tv KQED Newsroom PBS April 1, 2018 5:00pm-5:31pm PDT
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widespread outrage over the sacramento policeg shootin of stephon clark is sparking nationwide protests and calls for police reform. alo president trump takes on amazon as ses a and facebook continuestuo le. and a speak peek at fil take you to the supreme court. welcome to kqed newsroom. we begin with the controversial police shootingra in santo. we want to warn you the footage you're about to see contains graphic content that may be disturbing to watch. last week police officers shot and killed stephon clark an unarmed 22-year-old african american man in sacramento. the officers were responding to calls fbt car break ins when they confronted clark at his
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grandmother's home. they shot at him 20 times sayinh thought he had a gun. it turned out clark was holding a cell phone. the attorney general said the office would investigate the incident at the request of the sacramento police department. stevante. the mayor wants to talk to me. the chief of police got my brother killed. he shows no emotion at all.nd >> you all get mad at me for not crying on the ws >> yesterday mourners attended the funeral for stephon clark. rev ra al sharpton deliveredhe eulogy at the request of the family. >> the president's pressta sec said this is a local matter. no, this is not aca l matter.
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they've been killing young black men all over the cotry. and we are here to say that we're going to stand with stephon clark and the leaders of this family. we are puing aside our differences. it's time for preachers to come out to the pulpit. it's time for pligs to come out their office. it's time for us to go down and st this madness. >> to discuss all of this further, i'm now joined by politics and government reporter katie who joins us from sacramento. alsoso a public policy prof jack laser and a civil rights attorney john brew th. nk you for being here. katie, i want to begin with you. the family had requested an independent autopsy. those results wereed rele today. what did that autopsy find?
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>> yes. their independent found that stephon clark was shot eight times. five of those times he was shot in the back. he was sh once in the side, and once in the dmek, and then -- neck and then once in the thigh. >> who do the findings suggea ut the police officer's narrative about what happened that night? >> well, thettorneys for clark's family say that that suggests that the police offic ns'rative is not right. we have been told they feared for his life, that he was approaching them. they thought he had a weapon, but this report would indicate that he was largely standing with his back tned away from them. the doctor said that the firstl shot actuent in to his side while he was facing the house and it wasso powerful it actually spun him around to his back was fully to the officers where he proceede to be shot in the back and as he was either falling to the ground or on the ground, he was shot in the leg.
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>> so john, i want to bring you in at this point. you were involved in drafting a sacramento council mandate used in recent years to revise the policies on use of forc based on what you know, do you think proper procedure was followed in the clark shooting? >> i do not. given my assessment of the facts, the bigre issue h is you're not supposed to be use force unless your lifesn danger. if you perceive that, was that reasonable? my concern is the officers appeared to leave a position of safety. the young man walked toward them, and they seemed not to assess properly whether hetas a eat to them or not. the real question is did they really have - exerciseroper judgment. you can have all the procedures you want. we can do a good job and i think sacramento has largely tried to do a good job in revising the policies, but you also to v to follow them. if yo don't, you get a
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violation of the policies. you get what you get here. a number of shots. for me the failure to properly assess this young man is clearly in violation of the rules in terms of using ing excessive fo. >> professor jack,eren't there other rules that weren't followed as well? did they identify themselves as police officers? did they get immediate help for stephorclark? >> as s i understand, they didn't identify themselves which they are supposed to do, and it does seem like they spent quite a bit of time waiting before getting help for him in the latest report i saw it wasit th took three to eight minutes for him to expire after he hat. been sh so that's going to be an issue. but i'm not a forensic psychologist, and i'm not really prepared to comment on theha particular e. i can say this is the kind of thing we see. i'dh agree w mr. sharpton. this is not a local problem.
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>> also one of the issues was when the other officers came up an officer says to mute their mikes. that's disturbing, because generally aerson will tell the truth about something immediately after it occurs. if you tell themmu to their mikes, then you seem to be suggesting that you don't want to hear tem tell the truth about what happened at the beginninbegi beginnibegi beginin that's distuto me. i don't know that an officer can justify shooting this person that number of times in the back give than he never saw a gun. they were nev told that hed any kind of weapon that could be dangerous to them. at best, they were told that earlier that a person, and not even certain if it's that person, might have been breaking into windows. there was no corroborating evidence at he, in act, was doing that, or that he had any type of serious weapon. >> this issue has, of course, drawn a lot of national attention. there are protests nationwide. when sarah huckabee sanders at
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the white house was asked, she said the president felt it was he local issue. you said earlier it is not a local issue. in what way? >> there are local aspects to it. local criminalustice officials will adjudicate it at the locali level, bu's clearly a national phenomenon. it's not a worsening national f phenomenon, but 're becoming conscious at the unnecessary fatalities at the hands of police officers at the evidence of body wo cameras or bystanders. this is a national problem in the fact people are shot every year. i'm not going to say whether it's too high or low, but it's clear there are racial disparies among thoseunarped. >> i was going to say i had at least three shootings i'm looking at right now where a person, an african american male was shot in the back. in different cities. and not sacramento.
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acramento ae in couple years ago. it does happen. i don't see this as an isolated event. i see it as a mind set that officers in who n these areas. we talk about implicit, racial bias. that's engrained within a mental state. too quick to haoot. that's i see. you didn't have to do. you were in a position of safety. and what officers are taught is how to deescalate a situation. advise who you are. let them know whoyou are. you have time, distance and space. and plus when the person turned his back, did you not see i those are the questions we have to deal with. >> and those are thef questions the community of sacramento. katie, you've been following this story all ,alo and the sacramento police department is now ininvestig the state attorney general's office is overseeing the probe. is there any sense that that ives sacramento residents any
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more confidencthe area? what is the mood like in the city? >> i've heard mixed ings. me people say they are confident that this can be a turning point for the city. there's a lot of hope, because the police chief is relatively new. he's been in his job for seven months. but he is african american. he grew up in sacramento. the point was made that he h a job in a relatively affluent suburb north ofhere, roseville, and he came back to sacramento. so t sere are people who that as a good sign. also he voluntarilyasked the attorney general to oversee the investigation. t i did speak to some women who knew stephon clark's grandmother. they're known heror 40 years. they saidhy would things change now? they recalled an experience 30 years ago whenanfrican american was walking through a field and was shot by police. they did not hold out much hope. i think it is depending who
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you talk to, there are post sides being represented. but the community has been active. as you mentioned, coming out with protests, and really pushing for some substantial changes to the police fosae in amento so this doesn't happen again. >> i have worked with the sacramento police departmeyi and to bring about change. i had a couple cases. mll tell you the police chief as well asbers of his staff and the mayor's office are i equallerested in bringing about social reform to the community and to t so this presents an opportunity for not only community and the police to kind of work together. you need someone community side who understands what policing is about. so they canffectively put forth ideas that the police department can appreciate and, therefore, you can reach an accord. i've done that. i knowe they're availao do it, but you have to work at it and have people who are willing toake the time to work through the issues. >> one of the ideas that's taken off across the country is the
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ea of implicit bias training and workshops. does it work? tell, ar as we can there's no evidence training has foeffect on pance. i think implicit bias is real role in ink it plays a the problems. i think very likely in this case the misperception of the object in his hand was due to an implicit association between race and weapons. that's been well demonstrated and carefully resewched. t we can do about it is an entirely different question. >> what can we do about it? >> i think the training has to be focussedon eventing the problems. as john was saying, there arey to deescalate. you take time, distance and cover sofficers are not in a foot pursuit that's likely to lead to deadly force, or nondeadly force. there's a broader problem than deadly force. there's nondead force that also racially desperate and at
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levels that are not necessary, and then there are even more eemingly mundane but nevertheless harmful things like stop and search and frisk and arrest for minor offenses. >> this is a broader problem. the vast majority of the policing that needs to work is day in day ou conduct. because that's what people are stopped. that's where carsre searched. there are people being treated disrespectfully. you can eke a difference . in terms of everyday communications and i don't know that implicit training helps on the shooting. that's the officer's perception of the danger. a lot o work can be done. i don't think it's something we should throw our hands upy and it can not be looked at. >> there's plenty that can be done. >> i'm su we'll be hearing more. the family is now filing a federal lawsuit as well. i want thank you for your time. the professor, the attorney, and
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also our own correspondent in sacramento. thank you a. turning now to tech, yesterday president trump attacked amazon in a tweetmp saying theany doesn't pay enough taxes and is harming the u.s. economy. this comes id a rough week for the tech sector. tesla issued a major call. joining me now with more is tech editor jeremy owens. nice to have you back. >> thank you for having me. >>. >> president trump saying amazon pays little o no taxes to state and local government and has hurt the economy. is that true? w not realen we looked at the effective tax rates in advance of the ne tax law, amazon had an effective x rate of more than 40%. we go back further we now have a calculato online where you look at a company's sp, amazon is at
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%. higher than its sector and for the s&p overcall. not much. the average is about 30%. >> amazon is collecting taxes in the 45 states with sales tack. >> yes. the real question is third party sellers on the amazon platform. are they collecting enough sales tax from what they're doing, and is that on them or the small businesseslling on their platform. amazon said we'd like a federalh law. would make this the same across all states and make it easier to deal with this problem. but that law hasn't been passe, in fathe law that passed cut tax rates for corporations. >> why do you think amazon is caught in the president's cross hairs ri now? >> you'd have to ask him. obviouyhe ceo of amazon owned "the washington post." >> jeff bezos. >> trump has not had a great relationship sinces hcome president. they're popular right now.
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a lot of people are talking about amon. could be him calling out a popular figure so he can get more publicity and lk at that. >> any chance he's trying to protect his friends with businesses who feel they're hurt by amazon? >> it's possible. i yimean, to figure out what trump is doing is always an exercise in futility. but, yeah, it seems like there are a lot of potential reasons r him. the reasons he stated which was they're hurting the post office and they're not paying taxes, don'tlyeem to ree that true. >> all right. let's move onto tesla. this week tes recalled more than 100,000 model s sedans made before april 2016. this is because it needs to replace boltshat hold power steering motors in place. they can becom co-roaded and break. what are some of the other troubles the company faces? >> it's been a rough week for tesla. there were e-mails that leaked showing they were dthng everg they could to ramp up
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production to meet production rate that they promised to do is quarter, and they're already way behind on what they promised to do previously. they had to pull them down. >> that's for the model three.ll they're g people off of model f and x lines to come over and try to pruce more model threes by tend of the quarter. they had ali against it in their shareholder lawsuit. it' just a lot stuff happening for tesla which was capped off by the recall which brings more of their production into focus yet again. and moodies downgraded thec dit rating. it's leadingo questions about whether will the company have enough company to stay throughout the year? >> ites dt have enough money, elon can ask for more money. he's gone to shareholders, sold bonds. the downgrade is focussed on the
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bonds which have not been trading well. with tesla acquiring solar city, they were in debt. the deb load i large. it will be interesting to see if he'll have to especially as he couldn'ts to ramp up production, but that's kind of where ramping up the production, if he can get the model threes out and get more money in, that will help balance a little bit. >> okay. got to tk about facebook. still in the headlines this week. the company announce third down we it's going to ro out features and give users more control over how theiron informais shared. will this be enough to appease the anger and anxiety among users and regulators? >> it depends on what users are talking about. acebook has done this before when it's had privacy iues. we have a new dashboard. see easier for people to who has access and their privacy settings. this is anotherew product. right? and so we'll have to see if that actually does -- if it makes users feel better to see that,
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i'm sure facebook is going to push it hard to get peopleto go in and see who has access, what their pttvacy gs are. facebook did indicate that zuckerberg would testify in front of congress, but they are just nibbling around the edges autotheir data privacy things. they got rid of third party data. they were giving the advertisers her things. >> much to keep track of. thank for joining us, jeremy, with market watyoh. >> thank next week marks thestart of the sf film festival in the 61st year. it promises a powerful lineup of films and documen ries from around the world and the bay area. an oakland native studied filmis at san francco state university. the director debut takes on race, humor and telemarketing. >> iea just ry need a job.
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>> this is telemarketing. >> stick to the script. hello? >> mr. davidson. sorry to -- >> i'm going to give you a tiyo want to make money here? use your white voice?hi >> my voice? >> i'm not talking about will smith whi like this guy. >> hi, mr. kramer -- [ dial tone notic . >> joining me now are the executive director d musician. great to have you both here. i love that greeting. ell, the main character in the movie is an african american telemarketer who skyrockets success after he uses his white voice. how would you define th movie? >> it's an absurdist dark comedy with magical realism and it's called sorry to bother you. >> you were a telemarketer at
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one point? >> a couple of different points. >> how much of that experience is in this movie? >> i think that's the jumping off r a lot of ideas. and it's not a auto biographic movie, but you use experiences from your life. >> and noah, w did you choose sorry to bother you as the centerpiece film? >> this guy to myis right the main one. he's been an incrediblya impo force in the cultural area. the city of oakland, and how it's developed and how we can ntalk about that terms that are new and fresh and really expressive. this film was part of our film ho fse, andm granting programs at sf film. and we couldn'te more proud that something like sorry to bother you as come out of the
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programs. peits to the vibrancy and precision of what we're trying to do here in makinges movin the bay area. >> yeah. film house san francisco film society really sf film, made it possibl do this. because they not only gave the project money, but they gave me office space to sit and work. >> and you got into sun dance before this. congratulations on that. >> yes. >> but i also want to talk more about how the film was made. you're from oakland. the fi is set in oakland. the hero in the film is often torn between two worlds, needing to sound white for the job but act black, wanting to make money but stay true to his friends ane whhe came from. how much of that resonates true with your life? >> well, i think that the sacrifices that we have to make in orde to just survive is something that resonates with everyone. the film is not just about that.
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the trailer acally doesn't reveal most of what the film is about. >> the are quite a few surprises in the film. don't want to spoil it. ut yeah. and -- i think that in my life i'm always trying to figure out whether i'm doing the right thing or t. and i'm always constantly reassessing. so i think that's a, you know, very much a i part of me there. >> and noah, let's talk about the festival more you have said the festival wants to highlight bay area values and among them diversity, innovation, social justice. one of theilms is a documentary about supreme court jui justice ruth bader againstbergi. >> she's become such an icon. >> do you mind? >> i am 84 years old and everyone wants a picture with me.
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>> yeah. why did you choose that film? >> we're here. we've be talkingbout boots riley. another icon for people in san francisco in the area is ruth bader ginsburg. she's been a light during a dark political time right now. and this is one of those standud hout and cheer documentaries. it makes you feel like it's going to be better in theend. i think when we play this film during the festival, you'll see a real comfort for a lot of people, but i think also you'll see a lot of people standing up and cheering for this incredible woman. >> and something newi you're this year is hosting discussions around certain films. for example, the cleaners. w it's abo decides what we see online. let's look at a clip from that as well. >> facebook has a bigger population than any state in thl and so when it sensors, it's in some ways as powerful as state. >> ignore it.
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ignore. ignore. >> if i didn't have social media, i wouldn' be able to get the word out. i probably wouldn't be standing here. right? i probably wouldn't bedi st here. >> mark zuckerberg is now the front page editor for every newspaper in the world, effectively. >> so you're partnering with thn elect frontier foundation for discussion about this movie. what are you hoping to gh accomplish thrthat? >> i think what we're trying to do with sf film in general, because we're supporting film makers and we engage in educational programs. we're trying to channel wh we call bay area values in the work we're doing. one of the most important things we can do here in the bay area is talkbout technology its impact and how it's changed our society. without revealing any spoilers, one of the y aspects of sorry to bother you is an extremely sophisticated critique of how the venture capitalism and technology has actually really altered how we view moral
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i think what's been going on with facebook over the last couple of weeks reinforced we need to pay attention to this. the cleaners is a filmthat talks about this kind of farm of people in the philippines thatr s the internet. and so it goes through and finds porn graphic images or offensive speech, and these people who live in a very differentulre than what we have in the united states aret s of subjected to the worst of american capitalism in a way. what's great about the electronic frontier foundation ise have these incredibly interesting partners who can actually talk about the larger context around these technology concerns. >> it's a complex issue. >> complex issues. >> how to balance privacy with freedomf speech. >> it's huge. we began working with them on an amazing documentary citizen 4 about edward snowden. and we've been engaging them on
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a fairly regular basis to come back as guests of ours to actually continue to illuminate us in the bay area. and kind of allow us to be leaders in thisind of critique of what's going on in the technology industry. >> okay. and boots quickly, any more movies for you after the first film? >> yeah. i'm starting to write stuff now. >> all right. >> yeah. ais is just an expansion of everything i'eady been doing. >> we look forward to seeing your next work, and sf film festival running fm april 4th th to the 17th. >> is there more of this vodka? >> whisky is up next, but thank you for tenjoyi vodka. >> that's it? >> that's it. thank you very much. weitl send some home you after the interview. that'll do it for us. you can find more of your coverage online. thank you for joining us.
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captioning sponsored by wnet re >>ivasan: on this edition for sunday, april 1: president trump says no deal for dreamers despite being attacked during four years of war, this ukrainian plant manages to keep running. and, have politicians always considered their oppts" enemies?" next, on pbs newshour weekend. >> "pbs newshour weekend" is made possible by: bernard and irene schwartz. the cheryl and phip milstein family. sue and edgar wachenheim, iii. dr. p. roy vagelos and diana t. vagelos. the j.p.b. foundation. the anderson familfund. rosalind p. walter. barbara hope zuckerberg. corporate funding is provided mutual of america--
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