Tag Archives: Baltimore Uprising

Civil Liberties, Editor’s Pick, Featured, Government Accountability, Government Corruption, Police Accountability, Politics, US

Report: Thousands Of Suspects In Baltimore Arrests Required Medical Attention

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The mysterious death of 25-year-old Freddie Gray, who was denied medical attention and died from a severe spinal injury while in police custody, has led many to question how often suspects obtain injuries from their encounters with police officers, and how many of them receive proper medical care.

The Baltimore Sun reported that according to records obtained through a Maryland Public Information Act request, the Baltimore City Detention Center has “refused to admit nearly 2,600 detainees who were in police custody” between June 2012 and April 2015, with intake officers citing injuries such as “fractured bones, facial trauma and hypertension.”

While the records obtained by the Sun redacted the names of the detainees, the report used the story of Salahudeen Abdul-Aziz as an example of what many suspects endure. Abdul-Aziz was denied entry to Baltimore’s detention center after he was brought in by police with a broken nose, a fractured face and other injuries. He went to court, on the claim that he had been beaten by police and then arrested, and he was awarded $170,000 by a jury in 2011.

In Gray’s case, he was arrested on April 12, after he made eye contact with Baltimore Police Lieutenant Brian Rice, and then took off running. Rice, who had been suspended from the Baltimore Police Department and had his guns confiscated twice for mental health issues and for reported stalking, harassment and threats of violence, pursued Gray and arrested him, claiming that he was carrying an illegal knife.

Both a picture of the knife Gray was carrying, and an explanation behind the cause of the severe spinal injury that led to his death on April 19, have yet to be made public.

State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby announced on May 1 that the knife Gray was carrying was legal, that Gray was arrested illegally, and his death was ultimately ruled a homicide. Six officers have been charged for Gray’s death and they were all released on bonds ranging from $250,000 to $350,000 the same day.

Gray, who was healthy prior to his arrest, is suspected to have severed his spine during the 45 minutes he spent in a police transport van, which made four stops on its way to the jail. According to Mosby, at least five of Gray’s requests for medical attention were not answered by officers.

The Baltimore Sun reported that after investigating over 100 lawsuits against Baltimore city police officers, where the city “paid more than $6 million in court judgments and settlements,” it found that “dozens of residents accused police of inflicting severe injuries during questionable arrests and disregarding appeals for medical attention.”

While some criminologists and law enforcement experts say that suspects often fake injuries to avoid being put in a jail cell, the Sun noted that they also say Gray’s death “shows that police lack adequate training to detect injuries.”

A. Dwight Pettit, an attorney who has sued many Baltimore officers over the last 40 years, told the Baltimore Sun the data proves that the officers don’t really care about their public.

“It goes to demonstrate the callous indifference the officers show when they are involved with the public,” said Pettit. “Why would they render medical care when they rendered many of the injuries on the people?”

On Wednesday, Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake announced that she has asked the Department of Justice to investigate the city’s police force for the practices of excessive use of force and civil rights violations.

Civil Liberties, Government Accountability, Government Corruption, Police Accountability, Police State, Politics, US

Officer Who Pursued Freddie Gray Has History of Violence, Mental Health Issues

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Baltimore Police Lieutenant Brian Rice, the officer who initially pursued 25-year-old Freddie Gray after Gray “caught his eye” and then took off running, has been involved in previous incidents that resulted in his suspension and the confiscation of his guns, according to a recent report.

Gray, who was chased by Baltimore Police and then arrested for allegedly carrying an illegal knife on April 12, suffered a severe spinal injury and died in police custody on April 19.

State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby announced on Friday that Gray was arrested illegally, and ruled his death a homicide. Six officers were charged, and then released on bonds ranging from $250,000 to $350,000 the same day.

Rice was one of the six officers charged in Gray’s death, and his charges include one count of involuntary manslaughter, two counts of second degree assault, two counts of misconduct while in office, and one count of false imprisonment.

The Baltimore Sun noted that Rice was hired by the Baltimore Police Department in 1997, was promoted to lieutenant in 2011, and reported an annual salary of about $88,000 in 2014.

In April 2012, Rice was “given an administrative suspension after being hospitalised for a mental health evaluation” when he threatened to shoot himself, and he was disciplined by the department when a temporary restraining order was filed against him by his ex-girlfriend’s husband, according to a report from The Guardian.

Andrew McAleer, the husband of Karyn McAleer, who is Rice’s ex-girlfriend and the mother of his young son, was granted a restraining order against Rice in Jan. 2013. To obtain the order, Andrew McAleer, who is a firefighter in Baltimore, filed a 10-page complaint citing a “pattern of intimidation and violence.”

The full document was first published by The Guardian, and in it, McAleer claims that he is filing an order against Rice for threats of violence, harassment, stalking, and trespassing.

[pull_quote_center]”Within the last 30 days, an event occurred initiated by Brian Rice that has caused me to have constant fear for my personal safety from Brian Rice,” wrote McAleer. “The January 19, 2013, incident and a pattern of harassment, stalking, trespassing, and serious threat of bodily harm by Brian Rice with a concealed Glock handgun that he is authorized to carry by Baltimore City Police Department are detailed in the plea for protection.”[/pull_quote_center]

McAleer described the incident on Jan. 19, 2013, as a final straw, after Rice’s patterns of harassment began in March 2012. He said that his wife, who is also a Baltimore police officer, was at work, and he was “conducting personal errands” while their children were home alone. McAleer said that when he returned home, he stepped out of his car and Rice’s Hyundai Sonata immediately pulled into the driveway.

According to McAleer’s complaint, the fact that Rice pulled up right after McAleer did, made McAleer fear that Rice was stalking him. McAleer said Rice got out of his car, started waving his arms and yelling something unintelligible, and then got back in his car and began to rev his engine, flash his headlights, and inch his car towards McAleer, before pulling out of the driveway.

The Guardian reported that Rice was suspended and his weapons, including his personal 9mm handgun, two rifles and two shotguns, were initially confiscated in April 2012, after an emergency call was made reporting that he had threatened to shoot himself, and that he was put on administrative suspension once again, with his guns confiscated, after McAleer was granted a week-long peace order.

Civil Liberties, Featured, Government Accountability, Police Accountability, Police State, Politics, US

Baltimore Mayor Asks DOJ To Investigate City’s Police Force

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At a press conference on Wednesday, Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake announced that she has asked the Department of Justice to investigate the city’s police force for the practices of excessive use of force and civil rights violations.

Rawlings-Blake said that she sees this investigation as an “essential” part of the process to “reform serious patterns and practices of excessive force, biased policing, and other unconstitutional practices by law enforcement.”

[pull_quote_center]”Throughout my administration, we have taken a number of steps to change the culture and practices of the Baltimore Police Department,” Rawlings-Blake said. “Despite this progress, we all know that Baltimore continues to have a fractured relationship between the police and the community.”[/pull_quote_center]

This investigation will be in addition to the current investigation the FBI and DOJ are conducting, regarding civil rights violations in the death of 25-year-old Freddie Gray, who died from a severe spinal injury, while in police custody.

Gray’s unexplained death on April 19 was followed by days of peaceful protests, before riots broke out on April 27 prompting Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan to declare a state of emergency, call in the National Guard, and enforce a 10 p.m. curfew.

The curfew was lifted on Sunday, following Baltimore State’s attorney Marilyn Mosby’s announcement on Friday that Gray’s death has been ruled a homicide, and that six officers will face charges.

Rawlings-Blake also said that officers in the Baltimore City Police Department will have body cameras by the end of the year.

“I believe we need the assistance of the Department of Justice and civil rights investigation to shore up that foundation that is weak in our city,” Rawlings-Blake said. “At the end of this process, I will hold those accountable, if change is not made.”

Rawlings-Blake’s announcement comes after a meeting with Attorney General Loretta Lynch, who visited the city of Baltimore on Tuesday.

The Associated Press noted that Lynch pledged to improve the city’s police department after meeting with Freddie Gray’s family.

“This is a flashpoint situation,” Lynch said. “We lost a young man’s life and it begins to represent so many things.“

Activism, Civil Liberties, Education, Featured, Interviews, Police Accountability, Police State, Politics, US

Exclusive: Baltimore Teacher Discusses The Side Of The Protests MSM Ignored

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Meghann Harris, a teacher at the Baltimore Design School who teaches graphic design and architecture classes to middle and high school students, recently received a great deal of publicity for her Facebook statuses pertaining to the recent protests in Baltimore, Md., and the effect they were having on students.

In an exclusive interview with Truth in Media’s Rachel Blevins, Harris discussed the side of the story that the mainstream media has completely ignored, and she shared the ways her students have responded to the recent rioting and destruction, and turned it into an opportunity to restore their community.

Harris said the first protest she attended was on Saturday, in the western district of Baltimore. She said she was part of a group of people who started near the neighborhood Freddie Gray was from, and then continued down North Avenue, where they joined thousands of others, who marched with them down to City Hall.

[pull_quote_center]“The whole protest was really peaceful,” Harris said. “In fact, at the beginning of the protest, there were two people who got into a fight and the protesters stepped in and helped them to break it up immediately, on their own, without needing any intervention from police. It was amazing, and that was the only altercation we saw all day.”[/pull_quote_center]

While peaceful protests, such as the one Harris was a part of, were held for several days following the mysterious death of Freddie Gray on April 19, those protests garnered little attention from mainstream media. Harris said she saw very few cameramen marching with protesters, and that most stayed near City Hall, waiting for something to happen.

What did receive a great deal of attention were the riots that broke out after a flier circulated through local high schools promoting a planned “purge” of police near Baltimore’s Mondawmin Mall at 3 p.m. on Monday.

Harris took to her Facebook account to post a status about what she witnessed:

Meghann Harris Facebook

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The post has received nearly 2,000 shares, and was quoted by websites such as Upworthy and the Washington Post.

Harris tells Truth in Media that many students were trapped when their school buses were declared “out of service” and they were stranded in the area where the “purge” was scheduled to take place.

Harris said that she heard her students talking about the flier on Monday morning, and several of them voiced concerns about not being able to get home after school, because they lived in the area where the “purge” was supposed to occur.

After contacting their parents, Harris agreed to transport two of her students who were from the Mondawmin area. She said they left the school at about 2:55 p.m. and were in Mondawmin by 3:05 p.m.

“When we pulled up, we saw that all of the streets in the area had been blocked off, and it took us about 30 minutes just to turn the corner,” said Harris, who went on to explain that while they didn’t see a lot of students in the area rioting, as the flier had promised, they did see lines of police officers, fully armed in riot gear, marching in preparation.

[pull_quote_center]“We saw a line of what looked like 15 to 20 buses that had pulled up and said ‘not in service,’ and the passengers were being evacuated from the bus, into the area where the ‘purge’ was supposed to happen,” Harris said. “Once all of the buses were shut down, there was really no way for a lot of the people to get out of the area.”[/pull_quote_center]

In addition to overlooking the peaceful protests that were held in Baltimore before, during, and after the Monday night riots, the mainstream media has also overlooked the community’s efforts on Tuesday to cleanup and restore the city of Baltimore.

Harris tells Truth in Media that she has been overwhelmed by the willingness from both her fellow teachers and her students to jump in and clean up. She said that she received multiple messages from students on Monday night, asking what they could do to help on Tuesday.

As a result of the riots, Baltimore schools were shut down on Tuesday, and Harris said that several of the teachers from Baltimore Design School joined the school’s principal to pass out lunches to students in need. She said that she and another teacher joined with the organization Communities United to clean up businesses and residential areas.

[pull_quote_center]“There are a lot of really good things happening, and none of those things are getting media coverage,” Harris said. “The most awesome thing we saw on Tuesday was that there were so many people out cleaning and helping out that there actually wasn’t enough to clean – it got to the point where people began cleaning up litter in the neighborhood.”[/pull_quote_center]

Harris said that while a lot of negative media attention has been directed towards the youth of Baltimore, she has witnessed the opposite of what has made headlines. “I haven’t heard a single student say that they weren’t willing to jump in and help,” said Harris, who explained that on Tuesday, there were groups of students all along North Avenue helping in the cleanup efforts.

Harris tells Truth in Media that the national media coverage of Baltimore has also prompted many of her family and friends to reach out to her and to ask if she is safe. She attributed this to the fact that that most people don’t realize that the neighborhoods being affected by the riots are the poor black neighborhoods “the city has forgotten until now.”

While she is frustrated with the public’s perception of Baltimore, Harris said that she couldn’t blame people who don’t live in Baltimore for not understanding it. She explained that all the public is seeing are “crazy perspectives on video cameras that are waiting around all day.”

“On top of that, the media is not showing what is inciting some of these things,” Harris said. “If you go past a crowd of protesters at Canyon yards, and the sports fans are calling out the n-word to some of the protesters, or they’re calling the white protesters ‘n-word lovers,’ people are going to get upset. But nobody really wants to show any of those things. They just want to show the response. They’re trying to make it look like something that it’s not.”

Harris said that students in Baltimore have PTSD rates that are considered higher than some military service members. She attributed this to extreme poverty, living in areas of drugs and high crime, having parents that have to work multiple jobs to provide for their family, and living in a country with a welfare program that “encourages black mothers to be single, because they receive more government assistance than they would if they had a supportive father in the home.”

Harris tells Truth in Media that while the protesters are demanding justice for Freddie Gray, they are searching for an answer to the bigger problem that is plaguing both the city of Baltimore and the country as a whole.

“Freddie Gray is like the catalyst in the situation,” said Harris. She explained that while there are many Americans who are wondering “why all of the sudden are black people getting killed by cops,” this issue is nothing new for those living in poor black communities.

[pull_quote_center]“There are historic deep roots in this country that completely disenfranchise the black community and especially the black inner city youth,” Harris said. “Most of my students could tell me from day one, when I met them, that police brutality happens to black people in Baltimore city, and throughout the country.”[/pull_quote_center]