It was 2006 in Buffalo, New York. Cariol Horne had just been called to help another officer with an arrest. But when she got there, a white officer was choking a handcuffed Black man. Horne ran to the scene.
She saved his life by releasing him from the chokehold, and the white officer punched her in the face! But when she reported the situation to the police station, SHE was the one who got fired.
But the situation wasn’t over.
In 2021, Horne became eligible for back pay and pension benefits. And a new law was passed in Buffalo City Council – Cariol’s Law.
Cariol's Law makes it illegal for cops to protect each other's abuse. It protects officers who intervene in police violence or expose corruption. But Horne’s fight isn’t over. She wants this law to be national – so officers can’t just “leave one department and go to another one … [to] continue to do the same thing.”
Horne’s taking a jackhammer to the “blue wall of silence.” Her experience demonstrates the truth about “good cops”. They don’t stay cops for long.