In Freddie Gray’s neighborhood, some unease tempers celebratory moments
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Version 0 of 1. BALTIMORE — In Freddie Gray’s neighborhood, where he was arrested, where people marched to protest his death, where the rioting and looting took place, there was both a moment of exultation Friday and an undercurrent of unease. Drivers honked their horns and raised their fists in victory salutes. One man waved two fingers — spread in a peace sign — through the sunroof of his car as he passed through the intersection of Pennsylvania and North avenues. “I think that’s justice. That’s what they are supposed to do,” said Justin Miller, 19. “I felt safer. Since this indictment, maybe it won’t happen again to any of us.” But as much as people saw cause for relief after six police officers were charged in Gray’s April 19 death, there was apprehension about whether the officers would be convicted. Residents also expressed concern over whether, in the long run, conditions would improve in the impoverished Sandtown-Winchester neighborhood, where about half of working-age adults are unemployed. “I’m happy that they did hand down charges, but at the same time, I don’t think anybody’s going to get convicted,” said Tracie Clemons, 24, who lives in Owings Mill, Md., but works in the city. [Six Baltimore officers charged in Gray’s death ] As evening fell, the mood of celebration and vigilance was reflected in a massive multiracial march that filled the city’s streets. Fronted by a banner blaring “Black Lives Matter,” thousands of demonstrators waved signs as they walked arm-in-arm and chanted: “All night, all day, we will fight for Freddie Gray!” “We are looking for justice. Enough is enough,” Mary Salkever, 73, said as she joined the procession, her walking cane in one hand and a sign in the other reading: “The opposite of good is not evil. The opposite of good is indifference.” The march began at the Inner Harbor, halting traffic as it snaked past City Hall and lines of police officers, some of whom held riot shields and nightsticks, others mounted on horses. As the noisy spectacle made its way toward the epicenter of earlier unrest at the intersection of Pennsylvania and North, Monroe Reeves, clad in a black apron, stood on the sidewalk, weeping. A woman came up and embraced him. “I see white America and black America fighting for right,” said Reeves, the African American manager of the Stang of Siam Thai restaurant. “What’s happening in Baltimore is going to change the whole social fabric of this country.” His emotions echoed those that rippled across the city throughout the day. Earlier, Deneen Hunter was sitting at her kitchen table not far from Sandtown, watching President Obama say on television that what people “want more than anything is the truth.” “It was like a big pile of rocks had been lifted off their chests. It’s years of oppression built up,” said Hunter, 50, a pharmacist who had the day off. “When they heard they were charging the officers, they went buck wild. People were yelling, ‘Yes! Yes! We’ve got justice for Freddie Gray!’ ” But Chad Dawson, 31, said the charges — including second-degree murder for one officer and assault and manslaughter for others — amounted to “a slap on the wrist.” Mark Hill agreed: “Manslaughter is a slap on the wrist. Then, when they bring them to trial, they’re going to push it back two years, let everybody be calm about it and then let them off.” “Every day around here, we see police harassment, police brutality,” said Jernita Stackhouse, a longtime resident. “And Freddy’s death damaged our community. This is going to change a lot, and we won’t be the same after this.” Robert Monahan, 45, called the charges “a step in the right direction” but added that more attention should be paid to problems in the neighborhood that helped fuel the violence earlier this week. “What’s the long term?” he said. “I’d like to see people get jobs, houses. There’s no excuse for being homeless around here with all these vacant houses.” [Who is Baltimore State’s Attorney Marilyn J. Mosby? ] Reaction to the charges varied in other Baltimore neighborhoods. In Fells Point, Daniel Paredes put plywood on his store’s windows. When people loiter without buying anything, he said, he fears that they are casing his store for looting. “I understand people can be upset,” he said, “but I don’t know why they steal and break things.” Chantelle Laguerre, 20, was headed to visit her boyfriend when the store where he works, Urban Outfitters, closed abruptly at 2:30 p.m. It was one of many Inner Harbor businesses closing early after managers at the tourist destination heard that there might be another protest march. “I’m upset kids are rioting, but I understand it’s a reaction of the system that’s hurting them,” said Laguerre, who lives in Reservoir Hill, not far from the center of recent unrest. “People are saying to keep it peaceful, [that violence is] not what Martin Luther King would want. But it will always get violent. It has to get worse before it gets better.” Laguerre said she believes that the demonstrations are about more than race. They’re as much about how police treat young people in Baltimore, she said. Jasmine Whittington, 21, a student at the University of Maryland at College Park, traveled to Baltimore on Friday to support Gray’s family. Being “good” doesn’t exempt people from abuse by police, she said. “We’re college students, but we can’t wear our degrees on our sleeves,” Whittington said. “They just see the color of my skin. . . . People say, ‘Be a respectable person: Pull your pants up.’ But even Martin Luther King was shot in a suit. It’s not about us, it’s about them.” As Elton Hibbert stood on his North Avenue stoop with his year-old grandson, Amare, on his knee, he raised his fist in the air. Justice, he said, had been served. “I don’t want my little grandson to die like that,” Hibbert said. “It could have been me. It could have been my son, my grandson, my nephew. We can’t have little black kids be dying. That’s what we are fighting for.” Larry Johnson, who lives in East Baltimore, pointed to the need to spread prosperity to the city’s neglected neighborhoods. “If they can build these,” Johnson said, gesturing toward downtown office towers, “why can’t they fix those houses?” The celebratory response to the day’s news turned to civil disobedience Friday night as police began enforcing a curfew with protesters still on the streets. After repeated announcements that the curfew was about to start, police with riot shields moved into the crowd in front of City Hall shortly after 10 p.m. Dozens of demonstrators were pinned to the ground and handcuffed. In a matter of minutes, the arrests were completed and protesters were loaded into vans and driven away. Earlier, as night was descending, Renee Washington spoke to a crowd in front of City Hall beneath a banner calling for the end of police brutality. She claimed to know something about the subject. Her fiance, she said, died after an encounter with Baltimore police. “The same thing happened then is the same now,” Washington said. Her fiance, Joseph Wilbon, was arrested June 5, 2000, on a larceny charge and died at Mercy Hospital, sparking protests at City Hall that were covered in the local news. At the time, a police spokesman said there was no sign of trauma on the man’s body, but Washington said that when she first saw Wilbon’s body at a funeral parlor, “the makeup couldn’t even cover the bruises.” In its wrongful-death lawsuit, his family argued that delays in getting treatment for Wilbon led to his death. But a court case later determined that the police were not at fault and attributed the man’s death to cardiac arrest tied to cocaine use. Both police officers involved in his arrest remained on the force, according to news reports at the time. Justice may be hard to come by even after the arrests in Gray’s death, Washington warned. “Don’t think this case is going to be easy,” she said. |