Skip to content

Police abuse

It’s Not About Phenotype; It’s About The Interests Being Served

January 31, 2023 Dr. Wilmer J. Leon, III, Popular Resistance. , , ,
Well, they have done it to us again.  What for most White Americans is a simple inconvenience, a traffic stop, became for an African American another series of frames from a horror movie.  Instead of being pulled over, given a ticket and sent on his way; Tyre Nichols was pulled out of his car by the police, sadistically beaten and sent to the hospital to die. The villain or beast from this real-life horror was not Dracula or Frankenstein. The spawns of Satan that beat Tyre Nichols are not made-up characters from the minds of Bram Stoker or Mary Shelley.  This villainous threat to the African American community is real! They are stalking the streets of our cities and towns for more victims every hour of every day and night. This threat, these body snatchers don’t need the cover of darkness or need to operate in the shadows.  They conduct their evil in broad daylight under the color of law.  They are the urban army that is sworn to “protect and serve”.

Keith Davis, Jr. And Black Political Corruption

January 21, 2023 Margaret Kimberley, Black Agenda Report. , , , , ,
Baltimore, Maryland - Keith Davis, Jr. is free after an ordeal which began when he was shot by Baltimore, Maryland police on June 7, 2015. The police claimed to be looking for a robbery suspect and chased Davis into a garage where they fired 44 shots, three of which struck him. The robbery victim testified that Davis was not the perpetrator who attacked him, but the police charged Davis with another crime, a murder which took place in a different part of the city. They did this despite evidence showing he was also innocent of that charge as well. Five trials resulted in either hung juries or judges overturning verdicts. Davis was scheduled to be tried yet again but newly elected State Attorney Ivan Bates dropped all charges against him on January 13, 2023. No one knows how many Black men are like Davis, charged and most often convicted wrongfully due to police and prosecutorial misconduct.

Five Killed By Police During Anti-Coup Protests In Peru

December 13, 2022 Tanya Wadhwa, People's Dispatch. , , , , , ,
Since December 7, tens of thousands of Peruvians have been protesting in different parts of the country in rejection of the parliamentary coup that took democratically elected left-wing President Pedro Castillo out of office and led to his arrest. On December 7, Peru’s right-wing dominated unicameral Congress approved the third vacancy (impeachment) motion against Castillo. Hours following his removal from office, he was arrested and charged with allegedly “breaching constitutional order” for having tried to dissolve the Congress before the vote on the motion. For the past five days, the protesters have been organizing peaceful mobilizations and roadblocks across the national territory demanding that former President Castillo be immediately released and reinstated as the president of the country.

Anti-Police Activists In Baltimore Protest New University Police Force

October 29, 2022 Kian Seara Rey, Unicorn Riot. , , , , , , ,
Baltimore, Maryland – Students at Johns Hopkins University (JHU) and community members in Baltimore protested against the creation of a private university police force by disrupting two town hall meetings on September 22 and September 29, the first of which led to some antagonism with JHU’s VP of public safety, Branville Bard. The creation of a university police force – the Johns Hopkins Police Department (JHPD) – was postponed for two years in response to the anti-police brutality protests of 2020. Now the university is fast-tracking the process with minimal input from students or the community, despite active opposition going back to 2019 when several anti-JHPD activists were arrested for occupying a university building for around a month.

Shock: US Police Even Worse Than We Thought

October 19, 2022 Lee Camp, Mintpress News. , ,
Most countries are far different from the US when it comes to murderous police.. Denmark and Switzerland often have zero killings by police per year. Iceland has only had one murder by a police officer in its history. This means U.S. police murder more people in the first few hours of each new year than Icelandic cops have murdered, ever. So I will admit, this sounds kind of bad for America. Almost as bad as that but a new report shows it’s far worse. A month ago, the Department of Justice released a report about the number of people who die while in the custody of law enforcement. That sounds like a real page-turner. As one article from The Appeal put it, “DOJ Admits It Has No Idea How Many People Die in Law Enforcement Custody.” So, that 1,000 people number is just the victims we bothered to count.

DHL Strikers Pepper Sprayed, Arrested On Picket Line In Rhode Island

September 13, 2022 Kate Randall, WSWS. , , ,
Pawtucket, Rhode Island - Police arrested DHL strikers on the picket line in Pawtucket, Rhode Island, on September 9, as the strike by local delivery drivers entered its 12th week. About 70 delivery drivers struck on June 22 against Northeast Transportation Services, a contracted provider of international logistics giant DHL. The workers are demanding wages to keep up with the cost of living, affordable health care, retirement benefits and safety issues. Northeast has hired scabs, who are reportedly being paid $55 an hour, with DHL drivers earning only $18 an hour on average. Pawtucket police and Teamsters Local 251 confirmed the arrest of five people outside the DHL Express ServicePoint. The arrests took place as 50 to 60 protesters approached a gate which opens onto Concord Street, Teamsters business agent Thomas Salvatore told The Providence Journal.

Columbus Police Execute Donovan Lewis

September 10, 2022 Abayomi Azikiwe, Popular Resistance. , , ,
In the midwestern city of Columbus, Ohio, 20-year-old Donovan Lewis was shot to death while lying in his bed during the early morning hours of August 30. Police claimed they were serving an arrest warrant on multiple charges although there was no threat from Lewis who was unarmed. The police in Columbus say that Lewis raised his arms and therefore this justified the bullet fired into his body causing him to die at a hospital shortly afterwards. The officer involved in the killing of Lewis, Ricky Anderson, a 30-year veteran of law-enforcement, has been placed on paid administrative leave pending the outcome of an internal and judicial investigation. This act of blatant police violence represents a continuation of the legacy of law-enforcement brutality and killings across the United States.

Police Lied To Get The Warrant To Search Breonna Taylor’s Home

August 18, 2022 Marjorie Cohn, Truthout. , , , ,
The March 2020 killing of Breonna Taylor, which caused widespread protest around the country, was the result of police lies to obtain a warrant and racist police violence after officers forced their way into her apartment. On August 4, the Department of Justice (DOJ) announced the federal grand jury indictments of four Louisville Metro Police officers involved in the raid that resulted in Taylor’s death. Three of the officers were accused of violating Taylor’s Fourth Amendment rights to be free from unreasonable search and seizure by lying to secure a no-knock warrant. The officers who sought the warrant “knew that the affidavit used to obtain the warrant to search Taylor’s home contained information that was false, misleading, and out-of-date; that the affidavit omitted material information; and that the officers lacked probable cause for the search,” the indictment reads.

Akron: Arrests Target Demonstrators Demanding Justice For Jayland Walker

August 4, 2022 Abayomi Azikiwe, Popular Resistance. , ,
After public outrage over the death of Walker, who was shot 46 times by a group of eight law-enforcement officers, Mayor Daniel Horrigan declared a state of emergency while numerous people have been arrested and charged with serious crimes for merely exercising their democratic rights. Tensions remain extremely high in Akron due to the continuing anger and disgust of the shooting death of Walker. During the July 4 holiday weekend, people poured into the streets prompting police reactions which led to arrests and minor incidents of property destruction. Nonetheless, over the last month there are lingering fears of further social unrest and violence in Akron. A National Night Out event which was scheduled in several districts of the city for August 4 had been cancelled in at least four areas.

Chicago: Movement Forces The Release Of Chicago Police Torture Survivors

August 1, 2022 Fight Back News. , , ,
A series of victories was won in the past month by the movement to free survivors of torture and wrongful conviction at the hands of Chicago Police Department. Clayborn Smith, Marcellous Pittman, Juan Hernandez, Rosendo Hernandez, Arthur Almendarez, John Galvan, Eruby Abrego, Jeremiah Cain, David Gecht and David Colon have all had historic judgments in their cases. In the case of Clayborn Smith, a decision by the Illinois Appellate Court authored by Justice Cynthia Cobbs reversed the decision of Circuit Court Judge Alfredo Maldonado, finding that Detectives Kenneth Boudreau, John Halloran and James O’Brien had tortured Clayborn Smith into his confession. They granted him a new trial. In turn, Judge Maldonado found, in the case of Marcellous Pittman, that his tortured confession at the hands of Halloran and O’Brien was inadmissible. Marcellous Pittman also had the charges against him dropped by the state's attorney's office. Within the written decisions by each of these judges, it was laid out plainly that these detectives with a history of torture are not credible and should not be called as witnesses.

Akron Declares State Of Emergency After Police Execute Jayland Walker

July 13, 2022 Abayomi Azikiwe, Popular Resistance. , , ,
Protests have continued in Akron, Ohio after the June 27 police killing of Jayland Walker, 25, who had 90 bullets fired at him by officers, 60 of those rounds struck the victim. After the release of a police video of the shooting of Walker, who was unarmed, people poured into the streets to demand justice for the African American motorist. Police claimed that Walker had fired at them during a chase, however, he was not carrying any firearm when he was struck down in the hail of bullets fired by Akron police. The police later claimed they discovered a handgun in Walker’s vehicle after he had already been executed. This incident represents a continuation of police violence directed towards African Americans across the United States. More than two years since the brutal police killings of Breonna Taylor in Louisville and George Floyd in Minneapolis along with the lynching of Ahmaud Arbery by vigilantes in Brunswick, Georgia, the various law-enforcement agencies have been given even more resources by the federal government to carry out their brutal treatment of Black and People of Color Communities.

Justice Department Investigates NYPD’s Special Victims Division

July 4, 2022 Meg O'Connor, ScheerPost.com. , , ,
The U.S. Department of Justice announced Thursday that it has opened an investigation into the New York City Police Department’s sex crimes unit. “Over the last several months, we have learned concerning information from a variety of sources of historical issues about the way the Special Victims Division has conducted its investigations for many years,” said U.S. Attorney Breon Peace for the Eastern District of New York in a Justice Department statement announcing the probe. The investigation will assess whether the Special Victims Division (SVD) engages in a “pattern or practice of gender-biased policing.”

July 4th Events Canceled, Protests Over Police Murder Of Jayland Walker

July 2, 2022 Amanda Garrett, Beacon Journal. , , ,
Friday marks the third day of protests over the Akron police shooting death of 25-year-old Jayland Walker, an Akron DoorDash driver who was killed by multiple shots following a police chase on Monday. Previous protests were small, a couple dozen people. But as news of Walker's death spread across the city and national organizations like Black Lives Matter took note, today's protest downtown is expected to grow. Reporters and photographers from The Akron Beacon Journal will be reporting live from today's protest. Follow their reporting as it unfolds below.

New Documents: US-Trained Special Forces Involved In Drug Trafficking

June 12, 2022 Karen Spring, Honduras Now. , , ,
Tegucigalpa, Honduras - Members of the former Honduran elite police unit, the COBRAS, worked with the ‘Los Grillos’ criminal gang to steal drug money and shipments, according to newly released U.S. court documents. Los Grillos, together with the special forces police unit are involved in selling and stealing drugs “through police operations” and according to Honduran press reports, act as contract hitman. The U.S. DEA document (see below) dated July 13, 2016, was recently filed in the case against Ludwig Criss Zelaya Romero, a convicted drug trafficker and former Honduran police officer. Zelaya Romero is appealing his sentence after pleading guilty in April 2018 to conspiracy to import cocaine and use and carry firearms in connection with a drug trafficking conspiracy.

Leaked Records Of Baltimore Cop Exemplify Limits Of Police Reform

June 10, 2022 Brandon Soderberg, The Real News Network. , , ,
Back in April 2016, a Baltimore news report about “police recruiting perils after Freddie Gray”  focused on a new police hire with an ideal origin story. Luke Shelley, a National Guardsman deployed here during the Baltimore Uprising in April 2015, had recently joined the Baltimore Police Department (BPD). As a guardsman, he had been stationed at Mondawmin Mall, ground zero for the rioting that took place on April 27, 2015, “an experience that convinced [Shelley] he wanted to serve the city,” local ABC affiliate WMAR reported. “I want to be where the challenge is and where the need is for good police,” Shelley told WMAR in 2016. “To have that impact on countless lives—a hundred or a thousand or whoever you meet on a daily basis—I think is a pretty noble and high responsibility.”
«12345678910»
Sign Up To Our Daily Digest

Independent media outlets are being suppressed and dropped by corporations like Google, Facebook and Twitter. Sign up for our daily email digest before it’s too late so you don’t miss the latest movement news.