THE HUTCHINSON REPORT: Do police rush to judgment when they investigate themselves?

By Earl Ofari Hutchinson

Inglewood, California Police Chief Jacqueline Seabrooks faces a dilemma that many big city police chiefs face when their officer’s gun down unarmed civilians under dubious circumstances, and those civilians in almost all cases are young African Americans or Latinos.

In this case the victim was 19 year-old Michael Byoune.


The deep suspicion is that police routinely bend, twist and massage testimony and evidence to whitewash and ultimately exonerate officers.


The way to counter that is to conduct a thorough and honest investigation and if the officer(s) are found guilty of wrongdoing impose swift punishment.


But that almost always draws loud protests from police unions and some city officials.

The Byoune killing by any standard was a bad shooting. In fact, it evoked instant comparisons to the killing of bride-groom-to-be Sean Bell by NYPD officers in 2007. Bell, like Byoune, was a young African-American male. Bell and Byoune were unarmed. There is no indication that he, like Bell, was involved in any gang or criminal involvement. From tapes and news clips, Inglewood police officers riddled the car that Byoune was in with bullet holes. The car Bell was in was also riddled with gunfire.

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