Gang leader and candidate gets political education

Jorge Cornell would be the first latino to serve on greensboro City Council 

Jorge Cornell, the 32-year-old leader of the North Carolina Latin Kings, was seated at a small table in Center City Park on a recent Tuesday afternoon bathed in dazzling sunlight while conferring with associates on a cell phone. He wrapped up his call, and eagerly launched into a report on his campaign to win a seat on the Greensboro City Council.

He’s had a fair amount of derision heaped on him, particularly on the comment rolls of local blogs, but he’s also received his share of encouragement. The most surprising encounter might be from a security officer employed by Lankford Protective Services, a company contracted by the city of Greensboro. Cornell’s brother, Russell Kilfoil, was assaulted by a Lankford officer at the Depot last July. After an investigation by the city’s human relations department corroborated Kilfoil’s claim, former City Manager Mitchell Johnson banned Byron Meadows from working on city property and the officer was eventually convicted of simple assault.

“I had a Lankford security officer, knowing the situation with my brother, who said he’s excited about my run, knowing that I’m an everyday person who knows what it’s like to be on the street,” Cornell said. “He said his whole family is going to vote for me.” Cornell recalled that the security officer implored him to not demonize everybody in the company.

“That’s fair,” he concluded, “because we have individuals who commit crimes, and want to paint us with the same brush.”

Over the past 12 months, Cornell and his group have found themselves locked in a bitter dispute with the Greensboro Police Department’s gang unit. The Latin Kings have accused the gang unit of harassment. Last June, Cornell announced an organization to seek peace among street organizations and build unity between the Latino and African-American communities.

At the time, a warrant had been issued for his arrest on a misdemeanor charge, which was later dismissed. In the intervening 12 months, the Latin Kings leader has been shot by an unknown assailant and acquitted of assaulting a police officer and child abduction. Members of the Latin Kings have a half-dozen complaints against the gang unit under investigation by the city’s human relations department, and Cornell has called for the section to be disbanded.

Police accountability is only one of the agenda items on the Cornell campaign’s “three-point program.” The other two are “extending opportunities for our youth” and “community standards for the economy.”

On the issue of youth, he raised the specter of looming cuts in the state budget to programs for children with disabilities and mental illnesses, discussed his own positive experience as a child in a group home in New York state, noted his service on the Guilford County Schools’ Safe Schools Committee, expressed a desire to bring neighborhood parks up to the aesthetic standards of Center City Park and called for expanding the city Parks and Recreation Department’s recreational programming for youth.

Cornell said he thinks funding for the city’s gang prevention efforts should redirected. “You’re wasting your money,” he said. “A lot of that gang prevention money could go to more recreational programs and to more parks.”

The candidate’s “community standards for the economy” platform is largely focused on the Urban Loop for the moment, and he joins almost every other incumbent and challenger in expressing the sense that homebuyers should have received more notification about roadway plans. He said he believes the state funding for the loop could have been better used to improve public transportation and add bicycle lanes.

“We could have expanded our bus routes, have more times on the schedule,” Cornell said. “I’ve talked to Guilford College students. They want to see more bike lanes.

That’s a way of saving money on gas. Nobody should have to fear for their lives the minute they get on a bike that they’re going to get hit by a car.” On the matter of police accountability, Cornell has plenty to say. He supports a proposal to grant subpoena power to the complaint review committee, a citizen board that investigates complaints about police misconduct.

There was a car accident. There were four kids in the car that were Spanish. They ran away. The cops go into this bar and grab four people. Two of them didn’t even know each other. They charged them for that car accident.”

Cornell said that, based on that experience, he “grabbed some brothers” and “got the authorization” from the Latin Kings’ national leadership in Chicago to start a North Carolina organization.

If elected, Cornell, a Puerto Rican born in the continental United States, would be the first Latino to serve on the Greensboro City Council. He opposes the 287(g) program, which allows local law enforcement officers to carry out the functions of federal immigration agents. The Guilford County Sheriff’s Office recently signed a 287(g) agreement with the US Department of Homeland Security. The city of Greensboro has no authority over the sheriff’s office, but the city’s human relations commission recently passed a resolution opposing the use of 287(g) for any purpose other than deporting the most serious and dangerous of criminals.

“I’m sick and tired of seeing Latinos targeted,” Cornell said. “I’m also seeing them get an education. We allow them to get a high-school diploma, but we don’t allow them to go to college.

We’re turning away some of the greatest minds. That kid who is an illegal alien, you never know: He could discover the cure for cancer.”

Cornell’s affiliation with the Latin King is a significant liability in itself, but his status as a convicted felon and the fact that he has never before voted in a North Carolina election adds to the baggage.

For one, he pled guilty to a gun-related crime about 10 years ago in New York. He said he doesn’t recall the exact year, the charge or the circumstances of the crime. The conviction resulted in his disenfranchisement in New York State, so he was surprised to learn that he could not only vote in North Carolina after completing his probation, but he could also run for elective office.

“I registered for the first time this year,” Cornell said. “I know people are going to say, ‘You never voted.’ In New York you couldn’t vote if you had a felony, and I couldn’t vote for five years anyway because I was on probation. They never tell you that you can vote. The beautiful thing is not only can you vote but you can run for office.”

The way Cornell would like to frame the matter, being a felon gives him the common touch. “More people can relate to me because I know what it is to be screwed by the system,” he said. “I know what it’s like to live in a city where your own police department can target you and racially profile you. I’m your everyday person. I’m a felon. I believe we’re going to make history in more than one way: I’m going to give the youth hope that, ‘Yeah, I could do that.’ I’m going to give hope to that felon, that, no, you don’t have to be a number, and still keep going back into the system.”