The Ghost of Diallo Haunts Miami - Chief Miguel Exposito Under Fire in the Wake of Travis McNeil's Shooting

Add 28 year-old Travis McNeil of Miami, Florida to the list.

What was his crime? He was unarmed and sitting in a parked rental car when he was shot in the chest.

When will it end and where's the oversight?

It's been more than ten years since Amadou Diallo (pictured left), an innocent civilian from West Africa who spoke five languages and was armed only with his wallet, keys and beeper was shot more than 19 times by four over-zealous white New York Police officers from the NYPD's "elite" Street Crimes Unit while standing in the vestibule of his own apartment on a cold February night.

An autopsy later showed 15 of the 41 bullets fired entered Diallo's back and sides; one shot even hit the bottom of his foot.

As an African-American male living in Manhattan at the time I vividly recall the sickening sense of fear, revulsion and anxiety all New Yorkers, and indeed, people around the globe of races, religions and backgrounds felt in the wake of one of the worst incidents of excessive police force ever recorded in the United States.

I was instantly reminded of the incident when I read the March 22nd New York Times article by Don Van Natta, jr. profiling a string of 7 killings of unarmed black American citizens in the past 8 months by the Miami police department.

The disturbing cultural similarities between the hyper-aggressive "elite" police units are disturbing. The NYPD's Street Crimes Unit motto "We Own the Night" befitted a rogue police unit with an abstract mission and little organizational oversight that patrolled any of the five boroughs. Their members were known to wear custom t-shirts emblazoned with the famous Ernest Hemingway quote:
"There is no hunting like the hunting of man, and those who have hunted armed men long enough and liked it, never care for anything else thereafter."

Who actually shot Travis McNeil?

According to Don Van Natta's New York Times piece Detective Reinaldo Goyo, a member of Miami's gang unit who appeared in a controversial reality television series called "Miami's Finest SOS" wearing a hoodie with the word 'Punisher' on the front.

Another member of the gang unit, Officer Ricardo Martinez, killed two different men within 9 days in August, 2010. And so it continues. And continues. And continues.