By Kathy Wray Coleman, editor-in-chief, Cleveland Urban News. Com and the Cleveland Urban News.Com Blog, Ohio's Most Read Online Black Newspaper and Newspaper Blog. Tel: 216-659-0473. Email: editor@clevelandurbannews.com. Coleman is a 22-year political, legal and investigative journalist who trained for 17 years, and under five different editors, at the Call and Post Newspaper in Cleveland, Ohio. (www.clevelandurbannews.com) / (www.kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com).
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Attorney James Hardiman |
CLEVELAND, Ohio-The Cleveland Branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), the Collaborative for a Safe, Fair and Just Cleveland, and the Cleveland Chapter of the National Lawyers Guild held a press conference earlier today to announce the filing today of an amicus brief in federal district court in response to a consent decree on police reforms negotiated with the city of Cleveland and the federal government. (Editor's note: An amicus curiae is someone dubbed a legal friend to the court who is not a party to a case and offers information to assist a court that reflects on the case, but who is not to be solicited by any of the parties).
“We filed the brief because there are some key areas where the decree has unworkable stipulations that must be remedied to ensure the best chance of truly effective and lasting police reforms that will satisfy the people of Cleveland,” said Cleveland Civil Rights attorney James Hardiman, co-chair of the Criminal Justice Legal Redress Committee of the Cleveland branch of the NAACP. (Editor's note: The Cleveland Chapter NAACP is led by local president the Rev Hilton Smith).
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Cleveland NAACP President The Rev. Hilton Smith |
In the matter of United States v. City of Cleveland (1:15-cv-1046) officials representing Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson and U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch, who leads the Department of Justice, negotiated the consent decree under court oversight and following findings last year by the DOJ of systemic problems in the city's largely White Cleveland Police Department. Those scathing findings include a pattern of illegal excessive force killings, vicious pistil whippings of innocent women and children, and cruel and unusual punishment against the mentally ill.
In a "Friend of the Court" brief filed Monday in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Ohio, the community groups have asked the court to order six changes to the consent degree, demands that are coupled with a climate of ongoing hostility nationwide between police and the Black community, particularly in largely Black major metropolitan cities like Cleveland.
Among the changes requested are an inspector general that does not report to Cleveland Police Chief Calvin Williams, who is Black, the barring of police from policing themselves, particularly in deadly excessive force cases, a stronger community policing commission committed to biased free policing, and the removal of blanket testimony immunity for cops relative to monitoring measures under the consent decree at hand.
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Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson |
The court can accept or reject the requests in the amicus brief , or could allow argument along with the parties. The opposition will likely file a response.
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Cleveland Police Chief Calvin Williams |
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Dr. Rhonda Williams |
“As Civil Rights organizations, we represent stakeholders who want to ensure that the consent decree best protects the interests of aggrieved communities and that it is as strong as possible,” said Dr. Rhonda Y. Williams, an associate professor of history at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, and chair of the Collaborative for a Safe, Fair, and Just Cleveland. “We want the court to know that without these key fixes, the community will be negatively impacted.”
The fight over the consent decree comes on the heels of what community activists say is a racist verdict issued in May by Cuyahoga County Court of Common Pleas Judge John O'Donnell that acquitted White Cleveland police officer Michael Brelo of two counts of voluntary manslaughter. Racial unrest followed, and 71 protesters were arrested.
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Cuyahoga County Court of Common Pleas Judge John O'Donnell |
Brelo was the only police officer charged out of 13, none of them Black, that gunned down unarmed Blacks Malissa Williams and Timothy Russell in 2012 while slinging 137 bullets.
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Cleveland police officer Michael Brelo |
Other high profile Cleveland police murder cases include Tanisha Anderson, 12-year-old Tamir Rice, Daniel Ficker, and Kenneth Smith.
(www.clevelandurbannews.com) / (www.kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com).
