Wayne Reid: The solution is unity

By: Antho­ny Zepperi 
August 21, 2020
The Bloom­field Messenger 

The Bloom­field Pub­lic Library Wednes­day led a vir­tu­al pre­sen­ta­tion via zoom about a book enti­tled “Death by Cop: A Call for Uni­ty!” writ­ten by author Wayne Reid and co-writ­ten by Con­necti­cut Judge Charles Gill.

The sto­ry behind the book and how it brought the two authors togeth­er has an impor­tant mes­sage for the coun­try, as it faces the ques­tions raised by the killing of George Floyd by a Min­neapo­lis police officer.

Many years before Floyd, Con­necti­cut had its own reck­on­ing with what many per­ceive as use of exces­sive forced by police.

On Dec. 29, 1998, along Route 202 in New Mil­ford, two 27-year-old men found them­selves in a con­fronta­tion that would ulti­mate­ly take both of their lives. Franklyn Reid, a Jamaican immi­grant whose fam­i­ly had set­tled in New Mil­ford when he was a boy, was the first to die.

Reid, the broth­er of author Wayne Reid, had a crim­i­nal record and police held war­rants for his arrest. Offi­cer Scott Smith was one of sev­er­al New Mil­ford police offi­cers try­ing to arrest Reid that cold Decem­ber day.

There was a brief foot chase and then the two men strug­gled for 41 sec­onds along­side the busy road. Franklyn’s life end­ed when Smith fired a fatal shot from his into Reid’s back.

Three weeks lat­er, Smith became the first Con­necti­cut police offi­cer to be charged with mur­der for a line-of-duty shooting.

The pros­e­cu­tor charged with inves­ti­gat­ing the case, Water­bury State’s Attor­ney John Con­nel­ly, found that Smith’s claim that he feared for his life when he shot Reid was not justified.

The Tri­al for Offi­cer Smith last­ed five years from 1999–2004 and was presided over by Judge Gill, the oth­er author.

At a tri­al in 2000, a Litch­field Coun­ty jury acquit­ted Smith of mur­der, but did find him guilty of manslaugh­ter. Judge Gill sen­tenced Smith to six years in prison, one more than the min­i­mum manda­to­ry five years.

But in many ways the event was a death sen­tence for Smith in 2013 as the for­mer police offi­cer took his own life.

The same year, Judge Gill and Wayne Reid came togeth­er and decid­ed to write a book about the case.

Today, when the coun­try is being roiled by the death of George Floyd, a 46- year-old black Amer­i­can man, who was killed in Min­neapo­lis, Min­neso­ta, dur­ing an arrest for alleged­ly using a coun­ter­feit bill, that book brings a mes­sage con­trary to any expec­ta­tion: one of unity.

Dur­ing the Zoom meet­ing Wednes­day Wayne Reid said that the death of Floyd as well as his broth­er had a pro­found, emo­tion­al impact on com­mu­ni­ty members.

“We start­ed with COVID which was going to be the most impor­tant thing of the year and then George Floyd hap­pened,” Reid said. “His death essen­tial­ly ripped the bandaid on society.”

Reid said the sto­ry he and Judge Gill wrote has an impor­tant mes­sage for the reader.

“My sto­ry is about courage, love, com­pas­sion, civil­i­ty, for- give­ness, edu­ca­tion and the under­stand­ing of the emo­tion- al jour­ney expe­ri­enced from both sides,” Reid related.

Many Bloom­field polit­i­cal and com­mu­ni­ty lead­ers took part in the dis­cus­sion, among them Bloom­field Police Chief Paul Hammick.

Ham­mick stressed that in order to make amends with the com­mu­ni­ty, the police must cre­ate mutu­al friend­ships with­in the town.

“We have to cre­ate part­ner- ships with com­mu­ni­ty mem­bers to try and help them solve prob­lems in their neigh­bor­hoods, increase their qual­i­ty of life and iden­ti­fy the things that are neg­a­tive­ly impact­ing the com­mu­ni­ty,” Ham­mick said.

Accord­ing to Ham­mick, most peo­ple the police deals with are not hard core crim­i­nals but peo­ple who need some emo­tion­al help to keep them on the right track to avoid repet­i­tive offens­es and to help them back on their feet.

Ham­mick said that police need to keep in mind these things con­cer­rn­ing the so-called crim­i­nals they are deal­ing with.

“While they [offend­ers] should be held account­able, we also need to have some bet­ter mech­a­nisms for res­ur­rect­ing their lives,” Ham­mick said.

May­or DeBeat­ham-Brown said that in order to make a mutu­al bond with the police force, the com­mu­ni­ties such as Bloom­field must come together.

“It’s impor­tant to have these coura­geous and dif­fi­cult con­ver­sa­tions on the mat­ter at hand,” DeBeat­ham-Brown said. “We as a com­mu­ni­ty need to make sure that it’s not just a hash­tag or just anoth­er ordi­nary inci­dent but as a move­ment to keep the con­ver­sa­tion going.”

Or, as Wayne Reid, and Judge Gill would say: Unity!