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Ben Crump, MSNBC Contributor Suggests Re-Defining Crime To Accommodate ‘Black Culture’

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Brianna Lyman News and Commentary Writer
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MSNBC legal analyst Charles Coleman and civil rights attorney Ben Crump suggested in a new NBC documentary that the United States should redefine crime in order to accommodate “black culture.”

The group began talking about the criminal justice system under President Joe Biden in NBC’s “Black Men in America: Road to 2024” documentary. Coleman, also a former prosecutor, said he used to constantly deal with the notion or “circular argument” that authorities “go where the crime is.”

“I tell people all the time, if you looking for something you gonna find it,” Coleman said in the documentary. “So it becomes self-fulfilling in terms of ‘Well we go where the crime is,’ no, you’re going and you’re finding crime and if you went somewhere else, guess what? You find it there too.”

“They come up with things to profile us for,” Crump jumped in. “And so whatever laws were made — I believe this … We can get rid of all the crime in America overnight, just like that, and people ask ‘How, Attorney Crump?'”

“Change the definition of ‘crime,'” Crump continued. “If you get to define what conduct is gonna be made criminal, you can predict who the criminals are gonna be … They made the laws to criminalize our culture, black culture.” (RELATED: 24 People Have Died Since Violence Erupted Following George Floyd’s Death)

Crump then cited the deaths of Eric Garner and George Floyd, noting Garner was selling loose cigarettes and arguing Floyd was killed because he tried to buy cigarettes.

Garner died in 2014 after he was allegedly caught trying to sell loose cigarettes, a crime in the Big Apple. Officers placed Garner under arrest with one officer allegedly putting Garner in a chokehold, . The officer was not indicted.

Floyd was murdered by former Minneapolis Police Officer Derek Chauvin after he allegedly tried to use a counterfeit bill to make a purchase. During the arrest, Chauvin was seen kneeling on Floyd’s neck despite repeated pleas from Floyd that he could not breathe.