Big Picture, Small Pond
When I write, my inclination is to focus on national or global big picture issues, such as our nation’s endless war in the name of_____________ (fill in the blank). Other abominations that get my attention are the relentless neutering of our constitution and civil liberties and the contemptuous global corporate rape and pillage of our planet without a thought past the next quarterly earnings report. Most recently I suggested our country’s social and spiritual disease of racism is still very much with us as demonstrated by the frequency of public execution-by-cop/vigilante of young black men, the rise of the corporate prison-for-profit and its lopsided racial make up and the acceptance of racist dialogue in corporate sponsored media and the public forum of social media. (Not to mention the local vitriolic reaction to my essay.)
I have the constitutional right (so far) to express my thoughts and I thank The Blue Paper for publishing some of them. I am proud of my relationship with The Blue Paper and honored to be keeping company with the likes of Naja and Arnaud Girard, investigative journalists and editors of Blue. Going back through the archives of The Blue Paper one can see we in Key West have our own “big picture” problems, one being the KWPD’s heavy handed treatment of African Americans in our little city at the end of the road. Naja and Arnaud and The Blue Paper, have gone to great lengths to report police abuses in our community like no other local paper has. Their interviews and videos of black residents of Key West expose a pattern of racism ranging from ordinary disrespect right on up to physical violence bordering on fatality.
Would the police perform a public on-the-street anal cavity search of a white suspect, in front of white women and children? This actually happened to an African American suspect in Bahama Village, but apparently, what happens in Bahama Village, stays in Bahama Village. The two police officers involved in this humiliating, randomly punitive and completely illegal crime had their victim bent over the trunk of a squad car and one of the officers assisting found the whole thing amusing. All that was missing in this picture were pointy white hoods…
Click here to read and see the video of public strip search in Bahama Village.
According to grandmother and Bahama Village resident Donna Winn the police weren’t always like this. She reminisced of gentler times when the police force was primarily comprised of local people that grew up here and knew their neighbors. Donna Winn and her family were on the receiving end of KWPD tactics more suited to street combat in a war zone than a quiet residential neighborhood in Key West.
Donna Winn’s eleven year old granddaughter, Shanyia Winn was home by herself and described her terror to The Blue Paper. “When I came downstairs there was a policeman at every window with a gun pointed at me so that if I moved or my dog barked, I was going to be dead.” The police officers said they were looking for a man named Marvin Smith and for a gun. The problem is, at the time the police claim to have been looking for Smith, they already had him in custody at the police station!
Click here to read Shanyia Winn’s story.
Would this Schutz-Staffel behavior been tolerated anywhere else in Key West? Would the other local media have run a story on it had it been on, say, Eaton Street? Shanyia went on to say, “All those guns… Anything could have happened – an accident. A gun could have fired. They pointed their guns at my grandma and kept her away.” These are the words of a young girl right here in Key West! A child, for God’s sake!
These reports (read them yourself – links below) illustrate a continuing escalation of inhumane treatment of Key West citizenry by some in the KWPD and ultimately must be sanctioned by those higher up the chain of command. It is difficult to ignore the unspoken wink-and-nod by Chief of Police, Donnie Lee at the vicious brutality of some on his force. What other explanation is there? When certain officers develop a history of abuse and are allowed to remain unchecked, what is the public expected to think?
The local papers do publish damage control color photos of smiling Chief Lee shaking hands with one of his abusive officers congratulating him on his service and dedication to good police work. The irony and cognitive disconnect is bewildering and would be laughable if black adults weren’t being brutalized and their children weren’t being scarred for life by those few sociopaths in uniform.
Once you know that this treatment of children and adults is actually happening in our city that calls itself “One Human Family”, you can’t unknow it. When I first read about these two incidents I was shocked that our local law enforcement would/could behave in such a way. I voiced my concern to two of our city commissioners and was told this has been going on for some time and in fact, these experiences are not unusual for the residents of Bahama Village. I was also told that the police union is very strong and adept at protecting individuals prone to violence and abuse of power.
If you are as outraged as I am, write to your city commissioners and the Chief of Police and demand justice for the victims and removal of those few rotten apples that make the entire force look bad. If you are reading this and shrugging your shoulders because you don’t live in Bahama Village you are part of the problem. A profound change in attitude and behavior of and by the KWPD is essential if we are to live up to that city motto of ours. In order for this change to occur the community as a whole must first become aware of the police brutality going on right under its nose and then show solidarity with the residents of Bahama Village. What is going on is just plain wrong. Edmund Burke so succinctly stated, “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”
~~~~~~~~~~
Alex Symington
Alex lives with his wife, Anna in Key West, Florida. He enjoys writing poetry and prose and making the complacent uncomfortable.
More:
https://keywestthenewspaper.com//article/police-point-gun-at-six-year-old-boy-and-more/
https://keywestthenewspaper.com//article/could-key-west-reach-the-ferguson-flashpoint/
https://keywestthenewspaper.com//article/monroe-countys-secret-road-map-to-re-segregation/
https://keywestthenewspaper.com//article/blue-wall-of-silence-cost-city-almost-300000/
I agree that we have a major problem here. Obviously part of it is the action of the officers involved. Above them are their direct supervisors, and then the Chief.
But the worst part is that we the people are sadly unconcerned about injustice in general. People who are not black in Bahama Village seem not to give a damn about what goes on “down there”–the Blue Paper (the Girards and you, Alex) excepted. I couldn’t get a single nonprofit to give a damn about what the County was doing to the innocent board members of SUFA, to cite an upper-class example.
The famous epigraph about the Nazi’s taking away different groups:
First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Socialist.
Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Trade Unionist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.
Apathy is a disease. As you pointed out in your “Good,Bad, Ugly” piece, look what it got us in the mid-terms…I’ve always loved that haunting poem by Pastor Martin Niemoller. Another way to put it is, you don’t know what you got ’til it’s gone…
excellent work , Alex…its great that you have a platform