The Journal of Human Rights

The Journal of Human Rights

Blackness in America and the Presumption of Innocence: How the American Police and Mass Media Poisoned Everything

Document Type : Research Article

Author
Williams Iheme
Associate Professor of Law, O.P Jindal Global University, Sinopat, India.
10.22096/hr.2020.130966.1232
Abstract
In American history, the ‘Black body’ has been commodified both during the slavery era and in the contemporary period whereby the private management of prisons has partly resulted to mass Black incarceration. The abolition of slavery some 150 years ago is still fairly recent compared to the 400 years it was practiced: thus some of the heinous treatments by slave owners were carried over into the criminal justice system, causing the police, jury, judges, etc., to treat Black people unequally and unfairly compared to their White counterparts. From the ‘proceedings of the rebellious negroes’ in the slavery era to the racialized media coverages of police brutality against Black people, Black protests, treatment of criminal suspects, etc., the American mass media have been identified as playing a major role in the maintenance of the deep racist structures that perpetuate mass Black incarceration. This paper links up some historical practices against Black people with the contemporary racist practices in order to show that slavery is still functionally alive in America and manifests concretely through the justice system: this paper aims at amplifying the ongoing debates toward obliterating the remnants of slavery in America.
Keywords
Black People
Racism
Presumption of Innocence
Mass Media
Police Brutality
Prison
Protests
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Orecchio-Egresitz, H., (23 October 2020). A 17-year-old white supremacist apologized for her plot to attack a black Georgia church and was sentenced to juvenile detention. Business Insider. Retried from https://www.businessinsider.in/international/news/a-17-year-old-white-supremacist-apologized-for-her-plot-to-attack-a-black-georgia-church-and-was-sentenced-to-juvenile-detention/articleshow/78833398.cms

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The Journal of Human Rights
Volume 15, Issue 2 - Serial Number 30
Issue 30
September 2020
Pages 153-174