BY BETSY FARLEY
PHILADELPHIA - There have been protests here every week since the October 1 killing of 19-year-old Donta Dawson by Philadelphia police officer Christopher DiPasquale.

Dawson was parked legally on a North Philadelphia street when he was accosted by DiPasquale, who claimed Dawson did not immediately respond to orders to raise his hands. After at least eight other cops had arrived on the scene, the police got out of their cars, guns drawn.

DiPasquale claims that Dawson suddenly raised his left hand, prompting the cop to shoot him in the back of the head. Dawson died the next morning at Temple University Hospital.

Cynthia Dawson, Donta's mother, joined relatives of other Black and Puerto Rican youth who have been killed by Philadelphia cops in recent years at a press conference October 5 to demand a federal investigation into "Philadelphia police serial killings in the African community."

Kenneth Griffin was shot to death a year ago after being awakened from his bed by a police invasion of his home. On Oct. 20, 1998, a grand jury cleared the police of wrongdoing in the Griffin case. Moisés DeJesús died in 1994 following a beating by Philadelphia police. DiPasquale, the same cop who shot Dawson, was given a brief suspension along with eight others in that case.

Several street protests in the North Philadelphia Black community and at District Attorney Lynn Abraham's office have demanded indictment of the cops who killed Dawson. An October 13 town meeting initiated by city councilwomen Donna Reed Miller on the subject of police misconduct drew a crowd of more than 200 people to the Zion Baptist Church to hear speeches by civil rights leaders and local politicians.

Nancy Cole, Socialist Workers Party candidate in the 1st Congressional District, released a statement that has been distributed at the protests and in working-class communities of Philadelphia, calling for the immediate prosecution and jailing of all the police involved in the murder of Dawson. "The hysterical pitch of news stories about `youth crime' portray young Black men as a pariah class not worthy of equal rights under the law. Donta Dawson didn't follow the rules - the rules say that in Philadelphia today a young Black man is guilty until proven innocent, has no right to remain silent, and should do as he's told," Cole said.

"Recently enacted national and local laws voiding protection against unlawful search and seizure, restricting the right to remain silent, curbing the right to bear arms, setting curfews for youth, and limiting legal appeals for death row inmates have been supported by Democratic and Republican party politicians," she continued.

Cole pointed to recent union battles like the 40-day transit workers strike here. "Black workers have been in the leadership of many of these fights. It is to this rise in resistance that opponents of police murders and brutality can look for powerful allies.

"Attacks on democratic rights are ultimately aimed against the unions and other organizations of the working class that organize to resist the efforts of the rulers to solve the problems of their economic system on the backs of working people," she continued. "The fight against police brutality and all battles against racism are union issues."  
 
 
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