Bledsoe’s Chronology of the Black Book is a must read.
A key excerpt:
Wray told Johnson that he’d heard rumors of a book containing photos of all black officers that was being used for false incrimination. Not only did RMA not prove that book exists, it offered no evidence of its existence. Wray says he did tell Johnson about the legitimate photo lineups. Only later did RMA and the city manager turn those lineups into the black book and begin claiming it had been randomly shown to criminals without ever presenting any evidence to back up those claims.
Update: Incredibly, Bledsoe omits the public release of information at the Feb. 20, 2007 City Council meeting, during which Johnson confirmed the existence of a ‘black book.’
Johnson told the council:
As rumors began to circulate in the department about a “Black Book” that was being inappropriately used with regard to African American officers, I asked Chief Wray to investigate and let me know if there was any basis for this concern or anything that might have been construed as a “Black Book.” He assured me that, although he had heard rumors about such a book, he had never seen it not talked to anyone who had. In the following recording, you will hear about the discovery of the book. The recording contains two excerpts from an interview of former Deputy Chief Brady by the outside investigators. The first part is a brief discussion regarding Brady having to direct that a photo lineup be created. This then leads to the admission that he had secured a “Black Book,” which Brady apparently sees as potentially the item that caused so much concern.
Yes, Brady admits that he secured a “black book” in the trunk of the car, but never once during the tape do we hear for which sensitive case for which Brady was directed to create a photo lineup. Certainly an alleged assault by Greensboro police officers were be considered a “sensitive case.” I think the idea is people would simply assume the “sensitive case” was the probe of black police officers. Again, there is absolutely no context in Johnson’s presentation, which can only lead one to believe it was meant to validate the existence of a “Black Book,” a pattern that seems to appear through Bledsoe’s chronology.
