Understanding of history can help police officers defuse tense situations | Guest opinion

I recently had the opportunity to travel with my daughter and the Akron Urban League ’s Youth Adult Council to the Legacy Museum, the National Memorial for Peace and Justice, and the Freedom Monument Sculpture Park in Montgomery, Alabama.

The Legacy Museum chronicles our country’s history of the treatment of Black people, from slavery to Jim Crow, lynching and mass incarceration. The visit to the memorial came near the end of a months-long Urban League program in which high school students and recent graduates of Akron Public Schools work together to identify what they see as the most pressing problems in the city as well as possible solutions to these issues. This past year, the students chose to focus on three areas: policing, education and mental health.

A museum dedicated to telling the truth about this nation’s treatment of Black people is a difficult one to visit.

My ancestors were not victims of this kind of injustice and suffering. As a white person, I’ve also had an uncomplicated relationship with law enforcement. I was raised to respect and to trust authority, police included, and never saw or had any experiences to make me question that lesson.

Black people in general and Black men in particular have not had that advantage. Rather, in large part, their experiences with those in positions of authority, both Black and white, have been built on the mistrust, fear and violence of the past.

I have watched police officers work with compassion and grace in extremely difficult circumstances, both during my time living in Cleveland and teaching in Cleveland schools as well as while I have lived in Akron. There are countless police officers who work incredibly hard to establish relationships with all people in the communities they serve.

The treatment of Black people in this country makes the job of policing even more difficult. The mistrust, fear and anger felt among many in Black communities did not come out of thin air. Black people continue to be subjected to red-lining, de facto and de jure discrimination, as well as to brutality in all forms.

Police officers who understand this dynamic are the ones we don’t hear about as often; they are the ones who approach each situation with compassion and with the idea that the people or person they are about to address is first and foremost a human being. They are the officers needed to respond to incidents as dangerous as standoffs with armed suspects to calls about teenagers cussing too loudly on a basketball court.

While on the Montgomery trip , I got to know Young Adult Council member Terrelle Harris-Malone, 19, an Akron Public Schools graduate, who came on the trip with his mom, twin sisters and cousin. Harris-Malone smiled and laughed easily, asked questions that revealed a genuine curiosity about others, and spoke passionately about the goals of the council as well as those of his work for the Citizens Not Politicians campaign collecting signatures to get an amendment to end gerrymandering on the Ohio ballot.

He spoke with earnestness and enthusiasm about the work that he and others are doing and showed a deep commitment to his community, to the city of Akron and to democracy. His pride and love for his community also meant seeing there still is a lack of equity in education, a disregard for people with mentally illness, and a serious problem between young Black men like himself and the police.

Harris-Malone also happens to be facing charges of resisting arrest, rioting, obstructing official business and criminal trespassing, all stemming from an incident on Lawton Street last fall when police were attempting to disperse a group of young Black men and women after receiving a call about fighting in the area.

While it’s impossible to see in the video of this particular incident everything that happened, what can be seen certainly suggests another instance where a more skilled officer might have been able to mitigate the apparent suspicion, defensiveness and mistrust among the young people being approached.

At one point early in the video, an officer can be seen walking toward one of the young adults, pointing a finger; in another spot, an officer can be seen using pepper spray on a young person who looks to be bickering but not moving or doing anything physically threatening. Finally we see Harris-Malone, who, although apparently voicing frustration and possibly anger toward the officers, is walking away backward, motioning for the rest of the group to back away.

See the video: Footage shows altercation between Akron police and youths

The video then jumps to footage of four officers tackling Harris-Malone to the ground while he is clearly holding his hands in the air. The teen told a reporter immediately following the incident that he was asking the officers not to touch him and was tackled to the ground after one officer grabbed his hand and he smacked that hand away.

The video of this incident shows how easily an altercation between police and young Black men can go sideways. Of course, a viewer is not experiencing the flows of adrenaline and spikes in cortisone that interfere with sound judgment. But the police are supposed to be the professionals in these situations, tasked with using the skills it takes in the heat of the moment for a safer, calmer outcome.

It’s hard to imagine that this incident or others, many of which have ended in tragedy, could not have been avoided with responding officers who know that the best way to approach what is likely to be a tense and emotionally fraught situation is with a demeanor of control, compassion, calm and maybe even one that comes from an understanding of the history behind why their presence is a cause for anger and distrust among certain groups.

Guest columnist Kelly Urbano is a resident of Akron.

This article originally appeared on Akron Beacon Journal: Understanding of history can help police officers defuse tense situations | Guest opinion