Saturday, October 29, 2016

Freedom Rider Rip Patton Lends Voice to Who Will Watch the Watchers?

Freedom Rider Dr. Ernest Rip Patton Jr. in a Nashville recording studio narrates the trailer, introduction and closing sequences of
Click Photo to See Interview
our film.

Before laying down tracks, we interviewed Dr. Patton, and he reflected on how the Civil Rights era of the 1960s connects with today; his advice for young people today; his historic ride, and how his mother accidentally found out he was hundreds of miles from home being arrested.

On May 24, 1961, Patton joined fellow Tennessee State University students and others in boarding a Greyhound bus in Montgomery, Alabama, just 10 days after Klansmen had burned a Freedom Riders Greyhound bus in Anniston, Alabama, and other white supremists had beaten and bloodied those on a Trailways bus in Birmingham.  Just three days earlier, Montgomery's First Baptist Church had been attacked.

National Guardsmen with fixed bayonets stood in the aisles of the bus, assigned by the federal government to protect the activists, and helicopters flew the route Patton and the Freedom Riders took from Montgomery to Jackson, Mississippi.  There also were sharecroppers along the way, and Patton saw little kids waving and pointing, as if they knew the Freedom Riders and relief were on the way.

Patton and John Lewis took seats in the whites-only lunch counter of the Jackson Greyhound station.  Lewis, who has served as a U.S. Congressman from Georgia since 1987, got up to go to the whites-only bathroom, where he was arrested.  Patton was arrested at the lunch counter.   They and the others arrested were taken to notorious Parchman Penitentiary, where they were imprisoned for 62 days.

Patton was one of 14 TSU students who were expelled for taking part in the Freedom Rides.  Later, the university apologized and gave them honorary doctorates.

Patton tells his story to this day, and speaks to students and others around the country, on behalf of various educational organizations such as Facing History and Ourselves.  Patton also sings in the Nashville-based New Spirit and Friends choir.

More later.......

Wednesday, October 12, 2016

Three years later, police oversight board to hear case of arrest for filming cops

Three years after it happened, a citizen who was arrested after he sought to take a picture of police at Manna House homeless refuge in Memphis will have his complaint heard by the Civilian Law Enforcement Review Board Thursday Oct. 13, 2016, at 4 p.m. in Memphis City Hall, 125 N. Main St.
"I'm going to take you to jail for obstructing highway passageway." 

Paul Garner was arrested along with a Manna House volunteer who had objected to police entering the property without a warrant to search for a man.   Never mind that filming police is protected by the First Amendment as courts consistently have ruled.  Never mind about that search warrant business, that's Fourth Amendment. Memphis police even have a written policy that tells officers basically "hands off" citizens who film police.

Garner was told by police that he could not take a picture of their cruiser ID number because it was illegal to film without a permit.   Police then charged Garner and the volunteer with disorderly conduct and obstructing a passageway, since "pissing off the cops by saying no to a warrantless police search" (they walked past the volunteer and searched, anyway) is not a crime that is currently on the books.

Garner worked within the police department system and filed a complaint through internal affairs.  It took police six months to respond that Garner's complaint was "not sustained," meaning there was insufficient evidence to fault the officers.  The letter from MPD referred Garner to take his complaint up with the Civilian Law Enforcement Review Board if he was not satisfied.  Following the system as  prescribed, Garner sought to contact the police oversight board only to learn it had been illegally and secretly disbanded by Mayor A.C. Wharton's administration in 2011.

In the citizen video which is excerpted from the real-time, Memphis-made documentary Who Will Watch the Watchers? six police officers are actually blocking a sidewalk, and two pedestrians have to walk around them as the police arrest an apparently homeless man.  Then, an officer tells the photographer that he knows it's on video, but he is going to arrest the man, anyway, for "obstructing highway passageway."

Garner and other aggrieved Memphis citizens later organized around Memphis United and campaigned to bring back the review board.

On Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/MooreMediaFilms/

On Vimeo:
https://vimeo.com/187114629

MPD Policy on Filming Police:
http://www.tba.org/sites/default/files/public_recordings_policy_12202013.pdf