Our Voices, Part 5: Justice, law enforcement can depend on the color of your skin.

The invention of the cell phone changed our lives in immeasurable ways, but there might not be anything as important as how it showed us the truth about law enforcement and police violence.

Those handy photo and video apps allowed real time documentation of injustice that white society could not longer ignore. For people of color, of course, police brutality and a skewed justice system were routine and obvious, but for many white people it was inconceivable that officers of the peace routinely beat, menaced and killed people until the video evidence made it explicit. The video of George Floyd being murdered by police officer Derek Chauvin is paramount, but there are countless other examples, such as a South Carolina police officer Michael Slager shooting Walter Scott eight times in the back as he fled a traffic stop.

Today, you can read about how our police and justice systems have affected people of color in our communities in the fifth round of Our Voices, the joint project between the Herald Leader, RadioLex, Key NewsJournal and CivicLex to feature marginalized voices during a time of racial reckoning.

The project is funded through a grant from the Facebook Journalism Project and the Lenfest Institute. We are also grateful to our partners at the Blue Grass Community Foundation, which hosts the Bluegrass Civic Journalism Fund. To make a contribution to the fund, go to https://bgcf.givingfuel.com/donate-now.

Our previous rounds explored housing and gentrification, economic opportunity, and education and health disparities. In addition, RadioLex will be hosting interviews with some of our authors.

And as we’ve written previously, please remember that these writers are your neighbors. “While not everyone will empathize with those that experience structural racism every day, we ask that people read the stories and take an opportunity to put themselves in other people’s shoes before they comment. And if you do comment, ask yourself - if you spoke publicly about your family, education, or home, how would you want people to respond to you?”

This story was originally published August 13, 2021 at 9:24 AM.