Quantcast

In Akai Gurley case, a reason not to trust prosecutor

Hertencia Petersen, Akai Gurley's aunt, stands outside of the Brooklyn district attorney's office on Thursday, March 24, 2016, one day after DA Ken Thompson recommended house arrest and probation for former officer Peter Liang, in lieu of jail time.
Hertencia Petersen, Akai Gurley’s aunt, stands outside of the Brooklyn district attorney’s office on Thursday, March 24, 2016, one day after DA Ken Thompson recommended house arrest and probation for former officer Peter Liang, in lieu of jail time. Photo Credit: Getty Images / Darren Hauck

After the last of a long line of outraged speakers had denounced Brooklyn DA Ken Thompson to the media outside of his office Thursday, one man continued to yell to anyone who’d listen.

“They’re gonna keep killing us until we stop them. They’re gonna kill us again and we’re gonna be right back here doing the same thing,” he said. He, like other protesters, was clear Thompson had chosen his side.

He was right. Many who had praised Thompson after he secured a conviction of Peter Liang, the former NYPD officer who shot and killed Akai Gurley in the Pink Houses in 2014, had forgotten that as DA, Thompson is part of the system they’re protesting. After Liang’s conviction, he praised the NYPD as “the greatest police department in the world,” while also seemingly embracing a faint notion of justice.

Whether because of a calculated political decision or a case of cold feet, he couldn’t bring himself to follow through. In a statement after he said he wouldn’t recommend prison time for Liang, Thompson said in part: “this tragic case has always been about justice and not revenge.” That’s an interesting logic that every Brooklynite prosecuted by his office should make sure to bring up in court.

If Judge Danny Chun doesn’t sentence Liang to prison time, then we’d have a curious system of “justice” in Brooklyn, where low-level, non-violent offenders spend more time in jail than someone who kills an unarmed man.

Thompson’s statement was a slap in the face to Gurley’s family, painting them as somehow vengeful for wanting Liang to serve time in prison. But it also underscored the special treatment cops get from prosecutors. According to Thompson, “Liang went into that building that night, he did so as part of his job and to keep the people of Brooklyn and our city safe.” So, a police officer barging gun-first into a staircase and then killing a man, is still in the service of keeping us safe.

Trying to hand out get-out-of-jail-free cards to cops probably doesn’t help. For rally-goers who promised to not forget Thompson’s actions, it might be time to take a page from Cleveland and Chicago where prosecutors who dropped the ball in the Tamir Rice and Laquan McDonald cases lost their bids to stay in office.

Josmar Trujillo is a trainer, writer and activist with the Coalition to End Broken Windows.