Paul Bass Photo
Allison Batson at Sunday’s “Peace Rally” at City Hall.
State Sen. Gary Holder-Winfield challenged young African-Americans protesting the police killings of Michael Brown and Eric Garner to prevent future recurrences — by becoming prosecutors.
Holder-Winfield issued the challenge from the steps of City Hall before a crowd of 250 New Haveners at an NAACP “Peace Rally” organized to protest police violence in Ferguson, Missouri; Staten Island, N.Y.; as well as Cleveland, Phoenix and Seattle.
“We have to walk out and access the power that has always been there,” Holder-Winfield declared.
“That’s right!” came a response from the crowd.
“Black lives matter,” Holder-Winfield declared. So did other speakers. The crowd took up that chant, too.
It was the third rally in three days in New Haven, mirroring similar demonstrations in cities across the country. Five hundred law students and others held a silent “die-in” shortly after noon on Friday; hundreds more demonstrators stopped downtown traffic for two hours at a another rally that evening. (Click here and here to read Aliyya Swaby’s accounts of those two events.)
“I’m not going to speak about the new laws we’re going to create,” said Holder-Winfield, who in fact helped create a law aimed at limited racial profiling of black and Latino drivers and is working on an expansion to cover other forms of profiling. “I’m going to talk about power. Power to change the system that has existed. The young people here, you have a role to play. And that role is to access that power.”
Holder-Winfield’s voice cracked with emotion as he spoke on the City Hall steps Sunday afternoon about how the Brown and Garner cases reflect the reality of living as a black man in America, and how the black community has the ability to change that reality.
“I haven’t left my house a day in my life without ID in my pocket, because I felt like that’s at least one thing I could do to protect myself. And I’m known in this community,” he said. He continued describing an age “when from the instance of your birth the system of justice views you as a criminal bound to prove your innocence, even when victimized because of your skin, when parents must arm their boys and girls with the talk—The Talk— about respectability, before they leave the house knowing their child may encounter someone in the uniform of the state and not return …”
“Your role is to become the prosecutor. We go into law thinking we have to become public defenders to defend our people. We can defend our people when we decide that those who act against us must be charged!”
The potential future prosecutors Holder-Winfield addressed were looking right at him: The Yale, Southern Connecticut State University, University of New Haven, Quinnipiac, and local high school NAACP chapters helped organize the rally and brought out their members.
“That could have been a child from Hillhouse, WIlbur Cross, or Career,” NAACP Youth Advisor Kevin Walton told the crowd in reference to the deaths of young black men like Brown and Trayvon Martin.
Like Holder-Winfield, Walton called for the young people present to become prosecutors — as well as teachers and police officers. He called as well for cops to wear body cameras (read about that here) and for independent investigations, rather than internal police investigations, of fatal shootings by police. He said those measures would protect not just victims of police violence but the “many” good officers on police forces.
Greater New Haven NAACP President Doris Dumas, the event’s emcee, also spoke of organizing interfaith dialogues in New Haven in coming months.
She said young people’s voices need to be heard in the discussion. Many of the event’s speakers were NAACP youth leaders, including Kaleb Walton (pictured), Maia James, and Jamir Esdaile of the NAACP’s Youth Council.
In contrast to the tense scene at protests in other cities, no uniformed cops were visible at Sunday’s event. The only member of the department visible was Chief Dean Esserman, pictured in civilian clothes at the far left of the above photo.
And Mayor Toni Harp was among the speakers, applauding the rallies in town and commending the New Haven police for not overreacting to being spat upon and taunted. She noted that a majority of the current police academy class is black or Latino, which means the force will increasing “look like New Haven.” The next challenge is to convince more women to become cops and firefighters, she said.
Harp’s presence and the cooperation of police signal that “we are going to be working together in New Haven,” Dumas remarked. “New Haven is a unique city,” added Holder-Winfield. “New Haven is a city where protest and activism are a part of what we do.”
When is someone going to hold Michael Brown for his own death? When is someone going to speak the truth and point out that if that store owner had a gun he might have shot Michael Brown.
Every time I see that video of that big bull push that man who was trying to retrieve the items Michael Brown was stealing, and watch Mr.Brown push that man, all I can think of is if that was my father or mother he pushed..I would have killed him myself.
Shame on every black person including Gary Holder Winfield for not speaking the truth.
Eric Garner is a victim. He is a victim of poor policies in NYC that make selling cigarettes a crime that one should be arrested for. However, Mr. Garner felt that by people filming the police that gave him the right to resist arrest which is a crime. Again No one is speaking to truth. The policy officer broke policy by wrapping his arm around Mr. Garner's neck which was a contributing factor to his death. As a result he should lose his job and pension. Let the Police Union support him if they like but not on the dime of the people of the City of New York.
We may not like the laws but we can not change them by breaking them and I don't think burning businesses showed that Ferguson really cared about Michael Brown. They just cared about continuing with the civil rights struggle against racism that many have never experienced and the type they want people to believe still exists. Any racism that exist today is a result of of own behavior.
I'm so happy I don't vote. Al hamdulillah. Allah has freed me from those chains.