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Item 7: The study of deaths in custody, referring back to the Illinois case. The bill amends the Code to require assurances that States will follow guidelines established by the attorney general for reporting deaths in custody.
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National Task Force on Law Enforcement Oversight. The bill requires the Department of Justice to establish a task force to coordinate the investigation, prosecution, and enforcement efforts of Federal, State, and local governments in cases related to law enforcement misconduct.
Immigration Enforcement Review Commission. The bill creates a commission to investigate civil rights complaints against the INS and Customs Services with authority to make policy and disciplinary recommendations.
It is very interesting that, in New York, several of the cases that have taken place have related to immigrants. Amadou Diallo was an immigrant from Africa, the country of Guinea. Patrick Dorismond is a Haitian American. Abner Louima is a Haitian American.
I know this is only a coincidence because I have lived in New York for 42 years and there is a long list of victims of excessive force, negligent homicide, that were not necessarily immigrants.
Eleanor Bumpers was a grandmother who was shot down in her living room. Claude Reece was a 13-year-old who lived in a housing project in my district. Clifford Glover was 11 years old and was shot in the back. Randolph Evans was shot point-blank by a policeman who used a defense in court called psychomotor epilepsy. I have never heard that term before; and since that case, that trial, I have never heard it since. Well, the jury found the policeman not guilty because he had had a seizure of psychomotor epilepsy and he could not stop his hand from raising the gun and pointing to young Randolph Evans's head. He walked off scot-free.
So there have been a long list of deaths, of police killings and police brutality which did not deal with immigrants. But it just happens that recently the focus has been, by accident I think, on immigrants. So an Immigrant Enforcement Review Commission is very much in order.
Item 10: Federal Data Collection on Racial Profiling. The bill requires the Justice , Treasury and Interior Departments to collect data concerned with personal characteristics of individuals targeted for investigation, etcetera.
The bill establishes civil and criminal penalties for retaliation against law enforcement officers who in God's faith disclose, initiate, or advocate on behalf of a civilian complainant in actions alleging police misconduct and creates private cause of action for retaliation.
These are 11 of the points that are emphasized in the Law Enforcement Trust and Integrity Act. Many of them will require additional funding. My colleague the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. JACKSON-LEE) has added to that some other provisions that will require additional funding in the budget. She wants a budget increase to deal with the Weed & Seed program. She wants to address juvenile delinquency prevention with certain projects, a program to reintegrate great young offenders, and a program to reduce youth gun violence.
So in our seventh category, juvenile justice and law enforcement, in our budget, we are addressing some of the issues that are of great concern to my constituents back in New York. CBC, the Congressional Black Caucus, wants to support these issues in every way. Tomorrow we will deal with a budget which does that.
In addition to that, I think it is important to note that we are proposing and, in fact, I proposed at a meeting of the Brooklyn African American Clergy and Elected Officials, consisting of 96 members, on March 3, 2000, I proposed the following in reaction to my constituents and all those who are outraged and want some leadership, I proposed we have a declaration against surrender to this kind of activity.
We will not surrender to police abuse and a policeman state mentality. We will not surrender to a mayor and a commissioner who insist on protecting the extremists and the fanatics who constitute only a small part of the police department.
This declaration of surrender reads as follows: ``We, the undersigned leaders of the caring majority, pledge to unite in solidarity against continuing oppression by the extremist law enforcement establishment and the collaborating criminal justice system. With unrelenting fervor, we pledge to provide continuous leadership for the following actions and activities:
(1) negotiations to achieve the 10 demands for police and criminal justice reform set forth on March 27, 1999, almost a year ago.
A coalition of leaders from all parts of the city met at Local 1199 in the heart of the city, and we drew up a 10-point plan on misconduct and brutality. These 10 points cover the need for civilian review board which has real teeth. It covers the call for a special prosecutor to be appointed in cases involving police brutality or police homicide. It calls for a residency law for New York City.
Most of the country requires policemen to live in the city or the county. Most of the counties in New York State require policemen to live in the city or county. But not in New York City. The legislature exempts New York City from that requirement despite the fact that the city council and the people of New York want a residency law to guarantee that they get police that have a greater comprehension of the people that they are serving and the cultures that make up New York City.
[Time: 22:15]
On and on it goes. There are 10 demands here drawn up March 27, 1999. The problem with these demands is that for the 40 years that I have been in New York, most of these demands have been made repeatedly over and over again every time there has been some excessive use of force or misconduct among the police. The time that I have been in New York, for 40 years, there have been three commissions to investigate corruption and excessive use of force. They all come up with the same recommendation. Nothing gets done. For that reason, we are insisting that we negotiate again. We like to go to our constituents and say we are reasonable people, we are leaders who do not under any circumstances want our constituents to resort to violence. We want to proceed in a nonviolent way, in a reasonable way to try to get these so-called intractable problems that seem not to be solvable, to get something done. So we want to negotiate these 10 demands. We want to ask the mayor to negotiate again, but beyond the mayor we want the fathers of the city, we have a phrase in New York called the permanent government of the city. In a lot of the cities and towns across the country, there is a permanent government, the business people, the civic leaders, a group of people who really behind the scenes, if you do not have their approval, if elected officials do not have their approval, they cannot survive, they cannot exist. There is a combination of financial contributions as well as the press being on your side, indignation of people in high places who have the bully pulpit. They can govern in certain ways. We think that they are guilty in New York City of not weighing in and doing more over the years to rein in the excessive police abuse that continues to erupt again and again in New York City. So we want to negotiate with them as well as with the mayor and the governor. That is point one in this Declaration Against Surrender.
We want to, point two, take the necessary actions to achieve intervention in the Diallo case by the Justice Department and the prosecution of the four police defendants for the violation of the civil rights of Amadou Diallo. Four policemen have already been found innocent of anything, including reckless endangerment or negligent homicide, nothing, totally innocent, just as the people who beat up Rodney King in California were found innocent. Despite the fact that you had a videotape of them surrounding him and beating him, they still found the perpetrators innocent. The Federal Government had to go in and try those same people on a charge of violation of civil rights of Rodney King. We have asked and we are pressing hard to get the Justice Department to try the people who killed Amadou Diallo on the basis of the violation of the civil rights of Amadou Diallo, a victim of police profiling. Nowhere in the history of New York City have you had a person standing on his front porch shot down by the police. Only racial profiling gone mad and seeing any black as a threat could have conjured up an image of Amadou Diallo as being a danger to society or to the four policemen who
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Our third point here is an appeal to the United Nations to secure an objective review of the violations of minority human rights in the United States as evidenced by the following. Violations of minority rights in the United States are out of control. Too many people in high places are not excited about the fact that they are out of control. Why? Because, one, there is a national pattern, a national pattern of systemic police brutality with recurring unjustified homicides. Two, death penalty laws which result in a disproportionate number of minorities executed, a disproportionate number of minorities executed and a high probability of innocent victims on death row. I gave you the case of Illinois where the death row inmates who were innocent were fortunate enough to have a local university project conduct an exercise using the latest detective techniques including DNA, and they found 12 of 25 of the people on death row to be innocent. The next point, widespread officially sanctioned racial profiling. The next point, exposures of massive long-term corruption and illegal arrests in police departments. The next point of great racial disparity in sentencing. Great racial disparity. We have several studies which show that a black person and a white person accused of the same crime going through the same similar investigative procedure standing before a judge, the racial minority will get a tougher sentence, a higher sentence. Disparity in sentencing. Finally, the imprisonment of 2 million persons, most of whom are poor and members of minority groups. In the United States there are now about 2 million people in prison. Prisons have become a major industry. You can invest in prisons. If you invest in prisons, they do not pay off unless you have inmates. You are paid according to the number of inmates. There is something grossly unjust about this kind of system. There is something grossly unjust about so many people in prison. The highest number now of any of the industrialized nations are imprisoned in the United States of America. Almost half of them are imprisoned for nonviolent offenses related to drugs. There is something wrong with the system. We complain on the floor of this House, we have many bills which have made matters worse sponsored by the Republican majority. We complain. Nothing happens. An appeal to the United Nations may be where we have to go in order to get some attention focused on these gross abuses.
Finally, in this Declaration Against Surrender, we the undersigned leaders of the caring majority pledge to sponsor periodic ``Weeks of Outrage'' with citywide nonviolent actions including civil disobedience. Such Weeks of Outrage will be periodically sponsored until our just demands are met. Going back to point one, the demands we ask to be negotiated, we will not sit still and let those demands be treated with contempt nor ignored. We intend to have Weeks of Outrage starting with an April Week of Outrage which is in the process of being planned. There is a call for an April Week of Caring Majority Nonviolent Outrage.
The Declaration Against Surrender continues by saying that in the last 40 years, more than 50 outrageous killings of New York citizens by the police have gone unpunished, from the children, Clifford Glover and Randolph Evans, to grandmother Eleanor Bumpers, mental patient Gideon Bush, and immigrant Amadou Diallo, the callous actions of individual policemen have been supported and excused by a collaborating judicial system, by the establishment press and media, by the power brokers and the permanent governors of New York City. We declare that the caring majority of New York City will no longer surrender to these gross injustices.
Mr. Speaker, I submit the statement related to the Declaration Against Surrender for the RECORD.
Declaration Against Surrender
We, the undersigned Leaders of the ``Caring Majority'' pledge to unite in solidarity against continuing oppression by the extremist law enforcement establishment and the collaborating criminal justice system. With unrelenting fervor we pledge to provide continuous leadership for the following actions and activities:
Negotiations to achieve the ten demands for police and criminal justice reform set forth on March 27, 1999.
Necessary actions to achieve intervention in the Diallo case by the U.S. Justice Department and the prosecution of the four police defendants for the violation of the Civil Rights of Amadou Diallo.
An Appeal to the United Nations to secure an objective review of the violations of minority human rights in the United States as evidenced by: a national pattern of systemic police brutality with recurring unjustified homicides; death penalty laws which result in a disproportionate number of minorities executed and a high probability of innocent victims on death row; widespread officially sanctioned racial profiling; exposures of massive long-term corruption and illegal arrests in police departments; a great racial disparity in sentencing; the imprisonment of two million persons most of whom are poor and members of the minority groups.
Sponsorship of periodic ``Weeks of Outrage'' with citywide nonviolent actions including civil disobedience. Such ``Weeks of Outrage'' will be periodically sponsored until our just demands are met.
We, the undersigned Leaders of the ``Caring Majority'' invite all citizens everywhere who deem themselves as members of the ``Caring Majority'' to unite with us in the ``Declaration Against Surrender''.
Submitted by Congressman Major Owens and Approved by the Brooklyn African American Clergy & Elected Officials (March 3, 2000).
10-Point Plan on Misconduct and Brutality
FOLLOWING ARE THE PROPOSALS ISSUED BY A BROAD COALITION OF POLITICAL LEADERS AND COMMUNITY ORGANIZERS IN RESPONSE TO THE SHOOTING OF AMADOU DIALLO: MARCH 27, 1999
1. Mayor Giuliani must immediately implement the recommendations of the Mollen Commission, especially the call to establish an independent investigative body with full subpoena power that has jurisdiction over police corruption and brutality in New York City. Twice, the City Council has passed legislation creating a body to monitor corruption, but the Mayor has done everything in his power to block its implementation--first by veto and then, when the Council overrode his veto, by tying the matter up in court. The Mayor must also implement the recommendations (from both the majority and dissenting reports) of his own Task Force, that he appointed in 1997 in the wake of the shocking Abner Louima incident.
2. The Civilian Complaint Review Board must be immediately reconstituted, strengthened and fully funded so that it can effectively investigate civilian complaints of police misconduct.
3. The State Legislature must pass legislation creating a permanent special prosecutor for police brutality and corruption in New York. In conjunction with this, the State Attorney General must create a special unit on police misconduct and should issue an annual report documenting instances of misconduct throughout the state.
4. The Police Department must develop a comprehensive training program, developed in consultation with outside experts, to school its officers in racial and cultural sensitivity and must also implement a rigorous process of in-depth psychological screening of its recruits and officer.
5. The New York Police Department should reflect the makeup of the citizen population it serves--N.Y.C. police officers should live in New York City. The State Legislature must immediately pass a law mandating residency for city officers.
6. The Police Commissioner must also take specific and immediate steps to recruit more minorities and women to serve as police officers and develop a plan to increase promotion opportunities for women and minority officers.
7. The salary and benefits for police officers must be improved. Law enforcement officers are entrusted with extraordinary responsibility and they should be compensated accordingly.
8. The Police Department's ``48-hour'' rule, which delays the ability of N.Y.P.D. investigators to question police officers charged violations of N.Y.P.D. rules and regulations, must be eliminated.
9. The weapons, ammunition and tactics used by the department must be assessed and periodically reviewed, not only to measure effectiveness, but to protect the safety of innocent New Yorkers. The use of hollow point bullets should be discontinued immediately.
10. Congress must call on the Justice Department to honor its commitment to monitor and issue annual reports documenting instances of police misconduct throughout the country. This promise was made in the wake of the Rodney King incident and has yet to be acted upon.
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Declaration Against Surrender--Congressman Major Owens
THE DECLARATION AGAINST SURRENDER
In the last forty years more than fifty outrageous killings of New York citizens by the police have gone unpunished. From the children, Clifford Glover and Randolph Evans, to grandmother Eleanor Bumpers, mental patient Gideon Bush, and immigrant Amadou Diallo, the callous actions of individual policemen have been supported and excused by a collaborating judicial system; by the establishment press and media; by the power brokers and the permanent governors of NYC. We declare that the Caring Majority of NYC will no longer surrender to these gross injustices.
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