The Golden Door

Robert T. Floyd Jr.

Description

Writing about one’s own life is not a simple task. It consumes years and years of research in addition to the recalling of experiences, many of which are unsettling. I began with an incident regarding a position applied for along with a co-worker who was like myself, a former Philadelphia police officer. How, I asked, can deference fail to exist in the arena of public service?
Over the years, I have come to see that not only I have experienced these mishaps, but there are untold others, too numerous to mention. I just happen to be of African-American ancestry. This book is for them. It’s for the soldiers and airmen I served with in Vietnam, indeed it is for generations of Americans yet unborn.
There is always a struggle between good and evil. Plato describes it as a two-headed horse, each wanting to go in opposite directions. In law-enforcement this arises when innocence crosses the path of corruption. In the final analysis this is to let us not forget those who tried to serve.

Sujets

• Biography
• Public Service
• Memoir
• Military
• Law enforcement
• African American
• Autobiography

Informations

• Publié par: Xlibris US
• Date de parution: 20 août 2020
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781664124363
• Langue: English

Extrait

The Golden Door
An African-American & The Criminal Justice System
 
 
 
 
Robert T. Floyd Jr.
 
Copyright © 2020 by Robert T. Floyd Jr.
 
ISBN:
Softcover
978-1-6641-2435-6

eBook
978-1-6641-2436-3
 
 
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.
 
Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Getty Images are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.
Certain stock imagery © Getty Images.
 
 
 
 
Rev. date: 08/20/2020
 
 
 
Xlibris
844-714-8691
www.Xlibris.com
817507
For
Those Who Tried To Serve
 
 
 
“How much would it be worth to a young man entering upon the practice of law, to be regarded as a white man rather than a colored one? Probably most white persons if given a choice, would prefer death to life in the United States as colored persons. Under these conditions, is it possible to conclude that the reputation of being white is not property?
Indeed, is it not the most valuable sort of property, being the master-key that unlocks The Golden Door of opportunity?”
The legal brief of Homer A. Plessy, who was 7/8 Caucasian and 1/8 African blood in the Landmark U.S. Supreme Court case: Plessy vs. Ferguson (1896).
Chief Inspector’s Squad
PREFACE
This writing illustrates how my police career in Philadelphia, and its connection to former Commissioner Frank L. Rizzo’s liaison with federal intelligence, had a profound affect on my life following police service. I was reassigned from the 19 th District, at 61 st and Thompson streets to the Chief Inspector’s Squad (CIS) at Frankford and Castor avenues in 1970. CIS was a plainclothes intelligence unit, concerned mainly with vice operations and information gathering on many levels in the city of Philadelphia.
I had become familiar to police commissioner Frank L. Rizzo through an attorney whom I had contact, and who had a close relationship with the commissioner. This attorney intervened to have me transferred from an undesirable assignment at the 1 st District in south division to the 19 th District in west division. The 19 th , a huge section of west Philadelphia is the area of the city where I had grown-up.
The utilization of surveillance, whether physical or electronic became a powerful tool in apprehending vice characters. The squad worked closely with the FBI. However, surveillance and apprehension brings with it information pertaining to internal matters, i. e. inside the department itself. One thing I came to see, was that vice characters who pay for protection from arrest, usually identify a “bagman“, especially when that official holds high rank. It follows then, that vice characters whom I dared not arrest as a result of offering this kind of information would pass it back through the bagman in an effort to avoid reoccurrence. The Greek philosopher Socrates held that the only thing in life worth caring for was not wealth or social distinction, but the soul and its perfection. Jesus said: “For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world, and forfeit his soul?” Mark 8:36.
In CIS there were approximately twenty-five (25) officers, a lieutenant and a corporal. Four (4) officers were African-American. Following my first year, my supervisor gave me the highest performance evaluation I ever received as an officer. Ultimately, the squad was being used to reinforce corruption. Once my supervisor became aware of this scheme, our days were numbered. My supervisor, Lt. Chris DeCree resigned, along with the corporal, taking positions with the Pennsylvania Crime Commission. The squad was disbanded by the commissioner. Most of the white officers were promoted, or reassigned to other special units. Many went to the prestigious Organized Crime unit. The blacks were reassigned to uniformed patrol. My assignment was the 22 nd District, a densely populated ghetto and high crime area of north Philadelphia, where a riot had occurred in the 1960’s. For a uniformed patrol officer, the 22 nd was the department’s front-line. One of the other blacks from the squad was forced to resign, taking a job as bus driver with the public transit system. Still another was overheard by wiretap talking to a vice character. Another former black officer from CIS died mysteriously, while I was forced to submit to a polygraph, to ascertain whether or not I was a double agent, working for the Pennsylvania Crime Commission. I also learned that I was placed on Commissioner Rizzo’s “enemy list.” Therefore being assigned to the 22 nd district, rather than back to the 19 th was similar to a combat soldier being assigned permanent “point duty” in Vietnam. One week following my assignment to the 22 nd District, I laid across the front seat of my patrol car for cover from the engine-block, while gunfire ruled the night as the new year arrived. In February, an officer in my squad was shot and killed while he sat in his patrol car at the exact location where I had laid across the seat as the new year began. Following a year in the 22 nd District, I decided to also resign. During the exit interview, I stated I would seek employment in Washington, DC with the Federal Bureau of Prisons.
In 1972 a prostitute I contacted in New York city, with knowledge of the Vietnam War, seeking information regarding whether I was a veteran for or against the war, became a Philadelphia police asset when her male associate sent a hand-written letter and photo of myself and the woman to Philadelphia police. The letter stated: “The man in this picture is a pimp, the woman is one of his whores.” She peddled misinformation on my Vietnam war experience and character for cash.
On the evening of March 8, 1971 Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier met for the first time at Madison Square Garden in New York for the world heavyweight boxing championship. While millions of people around the world watched the bout, a team of burglars broke into the FBI’s office in Media, Pennsylvania just west of Philadelphia. The stolen files they removed, were subsequently photo-copied and mailed to various media outlets for publication. The information contained in the files sent the 47 year career of director J. Edgar Hoover into a tailspin.
“The overall impression in the Media files of how the FBI regarded black people was that they were dangerous and must be watched continuously. To become targets of the FBI, it wasn’t necessary for African Americans to engage in violent behavior. It wasn’t necessary for them to be radical or subversive. Being black was enough…The FBI thought of black Americans as falling into two categories - black people who should be spied on by the FBI and black people who should spy on other black people for the FBI.” (1)
Once I arrived in Washington, a plot was hatched to place an access agent into position to monitor my contacts. A Deputy US Marshal whom I had formed a working relationship with encouraged me on a blind date with the sister of a woman he was dating. The date was of little interest, yet for all my effort it seemed nearly impossible to back out. This individual worked for an intelligence agency of the federal government. The prostitute from New York also reappeared unexpectedly. Following three years in Washington, I was reassigned to a federal prison in Englewood, CO. (Denver). I made the mistake of agreeing to marry this woman. My brother encouraged the marriage, agreeing to purchase the rings for the ceremony.
The job in Englewood, Colorado was not great, in fact I was better-off back in Washington. The government bent-over backward to keep their access agent in-place, transferring her from the U.S. Information Agency in Washington to the Denver Federal Center. The agent was subsequently moved to the Rocky Mountain Arsenal, and finally to a position in Philadelphia when I returned east. Upon arriving at New York, I was informed of a month long training class in Atlanta, Georgia that I would have to attend. Following the training in Georgia, my wife informed me she was pregnant. Subsequently she was terminated from the job after a meeting with her supervisor. According to her account, the supervisor “questioned” the pregnancy before she was fired. I wrote letters to the job in Philadelphia seeking to ascertain the reason for the termination. I received vague replies, yet my wife was “blackballed” from further employment for the following two (2) years. When the child was born, she made every effort to create a barrier between the child and myself. I attended classes at Temple University, while working for the university’s police department. It was only after she received an offer to return to Washington for a job with the CIA did she abandon the relationship, taking the child.
Blacks in Philadelphia most targeted were students. Whether or not they were peaceful, they were under the FBI’s watchful eyes. The prostitute from New York unexpectedly showed-up on Temple University’s campus, attempting to entice me to visit her in New York. I declined while questioning how she had located me at Temple University in the first place? John Raines, Professor of religion at Temple University was one of the individuals that surreptitiously raided the FBI’s Media, Pennsylvania office. In a book Professor Raines wrote titled “Attack on Privacy” he remarks: “They depend upon persons who have many opportunities of corruption and are daily exposed to the retribution of angered