"They worked us to the bone then turned around and told us we sucked." Week 21 police killings
A longtime Chicago cop explains how last year's protest and scrutiny of police affected crime in the city.
As an uprising grew this time a year ago following the killings of Ahmaud Arbery and George Floyd, unrest took hold in many American cities. The protests and marches and fires and riots drew immediate comparison to the summer of 1968, the last time cities nationwide burned in rage. The comparison was apt — 2020 will be looked upon as pivotal a year as 1968, perhaps even more so considering the global implications of the coronavirus pandemic. But there is something else that ties the two years together: a sharp increase in violent crime. The last biggest uptick in murders came in 1968, when killings jumped 12.7 percent from the year before. In 2020, murders were up 21 percent, an obviously historic number. In America’s large cities, murder climbed nearly 40 percent above 2019 numbers.
In Chicago there was a 50 percent jump last year, resulting in at least 744 homicides, up from 506 in 2019. Right-wing pundits and politicians have blamed last summer’s Black Lives Matter protests as being the primary culprit for the rise in killings and violent crime. The thinking is that police, distracted and overworked from covering weeks and months of protests, weren’t able to do their jobs preventing crime. This is a dubious theory, considering violent crimes like murders are committed in the moment and not necessarily telegraphed to law enforcement. But, fewer cops on blocks in some neighborhoods might cause criminals to be more brazen, so there is some truth to the theory.
As with all issues with crime, though, the answers to last year’s spike are as complex as the events themselves. To try to get an understanding of it, I checked in with a longtime cop in Chicago who works homicide and other violent crime investigations to see if he had any answers to share. What follows is a condensed version of our conversation.
JG: What happened last year that violent crime went through the roof?
Mike,* a 15-year veteran of the force making dinner for his wife and kids on a Wednesday night: “Let me preface this by saying that one, my perspective is jaded and two, I live in this insane Chicago bubble where some people think it’s preferable that I get shot by a murderer or a sex offender instead of me shooting him to defend myself. I’m sitting here watching all these lefty politicians find out that they’re not left enough for the left anymore when it comes to defund the police and things like that. Black Lives Matter has its lunatic fringe, just like the NRA, where most people just want to own a handgun but then you’ve got the guys who think they should be able to have anti-aircraft missiles.
JG: The right-wing theory/talking point is that cops were distracted by the protests and criminals took advantage, but it can’t be that simple, right?
Mike: “Well, they worked us to the bone for three-and-a-half months [during the protests] and then turned around and told us we sucked. It’s hard for us to suppress violent crime and property crime when we’re pulled off our shifts and put on a bus all day waiting to respond to a protest. I remember that first night of the big protests, I’m sitting here and cops are getting beat up and getting in fistfights all over the place, there’s 10-1 calls [officer in distress] going off everywhere, and I’m just wondering when the mayor is going to call us in. She never did. I think it’s minor that cops were distracted when considering the violent crime rise and more that they were exhausted, pissed off, tired of being vilified and didn’t want to take the chance of being proactive on violent crime and end up getting harassed on a block. Were there some cops who said, ‘I’m done, fuck it,’? Yes. We’re there orders from on high to stand back and don’t engage? Yes.”
JG: Ok so there’s some truth to that theory then, but what about the other factors, the stress of the pandemic, joblessness, all that?
Mike: “That’s part of it, but the bigger thing is that we can’t really do our jobs. There’s no traffic chases! Why wouldn’t you run from the cops if you know they can’t chase you? Fifteen years ago my partner and I caught a guy and he literally tried to ram his car back into my partner. I broke protocol and chased him down and caught him and he said, ‘I thought you guys’d stop chasing me when I committed those two other crimes.’ He knew we were supposed to pull off. And that was 2015, we can’t even do anything close to that now.”
JG: So people are maybe emboldened, and maybe got more emboldened with the protests and the lack of cops on the streets because they were handling protests?
Mike: “There’s a lack of prosecution. If you’re a 13- or 14-year-old jacking cars and you don’t get punished, you graduate to violent crime. I’ve been working these carjackings [there’s been a massive spike in carjackings in Chicago in the last few months] — all that happens is you get a bracelet and if you violate that you just get another bracelet. There’s no will to prosecute. You’ve doubled down on excuse culture where nothing is anybody’s fault.”
JG: A lack of prosecution is one thing but it’s up to you guys to build the case. What are you doing proactively to stop or prevent violent crime and arrest offenders? Violent crime is committed in the moment, so it’s not like you guys can know when a guy is gonna shoot somebody and they’re not calling the cops to tell them they’re about to do it.
Mike: “Well our gang database is about to be fucked. We’re really only going to be allowed to have metadata in it — no individuals. An individual would have to admit on video or audio that they’re in a gang or else we can’t add them to keep an eye on them and know who the players are. It’s absurd.”
JG: Alright but is it just about more cops on the streets equals less crime? It can’t be that simple. Also, police departments always have it both ways: when crime goes up they say, We need more money to tamp down on this crimewave, and then when crime goes down they say, We need at least the same amount of money to keep crime where it is. It’s the only job in the world where you get more money for doing a shittier job at the one thing you’re supposed to do. Why should we just always be giving cops more and more money every year and seeing the same or worse results? I think that’s near the heart of defund the police.
Mike: “I think if we got everything we wanted we wouldn’t see the spikes that we saw, but there’s a pre-supposition that police are the sole arbiter of the criminal justice system.”
JG: Right, you need prosecutions to follow through and people to be locked up or else your work doesn’t mean anything, but what about the money? Why should you guys always get more if you’re not doing as good of a job?
Mike: “Everybody else raises their rates every year to account for cost of living so why shouldn’t cops? I’ve been working without a union contract for three years which means I haven’t had a cost-of-living raise in three years, how is that fair? And does crime ever get better if we freeze budgets?
JG: Well, I think that’s part of the working theory of defund the police: the system really isn’t working great now so why don’t we try something different and allocate resources in other directions.
Mike: “The conditions that cause crime are complex and the solutions are also complex, and I do think there’s plenty of room to talk about getting resources into neighborhoods to help out those vulnerable to getting involved in crime, but you can’t stop crime without the police. Plus, all this theory is just that. It’s a bet that taking money away from police and giving it to community programs is going to eventually result in less crime. But what do we do about this Saturday night? What do we do about this summer? I don’t know how to tell somebody your loved one’s murder doesn’t matter this year because we’re trying to do long-term shit that could eventually result in less crime.”
JG: Yeah that’s one thing, but what are you doing about this Saturday night, this summer? If cops are the best way to stop violent crime why are the rates so high?
Mike: “How do I get active witnesses when elected officials are saying cops are the problem, and if I go talk to the cops somebody on the street is gonna fuck me up anyway? I can’t tell you how many stories I’ve heard about guy dying in the street telling cops, ‘I ain’t telling you shit.’ I wish I had a clean answer that all we had to was X. There’s some cops who are assholes, sure. But this constant vilification of law enforcement does no good.”
JG: I understand that there would be a drag between institution of defund the police in some form and seeing positive results, but the argument is that something has to change because the status quo isn’t working.”
Mike: “Defunding the police won’t work because all of the necessary support systems won’t be there. You wanna defund the police and put the money elsewhere? Be my guest. But I don’t see it working because the change it may make, I don’t see anyone willing to wait that long for that to happen. Also, how wedded are the people who live in these communities to the idea of defund the police? People there say they want more cops.”
Here are nationwide police killings between Tuesdays on the 20th and 21st weeks of 2021:
Tuesday
Police in Jackson County, Ore. shot and killed someone following a domestic call and car chase. No mention of BWC footage and as of this writing the decedent’s identity has not been reported.
Wednesday
Michigan State Trooper shot and killed a man following a stolen vehicle call and a car chase. No mention of BWC footage and as of this writing the man’s name has not been reported.
Thursday
Police in Washington County, Va. shot and killed Brandon S. Odell after he allegedly pulled a gun from under a mattress during a search of his motel room. No mention of BWC footage.
Police in Pittsburg, Calif. shot and killed a man allegedly holding a gun and banging on his ex-girlfriend’s apartment door. He allegedly walked away from officers while holding the gun, then turned toward them. No mention of BWC footage but a neighbor’s camera caught the shooting. The neighbor told reporters it took 45 minutes for paramedics to treat the man. As of this writing his name has not been reported.
Friday
Police in East Feliciana Parish, La. shot and killed someone who allegedly refused to drop a weapon following a domestic disturbance call. No mention of BWC footage.
Police in Houston shot and killed a man who allegedly fired on officers and said “just shoot me.” No mention of BWC footage.
Police in Albany, Ga. shot and killed Kortnee Lashon Warren after he allegedly fired on officers when walking up to a crime scene. No mention of BWC footage.
Saturday
Police in Adel, Ga. shot and killed Steve Newsome during a traffic stop early Saturday morning. An officer was also shot several times, according to the Georgia Bureau of Investigation. No mention of BWC footage.
Police in Davidson County, N.C. shot and killed Adam Hartley after he allegedly fired on them in the backyard of a home. No mention of BWC footage.
Police in Troy, Ill. shot and may have killed Kody C. Waters, who was allegedly suicidal and firing a gun into the air in a gas station parking lot. The local NBC affiliate reports it is unknown whether Waters died from shots by police or his own gun. No mention of BWC footage.
Police in Newaygo County, Mich. shot and killed Johnny Owen King, whose family said was holding a BB gun but not pointing it at police when he was shot.
Sunday
Illinois State Police shot and killed a motorcyclist on a rural highway outside St. Louis. It’s unclear exactly what happened — police said the motorcyclist was driving erratically but there wasn’t an active chase at the time of the shooting. An officer took a through-and-through to the calf. No mention of BWC footage.
Police in Athens, Ga. shot and killed Juan Joseph Daniele Castellano after he allegedly hijacked a car at gunpoint. When officers responded Castellano allegedly emerged from the vehicle with a long gun and refused to drop it. No mention of BWC footage.
Police in College Station, Texas shot and killed Roderick Devonne Merchant Jr. after he allegedly fired on officers with a rifle while advancing toward them. No mention of BWC footage.
Police in Parkesburg, W. Va. shot and killed Rufus Ramsey III after he allegedly charged an officer with a meat cleaver. Ramsey also had allegedly just stabbed a woman. No mention of BWC footage.
Police in Kings County, Ca. shot and killed someone who allegedly fired on officers after a 10-hour standoff. No mention of BWC footage and as of this writing the decedent’s identity has not been reported.
Monday
Police in Villa Park, Ill. shot and killed a transgender man who was waving a pellet gun at officers and who had allegedly mentioned “death by cop.” Haven Bailey was 25, and was struggling with mental illness and alcoholism, his family said. No mention of BWC footage.
Police in Nogales, Ariz. shot and killed the driver of an 18-wheeler who was trying to flee from a Walmart parking lot. In a bizarre situation, a bystander was in front of the vehicle taking video when several officers opened up, firing dozens of shots into the cab. No mention of BWC footage and as of this writing the decedent’s name has not been reported.
Police in Washington D.C. shot and killed a man armed with a rifle who had allegedly been holding a woman against her will. No mention of BWC footage.
Today
Police in Lenexa, Kan. shot and killed someone inside a motel room Tuesday morning. Officers were called there for a couple arguing loudly, entered the room, and killed the person. No mention of BWC footage.
In other news:
A marquee Supreme Court decision will allow a Texas man who was held in a feces-covered cell for days to sue his jailers. The decision could have far-reaching consequences on the issue of qualified immunity, which shields law enforcement personnel from being sued personally for unconstitutional, illegal, cruel or unnecessarily violent action. However, the Court in one case has already gone back to old ways of shielding officers from being sued under qualified immunity in an appeal brought by the mother of an Ohio man shot and killed by police at close range.
The Associated Press last week obtained body cam footage showing the grisly police killing of Ronnie Greene. Louisiana State Troopers tasered Greene multiple times, dragged him while shackled on his stomach, punched him repeatedly in the face and left him lying face down in the dirt. He later died. The AP’s scoop comes after it obtained audio in which an officer involved in Green’s killing bragged that he “beat the ever-living fuck out of him.”
The officers in Colorado who beat a 73-year-old woman with dementia, dislocating her shoulder, then left her weeping and asking for help in a jail cell as they watched and rewatched footage of the beating, now face charges. The officer who carried out the beating faces excessive force charges, and his partner is charged with failing to intervene —a concept that is now in discussion nationwide in the wake of George Floyd’s killing, in which multiple officers did nothing as Derek Chauvin killed Floyd.
Texas now joins Georgia in introducing legislation that would prevent and punish cities that reduce police budgets. The push is part of Gov. Greg Abbott’s red meat offering to conservatives in the state, which also includes the country’s most expansive gun law, now on Abbott’s desk, that will allow anyone to openly carry handguns without any licensure process.
ProPublica has a good look at how seldom officers are held accountable for questionable use of deadly force, focusing on the case of Kawask Trawick in New York two years ago. The NYPD finally completed its internal investigation of Trawick’s killing and cleared the officers involved.
All the photos from this post are mine from 2015-16 in Chicago. The first is of a memorial for fallen cops somewhere on the West Side, taken during a march during the Laquan McDonald protests. The second, location unknown.
What in the fuck did I just read? Do you have even a *basic* understanding of abolition and what it means? This interview is a mess.