Five months after Charles Smith was fatally wounded while escaping a police cruiser in handcuffs, a grand jury last week found that the police shooting was justified. The decision has left many in the African American community searching for the appropriate response.
Unlike other cities across the country that have dealt with officer-involved shootings, the victim in this case was armed, according to police. Ultimately, the grand jury determined Smith is responsible for his own death.
After the September shooting there were sporadic “no justice, no peace” die-ins, marches and other forums of public displays of civil disobedience within the city of Savannah. But now that the grand jury has spoken, concluding that Smith, 29, was killed because he was a “gun-wielding” threat, some say the case has been put to rest.
For others the fact that Smith was searched by three Savannah-Chatham Metropolitan Police officers — recorded on videotape — before he was placed into Officer David Jannot’s police cruiser draws too many unanswered questions: How could Smith, who stood 6-feet-7-inches tall, be carried into the cruiser handcuffed from behind; and within minutes forced himself out of a car window, handcuffed in the front with a gun in his hand?
That’s why Omowale Brown, a 31-year old local activist, isn’t letting the case go.
“We knew (the police) were going to get away with it. I have not faith in the justice system,’’ he said.
Smith’s family is expected to speak publicly at 9 a.m. Monday at Mt. Carmel Baptist Church on Augusta Avenue in Savannah, directly across the street from where Smith’s memorial remains.
The grand jury released its decision five days after it convened. Jannot’s testimony; a video of Smith’s arrest; and testimony gleaned from a 900-page investigative report, and audio transcripts complied by investigators from the Georgia Bureau of Investigation were used during the process. The grand jury said it was “appalled” that several eyewitnesses refused to testify at the hearing but they weighed their taped statements, which contradicted the physical evidence. It concluded that Jannot’s testimony was credible.
“Smith had a gun in his hand upon exiting the window of Jannot’s patrol car and the gun belonged to Smith,’’ the report said. The grand jury made that finding, the report said, based upon Smith’s DNA found on the gun.
The report concluded that Jannot had to use legal force. It said the medical examiner testified that “four of the five bullet wounds to Smith would not have incapacitated him, or in all likelihood, prevented him from continuing to move and/or to fire his weapon at Jannot or the officer, Star Corporal Maurice Collins, driving the patrol car behind Janot’s. … “This supports Jannot’s testimony that he continued to fire at Smith until the gun-wielding Smith was no longer a threat to himself or Collins,’’ the report said.
Still, the grand jury’s decision has some African Americans in Savannah quietly railing. A complete picture of what happened that day has yet to be presented to the public. That alone is enough to take to the streets, even though the mayor and police chief has spent weeks calling for calm in anticipation of the grand jury decision.
“Just because Savannah is historic, I don’t think it is fair for officials to demand that people remain quiet. Just like PETA, why can’t we protest downtown. I don’t know if I would be able to be quiet if this happened to my son,’’ said Dominique Washington, a 24-year-old mother.
“Taking a human life is the most detrimental thing that can happen. I don’t see it staying nice and peaceful when so many people are frustrated,’’ added Kenyatta Manigo, a 27-year-old mother of two.
Many others are standing on the sidelines, which is something Adrian Anderson, a Savannah State University political scientist, said is historically in sync. When it comes to community organizing, history dictates, only 10 percent of the community will participate.
“In Savannah, you have a high percentage of the population who’ve been oppressed for a long, long time. You have outcomes, like learned helplessness. That happens when people have been so beaten up, psychologically they can do nothing to change their plight,’’ Anderson said.
Murray Silver, a community activist who is running for mayor, said “It’s a protest that never was. There’s isn’t the type of anger that we’ve seen in other places. This city is broken in places that it can’t be fixed.”
On the eve of the grand jury’s decision, Silver, 61, who is white predicted, “It’s going to be like it’s always been capitulation. You have an African American community trying to solve problems, it creates. If I can’t get white people involved and get them to stop leaving Savannah, this city will be bankrupt like Detroit.”
Anderson compared Savannah to another big city with a large African-American population: New Orleans. He cited a black mayor, a black police chief and a black city council overseeing a poor and largely powerless African-American voter base.
Anderson said full answers to what happened in this case and an ongoing dialogue about police conduct will come when citizens demand it.
“A march is the first step,” Anderson said. “It should transform into civic participation, going to town meetings. Now, it should escalate, do some letter writing. A march is one step in a 1,000 journeys,’’ he said.
Tina A. Brown is an independent journalist based in Savannah.
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