ANGER AT POLICE SHOOTINGS STAYS HOT IN SALISBURY

Drug war unfairly targets black youth, city's residents say

SALISBURY -- Two weeks after police fired 14 shots into a car at a crowded
McDonald's parking lot, anger remains palpable in black neighborhoods
throughout this growing Eastern Shore city of 20,000.

African-American residents say the wounding of two unarmed men who police
believed were carrying a large quantity of crack cocaine is just the latest
and worst example of an escalating drug war that has unfairly targeted them.
Police say one suspect tried to run them down in his car; residents insist
that the gunfire was unnecessary.

Led by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, local
activists have taken to the streets, carrying banners, marching to City Hall
and rallying outside the department's fortress-like headquarters just a
block from the site where the two men, who had neither drugs nor weapons,
were shot on June 4.

Residents say city officers routinely target teen-agers and young men,
especially those with previous drug convictions, harassing and roughing up
suspects. More disturbing, according to community leaders, is that some of
the officers are as discourteous to law-abiding citizens as they are to
criminals.

Critics say police appear only in predominantly black neighborhoods to
arrest low-level street dealers and drug users. They also fault the
department because only eight of 82 officers are African-Americans in a city
where 20 percent of the population is black.

"It's becoming a monster in our community," says the Rev. Moor-Hollman,
pastor at the Labor of Love Revival Mission.

"It just seems that the officers have the idea that they can pull these
young people in on something, anything," she says. "We know there are good
people in the system, but they are being overwhelmed by overzealous
officers. It'sa sad thing when young people can't trust the police."

City officials counter that they are responding to community concerns,
encouraging residents to file formal complaints, organizing weekly meetings
with African-American leaders and participating in community forums. But
they are not willing to abandon a tough anti-drug effort that the acting
chief, Col. Ed Guthrie, says has produced a 92 percent increase in drug
arrests and a 200 percent increase in arrests for under-age drinking from
1997 to 1998.

"The Salisbury Police Department has a zero-tolerance approach to the
dealing of cocaine or other drugs, and that is not going to change," Guthrie
says. "Any complaints that are substantiated will be dealt with severely. We
do not tolerate unprofessional behavior, but we strongly feel the methods we
use are within moral, legal and constitutional guidelines."

But many residents say they have little faith in the ability of even
well-meaning city officials to rein in individual officers who violate
policy.

After months of frustration following the arrest last fall of her
17-year-old son on a drug charge -- drugs he says belonged to a passenger in
his car -- Sheila Harmon got together with several other women to form
Mothers For Equal Justice.

The group meets once a week in a northwest Salisbury church to talk about
their problems. With help from local NAACP officials, members are learning
how to file formal complaints when they think city police have used
excessive force or acted improperly.

"It always seems to be the same cops, and you don't have to be in a bad part
of town," Harmon says. "The police show absolutely no respect for parents. I
couldn't believe how I was spoken to after my son's arrest. We're
God-fearing, hard-working people, and we don't deserve to be treated this
way."

Group members and community leaders are pushing city officials to establish
a civilian review board that would evaluate all complaints filed against
police, an effort that was already in the works before the shooting June 4
touched off protests.

"We are working toward a civilian review board," says Mayor Barrie Parsons
Tilghman, who has worked closely with the City Council's only black member,
Lavonzella Siggers.

"I'm meeting regularly with the NAACP and others, and I've asked them to
document these accusations, to give me dates, times and places. But at the
same time, I'm not going to crucify the Salisbury Police Department. We're
not going to be satisfied until everyone feels the Police Department is
their Police Department," says Tilghman.

Tilghman, who fired the previous police chief a year ago, has been unable to
agree with the City Council on a replacement. Among two finalists for the
post is Allan Webster, a major in the Baltimore County department's criminal
investigation division.

The city is stepping up its effort to recruit more minorities, but retaining
experienced officers has proved difficult, says Guthrie, who has recently
lost three black officers to higher salaries and better benefits offered by
neighboring departments.

The recent shooting, Guthrie points out, was the first time in nine years
that city police have fired their weapons except in training. The
department, he says, has three black officers in supervisory positions and
last year lost an African-American division commander to retirement.

The city department was the first to volunteer to participate in
community-police forums sponsored by the American Civil Liberties Union.
Funded with a $50,000 grant, the two-year series is aimed at easing tensions
in small and rural towns on the Eastern Shore.

Nichole Gray, who coordinates the program, says the ACLU's Centreville
office has logged about 20 complaints from Salisbury residents in the months
since the first community meetings last fall.

"It still seems there's a serious problem between the black community and
the police department," Gray says. "We have seen an increase in complaints
about excessive force or about particular officers. But on the entire
Eastern Shore, the biggest complaint is lack of respect and rudeness."

The shooting of 27-year-old Arthur A. Miles and his 26-year-old passenger
has caught the attention of civil rights activists from all over the Shore.
Both men have recovered from their wounds, but Miles remains under a
$100,000 cash bond in the Wicomico County jail.

Two officers who fired the shots, Troy Raines and Cris Taylor, have been
placed on administrative leave. An internal probe should be completed in a
week, and the case could be presented to a grand jury next month.

Meanwhile, community leaders are vowing to continue their 1960s-style
protests.

"There's clearly some history here in the way people have reacted," says the
Rev. Joseph Henry, a minister at Wesley Temple United Methodist Church.