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The Futility of Seeking Justice After Police Murder
I can’t find solace in Derek Chauvin’s guilty verdict when police continue to kill Black people
Update 6/7/22: Level has a new home. You can read this article and other new articles by visiting LEVELMAN.com.
Rattled by the emotional dichotomy of the Derek Chauvin moment, I found myself questioning the nature of justice: how fluid and elusive it is when its recipients are Black, how it can’t seem to find us most days even when we call out for it by its Christian name. I considered how when justice does manifest, Black folks so often question its credentials. It appears so frequently on our doorsteps selling snake oil that we dare not trust it entirely when it offers us the real thing.
The whole world seemed pregnant with angst waiting for the Chauvin verdict, as if everyone who’s been fighting the good fight since last spring were clenching teeth in unison. People were buried in their phones more than usual yesterday, scanning for updates. I noted some Black folks front-loaded their workload for the day to make room for the inevitable crush of disappointment to come.
As for myself, I could feel my fingers charging up with words of furious resignation, preparing to decimate a system so clearly incapable of doing the right thing. The expectation that Chauvin would be found guilty on any count always seemed specious at best, but on a day that felt like a bursting dam, people got superstitious real quick. Such doubts are not the kind of thing you say too loudly or in mixed company for fear of jinxing the outcome.
When the guilty verdict came, I could still feel in my digits all of the words I would’ve written if Chauvin had gotten off. I had to empty my hands of their cursing and dig through a completely different mineshaft of feelings. Relief seemed appropriate, as did begrudging respect. There will be books written about how close this case came to not achieving this outcome at all, from the random ingredients it took to capture and present the initial crime to backroom pleas that fell through to the community pressure that had to be maintained to impress upon the system its will. This was not a case of having justice in the bag. All that said, how good does it feel to finally…
