C.J. Brown wrote four times as many pedestrian tickets as any other officer in Jacksonville over the last five years. Most of them went to blacks. His boss says he’s just “good at his job.”
by Topher Sanders, ProPublica, and Benjamin Conarck, Florida Times-Union
It was just before 9 a.m. one day last July, and Noemi Martinez was
on her way from one job interview to the next, running to catch a bus on
Atlantic Boulevard in Jacksonville, Fla. Sprinklers from a nearby
nursery were showering water onto the broken sidewalk in front of her,
so Martinez walked out into the shoulder of Lee Road and pressed on.
Things were fairly urgent for Martinez, 52. An eviction notice had
been pasted on her apartment door on Jacksonville’s West Side. A job was
vital, and she’d just interviewed for work as a bus driver. Now, she
was off to interview for a position as a customer service representative
at Florida Blue, the health insurance giant.
Just then, Officer C.J. Brown of the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office
cruised by on his motorcycle. Martinez’s luck could hardly have been
worse.
Brown wrote more pedestrian tickets than any other member of the
sheriff’s force over the last five years. And so at 8:58 a.m. on July
19, 2017, he issued a $62.50 citation to Martinez: “Pedestrian failed to
use sidewalk. Walking in roadway where sidewalks provided.”
“I’ve never been stopped for anything and you’re going to stop me for
walking, when I was doing everything right,” Martinez recalled saying
to Brown. “He stopped me as if I was a criminal.”
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Source: ProPublica
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