By now most of us know that in late November 2006 police officers fired 50 shots at three unarmed black men in Southeast Queens, NY, killing Sean Bell, who was to be married that day. They also wounded two black men who accompanied Bell, as the three left his bachelor party.

As of this writing, January 2, 2007, Queens District Attorney Richard Brown still has not indicted the officers. Periodic demonstrations continue to keep the travesty in public view.

Brutality against blacks is as old as black enslavement in the Western Hemisphere. Police brutality is the most pervasive remaining vestige, and must be removed. Community control of police should be part of the solution. Civilian police review boards and community precinct advisory councils are precedents that need empowering. These bodies should be more than advisory. Their rulings should be binding. Moreover, local precinct commanders and even individual officers should be hired and fired by community councils elected by local residents. Ultimate earthly power should be in the people’s hands.

Presently, police are not beholden to the black communities that they patrol. This creates dangerous temptations for white police officers raised in a racist society. Even black and Hispanic officers, eager to get along with co-workers and perhaps advance, easily slide into racist stereotyping of neighborhood residents.

Police boosters too often insist that officers just want to get home safely to their families. The contradiction, however, is that taxpayers pay police officers high wages to get us safely home to our families. The primary job of police is to protect us, not themselves. If they want safety, they should become file clerks, and accept the pay cut. Police failed to protect us, especially Sean Bell and his friends, on the night of his death. Instead of protecting Bell, they killed him. The streets were more dangerous because of police presence, not less so.

We need new cops with better attitudes. Now that de jure discrimination has been outlawed, remaining police brutality will end by recruiting persons morally inclined to follow just rules already on the books. Training should weed out police recruits who perceive right and wrong as applying only to suspects and not to themselves. Residency requirements and improved education should also help, but neither substitutes for morality.

As we celebrate Rev. Martin Luther King this January, remember that his vision exceeded the civil rights legislation that his movement sparked. He saw a day when equality would be real, not just on paper. Leaning heavily on the prophets, he quoted Isaiah 40:4-5:

Every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall be made low; and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough places plain; and the glory of the LORD shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together: for the mouth of the LORD has spoken it. (KJV)

He also preached Amos 5:24:
But let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream. (NRSV)

The police assault on three unarmed black men in Southeast Queens illustrates that the day Dr. King sought has not yet arrived. But God still lives. Let our struggle for justice and righteousness, rooted in Him, continue.

Christians should seek Christ’s leadership for social activism, while the broader black community should respect black church’s leadership or prominent involvement. Throughout African-American history, most social activism with lasting positive results for black folks has emerged directly or indirectly from the black church. In the current crisis, the leadership of Rev. Sharpton, Rev. Herbert Daughtry, and supporting clergy and laity has been excellent.

So has the involvement of 100 Blacks in Law Enforcement Who Care. I worship with some of them, and thus get a sense of how it feels to be around cops who would rather protect me than suspect me.

Too few police officers radiate that. For example, Michael Palladino, president of the Detectives Endowment Association, has been quoted as saying of 100 Blacks in Law Enforcement Who Care, “I can’t seem to pinpoint exactly what care about.” They obviously care about the people, including black community residents. Palladino must not. Why else would he be so dense about something so obvious?

It gets worse. A guest on a recent Sergeants Benevolent Association (SBA) radio broadcast said that Rev. Al Sharpton and Councilman Charles Barron, two leaders of the movement for justice in the Sean Bell murder, had tried to overthrow the government.

Police who harbor such conspiracy fantasies concerning real human beings should not patrol the black community with guns.