Her Name Was Aiyana Jones
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A Black Agenda Radio commentary by Jared A. Ball, Ph.D.
Rev. Al Sharpton preached that her death was a "breaking point" - but he's said that too many times before. Even the police execution of a child fails as a catalyst for change. "These issues are the result of a legacy of enslavement which has seemingly permanently inscribed an archetype of Black people as property and predators."
Click here to download the MP3 of this BA Radio commentary.
Her Name Was Aiyana Jones
A Black Agenda Radio commentary by Jared A. Ball, Ph.D.
"Police brutality and mass incarceration are just not seen by Black leadership as issues worthy of popular attention."
Her name was Aiyana Jones. She was 7, Black, in a poor family, living in Detroit and was killed by the police. She was the victim of an unbroken and thoroughly vicious cycle of police brutality, followed by temporary, short-lived outcry and then the soon-to-come oppressive silence or worse, acceptance. Most will never hear the story, fewer will hear and follow up on it and fewer still will have yet another name to list during self-aggrandizing moments on podia, panels or in various forms of media commentary. The national eulogizer Al Sharpton spoke at Aiyana's funeral this week and said, again, that "this child is the breaking point... enough is enough" which I am sure a search would show he has said in one form or another at the never-ending cavalcade of funerals he does. But is it really enough? Is Aiyana really a "breaking point?" Absolutely not and we know it.
Precise numbers are hard to pin down but one study concluded that from 1990-2005 an average of one person per day was killed by the police. And in Chicago, for example, of the 84 people killed by police since 2000 only one was determined to be unjustified. But between under-reporting and unjust legal conclusions of incidents that are reported there remains this unbroken cycle. This cycle is irritatingly too easy to foresee and has, of course, already begun in the case of Aiyana Jones. This includes the obligatory and already mentioned Sharpton eulogy, followed by some basic local and national news coverage. Some have raised important questions about, for instance, the television show "The First 48" which was there filming the police raid which led to Aiyana's death and the role of what has to be euphemistically called "reality" t.v. in general in encouraging more action or prompting a greater degree of excessive behavior among the police. Some have asked about the "muted media" whose lack of substantive coverage prevents an appropriate societal education about police brutality or race in America. Of course, others prefer to focus on allegations that the Jones family was not well liked in their community and were themselves seen as a bad element, especially since the police were there looking for a murder suspect who was found either in or right next to the Jones household.
"One study concluded that from 1990-2005 an average of one person per day was killed by the police."
But other news reported recently speaks to the true nature of this cycle. For example, Black Agenda Report carried a story last week that was a follow up to the Jena Six case, the last major pre-Haiti earthquake cause celebre, which showed that rather than progress there has only been further repression and targeting of families and individuals who supported the six Black victims of that case. The federal probe into police killings of Black people in post-Katrina New Orleans is still on-going more than 5 years later.
And Jon Burge, the former Chicago police chief who "ran a torture ring that abused approximately 200 suspects" during the 1970s and 80s, finally goes on trial this week, decades later.
During a recent discussion with the powerful sibling duo of Michelle and Leslie Alexander whose scholarship and activism centers around the history of criminalizing Blackness the two made the point that these issues are the result of a legacy of enslavement which has seemingly permanently inscribed an archetype of Black people as property and predators demanding levels of "social control" which are only viewed as extreme or unjust if applied outside that context or outside those communities. They also both noted the "human rights nightmare" of police brutality and mass incarceration are just not seen by Black leadership as issues worthy of popular attention precisely because they often involve segments of our communities we'd rather escape from or simply not acknowledge. It is the concern summarized by Obama's willingness to defend his similarly classed Skip Gates while dismissing as issues the killings of the under-classed Sean Bell or Oscar Grant. And it is also why this cycle is so vicious and why it is predictable that this little girls name will soon be added to the list of the forgotten. Her name was Aiyana Jones.
For Black Agenda Radio, I'm Jared Ball. Online go to www.blackagendareport.com.
Jared Ball can be reache at jared.ball(at)morgan.edu
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We Are All Aiyana Jones
Internal community security is the goal. This will continue to happen until the Black communities in this land understands that it is up to our own people to maintain justice and righteousness in our various environments. The only thing police "serve and protect" is themselves and the current social and political order. We must all be are sister's/brother keeper. Otherwise you, I, or one of our Afrikan family a few degrees separated will no doubt be the next Aiyana Jones.
And yet...the full truth of this notion...it's more than "stop snitching". It's so much more...It has to begin with each of us, so that the next generation - 15, 20, 25 years from now - has the benefit of true community integrity.
Motor City Maddness
I like everyone else is completely horrified by the actions of the Detroit Police Dept but I am NOT surprised. You could see this train wreck coming a mile away. Remember Kathryn Johnston an elderly woman in Atlanta was killed in a botched raid on her house November 21, 2006. If you need your memory refreshed go here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathryn_Johnston_shooting for the history. The Officers involved lied to get a no knock warrant based on some weak information of an informant. These morons wanted to pump up their rep and picked on a 90 plus Black woman to bum rush. Then planted drugs in the house to justify the raid and cover their asses for the shooting. Do you see anything similar about that tragedy and the one in the motor city.
The initial reposts were that the gun accidently went off (Oh Yea I can see that). Then the officer was in a tussle with one of the occupants of the house (It’s possible but not probable) and the gun went off. Then the officer collided with an occupant (if at first you don’t succeed you know the rest) and the gun went off. Just the fact that there have been several different and not too believable accounts of what happened injected into the news stream stinks to high holy heaven (I smell a cover up coming don’t you).
This sounds like the Fred Hampton murder. In that assassination the police clamed that they were shot at by the occupants of the apartment but later when ballistic test were done by the lawyers for the defendants they found that all the shots came from the outside into the apartment not the other way around. I wonder if any ballistic test will be done for this cover up OOPS!!!) investigation that is supposed to happen and we know no one shot from the inside out this time.
There was a TV crew involved so any reasonable person could come to the conclusion that this raid was Staged for TV event. It is what some people call “The Cops Effect” if you want a detailed explanation go here and read this article http://freedominourtime.blogspot.com/2010/05/death-of-aiyana-jones-showtime-syndrome.html The people that participated in this debacle were already jacked up because they were looking for someone who was wanted for murder (I can understand that part) add the TV crew and now the whole dynamic has changed beyond comprehension. Now these guys are on a search and destroy mission as if they were in some God forsaken combat zone (I can not understand that). Anyone in the house is now a target. The flash bang kick the door down was simply used for the TV cameras. The child was reportedly burned by the flash bang grenade and if she had lived she probably would have been severely injured for life (physically mentally and emotionally). I’m not hating on the police but where was common sense once they found out that children were living in the house that they were about to go into. They were verbally warned several times according to witnesses’ that children were present and there were toys visible in the yard. Also according to one witness they had the house under surveillance so they had to have a pretty good idea who was in the house at the time (or maybe not). None of these things seem to jar the one track thinking that was apparently on full speed ahead at that time.
The other problem with this is the militarization of local law enforcement. This tragic event is a direct result of that process. For more information on this phenomenon check out these articles http://www.davekopel.com/cj/chap/afterprohibition.htm and http://www.creators.com/opinion/paul-craig-roberts/your-local-police-force-has-been-militarized.html and http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0JZS/is_20_18/ai_n25055133/ Local and state law enforcement agencies are now armed to the teeth with military type weapons tactics and mind set. From their perspective we the people (and I mean EVERYBODY are suspects threats problems or terrorists) and they are going to treat us that way. Up and down the chain of command SWAT teams and other special weapons/ops team get the green light on any thing they do without any oversight fact checking or due diligence done by judges and other command level decision makers. This has allowed police to misuse their authority (remember Rampart and their CRASH unit in LA? You remember don’t you if not look here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rampart_scandal or the Riders scandal in Oakland look here http://stopthedrugwar.org/chronicle-old/157/oakland.shtml ). It was inevitable that something like this would happen given the history of abuse and over use of excessive force by police.
Then there is this undeniable fact of the criminalization of black and brown and other poor people. This nation has spent the last thirty years or more building a prison industrial complex and they have to feed this monster that they have created. The way to do that is to make WAR on poor people of color. If you think this is not the case read his article on what is happening in NYC http://www.blackagendareport.com/?q=content/police-state-black-and-brown-new-yorkers I bet you it is the same story in any place you go where poor people of color live. The Code speak like War on poverty War on crime War on drugs actually mean War on Us!!! Anything we do/say can be looked upon as a criminal act. That is the reason for the massive militarization of local law enforcement the proliferation of SWAT teams and the reckless use of these units (But we have them now so we gotta use them right!!!) so they can feed the veracious appetite of the prison industrial complex. As in any war there are going to be causalities like Amadou Diallo, Sean Bell, Oscar Grant and now Aiyana Jones can be added to that list. How long does this list have to get before we decide to do something to make this STOP????
Peace
S Murph
Black Families
2010 marks the 45th anniversary of the publication of The Moynihan Report, a controversial document analyzing the conditions of black families in America. The goal of the report was to communicate ways in which our nation can achieve “the establishment of a stable Negro family structure.” In light of this blog, how have we accomplish or failed to accomplish better conditions and resources for black families? Could this tragedy have been avoided if it were not for an ongoing history of racism and discrimination, especially against lower class blacks?
Tonight on Basic Black, our panelist will examine the state of black families over the past nearly half-century since The Moynihan Report. Join us tonight at 7:30 on WGBH (Channel 2) or online at www.basicblack.org, where you can also tell us your thoughts on our live chat.
This story trumped by a mom from Delaware. . .
http://aapov.blogspot.com/2010/05/could-aiyana-jones-and-17-year-old.html
Who are you associating with and bringing around your family? Watch the videos. Jerean Blake, remember that name. Sorry Jared Ball, but you've been trumped by a house mom from Delaware.
More stories from Detroit. . .
Also Aiyanna's own father was allegedly in the vehicle when this young boy JeRean was murdered. THIS IS WHY THE POLICE WERE EVEN AT HIS HOUSE IN THE FIRST PLACE.
http://www.freep.com/article/20100603/NEWS01/6030304/1320/Aiyanas-dad-with-gunman-sources-say
http://detnews.com/article/20100603/METRO01/6030379/Court-testimony-links-Aiyana-s-father-with-teen-s-killing
The problem of police murder is worse than commonly thought
The author writes: "...from 1990-2005 an average of one person per day was killed by the police."
It's worse than that - more like about 3 per day. The October 22nd Coalition to Stop Police Brutality attempts to document all cases of people killed by police in the U.S. through the Stolen Lives Project (www.october22.org/StolenLivesProject.html). We documented, with names/dates/locations, over 2,000 cases in the 1990s, or about 200 per year. We know this is the tip of the iceberg, since the U.S. Department of "Justice" has a web page that lists the number of "justifiable" homicides by police (www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/homicide/tables/justifytab.htm - appears broken) and their numbers are almost 400 per year. They only give numbers, no names/dates or other info that might let us know which cases they consider "justifiable". So it's anybody's guess how many cases there are when the "unjustifiable" ones are included. One way we estimate that is to extrapolate from areas where we have fairly complete information; for instance, our Stolen Lives book - printed in 1999 - lists only 6 cases from Alabama, 2 from Arkansas, etc. in the entire decade of the 1990s due to us not having any activists in the deep south, but we know of at least 166 cases from Washington state in that time. With Washington state being 1/48th of the U.S. population, that would suggest about 800 cases nationally per year. One journalist in the LA area listed all the cases in LA county from the beginning of 2007 to the end of 2009 (3 full years), and there were 106(!) - see www.examiner.com/x-26553-LA-History-Examiner~y2010m3d20-Homicides-by-cop.... That extrapolates to over 1,000 cases nationally per year, and he didn't include jail deaths (which qualify, depending upon the circumstances). One researcher said that in the California prison system - with one out of every 6 incarcerated persons in the U.S. - one person dies of medical neglect every week. That works out to an additional 300 cases per year, or 1,300 per year total, assuming the rest of the U.S. has similar rates. Of course, LA county may well have a higher rate than the rest of the U.S., but it's also very likely that Washington state has a lower rate than the rest of the U.S., so somewhere between 800 and 1,300 per year - say, 1,000 - seems a reasonable estimate. That is about 3 per day - a silent epidemic of "extrajudicial killings" by police in the U.S. Tell everyone you know to check out their local CopWatch group - we need to fight back and expose these murderers.
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THE PROBLEM IS FROM WITHIN
I am always amazed at how blame is placed on others when it comes to a police officer or someone from outside the black community being involved in someone's injury or death within the black community.
When will you understand that it is you who has to stop the bloodshead - not the police or anyone else.
Think about this - if there were no crimes being commited there would be no need for the police to be present.
There are thousands of black children living in public housing that have a thirst to get out - who is knocking on their doors to help them - surely their parents are not because if they were, they wouldn't be there.
Who is knocking on the doors of those youths in public housing offering them an opportunity to better themselves - surley their parents are not because if they were, they would't be there.
Nobody cares about what goes on in the black neighborhood until a child is killed, then everyone complains making it sound like they do care. What about all the rest of the murders that happen in the black neighborhoods the remaining 364 days of the year.
I never hear the Al Sharptons complaining about those murders, other then the relatives of the person who was gunned down. Inetersting isn't it.
Why can't you see that - why do you always complain and place blame on others because of what is happening in the black communities.
If you want to stop crime in the black communities, you have to take ownership in the black communities and the police are not the ones who will do that.
SteveKJR
LIVING IN DENIAL
Let's see if I can handle the "logic" here. Because blacks murder other blacks, they should find it okay for cops acting under the color of law as agents of the state to do the same. Based on that logic, that a group of killers shouldn't care about who actually does the killing, then America itself should have been okay with the behavior of the 9-11 terrorists since America had (and has) one of the highest murder rates in the world. Instead of trying to sell this moral and logical claptrap, why don't you just say that you don't care about the little girl's death, or that you care more about protecting the Detroit police department's "rep" than about the consequences of their dangerous behavior. Let's try some reality. The cops were showing off for the camera crew, one of them acted out of department shooting policy by firing blindly into the building, and in the process killed a little black girl. Afterwards the police lied about the facts of the incident, and would have gotten away their lies except for the existence of the documentary crew's film. If it was a group of black cops doing the same thing under the same circumstances in a white neighborhood, and they killed a little white girl, there would be no excuses being made for them by members of "The Cop is Never Wrong" Lobby. Of course, this being America, cops of all colors know where the line is. It is always open season on blacks, whether they are Harvard professors, or uppity jaywalkers. You can even burn down and entire black neighborhood if you can find a justification and the bomb to do it with. Just don't do the same things to whites in their neighborhoods if you want to keep your job and collect your pension. That's why for example, one never saw endless lines of Italian-American men kneeling or lying on the ground while "peace" officers pursued the Mafia, or saw massive immigration raids on Irish social clubs in San Francisco during the 1980's when the city was overrun by illegal immigrants from that part of the world. In America, you can always count on someone to use the old blanket comdemnation of all or of most blacks, or of alleged endemic misbehavior unique to only the black community as a justification for pretty much any form of police misbehavior or misconduct. Fortunately, or unfortunately, I have gotten to see police in action up close and personal in similar circumstances in different neighborhoods, and I don't buy "the ghetto made me do it" justification for the exceses of either the police or of the so-called criminal justice system. Police response to situations is almost always calibrated to their perception of the power of the person or persons with whom they are dealing, not just the facts of the situation. Because of this, police, are a big part of the problem. In spite of whatever they and the larger society that they serve wants to believe, playing race and class games on the street is not policing. Long before they had the excuse of a drug and gun culture, and long before there was any such thing as Crips or Bloods, America had established its police forces as the first line of racial control over its black population. Because of this, there has never been a time in this nation's history when there was actual trust on a large scale between blacks and white dominated and white controlled police departments. Because of this, there has never been a time when police did not act as an occupying army in black communities. American police have defined themselves as the enemies of minority populations for so long that many of them do not know how to function in any other manner. The widespread, crackpot insistence by this society that police have a right to beat, torture, or even kill someone (as long as they are't white, of course) for the infraction of being disrepectful to officer or the badge seems more like something out of Stalinist Russia than common belief and practice in a nation that brags so much about its faith in the "rule of law" and about its belief in "due process". That's okay America. Keep living in denial about the crisis of police impunity that exists in this country from coast to coast, while your states, counties, parishes, and cities continue paying out countless millions every year in wrongful death and injury suits because, as far as you are concerned, "the cops are always right".
Vicious
A cycle so vicious that needs to be stopped asap
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