I wish I could remember her name. Although, I guess its not surprising that I cannot. I only saw her the one time.
I was a Bronx County Assistant District Attorney at the time. On a warm Fall night when I was on homicide beeper duty, I was called to her apartment in the North Bronx.
Nice neighborhood; nice building; nice apartment. And there she was – sprawled on the floor in the foyer in her own blood.
Something she had done or said had angered her husband as she prepared dinner that evening. He had taken such great exception to it, that he snatched a carving knife from her hand and plunged it into her back. Their child, who saw the attack, ran from the apartment. And when the woman tried to follow, her husband slammed and bolted the door. And then he chased her with a baseball bat, smashing it into her repeatedly before pulling the knife out of her back and using it to slash her throat.
I remember a lot about that night – the flecks of blood like bright, red paint on all the apartment walls. The blood on the floor as thick as Elmer’s glue around her body. How even the Detective’s voice quivered as he told me what he knew of the facts. The look of horror on the dead woman’s face...
I remember everything but her name.
I was once nameless and faceless, in a kind of way. Years before I married I was in an abusive domestic relationship. I was belittled, I was maligned, I was bullied, I was beaten. And I was isolated, because my abuser was charismatic and well-liked and I was not necessarily so. It seemed at the time there was no one to tell. Although, in truth, there were people who knew because they had heard the sound of his blows on my flesh, his soul-destroying words and my cries. But even those who knew acted like that did not.
And now here we are.... People of color of both genders are subjected to inappropriate displays of the power and authority of police personnel in disproportionate numbers...but often the outcry is about what is happening to Black and Brown men, without any acknowledgment that women, too, are subjected to abuse and mistreatment. It seems to me, though, that the reticence to acknowledge what happens to Black and Brown women at the hands of over-reaching police power is akin to the reluctance of anyone who knew of my abuse to offer concrete help, which, in turn, is akin to the nonchalantly aggressive attitude toward women that led to the brutal killing of my nameless sister on the floor of an apartment in the Bronx these many years ago.
Let me say that more simply: racism, bigotry and sexism are fruit of the same tree of hatred. Where, then, do you think the greatest vulnerability truly lies when we are speaking of such things as these?
I watched the Sandra Bland arrest video last week. Before I knew it, I was in tears. I didn’t cry because of perceived police brutality. I cried because she was one more woman alone with one more man who had all the control and could not see her as a human being worthy of appropriate treatment. I cried because she was one more woman who was invited to speak her mind, and, when she boldly did so, was screamed at and manhandled and abused. I cried because just as I might have, at one time in my life, wound up like the woman in the Bronx apartment, I know I might yet one day wind up like Sandra Bland. And I don’t feel safe.
I have asked my husband – a civil rights champion – to stop highlighting the plight of men of color at the hands of certain police personnel in ways that ignore how much more vulnerable women are in those same situations. He has, I think, agreed (or did he just cave in to my tears?).
That night in the Bronx, after I had done my job in the apartment, I went downstairs to my car. My husband was there. I don’t see so well to drive at night, and couldn’t find my way around the Bronx even in the day light, so when I got beeped in the night, he would drive me.
I remember going down to the car. And, instead of telling him whatever I could tell about the facts – which was my custom – I just began to cry. And I don’t mean little tears, I mean great big blubbery tears. Really down from the core of your being kind of crying.
And all I could say to him when he asked what was wrong was: “I Can’t believe this is my job. I just can’t believe this is my job.”
I have a different job now. But I still cannot believe some of the things that are necessary as I fulfill my function – things like announcing as wrong that which human decency and compassion should inherently lead folks to understand to be wrong, and which, nevertheless, they do not...at least, not for some.
Sandra Bland, Kindra Chapman, Joyce Curnell, Ralkina Jones, Alexis McGovern, Raynetta Turner, Sarah Lee Circle Bear, Tanisha Anderson, Yvette Smith, Miriam Carey, Shelley Frey, Darnisha Harris, Malissa Williams, Alesia Thomas, Shantel Davis, Rekia Boyd, Shereese Francis, Aiyana Stanley-Jones, Tarika Wilson, Kathryn Johnston, Alberta Spruill, Kendra James...
God have mercy on us all.
I was a Bronx County Assistant District Attorney at the time. On a warm Fall night when I was on homicide beeper duty, I was called to her apartment in the North Bronx.
Nice neighborhood; nice building; nice apartment. And there she was – sprawled on the floor in the foyer in her own blood.
Something she had done or said had angered her husband as she prepared dinner that evening. He had taken such great exception to it, that he snatched a carving knife from her hand and plunged it into her back. Their child, who saw the attack, ran from the apartment. And when the woman tried to follow, her husband slammed and bolted the door. And then he chased her with a baseball bat, smashing it into her repeatedly before pulling the knife out of her back and using it to slash her throat.
I remember a lot about that night – the flecks of blood like bright, red paint on all the apartment walls. The blood on the floor as thick as Elmer’s glue around her body. How even the Detective’s voice quivered as he told me what he knew of the facts. The look of horror on the dead woman’s face...
I remember everything but her name.
I was once nameless and faceless, in a kind of way. Years before I married I was in an abusive domestic relationship. I was belittled, I was maligned, I was bullied, I was beaten. And I was isolated, because my abuser was charismatic and well-liked and I was not necessarily so. It seemed at the time there was no one to tell. Although, in truth, there were people who knew because they had heard the sound of his blows on my flesh, his soul-destroying words and my cries. But even those who knew acted like that did not.
And now here we are.... People of color of both genders are subjected to inappropriate displays of the power and authority of police personnel in disproportionate numbers...but often the outcry is about what is happening to Black and Brown men, without any acknowledgment that women, too, are subjected to abuse and mistreatment. It seems to me, though, that the reticence to acknowledge what happens to Black and Brown women at the hands of over-reaching police power is akin to the reluctance of anyone who knew of my abuse to offer concrete help, which, in turn, is akin to the nonchalantly aggressive attitude toward women that led to the brutal killing of my nameless sister on the floor of an apartment in the Bronx these many years ago.
Let me say that more simply: racism, bigotry and sexism are fruit of the same tree of hatred. Where, then, do you think the greatest vulnerability truly lies when we are speaking of such things as these?
I watched the Sandra Bland arrest video last week. Before I knew it, I was in tears. I didn’t cry because of perceived police brutality. I cried because she was one more woman alone with one more man who had all the control and could not see her as a human being worthy of appropriate treatment. I cried because she was one more woman who was invited to speak her mind, and, when she boldly did so, was screamed at and manhandled and abused. I cried because just as I might have, at one time in my life, wound up like the woman in the Bronx apartment, I know I might yet one day wind up like Sandra Bland. And I don’t feel safe.
I have asked my husband – a civil rights champion – to stop highlighting the plight of men of color at the hands of certain police personnel in ways that ignore how much more vulnerable women are in those same situations. He has, I think, agreed (or did he just cave in to my tears?).
That night in the Bronx, after I had done my job in the apartment, I went downstairs to my car. My husband was there. I don’t see so well to drive at night, and couldn’t find my way around the Bronx even in the day light, so when I got beeped in the night, he would drive me.
I remember going down to the car. And, instead of telling him whatever I could tell about the facts – which was my custom – I just began to cry. And I don’t mean little tears, I mean great big blubbery tears. Really down from the core of your being kind of crying.
And all I could say to him when he asked what was wrong was: “I Can’t believe this is my job. I just can’t believe this is my job.”
I have a different job now. But I still cannot believe some of the things that are necessary as I fulfill my function – things like announcing as wrong that which human decency and compassion should inherently lead folks to understand to be wrong, and which, nevertheless, they do not...at least, not for some.
Sandra Bland, Kindra Chapman, Joyce Curnell, Ralkina Jones, Alexis McGovern, Raynetta Turner, Sarah Lee Circle Bear, Tanisha Anderson, Yvette Smith, Miriam Carey, Shelley Frey, Darnisha Harris, Malissa Williams, Alesia Thomas, Shantel Davis, Rekia Boyd, Shereese Francis, Aiyana Stanley-Jones, Tarika Wilson, Kathryn Johnston, Alberta Spruill, Kendra James...
God have mercy on us all.
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