'When a [white] cop breaks into a [black person's] home without a warrant, when we aren't safe in our own home, where are we safe?' - NYC Settles Ramarley Graham Wrongful Death Case for $3.9 Million

White media [NY Times, CBS and Fox] omits [controls your discourse] from its racist coverage that video surveillance contradicted NYPD lies about Ramarley running into house, that he was shot to death in front of his 6 year old brother and grandmother and that psychopathic white cops laughed about the murder in front of his mother and cheered on the white cop at his arraignment.  

The City of New York on Friday agreed to pay $3.9 million to the family of Ramarley Graham, a black Bronx teenager shot to death by a white police officer in 2012. The deal settled a federal lawsuit brought by the family of the 18-year-old Graham.

“This was a tragic case,” said New York City Law Department spokesman Nicholas Paolucci. “After evaluating all the facts, and consulting with key stakeholders such as the NYPD, it was determined that settling the matter was in the best interest of the city.”

The NYPD claims officers saw Ramarley with a gun in his waistband and ran after him when he took off. Surveillance video, however, shows the teen calmly walking into his building— followed by cops rushing the door and breaking it down -- without a warrant. A bag of marijuana was recovered in the bathroom.

Officer Richard Haste pursued Graham into his bathroom on the second floor of the building and shot Graham once in the chest as his 6-year-old brother and elderly grandmother looked on. [MORE]

Although Haste fired the fatal bullet after cornering the teen in the bathroom of the second-floor apartment, the family said the shooting wasn’t a solo operation. “There were many officers involved, but none of them were ever charged, including supervisors who should have known better,” Graham’s mother, Constance Malcolm said.

Haste said he fired his weapon because he thought he was going to be shot. No weapons were ever found. After the incident, Assistant district attorney Donald Levin described a scene in which Graham stared down the barrel of Haste's gun with no means to escape.

"Once this officer gained entry", Levin said, "he stood face to face with Ramarley Graham.

"Ramarley Graham was in the bathroom with absolutely nowhere to go," Levin said. "Officer Haste consciously and deliberately pulled the trigger."

He added that the case is "not about what he was told out on the street by his fellow officers", Levin said, challenging claims that Graham's death was the unfortunate consequence of bad information. [MORE]

“When a cop breaks into a home without a warrant, when we are not safe in our home, where are we safe?” Malcolm asked.

She described how she learned her son was dead: overhearing a cop talk about the “homicide” on E. 229th St. while she sat on a bench in the stationhouse waiting for information.

“I just froze,” she said, claiming that she heard officers laughing.

“They thought it was a joke. Just like at the arraignment,” she said, referring to cops who cheered Haste at Wednesday’s court appearance. [MORE]

Haste was indicted on manslaughter charges in the summer of 2012, but charges were dismissed by a judge who said prosecutors improperly instructed grand jurors to imply they should disregard testimony from police officers that they radioed Haste in advance to warn him that they thought Graham had a pistol. It took four months for Bronx prosecutors to obtain an indictment. A second grand jury declined to re-indict the officer.

Manhattan federal prosecutors are conducting a civil rights investigation. [dont hold your breath in system of racism]

Black College Student Gets Racism Lesson from White Yale Cop: There is No Such thing as "Upper Class Black" in a White Over Black System

Powerless Class. According to Neely Fuller in a White Supremacy System the most accurate way to describe what "class" people are in is to describe their power relationship to each other. All white people who practice racism must be recognized as those in the powerful class. All non-white people, being subject to the powerful class are the powerless class. In their relationship with whites Blacks cannot be be "upper" or "middle" - but only under whites in this operating system of vast unequal power based on skin color. [MORE]

From [HERE] A white Yale University police officer raised his gun at an innocent black man Saturday night while searching for the suspect in a burglary case — and attracted the ire of New York Times columnist Charles M. Blow, whose son happened to be the man in question. The officer approached him from behind ordered him to drop to his knees and to get on the ground. The Black 3rd year college student was unarmed. Then the cop let him go. 

Yale University released a statement on the incident, saying that police had specifically been looking for a "tall, African-American, college-aged student wearing a black jacket and a red and white hat." The suspect was believed to be involved in a flurry of minor theft incidents of various items from students rooms. No incidents involved force (no robberies) or violence and no one had been injured. NO WEAPONS had been observed on the suspect. When the white cop approached the student he did not flee or resist, he complied with cop orders.

For what reason did the cop seize him, detain him and pull his on gun on him?  For white folks, the 4th Amendment requires much more. But this shit happens everywhere, all day, everyday to Black and Brown men. In the context of White Supremacy there is no innocent Black male, just Black male criminals who have not yet been detected, apprehended or convicted. He is guilty by his mere existence. [MORE] As such to a white cop or a white journalist covering this story there is no need to justify the legality of the stop and seizure or the force used. All that mattered was skin color. That is the status quo of white supremacy. 

Charles Blow wrote the following about his son's episode in the NY Times:

Saturday evening, I got a call that no parent wants to get. It was my son calling from college — he’s a third-year student at Yale. He had been accosted by a campus police officer, at gunpoint!

This is how my son remembers it:

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Jury Finds White PBSO Deputy Liable: Put Unarmed Black Woman in Choke Hold, Body Slammed her and Punched her in Face while Handcuffed - Stopped b/c Music was Too Loud

From [HERE] Back in 2008, a Black woman who was pulled over [b/c she was Black] for allegedly blaring her car stereo in Belle Glade claimed that her encounter with police ended with a beating in the back of a police car. She filed a lawsuit against the Palm Beach Sheriff's Office. On Friday, a jury in federal court in Miami heard Maria Paul's claims about her run-in with former PBSO deputy Michael Woodside.

The jury awarded Paul $75,000 on claims that the white deputy intentionally used excessive force, violated her civil rights and unlawfully caused her injury. (In photo, racist suspect Sheriff Ric Bradshaw, who has faced allegations of racism in his department]. 

The suit claimed that on Christmas Day 2008, Paul was pulled over and cited for having her stereo up too loud. Following the stop, Paul drove off for a moment until she was pulled over again by Woodside. In a police report the deputy explained Paul drove off too quickly for his liking. The second stop ended with Woodside ordering the woman out of the car. He then allegedly put her in a "chokehold position, slammed her body to the ground, and handcuffed" Paul.

The encounter ended with Paul handcuffed in the back of Woodside's cruiser, where the deputy "repeatedly punched her about the face and body," according to the original complaint.

Woodside, it turns out, was just one of a number of rogue, racist cops running free in Belle Glade at the time. According to the suit, by the time Paul brushed up against Woodside on Christmas Day, he was the subject of four use-of-force complaints and two internal affairs investigations from his time in Belle Glade. A later 2009 probe would find him guilty of four infractions. 

The lawsuit points out that he applied and was rejected by the department twice, in 1998 and 2005. During his third try at a job with the sheriff, Woodside was involved in a 2007 federal lawsuit stemming from his gig at the time as a Jupiter cop. In that suit, later settled, Woodside was accused of "false arrest and false imprisonment." Despite that pretty hefty smudge on his record, PBSO brought him on.

It just so happened Woodside ended up in Belle Glades, where he fell under the supervision of Sgt. Brent Raban. This was the fine public servant who would later be booted from the department in 2009. You might remember the case: Raban wore a hat inked with "punishment" while running around on duty in Belle Glade. He also bragged on Facebook about smacking around citizens. "[U]nder the supervision of Sergeant Raban" Woodside "acted aggressively towards the citizens of the Belle Glade area," Paul's suit claims.

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After Allegedly Rolling a Stop Sign, Black Cop Fatally Shoots Black Passenger who Had Hands Up. [some Trivia: how many unarmed white people have Black Cops Killed? NONE. EVER.]

How Master Taught Me. Lesson #1 all Black men are criminally suspect, approach with caution [MORE]. According to Anon, in the history of modern law enforcement there has not been a single instance of a black police officer shooting or killing an unarmed white person. [MORE] 

From [HERE] and [HERE] A newly released video shows a tense traffic stop last month in which a man stepping out of a car with his hands raised at shoulder height was fatally shot by police.

The video from a police car dashboard camera shows Bridgeton officers Braheme Days and Roger Worley in a Dec. 30 traffic stop that escalates quickly after Days warns his partner about seeing a gun and then saying that the vehicle's passenger was reaching for something in the car. It ends with passenger Jerame Reid disregarding Days' order to not move, slowly getting out of the car and being shot to death. He had his hands up in the air. 

The driver, Leroy Tutt, is seen showing his hands atop the open window on his side of the car. It's not clear what Reid is doing, though Days repeatedly warns him not to move during an interaction that lasts less than two minutes.

"I'm going to fuckin shoot you," Days shouts. "You're going to be fucking dead. If you reach for something, you're going to be fucking dead."

"I ain't got no reason to reach for nothing, bro, I ain't got no reason to reach for nothing," Reid says as Days continues to yell to his partner that Reid is reaching for something.

Reid then says, "I'm getting out and getting on the ground." Days tells him not to move, but Reid repeats that he's getting out.

The passenger door then pops open, but it's not clear whether Reid or Officer Days opens it. Reid then emerges from the vehicle. His hands are at about shoulder height, and they appear to be empty. As he steps out, the officers fire at least six shots, killing him.

Days is out of the frame when the shots ring out. It's unclear how many times each officer shoots.

Prosecutors say a gun was recovered however some witnesses say that Reid was unarmed. [MORE] and [MORE]. Apparently, if a gun was found it was not on the person of Reid and not in the glove box. Thus, it seems he posed no actual threat to the frightened cop when he got out of the car. Tahli Dawkins, who was taking out his recycling at the time of the shooting, told NBC10 he witnessed the incident.

"He had nothing in his hands," Dawkins said. "He had his hands up trying to get out of the car, one on the door was getting out like this and he just started shooting him." [MORE] At a press conference Wednesday activist Walter Hudson said, "Jerame Reid complied to the officer's demand, got out the car and he received a hail of bullets."

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During "Knock & Talk" [white supremacy] Operation: White Orlando Cops Sneak & Murder Unarmed Black Man Watching TV on Couch. Cops then Denied Medical Treatment, suit alleges

From [HERE] An Orlando police killing of a Black teenager during a controversial knock-and-talk operation in 2013 now faces a wrongful-death lawsuit in federal court.

Karvas Gamble Jr., 19, died when eight Orlando drug agents responded without supervision to a week-old tip and opened fire under such questionable circumstances that the Orange-Osceola State Attorney's Office reviewed this and other fatal law enforcement confrontations. All the cops involved apparently were white. 

"Our conclusion bluntly is that this should not have happened," a grand jury wrote of the 19-year-old's death. White prosecutors sought no criminal charges against the white cops. 

The lawsuit filed in federal court in Orlando on behalf of Gamble's parents seeks more than $75,000 from city government as well as three police officers. The lawsuit said Karvas Gamble Jr. was unarmed when police wearing dark, plain clothes hid outside the house and then -- without any warning -- shot their unarmed son.

The suit targets OPD and three officers for the "unnecessary and violent murder of an unarmed young man at the hands of heavily armed Orlando Police Department officers during an execution of a warrantless operation." At the time, police said Gamble reached for a gun. But the lawsuit says he had no weapons, broke no laws, was not under arrest, and was not a threat to himself or others.

According to the suit, on Jan. 16, 2013, eight drug agents sneaked up in the dark outside a building on Arlington St. where Gamble and friends were inside.  Gamble was watching TV when undercover officers hiding outside shot through an open window and killed him. One of the officers though he saw the teen reaching for gun and fired, hitting him in the belly.

The lawsuit says the officers went on the investigation based off a "stale" and unverified drug tip. The operation was poorly planned, but the purpose was to "knock and talk" with people inside, claimed the suit, but when Gamble turned toward the window, Officer Christopher Bigelow shot him through an open window.

Citing fire department records, the family's lawyers accused police of waiting 20 minutes before calling an ambulance as Gamble lay mortally wounded and then not allowing paramedics for 15 minutes to treat him.

"It shows a complete failure of the department to do these types of operations safely," Attorney J. Clancey Bounds of Maitland said Friday. "They put themselves in danger and an officer thought it was appropriate to shoot this young man through a window."

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North Miami Beach Cops Used Black Mug Shots for Target Practice

From [HERE]  National Guard Sgt. Valerie Deant and her fellow soldiers went last month to a firing range in Medley, Fla. What they saw there made them angry. Not only had North Miami Beach Police snipers who had used the range before them used mug shots of six African-American men as targets, but one of the men pictured was Deant's brother. The mug shots were riddled with bullets.

"I was like, 'Why is my brother being used for target practice?' " Deant told NBC6, which first reported this story on Thursday.

The mug shot of Woody Deant, her brother, was taken 15 years earlier. She said it had bullet holes in the forehead and an eye. Woody Deant had been arrested in connection with a drag race in 2000 that left two people dead; he spent four years in prison.

North Miami Beach Police Chief J. Scott Dennis [racist suspect in photo] acknowledged that his officers, who had selected the targets, could have used better judgment. But he denied racial profiling was at play, noting that the sniper team included minority officers. He said his department also uses pictures of whites and Hispanics for target practice.

But, he said: "Our policies were not violated. There is no discipline forthcoming for the individuals who were involved with this." [more on the psychopathic racial personality] 

[If you are Black you can be Legally Executed by White Cops Anytime, Anyplace] Mistrial for Police Chief who Killed Unarmed Black Man During "Parking Ticket" Arrest

Former Black Police Officer Executed by Terrified White Cop From [HERE] and [MORE] Judge Edgar Dickson of the South Carolina Circuit Court, on Tuesday, declared a mistrial in the murder case against a former police chief for the 2011 killing of an unarmed black man. Thisdecision followed the jury remaining deadlocked after 12 hours of deliberation. Former police chief of Eutawville, Richard Combs allegedly shot 54-year-old Bernard Bailey in the town hall parking lot in May of 2011. If convicted, Combs may have faced a sentence of life in prison. Bailey was a former correctional officer. [MORE]

Nine of the 12 jury members thought he was guilty of murder, but three accepted his argument that he had acted in self-defence. To avoid a hung jury, all 12 members must be unanimous.

The seven black and five white jurors could have found Combs not guilty, guilty of murder or guilty of voluntary manslaughter. Murder carries a penalty of 30 years to life in prison without parole. Voluntary manslaughter carries two to 30 years in prison and would have meant Bailey’s killing was illegal but it happened because of passion.

The prosecution now has the opportunity to bring fresh murder charges against Mr Combs. “I'm going to take a little time, but we’re going forward,” prosecutor David Pascoe told the Associated Press.  Eutawville officials had previously reached a $400,000 settlement in a lawsuit brought by members of Mr. Bailey’s family for the actions of the white cop. 

By every account, Mr. Bailey and Mr. Combs met for the first time in March 2011, after Mr. Combs stopped Mr. Bailey’s daughter for a broken taillight. Mr. Bailey went to the scene and, according to Mr. Combs, was "belligerent." 

Although Mr. Bailey was not arrested during that early-morning stop, Mr. Combs sought a warrant for obstruction of justice. "Obstruction of justice" for obstructing what? Arrested for being belligerent? A white judge approved the request, but Mr. Combs did not try to serve it for more than a month. Instead, he said, he planned to arrest Mr. Bailey on the day when his daughter would make a court appearance about the traffic infraction.

But Mr. Bailey visited the Town Hall on May 2, a day before his daughter’s court date, to discuss the citation, and Mr. Combs decided then to attempt an arrest. Mr. Bailey, described by witnesses as angry and stunned, tried to leave without being detained. [Arresting him for what again?]

According to Mr. Combs, Mr. Bailey shoved him away during a subsequent skirmish in the Town Hall’s parking lot.

After Mr. Bailey started his truck’s engine and shifted the truck into reverse, Mr. Combs said, “I thought I was going to die. I thought I was going to be run over by the truck.” He drew his handgun, a .40-caliber Glock, and fired; Mr. Bailey died at the scene. [Did the shooting stop the car?]

Mr. Combs also struggled on the witness stand, especially when he was asked to reconcile his account of how he obtained the arrest warrant. He also appeared ruffled when Mr. Pascoe clutched the handgun used in the shooting and posed questions like, “How did Mr. Bailey feel when you shoved State’s Exhibit 1 in his face?”

One witness said that after the incident Combs was calming drinking coffee as if nothing had happened. [MORE] Most white people function as psychopaths in their relations with non-whites. [MORE]

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Albuquerque Police Cops Charged With Murder of Homeless Man

[MORE] 

Racism is the Smoking Gun: White NYPD Cops Planted Evidence, White Prosecutors Brought Case Against Innocent Black Man

From [HERE] A Black man who claimed the police manufactured gun-possession charges against him had his case dismissed on Thursday, amid two investigations into the practices of a group of police officers in the 67th Precinct in East Flatbush.

The man, Jeffrey Herring, had maintained his innocence ever since his arrest on June 4, 2013, asserting that officers had planted the gun on him and fabricated the circumstances of his arrest. As the charges were dismissed, Mr. Herring, 53, a rangy man dressed in gray slacks and a blue oxford, brought his hands up to his face, his eyes tearing up. If convicted of the top charge of gun possession, he could have faced up to 15 years in prison.

The officers claimed that they got a tip from a confidential informer that Mr. Herring had a gun. Prosecutors had been instructed to bring the informer to court on Thursday; the defense had challenged whether that informer even existed. Prosecutors were ordered numerous times since last October to produce the informant who police said led them to Herring. They claimed a month ago that he was found, but still didn’t bring him to court. [MORE]

At the hearing, prosecutors offered no evidence or mention of that informer.

“Based upon information provided to us by defense counsel” and on the office’s own investigation, said Paul Burns, an assistant district attorney, “we do not believe at this time that we can prove beyond a reasonable doubt the charges against Mr. Herring.”

Justice Dineen Riviezzo of State Supreme Court dismissed and sealed the case, saying she was “glad to hear there’s an ongoing investigation.”

In 2011 a court found that NYPD cops had been planting drugs on innocent people that was a  common practice, a quick and easy way to boost arrest numbers. The practice is known among NYPD officers as “flaking,” and officers in Brooklyn and Queens narcotics squads were doing a whole lot of it. [MORE]

In researching the case, a lawyer for Mr. Herring, Debora Silberman of Brooklyn Defender Services, found others that mirrored it, involving the same group of police officers. In the other cases, defendants also said the guns were planted, with the police saying that officers saw the suspects storing the guns in plastic bags or handkerchiefs.

After the arrests, more similarities arose: The use of confidential informers was suddenly mentioned months into the proceedings, and the informers were never produced in court even after judges’ and lawyers’ requests. Judges had called some of the police version of events “incredible,” and the accounts “extremely evasive.”

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["Have you ever see one lone white man lynch one lone Black man? Have you ever seen it done without a gun?"] Black Woman Still Seeking Justice in Father's Death at Hands of Cleveland Cops in '92

From [HERE] The daughter of a Black man who died after a Cleveland police officer placed him in a chokehold has filed another lawsuit against the city of Cleveland. The lawsuit comes more than 22 years after Michelle Jones' father passed away and is the second time Jones filed suit in less than two years. Her previous suit was dismissed because she had not properly served all the parties to the case. 

Jones, who was not born when Michael Pipkins died, filed the latest suit Friday in the U.S. District Court. She is asking for at least $14 million in damages from the city. The city settled a lawsuit with other members of Pipkins' family in 2001.

Pipkins died Dec. 28, 1992, after white Officer Michael Tankersley placed him in a chokehold and smothered/pounced on him with another white cop, rendering him unconscious, according to the lawsuit.

The city also requested U.S. District Judge Solomon Oliver Jr. dismiss the suit, saying Jones was not appointed to represent Pipkins' estate and that the claims' statute of limitation ran out nearly two decades ago. Oliver dismissed that suit in January 2014 upon Jones' request. He never addressed the city's concerns.

The new case is being heard by Judge Dan Polster.

As two white cops attempted to arrest Pipkins he attempted to flee, and a struggle ensued.

According to the officers, Officer Gibson grabbed Pipkins around the mid-section and wrapped his leg around Pipkins' legs in an attempt to trip him. Both men fell, Pipkins landing on top of Officer Gibson. Officer Tankersley pulled Pipkins off of Officer Gibson, then pushed him to the ground, face down with his arms under his chest. Both officers were on top of Pipkins as they attempted to pull his arms out and handcuff them behind his back.

Officer Tankersley applied a "choke hold" to Pipkins, placing his arm around Pipkins' neck and applying pressure, thereby rendering him unconscious [and killing him]. The cops then handcuffed Pipkins. Pipkins was limp and motionless when the officers carried his dead body to their patrol car and "threw" him into the back seat, where he landed face down with his head in Rubin Smith's lap (Smith arrested in connection with the same stolen car). After driving a short distance, the officers stopped and removed Rubin Smith from the back seat, purportedly out of concern for Smith's safety. They proceeded to the Fourth District police station, with Pipkins still lying face down in the back seat. The officers dragged Pipkins into a cell and dropped him on the floor, where he lay unconscious, made no sounds, and did not appear to be breathing, for nearly fifteen minutes before officers eventually summoned emergency medical personnel. [MORE]

The Cuyahoga County Coroner's office ruled Pipkins death a homicide and the City of Cleveland settled a lawsuit filed by Pipkins' parents, Jack and Betty Blair. Tankersley resigned from Cleveland Police in June 2013. It was not immediately known when Gibson left the department.

Pipkin's death sparked demonstrations and a call for an investigation into how police treat people in their custody. White prosecutors did not press charges against Tankersley. At the time, Mayor Michael White declined a community group's request for an independent investigation into Pipkins death.

Pat D'Angelo, the attorney for the Cleveland Police Patrolman's Association, said Tankersley remained on the force and won an appeal to reduce the amount of discipline he faced from Pipkins' death.

Tankersley also got in and out of trouble in 1995. Court records show he was indicted on charges of felonious assault with a firearm and vandalism for attacking a man and breaking into his home.

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