In Southlawn, ‘safety zone’ raises discrimination fears
Activists charge program bans men from neighborhood because of race
Efforts to ban black men suspected of being gang members from a courtordered “safety zone” in a southeast Houston neighborhood are discriminatory and were undertaken without the knowledge of the community, lawyers for the defendants charged Thursday.
At a news conference, the attorneys, accompanied by local residents, charged that the men excluded from the Southlawn neighborhood were targeted because they are African-Americans and said the action will keep some of them from their homes.
“What we are seeing is an overarching display of lazy policing,” said Brennen Dunn, who represents a dozen defendants. “We’re going to do what we have to do to fight against it.”
Last September, state and Harris County officials quietly began the legal process in civil court to permanently ban 92 individuals allegedly associated with the Bloods, Crips and other gangs from a 2-squaremile area of the Southlawn neighborhood south of the University of Houston and Texas Southern University.
Southlawn is the third “safety zone” created recently in Harris County. The other two are the East Aldine/Haverstock area in northeast Harris County and the Brays Oaks community in southwest Houston.
According to U.S. Census data, the population in two of the zones — Southlawn and East Al-
dine/Haverstock — is 70 percent African-American and in the third, 41 percent are African-American and 40 percent are Hispanic.
In 2014, residents in the Haverstock/Aldine zone reported reduced crime, following a 2010 injunction involving an apartment complex. The zone expanded three years later.
Safety issues cited
Southlawn activists charged Thursday that they only found out about efforts to exclude the men last week as lawyers who represent some of the defendants started distributing copies of the lawsuit at community meetings and talking to organization leaders.
A hearing on a permanent injunction is scheduled for April.
Robert Soard, first assistant Harris County Attorney, acknowledged Thursday that officials had sought to keep the legal efforts to ban the men quiet out of a concern over “safety issues.”
“Early on there was a conscious decision made to keep this a little bit under the radar,” Soard said. “These were very serious allegations against individuals within that area. There were a lot of them. All of them had to be served and if there were publicity on it, it would have made it difficult to have papers served on them.”
Former gang interventionist Charles X. White said the “discriminatory injunction on black men” was done in “secrecy” and announced a public hearing called by community members and activists at 6:30 p.m., Feb. 25 at South Union Church of Christ. He said he intends to invite Harris County Attorney Vince Ryan and District Attorney Devon Anderson.
Houston defense lawyer Monique Sparks said police are labeling people as gang members based on subjective criteria.
Reading from the Houston Police Department’s gang policy, she noted that the general order states that “when in doubt about whether or not an incident should be coded as a gang crime … officers should code the report as a gang crime.”
“When in doubt: Gang crime. That’s why there are 92 men on this list,” said Sparks, who represents a dozen men named in the lawsuit.
Activists said that even though most people in Harris County do not live in these neighborhoods and are not black men, everyone should be concerned about this method of addressing alleged criminal activity.
“There has not been one piece of legislation that was aimed at improving the conditions of black people that only benefitted black people,” White said. “So when we get help, everybody gets help. The county and the police can apply this to any ethnic group. We want to stop it here.”
Soard said that the injunction lawsuits do not seek black male exclusion from certain neighborhoods, but are filed in response to reports from law enforcement about crime hot spots. He said officials have proceeded with cases only when there is sufficient evidence.
He added that a permanent injunction hearing on the Southlawn case will include “many local residents who are asking that this injunction be issued — apartment complexes, apartment managers, people identified in our pleadings. This would not go forward unless there were witness- es on the scene available and willing to testify. It’s more than just police officers.”
Ryan said the injunction efforts are part of the county’s “community protection program.”
“We are responding to the police department and other concerned groups about these gangs in these neighborhoods.”
The Southlawn safety zone includes 1,326 acres and is roughly bounded by I-610, Texas 288, Old Spanish Trail and Cullen. There is no temporary injunction in force, but there are agreed orders with about 50 defendants who have legal representation. Those filings exclude them from a small area near the Southlawn Palms apartments — which is the entity with the major complaint about gang activity, according to the defense lawyers and Soard.
“In order to move this forward, we had to come to an agreement … on the Scott block between Yellowstone and Lydia, where, right now, these young individuals are not allowed to be,” Dunn said.
This month, 14 men were legally excluded from the entire zone by “default” because they did not respond to the lawsuit.
“So, they are permanently banned from that community — from the entire 2 miles,” Sparks said. “Some of them are in prison. When they come home, they will have no home to go to.”
Violating the injunction switches the issue from a civil matter to a potential criminal charge.
At least one man who agreed last year not to show up in the area was spotted by police in January. A contempt charge was filed against Billy Duncan last week. He could face jail and a fine.
In November, a Houston federal judge questioned whether the county’s approach to excluding certain individuals, particularly one of the men who was incarcerated, conformed with the rights to due process afforded by the Constitution.
Due process concern
U.A. Lewis, an attorney who represents defendant DeAndre Fizer, tried to have the injunction lawsuit transferred to federal court to have constitutional questions resolved — namely potential violations of the rights to freedom of association, speech, assembly, travel, and from unreasonable search and seizure.
Fizer is serving a six-year sentence in federal prison for a felon-in-possessionof-a-firearm conviction and has a 2019 release date, according to Bureau of Prison records. Last September, the 22-year-old was being held pending trial.
“Him being enjoined makes no sense,” Lewis said. “He was already in jail. … He is not a threat to the community and he should be able to come back to the community once he serves his debt to society.”
U.S. District Judge Vanessa Gilmore determined that the injunction sought relief under state law but did not allege any federal questions, so she remanded the case to state court. Still, the judge had concerns that the defendant was not given the chance to appear at a hearing in the case.
“Although there does not appear to be a federal question in the current petition, the court would note that (Fizer) appears to have raised due process issues which could potentially create a right to relief under federal law,” she said in an order issued in November. “The court notes that it appears that the state court issued a show cause order requiring Fizer to appear at the temporary injunction hearing … but failed to send a bench warrant to the Harris County Jail to allow him an opportunity to appear at the hearing. This could create a constitutional claim for future consideration by the court.”