76104

Fort Worth, Texas. 76104.

This is the city that houses the zip code with the lowest life expectancy in the state of Texas. This is also the city that has one of the most unusually high maternal mortality rates in the region, and this particularly affects African American mothers and their postpartum care. This is the narrative, the dominating conversation, of a historical African American community and location of Fort Worth. On Allen Avenue, in the 76104 zip code, this is the location where Atatiana Jefferson was murdered by a FW police officer in her own home.

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Life Expectancy at Birth Across Communities of Texas Report

Life Expectancy Interactive Map
 

Of Atatiana's Murder

FWPD responded to a wellness check called in from a neighbor, James Smith,

who was concerned when he saw his neighbor's door open

around 2 in the morning. Smith did what he believed was right;

he called the non-emergency number to have a wellness/welfare check for

his neighbor. FWPD arrived to the East Allen Avenue location, unannounced,

squad car parked out of view, and did not approach the front door to state who

they were. It was close to 3 o'clock in the morning, and FWPD had moved around

to the back of the house, and, without identifying who they were, 

murdered Atatiana Jefferson with one kill shot to the chest, through a closed

window, without ascertaining a response from anyone inside.

Her 8-year-old nephew was the sole witness of the entire incident.

This happened weeks after a verdict was given in the Botham Jean

trial where the officer who murdered him received 10 years for murder. 

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Of Fort Worth PD Officer Involved Shootings in 2019

This is the city, since June of 2019, that has had seven police-involved shootings. Six of them, now including Atatiana Jefferson, have been fatal. The community has been seeking justice, not just in 2019, but for years as tensions have escalated between members of the community and FWPD. Tensions rose to an all-time high at the firing of FWPD former Police Chief Joel Fitzgerald, the first African American police chief of Fort Worth. There has still not been an established committee of police oversight comprising members of the community, despite the call for the establishment of it for years. As of this current writing, a new police chief, the former interim Ed Kraus, has been selected without the convening process of opening a search committee for a national search. This vote went through in December 2019, months after Jefferson's murder. 

 

Fort Worth Star-Telegram records 2019 Shootings

Interim Police Chief Ed Kraus Named as New Chief in FW

 

No charges have been called upon for child endangerment of Jefferson's 8-year-old nephew, who witnessed her murder and was questioned and taken into custody without parental consent or presence.

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Of 76104 in connection to FWPD and the City's response

FWPD has not released all the body-cam footage of the shooting. It has not released audio of how the call was dispatched. It has not released the name of second police officer that was also on foot, out of the squad vehicle, and present at the time of the shooting. What we do know is that the officer is a woman, but nothing else has been mentioned of who she is and her involvement in the shooting. FWPD is still having a strong presence in the community, despite concerns that there is still an appearance of hyper-surveillance and a disproportionate number of white officers in communities of color.

 

The officer, who does not deserve to be named other than for the sake of Atatiana's justice, was allowed time to resign instead of immediate termination. The Police Union showed up at Jefferson's house before the officer was prompted to give a statement. The officer has not cooperated, had not given a statement, and was released on bond hours after being charged with murder. His bond was provided for by his former employer's union, and his legal team is also being financed through those union funds. 

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Why this matters

This matters because the initial reports are being scrubbed from online sources. There are condensed and now retracted stories from the first 48 hours of reporting. What is being shared on this page comes from community insight, comes from me, Angela Mack, as a native who still has an ear to her childhood community. Much of this information is not being captured and collated, but this digital space is an attempt to do so here. 

 

This matters because the narratives of negation and deficit created in this community thus instigate environments of hyper-surveillance. This is where police officers, regardless of their length of training, come into neighborhoods perceiving threats everywhere when those threats are specific and non-ubiquitous.  Community members are more likely to be perceived as dangerous and become targets of institutionalized violence where police officers, with guns, Kevlar, badges, authority, and union support, can come and target Black and Brown bodies that are at a disadvantage of protection and safety. 

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This matters because people are dying. Those of the community that are racialized, that are read by their race, do not feel safe. What backs the blue does not readily back the Black, the Brown, the working class, the homeless, the marginalized. This is why there is a call to action against the City Council because it seems as if they are the only ones feeling safe when a whole city no longer does.

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