Burgess Owens: “I want to repeat that the fact that we are talking about the verdict that the majority of New York City and New York…”

“I want to repeat that the fact that we are talking about the verdict that the majority of New York City and New York State citizens consider to be a miscarriage of justice. We are talking about the fact that 10 reasonable demands that have been made for the last 40 years which, if they had been heeded, would have gone a long ways toward preventing what happened in the Amadou Diallo case. We are talking about the fact that there are extremist elements in police departments, in law enforcement agencies. The rogue cops and the extremist elements, however, are aided and abetted by the cover-up procedure that takes place, from the commissioner and the mayor on down, when something goes wrong. The criminal justice system goes into motion to cover up these cases. Our appeal is to meet those 10 demands in the case of New York City. We will go a long ways toward seeing to it that this never happens again. We also appeal for national action.”