LOS ANGELES, Shreveport — July 11, 2003 — Angry Black leaders in the city of Shreveport, La., said Thursday that they are arguing in protest against city officials for four months now after a Black man was shot dead by a White police officer.

In March, a White Shreveport Police officer shot Black suspect Marquise Hudspeth following a high-speed chase. The Black suspect had pulled into the parking lot of a convenience store when the police officers approaching him he ran from the officers. Two officers called to Hudspeth to halt, but he did not comply, evading police and resisting arrest, the officers warn Hudspeth to stop or they would fire. Hudspeth did not heed their warnings to halt but ran and then reached for his cellphone, which police mistook for a weapon. They mistook his shiny, metallic cell phone for a handgun and believed he was intending on aiming it at officers when they shot him.

A local police review board and the District Attorney, after examining the videotapes, ruled that the shooting was justifiable, and all three officers involved — Denver Ramsey, Michael Armstrong and Steven Hathorn — were cleared of any wrongdoing.

Angry members of the Black community, following citywide marches and talks of rioting and/or a potential economic boycott, are now getting attention for their protests.

Regular meetings with Black leaders with Mayor Keith Hightower and members of the City Council, in recent weeks, has somehow lead to Police Chief Jim Roberts being forced to resign.

The next goal, say members of an anonymous Black ministers’ alliance, is the firing of the three White officers involved in the shooting. Three of the seven council members are Black.

“We are hoping to get these officers on administrative leave,” said the Rev. Richard Hardy, senior pastor of St. Mary Baptist Church in Shreveport.
Hardy said that aside from removal of the officers, angry Black residents of Shreveport are demanding that the FBI and the Justice Department lodge criminal charges against the White officers, and ultimately see the White officers jailed. “We are still waiting for the Justice Department to bring some closure to this,” Hardy said, noting that Hudspeth’s family is also likely to file a civil suit.

But several White citizens of this racially divided city of over 200,000 residents say they believe the police and are tired of hearing them bashed by the Black community. The White citizens who support the local police department have formed their own political action group called Back the Badge, to stand by city police and the accused White officers. Back The Badge has held rallies and marches, supporting the White officers.

Angry Black residents expressed their anger that Mayor Hightower attended the Back the Badge rally but was a no-show for the Black rallying.
Veronica Harris a member of Back the Badge, said, “People want to support and encourage the police who are being falsely accused. They want to tell them how much they appreciate them.”

An angry and uncompromising Rev. Artis Cash, retorted, “We back the badge, but we back the badge when it’s not killing us! Suicide by cops, we don’t do that in our community.”

Shreveport, which is centered between Jackson, Miss., and Dallas, is almost divided equally in its racial makeup — 51 percent Black and 49 percent White. But, Black residents say they harbor much resentment of Shreveport’s Southern plantation past.

The geographical setting of Shreveport, is so in that these Black communities are near what used to be plantations and farms, seems to remind them daily of a past long left behind and still serves to feed Black anger and resentment toward the present day White community. White residents in those communities find it the hard to make peace with this angry Black communities unyielding bitterness.

Rev. Cash reveals, “The average White pastor here can’t join the Black ministers, joining… would be like committing treason.”