In a December 6th article in the Washington Post, former ACLU “racial justice manager” and current NAACP field organizer Redditt Hudson gave us a brief glimpse into his five-year “career” in law enforcement.
The article, with the inflammatory headline “Being a Cop Showed Me Just How Racist and Violent the Police Are,” is filled with blasphemous generalities about St. Louis Metro PD in particular and law enforcement officers in general.
I strongly suggest that you read his entire article before reading this one, but here is my summary:
Despite constant harassment by local law enforcement during his youth, suburban St Louis native Redditt Hudson joined the St. Louis Police Department in 1994. He thought that by becoming a St. Louis cop he could help change the way police officers treated people of color, but instead he entered a “deeply racist” and dysfunctional culture. He witnessed brutality, discrimination, and corruption but when he complained, he was told to “get back to work.”
He had access to a private website called CopTalk, where SLMPD officers could post grievances and information that turned into a largely racist forum and at one point had to be taken down. He and his co-workers had lots of training on racial sensitivity and limiting the use of force, but these did no good. When his colleagues “got caught” being brutal and racist, they were gleeful about being investigated and enjoyed being put on paid leave, calling it a vacation.
While all of this was going on, Hudson was apparently a great cop. He talked about the time he and his sergeant heroically responded to a “man with a knife call” and instead of yelling and screaming and using force, they talked the man into eventually surrendering (it was obvious the man was mentally ill and certainly meant the officers no harm).
He was also shot at and attacked and faced “mortal danger” during his career. In fact, despite the hostile atmosphere, Hudson claims that he liked his job and “was good at it” but after five years on the job he left law enforcement and entered the racial grievance business, working with the local branches of the ACLU and the NAACP.
He concludes that most cops are brutal racists and the prosecutors and the courts are in cahoots with the police.
The End.
Where Do I Even Start?
Let’s begin by examining his terminology. Any cop with more than a year on the job will recognize his odd unfamiliarity with basic law enforcement language. He “accompanied a fellow officer” on a call (cops back each other up) he complained about misconduct but his “manager” would not take the complaint.
I don’t know about you, but I had sergeants and lieutenants and captains, not managers.
Further, he calls pistol magazines “clips” (I’ll bet that one made you firearms instructors cringe). Perhaps he was just trying to write in a way that citizens could understand, but wait, there’s more.
Hudson paints with an incredibly broad brush; at the beginning of the article he says “many” of his SLMPD peers were racists. By the end of the article, “all” cops violate people’s rights and know that they will get away with it. Most of his claims are downright fantastical.
Where Was His Outrage Then?
What I find most appalling is Hudson’s apparent lack of moral courage. During his five-year career, Hudson witnessed police officers engaging in brutality, racism, discrimination, excessive force, and corruption on all levels. He also observed prosecutors who shared the same immoral values as the bad cops, and a court system that generally condoned excessive force. Despite this horrendous situation, he didn’t attempt to alert anyone outside of his “manager” about any of this.
When his sergeant refused to address his complaints of brutality, he didn’t take it any further, to Internal Affairs, his boss’s boss, Human Resources, the media, no one. He apparently didn’t even tell his dad’s best friend, his mentor and fellow police officer, the guy who talked him into becoming a cop.
When he went into the private sector, it seems strange that he did not name names or expose the specifics of any of the examples he gave. After all, exposing human rights violations was part of his new job. If he had, this would most certainly have been a regional if not a national scandal that would have rocked the SLMPD and St. Louis County court system.
Hudson also apparently witnessed terrible physical abuse of innocent citizens, but never once stepped in to stop it. In fact, by his own admission, for five years he participated in an “intentionally unfair and racist” system.
Here’s the bottom line: Redditt Hudson is a wannabe politician who, despicably, seems determined to use the Ferguson situation to try and jump-start his stalled career. He was trounced in his failed state senate race in 2012 so he’s now running for the St. Louis Community College Board of Trustees. He’s going to get back into the local political arena by jumping on the “cops are racist” bandwagon. And he’s going to use whatever experience he had with SLMPD to give him “credibility” on the street.
The one true statement that Hudson made in his bizarre article is this: “Prosecutors are tight with law enforcement, and share the same values and ideas.” Yes, we do. Prosecutors and cops alike are trying to bring criminals to court and help crime victims seek and receive justice.
People like Hudson prey on the victimized and the disenfranchised, and they offer no real solutions — only rhetoric and hate. Law enforcement needs to speak up and tell the truth. We need to clean our houses if they need it, and we need to call out the cop haters and the race-baiters for what they are.
