St. Louis Police Officers Ask NFL to Punish Players Who Publicly Supported Michael Brown Sunday
L.G. Patterson/AP
Five Rams came onto the field displaying "hands up, don't shoot" gesture.
Several St. Louis Rams players are being criticized by a police officers association in Missouri for entering the field before Sunday's game in support of Michael Brown in the wake of Ferguson Police Officer Darren Wilson not being indicted by a grand jury in Brown's death in the St. Louis suburb.
According to St. Louis television station KDSK , the St. Louis Police Officers Association posted a statement to its website asking the NFL to punish Stedman Bailey, Tavon Austin, Jared Cook, Chris Givens and Kenny Britt after the players came out showing the "hands up, don't shoot" pose that's marked Ferguson protests this year.
The SLPOA is calling for the players involved to be disciplined and for the Rams and the NFL to deliver a very public apology. Roorda said he planned to speak to the NFL and the Rams to voice his organization's displeasure [Monday]. He also plans to reach out to other police organizations in St. Louis and around the country to enlist their input on what the appropriate response from law enforcement should be.
The SLPOA statement called the gesture as “tasteless, offensive and inflammatory.”
The person quoted throughout the letter is SLPOA official Jeff Roorda. Roorda was remprimanded during his time as an Arnold, Mo., police officer for falsifying reports in 1997 . He was eventually fired for incidents around his "interactions with other police officers after accusing them of threatening and abusing him." Roorda was later elected to the Missouri House of Representatives and has pushed for anti-transparency state laws in Missouri .
The police statement reference's the league's ad hoc judicial system that does not need criminal charges to be levied in order for punishment. The league has suspended and punished players for different crimes and has been under fire recently for its uneven system.
USA Today reported Monday that the league will not discipline the Rams players and is listening to the players on the issue. "We respect and understand the concerns of all individuals who have expressed views on this tragic situation," NFL spokesman Brian McCarthy told the newspaper.
The NFL has a majority African-American labor force, with some estimates as high as 80 percent.
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