On Monday, January 28th, the People’s Organization for Progress (P.O.P.) took its Justice Monday Protest to the streets and hosted a march and rally to support the call for the groundbreaking Independent Prosecutor’s Bill that is on the desk of Governor Phil Murphy.
Participants marched from the Martin Luther King Monument adjacent to the Essex County Hall of Records on Martin Luther King Blvd at 5pm.
Governor Murphy is facing a divide over the bill, which mandates a special prosecutor to be empowered whenever an unarmed civilian dies at the hands of the police.
Advocates say that it would provide much needed transparency for those kinds of investigations and help restore public trust in the process. Detractors, including NJ Attorney General Grewal, say that the bill assumes ill intent of police officers and undermines the credibility of the current process.
After the march, Chairman Hamm participated in a panel discussion on The Force Report, the groundbreaking expose on the use of force of nearly every municipality in the State of New Jersey and its related problems that was done by NJ Advance Media.
The gathering, hosted by Newark Communities for Accountable Policing (NCAP), was entitled “Where Do We Go From Here? The Force Report-The Community Responds,” and was inspired by the title of Dr. King’s epic book detailing his vision to combat Racism, Militarism and Poverty. For this panel discussion, Hamm was joined by activist educator T.J. Whitaker of the MAPSO Freedom School and Assemblywoman Britnee Timberlake, co-sponsor of the Independent Prosecutor’s Bill.
It took place at The Source of Knowledge Bookstore, 867 Broad Street, Newark at 6pm…
