Would Pantaleo Be on the NYPD if he’d Killed a White man in Lynch-hold?

2017-07-21 00

Cowardly Pantaleo applies the death squeeze

This week marks three years since Eric Garner was choked to death, in a lynch-hold, on a Staten Island street by NYPD Officer Daniel Pantaleo, for allegedly selling “loosie” cigarettes, a claim that ultimately proved false.

There has still been no justice for the Garner family. Pantaleo continues to draw an NYPD salary courtesy New York tax-payers. Even worse, can we say the NYPD has changed the very policies that led to Garner’s death?

On July, 17, 2014 Garner was choked to death by Pantaleo, one of New York”s so-called “finest.” Pantaleo and the other officers saw Garner as an easy target for a summons or arrest—to fulfill the quotas we’re told the NYPD doesn’t have.

The killing was captured on video and went viral illustrating the cruel inhumane manner in which Black people are treated in New York, and in America. Garner’s death was a clear example of the criminalization and economic exploitation policy that this nation endorses for Black America. Black lives don’t matter to the establishment, including to some sellout Blacks, who make police policy.

This is why Pantaleo was not indicted in a secret grand jury proceeding, where we still don’t have the basic information on what transpired. We still don’t know what was in the testimony transcripts, autopsy reports—or, even what charges were considered. Then prosecutor, Dan Donovan, was no doubt rewarded for his efforts by having cops on Staten Island vote to elect him to the U.S. Congress.

Ironically, of all the people, it was former President George W. Bush said the non-indictment of Pantaleo was “hard to understand.” At the time, Governor Andrew Cuomo said “We have a problem. Let’s acknowledge it.” It is painfully obvious we do “have a problem” when Ramsey Orta, who videotaped Garner’s death, is in jail and not Pantaleo.

Garner, like Sean Bell, Amadou Diallo and so many others, were targets of the racist quota-driven economic exploitation system the NYPD practices on Black and Latino New Yorkers. Are White communities, like Park Avenue, targeted for quotas? Since 58 percent of NYPD officers live in these types of areas in Manhattan, we know the answer to this question.

Some claim progress has been made in the past three years. What progress? This week, supposedly progressive Mayor Bill de Blasio said “progress” is “taking hold,” and told NY1’s Errol Louis “what I’ve done each year is talked about what the tragedy meant and what we’re trying to do to change this city and change the relationship between police and community.”

Talking for three years about “what the tragedy meant is what he calls “progress?” The mayor told Louis he will work “relentlessly” to reform the NYPD. He also said his job was “not to continue to take us backwards” but to try and “figure out a path forward.”

The path forward is to hold anyone accountable for crimes committed whether they be civilian, or policeman. Why has Pantaleo not been fired yet?

This mayor took a step backward when he made a political calculation to skip a meeting with the Garner family this year. He chose to do so while meeting with police, so he could suck up and appease them even though there are some, like Pantaleo, who should not be wearing a uniform; the only one he deserves is one with stripes.

But this mayor is just as cowardly as other “progressive” Democrats in New York, and around the country, who remain silent while police maim and murder Black Americans across the country. How can we expect Republicans to speak out against racist police brutality when so-called progressive Democrats act deaf, dumb and blind? I ask again, why is Pantaleo wearing police uniform?

Elsewhere, let’s remember that in Missouri, Senator Claire McCaskill, and then Governor Jay Nixon, didn’t press for the recusal of Bob McCullough, the compromised prosecutor, which led to the grand jury fiasco there in the Michael Brown case, against Officer Darren Wilson.

In Chicago, Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s lackeys concealed the horrific video of Officer Jason Van Dyke’s cold-blooded murder of Laquan McDonald on October 20, 2014, to protect his reelection prospects.

Black America needs to reassess its political relationship with Democrats. Why are liberal Democrats so silent on this issue in the Congress? It is crystal clear White progressives have an equal aversion to standing up strong and speaking out forcefully against the racist police brutality that is killing the same Black people whose votes they are always begging for. Is this because the violence doesn’t impact them directly so they can’t relate to it on an emotional human level?

In New York, when Mayor de Blasio hired Bill Bratton as NYPD commissioner that was the first sign of his own cowardice. Why would a supposed progressive, elected on the votes of Black and Latino New Yorkers hire the man who was one of the main champions of the bigoted “Broken Windows” right wing policy?

People were busy breaking entire nations with high level crimes on Wall Street but Black and Latino folk are the ones regarded as predicate criminals –through ethnic designation as belonging to a Broken Windows class.

The Bratton choice undermined de Blasio’s credibility.

He did this to assuage the concerns of White NewYorkers, including those in the NYPD; instead of challenging New Yorkers to think about the economic deprivation Black people face and the consequences on their communities.

Like other politicians, he is afraid of the lobbying power of police unions. Voters are more powerful then these unions.

Even after hiring Bratton, NYPD officers engaged in one of the most shameful episodes of insubordination, turning their backs on the mayor, during the funeral of former NYPD Officer Wenjian Liu, who was killed along with Officer Rafael Ramos, by Ismaaiyl Brinsley on Dec. 20 2014. Bratton did nothing to discipline these officers.

Instead, Bratton took the opportunity to criticize peaceful protesters, saying the killings were a “direct spinoff” of the protests.

Will police leaders ever take responsibility for the hate they have created by tolerating those who engage in murderous actions like Pantaleo or trying to blackmail the mayor through disloyal actions?

A very similar thing happened recently, when officers again disrespected the mayor by turning their backs on him during the funeral of Officer Miosotis Familia, who was killed by Alexander Bonds on July 5. Like his predecessor, current Commissioner James O’Neill seems not to have had much of a problem with the disrespect of these officers.

And like Bratton, he pretends there are no people in New York who hate the police.

Listening to Commissioner O’Neill, one would think police treat Black people with the same respect as White people. Would any White New Yorker be a victim of choke-hold death like Garner was over allegedly selling “loosies?” Would Pantaleo still be on the NYPD if he’d been videotaped killing a White man under such circumstances?

One of the most stunningly hypocritical statements Commissioner.O’Neill made, during the funeral of Familia, was when he said :Hate has consequences. When we demonize a whole group of people whether that group is defined by race, by religion, or by occupation this is the result.” If only he could honestly analyze his own spoken words he would understand why many Black Americans don’t trust cops.

Indeed, “hate has consequences.” And police have played s role in some of the :blowback” hatred we see around the country given the hateful killings of unarmed Black folk that go unpunished. Some police officers do the dirty work of the political elites who’ve hired them to terrorize and criminalize Black people; the tradition dates back to the slave patrols era.

O’Neill, like Bratton before him, used the tragic death of this officer to cover-up and gloss over the unaccountable atrocities and crimes racist officers like Pantaleo inflict on Black people.

Have the NYPD stopped racially profiling Black people to fulfill their quota requirements? Have the “collars for dollars” scheme where officers receive extra pay and promotions for making maximum arrests and summonses stopped?

Of course not.

These nefarious schemes should remind us of how
police and court officials were balancing their budget on the backs of Blacks in Ferguson, Missouri with tickets written up on imaginary or concocted violations.

All life is precious. The lives of Eric Garner, Sean Bell, Amadou Diallo, Timothy Stansbury, and many others in New York alone were just as precious as that of Miosotis Familia, Rafael Ramos or Wenjian Liu.

Somehow, when police kill innocent Black people we never get heartfelt speeches from the likes of Commissioner O’Neill because of fear of what Pat Lynch the police union boss would say.

Until Black lives, like Eric Garner’s true matter to the political and police establishment — just as much as that of any cop– Black Americans will get no justice and must start standing up for their human rights.

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