Transcripts For KQED Frontline 20240712

Public broadcasting. Major support is provided the john d. And catherine t. Macarthur foundation, committed to buildg a more just, verdant and peaceful world. The Ford Foundation wi workin visionaries on the frontlines of social change worldwide. Additional support iided by the abrams foundation, committed to excellence in journalism. The park foundation, dedicated to heightening Public Awareness of critical issues. And by the frontline journalism fund, with major support from jon and jo ann hagler. And Additional Support from Laura Debonis and scott nathan. Policing lice 2020 is supported by chasing the dream, a public Media Initiative from the wnet group in new yk that examines poverty, justice, and Economic Opportunity in america, with funding by the jpb foundation. Please. Please please, i cant breathe et get up,n the car i cant move itin the whole wailing just get up and get in the car mama. Getp and get in the car right mama. I cant ideo continues on computer jelani cobb the Minneapolis Police had responded to a call that a man had tried to use a fake 20 bill at a corner store. Oure stopping his breathing right now, bro, you think thats cool . Cobb they pulled him from his ca put a knee on his neck. Hes not even resisng arrest right now, bro. Minutes some eigh later, george floyd was dead. Is he breathing right now . Check his pulse i not gonna have this conversation. Ul check his cobb i watched the video at home in new york. George Floyd George Floyd c b i watched the unrest in people screaming . The outbursts of violence. people shouting . And the president senin federal officers. I am your president of law and order. Cobb all in the midst of a pandemic iwhich black people have died at more than twice the lack lives matter black lives matter cobb the ary tableau in the streets is a reckoning with the fact that, in this country, race is a shorthand for a set l ofe probabilities. Whats his name . George floyd whats his name . George floyd cobb the odds are different in black america. Of dying of covid. Of being poor. No justice npeace cobb of being incarcerated. Of being abused or even killed by the police. Donthoot hands up dont shoot hands up dont shoot people shouting cobb six years ago, when i was covering the last uproar over Police Brutality for the new yorker. People have been out here now for, you know, ten nights, 11 nights in a row. In fergus and baltimore. Ive talked withoung peoplere there seemed to have been, you know, really entrenched distrust for the police before. And at the dawn of the black lives matter movement. If youre simply relng on the mechanisms of kind of bureaucracy to function on yourn behalf, it going to happen. I teamed up with frontline to report onhat it would take for policing to ever be different. History of deep distrust between police and African Americans newark, new jersey a city that still bore the onars of a violent rebelli in 1967, after a white cop beatp a black cab driver. S race rocked new jerseys largest city, newark, for five consecutive days and. Nights at least 24 persons are kill. Cobb five decades later, the problems persisted. When i arrived, the city had just been singled out by the department of justice policing for routinelyry violating peoples civil rights. Racial profiling. Unconstitutional stops. Stop and frisk, excessive force. Cobb particularly black people. But newark was also becoming a laboratory for ways to improve policing. The Justice Department had begun to mandatehanges, and residents had recently elected a mayor who was a longtime advocate for Police Reform. He was also an old friend of mine ras baraka. Wed gone to college together. Wed been activists together. I wanted to know how he planned on changing things around here. R hi, mrs. Baka, how are you . So good toee you. His mother, amina, answered the doorn this visit in november of 2015. Ive been coming over here, andt g around and reading yalls books, and eating your food and all that. I had visited the baraka house many times over e years, first as a friend and classmate, and then later as a young historian to interview hiser faamiri baraka, who was a legendary poet and leader in the black power movement. Here comes the mayor, on time. Cobb that is amazing isnt it . Cobb mayor barak wed seen each other occasionally over the years. We can sit down and start talking. But decades had passed since college. You came in 86. Cobb it was the start of a series of conversations we had about transforming policing. laughter we began with a shared memory. Im pretty sure you remember this. In 1991, you, me, four other people, we were in cortlandt, new york, to have an activist retreat. We deced we were going to go hike up this mountain. And, um, six of us walking down this road, and theres a police car r each of us. They want us up against the cars, and that experience, in some ways, it was formative. Like, this is the function. Of the police. Cobb of the police. Yeah, yeah. I remember i didnt go back outside, either. That was. Its crazy. That was just a crazy situation. E but all of tinds of in know, growing up as a black boy in newark, you get thrown on the wall, yothe wt searched, you get put on theou. Those kinds of things i went through regularly. To come and disrupt and cause,is um, you knowhavoc, almost. And the real dichotomy othat is that we still thought that they should be doing their job in the community at the same if something happeou call the police. And, um. So its like youre stuck. Cobb weve talked about those formative experiences at, that we had as young people. And en you come home and become involved in politics. Nts there an idea that policing could be differe that this was something that there was a means of changing s . What the poliunction is in the community, how they relate to the community. All of those tngs i think can behanged. Its difficult and its, like, a heavy lift, but i would rather be involved in a process ofsi doing that thaing around being the victim of it. Cobb baraka had only been in power for a short time, but hey was alreking big steps to transform the relationship between the police and the community. No justice no peace no justice no peace cobb for years. Welcome to the newark Municipal Councils publicin me cobb . People in newark had been calling for civilian oversight of the police. Ps i been robbed by the coi done been assaulted by the cops. Ive been a victim of them more than once. Ive been a victim of retaliation after reportg police abuses. Cobb and in 2016. Motion to close the public hearing. Cobb . Baraka helped push the idea thrgh t city council. Unanimously, yes. cheers and applause cobb . Creating a uniquely powerful civilian view board with the power to subpoenaco and end discipline. But that vote was just a first step. T and at time, there was concern and opposion among the police rankandfile. I wanted to understand their harspective. To see firsthandpolicing looked like in a poor city, long plagued by violence. Details this morning in a double shooting in new jersey. A string of murders in newark. Ten of them in as many days. And Violent Crime in general. As risen to more than 3,000 incidents annual cobb . And to see for myself what the mayor and Justice Department were trying to change. We had a gun robbery at 12 30 hours. 49 fairview avenue. The victim, mr. Stokes,io prevly classified gshine, blood gang member. Fairview homes, we will ride by and monitor that location. Cobb i went out with the gang unit back then, one ofth e departments most problematidivisions. Ey were notorious for their aggressive tactics trying to get guns off t street. In newark, most of the victims and perpetrators were black and latino. Good to see you, man. Likewise. Likewise. Cobb so were most of the ready . Come on, slim ar alarm chirping all right, son. Cobb one night, i rode with ricardreillo, a former truck driver, and wilbertoui an air force vet. Both from newark. radio chatter whes he at, you see him . Isnt he out right there . Come here come here, man. Were out there hunting for guns, drugs, and intelligence about gang rivalries. You guys dont know anything onout the shootings going do here . Cobb they were conducting what they called field inquirs. See your hands. See your hands. Th got someing in your pants, man . N sir. So then why are you shaking like that . Cobb basically stopping and frisking. Tt cer, radio chatter so what im trying to understano is, ho the decision get made to say, okay, we need to stop that person, or we need d toa field inquiry with that person . You as an officer, you you start learning how to reads. People, their body languag want toperson doesn take his hands out of his pockets, starts pulling away from you. Obviously, if he starts running, you know. You know more or less, when you pass them and they give you that look, you know. Cobb pice are supposed tot have wcalled reasonable suspicion to stop someone, not just a hunch. Theres room for discretion. We just wanna make sure youre all right. Step off. Cobb but in its report on newark, the Justice Department had found that police were stopping people without legal justification roughly 75 of the me. Hes only ten years old, right . Hes my little brother, yo. Rel, little man. How old are you . 13. Walking. Ght, so what you. Keep walking. Thats what we have to deal with in the city of newark. 13yearolds talking back to police. Cobb do you think he wase justified to brried about his brother . Oh, absolutely. But he sees who we are. Po were ce. He shouldnt be afraid of lice. Spread your feet apart. B cs troubling as all this appeared to me. Right there, right there. people shouting got it, got. We got the weapon we got the weapon cuff him cobb . Almost every night that we were out with the gang unit, they got a ghe streets. Welcome to the fbi, pal. Au lter cobb at the end of one and reillo about what id beeniz seeing. Im just going to ask you straig out. Is it possible to make the communities that were talkinghi about safe respecting peoples Constitutional Rights . Absol absolutely. Without a doubt. We go out there every night. Cobb but the d. O. J. Doesnt feel like thats whathappened here. Thats an opinion. I mean, we go out there. Its notny disrespect to anybody out there. Its not about race, you know, or violating their rights. It has nothing to do with that. We have a job too. We live in this city. We care out this city. This is what we do. Obb i have to tell you something, though, right . U so, i grewp in queens, right . And on. My First Experience with the police was that i was thrown up against a mailbox just like this one. Baseball game, had my uniform on, was carrying a b and a glove. The guy said it was a crime that was kind of, like, im coming from a game. The next experience i had was a few years later. I was walking with a group of friends of mine, and a cop pulled a gun on us, and told us to get on the siwalk. You can point your weapon at somebody and give them commands to comply. Once you feel like the threats neutralized, like, you know, theyre complying with you, then you put your weapon away, and you know. Have a normal interaction. Yeah, have a normal interaction. C cobb butan you really have a normal interaction ifin someones d a gun atou . I dont, i dont. You got to look at it our way. I mean, they say there was five or six males, and one of them possibly has a weapo what would you do as a policeou officencounter a group of males, one supposedly has a weapon on him . How would you confnt the situation . Cobb im not sure. But thats why i asked the question about, can you do this can this, can this be done in a way that still respects peoples rights . I think thats the question than everybody is wdering about policing. Listen, we try to go out there and respect ever ghts. Exactly. Ut were notere saying, hey, were going to violate this persons rights. Thats not what were here for. Is to go home at the end of the night. Cobb no matter what their critics said or what the federal authorities found these cops seemed to have no doubts about the way that they did their b. radio chatter that was most clear to me in hop they handled oticular stop. radio chatter yo. Yo. Hey, hold on ol hold up, hd up, hold up, hold up, hold up stop, stop, stop, stop. You want to pull away from ge, man . Youre going to t hurt. Stop resisting. Sir, i did not. Cuff him for safety. All right, si cuff him for safety. I didnt do nothing just stop. Sir, youre not under arrt. This is for your safety and our safety, ok . All right, bring him up to hisf. Stand up, man. Why are you acting like a jerk, bro . We stopped you bleep . You cant pull away from a cop. Yes, you did, sir, because you pulled away from me. Bro, i said, dont touch me, please. Because yall pulling up, what the bleepdo . Nothing. Im walking home. You dont even know what the hells going. Im going home. D yeah, ahats why were stopping to talk to you. I am ing home. When you start pulling away, its on. I didnt pull away from nobody shh. Look, we aint going to do tha if you want to do that, we could do that. Do what . Listen. Do you understand the reason why youre cuffed . No. All right. Now, when we came and approached you automatically ed away from us. No, i said, dont touch me, and kept walking. Listen. Re list, yoaking us think you have a weapon, the way you ran away. Yall are worried about me . Okay . An. Listen, just relax. Ax rel. You got it. You got it . Find out who he is. My man, its not wise to pull away from us like that, you hear . Y notfault, man. All right . You know, the violence from police is crazy right now. And, and the way yall approached m all i was doing was walking home. If yall would have said, young man, what are you doing . What are you doing today . Going home. You see how fast that was . Do not stereotype, because thats what yall did to me. Av, sir. Yall be easy. C b theops were supposed to write a report about that stop. Dinner of champions here. Cobb but when i later tried to get copy, the department told me they had no record of it. Thats lunch. Bo a to shut idown. Cobb it spoke to larger problem in newark. I just need you to sign these files out. Cobb thank you. To accordin. O. J investigators, hundreds of allegations of illegal stops or cessive force largely involving black residents had never been properly investigated disciplin by the newark pd. Many had not even been documented. Whats going on . How you doing . Good, good, good, good. Cobb i talked to the mayor about what id been seeing. How you doing . Yeah, yeah. Im visiting the precincts, man, letting them see pele in here working, you know. Cobb we met up one day whils he wouring the cys police precincts. Weve been out with the gang un. Theyre going around and getting guns. Getting illegal guns requires you rolling up on folk. Yeah. Cobb how does that happen without being the same sorts of policing that people are protesting about . Intelligence. Who is actually somebody you should probablstop, and somebody whos just ms. Marthas hat to the back, right . Llth his i mean, inigence gets you that information, not just, like, random sps thats not how you police. I me, that right there is racism. Cobb but these are black and brown cops. Yeah, so what . Cobb diverse Police Officer. Police for its not the who did it that make it racism. To me, it is the fact that, overwhelmingly, it happens to one specific group of peoples what makes it racism. It becomes systemic, and most of e from units c like that. They believe that everybody must be a gang memb, im going to gr you, and, and its wrong, its unconstitutional. Cobb not long after we spoke, the gang unit was disbanded, and one of the officers we rode with, wilberto ruiz, was fired following multiple complaints against him. You need the right people ing this type of stuff. Cobb at the same time, the mayor was welcoming the d. O. J. s help to fix the system problems here. A lack of resources and expertise and the friction of local politics have long madeor it difficultities like newark to reform their own Police Departments. Thats why, more than 25 Years Department of justicee extraordinary powers to police local Police Departments. It happened in the wake of the infamous beating of rodney king by four white cops in a. Not guilty of the crime of f assault ce. W cobb when the officersere acquitted. You bleep piece of bleep pig i ho you burn in hell cobb . The citexploded. Congress decided to act. C the critrol and Law Enforcement act is adopted. Cobb . Adding a provision to the 1994 crimbill that gave the department of justice the power to investigate local Police Departments and for them to reform. Congress thought it was important for the Justice Department to have a way tore really a and engage systemic reform in Police Departments around theountry. Cobb vanita gupta ran the Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department uer president obama. We are here today to announce a landmark Settlement Agreement between the Justice Department and the city of albuquerque. An exhaustive review of the eveland division of police. The challenges related to policing in the city of baltimore. T cob office used its power aggressively, opening 25 new investigations into Law Enforcement agencies for civil Rights Violations. All but a few ended up inen agts to carry out reforms. Many of those were court enforced Consent Decrees. How effective have these decrees been . So theyve been really effective. And look, theyre not. The net result of our work in a policeepartment does not result in a peect police depament. I dont think there is such a thing as a Perfect Police department. But we have seen in Police Departments over and over again small and big that even where theres deeply entrenched discriminatoryli ng, or problems with use of force, or lack of accountability, that those are changeable over time. Cobb on the day we spoke in 2016, gupta was in newark to sign the Consent Decree between the city and the Justice Department. I now stand before you to announce this agreement that holds the potential make newark a nationamodel. Cobb the agreement would force the city to spend millions of dlars to write new policies, train officers, and overhaul the departments disciplinary system. And i know that together, were going to be able to write a new chapter for the Police Officers of nerk and the communities that they serve. Thank you. Ew the city ofk, new jersey, agreed today to reform the way its police treatno ties. From now on, officersac tions, their use of force, and lyvestigations will be clo watched. Revise its search and seizure policy, in carnd body worn cameras, collect data on all uses of force, and create ai cilian oversight entity. Obb as reforms got underway in newark, and the Obama Administration continuedth pushinugh an unprecedented number of Consent Decrees. Friends. Cobb . An entirelyff ent view of race and policing was about to take hold in washington. The war on our police must end and it must end now. cheers and applause cobb donald trump was on his way to victory. Ofd from the very beginnin his presidency. I, donald john trump, do solemnly swear. Cobb . Investigating pos ce departmer civil Rights Violations was no longer a priority. Jeff sessions, the new attorney general, spelled it out. I made it clear that this department of justice will not sign Consent Decrees tll cost lives by handcuffing the Police Rather than handcuffing the criminals. Cobb christy, how are you . Im fine, how are you doing . O cobb gd. Thank you for taking the time to ta today. I recently spoke remotely with christy lopez, who oversaw thd. O. J. s Police Investigations during the Obama Administration. There was this narrative that many were trying to paint, that these Consent Decrees were this radical thing thatere happening, and they were not. They really were simply meant to keep Police Departments from syematically violating peoples rights. Cobb lopez left the department right before jeffer , Jeff Sessions said, at the end of therevious administration, many of youf you came to believe that some of the Political Leadership of this country d abandoned you, speaking to a Police Officers group. Some radicals and politicians began to unfairly malign and blame police as a whole for the crimes and unacceptae deeds of a few. Cobb and he then goes on to say, and let me say this loud and clear. As long as i am attorney general of the united ates, the department of justice will have the back of all honest ando ble Law Enforcement officers. applause cobb what were you thinking this was happening, as all this w unfolding . I was thinking, this mans living in the last century, if not two centuries back, and this man knows noing about policing. Because i thk he cares about police, but i dont think he realized how, what he was advocating f actually hurts police, along with black people and latinx pple. Cobb how so, how does is hurt black people or latinx people if you, iyou tell police was abandoning you because they were insisting that you comport yourself consistently with the constitution, then you are tellg police that they have a right to police without comporting themselves to t constitution. As plee dont too nice. Like when you guys put somebody in t car and youre protecting their head, you know, the wa you t their hand over . Like, dont hit their head and eyve just killed somebo dont hit their head . I said, you can take the hand away, okay . laughte cobb since President Trump came into office, he has signed two executive orders aimed at asproving policing, but the Justice Departme initiatedly on one new investigation of a Police Department, and unsuccesully tried to end pending agreements in ltimore and chicago. The Justice Department and former attorney general sessions declined our repeated requests for an intview. The d. O. J. Pointed us to public statements of the current attorney general, william barr. I think that there are instances of bad cops. And i think we have to be careful about automatically assuming that the actions ofn individual necessarily mean that their organization is rotten. Cobb there are people who say that these are systemic problems, and there are people who say that this is just the work of a few bad apples. Yeah, i think the fact that those bad apples are allowed to remain on police forces, evenaf hthve killed people and after theyve beming people, sometimes for decades, or go to other Police Departments and dohe same thing, indicates to us that ther lem is not just with these bad apple officers. There are systemic deficiencies that are allowing them to existd and to persisto continue working, and, and to continue harming people, and i have seen that in every department that i have investigated. Cobb and that, as much as anything else, iwhat set the country on fire this summer. Not only that george floyd had been killed, but that the cop who killed him had a history of complaints, yet still was on the job. We want him found gunt justice. No justice no peace cobb as people took to the streets. Justice when do we want it . Now obb . Venting their frustration with how many names there are to say. Say her name Breonna Taylo say his name george floyd dont shoot black lives matter cobb . Calling for defunding or even abolishing the lice, they were all,n essence, asking the same question can this ever be different . That was the very same question theyd been trying to answer in newark for the past several years. So, this summer, i went back to see how their experiments in Police Reform had been working out. Georg floyd georg floyd george f yd cobb one thing i noticed right away were the protests. Black lives matter black lives matter c cobb unlike in other cities, where the policefronted protesters with rubber bullets and tear gas. I cant breathe i cant breathe cobb . In newark, mayor baraka was leading the march. Mayor ras baraka, give him a big hand cheers and applause cobb howve you been . Ood. Cobb we met up in a city park. Thank you for taking time. Can you hear me . Yeah. Cobb okay. , many places in this country dozens of places in this country thereere protests that tipped over into violence. We saw police cars bng set on fire in salt lake city. Right. C b newark as a city, its almost the opposite. Things remained relatively calm dung the protests here. I wanted to understand how that happened. Historically, people know what weve been through in newark. We needed Police Reform in 1967, and we burned the city down for three or four days, and we still need Police Reform. 50 years later or so, so. They, i think, in their heart, they understood that that inf and of itsuld not give us the results we were looking for. Cobb he sayshe peaceful protests are partly due to the federal Consent Decree, whichis till in effect in newark. The department of justice has said that they see Consent Decrees as a unwarrantedde feral intrusion into local affair i wonder what you, what you make of that. Well, if it wasnt for federal intrusion, wed, wed still be in slavery. I mean, wed be in bad shape if the state or thtrusion. Municipalities cant provide harmed, then the fho are government should step in and, and defend peoples civil ts. And i think thats important. And, and thats what the federal their job. Is do cobb when the Justice Department came to newark back in 2016, peter harvey, a former new jersey attorney general, was appointed to monitorompliance with the mandated reforms and report to a federal judge every quarter about the citysre pr. So its been four years since the Consent Decree began. It how is thedoing overall . Much better. I think that newark is an wexample of what can happn a Police Agency decides tore rm. Cobb he says over the past four years, the polime depa has toughened its policies on everything from body cameras to use of force. Anyone else . Questions . A cnd implemented extensive training to help officers understand the new standards. Yo dunderstand . That wou be a plain touch exception. They ablutely didnt know the law in certain aspects. Stops, searches with or without a warrant. Arrests with or without a warrant. Theres no question that many officers did not know it. Cobb do you think that training in itself works . If its the right kind of training, yes, it works. Now, the question is, what kind of training are you receiving . Wh and part o weve done with use of force is, we took videos from other citiewhere someone was killed, and asked them questions. What should the officer dntat this p what were the alternatives that the officer could have employed re to deescalate the situation . So were using these videos to help newark officers understand that when youre in this moment, you had more tools than simply pulling the gun and shooting someone. Newarks Consent Decree isou all of the things that people complain about as being wrg with policing in the United States today, right . Like, its about search and seizure, use of force, bias in policing. Community engagementsight, all those kinds of things. Cobb deputy chief brians oharawark pds point man for the Consent Decree. Or he r to anthony ambrose, the director of Public Safety in newark, who initially expresd some concern about federal oversight. You said that its eve executives worst nightmare. What did you mean then, and do you still see it that way now . Well, i think when i say its every executives nightmare, is that, that you have monitor. And now you have someone every day or every minutein loat your policies, looking at your practices, looking at it. But i have to say, some fivete years i think that, that weve done some great things because of the Consent Decree. Weve been able to train people that, at we, we wouldnt have been able to train years ago because of budgetary issues. That it was mandatory that we had to train. If thats what it takes to get it done, then im for it. Cobb so far, surveys conducted by the federal monitor show a slight rise in trust ine thpolice. But the data ao shows that the frequency of cops using force against newas residents has been going up. Based on the data thateve seen, it appears that incidents involving use of force are up. Does that concern you any . Im gonna have him answer you. Reporting is up, which is what you want. Cobb mmhmm. Or repting is up. So i think a lot of officersid levels of force must beowest reported, even in situationsre where peopleot arrested. No one got that before. Then on top of it, after that, every month, we have a review board that meets here, and they determine, okay, do we have a a disclinary issue here . Do we have a training issue . Is there anything else about this situation . Was there an opportunity tod deescalate they did not properly deescalate . And from those, i mean, weve seen great scess. No justice, no peace prosecute police cobb but thats not how many in newark, and around the country, continue toee things. chanting cobb after the recent shootings of Breonna Taylor and jacob blake, the calls for n vilian oversight of the police have growuder. Its against your code, bro cobb newarks own civilian review board, hailed four years ago as a step forward, has actually been tied up in lauits. And this summer, the new Jersey Supreme Court severely limited its power, striking down its ability to issue subpoenas. What do we want . Justice cobb it was a bitter disappointment tone of the leading community activists, larry hamm. The Police Review bs a mechanism to give civilians some power over the police and how the police carry out their jobs. And specically to deal with violation of Constitutional Rights, racist policing tactics, use of excessive force, and unjust murder of civilians. When you saw chauvin. Cobb you mean derek chauvin, the officer. Cobb yes, derek chauvin, the officer that killed. Cobb kneeling on. Yes, that had his knee on George Floyds neck. When you look at that video, you know what the most disturbing thing was for . It wasnt the knee on the neck. It was the look on chauvins face. Cobb what did that look say to you . It said that this was a man that had no worries about what he was doing. Cobb mmhmm. He looked straight at theas cameras he wnt worried about no cameras. You know why . Because they know at 99 of Police Brutality cases dont end in a conviction. See, when itslear to them that there will be an immediate price to pay for unjustly taking theives of human beings, and unjustly brutizing people, that your going to lose your badge, youre going to lose your gun, youre gointo lose your job, youre going to le your pension, and you might lose your freedom if youre convicted, when they understand that, i guarantee you that there will be a precipitous decline in Police Brutality cases in the United States. Cobb no one fought harder itainst the civian review board than the cys police union. I have a disciplina process here for our members. Nowhere in it does it say the members are subject to discipline by an outsideyou know, oup of people. Here in the city, we got body worn cameras. Something like 50 of the complaints made against lice officersre exonerated as soon as the body cam is viewed by internal affairs. T there is a problematic cop out there, hes ing to be out there for long, okay . You know, this notion that there is just, you knos army of Police Across the country that are just out there nojust assaulting people i factual. Those guys. Cobb wl, if were talking about use of violence, there are about 1,200, 1,100, 1,200 people who are killed each year in interactions with the police. A significant number of those people are urmed. Its not just kind of people making it up. Okay, um, last night, there was a million interactions with the police and notng happened. T you makeem likthere are, you know, these ysical encounters with police are unjustified. You know, i think the vast majority of investigations reveal they are just cobb but i think that thats people would say is the problem. That if you have an interactn with pole, a sysm is set up that will generally exonerate the poli officer irrespective of what happens. You know, that, that. Cobb i think thas the criticism people are making. Im, im glad youentioned it. But the investigation reveals what the officer is alto do, right . You know, thats the beautyan the curse of social media. You see a video, everyone loses their mind. Doe cant do that, he can this. Well, maybe he actually can. You know, maybe the law, maybe why so many cops are not convicted which is, you know, part othe uproar is because tthey actually acted withir rights and within the law based e. What occurred at that t cobb the u. S. Supreme court has established at an officer can use force if they believe theres a threat to their own life or to the lives of others. Please, please. Please, t me talk to him. Cobb but still, its often a murky question whether a cop using force against a civilian is justified. Yre a bitch, too. Straight up. Oh obb take this incident caught on camera in newark in may, when officers were responding to a disturbance. video continues get the bleep . Give me your bleep hands indistinct chatter im not even resisting. Your back. Hind im not resisting. Cobb its currently under investigation. Oh im stop punchi in the face like that put your hands bend your back but you punching him, its yall gonna break leep arm cobb is that a justifiable e of force . Certainly. Cobb how is that justifiable . The suspect came at the o policefficer, he doesnt have to wait to be strucky the suspect. He took the first action. En, trying to get him to comply, hes not complying. Thats why the officers arewi grapplin him on the ground. Is, you know, is that the best place to be . Does it look goo no. Its not in the movies, put your hands behind your back a. It happens. Sometimes its a struggle. Were required to use the force nessary to get him under control. Llowedb should you be to do that . Okay, well, whats the option . Ill go back to that, if you, if you wanna play that. Cobb no, im aing you should you be allowed to do that . Ow could we not . Cobb so i thk the, the debate that were having here is that many people wld say that the fact that its legal doesnt an that its right. Okay. You know, i, i cant dispute everybodys opinion. You know, is there an opportunity to maybe take a step back . Yeah, maybe. Break down every video that we ever saw, you know, maybyou come up with something. The police arent going out there ju looking for violent encounters or looking to, you know, physically impose their will on people. What does a cop want . Om we want toto work, do our job, and go home. We want a positive interactionhe with community. Bu you know, everybodys piling on, everybodys against you. Theres protests or rallies all thtime, antipolice this, antipolice that. U know its a different difficult atmosphere to, uh, to want to be a part of in 2020. Cobb in the past few months, there have been proposals in congress to create more clearly defined standards for the use of force nationwide. Ranking senators are buttg heads over the issue. Weve asked that there would be a meaningful discussion of the justice in policing act. They dont want a debate. They dont want amendments. Cobb hus far, the bills have stalled, and a stubborn fact remains police use force against blacpeople at a far higher rate than against whites. But newarks pubc safety director says that that is just the reality of figting cri inhi city. You said, blacks are 1. 6 times more likely toopped than whites, 2. 5 times more likelyed to be arreand that police use force in those arrests 3. 7 times more often. But you also said those numbers could create a false impressn that the police disproportionately target black people. Okay, s our homicides are 20, i think i read 22is homicides ear. About 94 are African Americans. I dont condone racial profiling. I dont condone Police Officerso ing anybody up for their race or their gender or their creed or religion, anything like that, but the numbers are the numbers. Cobb newarks federal monitor is currently investigating whether the police are disproportionately targeting black ople or whether, as ambrose says, theyre simply responding to crime. But, regess, crime stats have long been citeds justification for an aggressive type of policing that critics see as an unrelenting knee on the neck of entire communities. I cant breathe i cant breathe cobb its why, right now, momentum is thering not just to reforpolice, but toan defund them invest in alternative ways to addresscrims like newark. So, one of the things that came to prominence after the, the protests started, relating to george floyd, was thisnal conversation about defunding the police. You know, as, as the mayor of, of a major city like w newark, man, walways have to be clear ancareful about how we organize and what we say. For example, i think defundings necessary, right . I think its necessary to begin to divert funding from Police Organizations to social services, other kind of things like tha cobb mmhmm. Eve been thinking about that in newark for some time now. Uh, so. Cobb hes publicly opposed calls to abolish pice. He wants to keep them, but staro treatingnce as a Public Health crisis, not a problem to be solvewith policing alone. In Public Health, some people are sick. Er and because s some people sick, you have to address them with doctors, right . You have to address sickness. If the data says that if m father was involved in Violent Crime, im more likely to been involved in vicrime, if thats what the data is telling us, thene have to intervene so that the son and the grandson is not targed by the police, but is now targeted by people who are trying to give them cial services to that they are almoranteedion to become a victim of violence and a perpetrator of ve. And treat it as a Public Health crisis as opposed to the pole response. Cobb one way the mayor has been doing that is through a s progratarted several years ago, the Newark Community street team, which enlists former gang members to defuse conflicts and work as mentors. You know, all of the conversations that are happening up here is positioning us, you know, to be the ones that reduce violence and crime in ghr neighborhood. Cobb he brout in aqeela sherrills, who had led successful Violence Reduction programs in other cities, including l. A. , where he helped organize a peace treaty between the crips and the bloods. Because, you know, we talk inabout overaggressive pol and police kling our kids with impunity. D im, like, hwe deal with it . We reduce violence and crime inb our own nehoods. Then that way, theres no need fo you know, 20 cops, you know . Becausif wmaking the neighborhood safe, then maybe we only need five, and we need to deploy them strategically. And then we can have better relationships th them because were not putting all of this presre on our cops to do things. We gonna start spliing up, this side of the street and the other side of the street. Cobb the newark street team has grown to a 50person organization. This is our 1800 number. If you see something transpiring. Cobb its become an important part of the citys overall approach to use community interventions, instead of police, to reduce violence. In july, we met up with street team workers in the soh ward. Missed you this morning. Were starting here and just walking straight down. B c talk to me a little bit about whats happening here and why the street team is walkingok down ble street. Yeah, so july 4 weekend, we had a double homicide on this block. C b wow. You know, were talking directly to the family members whove been impacted, and if there is plans for retaliation, that we convince them retaliate. Always say that we cannot stop the first bullet, but we sure can stop the second, the third, and fourth one. We coming to you live mandating with Newark Communityt strem. This is one of the arease ars thats called a hot spot. We just want to touch everybody, if you need any services, we here. Find on our facebook, like our page. Cobb the street team is also trained to answer distress calls. Theyre stationed outside of the citys schools. What time you going home, man . Cobb and theyre embedded in e hospital to help victims and perpetrators of violence with social, legal, andsychological services. Were ting to introduce more alternative ways for trauma. To actually address their youve got all of the violence that has happened over the years, multigenerational trauma. Im, like, you know, you he young guys here, man, im, like, it was astounding, brother, that most of the people on my team had been shot. You know, male and fale. Cobb wow. And their parents were shot. And their parents parents were shot. You know . Cobb trauma has been a constant in sherrills life. Dsowing up in l. A. , he lost more than a dozen frio violence, and 16 years ago, his own son was shot and killed. Hes devoted himself to conflict resolution. So how receptive has the newark pd been to your work . You know, istarted out as a tense relationship, you know . K but i that over, you know, the past four or five years, weve really gained a lot of traction. We know that the work that wert doing city is the same, its to create Public Safety and reduce harm. We anave a different approach. Were not looking to arrest,to were lookineal. Cobb you can say that Public Safety and policing are not the same thing. Thats righ cobb but in a lot of peles minds, they are. So how are you defining Public Safety . Well, you know, first, you know, safety is, is different from, for, for black people and white people in this country, right . You talk to most black, and most black folks aint never felt safe. And so Public Safety is not just the, the absence of we gotta increase that, that sense of wellbeing, where people feel okay about walking down the street at night. Cobb that involves trustbuilding with the cops, a. We this unorm is not a sign ofppression. Cobb the city holds regular meetings where Police Officers and commity members share their traumatic experiences with each other. Part of the reason ill never able to see beyond you being a Police Officer is because youre not my neighbor. Growing up newark, youve experienced some level of trauma. Ive seen my father beaten by the police, rested by the police, you know. Ive been arrested, stopped by the police, ve seen people shot, all kind of stuff. So, ive been traumatized. And police are traumatized, because they were indoctrinated that the community dont like them, that the neighborhood violent, that the criminals live here, people are gonna murder you, shoot you, they dont care about you. And so what we tryo do is go face to face, the police and the community, come face to face with those kind of realities. Brother damon, Newark Community street team. I know. Ill give it to you, brother. Cobb while its hard to attribute changes in crime numbers to any one factor. Ll just s, rather than calling Law Enforcement. Cobb the approach in newark does seem to be havinge success. Wa you can walk in this y, yall. Cobb last year, the city had a 30year low in Violent Crime, and in the south ward, where much of it is concentrated, there was a 50 reduction in homides. I think that early on, when the mayor talked about bringing Newark Community seet team in, and bringing people in, it, it had to be explained to the police division, this is alternative policing. We cant do it all alone. When it first started, i said, you know, mayor, i dont know know . His is gonna work, you cobb were you a little bit skeptical at the beginning . I wasnt skeptical, i was, i was concerd, like, all right, is there gonna be interference, you know what im saying . And, and i have to say that, that, you know, theres. T we call, we cam. I call aqeela up, i say, listen, man, theres something going on here, blah, blah, blah, could you look into or . , and he says, wer already on it. Whoo, watch out for that vicis. Cobb in july, the mayor gave11 million to programs like the street team, money he got by diverting fe percent of the Public Safety budget. Yall hit thiall hit this o . And until you adminr the training, you dont get different behavior on the street. Cobb but peter harvey, the federal monitor overseeing the forms here, cautions that the push to Defund Police departnts should be weighed against the fact that reforming them costs money, too. So is it fair to say that your perspective is that, you know, we should be increasing funding to Police Rather than defunding them . T i think you have to inv in certain components of Police Agencies if you want high quality policing. If youre not going to give Police Agencies adequateth resources focomponents that matter biasfree policing training, community engagement, useofforce training, stop, search, and arrest, internal affairs, data systems then you are asking for trouble. Cobb as the country continueto grapple with the fallout of police violence, and the frustrated callsor change when it comes to policing, what i see in newark gives me hope. Let us all take a knee. Cobb its an experiment that is trying to move beyond policing, and at least in some measure address problems that have plagued black arica for far too long. Y tha. What people really want is, thee dont want turdered running from, at a traffic stop, or choked to death because they got a loose cigarette, or, you know, their neck stood on because of a 20ll or their kid murdered in front of a rec center for playing with a toy gun. They dont want to be murdered, and the real crazy thing is, even if you defund the pice, its not going to stop people from murdering us, or make, make people see us as human beings, right . Thats not the crux of what, what we need to be getting at. And jesse said something powerful, and i dont, i dont saquote jesse a lot, but h something powerful. Cobb Jesse Jackson . Jesse jackson said, listen, heaid, we didnt struggle all these years just to have a kinder and gentler polic force. Thats not what we want, right . It would be helpful, right . Le chu but thats not the end. The police represent a larger system that, that thre enforcing these peoples values, right . More African American women die giving birth than on the streets by police, cause of inequity in the damn hospital. Every institution in america has the samealues that the Police Department has in america. The police just got guns. Cobb what struck me about w thas that so much and so little has changed. 50 years ago, a commission was appointed to investigate the cause of the newark rebellion of 1967. W you doing . Thank you for coming. Cobb im here to see the lilley report. Okay. Cobb the report laid blameth wi the police, but it also went further than that. It blamed the violence on racial inequities and the f of public education, as well as housing and employme discrimination. The authors wrote that the report refcts a deep failing in our society, and that many of these problems should have been solved by now. The question, they sd, is whether we have the will to act. 50 years later, the question remains the same. Breonna taylor rontline. For more on how protests nationwide have impacted efforts at Police Reform. And listen to our podcast with jelani cobb on race, p and the pandemic. We really need a kind of gigantic systemic overhaul in so much of the country. Connect with the Frontline Community on facebook and twnter, and watch anytime o the pbs video app or pbs. Org frontline. We are taking back our country soul of america. The narrato as america faces an historic choice. As the coronavirus explodes. Historically bad these unemployment nbers are. Protests against Police Brutality. Narrator from frontlines the Election Year traditionm critics have called a fair and humanizing look b ath candidates the oice 2020. Frontline is made possible by contributions to your pbs yostation from viewers lik thank you. And by the corporation for public broadcasting. Major support is provided by the john d. And catherine t. R macartundation, committed to building a more just, verdant and peaceful world. 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