[cure-news] Whites Call for Prosecutions of NYC and Atlanta Police

[Ida Hakim]

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

December 5, 2006

For further information:
Contact Ida Hakim, CEO
Caucasians United for Reparations and Emancipation
770-969-3963
hakimida at reparationsthecure.org

Whites Call for Prosecutions of NYC and Atlanta Police
Groom murdered on Wedding Day, 92 Year Old Woman Shot in Own Home

A group of whites from across the United States is calling for an 
immediate prosecution of the New York City police officers who shot and 
killed groom-to-be Sean Bell on the day of his wedding, as well as the 
Atlanta, Georgia police responsible for the murder of Kathryn Johnson, a 
92 year old woman, defending her life in her own living room.

?The assassinations of Sean Bell and Kathryn Johnston should give all of 
us cause for outrage,? said Ida Hakim of Atlanta, Georgia. Hakim serves 
as executive director for the group Caucasians United for Reparations 
and Emancipation (CURE), whose members support and advocate for slavery 
reparations. ?We see the ongoing, state-sponsored violence directed at 
Black America as a part of the legacy left in place by the institution 
of slavery, and it is one that must be immediately addressed.?

Kathryn Johnston of Atlanta was killed last Tuesday when Atlanta City 
police officers fired a hundred rounds into her home while executing a 
?no-knock? search warrant. Ms. Johnston used her six shot handgun to 
defend against what she understood was a home invasion, injuring three 
officers. Police returned fire and nine bullets riddled her body. Now 
Court officials, in violation of the Georgia Open Records Act, have 
refused to release the sworn statement by police which formed the basis 
for issuing the ?no-knock? warrant.

Sean Bell, 23, intended to marry the mother of his two children on 
November 25, 2006 but was killed by police early that morning, hours 
before he was scheduled to walk down the aisle. As Bell and two friends 
left a strip club, where they had been celebrating his bachelor party, 
they were involved in an auto accident with an undercover police 
officer. In response, NYPD officers fired 50 shots at the groom's car, 
killing Bell and wounding friends Joseph Guzman and Trent Benefield. It 
is unclear why the officers began firing on the unarmed men. The 
explanation offered on why such a large number of rounds were fired, was 
?contagious shooting?.

According to CURE member Dorothy Fardan, ?the only thing believable 
about the ?contagious shooting theory? is that it is reminiscent of the 
same kind of contagion that spread among those familiar lynch mobs whose 
zealous officials and posses got caught up in the heat of the moment. 
Such a theory is nothing more than a poor excuse for murderous cops.?

Hakim asked that White America stand up to protest these shootings and 
join in the call for a speedy prosecution. "Such abuses of power will 
continue unabated until the white community stands up to demand an end 
to this," she said.

CURE member Amanda Furness agrees. ?Throughout American history, Black 
folks have been the targets of police brutality,? Furness said. ?In 
cities across the nation, we're witnessing an increase in the number of 
victims. What police and city officials don't realize is that aside from 
the fact that these shootings constitute a violation of human rights, 
they also contribute to the cesspool that is already American race 
relations.?

Only seven years after four officers in the Bronx shot to death an 
unarmed Amadou Diallo with forty-one bullets, this latest slaying is 
also being labeled as murder by community leaders in New York, and by 
CURE as another prime example of the unfinished business of ending 
slavery and racism.

Early reports say that one of the officers involved in the Sean Bell 
killing fired his weapon thirty-one times, in violation of police 
training, which instructs officers to ?assess the situation after firing 
three times? and which prohibits the use of deadly force to fire on a 
motor vehicle, unless a firearm is being used from inside that vehicle.

Ironically community activists have questioned how city officials were 
quick to label this latest killing by black, brown and white officers as 
"excessive" while the four white officers who killed Diallo were never 
prosecuted. Activists having observed this hypocrisy still agree that, 
as Rev. Al Sharpton has stated, ?racial profiling isn?t about the color 
of the person doing the profiling; it?s about the color of the person 
being profiled.?

?Black and brown families will continue to live in fear of their public 
servants, until we as white folks have taken the steps necessary to 
deconstruct the racism which makes it possible for cops to fear un-armed 
men and 92 year old women in their living room,? said Hugh Esco, a 
Georgia Green Party member active with the group of white 
reparationists. ?Those of us privileged as white in this culture must 
step up and demand accountability from our government agencies and the 
corporations which still exploit divisions over race and discount the 
lives of people of color.?

?We must demand justice for Kathryn Johnston of Atlanta and Sean Bell, 
Joseph Guzman and Trent Benefield of New York,? said Hakim. ?Racism is a 
white people's disease and can only be eradicated when white people 
stand up and demand justice. I urge people to contact both District 
Attorney offices to call for indictments in the murder of Ms. Johnston 
and Sean Bell and in the armed assaults on Mr. Guzman and Mr. Benefield.?

To contact Queens County, New York District Attorney Richard Brown's 
office, please call (718) 286-6000.

To contact the Fulton County, Georgia District Attorney Paul Howard's 
office, please call (404) 730-4981.

For more information about Caucasians United for Reparations and 
Emancipation, visit the group's website at: 
http://www.reparationsthecure.org/