[The Crescent Report] Lessons from the Color Line Even ‘Famous’ Black Men Can Be Thrown Up Against the Wall

MAS Freedom Civil and Human Rights Director Ibrahim Abdil-Mu’id Ramey discussed Cambridge police mistreatment of Harvard Professor Henry “Skip” Louis Gates, Jr., in Lessons from the Color Line Even ‘Famous’ Black Men Can Be Thrown Up Against the Wall:

For those who may not otherwise be aware, Harvard University Professor Henry “Skip” Louis Gates, Jr., is one of America’s most preeminent scholars and public intellectuals, in addition to being a prolific writer, researcher, and producer of major documentaries for American public television.

Professor Gates is also a Black man; and apparently, that was the most salient part of his identity when it came to a confrontation with Cambridge, Massachusetts police officers earlier this week.

It seems that Professor Gates, on returning from a trip to China, was attempting to un-jam his front door with the help of a driver hired to drive him in from the airport, and while doing so, the local police department received a report that “unidentified” black men had been seen attempting to break into the Gates residence.

When officers arrived on the scene to investigate, Gates, in producing his University identification also happened to ask, as was his right, for the badge numbers of the officers confronting him. The officers reportedly refused to identify themselves, a disagreement followed, and Professor Gates was arrested – somewhat roughly – and charged with the offense of disorderly conduct.

[To read the entire article, click here.]

I am aware of localities where DWB (Driving While Black) is a reason for a cop to pull over a car.

Yet while I am certain that there was a racial component in the incident, I have had the same problem with Cambridge cops even though I am white.

Asking for an officer's identification in Cambridge is almost always good for a quick trip to the police station during encounters either with Cambridge city cops or with Harvard cops, who are deputized by the city if I am not mistaken.

I was able to talk my way out of an arrest, but I have worked over a lot of the last 15 years as a salesman. If I were still on the MIT faculty, I would probably have had more difficulty with the Cambridge police.

The USA has a really sick police culture, which seems to make it easy for cops (and sometimes FBI agents) to think they can get away with anything despite the laws and regulations.

This attitude is probably the root of the subversion of the Boston FBI office by the Winter Hill gang, and I have to admit — even if it is racist to say so —

1. that African American cops generally are not as power crazed as the white cops and
   
2. that I always prefer to deal with a black officer than a white cop.

I recently consulted with a retired DA about the Chuck Turner sting, and he mentioned in passing that Boston-area cops really don’t understand how much their misbehavior has made them objects of scorn and distrust. Nowadays a large part of a Boston-area prosecutor’s job involves overcoming hardly unreasonable anti-cop feelings on the part of local juries.
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