This Verdict Was Heard Around the World
By Troy Curtis

It has been over a year since that first vigil was held in the ally were Rudy was slain and all those questions still hang in the air like the ghosts of an unsettled spirit. I've spent this last year traveling all over America meeting people from all over the world. Where ever I've gone I've taken Rudy's story with me and now after the “not guilty” verdict has been delivered there has been a collective grone of dissatisfaction not just from folks in San Jose but internationally.

As a musician and a journalist I travel a lot. In the year after Rudy's death I've traveled thousands of miles around this country and had many conversations about police brutality and the history of injustice in America. I made many international friends while working as a camp counselor for children who've lost a loved one in the attacks of September 11th. There in the woods of western Massachusetts I told Rudy's story to my new friends. From Italy and Africa, Turkey and Australia, people from all over the world heard and connected to the Cardenas's families fight for justice. As I traveled all over the east coast, the mid west and back and forth, I'd talk to friends and family about San Jose's police brutality problem and how the community is mobilizing against it. As a media culture we get desensitized to what is going on around us. But I've found when people have the opportunity to understand a real person in a real situation they have the opportunity and ability to care. Whenever I'd get news from San Jose and I'd relay it to friends and family all over the globe, they would e-mail me back with words of encouragement and support.

It saddens me to come back home to San Jose and still find myself and my community at vigils with confused looks on our faces. But I know that as we the people here in San Jose seek justice there are people all over who feel and understand our cries of “No Justice, No Peace.”

Related stories:

Walker is Every Cop in San Jose
By Elizabeth Gonzalez

Will There Ever be Justice?
By David Madrid

GHAZAL* FOR SAN JOSE
by Christopher Patrick Nelson

Lesson Learned From The Walker Verdict
By Raj Jayadev

Post a Comment:
(De-Bug will publish e-mails on this page as soon as possible.)