Race and the NYPD

[O'Gee]

RACE & THE NYPD

By ADAM BRODSKY - Sunday, December 3rd, 2006 'The New York Post'



City Councilwoman Helen Foster says, point blank, that Sean Bell's death
was a "racist" act. Councilman Al Vann bemoans "institutional racism."
Councilman Charles Barron, taking the prize for recklessness, insists
blacks "are being murdered" by cops.
What repugnant lies.


Racism almost certainly was not a factor in the tragic gunfire that left
the 23-year-old groom dead. But race definitely was.

Start with a fact that every cop surely knows: While the victim of an
accidental police shooting is likely to be black, so too is the perp when
cops are killed.

Of 21 NYPD officers shot to death in the line of duty since 1994, police
records show that 14 (67 percent) were killed by African-Americans, four
(19 percent) by Hispanics and three (14 percent) by whites. (In one other
case, the killers included one black and five Hispanics.)

And, yes, New York cops do confront blacks more than they do whites. But
that's because blacks are disproportionately involved with crime - both as
victims and as perps.

Even the Rev. Jesse Jackson admitted that, in walking city streets, he
worries more about groups of black youths than white ones.

Two decades ago, then-Police Commissioner Ben Ward - who was black - made
the point more bluntly (even citing the very area where Bell was killed):
"Young, black men," Ward said, "are ripping off the neighborhoods. They
are doing the shooting out in southeast Queens and killing innocent
people."

Crime's way down since then, but the racial breakdowns haven't changed
much. African-Americans, about 25 percent of New Yorkers, account for 60
percent of the city's crime victims so far this year, according to an NYPD
analysis last month. And more than 60 percent of perpetrators in murder
cases were black (93 percent were male).

For each of the past three years, NYPD records show, nine of every 10
crime victims citywide were either African-American or Hispanic.

So were a similar percentage of perps.

With police responding to more crimes involving blacks, there are more
opportunities for police abuse of blacks - including (rare) accidental
police shootings.

(Again, blacks also benefit disproportionately when cops do their job; the
vast drop in New York City homicides over the past decade has saved the
lives of mostly blacks and other minorities.)

Let's face it: To fight crime, cops must go to the areas where it occurs.
A disproportionate number of police operations, like responding to calls,
take place in minority communities.

The Kalua Cabaret, for instance, where the Bell tragedy started, is in a
largely black neighborhood - and is heavily patronized by blacks. NYPD
officials note that cops were called to the scene 26 times in the past 12
months.

Presumably, most of the callers were black.

The point is that if cops are going to protect the city - if they are
going to respond to calls from blacks as well as whites - then inevitably
they are going to come into contact with more African-Americans than with
other folks.


And greater contact breeds greater potential for conflict - and for
tragedies, like that of Sean Bell - even as blacks also gain from all the
crime averted.

How unfortunate that racial activists mislead folks about the reasons for
confrontations - insisting that police actions are often not just
ill-motivated, but illegal.


If black leaders really want to cut down on wrongful killings in their
community, one idea might be to focus more on stanching crime.

Steering more young black men into legal, productive lives would not only
give these youths more hopeful futures, it would also reduce the number of
interactions with cops and, thus, the opportunities for disaster.

Of course, curbing crime means helping cops - not attacking them.

A first step might be to stop calling them "murderers."

[7mmMag]

Suprised that came out of the Post.