(upbeat music) - [Patrick] The fatal shooting of Patrick Lyoya, a 26 year old Black man by a White Grant Rapids police officer during a traffic stop is tragic and again, raises questions about bias in policing.

What threat did Lyoya pose?

What is the appropriate level of force police should use in response?

We discuss elements of the fatal traffic stop, and potential solutions on West Michigan Week.

- [Policeman] Do you have a driver's license?

- Yeah.

- [Policeman] Where is it at?

- Its in the car.

- [Policeman] Get it for me.

- What that going on?

- [Policeman] The plate does not belong in this car.

- Wait minute, grab me my license there.

- [Man] It's not here.

- Right there.

(indistinct) - [Policeman] No, stop.

Put your hands behind your back.

- [Patrick] This is video of the traffic stop from the Grand Rapid's police officer's body camera, the chase, then a scuffle, the two men wrestle for the officer's taser then the fatal shot back of Patrick Lyoyo's head.

The Grand Rapid's Police Department released a number of videos from the officer's squad car dashboard, the officer's body camera, which turns off 45 seconds before the fatal shooting, a home surveillance camera and phone video recorded by the passenger in Lyoyo's car.

Here to discuss the anxiety intention brought on by police encounters during traffic stops is Scott Roberts, Senior Director of Criminal Justice campaigns for Oakland California based "Color of Change".

Thank you so much for joining us.

You're in Washington DC, so let's make that clear.

- I'm in DC, thanks for having me, Patrick.

- You've had an opportunity to watch these videos multiple times.

What is it that you see?

What do you take away?

- I think the word that comes to mind for me when I watched the videos is escalation.

One of the things that we hear often about in police reform is the need to train officers to deescalate situations.

And I'm not sure what training this officer may or may not have received, but it just appears that in every instance when there was an opportunity to deescalate the situation, he did escalate it, whether it be the initial stop, I think there are questions and I know we'll get into whether or not this type of stop is justified or is wise, but it seems that these types of situations, officers are trained and taught that these are highly dangerous situations for them.

And I think the officer continued to escalate the situation tackling Mr. Lyoya, (indistinct) trying for failing to deploy his taser.

And ultimately, obviously killing Mr. Lyoya with a gunshot to the back of the head.

Watching the video is pretty devastating.

I know that I personally was expecting something more to happen, and I think that's what I, when I think about escalation, because when the kind of response for me doesn't meet the moment, in multiple times the video.

And I when I heard that he killed Mr. Lyoya and I turned on the video, I thought, more would happen before that ultimate fatal moment that we all saw.

- As you know, people see things through different prisms.

And there are, it seems to be two prisms through which people see the events of this traffic stop.

As you mentioned, deescalation is a course to take, it's a minor traffic infraction and we're not really certain (Patrick clears throat) excuse me, why the officer is following Mr. Lyoya at 8:00 AM.

And maybe we get into some of that, but there is that idea of deescalation.

There's no need to chase somebody over a minor traffic violation.

The other prism is, Hey, why isn't Mr. Lyoya responding to the demands of the officer?

So you have these two perspectives on this stop.

How do you view that?

Or how do you explain to those who say listen to what a police officer tells you?

- I think both sides have been taught through largely through culture whether it be police culture, that's fostered in police departments by police unions which trains officers to have a warrior mentality but also explicitly teaches that traffic stops are some of the most dangerous moments for police officers and there's evidence, right?

I mean, police officers have lost their lives in these types of stops.

The same is true for the Black community.

And particularly for younger Black men, like Mr. Lyoya that culturally you're warned and you're given the talk as a young man.

I know Mr. Lyoya was an immigrant.

And so maybe didn't go through the exact type of experience that someone like myself who grew up in Virginia did, but we are taught to be extremely careful in these situations that these situations can be very dangerous.

And of course, there's plenty of evidence also that these situations can escalate.

About once a week, someone is on an average I should say about once a week in the United States someone is shot after a traffic stop, it doesn't involve a violent crime and those people are unarmed.

So these situations do escalate.

And I think that's why we should be looking at this fundamental issue of whether or not this type of stop, it makes sense in terms of safety but also in terms of justice, from a fairness and an equity standpoint within the criminal justice system.

- The New York Times released an investigation.

It dates back to last year.

It involves deadly police stops over the last five years.

The times found the police killed more than 400 drivers or passengers who were not wielding a gun or knife or under pursuit for a violent crime traffic stops which are often motivated by hidden budgetary considerations, because of of the ticket revenue they generate are the most common interactions between police officers and the public.

Yet the police consider them among the most dangerous things they do.

And there's the presumption of peril that has been significantly overstated but it has become ingrained in police culture and court precedence contributing to impunity for most officers who use lethal force at vehicle stops.

I mean, you've hit on a number of these things but it's fascinating to see that there's an investigation and you have a data set to draw from.

- Yes, this as again, these steps are dangerous.

They often lead in violence against the driver by police or well frequently enough in the United States where it's happening.

Like you said, 400 times in year almost once a week on average.

The other issue is that there's a strong racial bias in these types of traffic stops in Grand Rapids.

There was a study in 2017 this showed, that there was a disproportionate amount of Black drivers being pulled over.

And when it comes to these types of stops, pretextual stops, right?

You're using the stop as a pretext to criminalize the driver, to figure out they have a warrant.

If they have something illegal in of the car, there's a racial bias there.

And they're used for racial profiling.

So an officer, if they are either taught to target or there's policy, basically to target Black in the department, or individual's officer's bias shows up and they're more likely to run the tags or look for a minor thing, like a light that's out in the back of the car or something like that to pull folks over.

And so it's just yet another reason besides officer safety, the kind of predatory profiteering that see locals doing to in terms of these traffic stops, in terms of looking for tickets, but the kind of pretextual stops that are really aimed at criminalizing the driver are applied disproportionately from a racial standpoint.

And like I said, yet another reason why we should really be rethinking whether or not these stops make sense - After the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis where an officer there kept his knee on the back of George Floyd's neck for over eight minutes, Andy Shore, the Mayor in Lansing decided it was time to change a little bit of the culture there and how police proceed when it comes to traffic stops and minor traffic infractions.

There are other cities doing the same thing.

You mentioned the 2017 study here in Grand Rapids.

Why is or why are community slow to react when there is data, the New York Times investigation, Grand Rapids 2017, what happens?

What is in the machinery that holds up reform?

- Well, I wanna say this and I know this will be controversial for some people but some of these things are fundamental to police.

There's a, especially when you talk about the 2017 study, which showed racial bias, right?

There's never been a time in the United States where racial bias wasn't intricate in policing.

And we see that in, whether traffic stops, arrests, police use of force including police killings, all disproportionately happening to people of color, particularly Black people.

And so there has to be a lot of really fundamental change I think, to our approach to public safety, to police culture, if we're gonna address those things.

I think the other things that one is something that you mentioned, there is a financial incentive to have a high rate of traffic stops in a lot of communities.

Some of this is as a result of the economic blows that certain communities have taken.

I know, in a lot of industrial areas or formally industrial areas, this is the type of revenue that is replaced tax revenue from from business that may have left, myself, I'm from a small town that in Virginia, where there as factories and processing plants left, we saw more and more use of these types of tactics, just to fund local schools and things of that nature.

So that's a heavy, that's a motivation for folks.

But I also think that police officers and police unions are frankly very resistant to reforms and they hold a lot of power locally.

They're politicians are often afraid to be seen as soft on crime and to institute these types of reforms.

So I think there's a lot of factors that are motivating us and keeping us kind of stuck right now.

We're in a situation where it seems that a lot of momentum has been lost from that period where George Floyd passed or was murdered.

And, as we've seen violent crime tick up in some parts of the country, we've seen kind of a backing away from reform just earlier this year, it's the President was shelving in his executive order on police reform.

This killing actually seems to have reinvigorated them to take some action, the killing of Patrick Lyola, but yeah, we have to, I think also be steadfast, right?

And not allow these kinds of traumatic moments that we have a country like up tick of crime rates or even shootings like we saw in New York last week deter us from these two days before us.

- Before I let you go.

You're in Washington DC, you do a lot of lobbying work.

Do you meet with the national union discussing this very topic of traffic stops and the deescalation because as mentioned these are those points of contact that turn ugly, wouldn't this be beneficial to police unions to deescalate in these situations?

- Yeah, well, I think your question earlier was right in terms of what local communities can do, because unfortunately although I would, there's actually we'd like to see Congress say, and that we like to see from the White House, when it comes to regulating these types of stops, these are really localized decisions.

We do talk to folks about this.

We often are talking to the Department of Justice about disproportionate stops and generally disproportionate contact with police with Black folks.

And we're looking at places for those investigations from the federal government.

But again, they're very, even those interventions are localized in a sense, right?

So, but yeah, we're talking about this stuff.

And I think where we were seeing the movement is actually at the local level.

So if folks are, do think that this ought to change I think it's your local officials, your mayors your city councils, county councils that have the ability to really turn the tide on us.

- Scott Roberts, Senior Director of criminal justice campaigns for "Color of Change".

Thank you so much for joining us.

- Thank you.

(upbeat music) - We sent a media request to the City of Grand Rapids, inviting Mayor Rosalynn Bliss, City Manager, Mark Washington, Director of Oversight and Public Accountability, Brandon Davis and Chief of Police, Eric Winstrom to join us for this conversation, our emails and voice message to the City's Communication Department went unanswered.

Well, joining us now is Cle Jackson, President of the Greater Grant Rapids NAACP and attorney Carlton T. Mayers, the second founder and owner of Mayer Strategic Solutions.

You work with the NAACP legal defense, and educational fund as policy council for its policing reform campaign advancing efforts to affect responsible and unbiased policing by working with local communities and stakeholders.

Thank you both so much for taking the time.

This is a busy time for both of you.

As we continue to dig into the circumstances of what happened with Patrick Lyoya.

Cle, I'd like to start with you when you first learned of this shooting, this fatal shooting of Patrick Lyoya what was your reaction?

- Thanks Patrick, for having us, I will was notified shortly after it actually happened and was notified by the Chief Eric Winstrom as well as the City Manager and a Commissioner.

And my immediate thought was that, kind of what happened?

And I was explained that it was over a traffic stop really didn't know the particulars because none of us had seen any of the video footage at that point.

But one of the things that I've highly recommended when I got the call was that they released immediately any video footage, regardless of how horrific it could be.

It for me, it came down to an issue of just being full or I should say having full transparency with the citizens of this city.

And so that was my initial request and recommendation when I found out about it.

- How did that conversation transpire?

I mean, you're asking for this video to be released, they're pumping the brakes, I guess why did you want that released?

- Because again, I know that there is element of total mistrust here.

And so it doesn't, look, let's be honest.

We have been dealing with the issue of police harassment of brutality against Black and Brown bodies for years and years and years.

And I said, we have to be fully transparent in this situation, in this scenario, if we think about it, Patrick, in 1967 when the riots started here in Grand Rapids, what I've found out just recently that it was actually what the impetus of those uprisings was over a traffic stop, right?

And we know what's bigger than that because there were many more issues, when you talk about disparities across the board but that was just like, that was probably the last straw this young person who was stopped and harassed and then the city went up in flames, right?

And so again, I felt that it was critically important, for them to be fully transparent immediately in releasing any video footage that they have because we know that the relationships between community and the citizens in Grand Rapids has been strained for many years.

And so that's why I thought it was very important for them to release those videos.

- I'm gonna cut to the chase here then, because you're clearly you have a relationship with city officials, with county officials and Carlton, you can step in here too.

The City of Grand Rapids conducted a traffic stop report survey back in 2017.

Activists have been calling for reform for years.

So now this takes place.

Could this have been preventable?

- Yeah, no, definitely could have been preventable.

I believe that if you look at just the facts, right?

It's been, at least I'd say or right about 20 years of consultants I think there's been at least three different types of consultants over that 20 year span who have done assessments of different aspects of the community police relations between the Grand Rapids Police Department and the community is meant to serve.

And each one of them have essentially said the same thing, right?

Which is that the best way for the Grand Rapids Police Department to reform their department is to start allowing community members to be interwoven into all aspects of that department's police civilian interaction.

So what are we talking about?

We're talking about stops, arrests, use of force, trainings that relate to that, right?

We talk about Patrick's incident, cultural sensitivity training, implicit bias training, use of force training.

These were all mentioned as recommendations from these consultants over a span of 20 years and still nothing was done.

Why?

In my opinion, because there's no commitment and no willpower from leadership up top to actually get the work done.

I do wanna make one quick point, NAACP Greater Grand Rapids branch, ACLU Michigan, Urban Core Collective and Linkup, we all worked together about a year or so ago on providing revisions to the current existing Grand Rapid Strategic Plan for 2021 through 2023 to do exactly what the consultant said, interweave community members into the law enforcement department.

However, they only adopted a minority of what we proposed.

And what we found out recently from the city manager is that they haven't even moved forward on any of the proposals that we made that were adopted.

And so at the end of the day, like I said, it comes down to a lack of willpower and commitment from leadership up top.

And that is ultimately what resulted in Patrick's unnecessary and unjustified death.

- How many bodies are that who you need to work with?

You've mentioned this.

I mean, the police department is dealing with the unions.

Do you reach out to the unions?

Do you talk with the union leadership about reform or does that have to go through the Chief's office?

How does this all work?

- The union.

So there are two unions through that have oversight for the command staff or command officers.

And then the other officers who are on the beat and I've had conversations with both of the union presidents on occasion.

So it's not like, we're best friends or we've really have a relationship, but we've had some conversations and quite honestly, Patrick I think it's almost like us against them mentality essentially, but we try to come to the table and say when we had, "Hey, we're here as a resource.

"We're not the enemy.

"We don't see you as the enemy.

"We just wanna make sure that at the end of all of this, "that your officers are fulfilling "their fundamental responsibility "which is to protect and to serve this community "and all residents, regardless of their zip code."

And clearly there is opportunity for improvement in terms of improving those relationships, right?

Between community and local law enforcement.

And we really want to work with you guys on trying to try to do that.

I think oftentimes though, and this is no indictment.

This is just an observation.

I think the city leadership and I think the Chief's office is really not effectively engaging the union leadership in these conversations honestly.

Now that could be moving in a different direction, 'cause every Chief has his or her different style.

But I do think that's kind of an issue.

And when I say engaging in community conversations, I'm talking about specifically when you are considering having neighborhood meetings and considering having community meetings, considering having meetings with the NAACP or the Urban League or the MICA Center or Linkup or UCC.

One of the first thoughts is that you should, I would strongly recommend, or that they should have included the Chief as well as city leadership is we must engage the union presidents up front in these conversations and I'll take some slack too.

We could probably do a better job, I'm being full of transparent, as one of the community partners we could probably do better in saying, "Hey you know what, Chief, Winstrom "we not only want invite you into this conversation "but we wanna invite the union presidents as well.

"City Manager, Washington, we not only want to invite you "or Brandon Davis who's head of the of Oversight and Public Accountability.

"We wanna invite the union presidents "and some union representation into these conversations."

So I think we got improvement to make on that.

- We're about 90 seconds here, moving forward, what are the next steps?

- Okay, yeah, no, definitely next steps.

Number one, the officer needs to be publicly terminated.

So the police Chief needs to come out publicly and say if he has already started that process or not, there also needs to be de-certification so revoking the license of that law enforcement officer to be a police officer in the state of Michigan, the police chief has that responsibility.

And then we need to also need the county prosecutor to indict the officer for murder.

And if not the county prosecutor, then we need the state attorney general to do similar to what Keith Ellison did in Minneapolis for the Derrick Chauvin trial and for the Kim Potter trial.

And to actually take over oversight of the investigation and the potential prosecution of this officer.

So I think those are the three takeaways for now.

On the local level, we definitely need the police chief to revisit our response to the Grand Rapid Police Department strategic plan for 2021 through 2023, let's get back to work, let's start to make some real change in this community.

- Attorney Carlton Mayers, The Second.

Thank you so much Cle Jackson as always appreciate your time.

And thank you for joining us.

We'll see you again soon.

(upbeat music)