By: Marian Jefferson
The Dallas Examiner
This past Thursday, members of the Black Panther Party, The Nation of Islam, Olinka Green, and a few others gathered at the Mt. Tabor Baptist Church in Oak Cliff. The group gathered to make the Dallas Police Department aware of the feeling of the Black community concerning four Black men who were killed while in police custody. The forum also addressed the issue of growing mistrust among Black citizens and the need to hold both DPD and the Black citizenry accountable for bringing peace and restoration back to a community that has been sitting on a virtual tender box since the start of this year. Few attended the meeting despite, as Green stated, having passed out over eight hundred flyers, but DPD was there in force.
Chief David Kunckle was there, flanked by his second in command, Chief David Brown and Don Walbrook, Assistant Chief of Investigation. Also present were Chief Sheryl Scott, Deputy Chief Pat Paul-Hill, and Levi Williams. Representatives from DART were not present. According to Green, they declined to come because of pending litigation in the shooting death of Bobby Walker, a 15-year-old youth who was killed by a DART police officer. The Chief told the audience that he was there to subject himself and his office to criticism and scrutiny and to be open and transparent to the community. He acknowledged that there were indeed some areas of great strain regarding community relations but said that there have been milestones reached, citing the fact that Dallas last year had 187 murders. Kunckle said this was the lowest murder rate since 1967 despite adding almost 700,000 more people to our city.
The group asked few questions. Most rose to make statements about their disappointment in the justice system and disillusionment with a lack of programming designed to bridge the gap between DPD and the community. Speeches were made by Minister Jeffery Muhammad of the Nation of Islam and Olinka Green but by far the most poignant moment came when the mother of Robert “Scooter” Woods, Jr. recounted for the audience the day she watched helplessly as her son was hand-cuffed, beaten, then put on the ground in front of her as he appeared to be having what some believed was a seizure. She stated that she watched her son be killed right in front of her eyes while police officers just stood around doing nothing to help him.
“They killed him,” she said. “They killed him right in front of me and I will never forget it. If I live thirty more years, I will never forget it.” Someone near her reached out to try and quiet her, but she would not be contented until she had told the whole story of how her son was killed and how she had not been able to find any justice with the justice system.
Insult to injury
Rev. Wright of the SCLC stated that the troubles for Johnson have not stopped at the death of her son this past April. Wright told The Dallas Examiner that on yesterday afternoon, Ms. Johnson called him and stated that DPD raided her home with a search warrant looking for her son, Robert Woods, Jr. Ms. Johnson, according to Wright, stated that they had been present on the street when she arrived back home from being out in the community. She said they explained that they had a search warrant for Robert Woods, Jr. She then explained that Woods was dead. What happened then, Wright said, stunned even Johnson. She explained that it was not enough to state that her son was dead. She said the men demanded that she produce proof that he was dead. She said they asked for her son’s death certificate, and they did not stop there. According to Johnson, they went back to the bedroom where her husband was resting. According to Wright, Johnson says this is not the first-time police have been back to the house. Johnson states she is being repeatedly harassed by DPD. The Johnson family plans to file a lawsuit against DPD.
Officer No-Billed in Washington Shooting
SCLC is also involved with the case involving Brandon Washington who was killed by use of deadly force in April. Wright and other community leaders worked hard to get witnesses to come forward to testify. He stated that despite gathering witnesses, none were presented to the grand jury, and they were never even asked to appear. He stated further that the whole proceeding was over and done within 30 minutes and neither the mother of Washington nor any other person presents on his behalf was allowed to witness the event.
“We’re going to meet with Craig Watkins this week,” said Wright. The problem is with the District Attorney’s Office. We collaborated with the police in bringing them witnesses, worked to re-educate the community on the importance of talking to the police and I personally recorded witness statements but on the day of the grand jury hearing, none of the witnesses were presented…” The Washington family also plans to file a lawsuit against the DPD.
Getting together
“There is power in numbers and not one shot must be fired for us to get it done”, said Wright. We need to take back our community. For over thirty-five years there has been a problem with the trust factor with the police. Wright said that the hip-hop culture has had a lot to do with community apathy. Wright said that nothing will change until we have more unity among our own people and start holding ourselves accountable. According to Wright, the presence at Mt. Tabor was a split. He said that the press conference held to highlight the No-Bill was where the presence should have been. He said that if The Black Panthers were serious that they would not show up when things are heated but be a constant presence in the community. He posed that they could do more by working with DART on a proposal to find funding to patrol at DART stations to bring greater community awareness, presence, and unity. He called the meeting last Thursday, “useless” and that it was nothing more than rehashing the past. Wright said that everyone needed to work together in order for the city to move forward.
As of today, we have eight Dallas police shooting investigations, one involving Dart police and one involving Arlington PD for a total of ten. How many persons, not including officers, have lost their lives as a result of deadly force shootings this year? As of the end of May, 75 people have lost their lives because of deadly force shootings. One officer, Mark Nix, has died because of a deadly force shooting.