Barack Obama’s legal mentor publicly scolded the president this week for inserting the White House into a debate about the controversial arrest of Obama’s friend, African-American scholar Henry Louis Gates Jr., by a white police sergeant last year.
Obama “blackened himself” by commenting on the low-level municipal arrest, turning it into an “international story,” said Harvard Law Professor Charles J. Ogletree before 100 people attending an event Thursday promoting Ogletree’s new book on racial injustice.
“He was the black president taking sides with the black professor,” Ogletree said. The second mistake Obama made was immediately labeling the incident one of racial profiling by discussing the long history of blacks and Latinos being stopped by police in this country, Ogletree said.
Obama said Sgt. James M. Crowley and the Cambridge Police acted “stupidly” by arresting Gates at his own home. The President later invited both Gates and Crowley to mend fences at a get-together now known as the White House “beer summit.”
Gates, 59, said at the time he was arrested because he was black.
Crowley said Gates was uncooperative and screaming at him while he inquired about a 911 report of a possible break-in at Gates’s Harvard Square home.
The disorderly conduct charge was dropped within days, but Obama’s comments triggered widespread debate and the establishment of a special police panel to review the incident.
The Cambridge Review Committee released a report this week stating the arrest was unnecessary and both men should have made attempts to “ratchet down” their behavior. The committee’s work cost Cambridge about $100,000, city records show.
The report follows last month’s New England Center for Investigative Reporting analysis of police reports over the past five years. The study found Cambridge Police arrest more whites than blacks for disorderly conduct, considered among the most discretionary criminal charge used by officers.
Gates has declined repeated requests to be interviewed in the past month.
But he has some regrets about last summer’s incident, Ogletree told an NECIR reporter following his speech at the Harvard Coop bookstore.
“Gates wants to put this behind him. He didn’t want to be the poster boy for racial profiling,” Ogletree said. “Now he has a better understanding of Crowley since meeting him.”
Ogletree said “common sense went out the window” during the encounter, which would not have occurred had both the suspect and police officer been female.
“Judgements were made that caused the situation to escalate,” Ogletree said about the behavior of both men.
Crowley last month said the NECIR report absolved him and the police force of racism. Following this week’s report, Crowley issued the following statement, which reads in part: “I’ve learned a lot through this process and I continue to be committed to the city of Cambridge, my responsibilities as a police officer and father, and my dedication to teaching fellow officers about the need for balancing tolerance and safety.”
Ogletree also said Gates was truly afraid of Crowley at the time of the incident.
“When he met Crowley at the White House, he said ‘you’re smaller than when I last saw you. You were 6 ‘ 8 “ and 300 pounds last time,” Ogletree said.
Crowley, meanwhile, initially did not want to attend the White House session because he felt he would be the odd man out, given the friendship between Obama and Gates. He changed his mind when told he could bring family and friends along, Ogletree said.
Ogletree said his book, “Presumption of Guilt: The Arrest of Henry Louis Gates Jr. and Race, Class and Crime in America,” was not about the Gates’ arrest but about the “broader problems of minorities being racially profiled.” Gates did not participate in the preparation of the book, he said.
Ogletree also said citizens would have benefited from having the charge processed through the criminal justice system.
Ogletree also said Dr. (Martin Luther) King (Jr.) “wouldn’t have wanted the charges dismissed.”
“If Gates went to trial (he) would have been acquitted,” he said.
NOW WHO’S STUPID? GATES LAWYER REBUKES OBAMA
| By Sarah Favot and Maggie Mulvihill - July 3rd, 2010 | Uncategorized |
Cambridge PD: Gates arrest ‘avoidable’
| By Maggie Mulvihill - June 30th, 2010 | Uncategorized |
By Maggie Mulvihill, Sarah Moffit and Carroll Cole
Nearly a year after Harvard scholar Henry Louis Gates Jr. was arrested for disorderly conduct at his Cambridge home, a special panel of law enforcement experts and academics released a 60-page report today stating the arrest was avoidable.
“This incident could have been resolved quickly and peaceably,” said Chuck Wexler, Executive Director of the Police Executive Research Forum and a member of the 12-member Cambridge Review Committee.
President Barack Obama, a Gates’ friend, said last year the Cambridge Police “acted stupidly” in arresting Gates.
The criminal charge was dropped by the Middlesex District Attorney’s office within days of the incident.
The review committee was formed by Police Commissioner Robert C. Haas following the July 16, 2009 arrest of Gates, a prominent black professor. Gates claimed the white sergeant, James Crowley, who arrested him did so because he was black. At the time, Crowley was responding to a 911 call about two men possibly breaking into the house.
The committee’s report also backs up findings released earlier this month by the New England Center for Investigative Reporting demonstrating the Cambridge Police have had no pattern of racial bias with disorderly conduct arrests within the past five years.
Wexler said while race did factor into the Gates arrest, issues such as class and police authority also came into play during the encounter between Crowley and Gates.
Gates has declined requests to be interviewed by NECIR. His attorney, Harvard Law Professor Charles J. Ogletree, is currently promoting a book entitled: “The Presumption of Guilt: The Arrest of Henry Louis Gates Jr. and Race, Class, and Crime in America.” In the book, Ogletree compares the Gates arrest to the 1991 beating of Rodney King in Los Angeles, which led to race riots. He has acknowledged he never reviewed arrest data from Cambridge police nor did he interview Cambridge Police officials or Crowley before writing his book.
No Expulsions for Sexual Assaults at BU, Records Show
| By NECIR-BU - March 4th, 2010 | Uncategorized |
Investigative News Network Inaugural Report
| By Maggie Mulvihill - March 3rd, 2010 | Investigative Reporting Movement |
Last week marked the first of what we hope will be many future collaborations with other investigative reporting centers forming around the country. NECIR was a founding member last summer of the Investigative News Network, a coalition of a growing number of non-profit watchdog journalism groups. The campus sexual assault project, led by the Center for Public Integrity, was the first to be tackled by INN members. Take a look at the companion stories that were published by our investigative reporting colleagues.
http://www.publicintegrity.org/investigations/campus_assault/related_stories/
Super Bowl Blitz
| By Maggie Mulvihill - January 29th, 2010 | The Right to Know |
New Englanders! Help us follow the money “Super Bowl” style:
Super Bowl Sunday is a just week away. Which New England politicians are getting coveted tickets as a perk of holding office? Help us track that information by lending a hand to our journalistic colleagues at ProPublica with their online SuperBowl project. They are carefully tracking who is going to the game and how they got their tickets. We have Massachusetts covered but we need help with the other New England states. You pay the politicians’ salaries; you deserve to know who is providing them with perks.
All the information to help dig out this information is here: http://www.propublica.org/ion/reporting-network/item/super-bowl-blitz-which-congressmen-are-getting-super-bowl-perks-126.
If you can help out here are a few simple suggestions:
1. Call your local politicians, including members of Congress, and ask the following two questions: Did the lawmaker go to the Super Bowl last year and is he or she planning to go this year. If yes, who provided the tickets? Again, our reporters have Massachusetts covered. Please help us with Maine, Rhode Island, Connecticut, Vermont and New Hampshire.
2. Get the name of the person you spoke with, including the correct spelling. Receptionists are not going to know the answer to this question. You make need to talk to the lawmaker’s scheduler or even the chief-of-staff. If you encounter obstacles, note that information down. You are a constituent and are entitled to this information.
3. Email New England Center for Investigative Reporting Associate Director Maggie Mulvihill at mmulvih@bu.edu with the name of the person you spoke with, the date and time you spoke with them and what information you obtained. We’ll be creating an online chart of who is going and you’ll get credit in that chart, which we’ll be sharing with ProPublica.