All the Police Have to Do Is Utter Those Five Magic Words

Janine Jackson: If there is a word for being stunned and stunned again, and yet unable to become numb, it would go some way towards describing how people — especially black people — felt as we heard the verdict in the case of the murder of Philando Castile. That a jury determined no crime was committed when Police Officer Jeronimo Yanez pumped seven bullets at Castile and into the back seat of the car where his girlfriend and her four-year-old child were sitting. That this was the system working.

If these outcomes are to be more than a punch in the gut, we have to try and learn what they teach us about the limits of the law in achieving justice. The ultimate response to state violence against black people is building community power. But, with that, can the law — supposedly a living thing — be changed? What other points of intervention exist, and how do we measure progress?

Our next guest has been working on these issues for many years now. Ronnie Dunn is professor of urban studies at Cleveland State University in Ohio. He joins us now by phone. Welcome to CounterSpin, Ronnie Dunn.
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