As you know, this blog is about law and technology. I do my best to keep the subjects I write about within those parameters. However, some issues are so important, so vital to the well-being of our society, I feel compelled to share them here, even though they may not have anything to do with the comparatively mundane topic of legal technology. I also feel compelled to do what little I can to amplify the voices of those who speak out or write about such important, vital issues.
One such issue is the vile reality of police misconduct and abuse and the response to it by the Black Lives Matter Movement. Make no mistake, BLM is the most consequential movement in the U.S. since the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s. May it continue to highlight the racial injustice that infects our society, and may we all do what we can to rebuild a better, more just, more equal, “more perfect union.”
One such person has recently written on a legal topic that goes hand-in-hand with police misconduct and abuse. It is an topic that has not often been mentioned much by the media (though that is changing), which is astonishing given the key role it plays in legalizing police violence against our neighbors who happen to be of a different race or ethnicity than us whites. That issue is the judge-made doctrine called “qualified immunity.” The person who has recently wrote about it is Judge Carlton W. Reeves.
Judge Reeves was appointed to the Southern District Court of Mississippi by President Obama. On August 4, 2020, Judge Reeves issued an opinion in the matter of Jamison v. McClendon about qualified immunity that is, without a doubt, one of the most moving pieces of legal writing I have ever read. Detailing the long, tragic, gut-wrenching history of how African-Americans, in particular, have been treated by law enforcement reduced me to tears. After I read the opinion, I felt anger at our judicial system and the judges who created this fictional “escape hatch” that allows murderers with a badge to escape any legal consequences for the horrors they have wrought. I felt shame at myself for the many privileges I unconsciously enjoy every day solely because I happen to be white.
I understand that statement offends some white people, threatens them to their very core, but it remains true nonetheless. As things are, I do not have to worry that I might be shot dead in my own bed like Breonna Taylor. I do not have to fear that a child of mine might have his or her life taken away in an instant simply because he or she was playing with a toy gun in a public park like 12-year-old Tamir Rice. I never think that I might be murdered while helping an autistic person who had wandered away from a group home like Charles Kinsey. If I have a broken tail light on my car, and an officer sees me, I do not fear that I might be shot to death like Walter Scott. For that, I am lucky, and because of that, I am ashamed.
It is difficult to read the opinion because it is so heartbreaking, but the time has come for all of us to feel the heartbreak the African-American community has felt for centuries. The day of reckoning is here. Everyone should read Judge Reeves’ opinion in Jamison v. McClendon. I only hope his moving words help end the travesty of qualified immunity so that equal justice can finally have its way.
I include Judge Reeves’ opinion here for those who care. Thanks for reading.
CyberEsq 