By Tashi McQueen
AFRO Staff Writer
tmcqueen@afro.com
The University of Maryland Francis King Carey School of Law, in partnership with the Campaign for Justice, Safety and Jobs, held an event on April 11 to reflect on the death of Freddie Gray. The 25 year old was injured in an altercation with police on April 12, 2015 and died on April 19, 2015. On the day of his funeral, protests broke out, leading to the “Baltimore Uprising” that began on April 27, 2015.
A conversation with William “Billy” Murphy Jr., former attorney of Gray’s family and founding partner of the Murphy, Falcon and Murphy law firm, led the discussions of the day. The talk was moderated by Michael Pinard, faculty director of the Gibson-Banks Center for Race and the Law of the Maryland Carey Law.
Murphy shared that the family wanted to fight “tooth and nail, both privately and publicly, for justice,” so they selected Murphy to represent them. Murphy depicted how he worked with the family to get a $6.4 million settlement.
He said tension kept building between his team, who were working on behalf of the family, and Baltimore City personnel as they were in disagreement on how to compensate the family for the harm done to Gray.
“Leaders in the community…they started putting pressure on the city to settle this case,” said Murphy during the event at the University of Maryland Francis King Carey School of Law’s Westminster Hall. “Finally, the city came to the table, and we worked for [the settlement].”
The day also featured a panel discussion about community and legal action taken in the aftermath of Gray’s death. The panelists were an array of Baltimore community and city leaders, including Michaela Brown, co-founder of Organizing Black; Iman Freeman, co-founder of Baltimore Action Legal Team; Ralikh Hayes, a community organizer for the NAACP Legal Defense Fund; Ray Kelly, executive director of the Citizens Policing Project; David Rocah, senior staff attorney for ACLU of Maryland; Melvin Russell, former chief of the Baltimore Police Department (BPD) Community Partnership Division; and Sheridan Todd Yeary, senior pastor of Douglas Memorial Community Church.
Yeary shared that when he and other community members spoke with youth at the time who were outraged about Freddie Gray’s police-involved death, they “kept saying, we just want to be heard.”
The panelists shared their experiences helping craft the consent decree that the U.S. Department of Justice and the City of Baltimore agreed to on April 7, 2017, in response to the uproar about police misconduct in Baltimore. Kelly shared the impact of navigating the consent decree under several federal administrations over the years.
“We started our process under the Obama administration, and there was a sense of urgency to get these reforms done,” said Kelly. “Then we newly bend into the Trump administration. His immediate response is to eliminate all these police accountability statutes.”
Kelly pressed that community and city leaders have to ensure that the “spirit” of the consent decree doesn’t get lost in the “rollercoaster of implementation.”
Murphy, when asked for his thoughts on the current presidential administration and how it may impact the future of police accountability, warned of a potential “dictatorship” in America.
“I think there will be a dictatorship,” said Murphy. “I think he will [take] power at an enormous, unprecedented level.”
He called young people and aspiring lawyers to action.
“You have to fight the power,” said Murphy. “You can’t be scared. You can’t be ambivalent about it. Choose sides and be warriors.”
Correction: This article previously stated that Freddie Gray died on April 11, 2015. It has been corrected to reflect that he died on April 19, 2015.