The Atlanta Police Department seems in the news a lot lately. Perhaps this is only because I've been watching more intensely. Of course, the mayor's race may have something to do with it. The police union recently endorsed Kasim Reed. Chief Pennington issued an order that officer have to cooperate with the civilian review board (CRB), although the officers do not have to testify before the board. Pennington is committed to keeping a CRB without the power to do its work, a stance consistent with the APD. He only issued this order after significant prodding from the CRB to keep his promise.

Lastly there is the CBS Atlanta story on bad cops, posted on November 16 and updated on November 17. While it's interesting to read the stories of cops gone bad, the problem is it positions police misconduct as the problem of a few bad apples. The lesson from the CBS story is that most cops are good people, but sometimes there are bad ones. We have to weed out the bad ones and we'll be fine. What if the problem is systemic? What if we're not talking about bad apples, but a tree that produces poison fruit?

If this sounds interesting, I recommend Kristian Williams's book, Our Enemies in Blue.

For what it's worth, the CBS Atlanta story is reprinted below.

CBS Atlanta News Investigates Cops On Other Side Of Law

http://www.cbsatlanta.com/news/21632579/detail.html

ATLANTA -- CBS Atlanta News is asking tough questions about good cops gone bad. The people protecting the streets in Atlanta have found themselves behind bars for drinking and driving and even charged with murder. In less than two years, 27 Atlanta police officers have had run-ins with the law, some of them more than once.

Reporter Jennifer Mayerle asked Maj. Lane Hagin what the arrests say about the department.

“It says police officers are human. Certainly it's not the image we want to present as a police department,” said Hagin.

CBS Atlanta News obtained video of Officer William Greenwell after drinking with another Atlanta police officer. He stumbles during a sobriety test, telling the Smyrna Police officer who pulled him over he had eight or nine mixed drinks. The incident reports shows Greenwell’s initial blood alcohol level was .17. He pleaded guilty to DUI.

John Freeman is in jail awaiting trial on a charge of murder. He admits shooting the security guard at his apartment complex multiple times.

“It’s embarrassing to even have someone accused of that as a police officer, and certainly if it's proven to be true and he's convicted, that's a black eye,” said Hagin.

Edward Rabb was charged with the rape of a neighbor in 2008. The District Attorney’s office decided not to take the case to court. Less than a year later, he was arrested for drinking and driving. Reports show he blew an initial .18, more than twice the legal limit. Police reports show his "eyes were blood shot and watery, and he had urinated on himself."

William Rucker is another double offender. Video CBS Atlanta News obtained of Rucker weaving in and out of traffic is what landed him in jail for a week, while APD kept him on the payroll. He was found guilty of numerous traffic violations. Rucker was also jailed for lying to police in South Carolina. Rucker is currently on desk duty.

Stephen Moyet was charged with simple assault and battery for attacking a fellow officer responding to a domestic 911 call.

Two officers resigned while still under investigation. Justin Green pleaded guilty to hit and run. He didn't resign until he tested positive for cocaine, and admitted to losing his gun while out partying.

Duane Grundy was already on administrative leave when he was locked up for the attack on then girlfriend, Brittani Lewis. Lewis said she feared for her life.

“He actually started choking me, and my head was down in my leather couches and I couldn't breathe. My 3-year-old son was hitting him, fighting him, trying to pull his pants, trying to get him off of me,” said Lewis.

Grundy also admitted to smoking marijuana while working at APD. CBS Atlanta News has learned he is now working at Lenox mall.

Mayerle asked Hagin what the department is doing to make sure there aren't any more black eyes.

“We have good people here, we have good training. There's a very stringent hiring process that we put people through,” said Hagin.

If you see cops behaving badly, you can file a report with the department they work for over the phone or in person. You can also contact the Office of Professional Standards.

The Sunday Paper recently ran an open letter from Sgt. Scott Kreher. Sgt Kreher is president of the police union and a veteran of the Atlanta Police Department. After reading the letter I had some questions I would like to ask Sgt. Kreher. An edited version of this letter will be published, maybe, in The Sunday Paper this coming Sunday, November 15.

Dear Sgt. Scott Kreher:

I recently read your letter to the Atlanta mayoral candidates, “Save Our Cops: An open letter to Atlanta's next mayor.” In your letter you mention that in order “save our cops” the city should implement certain changes including pay raises, tuition reimbursement, and other steps to help reduce police turnover.

Based on your letter, the best way Atlanta can keep cops seems to be to prevent turnover. That sounds like a good strategy. But your letter is missing a key selling point: what’s in it for the people of Atlanta.

Are more cops the best strategy for insuring public safety? I’m not so sure. There are some things that police are particularly unable to help with. Domestic violence immediately comes to mind. “Most intimate partner victimizations are not reported to the police.” That’s a quote from a report by the U.S. Department of Justice, National Institute of Justice. Here’s another quote, “The majority of victims who did not report their victimization to the police thought the police would not or could not do anything on their behalf. These findings suggest that most victims of intimate partner violence do not consider the justice system an appropriate vehicle for resolving conflicts with intimates.”

Can you imagine? Being beaten, threatened, abused every day and refusing to call the police. Why? Because the police bring problems, they don’t solve them.

Here’s my idea. Make a bargain with the people. Be the first police department to submit to civilian control. Why not make a contract with the people of Atlanta; civilian control for better working conditions. Specifically, I’m talking about a civilian review board with the actual power and funding to review the police. Right now Atlanta has a sham board incapable of holding police accountable for their actions. This isn’t the fault of the board. They are good people, but the board just doesn’t have the power to do the job. Given the continuous pattern of violence of the Atlanta police department, a body able to truly investigate misconduct would go a long way to restoring trust.

I know that supporting this idea goes against the tradition of the Atlanta Police Department. I also know that this pattern isn’t limited to the APD. Lots of police departments oppose the idea of a civilian review board. I dare say that the majority are absolutely opposed to the idea of a review board with independent subpoena power. To be honest, I can see the sense of that. If I had the chance to do my job with less supervision, I probably would accept it. If someone wanted to add another boss to my job, I would probably oppose it. Of course, if doing my job kept leading to people being abused and even killed, I wouldn’t doubt that this new boss would be added despite my objections. Back 2008, I believe, the APD opposed the civilian review board holding subpoena powers. Not a year before this the U.S. Attorney said there was a “culture of misconduct” in the department. Sergeant, it’s just quite clear that the Atlanta police need another boss. The current bosses aren’t doing the job.

Fortunately, there are some things the APD can do to redeem itself. First, they can support the demands of Atlanta BLOCS (Building Locally to Organize for Community Safety). The three demands are that the mayor support:

1) Creating a Search Committee to conduct a nationwide search for the next Chief of Police, and guaranteeing that this committee include members of the ACRB and concerned community members;

2) Appointing a police chief who publicly commits to ensuring full cooperation with the ACRB, including the disciplining of officers who refuse to comply; and

3) Calling for, and supporting a full ACRB investigation of the REDDOG unit with a commitment to following the recommendations produced by such an inquiry.

However, I would say this is only a first step. For the APD to really show it deserves support the department, the chief, and the union will have to support a fully funded civilian review board with subpoena power. The funding for the board can come from the same sources you outline in your letter. Towing fees, license enforcement, and better contracting of supplies (quartermastering) sound like a decent way of raising the funds. Personally, I’m willing to go on trust that this will work. The Southern Center for Human Rights has a report on the Atlanta civilian review board, including recommendations to make the board effective. If you and the rest of the police are willing to accept those recommendations, I’m sure the people of Atlanta wouldn’t begrudge you a small pay raise and tuition reimbursement. What do you say? If your answer is no, then what exactly about the APD is worth saving?

Sincerely,

Dan

This was sent out by GSU Progressive Student Alliance (PSA). I don't know if it was previously published though.

Not quite Stonewall: 40 years later the cops haven't changed, but we have
By Giselda

"Hey, Red Dog: Bored with Grandmothers?" Those words, scribbled with marker on a makeshift sign, lingered above a crowd mostly confused by their meaning. Who was Red Dog and what grandmother? In other communities in Atlanta, away from the gentrifying "gayborhoods" of Midtown, that sign could probably escape any need for clarification. This wasn't southwest Atlanta, though. The rally was gathered behind a leather gay bar, the crowd predominately middle-aged gay white men.

The circumstances behind the rally shouldn't have been a shock to the attendees. Nights before, officers of the Atlanta Police Department, with participation from the particularly brutal Red Dog Narcotics Unit, entered The Atlanta Eagle bar, apparently tipped off by complaints ranging from drug use to public or solicited sex. Around 62 patrons and staff were forced on the ground for an hour, many handcuffed, and searched by cops freely uttering homophobic and racist remarks. Unfortunately for the APD, no weapons or drugs were found on anybody, forcing them to resort to Plan B - confiscating IDs and running a background check for potential outstanding warrants. Here, also, the APD struck out, so the patrol cars and paddy wagons left mostly empty, with the exception of The Eagle's staff, who were arrested for only wearing underwear. The officers charged the employees with stripping unlicensed (it was "underwear" night at the bar, but the act of actually stripping seems like a desperate stretch by the APD).

Fortunately, a reporter from Atlanta Progressive News was on scene to break the story, and by afternoon time the next day many Atlanta area queers (at least in the limited demographic world of facebook) opened up various internet accounts to find some sort of reference to the raid and growing outrage. It was Stonewall all over again, many cried. The national publication The Advocate ran the story alongside constant coverage from Atlanta's smaller news outlets (the major Atlanta paper, The Atlanta-Journal Constitution, was skittish), and solidarity actions in Atlanta were quickly planned, the largest being the rally behind the bar which was attended by hundreds.

For many of us, especially queer radicals, the story and immediate growing reaction was full of promise. This could be a chance to realize a queer agenda beyond marriage, and one that could help build unity between the queer community and other communities that traditionally face police brutality (in Atlanta, those communities are overwhelmingly black and poor). It would also be a chance to build unity, or at least secure an acknowledgment, to those within the queer community to which these events aren't at all shocking but rather routine - queers of color, transgendered people (particularly homeless), even men in the leather scene. Those that do not look like, or share the vision of, the gay movers and shakers who attend the banquets of The Human Rights Campaign or Georgia Equality (both, not surprisingly, missing from the rally). Those queers whose reality more closely parallels straight black men indiscriminately stopped, searched and even shot unarmed by officers of the APD and their most uncontrollable unit, Red Dog, than the reality of gays rushing out of an expensive Midtown townhouse to catch the neighborhood association meeting and help decide how many more "undesirable" crime committing elements should be removed to help make the neighborhood safer and more profitable for its white newcomers.

The story had a lot of other political promise, as well. Atlanta's electoral atmosphere leading up to November's elections has basically boiled down to two things - I love the cops and can bring more into the city and I love the cops and can bring even more than your more. Public safety is on everyone's lips. The grandmother the sign at the rally was referring to, Kathryn Johnston - a 92 year old woman gunned down by Red Dog Narcotic Unit cops - was all but forgotten by white Atlanta as publications and neighborhood groups rushed to secure more cops, now, at any price. Ironically, the man at the head of this movement of white panic, Kyle Keyser, is gay, and was the only mayoral candidate to address the crowd at the rally, shedding his usual rhetoric of more cops with little oversight - instead timidly asking for answers from the force for this one event. The raid on The Eagle suddenly became a useful tool, not only to funnel a new, angry crowd into a movement for police accountability but also to put local political candidates in a position where they may have to condemn police conduct instead of lavishing praise on the force and promising hundreds more on our streets if they're elected. Considering the growing influence of mostly white, middle-class gay Atlanta from gentrifying neighborhoods local candidates may find themselves in a bit of a dilemma - condemn the raid and risk having an anti-police quote used by competitors in the pro-police frenzy that is white, middle/upper class Atlanta voting or stay as neutral as possible on the subject and risk the fury of gay voters?

Hopes for an unleashed queer fury, not quite Stonewall but not quite HRC, were quickly dimmed by the organizers of the rally, however. Messages were sent out on facebook reminding potential attendees that this was not a protest against the APD - in which we supposedly have queer allies - but rather one in support of gay establishments. Any suggestion that the protest actually happen at the police department was scuttled. People spread solidarity messages around facebook, referencing how similar this felt to being gay in '69 rather than black in '09. This shouldn't happen to us, this hasn't happened to us lately. An eery, subtle message being relayed through many such expressions was on display more explicitly by signs at the rally - how dare you treat us like THEM. Signs that kept asking the PD why they would target The Eagle rather than gangs, drug-pushers and muggers. "Who made this call?", one sign asked, placing The Eagle on one side of a seesaw and various street crimes piled up on the other. We're law-abiding citizens, many said, and I never thought I'd see this again.

Where are we looking that we don't see it, exactly? Not in the overcrowded jails of the APD, where arrests are brought in mass after a Red Dog Unit raid or traffic block. We're not looking, apparently, in the face of Tremaine Miller and hundreds like him, shot unarmed by Atlanta cops throughout the years with little protest or rallies. In the signs of the rally that asked for an apology, the speakers who assured the crowds most cops are good and this is an oddity, all who came out once this year and maybe once in a decade to ask why this happened and how do we get answers to this one event the message was unintentionally, unknowingly chilling - this doesn't happen all the time.

But it does, and will continue to. The question now is what sort of reaction should the Atlanta queer community have? Should it be one that seeks answers to one event, maybe even forces some empty political statements and press release apology? Should it be a movement to solely stand in solidarity with gay establishments? Or should we consider longer term accountability for cops, not just when they attack our community but when they attack all, and work towards strengthening the Citizen Review Board and fighting for any oversight and justice we can for the Atlanta PD? Should we consider that sign, referencing Kathryn Johnston, almost out of place at the rally - "Hey Red Dog: Bored with (African-American) Grandmothers?" Perhaps in that sign there was an ability to make a connection and more wisdom than any commentary from the self-appointed, bourgeois heads of gay advocacy and their white, middle-class allies can actualize.

Great news today. Chicago cop Jon Burge has been federally charged for acts of torture. Below is the full story from Reuters. You can find out more information on Burge and systemic torture in Chicago police department at Human Rights at Home: Chicago Police Torture Archive. Look to hear something about how this is just an isolated incident and not a symptom of a larger police problem. You might also hear about how torture is not a routine thing in the United States.

Ex-Chicago policeman charged in torture case
http://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUSTRE49K6I020081021?sp=true

CHICAGO (Reuters) - U.S. authorities on Tuesday charged a policeman accused of torturing suspects with perjury and obstruction of justice for allegedly lying in a civil suit brought by one of the tortured men.

Former Chicago Police Lt. Jon Burge, 60, whose activities were once called to the attention of the United Nations, was arrested at his home near Tampa, Florida. He could face up to 45 years in prison if convicted of the three criminal counts.

Burge was acquitted of brutality in a Chicago trial 20 years ago, but was subsequently fired by the police department in 1993. He still receives a $30,000 annual police pension.

Special prosecutors appointed in 2002 documented more than 100 cases of brutality involving Burge and other police officers who worked on Chicago's South Side. While prosecutors claimed several officers elicited confessions from mostly black suspects through torture, they said the statute of limitations had run out and no one was charged.

The suspects were beaten by mostly white detectives with telephone books, suffocated with plastic typewriter covers, burned with cigarettes, threatened with mock executions, and suffered electric shocks to their genitals.

"There is no place for torture and abuse in a police station. There is no place for perjury and false statements in federal lawsuits," U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald said. "No person is above the law, and nobody -- even a suspected murderer -- is beneath its protection. The alleged criminal conduct by defendant Burge goes to the core principles of our criminal justice system."

In a federal indictment, Burge was accused of lying about his knowledge of the torture in a 2003 deposition for a civil suit brought by Madison Hobley.

The torture allegations led former Illinois Gov. George Ryan to pardon four men, including Hobley, who confessed to murder after being tortured. Ryan also cleared the state's death row because of a pattern of faulty prosecutions.

While he was a Illinois state legislator, Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama helped pass a state law requiring videotaping of police interrogations.

Victims' attorneys presented information about the brutality case to a United Nations commission on human rights in 2005, which called on the U.S. government to investigate.

(Reporting by Andrew Stern; editing by Michael Conlon)