had always seemed harsh to her. African-American was a preferable term. And there was Negro , no longer fashionable.
If she was anything, she was Hispanic. In crude mouths, spic.
Yet among Hispanic Americans she was “too white”—not just her appearance but also her way of speaking, her manner.
Her life had been, since adolescence, an effort to overcome the crude perimeters of identity. Her skin-color, ethnic background, gender. I am so much more than the person you see. Give me a chance!
Must’ve been, in her early twenties Ines Iglesias had some confusedidea—idealism—about serving the community, serving the country .
Several of her (male) cousins had enlisted in the U.S. Army. Scattered among the Iglesias relatives were women who’d made decisions similar to Ines’s—inner-city teacher, social worker, psychiatric nurse, Red Cross nurse, youth facility psychologist.
An older relative, an uncle of her (adoptive) father’s father, had been a New Jersey State trooper. Another relative, also in her father’s family, was a Pascayne police captain in the Forest Park precinct—the first Hispanic officer to rise to that rank.
When she’d graduated from the police academy and began to wear the patrol officer’s uniform she’d felt suffused with pride. She’d thought Now I am one of—something. Now there are many like me.
Apart from the Forest Park captain Ramon Iglesias there were few Puerto Rican–American police officers in the Pascayne PD. Very few African-Americans. And very few women.
Not quite out of earshot her fellow officers had begun saying of her If Iglesias believes that rape bullshit she’s crazy. She’s finished.
Driving the streets of Red Rock.
Not wanting to think she was becoming obsessed with Sybilla Frye.
The girl, and the mother.
White cop. White cops.
Talkin with you ain’t worked out like I hoped, you one of them.
She’d never lived in Red Rock. She’d grown up across the river scarcely a mile away. A thousand miles away.
She’d been sixteen in August 1967, when the inner city of Pascayne had erupted into several days and nights of sporadic gunfire, burning and looting, martial law, the deployment of the New Jersey National Guard to control violence. Twenty-seven people had diedin what was called a “race riot” and of these twenty-four were black.
Of the twenty-seven deaths, at least twenty were individuals uninvolved in the violence, unarmed, incidental bystanders who’d been in the wrong place at the wrong time or who’d come unwisely to stand at a window in an area in which “sniper gunfire” was suspected by police officers. Three were children younger than twelve and two were elderly women shot inside their homes by National Guardsmen firing into windows.
Two had been police officers, determined to have been shot by “friendly fire”—“in the line of duty.”
Pascayne PD officers had been outfitted in riot gear, carried tear gas canisters, automatic weapons, shotguns. They’d shot freely at individuals with dark faces who’d been perceived as behaving “suspiciously”—“threateningly.” They’d shot at passing vehicles and into the windows of houses and apartment buildings. Many had removed their badges and covered the license plates of their vehicles with tape. Of investigations into wrongful deaths in the months following the riot not one condemned the use of extreme force by any officer.
In the wake of August 1967, much of Red Rock was burnt-out and would not be rebuilt. But in the wake of August 1967, a new city administration and a new police chief initiated an era of reform in the Pascayne PD. There were campaigns to integrate the police force, programs to train minorities and women. A new era, an era of social justice, and Ines Iglesias had wanted to be part of it.
Now it was twenty years later. The inner city had lost population, like most of Pascayne. Red Rock still resembled a battle zone.
In her (unmarked) police vehicle driving
If she was anything, she was Hispanic. In crude mouths, spic.
Yet among Hispanic Americans she was “too white”—not just her appearance but also her way of speaking, her manner.
Her life had been, since adolescence, an effort to overcome the crude perimeters of identity. Her skin-color, ethnic background, gender. I am so much more than the person you see. Give me a chance!
Must’ve been, in her early twenties Ines Iglesias had some confusedidea—idealism—about serving the community, serving the country .
Several of her (male) cousins had enlisted in the U.S. Army. Scattered among the Iglesias relatives were women who’d made decisions similar to Ines’s—inner-city teacher, social worker, psychiatric nurse, Red Cross nurse, youth facility psychologist.
An older relative, an uncle of her (adoptive) father’s father, had been a New Jersey State trooper. Another relative, also in her father’s family, was a Pascayne police captain in the Forest Park precinct—the first Hispanic officer to rise to that rank.
When she’d graduated from the police academy and began to wear the patrol officer’s uniform she’d felt suffused with pride. She’d thought Now I am one of—something. Now there are many like me.
Apart from the Forest Park captain Ramon Iglesias there were few Puerto Rican–American police officers in the Pascayne PD. Very few African-Americans. And very few women.
Not quite out of earshot her fellow officers had begun saying of her If Iglesias believes that rape bullshit she’s crazy. She’s finished.
Driving the streets of Red Rock.
Not wanting to think she was becoming obsessed with Sybilla Frye.
The girl, and the mother.
White cop. White cops.
Talkin with you ain’t worked out like I hoped, you one of them.
She’d never lived in Red Rock. She’d grown up across the river scarcely a mile away. A thousand miles away.
She’d been sixteen in August 1967, when the inner city of Pascayne had erupted into several days and nights of sporadic gunfire, burning and looting, martial law, the deployment of the New Jersey National Guard to control violence. Twenty-seven people had diedin what was called a “race riot” and of these twenty-four were black.
Of the twenty-seven deaths, at least twenty were individuals uninvolved in the violence, unarmed, incidental bystanders who’d been in the wrong place at the wrong time or who’d come unwisely to stand at a window in an area in which “sniper gunfire” was suspected by police officers. Three were children younger than twelve and two were elderly women shot inside their homes by National Guardsmen firing into windows.
Two had been police officers, determined to have been shot by “friendly fire”—“in the line of duty.”
Pascayne PD officers had been outfitted in riot gear, carried tear gas canisters, automatic weapons, shotguns. They’d shot freely at individuals with dark faces who’d been perceived as behaving “suspiciously”—“threateningly.” They’d shot at passing vehicles and into the windows of houses and apartment buildings. Many had removed their badges and covered the license plates of their vehicles with tape. Of investigations into wrongful deaths in the months following the riot not one condemned the use of extreme force by any officer.
In the wake of August 1967, much of Red Rock was burnt-out and would not be rebuilt. But in the wake of August 1967, a new city administration and a new police chief initiated an era of reform in the Pascayne PD. There were campaigns to integrate the police force, programs to train minorities and women. A new era, an era of social justice, and Ines Iglesias had wanted to be part of it.
Now it was twenty years later. The inner city had lost population, like most of Pascayne. Red Rock still resembled a battle zone.
In her (unmarked) police vehicle driving
Similar Books
