Executed ‘Walking While Black' in Miami
by Mel Reeves
"The State Attorney's office has failed to indict a single officer in brutality and wrongful death cases in over 20 years."MiamiVigil
On a warm night in late October in this tropical oasis an unarmed 19 year-old Haitian immigrant Gracia Beaugris was shot dead by a Miami Dade police officer. His crime? Walking While Black! What will be done about it, without continuing public pressure including national pressure, probably nothing?
Beaugris was only 20 yards from his front door in a North Miami neighborhood, when he was killed by Officer Christopher Villano. Community leaders called it an execution. But of course that is too inflammatory and leads folks to suspect that we aren't willing to give the police the benefit of the doubt. Beaugris, a clean and conscientious kid, was killed while walking home from the Laundromat. Ironically, his burial was scheduled for November 17, exactly six years to the day that he arrived in this country.
It appears that the young man died because he had gotten, "sick and tired of being sick and tired." He had been hassled by the cops before, he heard stories about his boys being harassed by police, surely he was probably aware of other folks being harassed who looked like him. So when this cop stopped and frisked him and his friends, he decided to object by asking, "Why?"
That question may have gotten him killed. According to witnesses, when the youth asked why he had been stopped and frisked, the officer cursed at him and pushed him. Beaugris offered resistance and was choked and then shot in the arm by the officer, which caused him to fall to the ground.
What has the community so outraged is that the cop then shot the teen two more times - once in the head - while he lay on the ground defenseless, killing him. Calling it a murder would not be inappropriate.
The cop, according to police, can't give a statement just yet; the top brass claim something about not wanting to grant immunity. But I and the community suspect, it's probably because he and his cronies are trying to find out what people witnessed, so they can spin the tale better. Villano -which in Spanish literally means villain - said through his attorney that the kids jumped him and beat on him. Now, knowing the cops like we do, we know that if they had any evidence that someone hit or scratched the cop they would have photographed it, and the "running dogs" known as the big business media would have rushed to show it all over our TV screens and in print. But there were no pictures, or film of his injuries forthcoming. Hmmm.
"The cop shot the teen two more times - once in the head - while he lay on the ground defenseless."
And further inflaming intentions, an attorney for the so-called police union - police union is an oxymoron - implied the shooting was justified. He said in the Miami Herald, "he [Villano] would have been justified in shooting earlier." The community took that to mean he should have shot the teen right away.
The first response of Miami Dade city government was to send its Community Relations specialists into the neighborhood. The first words that came out of the mouth of one of them on the scene a few days later, was, "we want to prevent any violence." There used to be a name for folks who did this kind of work. So they weren't really interested in what the community was interested in, which was justice. They just wanted to put water on the fire that the power structure started.
But we activists beat them to the punch and began organizing so that the people could have a disciplined and organized effort to fight for justice. Max Rameau of CopWatch and a longtime Miami community activist organized a vigil, which quickly turned into a protest. Speaker after speaker denounced the shooting - including myself as a representative of the NAACP. Some speakers called it a murder or an execution. The president of the Miami Dade NAACP said he was tired of police shooting our folks. The speakers represented both the African American and Haitian communities.
This story is somewhat known generally in our community, but we're still struggling to get out the truth because the "official" big business press, The Miami Herald, has printed the officers side, which is in essence, "hearsay." Yet the press have been careful not to present the other side, or the side of the story as witnessed by youth on the scene - to do so, they would tell you, would be the same as printing "hearsay."
Of course, this is the double standard every community in the US faces when an officer of the law kills or brutalizes someone. Usually an attempt is made to smear the victims' reputation, to make the victim look as bad and crazy and criminal as possible. The idea is to insinuate that the victim deserved what he got.
Adding Insult to Injury
"We want someone from our community who is not a part of the power structure, who we trust to help conduct this investigation."
The Community Relations Board organized its own meeting. Miami Dade Police Chief Robert Parker, the State Attorney's office and members of the Community Relations Board all gathered to tell the community that an investigation is being conducted. However, the assembled citizens were united in telling these representatives of the power structure that they don't trust them to investigate themselves.
While the primary demand is for the prosecution of the cop that killed Beaugris, the other important demand is for an independent investigator.
"We do not believe the police can police itself," declared Marleine Bastien, a longtime Miami Haitian rights activist. "That's why we've heard calls for an independent investigation."
When the highly degreed and very intelligent panelists acted as if they couldn't understand the concept of "independent," someone from the audience made it clear. "What we want is someone from our community who is not a part of the power structure, who we trust to help conduct this investigation, because we don't trust you."
The State Attorney's office has failed to indict a single officer in brutality and wrongful death cases in over 20 years. During that time there have been dozens of cases of apparent police misconduct and more than a dozen Black men have died at the hands of police, under questionable circumstances.
The African American police chief seemed to take personal the idea that he, a black man, was not trusted by other blacks. Unfortunately for Chief Parker, he is not very gifted in the art of verbal sparring, so he fell back on the retort that, police in the US are better than any in other parts of the world. Of course everyone probably thought at the same time, "you old Tom, we're not in any other part of the world, we're in Miami where black folk still don't get respect."
Before I could get this article written another Black man died in police custody after being tasered by the Miami Dade police. He had been driving erratically when stopped and police are sure that they will find that cocaine had something to do with his death.
Mel Reeves is a political activist and journalist living in Miami. He can be contacted at mellaneous19@yahoo.com.
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