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| Cops needed at funerals for black gang members in Chicago? That's the Chicago Way! |
Mayor Rahm Emanuel says Chicago police are making strong moves to confront continuing city violence—which has included violent attacks at funerals.
The mayor expressed anger that people have been shooting and carrying guns at gang-member funerals.
“The police department is going to change the way they deal with gang funerals,” he said. “If you cannot respect a place of worship, at a time of a funeral, we are going to show a different type of attitude.”
The funerals will be treated as “gang events,” with mourners being searched and patted down, among other security measures.
Just last week, 21-year-old gang member Sherman Miller was slain on the steps of St. Columbanus Church, at the funeral of another gang member.
“Gang funerals are going to be treated different, because there’s no respect shown,” the mayor said.
The new tactics were on display Tuesday at Miller’s funeral, with police out in force, carrying automatic weapons.
But the plan has drawn some mixed reactions.
Rev. Corey Brooks, pastor of New Beginnings Church, has been on a mission to build a $15 million community center for the Englewood and Woodlawn neighborhoods, as part of an effort to reduce violence in those communities.
He’s even camped out on the roof of a shuttered motel to raise the money to buy and demolish it, and then walked across the country to raise money to build a community center where the motel once stood.
But he said he’s “a little concerned” about the mayor’s plan.
“I’m hoping it won’t escalate to more violence,” he said.
Brooks preached Tuesday at Miller’s funeral, and at the funeral where Miller was murdered.
“My biggest fear is those individuals are going to get just more hostile. They’re already angry, and I’m hoping that it just won’t escalate even to more anger, and then you have confrontations between police and guys from the streets,” Brooks said."No respect shown at funeral." So says Mayor Emanuel about those survivors of black violence in Chicago, instituting new rules such as a huge police presence (a costly maneuver) at black churches, operating pat-downs on mourners in the hopes that peace can prevail in the Lord's house. Oh... all of this while police carry automatic weapons.
During the 1920 Prohibition era in Chicago, were police necessary at the funerals for gang members gunned down in turf wars? This is an incredible admission on the part of the top executive official in Chicagoland of the savagery of black community; instead of just profiling young black males, all people attending a funeral of a gang member in Chicago will be treated as the TSA treats those overwhelming white patrons of the airlines.
But it's not just funerals where a greater crackdown on civil liberties must take place in Chicago (though we are way past a "civil" response to the escalating levels of black violence in America... not just in the Second City), with entire areas of the city where the only white face is either a liberal social worker or a police officer trying to maintain some sense of... civilization [Terrorised Chicago residents plead for police crackdown as gang war murders soar/Residents of the mainly black South Side want stop-and-search tactics brought back as gang murders plague President Barack Obama's home city, The Telegraph, 7-15-12]
In the killing zones of Chicago's predominantly black and poor South Side, turf warfare is no longer waged for control of districts but street to street.
A splintering of traditional gangs into smaller factions - known as crews or cliques - with ever-younger members desperate to prove their tough-guy credentials is fuelling a murder rate that makes swathes of Chicago more lethal than Afghanistan.
"This is a block-to-block war here, a different dynasty on every street," said a dreadlocked young man heavily inked in gang tattoos who calls himself "Killer".
"All the black brothers just want to get rich, but we got no jobs and no hope. We want the violence to stop but you ain't safe if you ain't got your pistol with you. Too many friends, too many men are being killed. We don't even cry at funerals no -more. Nobody expects to live past 21 here."
When the top executive official of a city is forced to dedicate police officers to protecting life at all funerals for gang members in Chicago, you know the black community is way past a "Pound Cake" speech by Dr. Cliff Huxtable himself, Bill Cosby.The victims and killers are mainly black males aged between 15 and 35, often with gang affiliations - but not exclusively. A seven-year-old girl, Heaven Sutton, was buried this month after being gunned down at her mother's street sweet store. And last week, two girls aged 12 and 13 were shot and badly-wounded as they walked home from a newly-opened community centre.
"Killer" and his friends in the "ATM crew" are only talking after reassurances from Willie Cochran, the city councillor for the Ward 20 district and a well-known figure in the community, who gave The Sunday Telegraph a tour of his district's most-blighted streets.
They overwhelmingly urged a return to the more aggressive policies of stop-and-frisk (known as stop-and-search in Britain), previously used by elite anti-gang squads that would temporarily flood trouble zones. That surprised many, as those tactics had prompted complaints of harassment, abuse and racial profiling in black and Hispanic communities.
May the day come when we realize all events where black people gather in the city of Chicago should be considered "gang events." And the Chicago Reader wonders why white people are afraid of black people... when police carrying high-powered automatic weapons are required to maintain peace in a church (a black church, mind you), and every individual must be searched before entering the place of worship for fear they might be packing, well, it's way past time that an elderly black man who hawks Jell-O pudding can save this community.
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