Journalist – Historian – Speaker
A lawsuit alleges the following (courtesy of the Chicago Tribune): [Matthew] Jackson, a 21-year veteran of the force, became enraged after Nathaniel Taylor, 18, crossed onto his lawn on his way home from school, according to the lawsuit, which was filed Friday. Jackson beat the boy with his fists and shoved his service revolver into Taylor’s …
A double amputee (legs) not matching the description of a robbery suspect was told by police to get out of the car with his hands up. 8th Circuit Court has reversed a district court granting “qualified immunity” to the police in question. I’m going to be referring to this case a lot as it embodies …
Two disabled men were killed by law enforcement over the last few days. Details are still emerging. Both seem to be relatively young white men. Daniel Harris, in Charlotte NC, was Deaf and communicated via sign language. Joseph Weber, in Hays KA, has not been identified by diagnosis, but a local source tells me he …
This is a particular bad version of the kind of story we see far too often. LA law enforcement was pursuing a carjacker, found a different black man in a yard, and ordered him to comply. He didn’t comply. So they killed him. The armored vehicles — and the heavily armed deputies inside them — …
I have a new piece up at CNN on the shooting of Charles Kinsey, protected a Latino autistic man named Arnaldo Rios [Edit: See below for correction information] and the intersections of racism, ableism, and the #CultOfCompliance. Kinsey later told reporters, “I was really more worried about him than myself. I was thinking as long …
Last night, a new story in the ever evolving evidence for the #CultOfCompliance and the dangers it poses to marginalized people when they encounter police went viral. A police officer in the Miami area shot a black man lying on his back with his hands in the air. The man, Charles Kinsey, is a mental …
The White House is hosting a forum today on disability and criminal justice. They are announcing the “AVID prison project.” Here’s a press release with live-streaming information. Here’s a useful summary from the Center for American Progress. I’ll write more tomorrow, plan to watch the stream as much as possible, and will be engaged on …
I’m interested in all the ways the “Cult of Compliance,” my term for the collective way that our society promotes and rewards compliance to authority, protects authority figures who treat compliance as sacred, and criminalizes noncompliance, emerges in our society. Disability, in particular, exposes the manifestations of the cult of compliance, while people with disabilities …
I generally start my presentations on police use of force and disability by talking about a deaf man shot in the back. I like to end (or at least end the section), by talking about non-white men killed while wearing ear buds, talking on cell phones, or not speaking English. It’s a way to point …
Two deaths of disabled men at the hands of law enforcement have been in the news lately. One was black, a veteran, and a mental health crisis spun him into custody, where an officer (allegedly) broke his neck. The other was white, nonverbal, autistic, and walked away from his group at a park, where an …