Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, April 11, 1991 TAG: 9104110205
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A-1 EDITION: EVENING
SOURCE: By LAURENCE HAMMACK STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
But NAACP President Evangeline Jeffrey had little to say Wednesday, after Commonwealth's Attorney Donald Caldwell announced that his investigation concluded police were justified in using deadly force to protect themselves.
"Our position is that we want to get a complete report before saying anything" about the facts of the case, Jeffrey said.
Even though Jeffrey says some questions remain unanswered, one fact seems clear: The fatal shooting of Leonard A. Morris - justified or not - has only widened the rift between the Roanoke Police Department and the city branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.
Morris, 27, was shot as many as nine times by two officers who went to his Southeast Roanoke home the morning of March 23. Police wanted to question him about a woman who was sexually attacked, stabbed repeatedly and left on a nearby street corner, but they said they were forced to draw their revolvers after he turned violent.
In a flurry of news conferences, allegations and investigations since Morris was killed the morning of March 23, there has been little communication between police and the NAACP.
When Jeffrey went public two days after the shooting to raise questions, it was news to the police, who had not been notified or consulted. By the same token, Jeffrey said she was not told of a news conference police held hours after the shooting, or of Caldwell's announcement Wednesday.
And it was only at the urging of a third party that police sent a letter to the NAACP asking for its input in an internal investigation of the shooting.
There was no response. Jeffrey said one was in the works, but the NAACP did not know a decision would be announced so quickly.
But poor communication between the NAACP and police cannot be attributed solely to differences over the Morris case. The tension goes back to last summer, when the NAACP accused police of often using excessive force in dealing with blacks. Questions were also raised about recruiting practices in the nearly all-white force.
Still, the Morris shooting came at a time when relations seemed to be improving.
When the city Drug and Alcohol Abuse Council - of which Police Chief M. David Hooper is a member - met at Lincoln Terrace last month to discuss problems with drugs and violence, residents were highly supportive of police presence in the housing project.
One woman told Hooper that having police pass by was like having "Mommy and Daddy" watching over them.
Which raises the question: When the NAACP complains about the Police Department, does it speak for the entire black community?
Some say it does not. "The NAACP represents a certain part of the black community, but I think the community is much broader than that," Caldwell said. "No more than George Bush does not speak for everyone in America, no one in any organization speaks for all of the people in a certain community."
As a member of a city task force studying race relations, Caldwell has not been hesitant to point to problems he sees in the Police Department.
But after investigating the Morris shooting, he was just as quick to defend it. "Every case rides on its own facts," he said.
Although Jeffrey declined to comment on the facts as revealed by Caldwell's investigation, she said she is concerned that the NAACP has come under criticism for raising questions.
"Is it so much to ask for a complete review of something when someone's life is taken?" she asked.
"We do not live in an age where vigilante justice is the order of the day. You do not make a judgment, sentence and execute an individual on the spot."
At its news conference last month, the NAACP stopped short of making accusations. Instead, it asked for a federal investigation into the "grave possibility" that excessive force and racism may have been involved in the Morris shooting. However, that message may have been confused with the accusations of a family member who appeared at the same news conference.
"We did not make any accusations, we just asked questions," Jeffrey said. "But if asking questions perturbs people, then that tells us that maybe this community is not looking at the value of black life."
Jeffrey dismissed suggestions that outrage over the recent beating of a black man by Los Angeles police officers prompted the NAACP to jump on the bandwagon at the first opportunity.
"If everyone would take notice, we raised the issue of excessive force last summer, long before anything in California broke out," she said. "We're not dovetailing on anything, we're just following through on something that we've already raised."
Jeffrey said she feels obligated to ask questions on behalf of the black community. And Caldwell agrees there's nothing wrong with NAACP leaders raising the issue.
"Even though I may not agree with them all the time, I know that they are motivated to try to help the community as a whole," he said.
Based on his work with the Community Relations Task Force, Caldwell said blacks generally seem more concerned with broader issues - such as the lack of minorities on the police force and efforts to improve communitywide relations - than with the facts of the Morris case.
"I think the problems are more in the perceptions of everyday treatment" of the black community by police, he said.
"If we could ever try to address some of those problems, then maybe we wouldn't have so many questions when something like [the Morris shooting] happens."
by CNB