By Rev. Leah C.K. Lewis
June 15, 2015
I actually remember learning about 911 as a little girl. It
seemed like some sort of rite of passage because of its weight and gravity.
Calling 911 was a very serious matter and not something to do unless
circumstances warranted the attention of the police, fire department, or
emergency medical services. Dialing those three little numbers demanded
sobriety—and it still does.
As the media continues to highlight cases of police
brutality, I have been captivated by how 911 calls initiated the events that
eventually led the deaths of Black men, women, and children. Particularly,
Tanisha Anderson, a mentally ill woman; Tamir Rice, a 12-year-old boy in
Cleveland; and John Crawford III in Beaver Creek, Ohio outside of Dayton.
Recently, I read an article by Shannon Nasah-Miller, Ph.D.,
in which she describes an incident where her 15-month-old daughter fell off a
stuffed lion rocker eighteen inches to the floor while she and her wife
supervised. During thrift shopping at Goodwill, her precious daughter was
instructed to get off the lion and in typical childish defiance, baby girl went
limp in full tantrum mode. As a result of this scene, unbeknownst to the
child’s mothers, someone called 911 seeking unneeded medical attention for the
toddler. As is typical, police arrived along with the ambulance, and a
conversation ensued between an officer and one of the moms. Thankfully, the
matter did not escalate into anything violent, but it easily could have.
Then there last weekend’s occurrence at the Craig Ranch
subdivision in McKinney, Texas, where video shows overzealous police officer
Eric Casebolt running amok, pulling a gun on teens, only corralling the youth
of color and manhandling Dajerria Becton, a teenage girl in a bikini. In this
case, officers were called to attend to a well populated end-of-school cook-out
hosted by Tatiana Rhodes, a resident of Craig Ranch, after two adult white
women and one man allegedly engaged African American teenagers with racial
slurs and ignorant, lowbrow dialogue (“go back to your Section 8 housing”). A
woman named “Kate” is accused of actually slapping Tatiana in the face.
Reminiscent of the Jim Crow era, there is the appearance
that callers utilized 911, desirous of a “whites only pool,” as a means to
extract the children of color from the recreational facility and the
subdivision. One video shows the confrontation involving two aggressive white
women, one white man, Tatiana, and her friends. Police were called, ten units
total, and an unhinged Officer Casebolt confronts the young people who appeared
a mixture of calm, rational, concerned, confused, and fearful.
All the victims I have mentioned were African Americans
(with the exception of those involved in McKinney, Texas where people of
Mexican and Arab or Persian descent were also accosted).
In the case of Tanisha Anderson, her family called seeking
aid. Because of Tanisha’s death, her family deeply, deeply regrets making that
call. Presumptions have been made as to the ethnicity of the callers in the
Tamir Rice and John Crawford case. It has been presumed by many that the
callers in these two cases were also white.
In the extraordinary case of Charlene Cook, we know that the
person who initiated that 911 call was a white woman. She was body-slammed by
police in Barstow, California while eight months pregnant. This occurred at her
second grader’s school after she and the caller had a disagreement and
confrontation while in the drop-off line.
Our emergency notification system is becoming a method for
executing mayhem and murder in the lives of African Americans. The travesty is
further exasperated because there are no consequences for callers who set off
the chain of events that lead to the deaths, assaults, and general violations
of people’s rights, where the human subject of the call proves to be innocent
of the allegations or concerns enumerated by callers.
John Crawford was standing in a Walmart, on a phone, holding
a toy BB gun sold by Walmart. Tamir Rice was playing with a toy gun in a
playground. Charlene Cook was standing at her child’s elementary school and
merely refused to give officers her name all while they acknowledged that no
crime had been committed. Shannon Nasah-Miller’s fifteen-month-old daughter
fell off a toy eighteen inches to the ground. Dajerria Becton was not part of
the instigating confrontation in McKinney. Tatiana Rhodes, for goodness sake,
simply wanted to have a celebratory cookout in her residential community.
Tanisha Anderson’s family, like so many others of mentally
ill people called for aid, not destruction. She was agitated and unarmed. Even
so, there was distress. Calls pertaining to mentally disturbed men, women, and
children merit a response from specially trained police officers and EMS
workers.
There is a part of me that remembers the rhetoric and
propaganda of “Officer Friendly.” There remains the knowledge that some good
officers do in fact exist. So, when we perceive danger, it is reasonable to
seek the aid of police. Yet, we must acknowledge that whenever police are
called to a scene, the potential for escalation exists. Where police are, there
are guns, tasers, and other weapons. This is a precarious combination. If
possible, calling law enforcement should be a last resort.
To be frank, African Americans are tremendously reluctant to
call for police assistance due to our understandably uneasy history with law
enforcement. African Americans know the history of the slave patrols called
“paddy rollers.” Officially, it was U.S. Marshalls that enforced the indignity
of the Fugitive Slave Act. Every generation of African Americans can cite
examples of police brutality. There is literally no era in American history
where African Americans have been able to live peacefully without some major
violations of human rights, dignity, civility, or sanctity. From the imposition
of slavery and Jim Crow, to the destruction of thriving all-African American
communities and economies like Greenwood, Tulsa, Oklahoma and Rosewood,
Florida. From the brutal murder of Emmett Till, to the framing of
fourteen-year-old George Stinney and his execution for a crime he did not
commit, and the plethora of contemporary abuses, African Americans are
extremely hesitant to call upon the first-line executors of a legal system that
has yet to grant us the basis of justice we ought to be afforded as citizens.
For the greater part of its existence, law enforcement in
the United States only served the interest of whites, particularly those who
were wealthy or land-owning. Their financial and social interest was, and
remains, the sanctity that law enforcement generally seeks to maintain. Today,
pernicious whites utilize this historical advantage to terrorized African
Americans, other people of color, and poor whites who have also been
disenfranchised. They use 911 as a means to exercise white privilege in a
manner that exploits taxpayer dollars. Mean-spirited and devilish people of all
ethnicities employ 911 to invoke danger, as opposed to stopping or preventing
danger. Such a practice is egregious, especially where innocent people are
harmed.
Policy-makers must develop protocols and legislators must
institute laws that stem the tide of abuse, should the assault on African
American lives persist due to ridiculous and unwarranted calls to 911. I
already hear the chorus of, “Better safe than sorry.” And, “An ounce of
prevention is worth a pound of a cure.” I agree, but #BlackLivesMatter more
than these adages ever will.
Leah C.K. Lewis, J.D., M.Div., D.Min., (ABD), is a minister,
councilwoman, author, animation producer, and literary activist. She recently
completed her dissertation on sex and sexuality in the African American Baptist
Church and a manuscript on legal, religious, and political rhetoric pertinent
to “race.” Follow her @HumanStriving and on
SoundCloud.com/Reverend-Leah-CK-Lewis. #BlackLivesMatter #StayWoke
#HumanStriving #RighteousvRacist
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