Sagon Penn/San Diego CopWatch Conference Audio - Panel 4

The Sagon Penn Chapter of CopWatch Conference, focusing on Police Brutality, was held on October 22, 2005 at the Hot Monkey Love Cafe in San Diego. Audio and transcribed excerpts from the fourth panel "Justifiable Homicide: Murder by Law Enforcement." Audio Duration: 1:31:05.

Prior three panels:
http://radio.indymedia.org/node/7402
http://radio.indymedia.org/node/7404
http://radio.indymedia.org/node/7433

Panel 4:
Justifiable Homicide: Murder by Law Enforcement
Facilitator: Carl Muhammad
Panelists: Cherry Mason, Lynne Faust, Peggy Richmond

Audio Duration: 1:31:05

Carl Muhammad (0:00)
It is a difficult thing to deal with the death of a loved one. It's doubly difficult to deal with when they are killed unjustly. Another aspect of it, we often times forget, those of us who have not been directly affected by police brutality in this manner, is that there is a long ordeal, another process that begins after the death. And that is trying to seek justice for your loved one. That it many ways can be more taxing, more brutal than the actual death... Forums like this bring the point home that we as activists have to stand with them while they are going through that fight. And we should always be there for them and lend them the support they need so they can continue the fight. One of the things we have to do, we have to recognize, is that the system is going to continue to roll. But our job as activists is to call attention to the injustices of the system, but also create another system within ourselves to combat that system. And activism is that system. So when we create that system we become a part of that family. So when one of the members of our family dies. we have to come out as family and stand with them. Unconditionally.

Cherry Mason (3:30 ) (Her daughter, Sonserra Holloway, was murdered by a border patrol agent 30 miles from the border on 3 February, 2000 while she was five month's pregnant, unarmed and handcuffed)

My daughter was killed by the border patrol and to talk about it. I'm here to talk about how the agent got away with killing her...

They say that they fear for their life. They can use that any time. You dont even have to say anything to them for them to beat you or shoot you.

I've got a 15 year old. He was harassed by the police a couple of weeks ago. He was late for school. He was on his way to school and they pulled him over. They whopped on him. They said he was talking smart to them. They didn't call me and let me know they had gotten him. I waited for him to come home the whole day. He spent the night in the jail downtown...

In my eyesight, we don't have any rights. Because if we had rights, the police wouldn't be beating on us like they do, they wouldn't be shooting us like they do...

You have to be careful with the law enforcement, they are the biggest criminals in the world... The law enforcement is really the gangbangers. They are the ones we really have to watch. It's bad when you can't call the police to your rescue, because you are afraid that they are going to come and do something to you.

My daughter been deceased five years now, almost six... Around this time of the year I begin to have tears come to my eyes because I know my daughter be deceased for no reason six years coming up. Five months pregnant and then they say that it was her fault that she is deceased. I don't have no explanation and I guess I don't deserve one. So i am going to have to live with this. It's a hard thing. So I'm saying, just be careful. So if you don't have any money and have kids, don't mess with the police No border patrol, none of that, do what they tell you so you can just get away from them... In my eyesight, you don't have any rights. Many of you might think you do, but you don't...I cant go back and file wrongful death on my daughter because i don't have no money and the lawyers are scared...

Where's the justice for us? Where's the justice for the ones that don't have no money? Their families just got killed, beat up. It's bad. I have to live with it and its painful for me. I wanted to talk about getting together some of these parents that the law has beat and shot and killed... As long as its just one on one we're not going to get nowhere if we don't have any money. You have a family that is deceased, the border patrol or the police, they killed them, and they saying that they scared for their lives. They don't be scared for their lives. They know that that all they have to say is they have fear. Fear is what is in their book. We need to get that fear for their lives out of there. Because they just beating and killing people. And they doing it just for the hell of it. It's not because they are scared. It's because they can... I figure we can get somewhere if we all work together. We work together, they will stop killing our people and beating on our people.

My daughter was sitting on the bench on the corner where we live. The police arrested her on suspicion of selling drugs to an undercover police officer. First of all, she had no drugs on her. They took her behind the club that used to be there and stripped her naked and went into her body and they didn't find anything.

The police officer said that she was using profanity so they arrested her. He gave her to the border patrol. While they were on the way to the jail, somehow they said she was climbing out the window and said she was cussing and fussing and screaming... The border patrol told her to shut her damn mouth or she was going to shoot her ass... Some type of way they said she got out of two sets of handcuffs, she was climbing out of the window. When the border patrol pulled over, they said she got out of the car and tried to run... My daughter was supposed to be in two sets of handcuffs... Her hands were cuffed behind her back and she was flat on the ground. The border patrol shot her.

I didn't see my daughter for nine days. They didn't call me to tell me that my daughter was dead... I called for her that night, I called the jails, I called the hospitals, and they said they hadn't seen her or nothing... My [other] daughter came and got me, was screaming and hollering. I'm like what's the matter. She never did tell me. I got up the next day and the TV people were knocking on the door. They wanted to know about my daughter. That's when my [other] daughter told me that my daughter was dead.

Nobody still up to today has come to me and explained to me what happened... When I did get to the morgue... they had done the autopsy and embalmed her without asking... I see this vision of her every time I close my eyes... To me my job is not done because there is no justice done for her. Even though i know i cannot bring her back and she can't be brought back, but i feel that i should have some justice, even some explanation...

What is she [the border patrol agent] coming to work with two guns and nine clips of bullets? You ain't looking to solve no problems. To me, you are looking to kill a person. That's enough ammunition to start your own damn army.

Lynne Faust ( 31:50) (Her son, Jacob Faust, was murdered by sdpd officer Stephen Holliday on April 4, 2005 during a routine traffic stop)

There is nobody. When your loved ones are taken like this, there is nobody to come to your assistance. There is nobody from the city, certainly nobody from law enforcement. You're alone and you're devastated and destroyed. We do need to show up for each other and be there. You guys were great for us and i appreciate it. I don't think any of you really knew Jake. But you came out because you knew it was wrong and I really appreciate it.

This is Jake. He had just turned 25 in February. The police pulled him over for what they said was an illegal left hand turn...

To me it is criminal that the records aren't made public, that they're not available to us. My son it taken and no explanation is given other than that it was a big unfortunate event. And yet there is no record that they give me to look, there's no testimony recorded that i can look at and view...

There is a lot of contraindication from what the witnesses say that they saw and heard and what the police said they saw and heard. Jake was shot in the back. He was sitting in his van and they claimed that they were fearing for their lives. That's the key word now. We're afraid, and you know what, that's all they have to say, is we're afraid and the city and the government is going to find justified killing... I am pretty sure that Jacob talked about his rights, because he knew them...

The police claimed that is was too dark for them to see clearly into the van and that he made a threatening movement. But none of it jives with the story that the witnesses saw, what their testimony was, they all claimed they didn't hear any loud music. The police claimed that loud music was a huge thing...

Jake was listening to the Big Bopper, "Chantilly Lace"... He loved vintage music, that's what he was playing. How they can justify taking someone's life for not getting out of a vehicle it's just beyond me. They claimed that he struggled with them. Jake weighed about 145 pounds. Two armed officers are claiming that they were afraid of my son, sitting down in his van...

The thing that has struck me really profoundly going through this, aside from the horrible pain that just is new every day and i believe is with us for the rest of our lives and its nothing i would every wish on anyone.

The thing that really shocked me growing up in america and thinking that we had overcome so much of the injustice in this country and thinking that we all had certain rights and realizing that we really don't.

The police have the rights and they are carrying weapons and the law is on their side and all they have to say now especially since 9-11 is we\'re afraid, we feared for our lives and they can justify shooting any of us at any time if no one is there to corroborate the other story.

We say that the we're the land of the free and the home of the brave and really we have a bunch of cowards out there carrying weapons that can gun down any of us at any time.

Aside from the independent media in San Diego... the media were really silent.

We lived on 5th avenue in the gaslamp, and Jake was shot across from the golden west hotel, just around the block. It took them six hours to come and tell us Jake was shot...

He was one of my best friends. I don't know if there were as many people in the world as compassionate as my son. They don't know who they killed.

It was a crime to me that what we consider the free press in this country, in our city, in america's finest city, only puts out what they want put out there, and they are very complicit with the police... And when the UT came in they cleverly sent me out of the room to look for a picture of Jake because they said the one on the mantle wasn't good enough, and while they had me out of the room, my husband, who was in hysterics, was the one they interviewed, and it was his comments that made it into the paper.

We haven't even filed a lawsuit, we filed a claim against the city, which I've been told by our lawyer will be denied automatically...

We were told by another lawyer ... that san diego is corrupt from the judges on down... What do you say to that? ... I think it is really interesting that san diego's headlines every day are about the pension fund, they don't care about the bloodshed in the city. And until we raise our voices and make them aware of it, until citizens as a whole wake up and say it could be any one of us out there then i guess that the pension fund and the beached whales are going to continue to grab the headlines.

Carl ( 1:08:00) Sagon Penn was a case that really polarized the city... He was driving down the street with a number of friends coming back from the beach. The police pulled him over. What happened was the police yelled racial slurs at him. The attitude that you're talking about. The tone oft heir voice. The things that they say. They do it to incite you. So they did. So they began to beat Sagon Penn. And he told then, twice, stop doing this, don't do this I haven't done anything, And they continued to beat him. Well Sagon Penn was a martial artist, he was trained in the martial arts, so he was able to disarm the officer and turn his gun on him and shoot him and he killed him. He ran back to the community and his grandfather told him 'turn yourself in.' Of course, we know, especially in the black community, there is no justice. Back in the old days, the slave days, the mothers used to say ' run boy, run, you;'re not going to get justice." Because they were pillars of the black community, he said 'stand.' Go down and face it and he did. After two trials, he was acquitted of that and they found that the officers violated his civil rights.

From that point on the family went through hell because they were harassed by the police, they harassed him until the day he died. They came to house with a warrant for someone in the building supposedly and went to the wrong house. Just happened to be the person they were harassing for past fifteen years. And they harassed him that day.

That day later on he was found dead in his apartment. That's way we think it is an honorable thing, to consider CopWatch in this city under Sagon's name. He got justice where we never got justice before. We never had that happen before. We were able to beat the system.

Peggy Richmond (1:11:25 ) (Her son, Sagon Penn, was brutally attacked by sdpd officers. A martial artist, he fought back, killing one and wounding the other. After two trials, he was acquitted, but was harassed for the remainder of his life by the sdpd and died 15 years later under suspicious circumstances.)

My son was a very honorable, kind, a very kind young man. He was stopped by the police and he was harassed... There were a lot of people standing around watching this happen, it was by a church.

They asked for his id, he gave them his whole wallet. His demeanor is to give, He took the picture out and gave the picture to them. and turned around and walked away. When he turned around and walked away, they hit him with a club. He was a man who knew karate and self-defense, but he was never the aggressor so he defended himself by hitting back.

He was defending against the clubs with his arms but they kept hitting him. People were telling the police to stop, but they continued to beat him down to the ground. And after he was down on the ground, the police were on top of him beating him and told the people to get back and get out of the way. The people said for them to stop, you're going to kill him. But they continued to keep beating him and beating him.

He finally got the gun that one of the officers had, somehow, and took the gun and shot one of the officers.... He never tried to be a big shot, his demeanor has always been humble...

This incident about killed me because i couldn't understand how anyone could do anything to him. It is hard to speak of this thing again.

He shot the police officer. He shot another officer... He got in the car and fled off in the police car. He went home in the police car. My father was there and said you are going to have to go down to the police station and turn yourself in. So that's what he did. He went down to the police station and turned himself in.

He was very scared. He turned himself in and he went through two trials, not one but two, It was very hard. At the last trial, he was acquitted, but afterwards he still was harassed wherever he went. He could never get a job...

He couldn't understand how people were so evil and so wicked. He was so crushed by the wickedness of this world... And people are able to get away with wickedness and do this to innocent people, kind, loving, good people. It's like what we are going through in this life is a test.