NAACP President Blasts Police Chief for Skipping Funeral, Attending Meet

The president of a major local civil rights group said the fact that no one representing the Pasadena police attended Saturday’s funeral service for Kendrec McDade was “a total slap in the face” to the family and the community.

McDade was shot to death on March 24 by Pasadena police responding to a false 911 call of an armed robbery. Officers pursuing McDade say they thought he was reaching for a gun in his pants waistband and opened fire. In fact, McDade was unarmed.

Joe Brown longtime President of the NAACP Pasadena branch, says the fact that no one representing the Pasadena police attended Saturday’s funeral service for Kendrec McDade was “a total slap in the face” to the family and the community. [Art: Peter Latham]

 

Joe Brown, longtime President of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) Pasadena branch said Saturday night that Chief Phillip Sanchez chose instead to attend a community meeting at the Western Justice Center.

“It couldn’t have been any worse timing,” Brown said. “If I had known of it, I would have pleaded with the Chief, ‘Chief, wait until after this young man is put to rest.’”

“Two of the persons who were there immediately came up to the homegoing [funeral service], totally disappointed and disgusted, not about the meeting, but about the timing of the meeting,” Brown said.

Pasadena police spokesperson Lt. Phlunté Riddle said in an email “The Pasadena Police were not invited [to the funeral], therefore it could have been perceived as  disrespectful to attend.”

Earlier, the lawyer who represents the McDade family in a federal civil right lawsuit had sent media an email saying her law office would be watching police activity at the funeral service.

Attorney Caree Harper said she planned to field private investigators to videotape “any and all police activity that would give the appearance of harassment or unlawful profiling of attendees.”

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