'Police beat my mother'

“When I looked out the window, I saw my mother in an angry confrontation with the police. One of the officers lifted his billy club and hit her in the face with it. He busted her eye and she staggered back…I was deeply upset by what I had witnessed. I mean, I was only ten and I had just seen the police beat my mother in the face.’’

Robert Barisford Brown, aka Bobby Brown (born Feb. 5, 1969), singer, songwriter, rapper, dancer and actor. He grew up in Boston’s predominately African-American Roxbury neighborhood.

Mosque in Roxbury

Community garden in Roxbury

— Photo by Wilber Reyes01