Viewing page 51 of 100

This transcription has been completed. Contact us with corrections.

POLICE BRUTALITY    WILSON 
duce swift results. Destructive of human dignity, the use of these epithets (blackie, nigger, boy, shine, et al.) usually produces deep resentment and eventual rebellion.
The range of actions which can be affected by police brutality then covers many areas of law enforcement activities when a police officer is in contact with minority groups. The use of the term police brutality is actually misleading, because this seems to connote beatings. In reality, the subject should be called the inequality in law enforcement-in order to provide understanding about the wide range of words and actions involved. Since law enforcement is a primary means of social control, police misconduct and mistreatment can become the ultimate weapon for keeping Negroes and other depressed minority groups ''in their place.'' Incidents of police misconduct are generally visited upon victims whose economic, social and political powerlessness offers little protection to the victims and no real threat to the policeman. While white supporters of unpopular cause have been and may be victimized by police misconduct, Negroes are triply vulnerable because of racial visibility, presumed guilt as well as their actual political powerlessness.
Occupation or status do not always seem to be barriers to policemen's action. August 10, 1965 the New York Post reported that Florence Kennedy, attorney and WLIB interviewer, met with an overzealous policeman at 4:30 p.m. the previous day. Miss Kennedy was returning home from a hospital where she had been treated for an eye infection. She followed over a dozen white people through a street barrier and was stopped by police. The police reported that Miss Kennedy became loud and boisterous after being warned not to cross the barrier. The police also claimed ''she resisted arrest.'' Miss Kennedy, however, maintained that the arresting officer at first didn't believe that she lived on that block, a fashionable white downtown area. After he was shown identification, the officer told her to take a route three blocks out of her way. When the officer turned and walked away, Miss Kennedy thought it meant that it was all right to proceed through the barrier on her original way, since other white people were ignoring the barrier and busses were also passing through. Unfortunately, the policeman did not think so and pounced upon her.
''Listen, I always felt that cops were the victims of some pressures that afflict the Negro. I never believed that there was all that much 

49

Transcription Notes:
---------- Reopened for Editing 2024-02-13 01:28:12