TCB June 25, 2020 — Caged with COVID by Triad City Beat

Greensboro / Winston-Salem / High Point June 25-July 1, 2020 triad-city-beat.com

WINSTON-SALEM EDITION

FREE

Winston-Salem man fights for release from prison racked with coronavirus outbreak PAGE 5

CAGED WITH COVID Mural dilemma PAGE 9

‘Black’ and ‘white’ PAGE 8

Zoomers PAGE 2

June 25-July 1, 2020

EDITOR’S NOTEBOOK

Don’t mess with Zoomers At first blush it looks like they’re doing absolutely nothing, these Zoomers of mine. For the last few months they’ve been closeted by Brian Clarey in their rooms, sometimes working as many as three separate screens at once. They’re whispering into their devices and staring at the wall. They stay up all night and fill the sink with dirty dishes before the dawn. They never go outside. But they hatched a plan, these kids of ours, using the only things they have at their disposal: time and spite. My kids were among the million or so teens who reserved tickets for President Trump’s Tulsa disaster in an effort to inflate the numbers, create unrealistic expectations and basically just rat-fuck what was a terrible idea to begin with. And I get the sense they did it just because they could. My kids are not particularly political for Zoomers — that’s the generation a couple clicks behind Millennials, for those who need a primer, born in the first decade of this century and sometimes referred to as Generation Z. But like just about everyone else in their cohort, they have friends

from across the gender, sexual and color spectra; they have more acquired knowledge than learned experience; and they’ve concluded that the president is a joke. My kids heard about this Tulsa thing in group chats. Others came into it through TikTok and the encouragement of the K-pop community. It was a real gathering of the tribes, thrown together in moments, on a whim, and disseminated through channels to which adults and other squares are just not tuned in. And it worked. Trump said on TV that his team had more than 1 million requests for tickets. The actual head count was just above 6,000. By all reports, the president did not take it well. When my kids told me of this plan, I was way on board, but I never thought it would amount to anything but a blip on the radar. But damned if they didn’t pull it off. I’m telling you to watch out for these kids, these digital natives who can each muster a few hundred people for a worthwhile cause as easily as I rounded up enough kids to play 2-on-2 in a driveway hoop when I was a kid. They’re connected in a way that the rest of us can’t understand. And they make up 25 percent of the US population. Change, friends, is coming. The Zoomers have been chatting about it for years.

QUOTE OF THE WEEK

He could easily die as a result of this. — Kellie Mannette pg. 5

BUSINESS PUBLISHER/EXECUTIVE EDITOR Brian Clarey brian@triad-city-beat.com

PUBLISHER EMERITUS Allen Broach allen@triad-city-beat.com

EDITORIAL SENIOR EDITOR Jordan Green jordan@triad-city-beat.com

ASSOCIATE EDITOR Sayaka Matsuoka sayaka@triad-city-beat.com

1451 S. Elm-Eugene St. Box 24, Greensboro, NC 27406 Office: 336-256-9320 Cover images SPECIAL SECTION EDITOR Nikki Miller-Ka GREENSBORO: The “One Love” niksnacksblog@gmail.com mural on Davie Street has elicited ART different responses. [Photo by ART DIRECTOR Robert Paquette Carolyn de Berry] robert@triad-city-beat.com WINSTON-SALEM: Inmate Perry Pitts is highly vulnerable SALES to COVID-19, and it’s about to KEY ACCOUNTS Gayla Price get worse. [Illustration by Robert gayla@triad-city-beat.com Paquette] CONTRIBUTORS

Carolyn de Berry, Matt Jones, Michaela Ratliff

June 25-July 1, 2020

CITY LIFE Jan 25-28, 2019 by Michaela Ratliff

THURSDAY June 25

Music Bingo @ Pine Tree Tavern (W-S) 6:30 p.m.

SATURDAY June 27

Running for their Lives 5K @ Mount Eagle College (W-S) 8:30 a.m.

Up Front

Garth Brooks Drive-In Concert Experience @ Marketplace Cinemas (W-S) 9 p.m. Marketplace Cinemas is one of 300 exclusive theaters in the country to broadcast this Garth Brooks concert, so don’t miss out. Visit the concert page here to purchase tickets. Don’t forget to take two piña coladas with you.

SUNDAY June 28

Women’s Self Defense Seminar @ Macon’s Martial Arts (HP) 8 p.m. Dress comfortably and meet the black belt experts at Macon’s for a women’s self-defense seminar. They’ll be teaching everything from basic self-defense moves to tips to stay safe. Learn more on the event page.

Grand Opening Pawty @ Doggos Greensboro (GSO) 4 p.m.

Opinion

Finish Line Timing needs your help raising proceeds to benefit the Salem Pregnancy Care Center. Visit the event page to register and learn more information.

News

Test your music knowledge while enjoying a night of drinks, bingo, and lots of fun at Pine Tree Tavern. Find more information on the event page.

Yappy Hour @ World of Beer (GSO) 11 a.m.

FRIDAY June 26

Company Auditions @ Royal Expressions Contemporary Ballet (GSO) 6 p.m.

Culture

If you ever wondered how to get a complimentary pretzel from World of Beer, it’s as easy as going to happy hour and letting the staff pet your dog. Visit World of Beer’s Facebook page for more information about lunch specials for both you and your furry friend. Live Music & Food Trucks @ Pig Pounder Brewery (GSO) 12 p.m.

Shot in the Triad

Royal Expressions is excited to announce its revival and they’re looking for dancers to join their team. Those interested in jazz, contemporary and/or ballet are encouraged to register for auditions and learn more about the company here. Let your dog do his thing while you do yours! Join the Doggos team for a day of fun and drinks. Register your friendly, fixed, vaccinated good boy or girl at their website for a tail waggin’ good time! Shotgun Saints @ Ham’s Palladium (HP) 9 p.m. Rock fans, this one’s for you. Join Shotgun Saints at Ham’s Palladium for a rockin’ party!

Make your way to the Brewery and enjoy live music by Big Dumb Hick while enjoying a meal from the Street Fare food truck. Find more information about the event and safety precautions to take before going on the event page. *Some events may be canceled due to coronavirus. Please check with event organizers for up-to-date information.

Puzzles

Well-Read Black Girl Book Club Virtual Meeting @ Bookmarks (W-S) 6 p.m. Join the Winston-Salem chapter of the Well-Read Black Girl Book Club as they discuss the writings of women of color, this week’s reading being Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi. The meetings will always be hosted by women of color but people of all colors and genders are welcome. Visit Bookmarks here to receive the meeting link.

June 25-July 1, 2020

Coronavirus in the Triad:

Up Front

(as of Wednesday, June 24)

Documented COVID-19 diagnoses NC

56,174 (+9,319 since last week)

News

Forsyth 2,679 (+346) Guilford County

2,482 (+315)

Shot in the Triad

Culture

Opinion

COVID-19 deaths NC

1,272 (+104)

Forsyth

31 (+6)

Guilford

110 (+12)

Documented recoveries NC

36,921 (+7,702)

Forsyth

1,367 (+295)

Guilford

1,110 (+308)

Puzzles

Hospitalizations

906 (+60)

Forsyth

50 (+6)

Guilford

323 (+25)

W-S man fears contracting COVID-19 after transfer to Goldsboro prison

News Opinion Culture Shot in the Triad Puzzles

One night in April 2017, two WinstonSalem police officers were attempting to serve a warrant at the Piedmont Circle Apartments public housing community when they spotted Perry Pitts lean into the back window of a nearby car and touch hands with a passenger. Based on the encounter, one of the officers frisked Pitts, but didn’t find anything. The officers ordered Pitts to sit on the curb while they investigated the odor of marijuana. According to court records, that’s when Pitts went down on one knee and began experiencing a seizure. An officer traveled with Pitts while he was being transported by EMS in an ambulance, according to an appellate court opinion, and searched his underwear, finding cocaine and marijuana. (The officer who observed Pitts touch hands with the passenger later testified that he didn’t see an exchange of items at the time.) In October 2018, Pitts began serving a prison sentence for drug possession and habitual felon status. Now 49 years old, Pitts suffers from asthma, hypertension, seizures and obesity. Functionally illiterate, Pitts dropped out of middle school. A psychologist at Pender Correctional Institution in Burgaw wrote in a summary for the prison’s day program that she observed “a sharp drop in his intellectual and academic functioning scores that correlates with his report of being beaten in the head with a carjack in the 1990s.” Pitts also told the psychologist that on other occasions he had been assaulted by 12 people, hit by a car and beaten by police officers, resulting in additional head trauma. The case notes by Pitts’ psychologist describe him as “developmentally delayed” with a mild “intellectual disability,” and show that he needed to be reminded to go to evening medications call after being confused by a correctional officer who incorrectly told him he didn’t need to take his medication. The psychologist said Pitts’ “difficulty with adherence to medication regimens”

was not surprising “as it has been witnessed at this unit that he struggles to find his way around the camp.” Noting Pitts’ “difficulty relaying his day-to-day needs regarding services such as medical and mental health,” the psychologist also wrote that he was continually “at risk for exploitation by other offenders” who bullied him into buying items for them in the canteen. On May 27, Pitts was transferred from Pender Correctional Institution to Neuse Correction Institution, a state prison in Goldsboro that has become the epicenter for COVID-19 in the state prison JORDAN Perry Pitts was arrested at Piedmont Circle Apartments in 2017 after a Winston-Salem system, with three inmate GREEN police officer observed him touch hands with a passenger in the back seat of a car. deaths and 466 cases — more than half of all deaths and Judge Rozier’s decision found that the tions who have a 2020 or 2021 release overall cases across the entire system. state has “failed to provide the sufficient date. “This is a crisis for him right now,” COVID-19 testing to accompany the There’s little doubt that Perry Pitts’ said Kellie Mannette, Pitts’ lawyer, who crowded and communal social distancasthma, hypertension, seizures and is filing a motion for appropriate relief ing protocols,” and said that the state’s obesity qualify as underlying health in Forsyth County court in an attempt to practice of transferring “incarcerated conditions, but he’s scheduled for release secure his early release. “I believe there individuals between facilities” contrain 2022 and he’s five months short of is a significant Eighth Amendment issue dicts Centers for Disease Control guideage 50. for cruel and unusual punishment belines. The plaintiffs have established a The state Court of Appeals has cause it’s a nonviolent crime. He’s served risk of irreparable harm, Judge Rozier upheld Pitts’ conviction, rejecting a chala significant amount of his sentence. said, “including the risk of COVID-19 lenge arguing that the officers detained He’s got an underlying medical condirapidly spreading throughout the vulnerhim without reasonable suspicion. tion such that if he catches COVID, it able prison population, along with the Mannette filed a petition to the state could be devastating. He could easily die substantial risk of death and long-lasting Supreme Court on June 3, asking the as a result of this.” health consequences stemming from the high court to review whether Pitts’ disease. Fourth Amendment protection against ‘Vulnerable to COVID-19’s “Thousands of these individuals in unreasonable search was upheld. There’s threat of serious injury or defendants’ custody are elderly, have no guarantee that the Supreme Court death’ disabilities, or have underlying health will agree to hear the case, and it could Local and state officials have acknowlconditions,” Rozier wrote, “making them take months to file briefs, so Mannette edged the danger posed by COVID-19 particularly vulnerable to COVID-19’s also filed a motion for appropriate relief to prison and jail populations, but as of threat of serious injury and death.” in Forsyth County court on June 11. The June 8, only about 750 people — roughThe state Department of Public Safety motion for appropriate relief allows for ly 2 percent of the overall prison populaannounced plans on June 18 to test the court to consider facts outside of the tion — had been released, according to all 31,000 residents of the state prison trial record. the ACLU of North Carolina. system. “We didn’t know about COVID at The ACLU and other groups sued in To protect residents and staff, the state the time [Pitts] was convicted,” Maneffort to force the state to protect prisonDivision of Adult Correction is allowing nette said. “I’m trying to be as expedient ers, and on June 8 Superior Court Judge offenders who meet specific criteria to as possible. I noted we would waive a Vinston Rozier Jr. ordered the state to serve the remainder of their sentences hearing. It is important to be as speedy work with the plaintiffs to develop a plan “under the supervision of community as possible because every day in that for ensuring that prisoners across the corrections officers,” typically under prison is another day he could contract state are safe. A plan was due on noon house arrest or through electronic moniCOVID.” on Monday. The order also requires the toring. The criteria includes offenders Forsyth County District Attorney state to submit a detailed description of who are pregnant, along with offenders Jim O’Neill, who is running for state conditions in all prisons, including the who are 65 or older and those of the number of residents placed in each cell ages 50-64 with underlying health condicont. on pg. 9 and spacing between bunks.

Up Front

by Jordan Green A drug sale three years ago sent a 49-yearold Winston-Salem man with hypertension and asthma to prison. Last month, he was transferred to Neuse Correction Institution, a COVID-19 hotspot that could amount to a death sentence.

June 25-July 1, 2020

NEWS

June 25-July 1, 2020 Up Front News Opinion Culture Shot in the Triad Puzzles

Requested delay in Marcus Smith case sparks anger in community by Jordan Green A request by the city of Greensboro to delay discovery in Marcus Smith’s wrongful death lawsuit aggravates still-fresh wounds during the George Floyd uprising. Amid the spontaneous eruption of anger across the globe in response to the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis, the waves of protest in Greensboro have lifted up another name: Marcus Deon Smith. Smith was anxiously pacing in the middle of Davie Street in downtown Greensboro as the North Carolina Folk Festival was winding down in September 2018 when he asked a group of Greensboro police officers for help. At first, he agreed to sit in a squad car while the police called EMS, but then he started trying to kick out the window, and they opened the door. In the scene that ensued, officers took Smith to the ground, handcuffed and hogtied him. As officers tightened the restraints connecting Smith’s wrists and ankles, police body camera video shows him groaning and gasping for air. With two paramedics watching alongside the eight police officers, Smith stopped breathing. A state medical examiner ruled Smith’s death a homicide, identifying the cause of death as “sudden cardiopulmonary arrest due to prone restraint,” along with the use of ecstasy, cocaine and alcohol, and hypertensive and atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease. The press release initially issued by the Greensboro Police Department made no mention of the restraints, saying only that Smith “became combative and collapsed.” The department cleared the officers of wrongdoing before the autopsy was completed, and Guilford County District Attorney Doug Henderson issued a decision to not criminally charge the officers five days before leaving office. Following the release of police body-camera video by the city and the homicide finding by the NC Medical Examiner’s office, the police department discontinued the use of the Ripp-Hobble device as a restraint in a striking aboutface from the police chief ’s previous defense of it. Eight months after calls for Chief Wayne Scott’s firing, Scott announced his retirement. The almost daily marches and protests that began at the end of May have breathed new life into the public calls for justice on Smith’s behalf. The first of 10 demands issued by Greensboro Rising

— a coalition comprised of veterans of the national protest wave in response to the deaths of Michael Brown and Eric Garner in 2014 — is: “Make amends to the family of Marcus Smith.” But the wrongful death lawsuit filed by Smith’s family has continued to move through the federal court system at a predictably slow pace, unyielding to the calls for justice from the streets. Instead of moving to expedite the resolution of the case, the city has asked a federal judge to delay discovery as questions about potential heirs have surfaced. On June 12, lawyers for the city and eight police officers, along with two paramedics employed by Guilford EMS, filed a motion, entitled, “Defendants’ Joint Motion to Temporarily Stay the Start of Discovery.” The motion requests that discovery in the run-up to a trial be put on hold until a separate state court proceeding can resolve the matter of whether Smith has heirs who would be entitled to any proceeds from a settlement. City Attorney Charles Watts rankled Smith’s supporters when he told Mayor Nancy Vaughan during a June 16 meeting of city council: “There is no stay being requested — no stay whatsoever. A stay would stop all litigation processes.” Later, he repeated the statement, saying, “So, we’re not asking for a stay.” The statement did not sit well with Smith’s supporters. Joined by Greensboro Rising, and Byron Gladden, a Guilford County School Board member, the Rev. Nelson Johnson publicly accused Watts of lying during a June 18 press conference outside Melvin Municipal Office Building. Acknowledging in an interview with Triad City Beat that the motion does include the word stay, Watts nonetheless insisted that his categorical statement about “no stay being requested” is an accurate depiction of events. He said his use of the word stay means something different than the delay that is being requested in the motion. And he pointed to additional statements to city council as accurately reflecting the legal action taken by the city. Watt said during his remarks to city council that the two parties in the case have resolved all questions about litigation except for one. “And that is the one question about when discovery would start,” Watts told city council. “One of the things that’s come to light is that parties that are plaintiffs to the matter may not be ap-

Marcus Deon Smith (left) died at the hands of Greensboro police officers in 2018.

propriate plaintiffs to the matter because it’s been a finding that there are children involved. These children need to be protected and represented in this matter. So, there’s a state court proceeding going on to determine the paternity. We asked that discovery not start until we know who the plaintiff is in the case.” Watts insists that he did not lie about the motion, although he conceded that he could have chosen his words better. “I would suggest to you that I used the word stay without all the adjectives that are around the word stay in our motion,” he said. “That’s why the word complete could have made it more clear. Whether there was some effort to deceive… the further description makes it clear that there was no effort to deceive, so it wasn’t a lie.” On the matter of potential heirs, a paternity claim surfaced four months after Smith’s family filed the wrongful death lawsuit against the police officers and paramedics in federal court. In August 2019, a woman named Kendra Scurry faxed a letter to Guilford County Clerk of Superior Court Lisa Johnson-Tonkins declaring that her son was fathered by Smith. “His dad never signed the birth certificate,” Scurry wrote. “He and I neither one knew the importance of doing so.” She added that Smith “always claimed” her son “and spoke of him to anyone who would listen.” Two other potential heirs are mentioned in a Petition for Declaratory Rul-

FILE PHOTO

ing filed in state court by Mary Smith on May 24. The filing says Smith’s family “has been informed that there may be two other children who might claim to be heirs of the decedent,” naming two minor females who live in Greensboro and Raleigh. The petition seeks a declaratory ruling from a state judge as to whether the three named individuals are heirs to Smith’s estate, arguing, “If the question of heirs remains unresolved, unnecessary delays in the administration of Smith’s estate will ensue and prevent proper administration of the estate to those legally entitled to any proceeds from the estate.” Watts said in an interview that the defendants will be at a disadvantage until they know who the actual plaintiffs are. “There’s a complete misrepresentation by Watts primarily that heirship somehow has an impact on the proceedings, whether there should be discovery or there should be discussion about resolution of the case,” Flint Taylor, one of the lawyers representing the Smith family, told Triad City Beat. “Because the proceedings are that if there is money in the case either through settlement, Watts was saying something like, ‘We don’t know who to pay the money out to until the heirs are determined.’ That’s ridiculous. The money would be held in a trust until the heirs are determined.” The motion filed in federal court on behalf of the Smith family argues that there are “many documents to be disgorged from the defendants and other

Perry Pitts cont. from pg. 7

Opinion Culture Shot in the Triad Puzzles

While the threat of COVID-19 is

News

‘The phrase ‘high-crime area’ has the effect of criminalizing race’

lished a legal framework for law enforcement to justify stop-and-frisk practices. “‘High crime area’ becomes a centerpiece of the Terry analysis, serving almost as a talismanic signal justifying investigative stops,” wrote Lewis R. Katz, a law professor at Case Western University. “Location in America, in this context, is a proxy for race or ethnicity. By sanctioning investigative stops on little more than the area in which the stop takes place, the phrase ‘high crime area’ has the effect of criminalizing race.” In her petition for state Supreme Court review of Pitts’ case, Mannette wrote, “Policing of predominantly black communities has come under fire as footage [of] everyday interactions has enabled viewers to see how police treat citizens differently based on where they live or their race.” In the wake of the massive protests in response to the killing of George Floyd, there has been widespread acknowledgement of systemic racism in the court system. “The data overwhelmingly bears out the truth… [that] in our courts, African Americans are more harshly treated, more severely punished, and more likely to be presumed guilty,” Chief Justice Cheri Beasley said in a June 2 press conference. Less than a year after Pitts’ arrest at Piedmont Circle Apartments, Officer Dalton McGuire — the officer who discovered 8 grams of cocaine in Pitts’ underwear while he was being transported by ambulance — conducted a traffic stop two miles away on Bowen Boulevard. Officer McGuire made the stop after running a “DMV query” and finding that the owner of the vehicle had a suspended driver’s license, according to O’Neill. Almost immediately, a passenger in the backseat of the vehicle named Edward McCrae caught McGuire’s attention. McGuire thought McCrae was trying to conceal something and ordered him out of the car and lie on the ground. Police body-camera video records McGuire shouting at McCrae: “Gun. Gun…. Don’t reach for the gun.” Then McGuire fired four shots, killing McCrae, a 60-year-old Black man. A pistol was later recovered from a storm drain near McCrae’s body. A review of the shooting by District Attorney Jim O’Neill found that McGuire “acted appropriately and lawfully.” The city of Winston-Salem later settled with McCrae’s family for $20,000 to resolve a wrongful death claim.

Up Front

attorney general, said in a statement to TCB that his office will respond to Pitts’ motion if a superior court judge asks them to do so. O’Neill’s statement alluded to an initial charge against Pitts of possession with intent to sell or deliver marijuana within 1,000 feet of a park, which was dismissed. (It is unclear what park is referenced in the dismissed charge; there is a large swath of undeveloped land between Piedmont Circle Apartments and Smith Reynolds Airport that owned by the city of Winston-Salem, Forsyth County and Ogburn Investments, but there are no amenities like playground equipment there.) O’Neill’s statement also implies deception on Pitts’ part, saying he “feigned having a seizure” while being placed under arrest, but the trial court found that Pitts “appeared to have a seizure” and the validity of his medical issues is reflected in the fact that he was transported by EMS in an ambulance. “Despite popular opinion, selling drugs, especially near a public park, is not a victimless crime,” O’Neill told TCB. “In fact, it drives so many other crimes and sadness in our community. “Pitts has proven to be an incorrigible recidivist, time and time again,” he continued. “Repeated attempts to change his behavior have all failed. Pitts is behind bars for a reason.” Jodi Harrison, the deputy general counsel for the state Department of Public Safety, told Mannette in a May 28 email that Pitts was transferred to Neuse Correctional Institute, the epicenter of the COVID-19 emergency in the state prison system “because he was promoted from Medium to Minimum I” custody, “and the facility he was previously housed in (Pender CI) is not a Minimum custody facility.” “I understand there has been some resumption of transfers, but this is terrifying — Neuse has had the largest outbreak,” Mannette wrote to Harrison. Harrison told Mannette she understood her concerns, adding, “I would respectfully point out that those concerns are likely to be widely shared by many offenders and, while understandable, the department is not in a position to permit COVID-19 concerns to prevent it from fully utilizing available space at operational facilities.”

the driver behind Pitts’ motion for appropriate relief, the eruption of global protest in the wake of the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis is the backdrop for his petition for the state Supreme Court to review his case. Pitts is asking the Supreme Court to consider whether the Court of Appeals erred when it found that there was reasonable suspicion to detain him. The petition notes that Officer Dalton McGuire and Officer GS Amaya “selfinitiated” a foot patrol at Piedmont Circle Apartments after unsuccessfully attempting to serve a warrant unrelated to Pitts. In denying a motion to suppress, the trial court judge found that the officers had met the burden of reasonable, articulable suspicion for detaining Pitts after observing him touch hands with the passenger in the back of the car. “It’s a salient fact that this is a highcrime area,” the judge said at the conclusion of the hearing. “It’s an open-air drug market. Piedmont Circle is known as that, 1 a.m. in the morning.” Pitts’ petition argues that the behavior cited as suspicious “is entirely consistent with a normal, every-day social interaction. People commonly end social interactions with the same type of physical contact like a handshake or a ‘fist bump.’” The petition goes on to say that Officer Amaya, the trial court and Court of Appeals’ continued characterization of the touching of hands as a “hand-tohand transaction” “demonstrates how the location transforms innocent actions into suspicious ones. As the Court of Appeals noted, a ‘hand-to-hand transaction’ is the term used to describe buying drugs. In 2017, all over the country, people were touching hands. Yet it is Mr. Pitts for whom hand touching leaps to ‘hand-to-hand transaction,’ even by a court who explicitly recognized that the officer witnessed no exchanged of items.” Citing a 2011 case, the petition notes that the Court of Appeals “held that allowing the investigatory stop in question ‘would render any person who is unfortunate enough to live in a high-crime area subject to an investigatory stop merely for the act of running.’ Finding reasonable suspicion here would subject residents of ‘high crime’ neighborhoods to investigatory stop merely for otherwise innocent behavior.” Pitts’ petition also cites a 2004 critique published in the Mississippi Law Journal of the US Supreme Court’s decisive 1969 decision in Terry v. Ohio, which estab-

June 25-July 1, 2020

agencies,” none of which, he said, was “in any way impacted by who Marcus Smith’s heirs turn out to be.” “Mary Smith both as administrator and mother, wants, and is entitled to a swift and fair resolution of her case,” the motion states. “A further delay in the case will unfairly and unnecessarily re-traumatize Mary Smith, who will no doubt legitimately conclude that it is yet another attempt by the city of Greensboro to obstruct her pursuit of justice for her son and his estate. “Similarly, the Greensboro community, which has also been traumatized by the homicide of Marcus Smith, is entitled to a swift and transparent resolution of this case so that it can heal the public harm,” the motion continues. “Hence, a completely unnecessary indefinite stay is highly prejudicial to the plaintiff, her case, and the Greensboro community at large, while serving no other purpose than to unfairly delay plaintiff’s pursuit of justice.” The May 25 death of George Floyd galvanized a global movement, and also reopened the trauma of Marcus Smith’s death in Greensboro for community members who have been pressing for transparency, atonement and redress for almost two years. And before Marcus Smith, there were other collective traumas, like the forcible arrest of Jose Charles, a 15-year-old boy, during the Fun Fourth Festival at Center City Park in 2016 that resulted in his hospitalization. “When we talk about building trust, we’re talking about the council asking its residents to handle these issues, while at the same time employing a city attorney that willfully lies to them and to the people about filing motions to delay trials in the midst of a climate when we are hurting, not only from George Floyd, but we’re still hurting from Jose Charles,” said Irving Allen, an organizer with Greensboro Rising and a former member of the city’s police complaint review committee, during a press conference last week. “We’re still hurting from Marcus Deon Smith. We’re still hurting from so many past cases that have happened in our community. And in order to build trust we need action.”

June 25-July 1, 2020 Up Front News Opinion Culture Shot in the Triad Puzzles

OPINION EDITORIAL

How ‘black’ becomes ‘Black’ The conversation has been coming up in white, American newsrooms for hundreds of years, in one form or another: How do we properly refer to the Black race, in print, for the record. Various solutions have been tried — no need to get down in the weeds with the history, because white newsrooms were not always concerned with the Black reaction to the assigned nomenclature. But decades ago the press settled on “African American,” hyphenated as an adjective, which can be interspersed with lowercase “black,” because in old-guard, newspaperstyle thinking to capitalize “Black” means that one must also capitalize “White,” which feels kind of white-supremacist-y. The solution of not referring to race has never been applied — because in this country, race applies to everything. Every institution, system and life outcome is structured through racism. In a country that was established through stolen African labor and land stolen from Indigenous people, these patterns selfreplicate. And so we stuck with “black,” with the notable exception of most of the Black press, which took and administered its capital B. Until now. The conversation about “Black” has

been resurrected in newsrooms across the country, many of them with more Black reporters and editors around to give voice to a nuanced argument for the capital B: that in the United States, Blackness is a thing — a people, a culture, a history, a state of being — in a way whiteness just is not, and, perhaps, Latinx is. Furthermore, white people can claim their specific ancestry to a country or a nationality in a way that Black folks, whose ancestors did not benefit from country-of-origin paperwork, cannot. That’s why white people love Ancestry. com. Hundreds of newspapers have made the change in the last three weeks, and we were having the discussion in our newsroom when the last domino fell: The AP Stylebook, the bible of newspaper style, declared that “Black” is to be used in “a racial, ethnic or cultural sense, conveying an essential and shared sense of history, identity and community among people who identify as Black, including those in the African diaspora and within Africa. The lowercase black is a color, not a person.” So there you have it, a historic change in newspaper style 150 years after the Emancipation Proclamation, as simple as Black and white.

It’s as simple as Black and white.

by Sayaka Matsuoka

CAROLYN DE BERRY Artist Phillip Marsh paints the mural in downtown Greensboro on Sunday, June 21.

Opinion Culture Shot in the Triad Puzzles

Azul’s board of directors; and public art consultant Cheryl Stewart. Organizer April Parker said she wants to see a larger conversation with Black artists when projects like this come up. “We need to have a larger Black artist roundtable where we can talk amongst ourselves, and all platforms can be respectful and accountable to the larger political discourse happening in the Black community,” she said. “Paint is not power nor policy change, but art and activism are powerful. The ‘One Love’ mural neutralized the national outcry about the needs of Black people.” Ryan Deal, the chief creative economy officer for Creative Greensboro, said there have been three more applications submitted since the project started on June 12. He said the murals don’t have to be pegged to any specific themes or messages but so far all three murals were submitted by Black artists and had ties to the Black Lives Matter movement. “We’re looking at this as an opportunity for creative placemaking holistically,” Deal said in an interview. As for a public input process, Deal said that there’s nothing like that right now and that those who want to spread a different message should apply for their own mural. “It’s not a requirement that the applicant be an artist,” Deal said. “If folks from the community are interested in adding their voice to the mix, I encourage them to partner with an artist.” Marsh, who is working on additional murals, said he understands people’s skepticism right now. “Some people feel that this moment of Black Lives Matter has gotten turned into a virtue signaling movement,” Marsh said. “People who never have been supportive are coming out of the woodwork. I’m trying to create art that can live in any moment…. Public art is meant to create conversations. As an artist that creates public art, I want someone to have an emotion to my art whether they love it hate it. This may be a catalyst for those individuals who feel the message isn’t strong enough to create their own message. I’m totally fine with that. We don’t want to stifle free speech.” And while nothing else is set in stone, Marsh said he’s in conversation with other organizers, including individuals associated with Greensboro Rising for possible future murals. “People know how to reach out to me,” he said. “It’s not about me. It’s about the message of the art.”

News

“To put a ‘One Love’ mural is like saying ‘All Lives Matter,’” he said. He also appreciates the fact that the idea for the mural and the work put into it were by Black artists, but said there’s a wider systemic issue in the city. “We have to make sure that Black people understand the history of racism in this city,” he said. “And understand how leaders have been impeding progress. The same leaders who are now signing on to ‘Black Lives Matter’ murals are the ones who have been restricting the freedom and transformation in the lives of Black folks in this city.” Femi Shittu, a former Greensboro resident who graduated from UNCG, agreed with Brinson. “In Greensboro, everything is so moderate,” she said in an interview. “That’s the type of climate that breeds a ‘One Love’ type of mural.” She pushed back on the notion that just because a mural is created by Black artists that it serves the wider community. “Are Black people a monolith?” she asked. “Is this artist a community organizer? What does it mean when that artist becomes your go-to person? I think it’s definitely the most liberal, most off-brand street mural thus far that I’ve seen across the country. I’m just really disappointed.” Organizer Brandi Collins-Calhoun is also skeptica, saying action like this from the city feels performative. “I think it’s one of those things, the city has been really good at this month,” she said in an interview. “Like picking and choosing which actions and which protests they want to be a part of. They pin it on ‘Look this came from Black artists so it must be going in the right direction.’ So, you put this mural in front of the park, but does that mean that Black children can safely play there now?” Marsh, who painted the mural with about a dozen other Black artists this past weekend, said his vision came straight from his love of Bob Marley and Rastafari teachings. Marsh, who has long dreadlocks like his idol, said that he wanted the mural to speak to the Black Lives Matter movement but that he didn’t want to do another Black Lives Matter mural because he thought that the messaging was being co-opted by corporations and white communities. “To my brothers and sisters out there pushing the lines, this was one in solidarity with those people,” Marsh said. “This was a rebellious act to get this art in this city to this scale. As an artist, I innovate. Why would we as a city want to do something that’s been done in 20 other places? That doesn’t move my needle.” A few weeks ago, Marsh created a collaborative mural with Artist Bloc co-owner Darlene McClinton at Elsewhere. McClinton, who is also Black, said the mural doesn’t have to appeal to everyone. “Art is therapeutic,” she said. “It’s just like beauty. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. It’s the same with art. People see visions and dream dreams and want to do things the way they see it and that’s it.” McClinton also sits on the mural review committee, a new group comprised of five city employees and five community artists, who decide on which murals get approved for the new project. In addition to McClinton, the community artist portion of the committee includes Jocelyn Brown of the African American Atelier; Roy Carter, an associate visual arts professor at NC A&T University; Claudia Femenias, the chair of Casa

Up Front

wo words have stirred up quite a bit of controversy in Greensboro within the last few days. A mural with the words “ONE LOVE,” painted on Davie Street in downtown, has been celebrated and critiqued by individuals within the Black community since June 21. While some find the work to be inspirational and uplifting, others claim that it’s tone deaf and misses the point of the movement for Black lives. The creator of the work, Phillip Marsh, is a Black artist who has been creating art for the last 45 years. “When we move under the flag of ‘One Love,’ it means more than what it has been sanitized to mean,” Marsh said in an interview. “One love means I come to you in love. Love can mean peace and it can mean war. That’s what it really speaks to in this moment. It’s what these kids are trying to say. We support them.” The mural was the first piece approved through the city’s new street mural initiative, to “support artistic and cultural expression through street murals painted on city-maintained street surfaces.” Anyone can submit an application to create a street mural. The application is then considered by a 10-person committee. The murals are facilitated in part by the city but are selffunded by the artists who create them. Painted in a bold, yellow-gold, the mural is one of many works that have gone up around the country in the aftermath of the killing of George Floyd as a response and continuing protests for Black lives. In Winston-Salem, artists painted a mural that reads “END RACISM NOW #BLM” on North Main Street near City Hall on June 13. Despite Marsh’s intention to create a unifying message, some in the community say the message is misguided. “I just thought that the mural seemed to be out of place and disingenuous considering what is happening across our country,” said Rev. CJ Brinson. “To be clear, I don’t support the murals. I don’t support murals without them being attached to demands or policy changes. There’s been no real conversation about how to address these policy suggestions, but folks can paint murals.” Although he doesn’t support murals, if he had to pick, Brinson said he would have wanted to see a “Black Lives Matter” mural go up first.

June 25-July 1, 2020

CULTURE Mural dilemma: New GSO street art sparks controversy

North Davie Street, Greensboro

June 25-July 1, 2020 Shot in the Triad

Culture

Opinion

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Up Front

SHOT IN THE TRIAD

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Scene from the installation of the “One Love” mural.

CAROLYN DE BERRY

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by Matt Jones

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(editor@jonesincrosswords.com)

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Opinion Culture Shot in the Triad Puzzles

1 Account execs 5 Common writing 10 Melting period 14 Tabriz’s country 15 Patty and Selma’s brother-in-law 16 Saintly symbol 17 Credit for a newspaper story on a Magritte work? 19 Musk who named one of his kids X AE A-XII 20 Topics during a job interview 21 Robotic “Doctor Who” nemesis 22 Rush singer Geddy 23 City’s outer fringe 25 CXV x X 28 Nervous ©2020 Jonesin’ Crosswords (editor@jonesincrosswords.com) 31 Confirm, as a password 34 Cumulonimbus, for one 36 Carrie Fisher 6-Down 38 Device with earbuds 39 Rolling Stone co-founder Wenner 40 One of the Rat Pack 41 “QuiÈn ___?” (“Who knows?” en espaÒol) 42 Common interest gps. 43 Mid-month Roman date 44 “Ready to do this!” Answers from last issue 45 Lynx cousin 47 American-born queen of Jordan 21 Like library books, eventually 49 Part of DOS or GPS 24 Inner vision? 50 Positive responses 25 Dead-end service gig, slangily 52 One of 30, for short? 26 Mild cigar 54 ___ cum laude 27 Stretchy thing from the past? 56 Markey, Merkley, or Murkowski, e.g. 29 Pleased 62 Bunches 30 Nearly alphabetically last country 63 Off-road cycling lane? 32 New Orleans sandwich, informally 64 Drummer Krupa 33 Idyllic spots 65 Company that had a breakout with Breakout 35 Like some dryer sheets or detergent 66 Prefix meaning “eight” 37 “___ Excited” (Pointer Sisters song) 67 Like some coffee 40 Webmaster’s concern 68 Insinuate 44 Literary twist of sorts 69 Aussie hoppers 46 Proud ___ peacock 48 The slightest degree Down 51 Luxury hotel accommodations 1 Clothing mishaps 53 Visible gas 2 French composer Satie 54 “We Three Kings” kings 3 Big ___ (David Ortiz’s nickname) 55 “Match Game” host Baldwin 4 Fishhook attachment 57 Card game with no cards below seven 5 Gym class, for short 58 Doris Day lyric repeated after “Que” 6 Thespian’s objective 59 Food truck fare 7 Leave out 60 Actress Miranda 8 “That makes no ___!” 61 Greek letters that look like P’s 9 Before, palindromically 63 Reusable grocery item 10 2011 Oscar winner for Best Picture 11 Oates’s attempt to go solo? 12 Ubiquitous lotion ingredient 13 Policy maven 18 Run, as dyes

EVENTS

June 25-July 1, 2020

CROSSWORD ‘Times Squared’—a sign of the times. SUDOKU