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Kansas City blues: Violent black mobs

‘I have never seen a group of white kids running around causing problems’

Congressman Emanuel Cleaver tried to warn them: “All we are going to do is make a lot of black kids angry,” he said last summer when the city council in Kansas City extended the city’s curfew.

Cleaver, a Missouri Democrat, was right: This weekend the angry kids returned. So did the black mob violence the curfew was supposed to stop.

By now, locals know black mob violence at Country Club Plaza is a Kansas City tradition. Or even a rite of passage: Hundreds of black people go to the plaza and fight, destroy property, invade surrounding businesses, stop traffic, defy police, threaten tourists, get pepper sprayed, stay out past curfew, hurt people, blame it on the cops, then go home. And next week, or the week after, do it again.

For five years it has been a “perennial problem.” The latest episode was not much different than the others. About 150 black people left a nearby movie theater, and soon after started fighting and creating a “ruckus.”

KCTV-TV news talked to a few of the local business owners: Those working and enjoying the Plaza Saturday night described a chaotic scene with high-school age kids running through the streets and police rushing to the scene.

“It’s kind of a growing problem,” said Kelly Griffin, a manager at Brio Tuscan Grille.

John Szudarski, another manager at the restaurant, said he would like to see a further crackdown to avoid even more problems.

“I’ve seen lots of things happen where they push people down in the street. They walk across our patio and knock people’s drinks over. They are not very courteous kids,” he said.

Read about Stamford’s latest experience with mob violence.

The local website Tony’s Kansas City has seen it all before.

“Flash mob season starts early,” he said.

One of his visitors remembers it as well.

“I used to run a store on the plaza but left due to this sort of thing,” said the visitor to Tony’s site. “It kills your business. I’m glad I relocated outside the city limits. Business has been much better. People seem willing to drive to an environment where they feel safe.”

Now the police chief said he is going to get tough on the lawbreakers, who he described as “a few deviants.”

The chief’s tough talk is a return to how the city first dealt with the violence five years ago. When that did not work, it got a new police chief. When that didn’t work, it got a new mayor in 2011.

Black mobs routinely terrorize cities across the country, but the media and government are silent. Read the detailed account of rampant racial crime in “White Girl Bleed A Lot: The Return of Racial Violence to America and How the Media Ignore It.”

Mayor Sly James promised he would have the black mob violence under control within six months. It just got worse. He even saw it first hand when shots were fired within 50 yards of him when he was on the Plaza three years ago.

Finally they tried the curfew. The riots kept on keeping on.

Last summer, the city sent a “community outreach organization” into the Plaza to ask the teens, “What do you need?”

“What they are doing now is not going to do any good at all,” said one teenager to Fox News. “They are going to do it regardless,” she said of the violence.

The black teenagers told Fox they did not like being targeted. Did not like being told what to do. And they needed more places to have parties. The city actually tried that too. But unfortunately, said KCTV: “That has met with limited success.”

So the riots continue.

Few lawbreakers are arrested or ticketed. Last weekend, three people received citations. The chief said that is going to increase, and he does not care what color the lawbreakers are.

Most of the news stories about black mob violence at the Country Club Plaza refer to the rioters as “teens.” But last year, when a city councilman objected to the fact that only black people were receiving tickets for curfew violations, he opened up local media for a rare admission:

“The fact that a lot of the teens that congregate here on the Plaza just to hang out are black teenagers has largely been an implied or unmentioned fact,” said Michael Mahoney, a local TV reporter with Channel 9 news. “The big deal on this is the issue of black teenagers down here on the plaza and a year round curfew is something that has been hinted at. Implied. Whispered about.”

And, of course, documented here at WND and in “White Girl Bleed A Lot: The Return of Racial Violence to America and How the Media Ignore It.”

Lisa Benson, a reporter for the local NBC affiliate and a member of the National Association of Black Journalists, covered the latest mayhem.

“In the past, council member Jermaine Reed has suspected racism in the enforcement of the city’s Entertainment District curfew,” she said. “But Saturday’s disruption was not a curfew violation; it was simply bad behavior.”

Maybe white racism is driving this black mob violence. Maybe it was not. Either way, Councilman Reed understands: “We know that our young people aren’t welcomed in certain places in this city; and it’s important that you act accordingly where ever you are.”

Benson may have satisfied herself that the people creating chaos were not victims of racial injustice. And the police were not perpetrators of it. But if there was any concern for the victims – tourists, pedestrians, business owners, residents – of this racial violence, it was not mentioned in her report.

The Kansas City Star wants no part of the racial angle on the story. No matter what Cleaver and Reed say. The Star also disables reader comments for stories that involve racial conflict. Including this one. Especially this one.

But other news outlets are more open to letting their readers open up about the Plaza. And they often say what the reporters cannot – or will not. As did Donovan Tozier last summer at the KMBC site.

Well I work by the plaza and I can tell you I have never seen a group of white kids running around causing problems. Have not seen a group of Hispanic kids running around causing problems. That goes for Chinese, Korean, or every other race out there. You want to make it a race thing so I am going to call it like I see it.

This issue revolves completely around our young black youth. Getting in large groups and running the sidewalks jumping around acting immature is not what the plaza needs or wants as real shoppers are trying to enjoy a night out.

I don’t blame anyone for avoiding the Plaza when this happens, it is not a safe environment when hundreds of out of control children are running around.

Said another visitor to the same site:

I had to cross the Plaza last summer going home from babysitting, and while sitting at a stoplight I was shouted at, called names, and had my car beaten on by these hooligans. They were ALL black. These are the type of situations that worsen the already tense race relations in this city. The problems on the Plaza are with BLACK teenagers. Call it what you will – since there are no white teens causing the problems. This is a problem for anyone who enjoys the Plaza – so we all get to suffer because of the lack of parenting of these black delinquents

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