A $21 million civil rights lawsuit was filed Monday against the city of White Plains, New York, and its police department over the death of 68-year-old African-American veteran, Kenneth Chamberlain Sr. Mr. Chamberlain was shot dead by police officers inside his own home after he accidentally set off his medical alert pendant.
The community, predominately African-American, lives in fear of its mostly European-American police force. White Plains Police initially reported that the victim brandished an ax, forcing them to shoot him in self-defense, but later admitted to fabricating that information. The Police also later acknowledged taunting Mr. Chamberlain with racial slurs — an act they have described as a “tactic” to distract him as they sought entry into his home. These admissions came only after an investigation initiated by the victims family uncovered an audio tape capturing the victim’s murder. The recording came from the medical alert facility monitoring the victim’s home, and not from police recording devices, which were curiously turned off during the course of the murder.
Yesterday’s lawsuit comes less than two months after a Westchester County grand jury decided not to indict Police Officer Anthony Carelli for the shooting. Historically in America, White Southerners were known for mercilessly killing innocent African-Americans as a reprisal for being forced to earn a living on their own, without the aid of slave labor. Now, it seems police forces in the North are being used as an equally deadly tool of racial oppression and soft-kill genocide.
Democracy Now! spoke with Mr. Chamberlain’s son, Kenneth Chamberlain Jr., and two of the family’s attorneys, Mayo Bartlett and Randolph McLaughlin. “This is just one step of many that we’re doing to try to hold the city of White Plains accountable for the death of my father,” Chamberlain Jr. says. “It’s unacceptable for the district attorney’s office or for anyone else to suggest that calling someone a racial slur is a tactic,” Bartlett says. “If anyone else had used that language, they would be charged with a hate crime — at a bare minimum, for aggravated harassment. … That further makes you wonder what actually was presented to the grand jury.” Find complete Democracy Now coverage here.