Socialist Action /June 1999
Commentary:
New York's 'Blue Wall of Silence' Totters
The trial that began on May 4 of four New York policemen in connection
with the August 1997 brutalization of Haitian immigrant Abner Louima has
taken two surprising turns.
Beginning in the second week of the trial, three NYPD policemen actually
took the stand to support the prosecution's charges that one of the defendants,
Officer Justin A. Volpe, had sodomized Louima with a wooden stick in the
restroom of the 70th Precinct station house in Brooklyn.
The three cops, breaking through the notorious "blue wall of silence,"
testified that Volpe had boasted of the crime, and they offered accounts
supporting aspects of the charges.
That three cops would take the stand against another cop in a police
brutality case is surprising enough; but then came another, unprecedented
development:
Evidently realizing that no defense arguments could nullify the cops'
testimony against him, Volpe decided to plead guilty to the charges. On
May 26, he read to the judge a prepared statement in which he admitted that
he had rammed a broom handle into the rectum and then into the mouth of
the handcuffed Louima, along with other crimes.
The judge will now determine Volpe's sentence; he could face life in
prison. The trial of the remaining three defendants continues.
(It is worth noting that Volpe's attorney, Marvyn M. Kornberg, had indicated
his intent to try to convince the jury that Louima's wounds were the result
of consensual sex prior to his arrest. This is an indication of the unscrupulous
tactics the NYPD-paid attorneys are prepared to utilize to keep brutal cops
from getting the punishment due them.)
These two startling developments-cops testifying against a cop and a
cop confessing to brutality-do not indicate that the NYPD has reformed itself.
The shooting of unarmed 16-year-old Dantae Johnson by a cop of the notorious
(but supposedly "reformed") Street Crimes Unit on a Bronx street
in the early-morning hours of the day of Volpe's confession drives home
this point.
Dantae was shot when he and a friend tried to run away from the police,
who allegedly told them to "freeze." Said his friend who was fleeing
with him: "We didn't run because we were doing anything wrong. We ran
because we were scared."
Although both Dantae and his friend were arrested, the arrests were later
voided. The point is that these killers in blue uniforms cannot be reformed
but must be removed from our communities.
Undoubtedly, the three cops who testified against Volpe were emboldened
to cross the "blue line of silence" by the protests against police
brutality that followed the murder of Amadou Diallo.
These protests involved massive civil disobedience and street demonstrations
of tens of thousands, backed by unions, churches, community groups, and
prominent public figures.
Such public protests changed the political atmosphere in the city, sending
the message that police abuse will not be tolerated.
The protests and organizing must be continued and expanded to keep the
pressure on.
Only broad, sustained, and massive public protests-and not reliance on
politicians-can bring justice.
-MARILYN VOGT-DOWNEY
Socialist Action /June 1999 |