A month ago, on the day two white Gwinnett County cops beat up a young black motorist, the Rev. Markel Hutchins was setting up a meeting with county police leaders.
The videotapes of the beating had not yet gone public. Actually, the beating had not yet even happened. But Hutchins was in Gwinnett to set up an initiative to build relationships between police and minority residents, an age-old goal we've heard about for, well, like forever.
That the latest case of brutality was set to break in the same county where he was working was coincidental, said Hutchins, an Atlanta preacher who knows how to wield a protest megaphone — and how to get police chiefs to pick up his phone calls.
Last summer, Hutchins packed the Carter Center's auditorium with just about all the top brass from metro Atlanta's police forces. That was a kickoff for his effort — One Congregation One Precinct (OneCOP) — to partner local churches with police forces. Back then, coincidentally again, there were recent cases of two black men dying at the hands of police in Louisiana and Minnesota.
On Thursday, Hutchins kicked off the first round of his OneCOP program before a roomful of Gwinnett law enforcers and faith leaders in Lawrenceville.
Gwinnett Police Chief Butch Ayers, who was roundly praised for quickly firing the two cops involved in the April beating, said he thinks the effort will build trust.
Longtime Gwinnett Sheriff Butch Conway (Yes, they are both named Butch!) called himself a “great supporter” of the effort.
As the crowd finished lunch, Hutchins lauded Ayers, saying, “This chief stood up and set an example for chiefs across the country in what to do.”
Hutchins said the beating was due to unconscious bias by police. (The first officer, a sergeant, cold-cocked the driver, who had his hands up. The second cop stomped his head while he was handcuffed on the ground.)
“What you saw a few weeks ago was what’s in our hearts and in our minds,” the reverend said. “There has to be some human connection. We can’t stand in our individual corners and scream at each other.”
Hutchins, who recently turned 40, strikes one as a man in a hurry, a preacher in search of a flock.
He leaped into the spotlight in 2006 after interjecting himself into the vortex following the killing of 92-year-old Kathryn Johnston, who was shot to death by Atlanta police during an illegal raid for drugs at her home. (There were no drugs. An investigation revealed that the raid was based on falsified information and covered up with planted evidence.)
Hutchins became the family spokesman just hours Johnston’s death and campaigned hard on her behalf.
Later, he sued the family, unsuccessfully, to get a piece of the $4.9 million settlement.
In 2008, he ran a quixotic elective campaign against Congressman John Lewis, the civil rights icon, saying a new day had come and the old lion was out of touch.
Two years later, he was a leader of one faction of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) during a bitter fight for control of Martin Luther King Jr.’s old org. Hutchins made news when he had the back door of the office welded shut and the parking lot gates padlocked.
But Hutchins is more conciliatory these days.
During his speech Thursday, he handed law enforcement an olive branch. While referring to the Black Lives Matter movement, he added, “I took offense (at any implication) that our lives meant more than any other lives. Humanity matters.”
A couple of years ago, Sheriff Conway stepped in a shinola storm when he published an opinion piece that many took as criticizing the Black Lives Matter movement.
“Those inciting riots and committing murders are simply criminals and do not represent the majority of Americans. They are domestic terrorists with an agenda,” Conway wrote at the time, before ending the piece with, “All lives, and I repeat, ALL LIVES matter.”
Conway complained he was misinterpreted as demonizing Black Lives Matter. A mutual acquaintance suggested the lawman call Hutchins, who arranged a meeting of other clergy leaders. Soon, the sheriff had a new civil rights buddy.
Conway told me police leaders get along with Hutchins because “Markel approaches them on their level. He’s very reasonable. He has a middle-of-the-road insight.
“It’s not entirely police at fault. It’s not entirely citizens at fault. People have become so adversarial.”
Renita Hamilton, president of the Gwinnett NAACP chapter, likes the idea of the effort but sees it as “just one step” toward “opening a dialogue.”
How can this be different than the thousand other initiatives that hoped to build relationships?
“Efforts in the past may have been more reactionary,” she said. “We need to get out in front of it. Both of us.”
But Marlyn Tillman, a longtime activist who attended the lunch, wondered how an Atlanta guy like Hutchins was getting such love from the local power structure.
“These issues have been raised by the county residents for years, but the (county’s) leaders have not responded to those concerns,” she said. “This is very strange to me. This bothers me very deeply.”
Tillman said she also had a problem with Hutchins’ comments that he “took offense that our lives meant more than any other lives. Humanity matters.”
“I was totally offended that he felt he had to trash a movement that has gotten things done,” she said. “I have a lot of trouble with black people who trade their authenticity to be accepted. I have to question the Rev. Hutchins’ motives.”
Hutchins told me being “territorial” will not help and he can’t worry about criticism. His OneCOP effort has several employees and is a non-profit organization funded by corporate donations from companies such as Kroger and Motorola Solutions, a big law enforcement vendor.
He said he takes no salary from the effort.
“I want to see this as solution oriented and not reactive to a racialized solution,” Hutchins said.
The test is on.
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