"My white neighbor thought I was breaking into my own apartment. Nineteen cops showed up."

SOURCE: The Washington Post

Snippet:

On Sept. 6, I locked myself out of my apartment in Santa Monica, Calif. I was in a rush to get to my weekly soccer game, so I decided to go enjoy the game and deal with the lock afterward. A few hours and a visit from a locksmith later, I was inside my apartment and slipping off my shoes when I heard a man’s voice and what sounded like a small dog whimpering outside, near my front window. I imagined a loiterer and opened the door to move him along. I was surprised to see a large dog halfway up the staircase to my door. I stepped back inside, closed the door and locked it. I heard barking. I approached my front window and loudly asked what was going on. Peering through my blinds, I saw a gun. A man stood at the bottom of the stairs, pointing it at me. I stepped back and heard: “Come outside with your hands up.”

This is another story of how people of color are routinely treated in the USA. The lady forgets her keys, calls a locksmith, gets back into her apartment, then shortly after finds herself in fear for her life as 19 cops swarm her and enter her apartment at gun point with attack dogs. It is a sad story played out it seems like nearly everyday. People call the cops and then people of color are treated like terrorist. I am just appalled by the frequency of these potentially deadly situations. This lady is now scarred for life and for what? Being black in a mostly white area.

My WHITE neighbor

people of COLOR are treated like terrorist

Irony noticed...

Anyone remember that Fox tv show America's Most Wanted?

There was a huge spike in "Suspicious black man" reports after it first started airing...

That was thirty years ago...


How far we've come

a reply to: machineintelligence

Unless the person next door knew what was going on it sounds like a good neighbour, id appreciate my neighbours calling the police if they suspected someone breaking in. Imagine if the home owner arrived back after soccer to find the house ransacked, or maybe rapist or god knows who in the house. And then to find out your "white neighbour" witnessed someone gaining entry but ignored it.

Why didn't the "white" neighbour knock the door and see what was happening? Because that's the job of the police, the "white" neighbour did there job by calling them when suspecting something was up (which it wasn't),

a reply to: machineintelligence

The neighbor saw someone breaking in to an apartment and called it in.

Any chance the neighbor would have called the cops if it was a white person breaking in?

Yes.

Would 19 cops have shown up?

Since we live in a police state, I'm going with yes.

Would it have made the headlines?

No.

I'm not saying there is no "profiling" of people in the US, I'm saying there are a lot of assumptions here and sometimes in life, # happens. If it looks like you're breaking and entering, one outcome you can expect (regardless of color) is that someone will see you and call it in.

So if a white guy looked like he was breaking in do ya suppose they would have only sent 18 cops?

We had some pretty severe wind here last night. After hearing some branches hitting my roof around 11:30 pm, I took the flashlight out back to look around. 15 minutes later two police cars pulled up. Someone driving by saw a person with a flashlight creeping around and thought maybe it was a burglar.

I'm not scared of the cops now. I'm glad that someone would make the call if they saw something they felt was suspicious. No one pointed a gun at me. No one yelled. When they knocked on the door, they asked me to step outside. It was over in less than 10 minutes.

The demon of racism is alive and well in the hearts of the many! Its shameful to have people being so racist in our day and age. I look foward to a day when racism has been overcome!

originally posted by: zilebeliveunknown

My WHITE neighbor

people of COLOR are treated like terrorist

Irony noticed...

Don't think that's Ironic.

Sometimes, people ignore everything and keep to themselves, even if they see and hear something they know is not right.

There's a headline from my city right now that causes me to wonder, why did this neighbor who heard everything not call this in? In this case, a young woman was murdered by her boyfriend.

What was considered a suspicious death in North Austin has been ruled a homicide. Kevin Michael Waguespack, 32, is accused of killing his girlfriend Monday in their home in the 7500 block of Northcrest Boulevard, according to police.

Detectives with the Austin Police Department Crime Scene Units obtained a search warrant and found a bloody scene throughout the house with furniture turned over, and pieces of what appeared to be the stock of a rifle in several rooms.

“I heard a bunch of crying, she was crying a bunch of yelling, things getting knocked down I guess punching walls and a lot of things falling down,” recalled Rangel. “I see him come outside, I don’t know what he was doing went into his truck for a minute, went around his truck and came back inside and more yelling, and she was crying talking a little bit, and after that it got quiet.”

KXAN

a reply to: machineintelligence

Same thing happened to me. I locked myself out and had to climb through a window to get back in. Someone saw me and called the police. As I'm sipping a beer watching the tv, three cop cars show up and start screaming at me to come out with my hands up.

I did and explained what happened, showed my ID and all was well.

I've had the cops come to my house several times. Every single time it's because of some busy body stuck their noses where it doesn't belong.

As for the story in the OP, I don't believe we are getting the whole story. Why would a locksmith open the door for someone that didn't belong there? The neighbor watched the homeowner AND the locksmith and called the cops? How does that even work? You call 911 and tell the dispatcher that there's a locksmith and calm lady breaking into a home and they rush in with guns drawn? Something is VERY fishy with this story.

Sounds like another "walking while black" fabrication. Keep up the divide people. This ONLY happens to people of color. SMH!

first off this is the Washington post (liberal media) second, sounds like she had an agenda, third how did she know who called the Police, they do NOT give that info out. this happened, yes but the "details" sound off.

originally posted by: kamatty
a reply to: machineintelligence

Unless the person next door knew what was going on it sounds like a good neighbour, id appreciate my neighbours calling the police if they suspected someone breaking in. Imagine if the home owner arrived back after soccer to find the house ransacked, or maybe rapist or god knows who in the house. And then to find out your "white neighbour" witnessed someone gaining entry but ignored it.

Why didn't the "white" neighbour knock the door and see what was happening? Because that's the job of the police, the "white" neighbour did there job by calling them when suspecting something was up (which it wasn't),

Yes but the cop pointing his gun at the home owner behind the window is somehow seeing what's happening? Seems more like an arrest.

Why not call the super to open the door they have keys to all apartments?

This does not smell right.

When did Dorothy Bland move to Santa Monica?

It sounds like she lucked out.
I remember a thread about the cops getting a call because someone spotted a suspicious person in front of a house. The cops entered the house with no knock, shot a family dog and then shot the homeowner who was guilty of sitting in a recliner in his living room, watching TV. He lived, dog died.

She didn't even get shot.

a reply to: machineintelligence

Her article is a load of racist, assumptive rubbish. There is no evidence of racism whatsoever, besides the racism being perpetrated by the supposed victim.

a reply to: machineintelligence

I read the story...this is a one-sided account from an individual who appears to have had preconceived notions about reasons why someone calls 911 on someone, why and how officers show up to a potential scene of a break in, etc., etc.

This excerpt from the story is what brought me to that conclusion:

The trauma of that night lingers. I can’t un-see the guns, the dog, the officers forcing their way into my apartment, the small army waiting for me outside. Almost daily, I deal with sleeplessness, confusion, anger and fear. I’m frightened when I see large dogs now. I have nightmares of being beaten by white men as they call me the n-word. Every week, I see the man who called 911. He averts his eyes and ignores me.

I’m heartbroken that his careless assessment of me, based on skin color, could endanger my life. I’m heartbroken by the sense of terror I got from people whose job is supposedly to protect me. I’m heartbroken by a system that evades accountability and justifies dangerous behavior. I’m heartbroken that the place I called home no longer feels safe. I’m heartbroken that no matter how many times a story like this is told, it will happen again.

Not long ago, I was walking with a friend to a crowded restaurant when I spotted two cops in line and froze. I tried to figure out how to get around them without having to walk past them. I no longer wanted to eat there, but I didn’t want to ruin my friend’s evening. As we stood in line, 10 or so people back, my eyes stayed on them. I’ve always gone out of my way to avoid generalizations. I imagined that perhaps these two cops were good people, but I couldn’t stop thinking about what the Santa Monica police had done to me. I found a lump in my throat as I tried to separate them from the system that had terrified me. I realized that if I needed help, I didn’t think I could ask them for it.

See, the problem I have with this story is that she assumes that everything done that day is on account of her skin color, and plays the victim because of that view instead of looking at the situation for what it was. Disappointingly, I can't get the portion of the 911 call to play (why isn't the call in its entirety on there?), but from what I read, I find it hard to subscribe to her victim-because-of-race mentality.

However, I do think that the issue with providing names and the amount of officers that showed up is a bit excessive, not to mention her claim that there is no official report on the interaction raises questions, but if it's consistent with protocol, as it appears to be claimed by the SMPD that it is (at least with how many officers showed up and how they approached her), then her claim of racial bias is uncalled for.

This certainly sounds like an example of overkill of police presence given a situation, and possible administrative issues at the department level, but racism--not so much.

Next time she sees her "white" neighbor attempting to gain access into the neighbor's apartment, she should call the cops and sit back with some popcorn. Seriously, I blame this on the neighbor...how do you live next door to someone and NOT know their face?

Then again, if the story is accurate, 19 cops and attack dogs seems like severe overkill for a simple breaking & entering call.

EDIT: furthermore, what kind of burglar calls a locksmith to gain entry into their targeted residence? The neighbor sounds like a paranoid bigot to me.

a reply to: raedar

Yeah, when I lived in military housing and had a family above me, one night I heard a bunch of banging and screaming. After letting it go for a couple of minutes to see if it would die down, it didn't, so I called the MPs.

As it turns out, it was actually the man's wife who had lost her damn mind and was throwing furniture at her husband and had sprayed him in the eyes with a few household cleaners and was punching and scratching and clawing him. He was pretty bruised up when he came down the stairs.

I called because they had a little three-year-old girl in the house, and I was concerned for her safety more than anything.

I could have just dismissed it and put headphones on, but then who knows how things would have turned out.

People ignoring what they consider to be suspicious activity is not the answer to situations like what's in the OP, and it amazes me that people respond with that mentality when it comes to situations like this.