Local civil rights leaders are calling for a revived campaign of police reform in the South Bay. The appeal to local leaders comes in response to a pending settlement stemming from a 2022 police shooting in San Jose that left a Black college student with multiple injuries.
The proposed $8 million settlement with San Jose would resolve an excessive force lawsuit from K’aun Green, a former Bay Area high school football champion shot by now-former San Jose police officer Mark McNamara. The March 27, 2022 shooting took place moments after Green intervened in a fight inside a downtown restaurant. The City Council on Jan. 13 will consider the proposed settlement.
Sean Allen, president of NAACP San Jose/Silicon Valley, has been making the case to South Bay leaders that the settlement — which follows a racist texting scandal connected to McNamara — only underscores the need for reform.
“This incident highlights how some law enforcement officials view Black men and other men of color, even when they are intervening to prevent violence against others,” Allen wrote in a Dec. 24 open letter to elected officials. “While the upcoming settlement acknowledges the harm K’aun has suffered, it cannot be viewed as a victory for the community.”
Allen points blame at law enforcement leaders. He said they have failed to weed out racist attitudes from their departments that lead some officers to more readily view Black people as suspects rather than victims.
“We’re continuing to see this practice and this lack of accountability,” Allen told San José Spotlight. “Police leaders and government leaders are being reappointed to other positions — are promoted throughout these organizations — when these problems should have been caught before they became a problem for the community.”
Representatives for the San Jose Police Department and San Jose Police Officers’ Association did not respond to requests for comment.
McNamara shot Green four times at the La Victoria Taqueria near San Jose State University in the March 2022 incident. Green was backing out of the restaurant holding the gun of another man he disarmed during a fight in the business. The shooting left Green with serious injuries to his abdomen, as well as his left leg and arm.
Police officials have reportedly said responding officers mistakenly believed Green may have been the same shooter responsible for a nearby homicide that had occurred less than an hour prior.
News of Green’s shooting sparked widespread public outcry at the time. A year later, an investigation into McNamara brought to light a number of racist texts he had sent. The investigation led to his resignation from SJPD.
In one thread sent the day following the shooting, McNamara used racist slurs referring to Green, writing “that “N**** wanted to carry a gun in the Wild West,” and then added, “Not on my watch haha.”
McNamara’s attorney declined to comment. Green’s attorney did not respond to a request for comment.
SJPD officials confirmed at the time of McNamara’s resignation that the text message threads involved two others connected to the department — one current officer and one former officer. The department placed the current officer on administrative leave pending an investigation over his “concerning dialogue,” officials said in 2023.
“What was exposed with McNamara is there is a deep-seated problem of culture within the police department,” Raj Jayadev, founder of civil rights watchdog group Silicon Valley De-Bug, told San José Spotlight.
In a memo addressed to councilmembers, San Jose City Attorney Susana Alcala Wood recommended they accept the proposed settlement agreement.
“The settlement reflects the risks of litigation when the officer involved was later found to have made reprehensible statements evidencing racial animus,” she told San José Spotlight. “Those statements would be difficult for jurors to ignore in evaluating how a reasonable officer would have reacted when Mr. Green emerged with a gun in his hand.”
For Jayadev, approval of such a settlement would lend credence to the concerns he and other SJPD critics have raised about the department’s practices for years.
“It gives the larger community something clear to stand on when they’re calling for changes — reduction of the police force, reduction in the violence of the police force,” Jayadev said. “The city can no longer gaslight community members who are making this call because they paid up $8 million of public dollars to get out of having this conversation.”
The latest calls for change come more than four years after San Jose launched a major police reform effort in response to the protests that followed the 2020 murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police. The campaign led to the establishment of an office of racial equity, as well advisory committees tasked with drafting proposals for further police reform.
But Allen said those efforts have failed to yield significant progress.
“We’re getting a lot of lip service, a lot of promises, a lot of commitments from our elected and our police leaders, but the results we’re seeing are the same practices that we’re standing against,” Allen told San José Spotlight. “The systemic racism problem in this county is not getting smaller, it’s growing. It’s getting larger.”
Contact Keith Menconi at [email protected] or @KeithMenconi on X.