Kenosha shooting of Jacob Blake strains tie between Black residents, police

KENOSHA, Wis. — Before the police shooting of Jacob Blake, the bedroom community of Kenosha was largely untouched by demonstrations like those seen in nearby Milwaukee and Chicago after the death of George Floyd.

Like other places in America, Kenosha’s Black residents saw inequality in the way police treated them. But there had been nothing like the shooting that left Blake, who is Black, paralyzed. An officer shot Blake in the back Sunday as the 29-year-old leaned into his SUV, where three of his children were seated inside.

Now, the city of 99,000 residents along Lake Michigan finds itself the latest flashpoint in a larger discussion about racism and police brutality.

“We’ve had some situations where we’ve thought the police department hasn’t been treating some minorities fairly. This incident, it’s just changed,” said Anthony L. Davis, president of the Kenosha NAACP branch.

The shooting, captured on cellphone video, has led to several nights of protests and unrest, with some people destroying buildings, setting fires and hurling objects at police, who responded at times with tear gas. On Wednesday, a 17-year-old from nearby Antioch killed two demonstrators, according to authorities.

Kenosha Ald. Anthony Kennedy, who is Black, said he often works with police to the benefit of the neighborhood he represents and was surprised by what he saw on video.

“Watching that video of Mr. Blake, you should be angry,” Kennedy said. “There’s no way you can have any humanity and not respond with anger, frustration. I’m that angry. I’m that hurt. I’m that frustrated. I have a responsibility to be that and still try to be constructive and build my community and maintain the quality of life of my constituents.

“Be angry and vocal, but, when you’re done, be with me so we can build this city.”

About 11% of Kenosha’s 99,000 residents are Black, but only about seven of the police force’s 207 officers are African American. Kenosha’s white population is about 67%, while 89% of the city’s police officers are white.

Ray Roberts, a data scientist who has lived in the city about a decade, said he and other Black residents face different rules when dealing with police.

“If you’re a white guy, a firefighter with an open [alcohol] container and gun in your car, and you get pulled over, you get dropped off at the firehouse,” said Roberts, 38. “If you’re Black, that might be the end of your life — you get shot or you might face 20” years in prison.

“The police here are terrible, and they treat Black people awful,” said Jacob Conway, a 22-year-old white Kenosha resident who said he has joined protests every night since the shooting. “They harass them and everything.”

At least four people have been fatally shot by Kenosha police since 2003. One — Bobby Sherrod — was Black. He was shot in 2005 by an officer who believed Sherrod had just broken the neck of Sherrod’s 5-year-old son. A prosecutor deemed the shooting justified.

Kenosha saw a peaceful protest days after Floyd’s death in May after a white Minneapolis police officer pressed a knee into Floyd’s neck for several minutes as the handcuffed Black man pleaded for air. A late June “Back the Blue” rally in Kenosha, organized to show support for law enforcement, was disrupted by anti-police-brutality protesters. One protester was tackled to the ground. No arrests or injuries were reported.

Davis said officers need better training on how to deescalate encounters like the one with Blake, who police said refused officers’ commands to stop before opening his SUV’s door and reaching inside. Officers had responded to a report of a domestic dispute when they encountered Blake. Authorities have not said whether Blake was part of the dispute.

“When emotions are running that high, who talks to you?” said Davis, 66. “It’s going to take a lot for you to calm yourself down. And that’s where the police — we feel — should have taken the opportunity to help Mr. Blake.”

The area where Blake was shot is the dividing line between a historically white neighborhood and a historically Black neighborhood.

Wide disparities in income between white and Black residents of Kenosha, as in Chicago, Milwaukee, Minneapolis and other major metropolitan areas in the Midwest, have helped create “underlying frustration and anger in the minority communities,” said Don Grimes, an economics specialist at the University of Michigan.

Yet some elected officials and professionals in Kenosha either believe racial discrimination doesn’t exist there or won’t openly acknowledge it, said Roberts, who spent three years in the Coast Guard and six years in the Army, serving in Afghanistan.

“It’s gotta get worse before it gets better,” he said. “I think some of this has to happen. There’s so much fakeness going on.

“There are casualties in war, and that’s what’s going on now.”