Cops’ kneeling won’t cover improper arrests

Some Phoenix police officers took a knee in a powerful moment of solidarity with those protesting police brutality and racial inequality.

That split second of unity from the men and women in blue — on that also has been seen in many other cities reeling with social unrest — is an effective tool to de-escalate tensions.

The symbolism of those moments isn’t lost. The national civil unrest broke out when Derek Chauvin, a white police officer, pressed his knee on African American George Floyd’s neck, snuffing his life out.

But is the kneeling of cops a goodwill gesture or a punch in the gut?

Like the Phoenix crowd did on Tuesday night, I applauded and cheered the three police officers who knelt in solidarity with the protesters.

I felt they finally understood what NFL player Colin Kaepernick meant when he knelt during the U.S. national anthem to protest police brutality and racism in America.

But my cheer quickly faded with Phoenix Chief Jeri Williams gloating that “images like these reflect our willingness to listen and work toward solutions.”

Police officers kneeling may feel like the thing to do right now. Willingness to listen sounds great.

But that emotional display of solidarity comes from a police department with the deadliest record of police shootings in the nation and a city government unwilling to finance a civilian review board.

Three police officers kneeling and a chief making a political statement isn’t going to magically erase police shootings and institutionalized racism. How can anyone forget that in 2018 Phoenix had more police shootings than New York, Los Angeles, Chicago and Houston?

From 2011 to 2018, Phoenix police averaged 17 shootings per million residents. Police shot at 212 people, killing about half during that period, according to an Arizona Republic analysis. Who were the most often shot during that period? Hispanics, African Americans and Native Americans.

We still don’t know exactly why Phoenix is so deadly. The city spent $149,000 to have the National Police Foundation investigate the 2018 shootings, but their report offered little explanations.

Forget the kneeling and tell us why. Be transparent with the public. I’m citing numbers from 2018 because Republic reporters painstakingly collected and analyzed the data. It wasn’t a goodwill gesture from the department.

“Quantifying the number of police shootings and analyzing the data is difficult, partly because law-enforcement agencies don’t make comprehensive information readily available to the public,” Republic reporters wrote.

Phoenix and police departments across the country have a lot of explaining and work to do. Merely hiring minorities to oversee police departments isn’t enough to eradicate institutionalized racism.

In fact, it’s a slap in the face to put the burden solely on the minorities when often they’re hamstrung by their political bosses and the deep-rooted police mechanism designed to protect cops — racists or not, killers or not.

Williams, an African American, can’t do it alone. She’s caught between a powerful police union and a divided City Council that only wants to pay lip service to people of color by approving a police review board without funding it.

City leaders must be held accountable if they don’t help her. But she shouldn’t get a pass either without explaining why Phoenix is so deadly and why her officers behave this way.

Williams’s police officers, for instance, went on a spree arresting protesters over the past few days without probable cause.

How is that OK?

Maricopa County judges have been releasing protesters in droves because Phoenix police officers didn’t have probable cause, according to various news reports.

How is it OK to suspend the core principles of policing? It is not.

Cops kneeling may be fine as a powerful symbol of solidarity, but it’ll remain an empty gesture until they prove it with actions.