Updated Report: Every 36 Hours A Black Person is Killed by the Police in the US

Report on Black People Executed without Trial by Police, Security Guards and Self-Appointed Law Enforcers January 1 - June 30, 2012.







Malcolm X Grassroots Movement (MXGM)


Updated July 16, 2012



This report was produced for the “No More Trayvon Martins Campaign”, demanding a National Plan of Action for Racial Justice. This is the 2nd Major report of the Campaign.



A human rights crisis confronts Black people in the United States. Since January 1, 2012, police and a much smaller number of security guards and self-appointed vigilantes have murdered at least 120 Black women and men. These killings are definitely not accidental or random acts of violence or the work of rogue cops. As we noted in our April 6th, 2012 “Trayvon Martin is All of US!" Report (see http://mxgm.org/trayvon-martin-is-all-of-us/), the use of deadly force against Black people is standard practice in the United States, and woven into to the very fabric of the society.

The corporate media have given very little attention to these extrajudicial killings. We call them “extrajudicial” because they happen without trial or any due process, against all international law and human rights conventions. Those few mainstream media outlets that mention the epidemic of killings have been are unwilling to acknowledge that the killings are systemic – meaning they are embedded in institutional racism and national oppression. On the contrary, nearly all of the mainstream media join in a chorus that sings the praises of the police and read from the same script that denounces the alleged “thuggery” of the deceased. Sadly, too many people believe the police version of events and the media’s “blame-the-victim” narratives that justify and support these extrajudicial killings.

However, we have studied each of the reports of these deaths — including false, implausible and inconsistent claims by police and witness reports that contradict police reports. From this study and many peoples’ experience, we must reject the corporate media’s rationalization for the horrible fact that in the first six months of this year, one Black person every 36 hours was executed. This wanton disregard for Black life resulted in the killing of 13 year-old children, fathers taking care of their kids, women driving the wrong cars, as well as people with mental health and drug problems.

This report documents how people of African descent remain “without sanctuary” throughout the United States. Nowhere is a Black woman or man safe from racial profiling, invasive policing, constant surveillance, and overriding suspicion. All Black people – regardless of education, class, occupation, behavior or dress – are subject to the whims of the police whose institutionalized racist policies and procedures require them to arbitrarily stop, frisk, arrest, brutalize and even execute Black people.

Invasive policing is only one aspect of the U.S. states comprehensive containment strategies to exploit Black people and to smother resistance. To contain the upsurge of the Black liberation movement of the 1960’s and 70’s and protect the system of white supremacy the institutional forces of racism have worked through governments at every level to destabilize the Black community via community divestment, massive employment discrimination, outsourcing, gentrification and other forms of economic dislocation. In addition, schools, housing, healthcare, other social services and transportation in Black communities have been denied equitable provision and distribution of public goods and resources.

The U.S. state maintains and reinforces these economic injustices with the militarized occupation of Black communities by the police and a web of racist legislation like the “war on drugs”, discriminatory polices like “three strikes” and “mandatory minimum” sentencing. The result is a social system that mandates the prison warehousing of millions of Black people and extrajudicial killings where the killers act with impunity and more often than not are rewarded and promoted for murder. The oppression and police occupation of Black communities parallels the brutalization, denial of human rights and killings being committed by the Israeli occupying forces in Palestine, and the persecution of Afrodescendants in Columbia and the Indigenous peoples of Brazil over the past several years . Nothing short of the structural integrity and survival of the Black community is at stake when we consider the historic record.

For those who doubted the framing of the “Trayvon Martin is All of Us!” Report, this 6th month update proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that the institutionalized violence of white supremacy is not only alive and well, but is, in fact, intensifying. To complete the picture, we must take into account the extrajudicial killings and other repressive policies directed at other targeted peoples and communities such as Indigenous peoples, Latinos, Arabs, Muslims, and immigrants. These, in conjunction with the oppression of Black people, demonstrate that the U.S. government remains committed to maintaining the system of white supremacy created by the aggressive and illegal European settler-colonies that first established the national-state project.

This crisis can only be stopped through decisive action. First, the Black community must organize its own self-defense. Second, we must build a broad, mass movement capable of forcing the government to enact transformative legislation based on our demands. The fundamental transformative demand must be for a National Plan of Action for Racial Justice to eliminate institutional racism and advance the struggle for self-determination. The Black community itself will determine the specific contents of The Plan, drawing from the foundation of CERD (the Convention to Eliminate all forms of Racial Discrimination) and the DDPA (Durban Declaration and Programme of Action) .

We call on everyone who believes that decisive action must be taken by Black and other oppressed peoples to confront and defeat national oppression and white supremacy to join us in developing an independent, mass movement for human rights that builds power in our communities and will have the capacity to force the Federal authorities to implement a comprehensive National Plan of Action for Racial Justice. You can join us immediately by helping us secure 1 million signatures to our petition (see http://mxgm.org/trayvon-martin-is-all-of-us/), organizing Copwatch and People’s Self-Defense campaigns, fighting for elected Police Control Boards, the demilitarization of our communities, and the reinvestment of the military and security budget into community reinvestment and social programs amongst other suggestions provided in our “Local Struggles” paper (see http://mxgm.org/no-more-trayvons-campaign/). We also encourage communities to organize their own grassroots crisis intervention, domestic violence prevention/control and mediation teams so families in crisis do not become so desperate for help that they compound their problems by calling 9-1-1 and inviting the police into their homes.

We also call all organizations and individuals who agree with the demand and framework for a National Plan of Action for Racial Justice to help us build the National Alliance for Racial Justice and Human Rights (NARJHR) as a structure that will help us develop and implement a comprehensive national plan that centers oppressed peoples’ right to self-determination and the full realization of our human rights.

For more information about the Report or any of these action proposals, contact Kali Akuno at kaliakuno@mxgm.org.