Families Demand a Repeal of Peace Officers Bill of Rights!

“Where justice is denied, where poverty is enforced, where ignorance prevails, and where any one class is made to feel that society is an organized conspiracy to oppress, rob and degrade them, neither persons nor property will be safe.” ― Frederick Douglass

In commemoration of Black August Groups and Families throughout California will gather at the Governor's Mansion in Sacramento on Thursday August 18, 2016 for a Protest & Rally. The purpose of the gathering is to demand that Governor Brown and the State Legislature Repeal the Peace Officers Bill of Rights. There is also an online Petition demanding the Repeal of the Police Officers Bill of Rights, which will be presented to the California Legislature.

There have been numerous Law Enforcement killings throughout the San Francisco Bay area just within the last 5 years, including Andy Lopez, James Rivera Junior. James Nate Greer, Mario Romero, Mario Woods, Alex Nieto, O'Shain Evans, Kerry Baxter Junior, Guadeloupe Ochoa, Jessica Williams, Kayla Moore, Hernan Jeramillo, Pedie Perez, Alan Blueford, Kenneth Harding, Raheim Brown, Antonio Guzman, and Yvette Henderson.

This is a tiny percentage of those killed in the Greater Bay Area in the last five or so years. There are hundreds more who have been killed throughout California in the last 10 years. In fact, throughout the United States there is an uptick in killings of African Americans by White Police Officers, Michael Brown, Sandra Bland, Tamir Rice, Freddie Gray, Eric Garner, and Walter Scott, to name a few. White supremacists in law enforcement is nothing new of course; in part, the origins of organized police departments in America actually goes back to the slave patrols of colonial times.

The ACLU of Southern California has been working to understand how many people have been killed by law enforcement in America’s most populous state. What they found is alarming. Over a six-year period that ended in 2014, California’s Department of Justice recorded 610 instances of law enforcement committing homicide “in the process of arrest.”

1. Whites were killed at 78 percent the rate one would expect if killings were distributed evenly across the state’s population.
2. Hispanics were killed at 115 percent the expected rate,
3. While blacks were killed at 280 percent the expected rate.

In the African American Community, it is well known that policing in America started with Slave Patrols and Paddy Rollers during Slavery. Just prior to and after slavery the White Militia was formed (from poor white communities), under the guidance of those who wanted to gain and maintain control of Slave Labor. This preceded the Jim Crow Period when black women, men, and children were lynched throughout the South, and in some Northern Communities.

Now we are faced with a President Donald Trump who is so outwardly racists that he calls for the ouster of Mexicans and other South Americans, he calls for the deportation of Muslims, and the jailing of women who dare to get abortions. Those who are attracted to his message feel emboldened now just as they did when Sarah Palin founded the Tea Party. Whether Trump wins or not we will still be left with his supporters who have no love for any minorities. They are in fact supporters of the White Male Patriarchy which allowed someone like Trump and his forebearers the opportunity to profit from others labor.

Samuel Jones of The Grio (an Online News Group) reminds us that as recently as 2006, The Federal Bureau of Investigation issued a warning that white supremacist groups like the Ku Klux Klan were increasingly seeking to "infiltrate" law enforcement.

One positively chilling aspect of this 2006 FBI report is the description of what white supremacists call "ghost skins."
Since coming to law enforcement attention in late 2004, the term "ghost skins" has gained currency among white supremacists to describe those who avoid overt displays of their beliefs to blend into society and covertly advance white supremacist causes.

Black and Brown families like Justice for Mario Woods, Justice for Alex Nieto, Justice for James "Nate" Greer, Justice for Mario Romero, Justice for James Rivera Junior, and several Organizations are uniting to demand that the Legislature and Governor Brown repeal the Peace Officers Bill of Rights! No Law should give Public Servants or any other group the right to kill with impunity.

Bill Clinton ushered in the three-strike era during his Presidency. The States followed suit and today California has the highest rate of Imprisonment in America. It seems that Police killings increased once California Prisons were placed under Federal Receivership. When not being killed outright In California and throughout the United States, Blacks are prosecuted and/or given disproportionate sentences to white offenders. It seems Corporate America has no place for those whose labor is not cheap or free, when they are Black or Brown.

"Gov. Jerry Brown was in the final months of his first term when he signed a bill championed by law enforcement groups to limit criminal defendants’ access to peace officers’ personnel records. The measure “represents a substantial step forward in protecting the rights of law enforcement officers in this state,” then-Attorney General Evelle Younger, Brown’s Republican rival in the upcoming fall election, said in a letter urging Brown’s support.

More than 35 years later, the 1978 law is part of a nearly impenetrable barrier restricting public access to law enforcement disciplinary records and civilian complaints in California.

Eighty-three percent of voters backed enshrining the state’s open-records law in the Constitution a decade ago. Even so, open-records advocates say California residents today have some of the least access to law enforcement records of anywhere in the country. Bills to tighten the restrictions, pushed by politically influential law enforcement unions, routinely sail through the Legislature. Attempts to provide more disclosure have been few and unsuccessful.

Under state law, peace officer personnel records are confidential, including personal data, promotion, appraisal and discipline records, and “any other information the disclosure of which would constitute an unwarranted invasion of personal privacy.” Only a judge can order their release as part of a criminal case or lawsuit.”

Judges who depend on donations from the Fraternal Order of Police, Police Officers Association, or the Prison Guard Union seldom come out against the Peace Officers Bill of Rights!

It is left to those impacted by these Genocidal Acts to raise our voices and demand representation, which is sorely lacking. Killings by Law Enforcement has increased whether by shooting, beating, or by denying medical assistance to someone shot in Urban Areas. Now Urban Areas and rural areas have become killing fields.
The numbers are climbing and we will not allow the continued Genocide of our people. Black, Brown, and Native are joining forces during Black August (and beyond) to demand action from Politicians and to remind them they are, “Elected” Officials, and Law Enforcement Officers are Public Servants paid by our tax dollars!

JOIN US IN SACRAMENTO ON AUGUST 18, 2016 FROM 9 AM – 3 PM

#RepealPeaceOfficerProtectionBill

1. The document that Jones refers to is a 7-page unclassified document published by the FBI.
2. By Jim Miller - jmiller [at] sacbee.com; http://www.modbee.com/news/state/article3162015.html#storylink=cpy