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KTLA News: “National Inquiry and Solution-Finding Hearing on Police Crimes” (1981)
Guest writer Monika Rhue was the project manager for “Archiving the Age of Mass Incarceration,” a collaboration between Million Dollar Hoods and the UCLA Institute of American Cultures. It is an initiative to create one of the nation’s most diverse collections of materials related to policing and incarceration. The effort will collect, digitize and preserve a sustainable archive of data, testimonies, artifacts and police files for the next generation of research on racial and social justice. This blog was made possible by a grant from the John Randolph Haynes and Dora Haynes Foundation.
What happens when past cries of injustice still echo into the present by Black people’s voices today? Still trying to convince a nation that the badges given to some police officers are an invitation to inhumanity, brutality and criminal intent against people of color. It is through the accessibility of archives that one can begin to examine the similarities of transgressions that took place in the past but still manifest themselves into the present. This is where the UCLA Film & Television Archive’s KTLA News Project on “Incarceration, Policing and Crime (1970–1980)” becomes an important part of providing evidence of testimonies and cases by Los Angeles residents reporting on police brutality and surveillance.
The Use of the Chokehold
Punitive control has been the systematic practice to oppress, control and keep Black people in their place since the enforcement of slavery. The recurring truth-telling from Black people on policing, brutality and unfair treatment by L.A. police officers seems to have no ending. The Archive’s KTLA newsfilm collection represents extensive footage documenting testimonies and cases about the Los Angeles Police Department’s excessive use of force, like the chokehold that has resulted in the murder of its citizens. The use of the chokehold by L.A. police officers resulted in the murders of 16 people between 1977 and 1982. Of those murdered, 14 were Black. Coalition leader Reverend Milton Merriweather was among those who challenged the use of the chokehold. In the KTLA footage, Merriweather shares his opinion about how most officers do not know how to use the chokehold, and how the chokehold has been the cause of several deaths of innocent people. In correlation to Merriweather’s concern about the chokehold, there is footage that highlights how Ferdinand Bell was choked in order to be restrained, resulting in his murder while in police custody, and the murder of 16-year-old David Aguayo, who was shot three times by authorities, with a bullet hitting him in the head.
KTLA News: “Reverend Milton Merriweather speaks out against police choke holds and police surveillance” (1978)
Murder Justified
Reviewing some of the KTLA newsfilm provided a historical narrative of L.A. residents being murdered due to manual strangulation, force applied to the neck to cause strangulation, and a shot to the head, cases brought before the L.A. police chief, internal affairs and the commissioners office. The footage also documents comments made by authorities to justify these murders by the L.A. police officers. Comments like, “he had to be restrained,” although 15-20 officers arrived at the scene to restrained one man, “the chokehold had to be used,” “he appeared to have a sharp object in his hands,” and there was “no alternative but to shoot,” not one shot, but three. These comments reflect historical patterns of defense and verbiage to protect police officers. However, these comments also can provide evidence of what happened to L.A. residents’ loved ones, when curated from a human rights and reparative justice lens.
KTLA News: “Press conference about the killing of David Aguayo” (1972)
Truth-telling
This news footage from the 1970s and ’80s documents the continuation of racial profiling, policing of Black and Brown communities, and the murder of unarmed citizens by police officers still in the 21st century. It also highlights stories by concerned residents telling the truth of what is happening in their communities and the risk of being retaliated against by police officers for speaking out. In the footage, community leaders share complaints from their community members experiencing police harassment, such as noting down their license plates, taking pictures of them, and sometimes arresting them on suspicion.
KTLA News: “Community leaders address the Los Angeles Police Commission about police retaliation following misconduct complaints” (1979)
Power of Curation
The KTLA collection represents a historical timeline of systemic abuse against Black and Brown people by L.A. police officers. It provides a sample of language that has been used to allow L.A. police officers to get away with a crime while carrying their badge, giving them punitive control and criminal intent against Black and Brown residents of Los Angeles.
Curating the newsfilm collection is an example of archiving and providing access towards reparative justice. This archival footage of residents reporting police brutality and retaliation in the 1970s and ’80s is an essential part of providing evidence that will open the way for residents and scholars to uplift the truth-telling of criminal intent committed by police officers. Additionally, the KTLA newsfilm is a reminder that the old chants that the criminal justice system is biased towards Black and Brown people still ring true today.
News stories reviewed:
“Reverend Milton Merriweather speaks out against police choke holds and police surveillance”
“Excessive force by LA County Sheriffs suspected in death of Ferdinand Bell while in custody”
“Criticism of methods used by police officers assigned to Chinatown”
“Press conference about the killing of David Aguayo”
“Los Angeles Police Department and District Attorney’s Office react to the Caplan Report”
“National Inquiry and Solution-Finding Hearing on Police Crimes”
