an investigation into the arrest of a homeless woman last month. The woman, Katie McCrary, was arrested for obstructing a law enforcement officer. She seems to have been panhandling and generally annoying customers at a convenience store. When the (still unidentified) officer arrived on the scene, he says she tried to grab his badge and baton.

A cellphone video clearly shows her trying to swat at the officer… while he beats the ever-loving hell out of her. They’re re-investigating, or whatever, because this video surfaced over the weekend:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B4CgEdA4-3Q

This is what police brutality looks like. Anybody who has witnessed or experienced police brutality knows that this is what it looks like.

What’s troubling to me is that this is not the image that most people see when they are actually READING about police brutality, say in a police report.

Police reports, generally, are lying pieces of tripe. They should not be believed any more than you’d believe anybody’s totally sanitized side of the story. Believing a police report, whole cloth, is like believing all of a child’s excuses about their incomplete homework.

But the police report in this case is almost refreshingly honest when matched up with the video. From the Huffington Post:

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In the arrest report, [the officer] said he delivered an “unknown amount of baton strikes to her left leg.” When she didn’t comply with his orders to put her hands behind her back, he continued to hit her legs and forearms.

“One strike inadvertently struck the side of her head as she was moving around,” he reported.

What do you all think an “unknown amount of baton strikes” looks like? Honestly. What in the hell do you think that’s going to visually translate to when a 200-pound man is striking a homeless woman? What do you think “continued to hit” is going to look like?

What, the F**K, do you think an “inadvertent” strike to the motherf**king head LOOKS LIKE? You think it looks like a love tap? You think there’s going to be just one “inadvertent” strike while delivering an “UNKNOWN” number of strikes? ARE YOU BEING OBTUSE?

This reminds of me of when Baltimore Ravens player Ray Rice told his coach and owner that he punched out his girlfriend. I have NO IDEA what they thought that looked like, but somehow when the video came out of Ray Rice actually punching her — LIKE HE SAID HE DID — they were shocked and horrified. I don’t know what they thought it would look like when a finely tuned football player punches his girlfriend… maybe they thought she was wearing a helmet?

Obviously, we know that video doesn’t lead to convictions. We know that there are many people, many “white” people anyway, who will see McCray’s pathetic little kicks as justification for the officer going to town on her with a metal stick. We live in a world where the police are allowed to beat and murder black people. We all know that.

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But it’s irritating and frustrating to me that people who are going to rubber-stamp the officer’s actions anyway seem to need OVERWHELMING VIDEO EVIDENCE of brutality before they even start to investigate brutality. Here, the officer himself described his own brutality in his damn report, and the powers that be were like “meh” — until they saw a video that made them look “bad.”

Here’s how it would work in a just world.

Fictitious non-white civilian: How many times did you hit her?
Officer: I dunno. She was resisting so I…
Fictitious non-white civilian: That’s enough. We’re going to place you on administrative leave until we get to the bottom of this. Please hand me your badge and gun.
Officer: But but, it happened fast. Maybe I struck her five or ten times, maybe more. I’m supposed to count?
Fictitious non-white civilian: You’re supposed to be able to justify every time you use violent action against the public. Not just start swinging your stick around like you’re Neo in the Matrix. Now get the hell out of my office.

Of course, we don’t live in a just world. We don’t even live in a world where people can visualize how brutal the police can be, even when a cop tries to explain it to you.

Elie Mystal is an editor of Above the Law and the Legal Editor for More Perfect. He can be reached @ElieNYC on Twitter, or at elie@abovethelaw.com. He will resist.

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