POLICE BRUTALITY

Grab a cup of coffee because this is going to be a long one.

I grew up in the 1970's in the hood.  It wasn't really "the hood" to me, it was just my community, but on my block there were quite a few gang bangers and when you grow up with these kids from kindergarten on you don't see them as gang-bangers.  At least I didn't.  They were my neighbors and friends and kids I played with in the street.  We went to school together and when we reached junior high they went off on a different track, but they always remained my friends and neighbors.  

In my city, just east of east L.A., the sheriffs were our local law enforcement and they ruled our city.  The Pico sheriffs were infamous throughout town for being especially brutal.  They were bad and violent cops.  They terrorized the gang neighborhoods and would literally come blasting through someone's front door billy clubs swinging.  I witnessed police brutality ALL the time.  Our local sheriffs were basically gang-bangers with badges and guns.  

One night in 1974 after a football game I went to a house party with my little gaggle of friends.  We were just a bunch of high school kids hanging out listening to music.  There were adults there and so everyone was just chilling and talking and listening to music.   I'm sitting in the living room talking to my friends when literally the front door burst open and a whole slew of sheriffs wearing their helmets came bursting in swinging their billy clubs and literally started banging heads.  I know that most people will find this hard to believe, but I swear to you it's true.  I was trying to figure out what the hell was happening and then it became more and more chaotic.  The parents were sitting in the kitchen and immediately got up to see what all the ruckus was about and when they tried to talk to these cops to find out why they were in their house they hit both the mother and the father with their clubs.  It was TERRIBLE.  Kids were screaming and running everywhere.  I managed to make my way out the back door and ran to the front of the house where my friend was already in the car and we took off.  Once the police showed up at any party in Pico this was the way they usually behaved.  A freaking riot would ensue.  

I happened to live on a street with gang bangers as I previously stated.  Almost every weekend the Pico Sheriff's would show up, testosterone blazing and looking for some action.  They would bust into one of those houses and start beating the shit out of everyone.  It was like a regular thing.  During one of these melees  Maria, the mom, had been beaten in the head with a flashlight and had to have a ton of stitches and one of the younger kids was literally picked up and thrown against the wall and knocked out.  So while your neighbors are being brutalized by the cops what do you do?  Call the cops?  NO.  You did nothing.  This happened ALL THE TIME.    

Years later after I had graduated from high school, I started dating one of those cops.  I was young, maybe 19 or 20, and he was much older and very handsome and he liked me.  I had literally zero experience in the dating world so this was a big deal to me.  This older guy was into me.  It was intoxicating and I was pretty enthralled with him.  Needless to say, the guys in the neighborhood were not happy about this.  

It didn't take long for me to find out what a sadistic prick he was.  Since he worked nights he would sometimes take me on ride-alongs.  It was kind of cool cruising around town in the squad car and going on various calls.  But I have to say that most of the time it was pretty boring just driving around all night.  There were different gang neighborhoods that I of course knew of and one night he decided to cruise into one of them.  He was driving down an alley and the next thing I know he's flooring it and we are flying down this alley when he comes to a screeching stop and tells me to stay in the car.  He runs down the alley and I lose sight of him.  When he comes back he has this kid with him who was completely bloody and pretty messed up.  He'd beaten this little 14 year old for smoking pot in the alley.  I could not believe what I was witnessing.  I became very quiet.  This really bothered me.  I thought what he'd done was unjustified and didn't warrant a beating like that.  But Mr. Cop felt completely justified which I found appalling.  

I remained quiet until he finally asked me if what he'd done had bothered me.  I told him that it did.  That kid was only getting high, not raping someone.  He did not deserve to have is head bashed in with a flashlight.  Mr. Cop tried to convince me of what it was like in the streets, how bad these guys were, blah blah blah, but I kept what I'd witnessed in my heart.  I knew what he did was wrong.  Unwarranted.  And it bothered me deeply.

Yet, I continued to see him.  

It was only a matter of time before I became tired of his lies.  He would lie about everything.  He once told me this really elaborate story about his time in Vietnam and I have to say that at the time I was enthralled.  You see he was so much older than me and I found him so experienced and interesting.  I looked at him as a man.  He had a life full of experiences which I found fascinating.  Well, as it turned out, he never went to Vietnam.  I found this out one afternoon while I was hanging out at his apartment with all of his cop buddies and they were trading stories of their experiences in Vietnam when one of his friends asked him where he was in Nam and Mr. Cop said he didn't go to Vietnam.  I remember looking at him eyes wide and full of shock!  I was so taken aback by his blatant lie and yet I didn't have the courage to call him out and embarrass him in front of all his cop friends for the fucking elaborate story he'd told me just days before.  He obviously had some deep and serious insecurities.  

He LOVED being a cop.  He had a roommate who was also a cop.  This guy was a tall white dude with curly blonde hair.  I didn't like him.  He came off as a racist pig to me which was ironic because his girlfriend was Mexican and attended the local high school.  Yeah.  He was 33 she was 16.  He was a smarmy bastard and was very well known by all the homies in Pico.  So was Mr. Cop.  These two got into a whole lot of trouble together.  They did many unlawful things which I witnessed.  Smoking pot and dating underage girls from the local high school.  Mr. Cop taught a criminology class and was literally banging all the chicks. Today?  They'd both be in prison.  

I'd had enough.  I could not be with anyone who could lie and cheat so easily.  

Eventually their crimes caught up with them.  White boy basically disappeared and was never heard from again.  Mr. Cop and his buddy ended up going on trial for falsifying evidence and lying about an arrest.  This was really big news that I read about every day in the L.A. Times.  Verdict?  Mr. Cop and his friend were thrown off the force in shame.  He's lucky he didn't serve any time.  

Years later I would run into him.  He was reduced to working the door at nightclubs.  He was the guy you handed your I.D. to.  I never spoke to him, I never looked at him.  I'd just handed him my I.D. and made my way into the club.  He eventually became engaged to my ex-best friend.  Yeah, he was banging her too while he was dating me.  Long story short, she dated this loser for 10 years until he finally married her.  They would break up and get back together and break up and get back together. One of those kind of relationships.   And seriously ... who dates someone for TEN YEARS? 

After this experience, I stayed away from cops.  Didn't trust them.  Didn't like them.  And I knew enough of them to be able to say that they pretty much were all the same.  Deplorable, arrogant and shameless.

Fast forward to 2011 and my new job at the Los Angeles Police Protective League.  I'd been unemployed for two years after the 2008 crash and these folks wanted to hire me.  I took the job even though it paid me nothing and had no 401K.  I was desperate.

Working for the police was very difficult for me.  It was one of the most disheartening experiences of my life.  I was not a fan of police, but after working there for a year and a half, I DESPISED them.  For these men you're either with them or not.  You're either a criminal or a decent citizen.  There is no in-between with this people.  It's black or white, NO GREY EVER.  They make excuses for their brutality and they sexually harass ALL THE TIME.  One director had been brought up on sexual harassment charges multiple times and NOTHING ever happened to him.  He was still there working as a director for the League.  They had no moral compass and many were openly racist.  I had to sign a nondisclosure agreement in order to work there.  A few months in, I knew why.  There was so much unethical behavior going on there it was mind-boggling.  Back stabbing, gossiping and ruining reputations of state and local politicians (who are also equally morally corrupt).  I could write a book on what I witnessed there and again, no one would probably believe me.  What I can say is that this police union will go to the mat for their cops.  It doesn't matter what they are accused of.  I have never witnessed such a powerful group defend and make excuses for crimes committed by their police.  It was quite an experience.  I know there are plenty of people who would call me a liar, or worse, but I can tell you that what I witnessed happened.  One officer had a picture of Obama as a monkey on his office door.  I found that beyond appalling but I was in THEIR world and I KNEW I had to keep my opinion to myself.  HORRIBLE.  

So, that's my two cents.  It's true.  It happened.  So when I see Trump's commercials trying to scare people into believing that when they call the cops in the future if Biden wins the presidency and the cops won't be able to answer your call because of lack of funds I just laugh.  In my neighborhood when you'd call  the cops they NEVER came.  EVER.