Officer Shanette Hall is the first of three Black female police officers to introduce herself on a recent Vice video in which black female cops talk about the culture of policing.
“A lot of us come in with the idea [that] we want to literally protect and serve — and me being a Black female, I’m not naïve. I know that there’s a fragile relationship between African Americans and police,” she said in the video.
Hall is a St. Louis County police officer and board member of the St. Louis County Chapter of the Ethical Society of Police (ESOP). She describes in the video how her father was a police officer, and she grew up hearing people talk about how he had helped them in that capacity.
“So, I wanted to be that to others,” she said.
But when her stepsister was arrested, Hall said in the video, the event turned into a narrative in which she was told she did not deserve to be an officer because she had “thugs” in her family.
This video was released Wednesday on YouTube — and on Thursday Hall was reassigned from her human resources role recruiting officers — including minority officers — to a patrol position in a different precinct with a predominately white staff. The transfer was slated to take effect Sunday.
On Friday, ESOP Police held a media conference outside St. Louis County Police headquarters discussing their board’s unanimous vote of no confidence in Chief Mary Barton, who was chosen as the department’s next police chief in March 2020.
That vote was based on five things, they said: her prior comments that no systemic racism was present in the department; her refusal to include ESOP in the Communication Committee, which she later reversed after public pressure; the racist statement by her brother-in-law, who was a dispatcher at the time; the Three Percenters flag flying in front of the home of one of her officers; and numerous unresolved complaints about racism at the police academy and with hiring.
“Let me start off by saying retaliation has once again struck again in St. Louis County,” said St. Louis Police Sgt. Donnell Walters, president of ESOP. “The St. Louis County Police Department has once again retaliated against another Black police officer for being honest and upfront about the conditions and style of policing within the agency.”
“Officer Hall has done nothing but taken pride in the agency and her job,” he said. “It is disgusting and downright disgraceful that command would transfer her without cause or reason.”
Several people spoke, including The Rev. Darryl Gray, a local criminal justice activist.
Gray noted that Doyle was passed over as police chief for a lesser-qualified Barton
“It is not a coincidence that the three of the founding members — all three officers of the Ethical Society of Police in the county have been retaliated against. It is not a coincidence — they know what they’re doing. They know if they can retaliate against these three, if they can attack these three, if they can silence these three, then the other 60 members of [ESOP] might be quiet.”
Several speakers called for the St. Louis County Council to hold a vote of no confidence against Barton to remove her from her position.
“The police commission is a wash,” Gray said, asserting the board was put into place to do St. Louis County Executive Sam Page’s bidding.
Most speakers on Friday expressed the same sentiment: ESOP and its partners stand together and will not allow discriminatory and racist treatment of officers to persist within the department.
Hall was at the media conference Friday, where she could be seen squeezing her hands as the community leaders took to the mic. In the Vice video, she calls for a change in policies, patterns and practices within police departments in order to create a more equitable workspace.
Among Hall’s recommendations outlined in the Vice video are immediate terminations, accountability and mandated reporting.
“We are not looking for more pictures of police officers taking a knee with other people,” Hall said.
Hall’s lawyer, who has worked with other Black officers in the county, confirmed at the media conference that they intend to take the matter to court.
Page did not immediately return a request for comment.
A spokesman for the St. Louis County Police Department responded, noting that in 2020 there were 388 transfers/re-assignments of commissioned personnel.
The Vice video can be viewed at https://bit.ly/39ZMvLr.
