 Welcome back to Think Tech, I'm Jay Fiedel here on Community Matters and we're talking today about another virus, it could be that we have two viruses in this country, we're going to talk about that with Kenneth Lawson, he's a professor of criminal law at UH Minoa with the Massachusetts School of Law, welcome to the show Ken, nice to have you here. Thanks for having me Jay. So let's examine the problem in this country that erupted in the George Floyd case that we saw in such stark and surprising detail and then let's talk about the protests that followed. You have covered this kind of thing through your career, your life and I wonder if you could give us a handle on what is going on out there. I think it's, as you and I were talking before the show, I've been involved in these types of protests because they affect me personally, they affect a lot of black people personally, having seen my father being dragged out of an automobile and slammed to the ground and so when I started protesting at an early age and I became an attorney then I started doing criminal law and civil rights law in Cincinnati, Ohio and so I used to represent families much like what we see with some of the other attorneys that represent black people being killed by the police on police custody and I would do those civil lawsuits and so in Cincinnati in 2001, I represented the 15th black male that had been unarmed that had been killed by the Cincinnati police in the two year period of time and the city just erupted, I mean just erupted, it was almost, it was as if enough is enough and I think what we're seeing here at least when I'm feeling and it's just been so hard to concentrate so hard. It is, you know, we saw a few weeks ago where brother Amud Arbery in Georgia, was ran down by three white men on a sunny day in Georgia like he was a runaway slave and killed and then the videotape was leaked out months later had it not been leaked out they were going to cover this up law enforcement was aware of it but never charged individuals then we saw a young lady as an EMT operator in Louisville who the police in Louisville kicked in her door executing a no knock search warrant that had been based on faulty information and her and her boyfriend who both had no record they wanted to suspect or anything was subjected to police shooting at him and she ended up being killed and then you know no one was charged in that then we saw you know before this happened with with Mr. Floyd a man in Central Park Birdwatching and a white lady calls on the phone and he's videotaping on everybody can see that he's not threatening her and she's saying she's calling the police and help come here quick there's an African-American male threatening me now you know and and the reason why that's dangerous is because a lot of police if they were to came rushing a Central Park thinking that a black man is attacking a white woman you know he could have been killed and you know you you're old enough to remember Susan Smith who who drowned her kids and said that a black guy had done it when she you know and so all these things and so then to see George Floyd George Floyd now George Floyd that was his name the man that was killed is George Floyd and and to see Mr. Floyd being arrested in the prone position and to see that officer with his knee on his neck for almost nine minutes and people saying get off of him he's he's dying and they hear him scream out mama was like watching a modern-day luncheon and I don't think and when we see that and it's I'm sorry Jay when we see that we know it can happen now and so we sit back and we wonder in 2020 why are we still seeing things that that in the 50s 60s you know that that Dr. King and others had fought for why are we still seeing the same thing happen over and over again you know and so I think that all that at least for me and I you know don't want to speak for the entire black community but you know for me I know and I believe the black community feels the same thing it was just like this is it this is you know because after that happened and then they didn't charge him and it was clear to everybody it was just plain murder and and you know when you hear him say I can't breathe mama and and and the echoes of Eric Garner is coming in and you know and same thing in New York City I can't breathe and what a lot of people don't understand is he when I started these doing these cases in the mid 90s one of my first cases involved a man that was placed similar bill his name was Daryl Price and he was built like Mr. Floyd and he was killed like Mr. Floyd but back then police departments really didn't understand the dangers of a positional fixation and so a lot of them didn't have policies that when you put somebody in the prone position in other words when you lay on flat on their stomach like with Eric Garner he was he was you know obese and so when you put somebody's heavy set down that they're really really in danger of dying because they're diaphragm they can't breathe in and out if you lay down on a hard service even if you're not obese if you just lay down with on your stomach it's just hard to breathe and when somebody's pressing down on you you can breathe out so you'll say I can't breathe help and all that and the air is going out but there's nothing coming back in and eventually it turns off the oxygen to your brain and then it generates a heart attack and so that's the positional fixation so now we know from the mid 90s and these these things were happening a lot police are trained that once you get somebody in that position and you and if you have to put them down there once you have them secure and handcuffed you immediately roll them over and so you know I had the probable crimes report so officer Shulman got arrested the one that had his knee on the neck of Mr. Floyd that we saw in the video and so I was able to get a copy of the arrest report that was used for him and to give probable crimes on why he should be arrested for third degree murder that's how it's defined in Minnesota and but what and I'm not going to go through the report but what what what they had on body cams and so they're talking to each other they being the police there are three officers one has his knee on the neck the other two one has it's putting pressure on the back of Mr. Floyd or Mr. Floyd's land down the other part did third officers on his holding his legs down and so the one officer that's holding his legs down after a while when Mr. Floyd's saying I can't breathe the officer turns to officer Shulman the one that got arrested and says shouldn't we roll him over I'm concerned about excited delirium that's the condition they can cause that can happen when you're in that prone position and Shulman tells him and they got this from his body count no we're going to leave him where he's at and they continue to keep he continued to keep his knee on his neck for for several other minutes then they checked for a pulse with um after six minutes and the and the officer that was in the middle checked for a pulse of Mr. Floyd and he told officer Shulman well you can hear it on the body count they I don't get a pulse and he's and at that point he's not breathing Shulman for the next two minutes and 53 seconds continues to keep his knee on his neck after being told he has no pulse and he's not breathing and so you know when when you see that and you see that no one's charged the other two still haven't been charged and I know and see what they and the reason why a lot of communities have said is because if you went out and committed a crime on video tape they're not going to say we're going to investigate let's we want to do the investigation we want to do a thorough investigation and Jay will come back and get you later no you get taken to jail right now you're charged with a crime and then the investigation continues and so when they kept saying things like you know no we're going to we want to do a thorough investigation before we make the arrest and stuff like that you know a lot of people know that that's just BS that's just BS so I think we're seeing a combination of stuff but but real quick if you watch that video tape and you hear the people that are standing around saying to him him being Shulman you're killing him let him up the look on his face when he's looking back into the video camera is one of arrogance he's he has his hands in his pockets his knee on mr. Floyd's neck and and mr. Floyd's not breathing and and he's looking into the camera he being Shulman with his knee on his neck is almost like you know I'm gonna sit and do what I want to do no matter what y'all said that's the impression I get from looking at it no concern whatsoever for human life and that look right there that arrogance I think that that really helped to inflame a lot of people well so why why did the police get to this point it sounds to me correct me if I'm wrong but this has been happening a lot in fact even on an increasing basis in our lifetimes the number of incidents a number of people and and you wonder what goes through um the police force as to have somebody like this and allow him to operate this way what is happening to our police what is happening to the relationship of the police in the community get you got a handle on that well let me just say this you know I was telling somebody yesterday you know when we hear the saying I'm lucky or we're lucky we live in Hawaii we are now you know me as well no jail you know you've been on me for a few years I'm critical of police misconduct but I will say this we what we see going on and on the mainland would not be happening here and and and every now and then you may get a death in custody but but I think even then I think what makes Hawaii different for me is that the police officers live in the community they've been raised in these communities they live they got relatives in the community they love their communities right that's what they're part of um and so there's a caring there in the mainland like in Cincinnati where I practice that and I did cases in the way about this cases off you know these types of civil rights cases all over the country most of your police officers don't live in their city they work there but they live in the suburbs they're not part of the community they don't come to the community in other words you know and some of them have testified in deposition I've taken that that you know to them it's almost like waking up in the morning leaving the suburb going to the war zone and they're going with that mentality it's us versus you um and it's um I mean um and it yeah and so again how do you resolve it do you resolve it by this when you see a police officer when a police commits a crime justice has to be served here's what the people have said about because a lot of times in these cases your people say well you guys aren't talking about black on black crime you're not talking about white on white crime why don't you talk about that every time the police kill somebody you upset and see that one that that's a fallacy there's no the reason why you got black on black crime the same reason why you got white on white crime the statistics from the FBI show that when we all live in neighborhoods together we're more likely to kill each other that look like us right so but they'll say black on black but here's the point when we commit crimes those people that commit these crimes are brought to justice they are charged with whatever crime for the most part there's sentence that can be enough to get a trial etc the reason that you see the frustration here is because for so long no one's brought to justice when when they were in that badge and are killing our people and that's the crime right um and that's the anger it's almost like we can kill you with impunity and so when you see people saying black lives matter what that is saying is this for some reason you kill us and and nobody cares you're not charged with crimes and sometimes when you're charged you're not even convicted um you know no matter what the evidence is people thought that we were riding in cane you know when the videotape first came out like yeah that's the right and you remember the riots he rubbed it then when they were found not guilty because what what we says the black community well you know we've been telling you these things been going on for years finally finally we got it on tape finally we got something see now now we can show you what we've been saying is real right and so now we're gonna have a trial and and you're gonna see and justice to happen and then it's like not guilty even with it on tape and so do our lives matter and see that's that is part of what the anger comes out and so when they say all lives matter so people say you know all lives matter and that becomes insulting because it's saying we really don't recognize that the issue and the statistics to show that you're killed at this portion disproportionate rate than any other race and no one's bought the charges it's almost like saying yeah yeah yeah but all lives matter and it's ignoring the real issue in the community so I'm sorry for rambling on it was okay so I see three levels of of groups here that are in the spotlight one is of course the police two is the justice system the judges and three is I suppose you can say the jurors to the extent they're involved and you don't come up with a fair result I mean are all three as or is there something else or there is there another group it sounds like they're all somehow involved in this injustice my right well I think look at Trayvon Martin case in George's amendment now you got a teenage kid now think about this man if a black man had followed a teenage kid from 7-11 that would they just bought some skittles and an iced tea and at a constant amen and they're killing him right that he was still being jailed and so getting back to your point a lot of these jurors like Trayvon Martin's jurors with six white females they for some reason in Florida you know in these six instead of 12 on a jury which he has six white females in George's amendment saying hey there's a black guy just attacking me and had he continued to attack me he was going to get now Zimmerman had a gun that Trayvon Trayvon had skittles and iced tea um and so again I think it's that mindset that somehow is is is brought into the jury system that that where we're viewed as animals and that and so if you can create an image of me in your mind that I'm an animal it's you're more it's okay for you to kill me you know you might and and then a lot of times you have jurors weighing especially if a defendant or client you know I would have men that they got shot and killed someone will have prior records and so you got the police sitting there and some jurors are thinking in their mind well this guy was really out to try to help us and so you know should we ruin his life by convicting when this guy is you really just was a criminal and had he just listened to the police he's still be here today he's you know so a lot of that goes on in these cases it's hard to convict a police officer so how do you uh you were about to get into this a minute ago how do you resolve this what steps do you take is it is it resolvable and what do you do and who does it I just think that people have to understand that you know everybody should be subjected to the same level of law and be willing to to enforce it that way again um you know if you saw people can see the reason why I can look look at the me too movement once it came out that it was not okay for you to put your hand you know when you see Harvey Weinstein when you see Bill Cosby when you right and so all of a sudden men can control their behavior right you know why because you now you're held accountable for it now if you do these things you get to be charged with with rape because you're in a position of power and you're using that power to right and so you're going to see less and less of it why because justice is being done and and so it doesn't matter it's not about changing the mindset of the men and say okay I want you to view women differently what the women are saying we don't want to give a crap how you view us you touch us you use these positions of power to rape us you're going to prison so you're going to see that stuff and the same type of attitude has to happen here see a lot of times after these shootings people say well what can we do to understand of the relationship in the black community better I'm telling you right now I'm at the point where I'm all out of s to give my whole point is I believe you don't need to understand me better you really don't need to empathize with what I need you to do is when you see somebody kill me and I'm on arm bring them to justice and make sure justice is served that is not that is stop it can you talk about the the protest can you talk about what happened there and you know the organic nature of it and how it got to be violent and what are the implications going forward this is the biggest series of protests the country has ever seen and it went international right right um you know it's funny because when you watch the protests in Hong Kong they freedom fighters right see the united states to look at them say hey they fighting for freedom and they over there burning stuff up tearing stuff up everything right but they freedom fighters and I'm not for looting I'm not you know when you know but but what happened in Cincinnati was so we will start off with peaceful marches and you will get uh some people out there some come in and they'll portray it for their own they come out they know they're going to come out and lose then you got others who lose their temper they get shot by a bullet you know one of those beanbag bullets back in when I was they had these beanbags that would shoot you now they got the rubber bullets too nobody had those back then too so you get shot then they explode right now let's tear up the cars and stuff then you got others you know in Dr. King's image and follow that model of no matter what that continue to move on um and so I'm not for looting or anything like that I but but what I am saying is it's not uncommon and and and to be honest when Dr. King was killed and the riots went up it only took six days to pass the civil rights act if you look everybody talks about you know what would you do and what would Dr. King do if he was here well y'all killed him so we don't know not all you know what I mean but you know what I mean we don't know it's everything what would Dr. King say about honestly if he was here well I don't know because he did somebody killed him but six days after he died remember a lot of young people don't know that but man this this this nation burnt up that a burn baby burn came out of that remember that Detroit LA six days later the civil rights act was passed and all I'm saying is this sometimes that loud noise gets stuff done if you go back to Minnesota last week they said well we're gonna take our time we want to do a thorough investigation didn't know people started you know raising hell he was charged the next day so like I said I don't want anybody getting an understanding that I'm for looting or anything like that so you know what I am saying though is like when we was in Cincinnati and the riots broke out four days National Guard was called in it was able what it did was big business put pressure on the local council and the mayor and the governor and they said you know they're down here tearing up this stuff y'all got to do something and so then everybody then then the mayor the governor prosecutors the police everybody had to start listening because the community and our officials are so tied to business and and so and and and honestly speaking that they got a reaction out of them but like I said you got you got you got people in a right wing ill for trading you got in this video taste man of white people are driving around passing out bricks they had nothing to do with the protest right now the trumpet I'm gonna stand there from the far left I forget the name of the group others are saying it's from the far right it doesn't matter some individual you know so I think all this goes on when you had his protest but it's at a heightened level now yeah Trump you say you mentioned Trump a lot of people are saying Ken that you know Trump is responsible for accelerating you know throwing gasoline on on the anger of the people in the streets and making it worse how do you feel about that that's intentional that's intentional you know because I think money wants a distraction from his his pandemic from just totally messing up the whole pandemic right so he needs a distraction the economy is done and he's trying to hold on by a thread and I really do think you know if you we just you just came on air we both did right but a few months ago he had a press conference and right before the press conference they started tear gas and peaceful protesters right outside the white house in order for him to have a press conference and do a photo at the church right next within walking distance to where he went out there and held up a bible so they tear gas innocent people here's a president or attacking his own citizens who are nonviolent peacefully protesting and I mean this wasn't like last night they were out there just peacefully protesting they tear gas them they drove them back with horses they attack I mean I've never seen a president attack his own nonviolent citizens in order to do a press out with a bible hey I'm telling you so yeah he's instigating it he's throwing throwing it on a fire we're a country divided you think you think your black community we understand or do you think the black community appreciates what he is doing and not doing in terms of this protest I think this and that's you know I have a very large following on social media and so I've you know I've been so consumed with this but I've been trying to educate the community the black community and on the mainland if you had to really be aware of a lot of these people that are going into these protests who are from the far right who are trying to instigate who are trying to start a race war I think that you know you go back and look at when when the people overtook the state capital in Michigan Trump instigated that right then you're going to tell the governor you know you should meet with those people those are nice people standing out there with automatic weapons that he runs down into the bunker yesterday right people standing outside the white house and you know they're like knock knock we're here at your house now and now he's running into the bunker hey man so ken what what are your expectations here this is obviously still in in play it's still in process it's not over um and who knows what will happen do you have an expectation prediction well I think it would help if they would arrest the other officers like I said I'm telling you man I've done I've done criminal law for years I teach it and I've done these cases on a civil land for years you do not need look you can arrest people right now and investigate these officers who haven't been arrested yet are sitting at home and they're investigating what's the difference between that and you sitting your ass in jail while we do the invest there's none right and so you can charge and then up to charge do another indictment we saw that with Catherine K. Lohan you know just for for context remember she kept getting indicted over and over again because things kept changing and that's not unusual and so I think if they arrested the individuals that would help calm things down yeah so what what if anything I mean we're not as I say we're not finished with this it's still in in process but is it too early to learn anything from it I mean what what lessons at least so far would you draw from the events that have taken place over the past few days we need leadership we need leadership man and you know as well as I do a president that was uh truly leading this country with what it what it's set down and done one those far side chats I mean you know Trump could have came out the bunker and did a different type of far side chat like he would have gave it new meaning but but you know I mean but really because see this is a time where a true leader could say look you know what this and acknowledge the pain you know and and and all that's all that has to happen look we are a country that can still stay together we've been through slavery we've been through reconstruction we've been through our civil war all this stuff right and so we can somehow try to unite but that that cannot come unless we recognize and respect one another but why you know I'm telling man this guy is dangerous this guy being the president he dangerous man yeah Ken Lawson on the faculty of UH Minoa William S. Richardson School of Law thank you so much for joining us Ken thanks for having me talk to you great to have your input and to appreciate how you feel thank you thanks for all you do Jen thank you