Before Maya Angelou passed away in May at the age of 86, she had been working on a rather unique project that blended her beautiful poetry with contemporary hip-hop music. For the project, Dr. Angelou recited her own poems, while producers Shawn Rivera and RoccStarr focused on original beats and instrumentals. The result was “Caged Bird Songs,” an album whose title plays off to Dr. Angelou’s iconic book I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. The album was released in November, and now, one of its 13 songs has a music video. “Harlem Hopscotch” is Dr. Angelou’s poem that was published in 1969. One foot down, then hop! It’s hot. Good things for the ones that’s got. Another jump, now to the left. Everybody for …

Before Maya Angelou passed away in May at the age of 86, she had been working on a rather unique project that blended her beautiful poetry with contemporary hip-hop music. For the project, Dr. Angelou recited her own poems, while producers Shawn Rivera and RoccStarr focused on original beats and instrumentals. The result was “Caged Bird Songs,” an album whose title plays off to Dr. Angelou’s iconic book I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings.

The album was released in November, and now, one of its 13 songs has a music video. “Harlem Hopscotch” is Dr. Angelou’s poem that was published in 1969.

One foot down, then hop! It’s hot.
Good things for the ones that’s got.
Another jump, now to the left.
Everybody for hisself.

In the air, now both feet down.
Since you black, don’t stick around.
Food is gone, rent is due,
Curse and cry and then jump two.

All the peoples out of work,
Hold for three, now twist and jerk.
Cross the line, they count you out.
That’s what hopping’s all about.

Both feet flat, the game is done.
They think I lost, I think I won.

The video itself features incredible dancers flipping, breakdancing and shimmying through the streets of Harlem and several locations in Los Angeles, including Venice Beach and downtown LA. Choreography comes from Emmy Award-winning duo Tabitha and Napoleon Dumo (NappyTabs), best known for their work on the hit television series “So You Think You Can Dance.” The video also features appearances by actress and singer Nia Peeples (“Fame,” “Pretty Little Liars”), dancer/choreographer Derek Hough, actor Alfonso Ribeiro, actress/singer Zendaya, dancer/choreographer Ian Eastwood, Quest Crew, and dancers from both “So You Think You Can Dance” and “America’s Best Dance Crew.”

Dr. Angelou’s grandson, Colin Johnson, reminisces that music was such a huge part of his grandmother’s life. “She loved everything, from pop to country and, of course, hip-hop. With her dedication to social activism and how she illuminated the struggles and injustices of the urban experience through prose, there’s a direct correlation to hip-hop today,” he says. “She was really excited about her street-wise commentary being presented in this way.”

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The Music Video For ‘Harlem Hopscotch,’ From Maya Angelou’s Posthumous Hip-Hop Album, Is Here (VIDEO)

When Michael Sam was drafted into the NFL in May, he made history as the first openly gay man to come into the league. But, the Mizzou graduate says, there are definitely other gay men currently playing professional football. In his first interview since being cut from the St. Louis Rams and later being waived by the Dallas Cowboys, Sam sits down with Oprah and reveals that other gay players in the NFL contacted him after he was drafted. “Very few reached out to me and pretty much just told me their gratitude and how thankful they were that I had the courage [to come out publicly],” Sam says in the above video. …

When Michael Sam was drafted into the NFL in May, he made history as the first openly gay man to come into the league. But, the Mizzou graduate says, there are definitely other gay men currently playing professional football.

In his first interview since being cut from the St. Louis Rams and later being waived by the Dallas Cowboys, Sam sits down with Oprah and reveals that other gay players in the NFL contacted him after he was drafted.

“Very few reached out to me and pretty much just told me their gratitude and how thankful they were that I had the courage [to come out publicly],” Sam says in the above video. “They wished that they had the courage to come out.”

“Gay men in the NFL reached out to you and called you?” Oprah says.

“Yes,” Sam says. “[They] just showed their respect and admired my courage… It was very good.”

Though Sam declines to say exactly how many gay players reached out to him, he does tell Oprah that it was more than one. She clarifies, “You’re using the plural. ‘Men.’ Not ‘man.'”

“Men,” Sam confirms. “There’s a lot of us out there. I’m not the only one. I’m just the only one who’s open.”

Oprah’s interview with Michael Sam airs on a special episode of “Oprah Prime” on Saturday, Dec. 27, at 10:30 p.m. ET, immediately after the 90-minute documentary “Michael Sam.” Find OWN on your TV.

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Michael Sam: Other Gay Players In The NFL Reached Out To Me (VIDEO)

Mike Colter has officially been cast as Luke Cage in the upcoming Netflix series “Marvel’s A.K.A. Jessica Jones.” The show will star Krysten Ritter as a retired superhero with post-traumatic stress disorder who now works as a detective. To put the casting news in context, we’ve gathered some information about Colter and his character’s Marvel persona. Read on for five things to get you excited about the upcoming show. 1. Colter will debut the Luke Cage character on “Marvel’s A.K.A Jessica Jones” and then star in his own Netflix series. According to Variety, who broke news of Colter’s casting on Monday, the character will debut opposite Ritter on “Jessica Jones” before headlining his own series on …

Mike Colter has officially been cast as Luke Cage in the upcoming Netflix series “Marvel’s A.K.A. Jessica Jones.” The show will star Krysten Ritter as a retired superhero with post-traumatic stress disorder who now works as a detective. To put the casting news in context, we’ve gathered some information about Colter and his character’s Marvel persona. Read on for five things to get you excited about the upcoming show.

1. Colter will debut the Luke Cage character on “Marvel’s A.K.A Jessica Jones” and then star in his own Netflix series.
According to Variety, who broke news of Colter’s casting on Monday, the character will debut opposite Ritter on “Jessica Jones” before headlining his own series on the streaming service. This goes along with the reported deal between Marvel-Disney and Netflix for four original Marvel series including one focused on Luke Cage.

In the comics, Jessica Jones has a romantic relationship with Cage. Presumably, the two characters appearing together on “Jessica Jones” will explore that dynamic.

2. He will take on the storied role of Luke Cage — also known as Power Man — who has superhuman strength.
In case you don’t have a comic-book background, Cage’s powers include super-human strength and near invincibility. According to Marvel, he can “lift/press approximately 25 tons and punch through barriers as thick as four-inch steel plate.” His skin is also “steel-hard and his muscles and bone tissue super-dense.”

Cage first appeared in Hero for Hire #1 in 1972, which also details his origin story.

3. Colter rose to prominence in a recurring role on “The Good Wife.”
Fans of “The Good Wife” may recognize Colter as drug kingpin Lemond Bishop. Though his character has been integral to several story lines over the course of the series, Colter did not originally know how big a role he would play. Speaking to Vulture in November, he shared that he first believed Lemond Bishop would be just a one-time appearance.

“I didn’t think that they’d work in a character for me that would recur on a show such as this,” he said. “I just went in thinking, This is a great — this is a nice show, I like the writing, and then it just kind of led to more opportunities.”

4. Colter’s other notable projects include roles in “Halo: Nightfall,” “The Following,” “American Horror Story” and “Million Dollar Baby.”
Colter stars as Jameson Locke in “Halo: Nightfall,” the installment that introduces his character to the franchise and bridges the gap between “Halo 4” and “Halo 5: Guardians.”

He’s also played Nick Donovan in “The Following,” David in “American Horror Story: Coven” and Big Willie Little in the film “Million Dollar Baby.”

5. Idris Elba, Terry Crews, and Isaiah Mustafa (a.k.a. The Old Spice Guy) all previously expressed interested in playing Luke Cage in a Marvel project.
At a press conference for the film “Thor,” in which Idris Elba played Heimdall, the actor was asked if there were any other Marvel characters he’d like to bring to life. He responded: “I’d like a stab at Luke Cage.” He also expressed his interest at a 2011 Sony Pictures Comic-Con presentation, saying he believed he could “do a lot with that character.”

Terry Crews talked about Luke Cage in an interview with Collider:

I heard [it’s greenlit] but I haven’t gotten any calls. I’ve been hearing stuff like, ‘Oh you’re too old,’ and I’m like, ‘Man do my workout 20 years ago and we’ll talk about who’s too old [laughs]. Like I said, anything can happen, I never rule anything out. I’m game. There are no rules. What’s up, Marvel? I’m right here, baby. I ain’t goin’ nowhere. You know where I live! [laughs]

Isaiah Mustafa, who became famous for his starring role in Old Spice commercials, was also very open about his passionate interest in the role. In 2011, he told Superherohype:

I’ve already had a meeting with Marvel. I talked to them and I told them that I was a gracious reader of their comics and that I wanted to be Luke Cage. So we’ll see where they take it… I think all their [early black] characters were these Blaxploitation characters – these jokey, clownish characters – but now they’ve really developed the African-American characters. Luke Cage has a lot going on. He’s this man, he’s got all these powers and abilities and he can use them to save whatever major city, but instead of doing that he uses them to help Harlem. He wants to fix his neighborhood, and that’s what’s so admirable to me. Instead of leaving and going someplace bigger, he stays right where he needs to be and tries to do the best that they can.

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5 Things To Know About Your New Luke Cage

Hug it out, because the first trailer for the “Entourage” movie is here. The film’s Twitter account announced that the trailer would debut on Tuesday, and the first few scenes show everything you would expect from an “Entourage” movie: Vince is now a director, Turtle lost a lot of weight, Ari has an anger problem and a Mark Wahlberg makes a cameo. “Entourage” stars the HBO show’s original cast, Adrian Grenier, Kevin Connolly, Jerry Ferrara, Kevin Dillon and Jeremy Piven, and features appearances from Debi Mazar, Perrey Reeves, Rhys Coiro, Piers Morgan and Emmanuelle Chriqui. Series creator Doug Ellin directs. And, oh look! It’s Calvin…

Hug it out, because the first trailer for the “Entourage” movie is here. The film’s Twitter account announced that the trailer would debut on Tuesday, and the first few scenes show everything you would expect from an “Entourage” movie: Vince is now a director, Turtle lost a lot of weight, Ari has an anger problem and a Mark Wahlberg makes a cameo.

“Entourage” stars the HBO show’s original cast, Adrian Grenier, Kevin Connolly, Jerry Ferrara, Kevin Dillon and Jeremy Piven, and features appearances from Debi Mazar, Perrey Reeves, Rhys Coiro, Piers Morgan and Emmanuelle Chriqui. Series creator Doug Ellin directs.

And, oh look! It’s Calvin Harris.

And Billy Bob Thorton and Haley Joel Osment playing father and son… with some horses.

And Emily Ratajkowski turning heads.

A few hours before the trailer came out, Spin My Planet posted stills from the movie, showing Turtle in a fight, a giant yacht, bros in a convertible and Nina Agdal in a bikini. The trailer delivers on all of that (and so much more).

“Entourage” is due out in theaters June 12, 2015. Oh yeah.

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‘Entourage’ Movie Trailer Is Bonkers, Of Course

If you’re not in the office on Christmas Day, thank your company. But government policy may have played a role in that as well, even if you aren’t a federal employee. Congress declared the first federal holidays in the 1870s — a handful of observances, with Christmas Day among them, according to a 2014 Congressional Research Service report. However, those holidays applied only to federal workers in the District of Columbia. By 1885, Congress had extended the holidays to federal workers across the country. Even today, Congress’ edict doesn’t apply to anyone else. Congress and the president have never tried to establish holidays that apply to the states, the…

If you’re not in the office on Christmas Day, thank your company. But government policy may have played a role in that as well, even if you aren’t a federal employee.

Congress declared the first federal holidays in the 1870s — a handful of observances, with Christmas Day among them, according to a 2014 Congressional Research Service report. However, those holidays applied only to federal workers in the District of Columbia. By 1885, Congress had extended the holidays to federal workers across the country.

Even today, Congress’ edict doesn’t apply to anyone else. Congress and the president have never tried to establish holidays that apply to the states, the CRS report says. Instead, states determine their own holidays — though most adhere (more or less) to the 11 federal holidays declared by Congress, meaning that employees of those states’ governments receive time off work.

According to the Council of State Governments’ Book of the States 2014, all states have adopted New Year’s Day, Independence Day, Memorial Day, Labor Day, Thanksgiving Day and Christmas Day. All states also honor Martin Luther King Jr.’s Birthday in some way, although a few celebrate it with a more general name, such as Civil Rights Day. Only nine states don’t celebrate Washington’s Birthday, also known as Presidents Day.

“The federal government sets a benchmark,” Dean Baker, co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, told The Huffington Post. He noted that most private employers, but not all, give extra compensation to employees who work on federal holidays.

These federal holidays were created at different times and in response to different movements. Here’s how they each came to be.

NEW YEAR’S DAY, INDEPENDENCE DAY AND CHRISTMAS DAY

These federal holidays, three of the first to be established, were created in 1870. In discussing the rationale for the creation of the holidays, members of Congress implied that most states were observing the holidays already, the CRS report says.

“They always call the states the laboratories of democracy, and quite often things do begin at the state level and then percolate their way up to the national level,” Senate Historian Don Ritchie told The Huffington Post.

Members of Congress probably wanted to be in their home states during those holidays, according to Ritchie, which would have contributed to the push for a national observance. Having people off on the same days in neighboring states also made more sense when it came to interstate commerce, as well as metropolitan areas that straddled a state line.

The dates of these holidays were tied to the traditional celebrations of New Year’s Day on Jan. 1, Independence Day on July 4 and Christmas Day on Dec. 25.

THANKSGIVING DAY

“Any day appointed or recommended by the President of the United States as a day of public fasting or thanksgiving” was also included in the original 1870 legislation. Although President George Washington had issued declarations for a day of thanksgiving a few of the years he was in office, the idea wasn’t celebrated annually until 1863. That’s when President Abraham Lincoln issued a proclamation setting its date for the last Thursday of November.

For decades after that, each president issued a yearly proclamation designating Thanksgiving as the last Thursday of November. In 1939, however, the final Thursday fell on Nov. 30, and President Franklin Delano Roosevelt worried that wouldn’t allow enough time for holiday shopping, so he moved Thanksgiving to the third Thursday of November. Confusion ensued as some states followed his lead and others opted to still observe the holiday a week later. In 1941, Congress permanently declared Thanksgiving Day to be the fourth Thursday of November. Many workplaces also take the following Friday off, and some states have even designated that day as a holiday, but it’s never been recognized as such at the federal level.

PRESIDENTS DAY

The federal holiday many Americans know as Presidents Day still officially goes by its original name of Washington’s Birthday, referring to the country’s first president. It was established by Congress in 1879 and set for Feb. 22, the date in 1732 when George Washington was born.

Washington’s birthday had been recognized before that, though, with celebrations across the country, including many recitations of his farewell address, the Center for Legislative Archives says. To this day, the Senate maintains its tradition, which began in 1862, of an annual reading of the address.

The date for celebrating Washington’s Birthday changed in 1968, when Congress passed the Uniform Monday Holiday Act. That law set the commemoration of Washington’s Birthday as the third Monday of February, and shifted the commemorations of some other holidays to Mondays as well. Congress said the move would “bring substantial benefits to both the spiritual and economic life of the Nation,” according to the Archives. Congress reportedly considered the new law an opportunity for increased time for family, travel and leisure, as well as an end to workweek interruptions from midweek holidays.

MEMORIAL DAY

Memorial Day, initially called Decoration Day, was created in 1888 for federal workers in D.C. The holiday was already celebrated in many Northern states to honor Union Civil War casualties, and was likely designated a federal holiday because many government employees had served in the war and would want to commemorate it.

The holiday now commemorates dead service members from both sides of the Civil War, as well as other wars, and is celebrated in all states.

The holiday was shifted from May 30 to the last Monday of May with the 1968 Uniform Monday Holiday Act.

LABOR DAY

The creation of Labor Day in 1894 was also a case in which Congress was influenced by the states, since 23 had already established their own Labor Day holidays by that time.

The House Labor Committee noted that time off was important to make an employee “more useful as a craftsman,” according to the CRS.

The CRS report also says: “By honoring labor with a holiday, the committee report suggested, the nation will assure that the nobility of labor [will] be maintained. So long as the laboring man can feel that he holds an honorable as well as a useful place in the body politic, so long will he be a loyal and faithful citizen.'”

VETERANS DAY

In 1938, Armistice Day was designated an annual holiday on Nov. 11 to commemorate the end of World War I and serve as a “national peace holiday,” according to the CRS. The day was renamed Veterans Day in 1954 and broadened to honor service members from other conflicts as well.

The 1968 Uniform Monday Holiday Act initially applied to Veterans Day as well, stipulating that it be observed on the fourth Monday of October. However, veterans groups opposed the change and most states kept their Veterans Day commemorations on Nov. 11, the date in 1918 when World War I fighting ceased. In 1975, President Gerald Ford signed a law that moved the holiday back to Nov. 11, according to the Department of Veterans Affairs.

INAUGURATION DAY

Inauguration Day was named a permanent holiday in 1957 for those in the Washington, D.C., area. It applies every four years on Jan. 20 when a new president is sworn into office.

COLUMBUS DAY

Columbus Day was created in 1968 as part of the Uniform Monday Holiday Act and set for the second Monday in October. At the time, Christopher Columbus was already honored with a holiday in 45 states.

Today, Columbus Day is the annual federal holiday most disputed among states. For many, the focus has shifted to the fact that people had been living in the Americas long before Columbus “discovered” them, and the arrival of Europeans led to widespread disenfranchisement and death for these people. According to the Council of State Governments, at least a dozen states don’t observe Columbus Day at all, and some states and municipalities celebrate it under a different name: It’s Native Americans’ Day in South Dakota, and Indigenous People’s Day in Seattle and Minneapolis.

BIRTHDAY OF MARTIN LUTHER KING JR.

In 1968, the year Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated, members of Congress began introducing bills to create a holiday honoring the civil rights leader. Yet the holiday wasn’t established until 1983. Many fiscal conservatives had argued the holiday would cost the government too much money, the House History, Art and Archives website reports. In the end, the observation was set for the third Monday of January, as opposed to King’s actual birthdate of Jan. 15, to avoid the burden on federal offices that a midweek holiday might create.

NEW HOLIDAYS BEING CONSIDERED

In recent years, frustration with low voter turnout has led to a push to designate Election Day — the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November — as a national holiday. A number of bills to this effect have been introduced in recent years, though none has made it through the legislative process. In November, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) introduced legislation to create the holiday, though it didn’t go anywhere in the 113th Congress.

Another proposed holiday is Cesar E. Chavez Day, which would honor the labor leader’s contributions to civil rights and education. Earlier this year, President Barack Obama issued a proclamation declaring March 31, 2014, to be Cesar Chavez Day. However, Congress would have to pass an act, signed into law by the president, for any commemoration to become a permanent federal holiday.

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Here’s Who You Can Thank For Not Having To Work This Christmas

Sunday evening in Baltimore, with the nation still reeling from the shooting deaths of two NYPD officers the previous day, Fox affiliate WBFF aired a story claiming that law enforcement officials were facing increased threats amid nationwide, largely nonviolent protests against police brutality and misconduct. To make the point, WBFF included a clip of a local woman leading a protest chant allegedly urging others to “kill a cop.” As WPYR reporter P. Kenneth Burns was quick to point out, however, this claim was completely inaccurate. (Gawker was also among the first to report WBFF’s error.) The clip was taken from video filmed at the National …

Sunday evening in Baltimore, with the nation still reeling from the shooting deaths of two NYPD officers the previous day, Fox affiliate WBFF aired a story claiming that law enforcement officials were facing increased threats amid nationwide, largely nonviolent protests against police brutality and misconduct. To make the point, WBFF included a clip of a local woman leading a protest chant allegedly urging others to “kill a cop.” As WPYR reporter P. Kenneth Burns was quick to point out, however, this claim was completely inaccurate. (Gawker was also among the first to report WBFF’s error.)

The clip was taken from video filmed at the National “Justice For All” March in Washington, D.C. earlier this month. Tawanda Jones is the woman in the video leading protesters in the following chant: “We won’t stop! We can’t stop! Till killer cops are in cell blocks!” But when WBFF aired the clip — or at least a version of it that cuts off midway through the chant — this is how an anchor interpreted Jones’ words: “We won’t stop, we can’t stop, so kill a cop.”

(Here’s the original video of Jones’ chant, which a confused YouTube poster uploaded with the title “Sharpton’s ‘Go Kill A Cop’ march in Wash DC.” In the video description field, the user wrote: “Did I really hear this right?” As it turns out, no.)

On Monday, WBFF apologized to Jones, whose brother, Tyrone West, died in police custody in 2013. WBFF characterized the incident as an “honest misunderstanding.”

“Fox45 is apologizing for an error made on Fox45 News at Ten last night. We aired a clip from a protest in Washington, D.C. where we reported protesters were chanting ‘kill a cop,'” the station said in a statement. “We here at Fox45 work hard every day to earn your trust and bring you fair and comprehensive news from around the country. Although last night’s report reflected an honest misunderstanding of what the protesters were saying, we apologize for the error.”

WBFF also apologized to Jones on the air, and has since removed the story from its website. A reporter later interviewed West for a follow-up segment.

“You’d have to be an idiot — someone that hates — to say ‘kill somebody,’ especially some cops that I need to protect my family,” Jones said in that interview. “We need the cops. My community needs the cops.”

Jones has been holding weekly nonviolent days of action since her brother’s death in July 2013. She and other activists use those occasions to call for justice and accountability in the Baltimore Police Department.

Some are now asking about the editorial process that led to WBFF’s decision not to air the clip in full, and wondering how the station managed to interpret the footage so inaccurately.

“‘Honest misunderstanding’ would seem to warrant such an explanation rather than asking viewers to accept it on faith,” David Zurawik of The Baltimore Sun wrote on Monday. He went on to argue that none of the station’s apologies did a sufficient job of clarifying how “such an outrageous change in meaning finds its way on air with all its potential to further inflame passions at this emotional time.”

Just hours before the erroneous WBFF segment aired on Sunday, the Fraternal Order of Police in Baltimore released a statement on the deaths of the two NYPD officers. In it, the group condemned “politicians and community leaders from President Obama, to Attorney General Holder, New York Mayor de Blasio, and Al Sharpton,” claiming that they had “created the atmosphere of unnecessary hostility and peril that police officers now find added to the ordinary danger of their profession.”

“Sadly, the bloodshed will most likely continue until those in positions of power realize that the unequivocal support of law enforcement is required to preserve our nation,” the statement continued.

The Baltimore FOP’s response is similar to those offered by other police groups around the nation, including the NYC Patrolmen’s Benevolent Association, which has blamed protesters for the deaths of NYPD Officers Wenjian Liu and Rafael Ramos.

Liu and Ramos were fatally shot Saturday by Ismaaiyl Brinsley, a Brooklyn native with a history of mental illness. Brinsley killed himself shortly after shooting the officers.

There have been occasional extremists in the demonstrations that have swept the U.S. since the police killings of Eric Garner and Michael Brown this year. But the majority of protesters have loudly denounced violence against police, and have done so even more emphatically in the wake of this weekend’s killings.

Many, including The Huffington Post’s Paul Raushenbush, have pointed out that it’s entirely possible to support police and police officers while at the same time calling for reform of the criminal justice system and the elimination of racial imbalances.

Source article – 

Local News: Protesters Didn’t Actually Chant ‘Kill A Cop.’ Sorry For The ‘Misunderstanding’

Like father, like son. Perhaps not surprisingly, LeBron James Jr. already has game. The 10-year-old son of the four-time NBA MVP recently showed off his precocious skill set during a youth tournament in Houston. Like King James, Prince James seems to be adept at scoring himself and setting up teammates. Like the returned star of the Cleveland Cavaliers, Jr. can defend and get out in transition. “He’s got a chance,” the elder James said on Tuesday, via Cleveland.com. “If he loves the game, and he works at it, he has a chance to be good. But he’s still young, just play for the love of the game, don’t worry about …

Like father, like son.

Perhaps not surprisingly, LeBron James Jr. already has game. The 10-year-old son of the four-time NBA MVP recently showed off his precocious skill set during a youth tournament in Houston. Like King James, Prince James seems to be adept at scoring himself and setting up teammates. Like the returned star of the Cleveland Cavaliers, Jr. can defend and get out in transition.

“He’s got a chance,” the elder James said on Tuesday, via Cleveland.com. “If he loves the game, and he works at it, he has a chance to be good. But he’s still young, just play for the love of the game, don’t worry about nothing else.”

The two-time NBA champ shared the video of his son’s highlights with the Gulf Coast Blue Chips via Twitter:

Proud of you son! Great job in Houston and congrats on bringing home 1st place. http://t.co/RuxSx4QMBY #JamesGang #StriveForGreatness #RWTW

— LeBron James (@KingJames) December 22, 2014

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LeBron James’ 10-Year-Old Son Is Already Dazzling On The Court

(Reuters) – From the dingy donut shops of Manhattan to the cloistered police watering holes in Brooklyn, a number of black NYPD officers say they have experienced the same racial profiling that cost Eric Garner his life. Garner, a 43-year-old black man suspected of illegally peddling loose cigarettes, died in July after a white officer put him in a chokehold. His death, and that of an unarmed black teenager in Ferguson, Missouri, has sparked a slew of nationwide protests against police tactics. On Saturday, those tensions escalated after a black gunman, who wrote of avenging the black deaths on social media, shot dead two New York policemen. The protests and the ambush of the uniformed officers pose a major challenge for…

(Reuters) – From the dingy donut shops of Manhattan to the cloistered police watering holes in Brooklyn, a number of black NYPD officers say they have experienced the same racial profiling that cost Eric Garner his life.

Garner, a 43-year-old black man suspected of illegally peddling loose cigarettes, died in July after a white officer put him in a chokehold. His death, and that of an unarmed black teenager in Ferguson, Missouri, has sparked a slew of nationwide protests against police tactics. On Saturday, those tensions escalated after a black gunman, who wrote of avenging the black deaths on social media, shot dead two New York policemen.

The protests and the ambush of the uniformed officers pose a major challenge for New York Mayor Bill De Blasio. The mayor must try to ease damaged relations with a police force that feels he hasn’t fully supported them, while at the same time bridging a chasm with communities who say the police unfairly target them.

What’s emerging now is that, within the thin blue line of the NYPD, there is another divide – between black and white officers.

Reuters interviewed 25 African American male officers on the NYPD, 15 of whom are retired and 10 of whom are still serving. All but one said that, when off duty and out of uniform, they had been victims of racial profiling, which refers to using race or ethnicity as grounds for suspecting someone of having committed a crime.

The officers said this included being pulled over for no reason, having their heads slammed against their cars, getting guns brandished in their faces, being thrown into prison vans and experiencing stop and frisks while shopping. The majority of the officers said they had been pulled over multiple times while driving. Five had had guns pulled on them.

Desmond Blaize, who retired two years ago as a sergeant in the 41st Precinct in the Bronx, said he once got stopped while taking a jog through Brooklyn’s upmarket Prospect Park. “I had my ID on me so it didn’t escalate,” said Blaize, who has sued the department alleging he was racially harassed on the job. “But what’s suspicious about a jogger? In jogging clothes?”

The NYPD and the Patrolmen’s Benevolent Association, the police officers’ union, declined requests for comment. However, defenders of the NYPD credit its policing methods with transforming New York from the former murder capital of the world into the safest big city in the United States.

EX-POLICE CHIEF SKEPTICAL

“It makes good headlines to say this is occurring, but I don’t think you can validate it until you look into the circumstances they were stopped in,” said Bernard Parks, the former chief of the Los Angeles Police Department, who is African American.

“Now if you want to get into the essence of why certain groups are stopped more than others, then you only need to go to the crime reports and see which ethnic groups are listed more as suspects. That’s the crime data the officers are living with.”

Blacks made up 73 percent of the shooting perpetrators in New York in 2011 and were 23 percent of the population.

A number of academics believe those statistics are potentially skewed because police over-focus on black communities, while ignoring crime in other areas. They also note that being stopped as a suspect does not automatically equate to criminality. Nearly 90 percent of blacks stopped by the NYPD, for example, are found not to be engaged in any crime.

The black officers interviewed said they had been racially profiled by white officers exclusively, and about one third said they made some form of complaint to a supervisor.

All but one said their supervisors either dismissed the complaints or retaliated against them by denying them overtime, choice assignments, or promotions. The remaining officers who made no complaints said they refrained from doing so either because they feared retribution or because they saw racial profiling as part of the system.

In declining to comment to Reuters, the NYPD did not respond to a specific request for data showing the racial breakdown of officers who made complaints and how such cases were handled.

White officers were not the only ones accused of wrongdoing. Civilian complaints against police officers are in direct proportion to their demographic makeup on the force, according to the NYPD’s Civilian Complaint Review Board.

Indeed, some of the officers Reuters interviewed acknowledged that they themselves had been defendants in lawsuits, with allegations ranging from making a false arrest to use of excessive force. Such claims against police are not uncommon in New York, say veterans.

STUDIES FIND INHERENT BIAS

Still, social psychologists from Stanford and Yale universities and John Jay College of Criminal Justice have conducted research – including the 2004 study “Seeing Black: Race, Crime and Visual Processing” – showing there is an implicit racial bias in the American psyche that correlates black maleness with crime.

John Jay professor Delores Jones-Brown cited a 2010 New York State Task Force report on police-on-police shootings – the first such inquiry of its kind – that found that in the previous 15 years, officers of color had suffered the highest fatalities in encounters with police officers who mistook them for criminals.

There’s evidence that aggressive policing in the NYPD is intensifying, according to data from the New York City Comptroller.

Police misconduct claims – including lawsuits against police for using the kind of excessive force that killed Garner – have risen 214 percent since 2000, while the amount the city paid out has risen 75 percent in the same period, to $64.4 million in fiscal year 2012, the last year for which data is available.

REPORTING ABUSE

People who have taken part in the marches against Garner’s death – and that of Ferguson teenager Michael Brown – say they are protesting against the indignity of being stopped by police for little or no reason as much as for the deaths themselves.

“There’s no real outlet to report the abuse,” said Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams, a former NYPD captain who said he was stigmatized and retaliated against throughout his 22-year career for speaking out against racial profiling and police brutality.

Officers make complaints to the NYPD’s investigative arm, the Internal Affairs Bureau, only to later have their identities leaked, said Adams.

One of the better-known cases of alleged racial profiling of a black policeman concerns Harold Thomas, a decorated detective who retired this year after 30 years of service, including in New York’s elite Joint Terrorism Task Force.

Shortly before 1 a.m. one night in August 2012, Thomas was leaving a birthday party at a trendy New York nightclub.

Wearing flashy jewelry, green sweatpants and a white t-shirt, Thomas walked toward his brand-new white Escalade when two white police officers approached him. What happened next is in dispute, but an altercation ensued, culminating in Thomas getting his head smashed against the hood of his car and then spun to the ground and put in handcuffs.

“If I was white, it wouldn’t have happened,” said Thomas, who has filed a lawsuit against the city over the incident. The New York City Corporation Counsel said it could not comment on pending litigation.

At an ale house in Williamsburg, Brooklyn last week, a group of black police officers from across the city gathered for the beer and chicken wing special. They discussed how the officers involved in the Garner incident could have tried harder to talk down an upset Garner, or sprayed mace in his face, or forced him to the ground without using a chokehold. They all agreed his death was avoidable.

Said one officer from the 106th Precinct in Queens, “That could have been any one of us.”

(Editing by Ross Colvin)

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Off Duty Black Officers In New York Say They Fear Fellow Cops

This past weekend, I wrote a post on Facebook that was shared numerous times regarding the killings of NYPD police officers Rafael Ramos, 40, and Wenjian Liu, 32. I decided to share the post with readers because it seemed to strike a chord with so many. Other than correcting the shooter Ismaaiyl Brinsley’s age, this is what I wrote: FACEBOOK: The attempt to use the killing of the two police officers in NYC over the weekend (which is horrible) to discredit a social justice movement dedicated to eradicating police brutality in black and brown communities is deplorable. Further, to isolate the murder of the officers from a chain of unlawful events including Brinsley shooting his ex-girlfriend in Baltimore hours before the murders is dishonest. The posts about the…

This past weekend, I wrote a post on Facebook that was shared numerous times regarding the killings of NYPD police officers Rafael Ramos, 40, and Wenjian Liu, 32. I decided to share the post with readers because it seemed to strike a chord with so many. Other than correcting the shooter Ismaaiyl Brinsley’s age, this is what I wrote:

FACEBOOK: The attempt to use the killing of the two police officers in NYC over the weekend (which is horrible) to discredit a social justice movement dedicated to eradicating police brutality in black and brown communities is deplorable. Further, to isolate the murder of the officers from a chain of unlawful events including Brinsley shooting his ex-girlfriend in Baltimore hours before the murders is dishonest. The posts about the violence he wanted to exact against police officers were posted by him on his ex-girlfriend’s Instagram account. The murder of the police officers was not an isolated event — it was one of many despicable acts by a mentally unstable 28-year-old. To use his awful actions as an indictment against those who justly fight against injustice in our country in fact shows how mentally ill we are as a society. While you pray for the police officers, remember to pray for his ex-girlfriend who is being written out of this dominant narrative in an effort to undermine the very real need to continue to fight against police brutality, despite yesterday’s tragic events. ‪#‎blackwomenslivesmattertoo‬ FACEBOOK END.

Many of the initial reports about the killings were telling the story of a lone wolf who assassinated two police officers in the Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood of Brooklyn in an isolated incident, when there was so much more to the story.

More details about the shooter Ismaaiyl Brinsley, 28, are becoming available and it is clear that the Baltimore-Sun’s http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/maryland/bs-md-co-owings-mills-shooting-20141220-story.html#page=1 initial reports were true; the killing of the officers was not an isolated incident, although many national media outlets reported the opposite. Brinsley started on a path of destruction at 6 a.m. that began with the shooting of an ex-girlfriend, Shaneka Thompson, 29, whom he shot in the abdomen at her Owings Mill apartment. Owings Mill is a suburb just north of Baltimore where many middle class Baltimoreans reside. Nicky Wolf of The Guardian reports:

“The wound was not fatal: Thompson’s condition was described as critical but stable. Brinsley took his ex-girlfriend’s phone and called her mother to apologise, telling her it was an accident and that he hoped her daughter would live.

Then he took a Bolt Bus to New York City.

Brinsley’s bus arrived at 42nd Street and 8th Avenue on Manhattan’s West Side at 10.50am. He was subsequently captured on video, taking the N train.

At 12.07pm, after sending a message to Instagram that said ‘this may be my final post’, Brinsley abandoned the stolen phone at the Barclay’s Center in Brooklyn. It has since been recovered by police.”

Brinsley’s heinous act was a series of actions by a man that was clearly out of his mind. Who shoots an ex-girlfriend and then calls her mother to discuss it? What person who is planning to assassinate police officers posts it hours before on Instagram? While many are blaming the murder of the NYPD police officers on Mayor Bill De Blasio, why was the intel that clearly indicated that Brinsley, who was born and raised in Brooklyn, was on his way to kill cops not relayed to Brooklyn PD? I guess after folks stop passing the buck, they’ll get around to finding out how this horrible event actually happened.

In addition to inappropriately blaming those who are justly fighting against police brutality in black and brown communities and laying the killings at the feet of the NYC Mayor’s office, many pundits, union leaders and police officers have neglected to even mention Shaneka Nicole Thompson. Therein lies the problem.

The idea that the lives of the members of the police department are more important or significant than Thompson, who is an Air Force reservist and health insurance specialist with the Veterans Administration, is a problem. Why should the lives of the slain officers have more value than hers? She also serves and protects this country and helps those who serve and protect this country, so why was the media so willing to leave what happened to her out of the ongoing discussions about Brinsley?

It’s the same reason that folks that want black women to march in the streets when unarmed black men are killed by police, don’t even flinch when they hear about unarmed black women and children being killed by police. There is little to no value placed on the lives of black women and girls in this country.

Take for instance, the killing of sleeping 7-year-old Aiyana Stanley-Jones. Where were the nationwide marches and die-ins when charges were dropped in October 2014 against Detroit police officer Joseph Weekley who shot and killed Aiyana while she was sleeping on the sofa with her grandmother? When did the shooting occur? Wait for it — during a raid while filming a reality television show on police officers. Black women writer/activists like Dream Hampton and Jessica Care Moore worked tirelessly to keep the story and memory of Aiyana alive, through organizing and demanding justice. Where was the national outcry for this child killed in her sleep?

Where is the national outcry for Tanesha Anderson, 27, who was killed after being slammed to the pavement by Cleveland police officers? Anderson, who was bi-polar, died after her head hit the concrete during a “take down” by police.

What about Rekia Boyd, who was fatally shot in the back of the head by Chicago police officer Dante Dervin or Yvette Smith, 48, who was shot and killed by a member of the Bastrop County Sheriff’s Office, when she opened the door to let police officers in after calling for help? What about Tarika Wilson, 26 or Tyisha Miller, 19 or Pearlie Smith, 93? You get the gist.

To quote Evette Dionne in her blog post on a similar topic for Ms., “Police kill black women all the time, too — we just don’t hear about it,” which leads me back to the murders of the NYPD police officers and the willingness of many journalists and stakeholders to initially dispose of, diminish or remove Shaneka Nicole Thompson’s presence from the story.

Where is the national outcry for the violence against Shaneka Nicole Thompson, who is as much of a victim of Brinley as the two slain officers? Thompson, a military woman who just happened to survive her life-threatening injuries, is still in critical condition. Where are the prayers for her? Where is the march against domestic or intimate partner violence against black women organized by black men? The American Bar Association reports that Black females experience intimate partner violence at a rate 35 percent higher than that of white females, and about 22 times the rate of women of other races. The number one killer of African-American women ages 15 to 34 is homicide at the hands of a current or former intimate partner, so why isn’t Thompson’s attempted murder by a former intimate partner newsworthy from the start of Brinsley’s campaign of terror?

Thompson’s life is as important as the lives of the slain officers and the lives of unarmed black men killed by police officers. It is unconscionable to expect black women to lead marches, protests and organizing sessions while allowing our murders and mistreatment by the justice system (Kellie Williams-Bolar and Marissa Alexander) to go unchecked. The lack of regard for the attempted murder of Shaneka Nicole Thompson by Brinsley in this now international story reflects the disdain, contempt and lack of value placed on the lives of black women.

If Thompson’s life doesn’t matter in the context of being another public servant gunned down by Ismaaiyl Brinsley, the same person that gunned down two Brooklyn cops which is now an international story and if it doesn’t matter in the context of intimate partner violence, then when does it matter?

As we go forward in this movement and pray for slain police officers and unarmed black men and boys, remember to pray for the lives of black women and girls, whose murders and attacks will more than likely go under reported or be willfully removed from news stories so that a dominant narrative and hierarchy can prevail. Black women’s lives matter too — they really do.

Nsenga K. Burton, Ph.D. is founder & editor-in-chief of the award-winning news and aggregation site The Burton Wire. Follow her on Twitter @ Ntellectual or @TheBurtonWire.

Link:

Shaneka Nicole Thompson’s Life Matters Too