Ex-Police Gets 30 Years:
Some thoughts on New York

 “I’m going to prison ... it’s a humble experience and I’m 27 years old.” Volpe said, as he wept in court.
       

"Yet, in 1999, New York, a city of diversity and supposed sophistication, is plagued by racial bigotry, prejudice and divisiveness that goes beyond that which southern states have ever produced."

"Yet, in 1999, New York, a city of diversity and supposed sophistication, is plagued by racial bigotry, prejudice and divisiveness that goes beyond that which southern states have ever produced.  How can there be people who know so well the pains of bigotry and hatred, exercising such influence in this city, and there still be a call to hatred, a return to such organized brutality, and the gross level of intolerance that is new York? How can a black person still find it hard to get a taxicab or can be brutalized by the very ones whose salaries we pay and there be no great outcry that continues until Justice flows like a river?  Where are those who care so much about human liberty that they can not sleep until all is one?"

                                      

The face of a sick man!

Justin Volpe, an ex New York cop, got 30 years in prison for his assault on Abner Louima, a Black Haitian immigrant. This was one of the most brutal crimes in New York City, a city with a known history of  police brutality. On June 8th Charles Schwarz  was found guilty of taking part in this sexual assault on Louima, along with Volpe, the most savage of the two. 

The New York City Prosecutor, Alan Vinegard, asked the Judge to impose the maximum sentence on Volpe--he lied to cover up his act,  saying that Louima was gay and got his injuries through gay sex. 

The Prosecutor argued that Volpe's assertions of remorse were  an affront to the court. Volpe, the facts showed, bragged about “how he broke a man down.” The Prosecutor said,  “He actually went and retrieved the stick with Mr. Louima’s feces still on it and walked around the precinct, brandishing this feces-filled stick in front of his fellow police officers.”  

Abner Louima testified that he was picked up by the police, driven around in their car and was beaten repeatedly by both cops.  Louima testified that an officer Schwarz held him down while officer Volpe rammed a stick up his rectum, causing severe internal injuries. Volpe  waved the stick and boasted. Volpe pleaded guilty to violating his civil rights, not sexual assault. Charles Schwarz was convicted of violating Louima’s civil rights; he didn't make any guilty pleas. 

Comment

I love New York. I may not be welcomed there, but I still love the city. I love its feeling, the flow of its streets; I love Central Park, even in Winter, not that it is a great park, it isn't, I just love it anyway; maybe I have read too much about.  I love the bustle of the city and its night pulse. But I know that I'm not welcome there. Justin Volpe and a town full of others make me know that they don't want me there. I have never done anything but refused a forced gratuity on my restaurant bill--that was my great offense. But I am not welcome there because my face is of a beautiful ebony hue. That, almost alone, makes me unwelcome in New York. 

Danny Glover stood in the streets waiting for a taxi and couldn't get one. He, too, is unwelcome there. A man suspected of being homeless attacked a woman,  and the Mayor nearly declared that the homeless, many of them ebony hued as well, had no place on the streets of New York. He declared that "Bedrooms are for sleeping in, not doorways and the streets." And with that profundity, he declared war on the homeless.

This is Mayor Guiliani's New York. A place of law and order, except, seemingly, by the police. The trial of Justin Volpe and Schwarz  raised serious questions about the New York City Police's screening process. How does a Volpe or a Schwarz get into a police department in the first place? Certainly, there are screening procedures that can screen out psychopaths and the mental perverse. 

Yet, in 1999, New York, a city of diversity and supposed sophistication, is plagued by racial bigotry, prejudice and divisiveness that goes beyond that which southern states have ever produced.  How can there be people who know so well the pains of bigotry and hatred, exercising such influence in this city, and there still be a call to hatred, a return to such organized brutality, and the gross level of intolerance that is new York? How can a black person still find it hard to get a taxicab or can be brutalized by the very ones whose salaries we pay and there be no great outcry that continues until Justice flows like a river?  Where are those who care so much about human liberty that they can not sleep until all is one? []