Bridging the Divide Between the Police and the Policed

In New York, the Mayor and police leadership have repeatedly voiced commitments to “create a bond” between cops and communities of color. The problem, according to high-level officials, is that the city chose the wrong people for the right job.
Photographer: Dawit N. M.
Publisher: The New Yorker
Format: Digital
Date: 2021/04/28

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The Brownsville neighborhood of Brooklyn has long had one of the highest homicide rates in the city. Photograph by Dawit N. M. for The New Yorker
Only one other Brooklyn precinct made more arrests for gun possession in 2019 than the Seventy-third. Photograph by Dawit N. M. for The New Yorker
In May, 2020, a struggle ensued outside a Brownsville apartment complex in which officers wrestled Jerry Akbar to the ground and repeatedly shocked him with a Taser. Photograph by Dawit N. M. for The New Yorker
“As a Black woman, growing up where I did, I had to deal with a lot,” Alicka Ampry-Samuel said, of Brownsville, an area she now represents on the City Council. Photograph by Dawit N. M. for The New Yorker
Latrice Walker, who represents Brownsville in the State Assembly, warned Craig Edelman that there would be “some type of blowup” if he didn’t ease tensions in the neighborhood. Photograph by Dawit N. M. for The New Yorker
White cops still account for three-quarters of the N.Y.P.D.’s roughly four hundred executives at the ranks of inspector and chief. Photograph by Dawit N. M. for The New Yorker
On Mother Gaston Boulevard, outside a nail salon where Kwesi Ashun was killed by police, in 2019, a team of violence interrupters now keep watch over the block. Photograph by Dawit N. M. for The New Yorker

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