6 Baltimore officers charged in Freddie Gray's death
Posted by ObjectiveAnalyst 8 years, 12 months ago to The Gulch: General
So the decision to bring charges has been made. I am glad it will go before a jury and people will get their day in court. This is how it should be resolved. The looters and rioters have only hurt their cause, their neighborhoods and reinforced unfortunate perceptions of the inner city minorities. A little patience for the system to take its course would have been in order. Even though it looks as though the authorities have decided there is sufficient evidence to charge, there was no excuse for the mayhem and destruction. All that came of it was the recognition that there is a greater number of potential criminals for the cameras to expose.
One can only hope the jury is unbiased, justice is done and that the facts are the decider not the emotion. Prosecutors are by nature imbued with an agenda.
Regards,
O.A.
A change of venue does seem in order.
Respectfully,
O,A.
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games begin!!
I concur.
Respectfully,
O.A.
Yes. What I was saying is the police or prosecutor may choose to _stop looking_ for evidence once they have evidence that supports their theory of the case. If they keep looking and find something like DNA of a convict who had been released at the time of the crime, they have to disclose it. In that scenario, it's up to the defense to keep looking.
I think it's a smart system, but it's one I vaguely understand. Attorneys in an adversarial case start with a desired theory of the case and then look for evidence to support it--- something that must be avoided.
About ten years ago I was working on a wireless device at a job. I said the problem could be as simple as interference from a microwave oven in the break room below the lab. My boss asked me never to utter that aloud b/c if non-scientific people hear the hypothesis, they will notice the time the radio has a problem when a microwave is on and not notice contrary evidence. They will steer the investigation that way without regard to the facts. In the legal world, though, they do start with a theory.
There was an investigation and evidence, I am not privy to it so I won't try to second guess her decisions. Clearly a death in custody requires investigation and the statement that the purpose for the arrest was inaccurate is disturbing.
Let's see what happens at trial.
I am always willing to let the system work. It is not perfect, but it is far better than most. If only the rioters had the patience to allow it to work, much damage may have been avoided.
Respectfully,
O.A.
The reason I lead with that is that while I agree with everything you said on a philosophical level, I cannot buy into the notion that "If only the rioters had the patience to allow it to work, much damage may have been avoided." I cannot and will not defend what the rioters have been doing under any circumstances, but I do think the rioters' actions brought a spotlight to this case that the prosecutors could not shy away from. I think that spotlight is the only reason these cops are being charged, and there is no chance they'd have to account for what they did if it weren't for the protesters/rioters.
There is exactly zero transparency within the criminal justice system when it comes to the police being at fault unless the public raises such a stink about it that they simply cannot hide.
I know it is an unrelated case, but think back a month ago to the officer in South Carolina who shot a suspect in the back as he was running away. If it weren't for that person's 3rd party video hitting YouTube, do you think for even one second that cop would ever have been charged with murder?
As it relates to this case, perhaps the charges against these 6 cops are simply a case of trying to appease the public, and perhaps these 6 cops are truly guilty of wrongdoing. They will have their day in court to defend themselves. Freddie Grey never got that chance. He was alive, then arrested without probable cause of any crime, and then he died in police custody. I want to know why, and I doubt your assertion very seriously that if the protesters/rioters had all just stayed home that the system would have ever been brought to bear against those 6 officers.
I agree with you 100% about the way the world should work, but I have less faith than you do in how it actually does work. As perverse as it is to say so, Freddie Grey's family is more likely to have justice rendered in his case as a direct result of what the protesters have done than he ever would if we simply put our faith in the police to investigate their own without the pressure from the protesters. It sickens me to say so, but that it the truth as I see it.
Your words not mine: 'I doubt your assertion very seriously that if the protesters/rioters had all just stayed home that the system would have ever been brought to bear against those 6 officers." I did not say that. I am all for peaceful protest and assembly. Amendment I Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
I am sure you know of Martin Luther King, Gandhi and even Nelson Mandela...
I want the laws which protect public officials from prosecution and personal liability revoked. Often when the cops do something wrong the municipality is sued not the cops. In this case the taxpayer is who is punished, not the perpetrator.What deterrent is there in that? .
Respectfully,
O.A.
Thank you. One more I just heard: Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on the bus. She didn't trash the bus.
Regards,
O.A.
The "justice" for homeowners, business owners, and innocent police officers appears to be taking a "rough ride" in the Maryland legal system.
In my perfect world, every cop would be required to a wear body cameras (video) and mics (audio) AND those recordings should be made available to the public upon request. The cops who have done nothing wrong can point to video and audio evidence to justify their actions. The cops who break the law, on the other hand, will have nowhere to hide. The thin blue line becomes transparent and useless when there is actual video/audio proof that flies in the face of what some other officer might say to back up their lies.
Do not mistake my words. I do not approve of what the rioters in Baltimore (or Ferguson, MO for that matter) have done. I also do not approve of the Us vs Them mentality that damned near every cop in the world has that allows them to hide behind the Blue Wall of Silence.
Put another way, the people do not trust the police. They do not believe that the system will protect them. In fact, they believe that the system will go to any lengths to protect the police no matter what they may be guilty of. I assume that you would ask that the black community should trust the police and not riot/protest. I ask you, to what end? What have the police done to engender that trust? What have they done for decades on end to destroy that trust?
Hell, I'm a 42 year old white guy business owner who has never been in any trouble with the law, and I don't trust the police any further than I can throw them. Why would I expect any black person to trust them whether they were criminal or law abiding folk just trying to live their lives?
Getting back to the matter at hand. Do I think they should be rioting? No, I don't. Am I sympathetic to their protests. You're damned right I am. If anything, my biggest complaint with the rioters isn't that they are rioting. It is that they are directing their anger at the wrong targets. The guy that owns that Mom and Pop pizza business is not guilty of police violence and the neverending string of lies and coverups that ensue after. The police are the ones guilty of allowing unnecessary police violence to continue. They refuse to weed out the bad cops. In fact, they brag about how they will protect each other no matter what they are guilty of with their Thin Blue Line.
I also want to add one other point. I have no doubt you'll call this an apples vs. oranges comparison, but the point is valid in my mind. In Atlas Shrugged, when John Galt was captured and tortured at the State Science Institute, did Dagny, Ragnar, Francisco and company all sit back and meekly file some kind of formal protest? As I recall, they raided the SSI and killed several of the guards to get John back. In other words, something horrible was done to one of them, and they used violence against the people who did it to right that wrong. Were you morally repulsed when you read that? Do you recoil against the actions of our forefathers who fought back against their British oppressors? That doesn't mean that every SSI guard or British redcoat was a sadistic bastard who enjoyed crushing people. I don't imagine every cop in Baltimore or Ferguson or NYC (Eric Garner) or Cincinatti (Tamir Rice) or Dayton, Ohio (John Crawford) or Sandy,OR (Fouad Kaady) or North Charleston, SC (Walter Scott) or the hundreds of others victims, of whatever race, of unnecessary police violence. That said, if they are going to stand by and watch their fellow cops getting away with murder, then they can't possibly be surprised when they find a target on their own backs. Aiding and abetting is a crime too. Falsifying police reports is a crime. Staying silent in the face of a crime is, at minimum, morally repugnant, and doing that as an officer of the law is unforgiveable.
Maybe I am being naive, but I think the police (meant in the most general sense) can fix this problem by hanging their own out to dry publicly whenever and wherever it happens. Cops cannot be above the law, and as long as they are, you're delusional if you think that people aren't going to fight back with violence when the system simply cannot be trusted to dole out justice through due process. If it were up to me, I would try those cops publicly (meaning video/audio cameras in the courtroom). If their actions were justified and they can prove that, then so be it. Let them make that case. That said, Freddie Grey is dead. He was alive. He was arrested for something that was completely legal. He died of a traumatic spinal injury in police custody. Now, he's dead. I don't think it is too much to ask that the world gets to know why. I also do not think it is too much to ask for those cops to pay for their crimes in the same way any of us would if we were found guilty of the exact same offense. Lastly, I seriously doubt that without those riots in Baltimore, any of those 6 cops would have ever been charged with anything.
I have no doubt that you will want to retch when you read all of this, but I do have one question for you that I am very interested in. At what point does it become justifiable to fight back? How many more people need to be sacrificed to unnecessary police violence with no hope for justice whatsoever meted out afterwards before you come to understand that sometimes violence really is the answer?
One last point. Go watch the video on YouTube entitled "why we need the second amendment". It is about 57 minutes long and it will amaze and disgust you. On a personal level, I am not looking for a fight. I don't want one with anybody. I am, however, prepared for one if one finds me. I would suggest you do the same.
I don't excuse the rioting - which by definition has innocent victims. Are *these* riots OK with you...as long as the ends justify the means?
There is no first amendment protection, or excuse, for the 'collateral damage' of criminal rioters. If someone wants to lawfully protest, then please do so. But, that is not a *license* to violate the rights of others. Anyone's damn protest ends at my property line. If someone, in the context of American society today, thinks it takes the destruction of the livelihood, property, and health of innocent people to make a case for their social change, then I want no part of their collectivist justice. The unspoken premise in that destruction is that my rights are granted or removed by the biggest 'gang' on the scene. My rights don't come from them.
If we descend into lawlessness, there won't be a Bill of Rights and we pave the way for whatever governmental czar wants to justify any action in the name of "protect & serve". At that time, we won't have to wonder when it becomes "justifiable to fight back".
You say no one is above the law. As respectfully as I possibly can, I am going to call BS on this one. The police are above the law by virtue of the fact that they do not police themselves. No matter what a cop does, up to and including murder, other cops won't say a word. You have to get these guys on video or audio to have even a ghost of a chance to see justice served against a cop. What's worse is that rare justice that does happen doesn't come close to the kind of penalties you or I would face for doing the same thing. The jail time you and I would get for beating someone half to death yields nothing more than a paid vacation for a cop. Do not tell me that "No one is above the law". That is a simpleton's platitude that bears no resemblance to the truth in the real world.
Next. I do NOT excuse *these* riots, but I am not blind to the fact that *these* riots have yielded a positive result along with all the destruction they have caused. That positive result being that the 6 cops involved in Freddie Grey's death will be tried for their actions. Also, as long as we are talking about *these* riots, I place a fair share of the blame for them right at the feet of the police. *These* riots never would have needed to happen if the powers that be had come down hard on those 6 cops publicly and quickly, right from the start. I contend that *these* riots are as much a result of the police dragging their feet in bringing their own to justice as the actual neanderthals out there bashing windows.
I accept your entire 3rd paragraph as is.
Skipping forward to the 4th paragraph. The police, as I mentioned above, are above the law whether you care to admit it or not. Say what you want about the Bill of Rights, but the police by and large couldn't care less about it. Your Constitutional rights mean jack squat to a cop when he makes up his mind to violate them. They also mean jack squat to every other cop up and down the line who will provide cover for anything the first guy did. That includes lying under oath, falsifying police reports, joining in on the violations, and any number of other things. You can be beaten, pepper sprayed, tazed, shot and/or caged with or without charges, and the only chance you have to see justice done is if you are one of the incredibly tiny percentage of people who somehow manage to get their interactions with the police caught on camera that you actually have access to. If you're one of the other 99.9% without proof of your word versus all of theirs, you're screwed. If you're counting on other cops to step forward to speak up against his fellow badges, you're a fool. It's just not going to happen. They'd rather an innocent person serve a life sentence in prison than to ever even consider ratting out one of their own. Say what you want about this government czar and that government czar as some kind of theoretical exercise. As for me, that's exactly what I see every time a cop drives by, someone who is above the law making up the rules as they go.
Now, I've answered your points. Would you see your way clear to answering mine? I want to know what you thought of the violence against government agents question I posed earlier. If Hank, Dagny, Ragny, Francisco, etc. can act against the guards at the SSI when John Galt was being tortured, then why would it be so wrong for the people of Baltimore to rise up directly against the police and the District Attorney's office when they were still protecting those 6 cops? The question I posed earlier remains. At what point is it acceptable to bring force to bear against the police when they refuse to do anything to bring their own to justice?
I know there is a chance I will become unwelcome on this board with these kinds of questions, but frankly, I think they need to be asked. I believe I answered your questions. Do me the courtesy of answering mine.
You will find multiple opinions of varying degrees of intensity both on this board and within more formal, intellectual discussions of Objectivism and that's why most of us are on this site.
Your views paint large groups of people with a broad brush...your description fits some specific individuals, but not all. The ones it doesn't accurately describe become your collateral damage. That level of discernment is not much different than a thug burning somebody else's vehicle "to get back at the police". He's just trying to get his point across like you are—without specificity. If it was your home, car, or business that was burned in these riots, I doubt that you would see it as a "positive result". If you were sitting in traffic, trying to get home, and someone jumped on top of your car, flipping off the police, the local auto body shop will enjoy a "positive result", but I doubt you are going to be sympathetic to the *Individual* denting your hood and roof. I apologize if I have assumed incorrectly.
Corruption in government should be fought through legal means on all levels because, currently, NOT everyone is corrupt. We haven't reached the point of being ruled by 'gangs' of corrupt politicos that exercise their whims by force. However, we can get to that point quickly if the rights of the individual keep getting trampled in pursuit of this kind of collectivist, rioting 'justice'.
In the context of the story, I have no problem, at all, with the heroes of Atlas Shrugged acting in the self-defense of Galt using deadly force. It's one of the best action sequences of the book, and I'd recommend that you read it again to see the specific choices the characters made. The "government" they faced is not what we have...yet. We should do what we can to keep it from getting there; not using the same broad brush some accuse others of using against them.
First, you say, "Corruption in government should be fought through legal means on all levels because, currently, NOT everyone is corrupt." While I agree with the notion that not everyone is corrupt, I often wonder what we should do with the ones that are. If we know the names of people in power and exactly what they did, why should we wait for our voices to be heard, IF they are ever heard, 10 years after the fact when those people are out of power. Worse, what if those same people are still in power and still getting away with it? Is it your contention that we should always play by the rules when the corrupt among us never will?
You next statement was, "We haven't reached the point of being ruled by 'gangs' of corrupt politicos that exercise their whims by force." By and large, you are probably right, but what are we to do in those cases where that is exactly what has happened AND we know exactly who did it.
I am going to give you a couple of examples of corruption in government where intimidation (the threat of governmental power being brought against someone) and actual force (violence under color of law) by those in positions of authority that have been excused or covered up to protect both the government and its agents at the expense of our rights as citizens.
Example 1: Intimidation. There are hundreds of examples of police intimidation on YouTube, but for this example, I am going to use the case of Lois Lerner and her targeting of the Tea Party. I choose this example because it so widely known that I will assume you know what I am talking about. Lois Lerner and her pals both up and down the chain of command at the IRS are obviously guilty of using governmental intimidation against innocent individuals for strictly political purposes. An IRS audit may not sound like force to you, but guess what happens when they decide that they need to foreclose on all your property to settle whatever they decide you owe. Guys with guns show up and if you resist being thrown off your property too vehemently, you get shot or worse, thrown into a cage from now until who the hell knows when. There is no real doubt that Lois Lerner is guilty. You'd have to be a starry eyed, Pollyannaish imbecile not to understand what she did and why she did it. That said, she is still being paid with taxpayer money and defended with taxpayer paid lawyers. I ask you this. If justice delayed is justice denied, then which would be truer justice, 2 years more of this 5th Amendment spewing, records erasing obfuscation followed on January 19th, 2017 pardon by a lameduck Obama or a bullet in the back of her head from one of the people whose lives she turned upside down? I understand your leaning toward a legal solutions, but how broken hearted would you really be if you learned one day that one of her victims had taken the law into their own hands?
Example 2: Actual Government Force/Violence. Imagine if Lois Lerner has a SWAT team at her beck and call. What would she likely have done against her political enemies? A scenario like that is exactly what happened in Wisconsin to many of Scott Walker's supporters. Under the guise of looking into some alleged very minor campaign funding violations, Milwaukee County DA John Chisholm sought permission from a judge to conduct a John Doe investigation against the supporters of his political enemies. The John Doe rules allowed him (Chisholm) to completely bypass any citizen review (grand jury) of his investigation AND allowed him to compel the people he was investigation to remain silent (i.e. not protest) against his treatment of them under penalty of law. He (Chisholm) paired up with Judge Barbara Kluka whose job it was to "supervise" his investigation. In fact, Judge Kluka acted only as a rubber stamp to approve dozens of early morning/late night police raids on people's homes who were only guilty of having a different view on government than Chisholm and Kluka. Imagine having a squad of heavily armed, amped up SWAT cops bashing on your door at 3 in the morning, swarming into your house, pointing guns at you and your kids, stealing your computers and smart phones, and then threatening you a string of criminal charges if you ever spoke a word of any of it to anyone for any reason. The short version of all of this is that Chisholm with Kluka in his pocket embarked on a political witch hunt that included police being used as a partisan political weapon in the political process. What should we do about this kind of thing? Should we just bend over and take it? Should we meekly crawl and beg before those same political partisans like Judge Barbara Kluka who actively worked to deny our political rights in the first place? Would it really be so wrong for someone to put a bullet in the heads of Chisholm, Kluka, every other prosecutor like Chisholm who participated in this John Doe investigation and every police goon who bashed down the doors of their political opponents in the middle of the night? You mentioned earlier in this conversation that rioting against the world and causing collateral damage to innocents in unacceptable, and you mentioned that is wrong to paint everyone in government with the same corruption brush. What then are we to do with the specific individuals whose names and guilt we know. How many tears would you shed if every one of these people were dead tomorrow from the actions of some individual out there meting out vigilante justice? Would the world be a better place without them? Would the partisan hacks with police power at their disposal think twice about the fights they want to pick if they knew the consequences could just as easily be someone forcing their way into their own homes in the middle of the night? Can a vigilante be both criminal and hero/patriot? You wanted some specific targets. There you go. You said, "We haven't reached the point of being ruled by 'gangs' of corrupt politicos that exercise their whims by force." I just gave you two specific examples of exactly why you are wrong.
What if it was your family whose house was raided simple because you chose to support one political candidate or another? What would you be prepared to do?
Back to the police. What if it was someone in your family who got shot without suspicion of any crime? I reference that YouTube video a couple posts up. Skip to 16:36 in and watch it to 27:40. Pay particular attention to the 10 minutes worth of graphic detail and explanation that both officers give in their recounting of the event, and then listen to the 27 second audio recording of the event. Both officers were found innocent of any wrongdoing in that case by an internal city investigation for one of the officer and by an internal Sheriff's department review of the other. In other words, they were cleared of wrongdoing by their fellow cops. When you listen to their explanations and how they match up with the 27 second audio of the encounter, I just don't get it. There can be no plausible explanation for how that shooting/tazing was justified. Mr. Kaady was no suspected of any crime. The danger he posed to the officers was incredibly dubious at best as he was obviously injured badly from a car wreck AND unarmed. I don't know about you, but if Fouad Kaady were in my family I wouldn't be happy to settle for some monetary settlement with no admission of wrongdoing from a couple of cops who got to go right back on duty. I would be looking for blood, one way or the other. The names of those two officers is known. what they did is known. They got away with it and were back on duty a short while later because they were protected by the city and the Sheriff's Department. That is what your fighting back through legal channels gets you, a hollow monetary payoff without so much as an admission of fault and a couple a cops back on the force who have gotten away with murder.
On a side note, feel free to Google Officer William Jacob Bergen for some of his other inglorious deeds and how the Sandy, OR police department covers up for their own. He was the city cop who shot Mr. Kaady along with Clackamas County Sheriff's Dept. Deputy David Willardand. It makes for an interesting research project.
As it relates to the Freddie Grey case, why would anyone with half an ounce of common sense think that Mr. Grey's family will ever get anything close to justice without fighting for it. And let me be crystal clear, when I say "fighting for it", I mean violence. The police, the mayor and the prosecutor's office weren't going to lift a finger to put those 6 cops on trial until the mobs starting hitting the streets. Blame the rioters all you want. They share of guilt is undeniable. While you're at it, though, blame the police in general for two things, 1) the culture of corruption and violence they use against their citizens and 2) that culture causing them to drag their feet in seeking justice against the 6 cops in this case until after they could no longer avoid it when violence erupted in the streets. I don't know for sure that it would have stopped the rioting before it started, but I contend there is a chance the rioting could have been avoided if the authorities had been 100% transparent and come down hard on the people who killed Freddie Grey right from the very start.
I just wish they'd attacked targets that deserved it. Or that the system had publicly decided, much sooner, to put the officers on trial, thus avoiding the need.
Words STRAIGHT from the Mayor. Now if this is not very disturbing in the context of "Justice."
"“If, with the nation watching, three black women at three different levels can’t get justice and healing for this community, you tell me where we’re going to get it in our country,”
Read more: http://www.bizpacreview.com/2015/05/01/b...
Almost tantamount to the chant, "Give them a fair trial THEN LETS HANG THEM!!!"
Maybe she is, I don't have the details. It does seem that the police arrested someone for carrying a knife that he could legally carry and that he died in custody.
While I don't feel the slightest urge to go and burn my local grocery store and steal toilet paper, I do think it is troubling.
D'Souza speaks of white guilt and the importance of shaming middle class America, because blacks alone, as a minority, could never get the power to get justice.
Because Obama's history was not rooted in America's experience he had to co-opt American black experience, which meant he had to decide what kind of black he would become. He had 3 power choices. The first 2 were seen by Obama as too limited and ineffective for inculcating massive change: black nationalism (in the form of Nation of Islam, for example) and black shakedown (Jesse Jackson's Operation PUSH).
The third option was a "bigger, more effective shakedown" that came from Saul Alinsky's Rules for Radicals. It was to bring the middle class on board by creating "alienation, to cut this group from the power bases in society, to intensify the feelings of hopelessness and frustration" and to "rub raw the sores of discontent." And so Obama became a community organizer and, encouraged by Jeremiah Wright's anti-colonial furies, did just that. As president, he's doing it on steroids.
White Guilt continues. Whites are on board with the fundamental transformation, every group is increasingly hostile to every other group, and everything is going according to plan.
There is much truth to what you say. There has also been minorities leaving the inner cities too. Successful blacks and others have left too. It isn't all "White flight." It is the producers leaving behind those who are stuck on welfare, single parent homes, and a plethora of liberal agenda failures that have exacerbated the problems.
Respectfully,
O.A.
Based on what I've seen, which is little, it seems that there was something up here. I think these issues are just evidence of misbehavior on the part of police, and the poor are the canary in the coal mine. Since three of the defendants are black, it is hard to view this a truly racially motivated.
"The looters and rioters have only hurt their cause, their neighborhoods and reinforced unfortunate perceptions of the inner city minorities."
Why are you perpetuating the myth that all of the "looters and rioters" were local and hurt THEIR neighborhoods? You might make the case that the locals that were most affected by the agitators did not help their cause, but those don't represent the majority by any stretch. Thousands of out-of-towners answered the call of the out-of town organizers, rioted the emotions of a handful of impressionable locals, and created a national stage for anyone to air any grievance.
You have (probably inadvertently) "reinforced unfortunate perceptions of the inner city minorities" by not acknowledging the existence of the non-local provocateurs.
Sorry, I have to defend my city.
I understand. You are right about the out of towners... the opportunists. I see this as a wider issue It is definitely not just a Baltimore matter. I believe many of the "inner city minorities" were from other cities as well. I live near Detroit and remember the riots of the 60s. I refuse to live in the city. We don't have riots looting and burning in the rural areas, though we do have minorities in our neighborhoods that live in peace. What we don't have is progressive government, the level of single-parent homes, crime, poor schools, drop out rates, gangs and rabble-rousers.
Respectfully,
O.A.
I believe the level of charges was politically motivated too. Sure there may have been some wrongdoing and I hope justice is done for all. It does appear that the prosecutor through everything possible at the police hoping some of it will stick, but I am no Alan Dershowitz...
We will see...
Respectfully,
O.A.
Before arresting anyone for any reason, he'll have to ask himself, "Will I get into trouble if I make this arrest?" Chances are that short of an armed confrontation, he'll say that it's not worth it. What will that do to the local crime rate? If I wanted to stay in law enforcement and not have to put up with this nonsense, I'd become an MP. Unless that also has become subverted. Then, I'd take up baking. Oops! Can't do that either.
She's a black woman, from a family of police officers who knows the difference between good and bad cops. I also have some police background and know the difference. She grew up in the city, experiencing all that entails.
Her husband is a law maker. However, the article states that he wanted to return to his poor, black neighborhood to live after his university time. That leads to a bunch of questions about his values and intentions. They good be all good. Don't know.
It sounds like she understands the correct principles and may be able to act on them. I hope so. By her sense of urgency she is described as a calming influence on those who don't trust the justice system and are demonstrating out of outrage and frustration - not to excuse one iota of the rioting. Let's see what principles are made visible in this trial - hopefully, becoming a positive example for all.
I was slightly encouraged by a report from the mayor who stated that video evidence was being examined thoroughly and looters were going to be identified and arrested. We will see..
Respectfully,
O.A.
For example, when an officer stops and interrogates (even a traffic stop), a professional, appropriate demeanor speaks for itself. If the stopped party acts defensive, a professional would reassure them that they are a professional who respects their their rights and the law. For a reasonable person, that should be reassuring if the rest of the behavior is consistent.
If that does't work, then they deal with the actual behavior in a professional manner including taking the problem person down and arresting them while protecting themselves from harm at all costs. That why they need extensive training and simulation exercises.
One of my daughters is an airline pilot and has regular cycles of refresher training, simulation exercises and recertification. They need to be able to act effectively in the moment - as do police officers. It's very hard to gracefully handle many such situations. Like in any field there are the good, the bad and the incompetent. Each needs to be dealt with appropriately - simply, justice with wisdom.
In this case- why did the black dude resist arrest? Its not worth resisting arrest- 99% you wont escape and you will only enrage officers.
Also, Why did he fight with the cops when he had an obvious very severe injury?
And the cops were probably rough with him, in that he didnt knuckle under and show them the respect that cops seem to demand.
And fourth, most likely this black dude was arrogant and encouraged bad cop behavior.
What a mess. The blacks in the neighborhood werent any better by rioting either. Its going to be very hard to sort out whose rights were violated I think.
I have always co-operated and been civil with the police. One should always live to have their day in court. I have paid my tickets when I was in the wrong, but also fought and won when I was in the right. Resisting arrest whether right or wrong is asking for trouble. It never works out for the better.
I do believe we need more cameras and more vigorous defense attorneys as well as personal liability for whoever is in the wrong including police. It does seem as if the drug war has also resulted in an inordinate number of run ins with the police. Perhaps we should stop arresting (and only fine like a traffic ticket) someone for simple possession. I hesitate to suggest full legalization.
Respectfully,
O.A.