not be able to work for free. they may need to make a living to make ends meet. and of the many advantages that the affluent have, i think this is one among them that is worth some attention. because you think of the -- now, it helps resonate when people apply for jobs, it produces contacts and networks for future jobs whether it's in the financial industry or in hollywood where internships are very competitive, very desirable. ..

next, in his new book rodney king recounts his life following the video recording of his beating by los angeles police on march 1991. mr. kaine talks about his own legal problems and alcohol addiction since then as well as the equal of ford, the officers in the case which led to the riots in l.a.. this is about one hour and 15 minutes. [applause] >> wonderful, wonderful. you've become an instant celebrity, so i know that you move in-betweens pieces very fluently. so, we are very honored to have you here at the center, and you've had a very patient and exciting and interesting

audience so we are pleased to have you here. we open this conversation about you and your work and experiences by talking a little bit about you as a kid, and i shared with them some opening passages about your love of fishing so i want to give you a chance in my prepared comments i wanted to ask you contrary to almost people know you either as an object victim of police violence or a controversy altogether in the midst of the rebellion, or as someone that has been part of a longer conversation about whether police think it is racist or not in all of those versions of rodney king there is no understanding of you as a kid that loves fishing or loves to

swim or whose sports are baseball and i would even say something most people know you are a firefighter. tell us a little bit about you as a person aside from the public figure that most people think they know. >> just a down-to-earth guy. i love life. my family it was a good experience, the neighborhood was a pretty much a mixed neighborhood, did a lot of fishing. we've seen a lot of fish fried, did a little hunting with him as the experience. i wouldn't trade the experience of being brought me as a kid for nothing. it was a good experience, it was a learning experience also. >> tell us about some of those lessons. >> i can remember when me and my brothers had our car to get to

this was a little rough so i will start with the rough, first to lead to get older and get the chance to go out on your own so we were out and we went swimming in the dam something like that. we were in pasadena. >> they don't know the whole story. >> we were swimming and i am so used to being around different people and my dad did housecleaning in the daytime but the buildings that might said they would take us to the employers house because we were too young so i had the experience of being around light at an early age and enjoying the

company. so, one day as we got older we were able to go out on our own and we went to the lake i was talking about and so we went up their playing frisbee, and we were swimming in the little mother whole, they were about 18, 19, 20, they were organized because we were like eight, nine, 10i would say. so i had seen him and he was trying to get it on there and so he gets the rock on there and start swinging his belt around and starts cursing and stuff like that and so i am watching

and i always notice what's about to happen for some reason, so i -- for some reason. so i got out of the water and left my other brothers swimming and i was so scared because i had seen the other guy coming down the lake with a rock and he got in that water with my oldest brother and tried to get him so he could tie him up with that rock and rope, and my youngest brother saw him what he was doing he meant down to the bottom of the leak and got some sand and threw it in his eyes and he started screaming and hollering and that's how they got away. so when my brother caught up with me he said why did you leave us? he called me all kinds of names. why did you leave, you little punk. it wasn't punk but he was a cussing me out and i felt so bad because i felt helpless and i was just so scared.

the first time we went out of that bird devotee. >> this is a coming-of-age moment of racism for you. >> it dawned on me black and white. estimate to describe certain aspects of the world that was sent shaped but it was open and you have relationships with all sorts of people one of which not so much a person that your dad's favorite music. >> we love country, rock music. he's the only black guy that loves countrywide music and he loves it.

the was quite an experience. was an experience also because my mother's religion. her religion allows us to be around different nationalities of people and when we have these assemblies -- jehovah's witness, yes i'm not baptized myself but it was a wonderful experience when i was young and growing up being able to go out there and we would be in the dodger stadium and there would be different nationalities of people there would come out for the assembly, white, black, you name it is a were there. during the lunch hour we would all help in preparing the food so we got to know a lot about different cultures and what they like to eat and stuff like that. it was such a to get the feeling being together with the people no one knew each other and everyone was happy and friendly. but, you know, there was a time we had to leave and go home and had a reality here it was so much different being out in the

world and the way people treat you compared to where, you know, being into a forum with everybody, the nationality there's such a pleasant seem to lead their and to be in the next and the real world it's not really like that. so, it was quite an experience. islamic you talk about the sort of part of the book is about redemption, and you described in the look but did not embrace religion and the full trajectory and to the rebellion and the afterlife today practicing, don't practice the faith but the

influence somehow is sort of giving you a sense of your own humanity. >> my mom's religion kind of set the tone for the rest of my life and it helped me not to hang on to angkor. it gave me structure. i have something to look for. there is a god out there. there be peace and everyone could come together and get along. estimate the inquiring minds want to have a context of that. can we have the first slide, we have some pictures behind us

many of which are familiar to you of course. >> this is that might one of the moving passages you describe actually what is happening before the cameras rolling. so, this is what you described you said. that was at their intent and was made brutally clear to me one of the officers kicked me with his food in the side of the face. taking a baseball bat to my head before i could register to the unbearable pain one of the other officers slammed me and i heard a crack and was so surprised when that happened that i immediately pleaded with melanie who was one of the arresting officers but at that point your

guardian angel at least in your mind was. it is quite some strange but i had felt safe with her there at the scene, sort of an eternal presence that wouldn't allow things to get out of control. i shouted out to her. they don't have to do this. tell them. they don't have to do this. >> i had a job to go to that day. the union job had taught me and that is paying way more money than i was making from being an usher the dodgers stadium and all. they told me to be ready to go to work and so when i ran, i heard that and got a few beers and went over to my buddy's house and i didn't let them know

i was going to be going to work. i didn't know how they would feel about that but it was all good and i went out with them and we were on our way over to where my dad used to take us fishing because i didn't want to be stuck in the same community where we were at where we grew up at, a couple of us. and so we started out over there and the highway patrol got on me and started chasing me in the car and so i saw, the only thing i thought about is i've got to get it back to this job on monday i'm supposed to start work monday i had been drinking and i'm on patrol. i've got to get away. >> that's a lot to worry about [laughter] >> you know, when you come out of prison and you really try to do the right thing and then you come in your whole world is

about to start there was the highway patrol car and what happened was the helicopter was up there, getting away from the helicopter my goodness. estimate but you did a thing for a minute you might help run. but you were in a hyundai? [laughter] >> hyundai. >> the joke here is and mr. king doesn't know this but i was pushing a hyundai at the time. [laughter] it was an xl gl and in fact i used to drive from philadelphia to chicago from college home in the allegheny mountains and it wouldn't get past 55. i wouldn't get past 55. so you were thinking that you were in the highbrows but you're really in the hyundai.

[laughter] >> exactly. anyway, to my surprise the caught up with me. [laughter] and when they caught up with me i could see them pulled on the side of me and said it looks like -- pullover. my heart started going so i had to think fast. i already said i know a beating is coming after the streets because that's just how it goes, unfortunately that's how it's been over the years. so i was looking for a pretty little area to stop and where i choose to stop there was apartment buildings but there was nobody out and i said to myself if i get out here and it goes bad at least maybe somebody will come out cyber something in short enough it went bad. they ordered me out of the car. the worry husband and wife team, of the patrol. the initial ones on the chase. and so, she came over to me, the

had already ordered me outside of the car, place your right hand and open the car up and least slightly down, face down. she came over to me and got my wall let and i was up so she could get my idp as she's doing that they're going through the trunk really fast and one is trying to get his baton out of the car he is running towards me and as she is walking away i said i'm playing on the floor face down eight of them they don't have to do this, they don't have to do this because i already knew the next thing to happen. when she walked away, her husband walked up to me and just kicked me in the temple and broke my fall dynast me how do you feel. my molar and everything was

broken at that point and the only thing i could do is not let him know he got the best of me which he did so i told him i feel fine, my jaw broken and blood, i feel fine. the sergeant heard that so he comes up and teasers me right away he is just letting me up and i can feel the blood coming out of my mouth and face and then he asked me how do you feel fine. i couldn't say anything. so he told me we're going to kill you, run. so i'm going to run. i hesitated for a second. i stayed on the ground just looking for clearance at that point. i'm still on the ground. i'm looking for clearance and when i see it, it was between the hyundai and the police officer so what i do is i.e. get up to go run but when this leg

went in front of me i didn't know it was broke. so when i felt bound it looked like i was going after him because my hands were like this but i was trying to get my hands in front of me so i wouldn't fall face down. >> the video wasn't running -- >> that was when the video had been running may be shifting, 20 seconds. so i caught that. what i didn't catch is the name calling and the teaser, the juice running 50,000 volts through my alladi. he did that in like three shots. but while he is teasing me he's beating me with a baton telling me to stay still comes the still. there's no way you can stay still with those kind of walz running through your body. at this point i am soaked in

blood and the electricity is hitting the at the same time so i'm feeling like when my dad almost burnt up the house when i was a kid, ran out, two minutes later the kitchens on fire, take a bath and a dry off he had an extension cord waiting for me. that same footing felt like a prepared me for the night with a taser because the thick extension cord and the shock is the same feeling. it's a horrible feeling. so when i felt that it was like 20 times worse than the extension cord. he ran at his arm until it ran out and said a standstill. so when he stops the teaser of course i'm regrouping myself to see if i'm still there.

i'm trying to stay still but shit, i can't. excuse me. [laughter] i could hear him calling me names. you effing n. once you start cursing and beating somebody you really get into it now. so they're calling me names and getting into it. so at this point i'm like man. >> said you had a moment you had described in the book where i won the audience to hear you describe it where you insert yourself in the long history black people experiences in the and i did states and you make a specific references to sleeve beating. >> i'm going to tell you what gave me a lot of strength also that might was knowing that blacks before me went through this in slavery, and up to this

day i said to myself it was just moments to think. this is what people really went through back in the day and still are going through. i said i've got to survive this. my brothers and sisters can survive through the same thing so you just have to stay alive. stay alive. you don't even have time to think of that but you already know because you are being beaten by people out of your color. my instinct is i cannot die out here i cannot let these guys tell me. i've got to stay alive. i've got to prove what happened to me to read succumbing you know, i end up being handcuffed and everything and the only thing i could do is hold on to my shoes and i think it was a shirt in the hospital and at the

was the only evidence i had. i didn't know there was the video camera. i said to myself nobody's going to believe you. you better hold on to these shoes and pants. after a couple days they wheeled me into another room and a black policewoman came in and said we've seen it all on tape. to go back a little bit with the highway patrol i did, i felt like everything was going to be okay. i thought it was going to be different. >> the female officer she worked there and said we've seen it all on tape. laid down there and get yourself well so we can get through this

to another part of the jail and the inmates must have gotten wind of it on the tv somehow and we couldn't walk or nothing so they were picking me up to the window they were ready to. one of them got me on this side and this side and the cops were looking in there and wanting to see how much damage was done and it was like which one of them didn't. i couldn't talk because my jaw was broken. they were ready to write in the jail that day. >> one thing you describe which won't be obvious to the audience you hadn't been charged with anything at that point. did you -- were you conscious of that at that point and how quickly did someone view that as

evidence that may be the officers realized they had overstepped their bounds? because clearly given the encounter looked like, there should have been some reckless driving in excess of speeding, but at this point you haven't even been charged. >> the beating was horrible i guess for them to even want to press charges. i got lucky because i had a black parole officer. so he understood, you know, he understood what went on. you won't be getting via lead on this. she said you've got to do something about this. get yourself well so you can focus on what's got to be done here. you've got work to do but don't worry about me. you won't be getting violated by me. >> we are running little late of course because things started late, but i wanted to get you to talk about -- you made reference in your expectation of the

police violence that preceded the moment that we are pulled over and one expected this kind of violence. i want you briefly just to sort of talk about what that was like because the book doesn't describe that expectation prior to that moment. you're talking but your parents and you're father's alcoholism and how you and your parents drink a lot as a young adult and sometimes you make stupid decisions of people driving too fast and you don't talk about that. i meant to get a broad sense of what it's like to be a young black man and los angeles in the 1980's when you have this expectation of the violence, and then i went to talk a little bit about of a trial, something and to share with the audience about what you describe from one of the officers. >> well, where i grew up that, i

could see there was a police car one time and had a lot of attempts. i would write my many to -- minibike up the trail -- there is a dirt trail right off the road, and i could see sometimes the copps bringing black guys up there, handcuff them to the car and just beat them that. >> this is a secluded area. >> yeah, it's in a secluded area. and it's in the mountains, it's in the mountains, but there's bike trails on the side of it and not many people go up there unless you live there but it's a good spot for them to take prisoners up there and beat them up. one day the police stopped me and said you know who's dent this is from, this is from --

that's my dendrite their path. you see his face right there where denney are you going to be? >> these are people that i knew. so the police brutality they stop bringing prisoners to the sheriff's station in california where i lived because they were saying the prisoners were hanging themselves and killed themselves, so it is just too many accidental death going on at the station. to many accidental deaths going on at the stations of they don't even bring them there anymore. they take them out to glendale. they move the holding tank. they hold them for a couple of hours, they don't spend the night, they take them to the next city over because the sheriffs were so brutal with things. >> been given those experiences, well known in your community

among your peers now there is a videotape. you are going into the trial a year later with what come expectations that justice will be served? >> yes. in a semi valley we get to the first court hearing in some of valley, and my lawyers tell me stay home, don't come to the court. we don't want you to blow the case. and i met homecoming you know, and i'm just going crazy because i can't be there to speak for myself. this is my case, you know, and i was just so discombobulated. >> the district attorney chose not to ask you to testify which meant the defense or the jury held against you. explain that a little because it seemed to make sense from the district attorney's standpoint that you might not necessarily incriminate yourself that you

might have the physical evidence. yet the jury said if you really were not a provocateur, if you were not the cause of this, the pcp was in play, you were uncontrollable, you'd been to the officers. islamic they never found pcp in my blood anywhere they still used this they felt that i was on pcp. but yes, the prosecutor would tell my attorney keep him away so he kept me away but he hurt me so bad because i'm watching all the reporters to a wonderful job, they were honest and you could almost see tears in their eyes like how come they didn't get convicted but then you have what is their name, nancy grace,

she's and the courthouse and she's just if this really happened to rodney king why isn't he here, where is he had? it must not have been at that. why isn't he here? the case almost got judge by some of the things he was saying during the two weeks he was there. i hate it irked me when he was inside of the courthouse trying my case outside of the courthouse as a reporter. >> do you think it matters that there were ten jurors, one hispanic and one asian? >> it definitely had an impact on my case. you have to have your peers on the case especially of your same nationality because they don't know anything about you even a

person of your own color doesn't know anything about you but at least you can understand a little bit more. there's a little bit more understanding. >> there is a couple of things that, just one example lot sure because ultimately this case came down to a sympathetic jury because you were not on trial. the defendants were four police officers facing about eight years' time with a fin charged with and from your account of it it's clear that afterwards they were swayed by the officers collective that they were following protocol. this is how i was treated at this person had to. because of the procedures what it boils down to is having fun

on their jobs and it was a pattern that they always have a hot if i couldn't beat someone like that if i hadn't before. it was a routine and i just happened to survive through a. >> you described as it happened leader one of the officers, laurence powell was recorded prior to your account she had come from a previous call, and i'm going to read what you wrote. he said the question of for the racist and forcing some kind of racial pravachol in los angeles young black man could be beaten with impunity and would be justifiable so the question of the racism through your experience was on trial hall was in the bup race this is about

his behavior and this was an acceptable response to his behavior so you said that now i don't know if powell is racist but evidence submitted in court he said this computer message in their vehicles, quote this is pool writing found almost exciting as our last call. sounds almost exciting as the last call. was right in the next. powell's lawyer tried in the trials to dismiss the comment that the interpretation of activity in black household by saying it wasn't necessarily racist he had been on the domestic. he just finished up with guerrillas in the midst evidence submitted by the district attorney is evidence of a kind of pre-existing mindset that preceded your actual encounter. today even as he wrote those

words in this book does it still surprise you what is not being a racist in terms of what a jury is going to say is evidence of racism or is not? >> it's surprising. i know that and for the deals knows that and the bad thing about it is it was too black cops there and the lawsuit we were lucky just to get the board that we had i would have been happy if they had before, even five that would have been fun but i was happy to get some kind. i missed my point. >> there's another example that i think is important to setting of the context of the switches that one of the jurors in an

interview afterwards basically described the character, the frame of this is important so here we have evidence that one of the officers is referring to a routine. then we have a juror later describing the lack of criminal behavior on the part of the officers because you were not really harmed by what they did. it was a characterization of you basically being able to take the beating and since you were not really harmed by it, how could this be an instance of excessive force? is that a fair characterization of is that yours? >> it was hurting. about what it made me realize is that blacks had been treated very bad in the past. i wouldn't ever have wanted to live back in the thirties were the 50's have a hideaway to this

day triet >> ron paul on this particular point of the stereotype and the demonization and the stigma and the black men as in this case you basically then prepared to kind of have an animal like strength we can all see the video and there's even a question on the trial of those blows were missing. they were not clean and you offer the prosecutor actually submitted one of the funds as evidence so all the jury could hold the physical baton but ron paul interestingly as a presidential candidate in this election cycle described in one of his newsletter to proceed with the trayvon martin tragedy that six-foot tall 14 year old black moises should be feared as if they were adults purely

because of their size. this is a legitimate response to the fear, legitimate response to their size and physicality and it strikes me that in your case not only did the jury penalize you for somehow being deserving of your size of the police officer may support your physical size by giving you a little bit extra. >> it's a sad case because it's been going on so, so long. it's been going on so long it's going on out there everywhere that they have over the years so they can keep their jobs and it's gotten to the point people have almost become numb to it. thank god for the videotape because what they did is kind of

woke they're lined up because had it not been for that beating on the figure to, it could be a lot worse than they are now. but, you know, it's been going on for so long and we have done so much work since the release of sleeveless -- slaves and have had to do the dirty work in some jobs we don't like and accepting things we don't like and once you have been the underdog so long it is easy for everybody else that came into the country to treat that attitude also come and went on, and the country has modern tools to work with, and

we should be way past that stigma point where the bad guy is always the black guy and told you are a bad guy over the years people would really start thinking you're the bad guy. he had to lose his life, you know in order to for things to change >> could we see just a run of the size around the rebellion we will talk about trayvon martin and the remaining time can you take us back to the dalia side.

there is a korean merchant in the property of the midst of the rebellion and the right. >> its people faugh -- people were fed up. >> this image comes from our collection of malcolm x papers and dehere this is a response to a police raid on a race of islam temple in 1962 when two african-american members of the temple were killed according to the nation in cold blood by the l.a.p.d. command this spurred malcolm x to an aggressive position on antipolice brutality

organizing and he carried that of course located here in harlem, but i thought that this was a powerful image and the headline reads seven unarmed negro's shopped in cold blood by los angeles police and this just gives us a kind of historical frame that you were born in 1960 -- 19653 years before rodney king was born but this certainly gives a richness and texture. did you know about this? >> i didn't, but it's been so many films. i'm always curious to see that exist in to where we are today. >> echoes your point about the deep foundational major of urban police either the bystanders or

politically conscious folks pushing back against the racial status quo in that moment. next slide. you make reference to both 1965 illegally in a 1965 riot to set the stage for the world you came into which is in the matter of chronology and interesting space and time to come in to be part of the larger community. but you also tie that moment, you're own experience to katrina, and this is an image of kathleen blanco's team was sent in to new orleans to deal with the vendor problem of losing which became a metaphor if for black people facing the most

desperate circumstances and one of the interesting irony is about this particular moment was all the mythologies about the crime and violence that were happening, 95% proven to be absolute, and even in their reporting of katrina, use of the juxtaposition of african-americans going into stores to get things, and again now i'm not here of solving things of whatever wrongdoing committed and minutes of that moment but nevertheless to capture bhatia what with appropriated objects said to have found them. it's fascinating to see the ratio was a sham, but it is this sense that the presence, the longstanding presence of police as some kind of occupied army. what did you think about katrina

in this moment and what did you think about the news reports of looting? were you saying to yourself this is when to be away all over again or did you say to yourself we still can't get along? what was the response? >> was horrible because of they had floods to deal with, they get copps going around giving them some goodies, too and then getting blamed for it. for people, period it was a sad moment and felt like it was worse in what happened down in l.a.. i just can't believe how things go from bad to worse these days

and we are in modern times. it's just unbelievable that it happens here america people have built and work so hard to get us up to this point to get credit and to be blamed and pick on as a race of people i just it loses me i get lost in my own country sometimes. like martin luther king says we still have a long way to go picture and we should always be working towards a better tomorrow and always talk about race relations in we should stay on. >> we have to be vigilant about

no one suffers but the minorities, period and instead think it does for the lights and the other nationalities and that come and make people realize this is happening, these guys are really going through. my hat goes off to people of this color and who has died for good cause and inside just warms me up with a lot of prayers praying for the good of the country and in my situation praying for me we wouldn't be alive to the state. my spirits would have been broken a long time ago ludington no this is america. islamic this is a weed in this part of the globe, and it's just not enough of them. but the ones it really makes a

difference, it's really a hat goes off to them because it's hard for us to do it on our own. >> it sounds like your mom's belief system really has helped you've to be grounded in something optimistic. >> the next slide, please. >> i wanted this one to be in play because it sort of brings us where we are in this moment and even katrina in some moments we are not at the situation of trayvon martin yet. this you may not have heard was a news report about the facebook group run by on the nypd sympathizers and allies and we have them verify all 1200 members of the forced but in

response to the indian day parade which is a cultural celebration in brooklyn, officers complain about having to do that beat and they share publicly on facebook what they thought about the black parade growth and we are not talking about what set of 19-year-olds who feel the narrow to be disrespectful and macho and pushing people around and talk about everybody which was so this is the photograph that appeared in an article where to lawyers have actually captured and among that conversation was the caption in reference to the parade gowers and animals and savages we should drop a bomb and wipe them out and one officer said if we don't do anything maybe they will just kill themselves. so, this is going back to that guerrilla in the next.

this is one of these moments where we don't have to abstract what members of local law enforcement community, not everybody think of the people that they are supposed to serve and protect and this cannot in december of 2011. it suggests that we might be moving in the wrong direction. the lessons of your experience may be lost to a generation and these young officers that we see here just don't look now scissorlike veterans of the first have learned nothing from what your experience taught you. do you feel that way? i know that you just described a lot of optimism but i'm curious how did you process something like this would you tell in 18 years of growing up in harlem or south central l.a. and the wake of its it's hard to hide from the daily experience we had an 18-year-old killed in his own bathroom suspected of selling

marijuana on the street corner, a chase she ran and got to the home for the police officer got there and they broke into the house. he was in the bathroom allegedly flushing whatever pot he had on him. if you can run that fast you don't have a lot. and she killed them. the grandmother said in that case pending. this is happening right now. when you tell young people? >> that is a hard one to speak on, but i want to tell you when things like that happen, we have people that can, you know, get ourselves in position every time a situation like that happens, when it's not reasonable, we should make moves where we can aspire to have this officers every time because it's happening too often and the only way they're going to start is to stop losing their jobs.

[applause] that's the only way. when you have this type of situation, everybody has to come together and demand that person be removed from the force so it's going to happen and when it happens it makes it okay for that guy and that guy and then the rockies that come out after its going to be engraved in them and take a long time. we as a people have to step up to the plate and demand it. when there is an on just killing someone has to be fired cox or go to jail. if they are on the police force they definitely have to be fired because you can't bring another life back. it's on its way forgot to do his next thing.

no mention the will to take another man's life and for someone to engage in your space like that, it puts me back many years. i can imagine what it was like to live back in the days. they've got to get rid of them. they've got to get rid of them. they have to. >> in case of trayvon martin it even makes surviving one of these encounters seem like a blessing in disguise and in a strange way that is the standard by which we judge. new york city is the world's leading bigger than some reason small countries and it has intensified its surveillance of black and brown youth in the country something like 700,000

which only intensifies increasing such encounters that can lead to these kinds of episodes. it's interesting that you mentioned holding the police accountable. camaguey to the next slide. i mentioned something knowing your anniversary was coming and not at the time up that your memoir was going to be out, but i wanted to take on the way in which the larger conversations about racist policing and about the use of police violence to repress the freedom black people literally have celebrities as black and brown people in the country freely without molestation has been reversed. i call this plan of violence

card in this particular moment, at the moment when the conversation is shifting again to your violence, so it was your behavior that elicited the legitimate response just like as geraldo rivera said trayvon martin shouldn't have been walking suspiciously in a hookie in that neighborhood and he is equally responsible for the george zimmerman taking his life because we are being electrocuted and moved to a threat next slide for trayvon martin. >> in the case of trayvon it's interesting the captain of that police department recently was submitted in the letter was kind

of a form of accountability that you just called for, the police department didn't kill trayvon with a test of his body for drugs, they didn't call his parents, sitting as a john doe for three days, they did bring in john zimmerman but he was released within hours and case closed. trayvon was the provocateur, standard ground always protected zimmerman said there was a kind of acceptance about that kind of vigilante violence in the case and we decided to resign and the controversy and guess what happened you probably know as of today they reported that local citizens stood up in defense of him and propelled the city council to refuse endorsing the the police response to george zimmerman as acceptable and legitimate and i just can't help but think that 20 years later on this anniversary we really are repeating history as you said.

we really are saying that it is okay for young black men to die when we feel that we as citizens and as police can kill a kind of legitimate fear whitcomb random stigmatize all of them as criminals to us and this is a fortunate outcome. as he makes his final remarks in trayvon's case and what he makes of all of this and where we are and where we should be going we will have a few minutes for questions. i know we ran a little longer because we started a little late but if you have a question please, come over to the microphone so it can record and in the interest everyone here, make it snappy so we have more people to get a shot. tell us communicative here we are in this moment with trayvon and issues of police violence on the table, young black men are still subject to a level of scrutiny as a form of racism in

my opinion here in new york city and florida, citizens get to the cave in such ways. but should we be learning in light of what happened to you that apparently we are not learning in the case? >> again, you know, it's a situation where she is trying to, you know, look good for the police. she's in the neighborhood and he knows they're killing these black guys i'm going to get away with it, and that was the case again because it's been going on for so long to where everybody thinks they're going to believe

that. what i think this -- i know i'm not going to make much comment about it because i want to have a fair outcome the family needs healing at justice and we need justice for trayvon any way that we can get whether that would be changed something definitely has to take place because i myself have felt the same and have been chased down the same this young man had his life taken, so like the law seemed like a was a lot put in place for the minorities because it's a lot of people that will get a certain black person and if you look scary he looks scary to me, too but i'm not scared o