By AFRO Staff
(Courtesy Photo/tellusdetroit.com)
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(June 26, 2009) - During its meeting at Union Baptist Church in West Baltimore, the NAACP presented a forum for members of the community to come forward with stories of misconduct perpetrated by the Baltimore City Police Department.
“We don’t advise you to go to Internal Affairs, because we don’t have confidence in them at this point,” said Marvin “Doc” Cheatham, president of the Baltimore branch of the NAACP.
Several people came forward and testified to the inherent mistrust many feel is ubiquitous between the Black community and the police department. And one man named Craig Levi told a harrowing story that ended with an 18-month jail sentence.
He claimed two plain clothes police officers pulled up to him in an unmarked car and asked if he had any drugs on him. When he replied “no,” they asked if they could search him and he said he complied. Then he asserted two more plain clothes officers joined the police action. He claimed the officers said they “discovered” drugs in an alley and attached them to him.
He said he was taken to the Eastern District lock-up, where police attached a gun found in that alley to him. “I’m being charged with a gun that I did not have,” he said during his testimony.
Ultimately, he said he was sentenced to, and served, 18 months in jail. Five months later, a grand jury found him not guilty of the charges against him and he was set free.
There have been many documented stories of “illegal” arrests and detention in Baltimore over the last several years.
“It’s the erosion of trust between our community and the police that causes these problems,” said Monique Morris, NAACP national director of research and advocacy.
“We count on law enforcement to provide protection and security in all of our communities. However, acts of police misconduct and abuse threaten the legitimacy, fairness and effectiveness of our justice system and contributes to the violence and victimization in too many of our neighborhoods,” read literature distributed at the meeting.
The civil rights organization wants individuals to not only come forward with oral testimony, but they want people to send videos of police misconduct. The online reporting launch date is July 6, 2009. Go to www.naacp.org for more information.