In 1875, an Irish-born Baltimore policeman, Patrick McDonald, entered the home of Daniel Brown, an African American laborer, and clubbed and shot Brown, who died within an hour of the attack. In similar cases at the time, authorities routinely exonerated Maryland law enforcement officers who killed African Americans, usually without serious inquiries into the underlying facts. But in this case, Baltimore’s White community chose a different path. A coroner’s jury declined to attribute the killing to accident or self-defense, the state’s attorney indicted McDonald and brought him to trial, and a criminal court jury convicted McDonald of manslaughter.

While the conviction of McDonald was unique, it was not a racially enlightened moment in policing. The killing of Brown was viewed not as racial injustice, but police violence spreading to their neighborhood. White elites saw the police as an uncontrolled force threatening their well-being. The clubbing and shooting of an unarmed Black man only a block away from the wealthy residences of Park Avenue represented a breakdown in the social order—but Jim Crow in Baltimore was not in danger. 

The Uncommon Case of Daniel Brown adds to the historiography of policing and criminal justice by demonstrating the pivotal role of the coroner’s inquest in such cases and by illustrating the importance of social ties and political divisions when a community addresses an episode of police violence.

The book is published by The Kent State University Press. The audiobook is published by University Press Audiobooks.