Summary Of Algiers Motel Incident By John Hansey

Social and economic disparities within the Cincinnati and Detroit communities led to civil unrest and riots. Although Detroit had a vast African American middle class, jobs weren’t abundant. Impoverishment caused racial stereotyping that infected the police department. In the summer of 1967, Detroit experienced five days of chaos including flames, looting, and deaths. Similarly, downtown Cincinnati in 2001 endured high-tension rioting from alleged police brutality and racial profiling. Vandalizing, stealing, and disputing erupted in Over-the-Rhine for four days. Ultimately, inequality present in Detroit and Cincinnati led to social despair and some of the worst riots in U.S. history. John Hersey’s true crime novel, The Algiers Motel Incident,

One mile southeast from where the riots began, some African American teenagers were playing with a starter gun. Upon hearing the shots, National Guardsmen reported sounds of a sniper gun and several policemen showed up shortly after. Almost immediately after arriving, the policemen stormed the motel where they first encountered a 17 year-old African American teenager, Carl Cooper. Without questioning, the policemen shot down Cooper killing him instantly. Another group of officers stormed through the back door where they confronted Fred Temple, 18, and initially shot Temple to death. Continuing, the officers went floor-to-floor searching for a nonexistent sniper. After the failed search, the policemen gathered the seven residents downstairs and lined them up. “Foreshadowing the gruesome ‘game’ to come,” writes Hersey, “the officers began to take people from the line, one by one, into rooms, for what might have been called—and might strictly not—questionings” (264). The officers began an aggressive interrogation that consisted of pistol whipping. One of the survivors, Lee Forsythe, told Hersey that the policeman, Robert Paille, “started questioning us, asking us where the gun was.” Forsythe continued, “And I kept telling him I didn’t know, so he pulled me out of the line and took me into A-4, I think it was, and began beating me and

Dan Aldridge, a young black nationalist stated, “Black people are telling white judges, white juries, and white newspapers that we are ‘hip’ to your tricks”. Aldridge went on to say, “that Carl Cooper, Auburey Pollard, and Fred Temple have not died in vain. Their deaths have been the signal that flashes injustice in America,” (351). Moreover, the fact that Carl Cooper and Fred Temple were killed at first site depicts the officers’ racial distrust towards the two African American