A Student Just Sent a Stunning Email to Campus Police

Alissa Lopez | August 1, 2016
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In early July, roughly 200 individuals gathered in Ithaca, N.Y., to protest on behalf of Black Lives Matter. And according to the Cornell Sun, one of the organizers, Dubian Ade, called for “bring[ing] this system down.”

Concluding the rally, Ade stepped forward to summarize Ithaca Black Lives Matter’s five main calls to action, which included calls for more people to organize and act as leaders in the community, defunding the Ithaca Police Department, new alternatives to the police, organizing at jobs and work stoppages and a strengthening of the local community of people of color.

Firstly, demanding things such as defunding the police department in an area that has a problem with drug and violent crimes is not pragmatic. But outside of all the anti-cop rhetoric, one person decided to step forward and express their appreciation and esteem for the Ithaca police.

The email, sent by a student studying at Cornell University for the summer, was shared on the department’s Facebook page on Friday.

Here's the email:

Dear Chief Barber,

My name is Shyam (pron. SHAAM) and I had the pleasure of living in Ithaca this past summer while I took language classes at Cornell. I subleased an apartment at 126 E. Spencer, and crossed in front of the Hall of Justice every day. I took delight in smiling at every police officer I saw and they smiled and waved back. Not sure if anyone remembers an Indian guy wearing a shirt and tie in this humidity, but that was me.

I wanted to write this email after I returned to California to thank you for such maintaining such a remarkable police department. While my only formal interaction with your department was on July 10th when I called to complain about my neighbors sitting on their roof and partying during a week day - to which an officer rolled up within minutes and gave them a warning - I have lived across the U.S., and truly have never met a more friendly group of law enforcement officers than in the City of Ithaca.

Chief Barber, I am American born, but of South Asian descent, and a Muslim too, but there was never a single moment this summer when I felt unsafe in Ithaca or did I ever feel that anyone in blue treated me with anything but the highest degree of respect. In fact, I felt very sad over the last few weeks to see your flag basically permanently at half-mast due to the killings of police officers.

In short, I want to congratulate you on hiring a fine group of officers. Organizations succeed when they have quality personnel, and I can see that you hire only the best. I am a former community college professor, and will return to that field after I finish my Ph.D. I teach my students how to be better citizens, and part of that is getting them to write letters to government officials when there is a problem, but also when praise needs to be doled out too. It has been my privilege writing this email.

Very respectfully,

Shyam K. Sriram Ph.D. Student

Department of Political Science

University of California, Santa Barbara

Soon after realizing his email had gone viral on social media, Shyam commented on the Facebook post, saying, “This is me! Glad this is going viral. Hope I can inspire others to appreciate law enforcement!”

Police officers are meant to protect citizens no matter what. That's their job. If an officer violates that duty and there is sufficient evidence to prove that, the justice system will handle it, as they should. It never ceases to amaze me how complicated of a concept this is for Black Lives Matter advocates to understand. But for people like Shyam, it's common sense.

It's refreshing to see a individual personally reach out to police to say how grateful he is for the work these officers do in protecting and respecting his life each and every day.

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