An Open Letter to Chicago Residents about Charlie Beck

A Warning from Black Lives Matter-Los Angeles to Chicago Residents on Choosing Ousted LAPD Chief for Superintendent—You Don’t Want Him

This is an open letter to the residents of Chicago from Black Lives Matter on former Los Angeles Police Chief Charlie Beck being selected as the interim superintendent for the Chicago Police Department.

Take it from us, you don’t want him. But if you get him--this is what you can expect.

Under Chief Beck, the Los Angeles Police Department became the most murderous police department in the nation with 45 officer-involved-shootings and in-custody deaths in 2017. A title they continue to proudly hold.

Beyond the police killings of Black and Brown people, there was Chief Beck’s brazen ongoing disrespect for community members, especially Black community members, who demanded accountability. There are also the many well-documented cases of Beck’s favoritism and cronyism that resulted in the loss of millions of tax-payer dollars in Los Angeles to pay the cost for his bad decisions.

Did you know that under Beck’s leadership, the LAPD targeted Black motorists at five times their population and searched them at a rate three times that of White drivers, even though they were found to be less likely to have contraband items? Chicago doesn’t need that.

Beck also pushed for an expansion to policing that gobbled up 53% of our city’s general fund in order to pay officers to do jobs outside of their areas of traditional expertise like responding to mental health and homeless crises.

It was Chief Beck who rolled out a predictive policing program that cast a wide net over mostly South and East Los Angeles neighborhoods--where we live--creating hot spots and enabling the heightened surveillance and criminalization of Black and Brown communities.

Building on the post 9/11 demonization of Black people, Muslims, and immigrants, the LAPD under Chief Beck re-configured itself as a counter-insurgency force creating a massive architecture of surveillance and deploying tools that were battle-tested in Iraq and Afghanistan. Using the guise of national security, targeting Los Angeles’ Black community, Beck unleashed programs like the Suspicious Activity Reporting (SAR) initiative. SAR created a culture of fear and suspicion, criminalizing innocent behavior, promoting racial profiling, invading privacy, and was not evidence-based and wasted resources.

Beck’s possible move to Chicago should also be seen in the light of the “revolving door” in the upper echelons of policing--similar to how military generals upon retirement seek other venues offering their expertise in the destruction of life.

Chief Beck embodies everything a White-supremacist would bring to Chicago to contain, control, criminalize, and cause grave harm to Black, Brown, and poor communities. All one needs to do is look beyond the scripted endorsements of former and current officers and politicians with aspirations of higher office to understand how truly dangerous Beck is.

Under Beck, Chicago can expect more #RekiaBoyds, #LaquanMcDonalds, and #RonnieMans.

A coalition of organizations, led by Black Lives Matter Los Angeles recognized years ago that the misleadership of Charlie Beck was so dangerous to Angelenos, that removing him as Chief became our top priority. While we’re breathing a collective sigh of relief that he is no longer our police chief--we would be doing a disservice to communities of color and poor people if we didn’t warn you of what you can expect from a Beck police administration.

Our #FireBeck campaign included regular attendance at meetings of the Los Angeles Police Commission, a t-shirt campaign, letters to the mayor, a petition signed by almost 10,000 Angelenos, banner drops, public disruptions, and a 54-day-long encampment in front of Los Angeles City Hall--the longest Black-led encampment in recent history.

Perhaps most notably, the aunt of Wakiesha Wilson, who was killed in LAPD custody, threw her niece’s cremated ashes in anger in Chief Beck’s face just weeks before we ran his ass out of the LAPD.

Hear us. Chicago--particularly Black Chicagoans, you don’t want Chief Beck. You need to mobilize and act now to make sure that he is not appointed. A Chief Beck police administration means more killings of Black people by the police with no accountability.

Your brothers and sisters in Los Angeles stand with you.

The struggle continues,

Signed:

  • Black Lives Matter Los Angeles

  • Stop LAPD Spying Coalition

  • White People for Black Lives

  • Los Angeles Community Action Network (LACAN)

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