KING: How did it take a dozen suits involving racism, brutality for a Detroit cop to lose his badge?
William "Robocop" Melendez Trial Day 1 Part 1 11/04/15
KING: How did it take a dozen suits involving racism, brutality for a Detroit cop to lose his badge?
In 2003, the LA Times ran a feature on Detroit cop Bill "Robocop" Melendez. Twelve years ago, he was already the subject of four lawsuits for racism and brutality, had cost the city more than $1 million in settlements and was at the center of an FBI investigation that resulted in one of the most sweeping consent decrees ever for a local police department.
Melendez, though, continued his career in law enforcement.
Former Detroit cop Bill Melendez sits in court in Detroit on Nov. 4. Melendez is charged with assault after he was caught choking and punching a black man on a dash cam.
In fact, wherever he served, lawsuits pile up against him. In the years after the story ran, Melendez was sued eight more times for racial profiling, extreme brutality and even wrongful death.
On Jan. 28 of this year, though, Bill Melendez was caught illegally choking and punching a retired black grandfather in the head 16 times. The victim, Floyd Dent, was a horrifically bloody mess and the dash cam video appeared to show Melendez planting cocaine on Dent. Every single charge against him was dropped and Melendez was arrested and charged with three felonies. From the beginning, Floyd Dent has believed that he was targeted and assaulted by white officers because he was a black man in a black neighborhood
Floyd Dent, 57, gets emotional as he recounts the beating he endured by Melendez to the media at his attorney's office in March.
At the Melendez trial last week, text messages from John Zieleniewski, the disgraced officer's former partner, suggested that both officers are violent, and racist.
"At least give me the satisfaction of knowing you're out there beating up n-----s right now," a friend texted to Zieleniewski, who is still a police officer.
Without skipping a beat, Zieleniewski replied, "lol. just got done with one."
Let's pause for a moment. This is crazy!
An officer of the law, whose partner has been the subject of lawsuits his entire career, is now found sending texts using racist language about African Americans and casually joking about brutality against local residents. How racist do you have to be for a friend to know you so well that he sends you a message like that? If anything, it strengthens the argument that Bill Melendez, who was actually a supervising officer, fostered the environment where systemic racism and abuse were tolerated.
Bill Melendez and other officers beat and put Floyd Dent in a chokehold after pulling him over in his Cadillac for a traffic violation in Inkster, Michigan.
Officer Zieleniewski should be fired immediately. Every case he's ever been involved with should be reexamined. An open call for abuse reports should be made.
Sadly, texts like these have been discovered from police officers in San Francisco, Miami Beach, Dayton, Baton Rouge, and elsewhere.
In spite of all this evidence, conservatives like Sheriff David Clarke of Milwaukee actually go on Fox News to proclaim, "There is no racism in the hearts of American police officers" and that "brutality ended in the 1960s."
It increasingly appears that we have made assumptions about the post-racial nature of 2015 that simply aren't true. The facts are that far too many police are racist and far too many people are brutalized by them.
William "Robocop" Melendez Trial Day 1 Part 1 11/04/15
KING: How did it take a dozen suits involving racism, brutality for a Detroit cop to lose his badge?
In 2003, the LA Times ran a feature on Detroit cop Bill "Robocop" Melendez. Twelve years ago, he was already the subject of four lawsuits for racism and brutality, had cost the city more than $1 million in settlements and was at the center of an FBI investigation that resulted in one of the most sweeping consent decrees ever for a local police department.
Melendez, though, continued his career in law enforcement.
Former Detroit cop Bill Melendez sits in court in Detroit on Nov. 4. Melendez is charged with assault after he was caught choking and punching a black man on a dash cam.
In fact, wherever he served, lawsuits pile up against him. In the years after the story ran, Melendez was sued eight more times for racial profiling, extreme brutality and even wrongful death.
On Jan. 28 of this year, though, Bill Melendez was caught illegally choking and punching a retired black grandfather in the head 16 times. The victim, Floyd Dent, was a horrifically bloody mess and the dash cam video appeared to show Melendez planting cocaine on Dent. Every single charge against him was dropped and Melendez was arrested and charged with three felonies. From the beginning, Floyd Dent has believed that he was targeted and assaulted by white officers because he was a black man in a black neighborhood
Floyd Dent, 57, gets emotional as he recounts the beating he endured by Melendez to the media at his attorney's office in March.
At the Melendez trial last week, text messages from John Zieleniewski, the disgraced officer's former partner, suggested that both officers are violent, and racist.
"At least give me the satisfaction of knowing you're out there beating up n-----s right now," a friend texted to Zieleniewski, who is still a police officer.
Without skipping a beat, Zieleniewski replied, "lol. just got done with one."
Let's pause for a moment. This is crazy!
An officer of the law, whose partner has been the subject of lawsuits his entire career, is now found sending texts using racist language about African Americans and casually joking about brutality against local residents. How racist do you have to be for a friend to know you so well that he sends you a message like that? If anything, it strengthens the argument that Bill Melendez, who was actually a supervising officer, fostered the environment where systemic racism and abuse were tolerated.
Bill Melendez and other officers beat and put Floyd Dent in a chokehold after pulling him over in his Cadillac for a traffic violation in Inkster, Michigan.
Officer Zieleniewski should be fired immediately. Every case he's ever been involved with should be reexamined. An open call for abuse reports should be made.
Sadly, texts like these have been discovered from police officers in San Francisco, Miami Beach, Dayton, Baton Rouge, and elsewhere.
In spite of all this evidence, conservatives like Sheriff David Clarke of Milwaukee actually go on Fox News to proclaim, "There is no racism in the hearts of American police officers" and that "brutality ended in the 1960s."
It increasingly appears that we have made assumptions about the post-racial nature of 2015 that simply aren't true. The facts are that far too many police are racist and far too many people are brutalized by them.
