El Grito de Sunset Park:

A Community's Struggle 

Against Police Misconduct

 By Dennis Flores (September 27, 2014)

The story begins in Brooklyn, New York's Sunset Park neighborhood, back when I was a counselor in a high school. As I was leaving school one day I noticed that police were abusing one of my students. As I got closer I noticed that the young man was crying and was not resisting arrest. From a distance I began taking photos and filming. I called 911 and reported this incident of police misconduct. The answer I received was 15 officers who confronted me with nightsticks, mace and false charges. I was incarcerated for simply being an observer and having the temerity to report it.

Twelve years later I'm still on the same path and I have gotten to a level whereby my community, Sunset Park, is responding. The neighborhood is acting upon the seeds that I have sowed on said path. I have been transformed from a victim to an activist helping other victims to transform themselves and to channel their courage to use the camera as an arm of denunciation, to spread the images of the realities that exist in the streets of our cities.

Over the last few weeks the world has borne witness to what I experienced firsthand. The world has been able to get a sampling of what reality is like in the United States. The images that are now coming out of Sunset Park are the testimonies of the street vendors, hardworking families and Latino citizens; it's the pain, the blood and tears, a sense of anger that can no longer be ignored.

Knowledge of the individual's rights has been growing in our community; a trend that we're hoping will serve as an example to the rest of the city and indeed the country. The people can organize, can fight and can call attention to the situation so that police can take responsibility for their misconduct. That's how Grito de Sunset Park was born. It's a popular movement composed of everyday people who have never had a voice. Today we have been able to let out a shout that can be heard in the rest of the world. With this same voice and this same spirit the world is being transformed and people are noticing what can be utilized to bring about change in the power dynamics in their local communities, in their governments and the police. Now begins the shift in the balance of power. Before the suffering and the tears of those who denounced misconduct went silent but now every individual has the power to document incidents with their cell phones and cameras and share them on social media and the internet.

What is being experienced in New York is the result of the so-called "Broken Windows Policy," whereby minor offenses are treated aggressively and young African-Americans and Latinos are criminalized. This practice began under the Giuliani administration with his then Commissioner Bratton being the principal proponent. Bratton has returned and has reintroduced strong-arm tactics against minor offenses that have affected the quality of life for many. An example of this being that just three people of color congregating in public spaces are oftentimes construed as gangs and hence criminalized.

It is a system motivated by number crunching so as to present the best possible statistics in correlation to crime reduction but it has not helped the poor people of this city, in particular the Afro-American and Latino communities.

We the "El Grito de Sunset Park", people of conscious and good will are DEMANDING from Mayor Bill de Blasio that he:

• Replace Police Commissioner Bill Bratton with someone who is culturally sensitive to communities of color
• Replace the 72nd Precinct Captain.
• Create a Blue Ribbon Panel to review the last 20 years of Police Department policy of engagement with the public with regards to safety issues.

Afro-American and Latino youth have become pawns in a system that makes money by closing schools and opening more prisons. While taxes should be used to improve education, they are instead being funneled to open up even more prisons. Our community is suffering because our future leaders are being criminalized for minor offenses that should be treated differently than what's now being offered up under the Broken Windows Policy.

We have a commissioner who has created an aggressive militarized police force that should of focusing on real crime as opposed to confronting young people of color who are just expressing themselves. What we are seeing are hard working families who are trying to provide a better future for their children being treated as guilty parties for questioning and resisting abuse.

What we are also seeing is the people are saying "enough," not just in Sunset Park but throughout the country. What happened in Ferguson, Missouri, in the streets of Sunset Park, in the Los Angeles, is happening in every neighborhood and every city where there are Afro-Americans and Latinos. It's time we rid ourselves of abusive and aggressive police tactics, and also rid ourselves of its principal proponent, Commissioner William Bratton.

We are asking that every one of the officers involved in the incidents in Sunset Park be fired. When the department only suspends with pay these aggressive officers it only sends the message that such behavior is tolerated by the brass. That's why police continue patrolling our streets with impunity, with a license to assail, mutilate or even kill.

With El Grito, like the Grito de Lares and Grito de Dolores what's being proclaimed in a loud voice is that it's time for Puerto Ricans, Mexicans, Colombians, Chileans, Dominicans etc. to come together as a unified Latin American people against the common enemy that is a police department that has criminalized our people for being what we are. Now is a time of denunciations, of a cry that ENOUGH IS ENOUGH!

We call on all communities to come in solidarity to Sunset Park, Brooklyn and support the victims of this police violence this coming Saturday, September 27th 2014 at 12:00pm to 46th Street and 5th Avenue in Brooklyn to march in protest to the 72nd Precinct. We want to also invite you, the community, to our Sunset Park Town Hall on police conduct and accountability next Wednesday, October 1, 2014 at 6:30pm at the Sunset Park Recreation Center on 43rd Street and 7th Avenue, Brooklyn, NY.

_________________________________________________________________________________________________

Dennis Flores, organizer of El Grito de Sunset Park, is a photojournalist, community activist and a member of Cop Watch, a community photography program that films police officers' alleged misconduct and reports it. A Sunset Park native, Flores is also an outreach specialist with Lutheran Medical Center's Sexual Behavior and Health Department. He can be reached at [email protected].

Related

"Pregnant Woman Slammed Into Ground By Police, Caught On Camera" By Carolina Leid, WABC-TV Eyewitness News (September 23, 2014)

"In Sunset Park, Videos of Confrontations Elevate Mistrust of Police" By Benjamin Mueller, New York Times (September 24, 2014)