MIM NOTES 195	October 1, 1999

Riverside, Cal. cop calls out police dept. racism
by MC12

Nine months after Riverside, Cal., police murdered Tyisha Miller 
in her car, a Black member of the police department has come 
forward to expose pervasive racism in the department in general, 
and the actions of the pigs on the scene in particular.

Officer Rene Rodriguez made the allegations as part of a lawsuit 
in which he is trying to get disability and back pay for post 
traumatic stress disorder for being a Black man in the middle of 
all that racism. To MIM, those circumstances plus the fact that 
he's a cop in the first place cast a shadow of doubt on his story. 
Still, it also seems realistic, so we'll report on it here.

Miller, a Black womyn, was killed by police as she sat in her car. 
They say she was sitting motionless in the car with a gun on her 
lap, and when they knocked on the window she reached for the gun, 
so they shot her multiple times -- to the point that her face was 
unrecognizable.

Rodriguez arrived at the scene of Miller's shooting soon after it 
happened. He says he found the four killers whooping it up, 
slapping each other on the back and exchanging high-fives. The 
most damning thing legally could be his claim that he heard one of 
the cops, Wayne Stewart, say to another, Michael Alagna, "She 
wasn't going to hurt you; I had that bitch covered." Soon after, 
as neighbors started to arrive, one of the officers said to the 
shooters, "We need to get you guys out of here -- these animals 
are arriving in busloads," according to Rodriguez. And the officer 
replied, "Yeah, they're having a Kwanzaa reunion across the street 
... If it'll make the family feel any better, we shot her with 
black bullets."

As the murder spawned an investigation, Rodriguez says, he started 
to get the cold shoulder from other cops in the department, which 
escalated into retaliation on the job and eventually threats on 
his life and his family. Now he is being investigated on what he 
calls a trumped up charge related to another case, in what he says 
is an attempt to discredit and get rid of him.

MIM calls the police pigs because of their role in the imperialist 
system of national and gender oppression. This is not an inherent 
characteristic of the humans who fill the role of pig on police 
forces. It is the perspective they adopt as a result of their 
gender, class and national background, reinforced by the effect of 
their oppressive duties on their consciousness.

If officer Rodriguez is ready to come over to the side of 
humanity, that's great. There are many cops who could do a service 
by telling the truth about what goes on among the police when no 
one else is around. Telling the truth would be an important part 
of the rectification of former cops who decide to switch sides.

Note: Los Angeles Times 2 September 1999, p. A1.