Next Step Explored For Last Week Public Hearings
A variety of issues surfaced at special listening sessions last week as a number of Grand Rapids residents voiced their concerns about encounters with the Grand Rapids Police Department.
The State Department of Civil Rights hosted the sessions Thursday, March 28, 2019, at the Center for Community Transformation, located at 1530 Madison Ave. SE.
Now that they have voiced concerns as well as storied their personal encounters, some community members wonder if anything will be different or whether things will go on as usual.
Representatives from the Michigan Department of Civil Rights have listened.
Some speakers are not yet convinced that much will be different are charting their course. Kevin Dengel is among them.
During his testimony, Dengel mentioned Quentin Carter, James King and himself victims of false arrests, and he mentioned Josh Kuiper.
Dengel also mentioned the initials of four people that he said had lied in his case. A former educator, he lost his employment and was incarcerated.
Yesterday, Dengel went beyond initials when he said to the Grand Rapids Times, "Their names are all of the following: Maria Lewis (ML), Ashley Gray (AG), Chynice Guydon (CG), autumn Guydon (AG)."
He continued, "Their names are documented with the U.S. Department of Justice for perjury and obstruction of justice. I have documented with the University of Michigan Law School Innocence Clinic, that Maria Lewis and Ashley Gray have fabricated a criminal case."
Dengel said he is planning to leave Grand Rapids.
Restaurant owner, Elijah Libbett, spoke last week about the community's lack of trust and the need to hold police officers more accountable.
Libbett said, "The community is not trusting the police, because they are watching their children being harassed and handcuffed and don't want to be beaten by the police so many community members are up in arms."
Libbett also said, "When you're dedicated to the community that you inflict, it is hard to for the community to see an eleven - year - old girl handcuffed when the police were looking for a forty - year - old White woman. The community has been justified and people are saying, 'I'm not working with the police, because they are going to trick me in a little while.' "
Libbett is among community residents offering suggestions for how to improve community - police relations.
One is to start holding police officers accountable to their own code.
"The officers are going to have start believing in what is right and standing up for what is right — whether they lose their job or not," he said. "The police are going to have to engage with the community, which means not letting them get away with anything but also the police should not be getting away with anything either."
He also said that more programs are needed for youth.
The Greater Grand Rapids Branch of the NAACP organized the sessions.
"I thought that the listening sessions were incredible," said Cle Jackson, the Branch President, We did a lot of mobilization to get people to come to the two listening sessions."
He continued, "We went door to door, we also hit churches, pod casts with our partners like LINC and the Hispanic Center. We also did a lot of social media marketing, but I was very impressed with the people who came out and shared their stories."
Jackson went on to say, "Between the two sessions, I listened to over eight hours of testimony… It was overwhelming, but it was also disheartening to not only hear the testimony but to also hear the trauma that many people have had inflicted on them in this community when it comes to the community and police relationship."
According to Jackson, the next step for The State Department of Civil Rights is to look at the testimonies and to analyze them with the Michigan Department of Civil Rights Commission and make a determination of how they will move forward with a formal investigation.
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