Sean Bell

2008-04-28
By Brian Gilmore

According to Lieutenant Gary Napoli, the commanding officer of the officers who had been working the Club Kalua, the now infamous club where Sean Bell spent his last moments of life, none of his officers identified themselves as police officers as they converged on Sean Bell’s automobile that night in the dark at 4:00 am in Jamacia Queens. According to Napoli’s testimony as reported by Newsday during the trial, “...he didn't hear anyone shout ‘Police’ or ‘Stop, police’...” Napoli added that he didn't recall seeing any of the officers in his unit display a badge, although he stressed he wasn't looking for the latter in the chaos. The second fact, of course, is less important than the first.

Jean Nelson, one of the more than 50 witnesses who testified in the Sean Bell trial and who also told it like he remembered it, testified consistent with Lieutenant Napoli’s version but with one important caveat. Nelson testified that the officers did not yell: “police,” nor did they say “stop police” when they descended upon Bell and his two companions. Nelson testified that one officer pulled out his gun as he walked towards Bell’s car and said – “let me holler at you.”

Think about it. It is 4:00 am in the morning. Someone is walking towards your car in the dark of night. You have just argued with someone out front of a strip club and threatening words were exchanged. The person you argued with advised you they are packing steel, and they would use their weapon without hesitation.

Moments later, your car is rammed, and then someone is coming towards your car in the dark with a gun and they say: “let me holler at you.” I will let you think about what you would have done if you were Sean Bell.

Sean Bell made his choice: he hit the gas and tried to escape; he thought this was it and he had a chance to save himself. He hit a police officer in the leg on his way out even though he didn’t know it was an officer. The officer reacted. His fellow officers reacted. The reaction was 51 bullets, a storm of hot lead. One officer, Michael Oliver emptied one clip, re-loaded, and kept shooting. He got off 31 rounds in just a few seconds. Two other officers, both of whom were black, were responsible for the rest of the barrage.

As the Sean Bell trial began, I intentionally did not pay attention to it. I knew how it would end. There were many Black Americans who were hopeful for a conviction but I don’t really think many of them even knew or know the complex facts of the case, or how it is really a case about confusion and shoddy police work.

Many Black Americans wanted the officers to get convicted because of all the cases where police officers should have been tried and convicted but got off with an internal disciplinary sanction or nothing at all. Most of those cases we never hear about; they don’t get reported in the news.

In other words, all of the cases where cops kill a black man or black boy have become the same and represent the racial history of America. They are one entity, one mass, one quest for absolute justice for Black America no matter what happened. It is unfair to the police to a certain extent because all of the incidents have become the Amadou Diallo story from New York or the Gregory Habib story from, Prince George’s County, Maryland or the Prince Jones story from Virginia. They all end the same too: no conviction or in some cases, no trial. We have gotten used to it.

Sean Bell might not even fit the profile actually but that doesn’t matter. Bell’s death and the trial of the officers represent what we long for in these cases – equal justice. Right after the not guilty verdicts, my email inbox was flooded with anger and sadness as friends and acquaintances chimed in on the justice system and how it failed us again. There was little, if any, reflection or empathy. Poems were written quickly about the episode, message boards loaded up with stark commentary about racism, police, and the failure of the system again.

Most of what I read had nothing to do with the Sean Bell case. But to the individuals who were making the comments, it didn’t matter. They barely knew the facts but a man was dead, he was black and the shooters were police officers.

No one cared that the prosecution had a difficult task of proof in the case, that several key witnesses changed their stories, and that it would not be a jury trial. This is because no one really cares about facts; Black Americans simply want the lives of black men to be respected and valued like other men in America and the Bell case was a chance to say that. America wants Black America to stop making every killing of black men by police officers a lynching.

Truthfully, it is probably the number of shots that set the tone for the trial and the hope for a conviction. After the Diallo case of 41 shots, 51 shots had to be the charm. Then there was New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg stating in the days following the shooting that it sounded to him like “excessive force was used” and that the more than 50 shots was “inexplicable” and “unacceptable.” This was good; the mayor of the city thought it was crazy. 

But the problem with Sean Bell’s murder was that it was a tragic killing but was much more tragic because it was the result of an unfortunate series of events that were highly unlikely. The Bell case, in other words, is terribly sad but it is not “the case” we have been waiting on to fix things. It was not the case that would finally say – we are not only moving towards a post-racial America politically as proven by the rise of Barack Obama; we are moving towards a post racial America when it comes to the justice system.

We are, by no means, there and the killing of Sean Bell and a trial with a different outcome probably would not have liberated us anyway from the racial madness we live.

Brian Gilmore is a writer and attorney in Washington, D.C. 
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