Law and Disorder
Paying the Price
One spring I pushed too hard and paid the price.
The hatred between the Hunters Point Gang and the Swampy Desert Gang, turned to all-out warfare during the funeral of Edrick Carr. The victim, a member of the Hunters Point Gang, was gunned down March 13 by several men firing from a passing car. The shooters were almost certainly members of the Swamp Desert Gang. They attacked again, this time at Carr’s funeral, a profound disrespect for the protocols of the street.
This provocation guaranteed a reprisal. The word was the Hunters Point Gang would attack the Desert Gang on its home turf in the Sunnydale projects that night. The SFPD called in every available officer in anticipation of more violence.
I was working the evening shift, so I got the assignment. The Sunnydale Projects scared me; the housing compound was an ill-conceived series of long, narrow, two-story row housing units separated by dead-end parking lots. It was the police officer’s nightmare – one way in and no easy way out.
I stopped by the Portrero police station and the Captain gave me some background on what he expected and where his officers would be stationed, important information in case things turned violent.
I wanted to interview some of the people in the neighborhood while it was still light. The Captain said I should be safe if I stuck to the main road. I cruised up and down Sunnydale Avenue, but I didn’t feel safe getting out of the car.
I was about to leave when I saw a group of four boys probably about 10 or 11 years old. There was a police cruiser with an officer inside parked across the road. The situation looked perfect. I called the news desk and gave them my location and asked them to stay close to the two-way radio just in case.
I got out of the car and made eye contact with the police officer across the street and pantomimed that I was going to interview the kids. She seemed to nod. I had my tape deck rolling and my microphone ready as I got out of the car. I debated whether to leave the car unlocked or not. I decided that the worst-case scenario was having the car stolen so I locked the door and kept the keys in my hand
The kids were happy to talk. Gunfire was a part of their everyday lives. “Today’s no different than any other,” the smallest one said.
I had been out of the car for about three minutes when I saw the cop car pull away. I thanked the kids and started walking back to the car. The first beer bottle hit the roof of the news car and bounced into my back. The next bottle slammed into the back of my head. The projectiles seemed to be coming from a unit on the second floor. I staggered behind the car to shield myself. I was pretty sure whoever it was wouldn’t keep wasting full beers for long.
As I crouched down, I put the key in the door lock and hit the transmit button on my two-way radio.
“Emergency I need help,” was all I could manage.
I turned around just in time to see a woman, well over 250 pounds, running at me with a crazed look. I tried to turn away but she hit me just above the right eye with a running roundhouse that buckled my knees. The two-way and tape recorder were stripped from my hands. I was really scared now. If I went down they’d be all over me. I struggled to my feet. It was time for desperate measures; all I could think to do was go on the offensive.
“God… fucking… damn it.” I started yelling. “What is wrong with you? I’m here to tell your story.”
I was screaming as loud as I could and staring each of them in the eye. “You think anyone else gives a fuck about you. At least I care enough to come here.”
Everyone froze, but I knew it wouldn’t be for long. Help came from an unlikely source, the kids.
“Yeah he was talking to us,” the smallest one said. “Leave him alone.”
The crowd began to back off and I tried to leave, but the keys had been stripped from my hand in the melee.
One of the kids looked me in the eyes and screamed under his breath, “get out of here now.”
“I can’t,” I said, “I lost my keys.”
The kids were all looking on the ground for the keys. Finally one of the boys found them inside the well of the hood resting on the windshield wipers and I quickly unlocked the car with shaky hands and drove away.
My house was less than a half-mile away, but I didn’t want my wife to see me in this condition so I drove to Mission Street and called the station. “We wondered what happened to you.”
“Didn’t you hear me on the two-way?”
“Yeah, but we couldn’t make out what you were saying.”
I had a concussion from the beer bottle and a contusion from the woman’s blow. A crew from our sister television taped an interview with me for the late news. They had me lift my bangs so they could get a close-up of the purple knot on my forehead.
The massive police deployment had worked. The threatened gang reprisal never happen. There was only one act of violence that night… an assault on a radio news reporter.
Getting the real thing
For a time in the 1980’s, a two-square-mile area in central and east Oakland was one of the most dangerous places on earth. Oakland’s murder rate, driven by a turf war between drug kingpins, rivaled those of New York City, Chicago or New Orleans.
Felix Mitchell and his “69 Mob” revolutionized the sale of drugs by bringing modern business techniques to the underground economy. He controlled all aspects of packaging, distribution and sale of cocaine. What he couldn’t accomplish with efficiency, he handled with brutality.
Many personal injury lawyers practicing Dayton has stated that crime rates in the inner cities were spiking. The news was full of lurid stories about the Bloods and the Crips, gang wars and drivebys. Much of it – like crack cocaine and crack babies – was overhyped bunk. Crack cocaine was no more dangerous than the white powder the rich people snorted. It was just cheaper and easier to sell.
I wanted to know more about it so I convinced the Oakland Police Department to show me what it was like at street level. I made it clear I wasn’t interested in a PR tour; I wanted the real thing.
I was introduced to the officers I was riding with at roll call. They weren’t happy to have me along, but they treated me fairly.
“So I understand you want to see what life’s like on the street?” the driver asked with some degree of condescension. “Can you keep up?”
“You just tell me what to do and I’ll stay out of your way.”
The car was an unmarked cruiser. It didn’t have a light bar to reduce its profile, but otherwise, it was fully outfitted. They were proud of their laptop that allowed them to tap into the police databases from the field. It was top-of-the-line stuff.
“If there’s a problem,” the driver said looking me in the eye to make his point, “use the two-way radio. Push the button and say ‘CODE 33.’ That’ll get everyone’s attention. Then tell them ‘officer needs assistance’ and give them our location.
“If anything happens, here’s how you release the shotgun,” he said pointing to a hidden lever between the driver and passenger seats. “Pull the pump down hard. The sound will usually stop anyone in their tracks.“
It was meant to make a point and it worked.
The target was East 14th street — the heart of one of the most violent stretches of land in the United States. We came in on back streets to avoid the lookouts. The officer in the right seat typed our location into the on-board computer.
“We need someplace where we can see them, but they can’t see us. So we’re going up there.”
He pointed to a two-story apartment building. The second floor was ringed by a concrete walkway. I turned on my tape recorder and followed them.
To get to the building we had to get over a six-foot fence. One of the officers searched a nearby carport, appropriated a ladder from the wall and set it against the fence.
The two officers climbed over first and jumped down the other side. I followed behind my radio equipment flapped wildly as I hit the ground. Once we were over, the officers drew their guns. They motioned for me to be quiet and slowly made their way through the shadows to the apartment house staircase. They climbed quietly, their guns sweeping their field of vision. They both had bulletproof vests, I didn’t. I had asked to see action and I was getting it.
The building looked like an old motel with brightly painted doors opening on to the walkway. We had come up the back stairs and made our way toward the front of the building where we’d have a view of East 14th. One of the doors flew open. Both officers pivoted immediately. My heart rate zoomed. A man in his underwear and a tee shirt standing in the doorway. He had heard our footsteps and came out to investigate.
“Get the fuck back in there,” one of the officers hissed under his breath.
“I didn’t do nothing,” the man said jumping back in and closing the door.
The whole incident took just a few seconds and left everyone short of breath. We finally got a clear angle so we could watch the drug dealers on the corner. They pointed out where they stashed their drugs and how they exchanged the cash for drugs.
One of the dealers ducked around the corner and disappeared. Soon the others began to drift away.
“We’ve been made,” the driver said. “We might as well go.”
With no reason to hide anymore, we walked down the front stairway and back to the car.
The officers told me the dealer was well known and they were collecting intelligence before they charged him. It might have been all for show, but it was real enough for me. The man coming out of the room wasn’t rehearsed and the adrenaline boost it caused was the same for the cops as it was for me. I can’t imagine ever getting used to it, nor would you want to.
Complacency could be death for a cop. I’m not sure how you can ever train fear out of someone whose life really is on the line. Routine traffic stops and fruitless patrols dominated the rest of the shift. The evening had been terrifying, emotionally-wrenching and sometimes boring. In the end, it was probably representative of a cop’s typical day, except I experienced it for one shift. I have no understanding of what it’s like to do it every day.
Our next call was a 10-79 – a coroner’s case. The house was in the middle of East Oakland, old but well kept. The body was lying on the floor. It was an older black woman. Her eyes were open and she looked remarkably normal.
The crime lab was busy and we were told to stay and make sure the body wasn’t disturbed until the techs got there. It took them over two hours. One of the officers covered her with a sheet and we waited in a corner trying to stay out of the way as friends and family came to pay their respects. The officers would gently keep anyone from getting too close to the body.
Her house was immaculate. The sofa and chairs were covered with plastic and the living room was clearly reserved for honored guests. The kitchen was for family with pots big enough to feed dozens.
Each new wave of visitors brought more grief and anguish. Some sobbed quietly others wailed uncontrollably. The raw emotion was painful to watch. I couldn’t help but feel like an intruder. I did something I rarely do. I turned off the tape recorder and put away my equipment.
what a difference a day makes
For the next night’s assignment, I put on dress pants, a tie and sport coat and headed to Senator Diane Feinstein’s house in the Presidio Terrace area of San Francisco. Feinstein’s husband, Dick Blum was holding a high-dollar charity fundraiser with Sir Edmund Hillary as the featured guest and I was among a few journalists promised a one-on-one interview with Hillary.
Unlike most of these events, the media was allowed to mingle and more importantly fed well. The house was spectacular, Hillary was fascinating and the hors d’oeuvres were tasty. It’s one of those nights you can’t experience unless you’re so rich you can afford to pay $1,000 to attend a cocktail party. I felt privileged to be there.
I had gone from violent streets of East Oakland to the cream of San Francisco society in 24 hours. Both were equally fascinating to someone trying understand a region and its people.