Happy Birthday, Bitch

Justice could not have been sweeter when on Thursday evening around 8pm, the jury's guilty verdict of Daniel Holtzclaw, the Oklahoma City policeman charged with 36 counts of sexual assault on 12 black women and one l7 year-old girl, was read aloud.  He was convicted of 18 counts of rape and sexual assault on his 29th birthday and faces a recommended sentence of 236 years in prison from the all-white jury. It was a big relief for many of us who followed this case from last Fall and a shock to many that simple justice would prevail at all given the mostly male, all-white jury. 

But justice happened last Thursday night only because the local police department knew of another report filed against Holtzclaw weeks before his final victim reported him the day of her attack.  And using GPS tracking to corroborate the details of her story, the police realized they likely have a sexual predator among them who abused his power and authority over women living in an economically distressed community. Now if they had suspended him from his duties pending investigation from the first report, he would not have been free to continue raping and sodomizing women in the community. This is still where attention and questions need to be asked of the OK City Police Department, because the initial complaint wasn't taken seriously to begin with. They did, however, work with the prosecutor to support the charges and did not protect Holtzclaw.  This is what makes the difference in all these police abuse cases: a police department that will not protect their "own" at any costs to the detriment of the community and a DA's office that maintains some neutrality and treats police officers accused of serious violent crimes like anyone else.  This is what was missing in Staten Island, Chicago and Cleveland especially where the DA has gone as far as to attack the family of 12 year-old Tamir Rice and has refused to charge police with a senseless killing captured on camera.  

This case still offers so many necessary discussions around policing, rape and violence against women, victim "worthiness", class and selective prosecution.  Hopefully, because we received some simple justice in this case, we'll continue to have conversations that unpack these issues in our justice system.