Leid Stories - 08/09/13

The Community's Tired of Asking, "Who’s Policing the Police?"

Two recent cases highlight the longstanding separate-and-unequal treatment African Americans and Latinos experience at the conjoined hands of the law enforcement and criminal-justice systems.
In the Bronx, N.Y., a grand jury on Wednesday (Aug. 7) found no reason to re-instate charges against a plainclothes police officer who on Feb. 2, 2012 chased 18-year-old Ramarley Graham from the street into the bathroom of his home and shot him to death, believing the Graham was armed; he wasn’t. On Tuesday (Aug. 6), 18-year-old Israel Hernandez-Llach was caught spray-painting graffiti on an abandoned McDonald’s in Miami Beach, Fla. Friends of Hernandez-Llach said officers high-fived each other and were laughing after one of them stun-gunned him. Within an hour he was dead.
Federal authorities have said they will review both cases, but the community's tired of asking: "Who's policing the police?"