A Maryland County Goes on Trial

PRINCE GEORGE'S COUNTY, Md.--A frail-looking 15-year-old boy weighting little more than a hundred pounds sits silently, hands folded in his lap, wearing that pensive look of desperation reserved by most adolescents for such crises as going out on the first date or getting caught sneaking a couple of dollars out of dad's wallet.

But this particular youth is not preparing to face his first girlfriend or an angry parent. This boy's desperation is terrifyingly real as he sits in Prince George's (P.G.) County Courtroom facing charges of murdering two policemen.

The mere mention of his name, Terrance Johnson, is enough to ignite an already explosive situation. You see, Johnson is black, the two slain policemen were white, and any Maryland resident will tell you that the most notorious features of P.G. County are its ultra-tense race relations and its controversial police force.

Rumors of a flourishing Ku Klux Klan chapter abound, and black residents often complain about what they see as police harassment and terrorism.

Blacks say Johnson was only defending himself against police abuse. White residents, on the other hand, say the shooting is an open-and-shut murder case and Johnson must be punished.

Police also claim the black community is using the case to stir up trouble and rekindle long-dead issue involving the police and the county's black residents.

P.G. County, although the largest county in Maryland, seemed more like a small town on the first day of the Johnson trial, which was slated for jury selection.

The county called in all 300 prospective jurors, a handful of whom were black, for the "event." As they filed into the courtroom, many greeted each other by name like old friends and chatted about the last case they had worked on together. "It sure is good to see the old faces," one said. "I'm looking forward to having another party like last time," commented a second.

Many spectators in the courtroom clustered near the windows to listen to the pro-Johnson demonstrators outside beating drums and chanting "Free Terrance" and "We say no to police brutality and racism." The court clerk swooped down on them, chastising them like wayward children to "Keep away from those windows; the blinds are closed for a reason." The whole event reached a sort of anti-climax with the announcement of a delay in the trial because the defendant had changed his plea from self-defense in both shootings to self-defense in the first and temporary insanity in the second.

Although the trial may be postponed, the controversy surrounding the case continues to polarize the community and intensify age-old strains and conflicts.

P.G. County was one of the largest and last strongholds of slavery. Only six years ago did the Justice Department force the county to desegregate its schools, and then in the midst of heated racial clashes which are far from cooled down.

The P.G. County police have traditionally projected an iron-fisted, shoot-first-ask-question-later image. Within a four-week period last year, white P.G. policemen fatally shot two unarmed black suspects. In nearby Washington, D.C., it is a standard warning that you don't venture into PG County unless absolutely necessary, and never at all after dark. "The police there don't take kindly to intruders, and they keep their own blacks squarely under thumb," as one black D.C. resident who used to live in P.G. County put it.

It was in this racially charged atmosphere that Officers Albert M. Claggett and James Brian Swart arrested Terrance and his 18-year-old brother Melvin on suspicion of rifling laundromat coin boxes.

Both brothers were taken to the Hyattsville police station, where they were put in separate rooms, ostensibly for fingerprinting purposes. Half an hour later no one had yet been notified of the boys' predicament. What happened next is unclear.

Police allege that Terrance ripped Claggett's gun from his holster while the two were alone in the small processing room, shot and killed him, and then shot Swart as he ran towards the room. Melvin, who was handcuffed to a bench in another room, claims he witnessed the officers beating his brother just before the shootings occurred.

Other policemen apprehended Terrance, who was then charged with murder.

Johnson's bail was first set at more than $1 million. Judge Jacob S. Levin, who will preside at the trial, later reduced it to $100,000, and Terrance went free pending trial.

In October, P.G. Circuit Court Judge Vincent J. Femia ruled that Johnson should stand trial as an adult, saying "There is no place for him in the juvenile system... We have no place for Terrance Johnsons."

Standing trial as an adult, Johnson could face two consecutive life sentences if convicted. In juvenile court he would have been engible for parole on his twenty-first Birthday.

Arthur A. Marshall Jr., Maryland attorney general, has decided to prosecute this case himself--for the first time in three years. Critics and Johnson supporters point out that Marshall did not try to get an indictment against the white policemen who shot unarmed black suspects last year. Marshall says, "I didn't go before the grand jury to seek an indictment in the Johnson case, either. I have always made it a policy to prosecute shootings involving the police, whether they are victims or defendants," once charges are brought.

No police officer involved in a shooting incident has ever been indicted in P.G. County.

The circumstances surrounding Johnson's trial, however, are quickly producing a sort of public indictment of the entire P.G. County police force. Recent events in the county and within the police department demonstrate a staunch resistance to change, especially when change means racial integration.

Under Justice Department pressure, former County Executive Winifred Kelly advocated plans to smoothly integrate black and white plans to smoothly integrated black and white P.G. communities and was bitterly criticized by many of his constituents.

Just as the community fought school desegregation, the rank and file of the police force resented, but were powerless to stop, the integration of blacks into their department.

Under Chief of Police John Rhoades, a Kelly appointee, the department instituted a mandatory, 20-hour human relations course for all members, and integrated classes of police recruits. Many policemen condemned Rhoades for being, as one officer put it, "Kelly's puppet" and "too responsive to the community at the expense of the department's needs."

Facing black community protest, Rhoades last summer fired Officer Peter F. Morgan for fatally shooting an unarmed black shoplifting suspect the previous Christmas Eve. The following week the county police union gave Rhoades a unanimous vote of no-confidence.

Commenting on the changes which the community and police have been resisting, 18-year veteran Sergeant Ralph Ross told the Washington Post last summer, "You have to understand one thing about this department; up until the mid-'70s, it was a known fact that if you came into P.G. County and made trouble the police would kick your head in. Simple as that. The county had that image and wanted it that way. The police were encouraged to be that way. But times have changes and that sort of thing wasn't allowed any more."

In this year's election, the county soundly rejected Kelly, returned two anti-desegregation spokesmen to positions of power and over-whelmingly approved a Proposition 13-style tax measure, prompting the Post to comment, "The voters seemed to be seeking a return to the days when life in Prince George's was simpler."

The Terrance Johnson trial is acting as a spotlight, forcing many hidden community attitudes out into the open. To some people, this is long overdue; to others, it is just one more unwelcome and complicating change.

Rev. Perry Smith, pastor of the Brentwood Baptist Church and a spokesman for the Terrance Johnson Defense Committee, said that an incident of this type "had to happen eventually; there are isolated instances of improved race relations here, but overt racism has not by any means been eradicated."

Smith goes on to describe the day-to-day relations between police and blacks in the county: "As it is, the black community has a great deal of negative feelings, fear and fright of the police. Harassment such as police stopping for imaginary traffic violations and then offering the option of jail or a ticket is commonplace."

The Committee Against Racism (CAR) voice stronger feelings about the local police, claiming the existence of a "Court-Cop-Klan Alliance." Pointing to past shootings of blacks by P.G. policemen, CAR literature states, "Given the racist history of these P.G. cops, it's not Terrance who should be on trial; these cops should be on trial for racist murders. Indeed, the P.G. cops have such a long racist history of murder and terror against workers in P.G. that, besides the county government, the only organized support they have is from the Ku Klux Klan."

Many black residents of P.G. County sympathize with Terrance but are reluctant to speak out about the couny officials or the police. Of those willing to discuss police-black relations, Henry Moore seems to sum up the prevailing attitudes.

"The police are very gun-ho; they carry .357 magnums and I don't know much about guns, but I know a .357 is hard to survive," he says. "I give the police the 'yes sir-no sir' treatment to try to avoid trouble."

He adds that "you can see racism all over the county; most blacks just know which restaurants and places to avoid. Cross-burning and name-callings are typical. There's no way that boy (Johnson) could ever get off, but even if he did, he would never survive in this community."

Other people in P.G. County see the Johnson case as a simple matter of a black man killing two white policemen, a crime for which he must pay. The latter group includes mainly colleagues of the slain policemen and many white residents of P.G. County.

John E. Brennan, a retired government worker, says, "I think our police are the best in the state, if not in the country, and that boy shouldn't get away with shooting two police officers."

Joseph Jackson, a white resident, says, "We have very fine policemen and I think justice will be done if it's in P.G. County."

The publicity surrounding the Johnson trail has focused a lot of attention on the character and practices of the P.G. police force.

Defence attorney Mundy filed a request with the court to obtain previous records of brutality charges against Claggett or Swart and any evidence that might show they belonged to the Klan. Judged Levin denied the request.

Three years ago Claggett was cleared of a charge of "excessive force" in the beating of a black man over a $10 traffic ticket.

Mundy said later, "The police are going to be pluperfect in their behavior until this trial is over."

Most P.G. policemen resent the attention the trial is casting on their department. They feel they are being unfairly scrutinized and see themselves as victims of bad press and an uncooperative black community, the target of instigators looking for a cause.

Sergeant Robert Law is a 22-year veteran of the P.G. police force currently working in the public relations department. He says his department's reputation for brutality and racism in due to a few isolated incidents which were magnified for political reasons.

"The higher tensions we have now are due to the recent pro-Johnson demonstrations. Most P.G. residents aren't even aware of racial tensions until they read it in the newspaper," says Law.

He adds that many community leaders used tension between police and the black community to get elected.

Law claims the 75 per cent decrease in police brutality cases over the past three years is evidence that "negative feelings about the police are unfounded." Each complaint is thoroughly investigated, he adds.

The department itself conducts these investigations, however. Last year, of 21 complaints filed against policement, of official results were two sustained, 15 unsustained, two still under investigation and two dropped.

Law says the police still "have lost of problems in black communities crime-wise, and when someone gives an officer a lot of trouble and he lifts his nightstick over their skull, they don't realize he's only defending himself. He's got to defend himself."

P.G. County black policemen are in a difficult position, torn between conflicting loyalties. Sergeant Kenneth Savoid has been with the department ten years, longer than any other black. When he first joined, he was the fifth black on the 500-man force in the county's 270-year history. Today he is one of 65 black on an 850-man force, and is the highest ranking black. Savoid says he feels "caught between a rock and a hard place."

The department's resistance to integration is understandable, Savoid says, because it was "shoved down the department's throat; it was too big a change, and too fast." He adds that there is till a need for more black policemen on the force.

"Blacks historically have had, and still do have a long way to go here," he says.

While Savoid has managed to accept and adjust to the difficulties inherent in his position, Nathanial Austin, a former black P.G. County policeman, did not fit in as well.

Austin finally left the police department last year after three years of frustrated attempts to recruit more blacks into the department and to organize a black police union.

Austin contends that the department "only brought blacks on as bodies to satisfy Justice Department pressure. There were no upward mobility opportunities."

Black and white policemen, he adds, "coexisted like Russia and the United States." Other black policemen did not want to join a union because of fear of reprisal and criticism from white colleagues, Austin states.

Having worked with other police departments, Austin concludes, "P.G. County still has one of the most racist police departments around, and their reputation is well-earned; they deal with blacks and low-income people ruthlessly and brutally. I certainly wouldn't rule out police membership in the Klan."

The Johnson incident, he adds, will be a much-needed "rallying cry" to oppressed blacks in the county.

Johnson supporters say that Terrance is one more black victim to P.G. County racism. White residents, the police and country officials instead focus on the two policemen slain on duty as the real victims in the case. But really, Johnson, the two policemen, and the torn P.G. community itself, like America in general, are all victims of a long-lived, deep-rooted racism that seems as hard to overcome now as it has ever been.