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Regarding Atlanta … and DA Paul Howard
Until the mid-’80s, my only views of Atlanta were through aircraft windows either arriving at or taking off from Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport (sitting numbly at airport food courts, waiting for connecting flights, doesn’t count). However, in early 1986, a headhunter called me up with a decent job opening so I decided to make the move to “The Big Peach.”
Atlanta was known as a boomtown long before the ’80s, with several companies making their headquarters there. Although there wasn’t much in the way of heavy industry (excluding two auto assembly plants) it was a prime area for the service industry including several software companies (one of which became my employer).
In some respects, Atlanta was already in the midst of an identity crisis. Far too many Yankees (such as yours truly) had migrated there for the city to make any real claim to “southern charm.” Still, there was a feeling that Atlanta was slightly more “well mannered” than most Northern cities. Perhaps that is why, during the tumult of the ’60s, Atlanta was billing itself as, “The City Too Busy to Hate.”
However, after arriving in Atlanta, it didn’t take me very long to see past the facade that the local chamber of commerce had constructed. For example, the city had long seen itself as a hotbed for sports. Pro football, basketball, major league baseball; Atlanta had them all. However, while cities like New York, Chicago, and Boston could legitimately term themselves as “sports towns,” I saw Atlanta mainly as a “frontrunners town”; in other words, if a team was winning, the venue would be filled. If they were losing, forget it.
When I moved to Atlanta, it wasn’t uncommon for me to go to the old Fulton County Stadium several times a year to see the Braves (in 1986 they were 72-89 and in 1987 they were 69-92, so it wasn’t terribly difficult to get tickets). On many evenings, attendance was less than 10,000. The football and basketball teams were a bit better but they were far from being championship-caliber. It seemed that the “game of the year” was always the Georgia-Georgia Tech football game.
What really struck me was how ignorant many of the fans appeared to be and I found that out during the latter part of the 1986 Braves season. You baseball fans probably remember that the latter 8’0s was the era of the “power pitcher”; strong arms who would ring up strikeouts in amazing quantities. (Roger Clemens, Nolan Ryan, and Doc Gooden come to mind.) In many ballparks, fans would set up “K Corners” in the outfield bleachers to mark the pitchers’ strikeout count.
Alas, the Braves had no such pitchers. So, when a previously-unknown Atlanta pitcher by the name of Zane Smith had back-to-back 10-strikeout games, the local faithful believed they were on to something. On Smith’s first home start after a 10-strikeout game, some high school kids gathered down in the left-field bleachers with their “K” cards ready to have their moment in the sun, possibly on TBS. However, after Smith’s third strikeout of the game, stupid sports history was made. When the third “K” went up, every usher in Fulton County Stadium descended on them, convinced that a burning cross was not far behind. Luckily, the Braves GM observed the commotion and dispatched an assistant to convince the ushers that, in this case, “KKK” represented three strikeouts and not the Klan. But, the damage was done. Not only the Braves ushers but also the fans became known as yokels. Ultimately, the Braves did make a dramatic improvement; even to the point of winning a world’s championship and several division titles. For me, however, it was just the first of many incidents which would show that, in Atlanta, race and ignorance would usually triumph over everything else.
Even in the ’80s, it always appeared to me that there was an uneasy existence between whites and blacks in the city even though there were few overt incidents. Since 1974, every mayor of Atlanta has been black. (In 2010 a local radio personality, a white by the name of Clark Howard, indicated that he might consider a run for the office. This caused a panic in the black community with the rallying cry of “a white can’t be allowed to become mayor.”) So, with a virtually all-black city council, it appeared that the lid would be kept on for at least a few more years. Unhappily, this would not prove to be the case.
In 1992, the so-called “Rodney King Riots” decimated much of downtown Atlanta, including the venue of Underground Atlanta which the city (and private industry) had poured millions of dollars into. Although more than 300 rioters were arrested, to my knowledge, none were convicted. Nearly 50 people were injured; some seriously.
With this as a backdrop, four years later, Paul Howard was elected as Fulton County District Attorney. Since I lived in a suburb northwest of Atlanta, I was relatively unaffected. I knew little about him but four years later, after Super Bowl XXXIV, all of us became acquainted with his work.
At about 4 a.m., about six hours after the conclusion of the game, Baltimore Ravens linebacker Ray Lewis and his posse were tooling around in their limousine when, somehow, they became involved in an argument with another group. Of course, opinions vary as to exactly what happened but at the conclusion of the argument, two men were dead from knife wounds.
To make a long story short, Lewis never faced murder charges and the two members of his posse that were charged in the murders were acquitted. The performance of Howard and his team was so awful that a CNN legal analyst (back when CNN could be believed) compared their performance to the bumbling Inspector Clouseau of the Pink Panther movies, “If they ever wrote a book listing the most inept prosecutions ever, this one will be highlighted as the standard by which all others are to be measured.” Just how inept were they? The trial judge had to admonish one of Howard’s ADAs for not knowing how to conduct a redirect cross-examination!
Evidently, this fiasco did little to diminish Howard’s opinion of himself. During my time in Atlanta, I carpooled with an employee of Georgia’s Department of Pardons and Paroles. One day he had to deliver some legal documents to Howard’s office and saw that, outside of both entrances to the DA’s office were huge portraits of none other than Mr. Howard. (Both done at taxpayer expense, I imagine.)
I left Atlanta nearly ten years ago when I retired and paid little attention to what was going on down there. However, about a month ago, I saw that the Georgia Bureau of Investigation was taking a hard look at Howard because he had evidently appropriated a quarter-million dollars that had been earmarked for crime prevention programs. Howard blithely stated that the money was a “supplement to my salary.” On top of that, he is fighting two sexual harassment complaints that have been filed against him. Still, Howard is running for re-election and, even though he has been forced into a runoff, no one is discounting his chances for another term (his seventh).
Because of this, it came as no surprise to me that Howard had charged Atlanta police officer Garrett Brooks with 11 felonies, including capital murder, in the Rayshard Brooks death. There is no doubt in my mind that Howard sees the prosecution of Brooks as his ticket back into the office that he has become accustomed to. Justice? That’s not the business that Paul Howard is in.
Unfortunately, it will be the citizens of Atlanta, both black and white, who will pay the price for Howard’s incompetence and corruption.
Published in General
Interesting history of the local scene. I was there in September of 2019 for work and had a very similar vibe, that beneath very shallow surface, things could boil over on a moment’s notice.
Will be very interesting to see what happens at this trial. The Powers that Be at work have recently made a huge, investment in downtown real estate. Couple that with our Willis Tower office’s and I expect a huge push to WAH (work at home) and local office’s will be more conference centers to accommodate events when large group must come together.
Hope I don’t have to go back. Interesting (aka Horrible) Times.
Great line. And apparently true.
I had to back track to sort out the Howards. My wife has friends who recently sold their big home outside Atlanta and moved to a condo downtown. I think that was a bad idea. A friend of my son just moved to an Atlanta suburb. He is an ex-cop who, after being shot twice, retired and went to work as a sales manager for a food product. He is now national sales manager and travels a lot but makes 5 times his cop salary. I think he will stay far away from downtown. He sold his California OC home and bought the place in Georgia for cash.
In terms of the current situation, it’s going to be interesting to see how the DA goes about refuting testimony from himself, since there was a video that made the rounds last night of Howard calling tasers deadly weapons just two weeks ago, when the first round of rioting hit Atlanta…
Conservative Tree House has an interesting theory about what Howard the DA is doing. He knows he will lose the election and is setting a trap for the successor DA. I don’t why he would do this; perhaps spite, but why ?
https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2020/06/17/its-a-political-trap-outgoing-atlanta-da-sets-up-successor-for-problems-charges-police-officer-with-11-counts-including-felony-murder-in-shooting-death-of-rayshard-brooks/
In what appears to be a decision heavily influenced by local politics, DA Howard is charging officer Garrett Wolfe with felony murder; an unlawful killing with malice, forethought and specific intent. It looks like Howard is purposefully making a mess.
The highly coordinated press conference narrative, as outlined by what seems like a not very astute district attorney, is very much at odds with what most people have already seen in the videos of the encounter. The purposeful disconnect gives the impression that DA Brooks is intentionally trying to throw the court case in advance.
There’s something very sketchy going on in the political background…. and I cannot help but wonder if Paul Howard Jr. is planning to be defeated in the next election (he seems in trouble) and is, as an intentional and self-centered plan, trying to set-up his political successor with a lose/lose scenario.
I don’t know why he would do this but his behavior is otherwise inexplicable.
A couple of observations – one on sports fans…most of the people in Atlanta aren’t from here and the people that go to the games (football, baseball, etc) are from somewhere else and are at heart still fans of their hometown team (note that baseball games against the Chicago teams, NYC teams and Boston are often sold out with HUGE swathes of the fans wearing the other guys colors. As for the other, a LARGE portion of the APD in at least 2 districts did a “no show” last night in their own little protest(it was severe enough that only the State Patrol was responding to traffic accidents and then only if there were injuries, according to the news). Atlanta city government has been very corrupt for a several decades and the current one may have to pay the piper this time…and for what it is worth I was born in Atlanta and so were both of my parents and I lived here with exception of college and my time in the service and actually rode on (in) the pink pig in Rich’s downtown… :)
After the murders of 9 black parishoners by Dylann Roof in 2015, there was a peaceful solidarity march across the Ravenel Bridge. A news crew asked one black protester why there weren’t riots, and he replied, “This is how we riot in Charleston.”
Those were the days. An internet search yields nothing about this interview, but there were real riots in Charleston following the death of George Floyd, someone who was not innocent because he was resisting arrest.
Five years of liberal indoctrination wipes out decades of good will in a great city . . .
It was good that Howard gave his spiel close to a picture of his favorite person; himself. The portraits that I alluded to are about 4 feet by 4 feet. Does Howard have a high opinion of himself? Naaaawwww!
I suppose it could be true but my own gut feeling is that Howard doesn’t have the smarts to pull off a plan like that.
I have to admit that when my Reds came to town, I generally (and silently) rooted for them. When Bobby Cox took over the Braves and they acquired Terry Pendleton (along with all that great pitching) they really took off. That’s when I noticed all the big crowds who appeared to be more interested in “being seen” than watching a ball game.
Of course, the Hawks did have some decent years especially when Dominique Wilkins (AKA, “The Human Highlight Film”) played.
When I spoke with native Atlantans (of both races) it seemed that both were nostalgic for “the old days”. Interesting…
My guess would be this is part of an all-out pandering effort to Atlanta voters to show he’s tough on cops, since he thinks that’s what the public wants right now. Even if his own claims two weeks ago on how dangerous tasers are ends up helping get an acquittal, the most important thing isn’t over-charging, it’s getting past the primary election.
I think Howard & Ellison are overcharging the police officers involved and will likely lose their cases in both Atlanta & Minneapolis. I cannot but fear that afterwards there will be riots (mind you I do not think that both officers should not face legal sanction-only that murder 2 is over charging). The only question is are they incompetent or are they trying to lose the cases to inflame the situation? I hope that the dictum “never infer evil intent when stupidity will suffice” is in operation here-but don’t hold me to it.
Given past ineptitude shown in the OP, gross incompetence underlying venal self interest seems a perfectly reasonable explanation.
I am a native of Marietta and we are not Atlanta.
Happily
My daughter, who was living in Charleston then, walked in that procession across the bridge. She is, unusual for her generation, quite conservative.
I think Chauvin might be a weirdo but, in a fair trial if possible, he will be acquitted.
I was thinking about it this morning that the Atlanta mayor had one of the better responses of a big city mayor to the riots, after a bad first night. Then she’s given a horrible overcharge by the DA and cops walking off the job. Too bad she can’t control that.
A town that has the “Big Chicken” has everything!!! (That’s an insider joke)
Nice to know that there is a fellow Marietta resident on this site!
Well, I lived there for over 25 years. I’m back up in Yankee land now.
I don’t understand why any non-black people live in Atlanta or Baltimore [city not county people, city!] etc. It’s not worth the hassle anymore than attending Howard University seems to me. This is a big awesome country with lots of options and cities. And if Coke doesn’t have a black Santa this year Coke is canceled!
Cancel the polar bears! After all, they’re white . . .
I (age 23, not sure what to do after college, Midwesterner through and through) was a live-in nanny for a (white) family in Marietta in 1997. One time I was getting the kids ready for an outing to World of Coca-Cola. I said, “Come on, let’s go, we’re heading downtown for the day.” The older of the two, a girl aged five and a half, said thoughtfully, “Downtown? Isn’t that where all the people with black hair and brown skin live?” I’ve never been sure what conclusion to draw from this, but it certainly made an impression on me (as I’m telling you all about it, 23 years later).
This shows an internal recognition of “the other”. It is something that is natural to being human. It may be wrong, it may be scientifically understandable and defensible, but at bottom it is normal.
My sister, because of our nursemaid who she cared from the rest of the nursemaid’s life (she died in a Catholic nursing home at age 95) was always very protective of “brown people” until she married a policeman in Chicago. She and I got into an argument over Martin Luther King’s intervention in the Vietnam War, and she did not speak to me for several years. I thought he had too many communists around him at the time and still think so. She has the typical sentiments of a policeman’s wife 40 years later.
Rolfe.
You are correct. Thanks.