‘Diversity alone won’t change policing’

How race and identity are shaping politics, policy and power.

Jan 27, 2023 View in browser   By Brakkton Booker With help from from Jesús Rodríguez, Renee Klahr, Rishika Dugyala and Teresa Wiltz  RowVaughn Wells, mother of Tyre Nichols, who died after being beaten by Memphis police officers, is comforted by Tyre's stepfather Rodney Wells, at a news conference on Friday. | AP Photo/Gerald Herbert Recast family, we’re breaking format today and forgoing our normal feature Q&A that typically runs on Fridays. We’re going to focus on the breaking news that the Memphis Police Department is set to release the video of the beating death of  Tyre Nichols this evening. Let’s jump in.  Why are we having this conversation … again? It’s the simple question I started all of my interviews with on Friday hours before the release of yet another video capturing the final moments of a Black person’s life after an encounter with those who swore an oath to protect and to serve. The sudden media interest in Tyre Nichols, the 29-year-old man who died earlier this month after being viciously beaten by Memphis Police officers less than 100 yards from his home, feels in many ways inevitable. A portrait of Tyre Nichols is displayed at a memorial service for him on Tuesday, Jan. 17, 2023 in Memphis, Tenn. Nichols was killed during a traffic stop with Memphis Police on Jan. 7. (AP Photo/Adrian Sainz) | AP Photo/Adrian Sainz Nichols’ death reminds us that we as a society are much more adept at showcasing this trauma than actually addressing why it keeps happening. Broadcasting images of mourning Black families crushed by the unimaginable grief of knowing that their loved ones' last breaths were spent pleading for their life is easier than targeting the root cause of this pandemic of Black death by law enforcement. Many are pointing out that this Nichols incident is different. It’s not. Three of the officers involved with the 2015 death of Freddie Gray while in the custody of Baltimore Police were Black, too. What is becoming evident is that diversifying a police force does not guarantee different outcomes when Black Americans come into contact with police. “We can't pretend that we haven't learned anything over these last few years, as hard as it is to accept those learnings,” Rashad Robinson, president of the racial justice organization Color of Change, tells The Recast. He adds: The five officers at the center of the Memphis case: Tadarrius Bean, Demetrius Haley, Emmitt Martin III, Desmond Mills Jr. and Justin Smith — are all Black. They’re facing charges of second-degree murder along with additional counts of official misconduct, aggravated kidnapping, official oppression and aggravated assault and were fired from the Memphis Police Department last week. In an interview with CNN Friday morning, Memphis Police Chief Cerelyn Davis, who is also Black, said, “it doesn’t matter who is wearing the uniform” because bias in policing likely helped escalate this traffic stop into a deadly encounter. WATCH: Memphis police chief on racial bias: 'It doesn't matter who's wearing the uniform' “It takes off the table that issues and problems in law enforcement is about race, and it is not,” she said hours before her department was set to release the police footage. “It does indicate to me that bias might be a factor also.” The officers involved in Nichols’ death initially said he ran away from officers after he was pulled over for reckless driving; a confrontation later ensued in an effort to detain him. Law enforcement officials investigating the matter said there’s no evidence to support that claim. We’re not yet three years removed from the national racial reckoning sparked by the 2020 murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police officers — not to mention the killings of Breonna Taylor and Ahmaud Arbery earlier that year — which spurred marching and protests and hashtags, and in some instances, violence. It prompted big promises from major corporations vowing to invest in communities of color as that video played on an endless loop on social media and on cable television. Businesses large and small created diversity, equity and inclusion positions and teams that were supposed to help usher in an era of change and understanding. Yet these heinous acts continue to happen. That moment was so pivotal it appeared that a grand bargain of sorts would soon be realized — a bipartisan federal police reform act, named after Floyd himself. But talks around this legislation of course collapsed some 16 months after his death. One positive some are pointing to in the Nichols case is how swiftly authorities terminated the officers and brought charges against them. Something that Ben Crump, who is representing the family, referred to as paradigm shift and a new blueprint for police accountability. WATCH: Ben Crump calls Nichols video release the 'blueprint' for police accountability “No longer can you tell us we gotta wait six months to a year even though we’ve got a video with evidence of excessive force,” Crump said during an afternoon news briefing Friday. That is progress, says Paul Butler, a former federal prosecutor and author of the book “Chokehold: Policing Black Men.” “What’s extremely concerning is that every year, police continue to kill about 1,000 per year” with a disproportionate number of those slain being Black men, Butler said. “That number hasn’t changed since the murder of Geroge Floyd.” There is some trepidation about what is in store. In the coming months, attention will shift to the court proceedings and whether the Shelby County District Attorney can secure convictions for the officers. And once again, the courtroom drama will eclipse the need to have hard conversations about the systemic change that is needed to prevent the deaths of future Tyre Nichols. People hold up candles and fists at a candlelight vigil for Tyre Nichols, who died after being beaten by Memphis police officers, in Memphis, Tenn., Thursday, Jan. 26, 2023. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert) | AP Photo/Gerald Herbert “There are some people who are going to … thump their chest and say this is a victory. But the reality of the matter is, a man was beaten to death by police officers as a result of a traffic stop,” Alicia Garza, co-founder of Black Lives Matter who now heads the Black Futures Lab, tells The Recast. “The reality is that at the end of the day, this case will become an exception to the rule as opposed to the rule itself.” That’s a conversation we intend to keep having here at The Recast. All the best, The Recast Team   Follow us on Twitter Brakkton Booker @brakktonbooker Rishika Dugyala @rishikadugyala Teresa Wiltz @teresawiltz Jesús Rodríguez @jesusrodriguezb Jesse Naranjo @jesselnaranjo   Follow us

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