Word: ackermanns
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...most of the problems with which Ackermann tries to deal are too complex to be neat little dictums. One of the book's major themes is the escalation of violence in the city during the 1970s, beginning with the takeover of University Hall in April...
...Ackermann sees the so-called "Peace Wars" as a tragic example of violence begetting violence. Police who were not trained to handle peaceful demonstrations let events get out of control and did not know how to respond...
...While Ackermann was mayor in 1972, a 16-year-old high-school dropout named Larry Largey was found dead in a police cell. A police autopsy claimed he died of a drug overdose. City activists claimed he was beaten to death by the police...
...book's most moving scenes, Ackermann enters the Towers and confronts Largey's 16-year old peers, sharing their anger and desperation. "Other children were weeping," she says of the moment. "This was Larry's wake we were at. I wept...
...Despite Ackermann's efforts to discipline the police force--eventually, the whole force was sent back to the police academy for a week-long refresher course--she writes with a good deal of sympathy for the officers. She suggests that the police are often ill-equipped to deal with the rage that society creates in incidents like the Roosevelt Towers riots. Police did not make the problem, she writes, they were simply a part...