Thursday, May 14, 2020
A young black man is shot while jogging. Over two months pass before arrests are made and charges are filed. As America grapples with yet another killing of a young black person, we ask: why does this keep happening?
Little action was taken on Ahmaud Arbery's case until a video showing the fatal shooting was leaked last week. Greg and Travis McMichael have been arrested and charged with murder -- and a national dialogue over racial profiling has been reignited.
This is part of a sad trend in American culture. We can recite by name young black men and women killed by white vigilantes or police officers in recent years: Trayvon Martin, Tamir Rice, Breonna Taylor, Keith Lamont Scott – the list goes on.
In Charlotte, there have been at least three controversial killings in six years of a black man by police, according to CNN, and City Council member Braxton Winston rose to prominence after a viral photo of him at a protest following the killing of Keith Lamont Scott.
While addressing racism has permeated the national conversation like never before, racially motivated violence and killings continue.
What is at the heart of these tensions? Why does this violence persist, and what can be done to curb it?
As racial injustice rears its ugly head yet again, we talk to a panel of historians, officials and experts to analyze the intersections of race, culture and criminal justice in America.
GUESTS
Khalil Gibran Muhammad, professor of history, race and public policy at Harvard University and author of "The Condemnation of Blackness: Race, Crime and the Making of Modern Urban America"
Braxton Winston, at-large representative of Charlotte City Council
Derrik Anderson, executive director, Race Matters for Juvenile Justice