Equipping Our Youth with Understanding: The Right to Remain Silent

By La Royce Jones

We at the North Dallas Gazette believe it’s time for us as a community to stand up and take responsibility for educating our own regarding our rights as citizens of the United States of America. This comes because we are in the midst of social change in our society and the growing mass of our people being incarcerated. Also, with the inevitable implosion of our youth determined to, sooner than not, reveal itself to America;

Continually we see incidents of sworn civil servants neglecting and displaying blatant disrespect of the badge they wear, and to the people they vowed to protect and serve. So, as a community, we must come together to educate our people of our rights as citizens. As community leaders, it’s imperative we take action now. We’ve witnessed too many of our people detained or murdered. We simply cannot  continue to huddle on the sidelines spewing our opinions of what we are witnessing.

It is time for us to stand up for our children, our community and our future.

Never forget, we are reaping the benefits of our ancestor’s labor of love. It is beyond our imagination to comprehend the torture and hate our ancestors endured. Yet, they did endure. Plus they taught their children how to endure, until an inevitable change arrived.

We need to recapture the same spirit of our ancestors to teach our people how to endure until our change comes. Yes, rallies, marches and movements can, and we believe will, aid in bringing changes to policy and laws. However, in the meantime, it is our responsibility to move to change our community.

Education is power, and without education we can feel powerless. Therefore, it is necessary and with urgency that we instill power of knowledge in our youth. This is critical if they should find themselves alone in a situation with an officer.  As parents, we ensure our children are equipped with their physical needs when they go out into the world. Yet, in many cases, we have failed to ensure they are equipped with the knowledge of knowing their rights. They must be equipped with the protection of full armor.

Also, we must help our youth understand the importance of countering emotion with knowledge. This will help them to remain calm and level headed during police encounters. We are emotional creatures and all too often we are respond reactively and emotionally. However, calmer heads must prevail and allow our knowledge to prevail and help guide the situation to a peaceful resolution. So if our youth are not equipped with the power of knowledge, then all they have to depend upon is their emotion. We can do much better to protect our youth.

It has become necessary for our youth to be taught how to interact with police officers. Hopefully this will help to remove fear and possibly change a negative outcome into a more positive one. Since this necessity has shown itself boldly in the light recent events, it cannot be ignored any longer with the shades of the blind eye which separates us.

As we know from numerous studies, Black youth are more likely to be suspected, harassed, stopped and frisked, identified as adults, detained and arrested. So, they must be educated to know what to say, and more importantly, what not to say.

Every youth should know their Miranda Rights. It has come to our community to take on this task of making sure all of our youth know and understand their rights. We need every leader, in every church, in every community organization, in every neighborhood and in every home to take on this responsibility. We must stand, and take action now. We have to shake off our complacent stance which only ignites in the aftermath of another tragic shooting or encounter.

Our youth are scattered and lost, in dire need of direction, crying out for guidance and understanding. Yet, their cries seems to fall on ears too caught up in all the noise, preventing them from hearing their pleas for help.

Take action – Now!

Fathers and mothers sit down with your children and have a blunt and direct conversation. Make sure they understand, this information could one day save their lives. It could possibly keep them from residing behind prison walls for the remainder of their lives.

Pastors gather your flock and structure classes to teach your youth. Mentors stress this to your mentees. We all have a role to play in restoring, rebuilding and replenishing our community.

Below is the Miranda Warning, also known as the Miranda Rights. Please share throughout our community.

If you are a community leader, learn the Miranda Rights for your jurisdiction, study them. Then teach them to our youth. Have the youth memorize them. Then help our youth gain understanding of their meaning by explaining and presenting them at their level.

It’s our responsibility, and it’s our turn to teach them how to endure with dignity and the power of knowledge. As we know knowledge is power. But knowledge only becomes powerful when it’s taught to the masses and implemented to form change.

Now we want to hear from you: Share your suggestions on how we can better prepare our youth to understand their rights and properly exercise them if any situation should arise. Their lives could depend on it.

Send your suggestions to businessoffice@northdallasgazette.com.

Miranda Warning 

This is a call to action from the North Dallas Gazette for parents, church leaders and community leaders to make sure our young people fully understand their rights.

Miranda Rights is a “right to silence” warning given by the police in the U.S. to criminal suspects who are in police custody before they are interrogated. Written into law after the Supreme Court’s decision of the Ernesto Arturo Mirada vs. State of Arizona.

Every U.S. jurisdiction has its own regulations regarding what, precisely, must be said to a person arrested or placed in a custodial situation. The typical warning includes:

• You have the right to remain silent when questioned.
• Anything you say or do may be used against you in a court of law.
• You have the right to consult an attorney before speaking to the police and to have an attorney present during questioning now or in the future.
• If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be appointed for you before any questioning, if you wish.
• If you decide to answer any questions now, without an attorney present, you will still have the right to stop answering at any time until you talk to an attorney.
• Knowing and understanding your rights as I have explained them to you, are you willing to answer my questions without an attorney present?**

The courts have since ruled that the warning must be “meaningful”, so it is usually required that the suspect be asked if they understand their rights. Sometimes, firm answers of “yes” are required. Some departments and jurisdictions require that an officer ask “do you understand?” after every sentence in the warning.

An arrestee’s silence is not a waiver, but on June 1, 2010, the Supreme Court ruled 5–4 that police are allowed to interrogate suspects who have invoked or waived their rights ambiguously, and any statement given during questioning prior to invocation or waiving is admissible as evidence.

Evidence has in some cases been ruled inadmissible because of an arrestee’s poor knowledge of English and the failure of arresting officers to provide the warning in the arrestee’s language.

Also because of various education levels, officers must make sure the suspect understands what the officer is saying. It may be necessary to “translate” to the suspect’s level of understanding. Courts have ruled this admissible as long as the original waiver is said and the “translation” is recorded either on paper or on tape.

**Please note in Texas and nine other states in lieu of “Knowing and understanding your rights as I have explained them to you are you willing to answer my questions without an attorney present?”  The officer must ask the following two questions

1: Do you understand each of these rights I have explained to you?

2: Having these rights in mind, do you wish to talk to us now?

The answer to question 1 is used to determine if suspect understands their rights to silence.

The answer to question 2 determines if suspect wishes to invoked their right to remain silent.