unhistorical: I live in Baltimore and there is so much going around right now in the media and on...

unhistorical:

I live in Baltimore and there is so much going around right now in the media and on the Internet, much of it totally ignorant in the same vein as all the ignorance that surrounded similar demonstrations across the country in the past few months. But some of it is especially heartbreaking and upsetting to read because it also obviously rests on these heartless and preconceived notions about Baltimore and the people here. Recent events aside, the people of Baltimore City get constantly dehumanized and shat on by the media and by people who have never even been here. Here are some articles that provide some measure of background about how Freddie Gray died and about the context that killed him. Far from covering the whole breadth of what is happening and what has been happening for a long time, they only scratch the surface of a context that’s absolutely not strictly limited to relations between the police and communities. There is so much more beyond that and the info here, so please keep that in mind as well. 

A series in the Sun from a few months ago about millions of dollars in settlements paid to victims of police brutality

ACLU: Plaintiffs win justice in illegal arrests lawsuit settlement with the Baltimore City Police Department 

ACLU of Maryland: Briefing paper finds at least 109 police-involved killings since 2010

In-custody death brings anger with police in East Baltimore: Police still investigating death of Anthony Anderson, 46

Tyrone West files show passenger’s account of death in police custody

Baltimore’s Newly Approved Youth Curfew among Strictest in Nation

The police officers’ bill of rights

Some Baltimore police officers face repeated misconduct lawsuits

Helena Hicks talks about institutional neglect in the neighborhood where Freddie Gray lived and was arrested

Baltimoreans Reflect on Freddie Gray and Their City

Policing with impunity: How judges let dubious police tactics flourish

What happened to Freddie Gray? Former cops and arrestees shed light on the question tearing Baltimore apart

Whistleblower cop Joseph Crystal recalls his battles with Baltimore’s blue wall of silence

Family attorney at Freddie Gray funeral: ‘Most of us knew a lot of Freddie Grays. Too many’

Bad Seeds: Baltimore police misconduct profiled in lawsuits portrays a department beset by costly allegations of illegal violence and dishonesty

Family members break down and anger about police treatment flares at a rally in West Baltimore yesterday

Baltimore native Ta-Nehisi Coates: Officials calling for calm can offer no rational justification for Gray’s death, and so they appeal for order.

NPR’s Scott Simon takes a walk through the neighborhoods of West Baltimore to talk with residents in the wake of Freddie Gray’s death in police custody