How It Went Down

At its core, How it Went Down focuses on the effects of racial bias. When Tariq Johnson is murdered by a white man in a neighborhood that is considered “the ghetto” even by its inhabitants, almost everyone who seeks to piece together what happened is cognizant of the fact that racial bias plays a role in how blacks are viewed by the media, law enforcement, and the public at-large. The author’s use of multiple points-of-view underscores this fact. White characters like Tom Arlen, and Tariq’s killer, Jack Franklin, stick to a narrative that paints Tariq as a thug who has a gun and was part of the city’s gang problem. To underscore this bias, Jack Franklin is released from police custody and given back his gun under the pretense that there is no evidence to hold him and that self-defense is an American right. Reverend Sloan critiques this police stance in pointing out that if the case went to court, Jack Franklin wouldn’t have a leg to stand on; Franklin, and others, imagined seeing a gun (which turned out probably to be a Snickers bar) and reacted without any facts.