In high school, I was one of only a couple white kids at a school in Flatbush. It was in the 70th precinct, the same station house where Abner Louima was brutalized ...

One day the cops rounded up a kid I went to school with. His name was Terrell. Supposedly he matched the description of someone they were looking for. They threw his body through a window after he was cuffed.

Some of us protested the way the cops were hurting Terrell. They covered their badge numbers and made Louima jokes. My friend Greg was arrested for speaking up. He was black. They would not arrest me.

I always think back on that day when these instances of police violence happen. It is seared into my memory.

I being this up to say we should all realize that these deaths on film are just part of the story. There's so much that doesn't make the headlines and years of incidents that weren't filmed.

Back in 2006 I was an intern on the business side of the New York Times. I was outside the old office in Times Square when I saw the cops take this african vendor and repeatedly throw him to the ground. They smashed his table where he was (illegally) selling things.

One of his friends filmed the whole thing on his flip phone. I was horrified by what I saw. The video was dramatic. I rushed the man into the newsroom and found someone on Metro (I don't remember who) ...

I had the man show the footage. I figured this was well worth writing a news story. The man had been hit and slammed to the ground. His belongings were destroyed. No one in the newsroom thought it was a story.

Today, these things make headlines but for years this behavior wasn't seen as newsworthy. I remember that day too. It's important for us all to remember that the killing of George Floyd is part of a story that is decades long and we're only starting to discuss

And this is an important point to include too https://twitter.com/hunterw/status/1265703351884316672?s=21 https://twitter.com/hunterw/status/1265703351884316672