This was discovered during an incident last month when Sgt. Valerie Deant, a clarinet player in the Florida Army National Guard’s 13th Army Band, showed up at the Medley Firearms Training Center after members of the department had been practicing, and recognized one of their targets – a mugshot of her brother from when he was just 18-years-old.
The other targets were also black men, and some just teenagers. But now the department is defending the practice.
Her brother Woody, who was arrested for drag racing in 2000 and is now married with children, was just as shocked and angry, noting; ‘The picture actually has like bullet holes. One in my forehead and one in my eye. …I was speechless.’
North Miami Beach Police Chief J. Scott Dennis says there is nothing wrong with this practice at all however, and even defends its use.
‘Our policies were not violated,’ Dennis said.
‘There is no discipline forthcoming from the individuals who were involved with this.’