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Proyecto Visión 21

How much they know about me if they say they know everything?

A couple of weeks ago two policemen came to my office to talk with me as part of their investigation of a robbery attempt that took place in the same building where my office is located.

I thought it would be a conversation about the “classical questions,” such as “Did you see any suspicious person around here?” or “Did you hear anything at such and such time?” But I was wrong. Suddenly, I become the main suspect of the investigation, even when I was at the other side of town at the time of the incident. I am sure the two policemen believed I was the person they were looking for.

One of them, speaking in bad Spanish even when I was answering to him in English, told me several times, “We know everything about you.” But, what they really know when they say they know “everything” about me? I know they know where I live, what kind of car I drive, how much I weight, how tall I am, and my hair color.

But do they really know “everything” about me? Do they know they now the dreams and goals I had as a child and the dreams and goals I have for my children? Do they know my struggles to complete my college degree and the many hours I have to work every single day?

Do they know how much my faith has changed during the past 30 years I have been studying philosophy and theology and how careful I have to be every time somebody wants me to explain what I believe?

Do these policemen know that, because I am Hispanic, my income is 30 to 50 percent less than a non-Hispanic with similar experience and education doing the same job?

Do they know about my walks around the lake, about the classes I teach at a local university, or about how three years ago I changed my diet to lose weight? (The diet is working, by the way.) Do they know the stories my grandmother used to tell me or the books my mother used to read me when I was a child?

Obviously, they don’t know anything of that. They only have access to a very small portion of my life. Therefore, it is a matter of real concern to know that on the basis of such a small pieces of information they immediately assume I am responsible for a crime.

Also, whatever happened with that old principle of being innocent until you are found guilty? How come I am thought to be guilty and I have to prove my innocence? Why, just because I am Hispanic?

I am not sure this was a case of discrimination, but I am preoccupied by the fact that they didn’t need any information to treat me as a suspect. Suddenly, they told me it was a case of “mistaken identity” and they left.

I wonder how many times -perhaps every day- this story doesn’t have a happy ending.

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