As the well-deserved praise heaped upon Baltimore City State Attorney Marilyn Mosby still makes its way along social media channels, it is important that we put this first step of the judicial process in context.
Yes, it is a push in the right direction that six Baltimore police officers have been charged for the death of 25-year-old Freddie Gray while in the custody of the Baltimore Police Department. His fatal spinal injury has been ruled a homicide, and someone should be held accountable for his death. Moving forward with charges to the officers involved is undoubtedly a logical move, considering the preponderance of evidence that Gray did not have previous spinal injuries and did not somehow magically give himself the fatal blows.
But the mere fact of having officers charged with the death of an unarmed black man does not equal justice. This has been proven multiple times.
Mere months after the LA Riots in 1992, Malice Green was beaten to death in Detroit by police officers Walter Budzyn and Larry Nevers. The official cause of death was blunt force trauma from repeated blows to the head by a police flashlight. Part of the defense strategy was to note that if Green had not been a drug addict, he could have survived the blows to the head. Budzyn and Nevers had separate trials. Both were convicted of second-degree murder in 1993, and both had new trials granted based on the fact that the jury had been shown the film Malcolm X, and both were convicted of involuntary manslaughter in the new trials. Budzyn was released in 1999. He is free and in the world today. Nevers was released in 2001 because he was diagnosed with terminal lung cancer and not expected to live long, so he was to carry out the rest of his 7-15-year prison sentence at home. Nevers died in 2013. Does that sound like justice to you?
On New Years Day in 2009, Oscar Grant was on the ground face down, unarmed and handcuffed at a train station in Oakland, CA, when he was fatally shot in the back by Officer Johannes Mehserle. The shooting was partially filmed by a train rider. Mehserle was charged in January of 2010. The defense argument was that Mehserle mistakenly used his gun instead of his Taser. Sound familiar? Mehserle was found guilty of involuntary manslaughter on July 8, 2010, and was sentenced to two years minus time served in November of 2010. He was released on May 3, 2011 on parole. Shooting an unarmed man who was on the ground and handcuffed in January of 2009, not being charged until January of 2010 and being released in the Spring of 2011. Does that sound like justice to you?
Chicago resident Rekia Boyd was 22 years old when she was shot dead by an off-duty Chicago police officer in 2012. Officer Dante Servin fired into a crowd after he claimed he thought he saw someone in the crowd with Boyd draw a gun, though no gun was ever recovered. Servin was charged with reckless conduct and reckless discharge of a firearm. He was found not guilty in April of 2015. Does that sound like justice to you?
All of that is just to say that the mere fact that there are charges against the Baltimore police officers in the Freddie Gray case does not mean that justice has been served. Not by a long shot.
A charge, an indictment — that is not the end of the journey. If we want justice in Baltimore and elsewhere in the United States, we have to stay vigilant about the entire judicial process and use our votes and our voices to make changes when necessary. What is a black life worth in America?
Follow Demetria Irwin on Twitter at @Love_Is_Dope and connect with her on Facebook.