I remember this happening like it was yesterday. I used to teach in Aurora, CO. I have family who live in Aurora. Family who are Black. Elijah McClain died at the hands of the APD a year before this happened. This happened only months after George Floyd was murdered by police for...what? After being told to get down on the pavement.
The four Black girls lay face down in a parking lot, crying “no” and “mommy” as a police officer who had pointed her gun at them then bent down to handcuff two of their wrists. The youngest wore a pink tiara as she held on to her teenage cousin’s hand.
The six-year-old Lovely watched as her mother, Brittney Gilliam, was led to a patrol car in handcuffs after she shouted in frustration at the police, who mistakenly believed the car Gilliam was driving was stolen.
www.theguardian.com/...
See the picture of the terrified little girl, named Lovely, in her pink tiara, clinging to her cousin’s hand? Click on the story if you can bear it, the details are disturbing.
I guess systemic racism doesn’t always pay. “The Denver suburb of Aurora has agreed to a $1.9m settlement with Gilliam and the girls to resolve a lawsuit that claimed the police officers’ actions were evidence of “profound and systematic” racism, a lawyer for the family, David Lane, announced on Monday.”
It’s entirely possible a jury would have awarded more damages, but in an effort to prevent the girls having to relive what happened during a trial, the family’s lawyer agreed to a settlement. The funds will be divided among the five victims, with the girls’ portions going into annuities until they reach the age of 18.
Good for them. These women and girls, at least, will survive the profound and systematic racism of the Aurora Police Department. Thank goodness for Civil Court. Because all of the offending cops are still out there doing their “duty.” An investigation determined the officers hadn’t committed any crimes, mostly because it was decided they were simply “following their training for conducting a high-risk stop of what they suspected was a stolen vehicle.”
I wonder how it would have been handled if it had been my blond daughter and her kids in the SUV? Hmmm…
*Just saw that The Root has also covered this story. www.theroot.com/…
“Per the body camera footage on the Aurora police officers, each girl was placed in handcuffs. ”
