Brown Berets Case Study

Primary Sources Essay: Court Declaration of Carlos Montes Carlos Montes was an influential activist who is most well known as a member of the Brown Berets. The Brown Berets were an organization that protected Chicanos/as rights and the general impoverished population of East Los Angeles against police brutality, the Vietnam War and the inequality of education. Carlos Montes was a target for the Los Angeles Police Department during the Chicano Movement in the 1960s. The primary source we have chosen is a court case declaration of Carlos Montes in May 1, 1979 against the harassment he has faced by the Los Angeles Police Department while being a member of the Brown Berets. The court case declaration by Carlos Montes was created in the …show more content…
As Chicanos/as were trying to expose the police from the brutality they received, Montes explains that many threats and warnings were given to him to not proceed with joining the Brown Berets in which would “save him trouble” in the future with the police. The police brutality that many members of the Brown Berets faced showed how much power and authority whites had over minorities like Chicanos/as. This source also shows the undeniable proof of police brutality against Carlos Montes. In addition, this source also provides insight to the social climate of the era specifically the racial tension present between white and non-white people and how threatening they became towards non-white people.
The unprofessionalism and approach of the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD), towards the Brown Berets lead to the declaration of exposing the misconduct of how the police would treat the organization of the Brown Berets and of other Chicanos/as. This court document was written to expose the police of such injustice of police brutality that Carlos Montes faced when being a member of the Brown Berets such as: harassing him, beating him, giving him traffic tickets for no