“I suppose that how it goes in Tosa, ‘little white amerikkka,’ where, as demonstrated last Tuesday, the vow to keep Tosa common council white, again!”
John Larry strikes again.
The Wauwatosa Committee Chairperson’s latest email tirades are included in the Common Council’s packet for its upcoming meeting. The rants, which he sent to the Common Council and mayor, are full of racial comments about white people. In the emails, Larry repeatedly refers to Wauwatosa Mayor Dennis McBride’s “white male ego” and referred to Wauwatosa as “little white amerikkka.”
It’s not the first time that Larry’s rhetoric and behavior have raised eyebrows. The Wauwatosa Police Union earlier unsuccessfully demanded “greater accountability” from the Common Council and its Government Affairs Committee, saying the city has failed to address the “violent and unethical behavior” of Ad Hoc Committee Chairman Larry, who was recorded on police body camera video threatening a police lieutenant. Larry heads an important committee formed to consider reforms of the Police Department but has previously made what the union calls discriminatory references to the city of “White-watosa” and the “White-watosa Police,” comments the union calls “extremely offense and divisive.”
The government ad Hoc committee Larry chairs – which is formally called the “Policing & Systemic Inequities” – is charged with making recommendations on changes in police and Common Council training and procedures on everything from warrants to racial bias issues to traffic stops.
Larry’s recent email tirades are filled with racial comments. Here are some examples:
“I suppose that how it goes in Tosa, ‘little white amerikkka,’ where, as demonstrated last Tuesday, the vow to keep Tosa common council white, again!”
“But, your (the mayor’s) white male ego leads you to believe that you know what is best for the citizens of Tosa despite Tosa citizens telling you what they need and know what is best for them! White is right, right? White mayor mcPRIDE is right, right?”
“We, Black male citizens of Tosa, will continue to experience the challenge of being Black and male in little white amerikkka with a mayor who continues to display his white male ego in collusion with a white male police chief.”
“Tosa is not moving forward because Tosa is back to whitebusiness as usual since getting rid of a trigger happy Black police officer. ”
“This has been the ongoing conduct of the mayor! His white male ego has resulted in him always going on the defense which does nothing but protect his own stereotypes, implicit bias, and subtle racism (I spoke of a resource that would prove this this past Thursday; White Fragility by Robin Diangelo).”
He also weighed in on the shooting of a woman police say attacked a random citizen and officer with a wooden pole. “Black woman shot, officers ready to shoot tear gas and rubber bullets, no body camera footage available except when protestors are in the city, lack of accountability, residents, both Black and white, no longer feeling safe, and we’re moving forward to be inclusive???!!!!!” wrote Larry.
Larry, the Wauwatosa police and inequities committee chair, was previously captured on body camera threatening to knock out and slap “the sh*t out of” a police lieutenant this August, according to the video and a citation that Wisconsin Right Now obtained via open records laws. The union has expressed repeated concern to city officials and the Common Council about Larry, but no action was taken.
The Wauwatosa Peace Officers Association “has made repeated complaints to the Wauwatosa Common Council regarding the continued offensive, inappropriate, and non-inclusive behaviors and statements of Chairperson John Larry. Yet they continue to ignore us. John Larry is the appointed Chairperson of the Ad-Hoc Committee to address Policing and Systemic Inequities,” the union president, John Milotzky, wrote in a news release.
And that was before his most recent comments.
A previous citation alleges that Larry “approached officers and made attempts to incite the officers. (Larry) made threats to harm Lt. Farina while on scene. (Larry) stated he would ‘knock you the f*** out’ and “I’ll slap the sh*t out of you.’ (Larry) also antagonized officers, stating, ‘Grab me, let’s see who wins’ and ‘I wish any of them would try it with me.’”
A previous release, written by WPOA President John Milotzky, says the union first brought the matter to city officials requesting action on Sep. 25 and “have followed up with numerous communications. All of which have been ignored, just as the body cam footage of Chairperson Larry has been ignored. These are serious matters that will not simply go away because you choose to ignore them.”
In a press release dated Oct. 26, the union stated that the “inaction of the Common Council, the Government Affairs Committee, and the Ad Hoc Committee” causes the union officials to believe that “many of the current council and committee members” are not willing to accept accountability themselves, even as they demand it from police personnel
It’s the Government Affairs Committee that chose Larry.
When Wisconsin Right Now reached out for comment from Larry previously, he responded:
Good Afternoon Mr. Piwowarczyk, I think you may have the wrong Mr. Larry. I did not receive an arrest citation last month, or any month since my nearly 40 years of being here on earth. Thank you for your interest in my life though. Here is a most recent article that mentions me a number of times. Make sure if you come for me, that you come ready. Please tell Jessica I said hi.
Disclosure: Jessica McBride, a contributor at Wisconsin Right Now, is the niece of Wauwatosa Mayor Dennis McBride. Jim Piwowarczyk, the owner of Wisconsin Right Now, is the author of this story.
